Termite Hill (Vietnam Air War Book 1)

by Tom Wilson

"We're turning now."

  09/0720L—Thai Nguyen, DRV

  Tran Van Ngo

  The lieutenant was shaking him. As Tran shook his head to clear it, the communications officer returned to his table to listen over headphones and repeat the important messages.

  Tran stood and stretched, aching and still weary. The lieutenant, looking increasingly grave, told him the Thunder planes were crossing the great Hong valley. They had not diverted southward as they had the day before, and now approached the narrow, rugged ridge of mountains that on the maps pointed like a giant finger from China to Hanoi.

  The Americans were less than thirty kilometers distant when Wisdom alerted the Thai Nguyen and Hanoi areas that either area could come under attack.

  Tran walked to the doorway of the house he'd appropriated and stared out at the rugged mountains in the distance. He could hear the lieutenant's words grow more excited. Two Thunder planes had swung northward, two others to the south.

  The radar-hunters, Tran decided. It was a new tactic some of them had been using.

  09/0723L—Route Pack Six, North Vietnam

  Bear Stewart

  Benny radioed, "Red Dog lead is turning back in."

  "Red Dog three, roger and ditto," called Pudge, then, "Red Dog three has a valid launch."

  "We got activity too," the Bear said to Benny. "The site at our one o'clock is serious."

  "I've got a launch light," said Benny.

  "Disregard," said the Bear. He was manually tuning and examining the signals with his sensitive and accurate receivers, a more exact procedure than the analog computer of the radar warning receiver could provide.

  "The one at ten o'clock is in the target area. Line me up," said Benny.

  "Come left ten degrees. There . . . you've got it on your attack scope."

  Benny muttered as he tried to get the signal on his Shrike needles.

  "Come left five degrees more!" said the Bear.

  Benny immediately responded, then momentarily went wings level to work with his Shrike needles.

  "Hurry with it, Benny. I'm blind back here when I give you a signal."

  "Yeah," muttered Benny, still trying to pick out the signal with his needles. "Aha! I've got it on the Shrike now."

  The Bear switched out of the blind mode and tuned to the signal. "Shit. We got a valid launch at two o'clock!"

  "Red Dog lead, Red Dog two. We got missiles at two o'clock." Tiny Bechler's voice confirmed.

  Benny launched the Shrike at the SAM radar he was lined up on, stood the aircraft up on the right wing, and pulled hard into the missiles.

  09/0724L—Thai Nguyen, DRV

  Tran Van Ngo

  Tran nodded slowly at nothing, looking out at the rugged blue-gray mountains.

  A terror-missile firing had been detected from the southernmost radar-hunters. Wisdom directed a rocket battery radar to shut off, another battery to fire three rockets in manual tracking mode.

  He saw specks over the mountains. Turning and twisting in the sky as they grew closer, coming fast.

  "Control says that Thai Nguyen is the probable target," said the lieutenant.

  Wisdom was warning his area.

  "Attack alert?" asked the lieutenant.

  "Yes."

  The lieutenant spoke into his microphone. Almost immediately sirens began to wail in the distance. The lieutenant lifted toggle switches, monitoring his several radios.

  Tran watched hopefully as rockets streaked from a battery north of the city toward the distant aircraft.

  09/0725L—Thai Nguyen, Route Pack Six, North Vietnam

  Bear Stewart

  The Bear saw a Guideline missile coming at them fast, and cringed small in the ejection seat. The missile roared past the canopy, close. A second one was approaching.

  Benny continued to pull, then as quickly reversed hard left. Neither of them saw the third missile, but when enough time had passed, Benny turned back toward the target area.

  The Bear glanced out. "Tiny's closing back up, looks okay."

  "What's happening?"

  SAMs at eleven, ah, two, six, and . . . that's eight o'clock. The one you fired at is off the air, but I don't know if you got it. My receivers act funny when we're upside down," he joked.

  They heard Swede Swendler call that Hawk three had been hit and was going down. Toki Takahara, remembered the Bear. Damn!

  09/0726L—Thai Nguyen, DRV

  Tran Van Ngo

  He watched as the specks climbed for altitude, still twisting and turning to evade the gunners below. The Thunder planes had indeed returned to Thai Nguyen. The rail yard again?

  Three rockets erupted upward in ragged unison from the site twelve kilometers south of them, dropped their boosters, then sprang forward again as their sustainers fired.

  The lead Thunder plane rolled onto its back, hesitated, tucked downward, and went into its dive attack. Col. Xuan Nha was wrong. The Americans had not been frightened away.

  "Control reports a Thunder plane has been shot down on the other side of the ridge."

  Tran nodded vaguely, still watching as all three rockets missed the airplanes.

  He watched the first two sleek fighters swooping down, then their bombs releasing, four from each airplane, flying neat and orderly formations of their own, then opening like peeled bananas and showering out bomblets that began to explode in the air as they touched one another. The bomblets would wreak havoc on his gun crews when they hit the ground and sprayed out showers of fragments.

  The target was the steel mill, as he had suspected.

  09/0727L—Thai Nguyen, Route Pack Six, North Vietnam

  Bear Stewart

  Eagle flight had delivered their CBUs to knock out the guns, and the first strike flight was in their delivery.

  The Bear glanced over at the target area, saw flak in multiple layers, and aimed fire in clusters of fours and sixes up over the blankets of barrage fire. A volleyball-sized artillery round blasted up between them and Tiny.

  "Jesus!" he yelled. "You see that?"

  "Hundred millimeter," said Benny. "It's inaccurate."

  "Thank God."

  "Line me up again."

  "Got one at two o'clock, going to three! Strong signal, he's about to fire at something."

  Benny cranked the Thud into a hard right turn.

  Pudge announced he was firing his second Shrike at a tracking SAM radar.

  "Come right ten more degrees," said the Bear. "Woops, the bastard's stepped his power and he's gonna fire."

  "I'm picking him up on the needles."

  "Got another SAM launch at our five o'clock. Not at us! Not at us!"

  "Roger. I'm shooting." Benny launched his second and final Shrike. Now they were on the prowl for something to bomb.

  "I got a visual on the SAM at five o'clock."

  "SAM launch in the target area! Heads up!" radioed Benny, since no one had called the launch.

  09/0727L—Thai Nguyen, DRV

  Tran Van Ngo

  The din of the guns was like constant thunder. White bursts from 37mm, fuses preset to common times, formed in layers. Flashes of explosions, closer to the Thunder planes, reaching out with their patterns of gray and black puffs to find the elusive fighters. Fifty-seven and eighty-five millimeter rounds.

  He saw a white line against the blue background of the sky, arcing over him and downward.

  Terror missiles!

  "Tell Tiger one to cease transmitting!" he yelled.

  Bombs erupted five kilometers away at the steel mill. First flashes and geysers of debris, a pause, then the rapid, muffled POOM-POOM-POOM-POOM-POOM-POOM sounds of the individual bombs exploding. Another series of sounds as a second group of bombs hit.

  "Tiger one does not acknowledge, sir."

  "Advise control that the target is the steel mill," said Tran.

  He could see more of the fighters, climbing high, poising, then diving toward the steel mill.

  His communications officer was in contact with Wi
sdom on their secondary channel. "Control has lost contact with Tiger one and Black Dragon seventeen."

  One rocket and one artillery battery.

  The third group of aircraft was delivering its bombs. The second of those was hit by tracking artillery fire, jettisoned its bombs, and flew erratically, almost drunkenly, back toward the mountains.

  The house was constantly trembling, occasionally shaking violently, from explosions, concussive waves, and noise. The lieutenant was white-gilled with fear as he listened and spoke on his radios.

  Good for you. Lieutenant. Does your concentration on your radios give you your only excuse for not running? Yes? Then, you are human.

  09/0730L—Thai Nguyen, Route Pack Six

  Bear Stewart

  They were well south of the target area now, but the defenses were still relentless.

  "See the site?" asked the Bear. They were staring out at the southern suburbs of Thai Nguyen.

  "I'm looking. Oh hell! Is that it? Yeah."

  The Bear looked in the general direction. Flak flooded the sky there. He hesitated before allowing himself to breathe.

  "Yeah, me too," said Benny.

  "Get the bastard," said the Bear finally, his voice thick.

  "Let's give it a go. Ready?"

  "Get him."

  Benny turned hard, pulling more than six g's, then bent it back in the other direction. They were both groaning and puffing, g-suits swollen tight with air, pushing back the blood trying to go to their guts and legs.

  More gentle jinking then, so Benny could make his call.

  "South of the city, Red Dog two. See the smoke?"

  "I got it!" said Bechler.

  "I'm going left, you swing right. Low angle attack, no pop-up."

  "Red Dog two reads you." The Bear watched Bechler jink out to the right. With all the guns firing, it would have been deadly to follow them down the same chute.

  The SAM and LAUNCH lights illuminated. The Bear quickly examined the signal on his receivers. "Ignore the launch."

  "Roger." They were in a shallow, thirty-degree dive-bomb attack.

  Radio calls. Another aircraft shot down, this one by the furious flak over the target.

  Benny pickled, the aircraft jolted and became lighter as the weapons released. He slammed the throttle forward and jinked off right, over downtown Thai Nguyen in burner.

  Flak in blankets, angry lines of tracers.

  Benny lowered the nose of the aircraft and swung left. They were low, a couple of hundred feet over the rooftops, and going fast. A fuzzy-looking bubble of air appeared over the cockpits, the effect created when the Coke-bottle shape of the Thud approached supersonic speed in the humid air of North Vietnam.

  "Whooo-weee," yelled the Bear. No one could harm them this low and fast. "We're in-vin-cible!"

  Benny agreed. "We just went supersonic. Must be mighty noisy down there on the ground."

  "Well don't stop to ask," said the Bear. "Hope we're breaking a few eardrums."

  Tran Van Ngo

  "Steel three has been attacked by a radar-hunter," said the lieutenant.

  "Try to regain contact and get a damage report," Tran snapped.

  Guided rockets, these from north of them. Speeding upward and past the flights of fighters. Up, up, until they were out of sight. Tiny white blossoms high above, where they exploded harmlessly.

  09/0733L—Thai Nguyen, Route Pack Six

  Bear Stewart

  They heard a radio call. Swede Swendler's voice. He'd been hit over the target and was talking on the radio to his wingman.

  "Hawk lead," called the wingman, "you're burning."

  "Aw shit," were the last words of Swede Swendler.

  "Hawk lead's airplane just came apart!" yelled the excited wingman. A pause, then a leaden voice. "He didn't get out."

  Tran Van Ngo

  More rockets crossed above from east of them, one narrowly missing the first aircraft in the next group as it was rolling on its back to begin its attack. Tran could see the aircraft shudder, try to correct itself, and torch brightly, still flying. Then, with suddenness, the aircraft came apart in the sky. It fell to earth in two separate groups of pieces.

  Again and again the aircraft would appear over the hill, twisting and turning, soaring, diving, and unleashing their bombs.

  More guided rockets swept through the sky.

  "Black Dragon twenty-four is not responding," droned the lieutenant.

  Another artillery radar destroyed. He remembered that the men of that radar had been chained to their positions, for they had been acting suspiciously nervous in the face of the attacks.

  09/0734L—Thai Nguyen, Route Pack Six

  Bear Stewart

  "I see Tiny up at our eleven o'clock," said the Bear, squinting. A lone Thud was jinking furiously, headed back toward Thud Ridge.

  "I see him," said Benny. He radioed Tiny that they were coming up on his right.

  Benny had slowed somewhat, but they were still flying close to the Mach and the bubble was still there.

  They slid past Tiny's wing. Tiny dropped back and flew off of their lead.

  Another SAM launch, this one at Sparrow, Max Foley's flight, the last strike flight. Max called the launch, but they just continued their attack and the missiles missed. His number four was hit by flak. Foley and the rest of Sparrow flight joined protectively around number four and they started out of the target area.

  Benny flew a couple miles back and to the left of Sparrow flight, trying to stay between them and the worst threats.

  Tran Van Ngo

  The sky grew empty and the firing diminished.

  "Control reports another group of aircraft on their way across the Hong valley," said the lieutenant. His voice was quavering, and Tran could smell his fear. It smelled like fresh feces.

  He spoke to calm the lieutenant, for he did not wish to shoot another of his men.

  09/0734L—Red River Valley, Route Pack Six

  Bear Stewart

  Someone ahead called that he'd seen a MiG. The Bear looked around carefully as they ventured back over Thud Ridge and out over the valley, finally flying west toward safety.

  "Wonder how the guys did on the target," he asked Benny.

  "I heard one guy say part of the mill was down. I tried to see, but there was too much smoke and dust to tell much."

  The mood of the strike force was strange, quiet.

  They watched as the great formation from Korat, thirty-six Thuds in a single huge gaggle, approached from the west. Their combined jamming from their ECM pods caused static to buzz and hiss in the Bear's receivers. Only the Korat Weasels flew apart from the big formation.

  The Korat bunch was past, and they could hear them calling flak and SAM launches. The Bear was amazed that the gomers had been able to reload missiles so quickly. One thing was damned sure. They had whittled down the defenses for them.

  "It's bad back there, Bear."

  "Yeah, but we did okay, made things a little easier for the strike guys." A pause. "I sure hate that about Toki and Swede."

  It was obvious that the gomers had concentrated their defenses around Thai Nguyen. The receivers showed a bevy of signals back at their rear quadrant, little where they were flying.

  Bear picked up a weak, distant Fansong at eight o'clock and a Firecan AAA radar at their twelve o'clock. He begrudgingly called the AAA threat. "Expect flak in a minute or two," he said. "Tracking Firecan at twelve o'clock."

  The strike force had climbed to 10,000 feet, so the AAA threat was not really a big deal. Not after what they had faced back there.

  "The gomers were tough today," said Benny.

  "Yeah," replied the Bear. "But you know, they threw everything they had at us, and our guys still hit the target. They showed us what they've got, Benny. Now it's our turn to show them a thing or two."

  11/1500L—People's Army HQ, Hanoi, DRV

  Xuan Nha

  "Two more Americans shot down," Xuan told General Luc.

  L
uc nodded. He was aging before them at the command center. He had lived there with Xuan Nha these past three days. Watching quietly, somberly, as reports of the destruction of the steel mill continued to mount.

  The south buildings were down, the blast furnace that had been Ho's first great success in his industrialization and modernization program had been bombed to rubble.

  Several times each day General Giap's and General Dung's offices called for status reports to be given the Lao Dong party, to Pham Van Dong's government ministers, and even to the increasingly ill and fragile Enlightened One.

  A rumor had it that the Enlightened One sank deeper into his melancholy as each dark report about the steel mill was given to him. That he was acting like all was falling apart about him, and his life's work had been for naught.

  Another rumor. Yesterday Colonel Huu, on Giap's staff, had presented a report that the modern refinery south of Haiphong had been heavily damaged by intense shelling from two American warships. Huu had been singled out by the Enlightened One as the culprit causing his misery. The refinery, built with the help of the Russians two years before, had been feted as one of the industrial successes of the Democratic Republic. The colonel had been sent away by General Giap to join a unit fighting in the south as a private soldier.

  Xuan decided to ask Li Binh if there was truth to that report. Their relationship had been strained during the past nights and he wondered if she would tell him even if she knew.

  He was most interested, that was the proper word, interested, in the fact that no one had yet laid blame at his own feet. He was in control of Wisdom and all ground defenses, had given the generals hope that they could fend off the attackers. He wondered why the powerful ones had not confronted him.

  He stood and walked over to Lt Quang Hanh's side at the communications desk.

  "Losses?"

  "Two Black Dragon battery radars," said the lieutenant. "No report yet on the status of Steel two rocket battery, east of Thai Nguyen. Wisdom lost communications with them almost an hour ago, during the last attack. It may be radio failure."

  "Perhaps. Two Thunder planes down?"

  "Perhaps one. It is now thought that two units may have reported the same aircraft kill. They are trying to sort it out now."

  "Tell them to stop trying. Two were shot down."