Guerra shook his head. “The only aircraft we have here right now ready to go are a couple of old Warthogs.”
“How fast are the bogeys moving?” Ben asked the radar operator.
Harley quickly translated the question. When the man answered, he looked back at Ben. “A lot faster than the Warthogs can handle.”
Ben looked at Guerra. “Scramble the Warthogs, General. Maybe they’ll get lucky with one of their guided missiles.”
Guerra nodded and picked up the phone on his desk, speaking rapidly into it. Then he looked up. “They’ll be airborne in five minutes. If the jets coming this way drop low enough, we might have a chance.”
“Better sound the air raid siren and get everyone under cover,” Ben said. “If those are F-111’s coming this way, they can carry over eleven tons of bombs and still travel twice as fast as a Warthog.”
Lieutenant Colonel Jaime Fuentes eased back the stick on his Warthog, and smiled as it lifted up off the runway at the Durango airfield. Jaime, who’d been trained at Fort Hood in Texas some ten years ago, lived to fly. To him, the war of aggression by Perro Loco was a godsend, relieving him of the boredom of the years of peace when he’d had to beg for air time to keep his skills intact.
He was a gifted flyer who’d finished first in his class, to the surprise of the college grads he’d beaten from the SUSA schools. Jaime had only a high school education, but he’d been born to fly and the complex movements of hands and feet and eyes came like second nature to him.
The Fairchild A-10 Warthog he was flying had few rivals as a close-support aircraft, carrying both guided missiles and a 30mm cannon in its nose. Its one drawback was it was very slow, flying at only 380 knots at sea level. The F-111’s it was going up against could fly at over seven hundred knots, and were better armed.
Jaime didn’t think of this as he pulled his beloved Warthog up as fast as it could go. He was going into battle, and his adrenaline was pumping and his heart was racing—in short, he was having the time of his life. Like most pilots, he felt he was the best there was, and counted on his skills overcoming the natural superiority of the planes he was going up against.
“Hog One, this is Base, come in,” a scratchy voice on his radio sounded.
“Hog One to base,” Jaime answered.
“Bogeys are separating,” the voice continued. “Only one bogey is headed this way. The other two are going to pass well to the west of us.”
“What is the current altitude of the bogey?” Jaime asked as he stared at his shipboard radar screen to see if he could pick out the blip that was to be his target.
“Fourteen thousand feet and dropping. It’s coming in for a bombing run, Jaime.”
“Roger that,” Jaime said, imitating the pilots he’d trained with in Texas, down to the Texas drawl they’d said it with.
He keyed the intercom switch to talk to his copilot and gunner, sitting directly behind him in the double cockpit. “Julio, put your dancing shoes on, we’re fixing to boogie.”
“I’m on the dance floor, but I cannot hear the music, compadre,” Julio responded, their personal code meaning Julio had all weapons systems ready to go but the target was still out of range.
“Snap off a quick ATA to see if we can get his attention,” Jaime ordered, hoping the air-to-air missile would at least get close enough to cause the other pilot to change his course away from the base.
“It’s too far,” Julio protested.
“I know, but lead him like you do the geese when we go hunting at the lake, Julio. Perhaps the missile’s heat seeker will pick him up as he approaches.”
“Sí, and perhaps it will miss him, circle, and pick us up instead,” Julio said, “but here goes nothing.”
The Warthog shuddered slightly as a missile jumped from the right-wing pods and angled off to the left, toward the unknown bogey, which was still on the very edge of the plane’s radar screen.
Jaime shifted course slightly to his left.
“What are you doing?” Julio asked.
“Most pilots are right-handed,” Jaime explained. “I’m betting when he sees the ATA coming at him, he’s going to jig to the right. I’m altering course to cut the distance down and when he jigs, I’m going to be there waiting for him.”
“What if you’re wrong and he jigs left?” Julio asked.
“Then we’re probably dead,” Jaime answered calmly, as if he knew that wasn’t going to happen.
Sure enough, when the blip of the missile closed on the blip of the F-111, the plane jigged to the right and downward to get away from the ATA missile, just as Jaime figured he would.
Jaime’s A-10 was already pointed at the F-111 as it dove, and he thumbed the button on the 30mm cannon and simultaneously fired another ATA, hoping if the other pilot managed to dodge one, the other would get him.
Several blips appeared on the screen as the ATA missile and machine-gun bullets arched toward the F-111.
“He’s dropped his bombs,” Julio said exuberantly, “well short of the base.”
Suddenly, the night sky was lit up by the explosion of several tons of aircraft above and directly in front of the Warthog.
Cursing, Jaime jerked his stick to the side and put the A-10 in a slip-sliding dive, trying to avoid the shrapnel-like wreckage of the F-111.
The windscreen in front of Jaime shattered and his face felt as if it’d been punched by a heavyweight fighter as pieces of the F-111’s fuselage punched through the Plexiglas.
Jaime’s head snapped back under the impact and he lost consciousness for a few seconds. When he came to, Julio’s voice was hollering in his ear over the intercom.
“We’re in a spin . . . we’re in a spin! Pull up, Jaime, pull up!”
Groggily, with only his instinct to guide him, Jaime’s hands and feet began a delicate dance together to regain control of the aircraft before it plunged into the desert sands below.
The Warthog leveled out at less than five hundred feet, Julio’s voice saying the Lord’s Prayer in Jaime’s ears as he finally cleared the blood out of his eyes and banked back toward the base for a landing.
THIRTY-SEVEN
There was jubilation in the war room of the Durango Army base when the radar operator reported the F-111 from Mexico City had been shot down well short of the base.
While the other men were celebrating the heroism of Jaime Fuentes, who was in the medical ward having the cuts on his face stitched up, Harley stood next to the radar operator and continued to question him closely about what he’d seen.
Harley’s face was glum when he came back to Ben to report. “Something strange about this whole thing, General,” he said.
“What’s that, Harley?” Ben asked, putting down the glass of wine that Guerra had passed out on the news of the successful interdiction of the attacker.
“The radar man says it looked like the F-111 dropped his bombs before he was blown up.”
Ben shrugged. “So what? They evidently fell over land that was sparsely populated.”
“That’s not what’s bothering me, sir,” Harley continued. “The radar man says it looked to him like the bombs exploded at one thousand feet instead of falling all the way to the ground.”
“Shit!” Ben exclaimed. “There’s only one type of bomb designed to detonate in the air like that.”
Harley nodded. “Yes, sir. BW bombs.”
“That means the other two that’re headed toward our southern border are probably filled with the anthrax bug too,” Ben said, “and even if we shoot ’em down, the bug is going to be released over northern Mexico or the southern SUSA.”
“Yes, sir, my thoughts exactly,” Harley said.
Ben leaned back in his chair and ran his hands through his hair. “I guess it’s time to tell the general what’s going on, and to get Dr. Buck to ship as much of the vaccine as he can spare down here pronto.”
“I’ll have Corrie get on the radio to Mike Post at headquarters immediately, Ben, while you talk to the general,”
Harley said.
After Ben had explained how Bottger had most probably released a potent biological weapon over General Guerra’s country, they made plans for the quick distribution of the vaccine to all units of the Mexican Army, to be followed as rapidly as possible by the vaccination of as many of the citizens of Mexico as could be gotten to.
“The problem,” General Guerra said, a sad look on his face, “is that this part of Mexico is very rural, with the population spread over many thousands of acres. It will be almost impossible to vaccinate everyone before the plague begins to spread.”
“You’re right, Jose, but that will work in our favor too. The plague is spread person to person, so if the people are very spread out, fewer of them will come in contact with those afflicted by the plague. We just have to get on the radio and TV and newspapers to tell everyone to stay away from congested areas, like towns and markets.”
“I will have my information officers get right on it, Ben, and we will pray that the vaccine gets here in time to prevent the loss of most of my Army to sickness.”
“Those that do contract the illness can be treated with antibiotics, which I will also have sent along with the vaccine, Jose.”
“Muchas gracias, Ben.”
At that moment, Harley returned from Corrie’s side. She’d been talking with Mike Post in Louisiana at Ben’s headquarters.
“Good news, Ben,” he said.
“Tell me,” Ben said. “I could use some good news right about now.”
“Mike says no problem on the vaccine and antibiotics. They’ll be on the way here by midnight, and should arrive in time to start inoculations first thing in the morning. He’s also sending extra teams of medics to help with the shots, both in the Army and in the countryside.”
“That is good news,” Ben said, a look of relief on his face.
“There’s more. General Striginov’s interceptors were able to shoot down both of the other bogeys before they reached our border. One went down near Chihuahua and the other over Monterrey.”
“Damn,” Ben said, some of the elation leaving his face. “That’s good for us but terrible for the Mexicans. There’s going to be tremendous loss of life before we can get the vaccine down there.”
“I know, but it could have been worse,” Harley said, “if they’d made it over Houston or El Paso.”
“You’re right, Harley. Guess we need to count our blessings.”
As they spoke, another man entered the room, a worried look on his face. After Guerra spoke with him, the general approached Ben.
“Our advance scouts report heavy troop movements to the south.”
Ben stared at him. “From the east or the west?” he asked.
“Both,” Guerra said shortly. “It appears as if Loco has given up on his idea of taking Tampico and has coordinated with Bottger to have both their armies converge on us here at Durango.”
“When does it look like they’ll arrive?” Ben asked.
“Our scouts figure they’ll attack at first light tomorrow, or shortly thereafter.”
Ben turned to Corrie. “What’s Striginov’s ETA here?” he asked.
“He said if he pushes it, he can be here early in the morning with most of his heavy equipment. The ground troops will be a few hours later.”
“Get back on the radio and tell him to push it,” Ben said. “Looks like we’re gonna have some visitors by breakfast time.”
Claire Osterman called a meeting of her advisory staff for eight o’clock in the evening. When they arrived, she looked like a cat who’d just swallowed a canary.
Harlan Millard, Major General Bradley Stevens, Jr., his assistant Colonel James King, and Herb Knoff all helped themselves to coffee from a sideboard in her office and took their seats, waiting to see just what Claire had on her mind.
Stevens and King had been very busy for the past week making sure all of her troops were moving back from their stations on the borders with the SUSA, as well as getting medics around to all the battalions to inoculate the troops against Bruno Bottger’s dreaded plague bacteria in case it was launched.
Claire took her time, letting the suspense build for a while as she shuffled papers on her desk and fiddled with her coffee, getting it just right with cream and artificial sweetener. Proud of her new build after her incarceration of the year before, she was still on a strict diet and daily workout regimen.
Finally, Stevens could stand it no longer. “Madame President, you called us here for a reason?”
“Yes, Brad,” she said sweetly. “I have here a collection of reports from my spies in Perro Loco’s army, as well as some news reports from reporters in the SUSA who are . . . shall we say, sympathetic to our cause?”
Stevens glanced at Millard and King. He’d heard nothing new in his daily intel reports that would justify such a meeting.
“And?” he asked.
“It seems that Ben Raines and some of his closest associates are down in Durango, Mexico, coordinating the fallback and consolidation of the Mexican Army down there.”
“So?” Stevens asked, wondering what bee was in Claire’s bonnet now.
“Perro Loco and Bruno Bottger both suffered severe setbacks in their last offensive, both due in part to the interference of Raines in Mexico’s affairs.”
Stevens had to force himself to keep his mouth shut about Claire railing against Raines for interfering in Mexico in a war that was the direct result of some meddling of her own.
“Perro Loco and Bottger are now working in concert and are forming a huge offensive against Durango, coming at the city from both sides with everything they have. It’s going to be a do-or-die effort, with maximum effort put forth to crush the Mexican defenders. What they don’t know, but I do, is that Raines has at least two battalions of his own coming to his aid. With that setup, who do you think will emerge victorious in the upcoming battle for Durango?” she asked, staring at Stevens and King.
Stevens shrugged, being careful to choose words that would not set Claire off. He didn’t dare give Raines and his Army too much praise, though he knew Loco’s ill-trained troops and Bottger’s hired mercenaries couldn’t stand against the highly trained and very loyal troops under Raines’s command. “I’d have to give the edge to Raines and the Mexicans,” he finally said. “They’re much better equipped and the Mexicans are fighting on their home ground, which always counts for something.”
King nodded his agreement. “Me too. I’d be surprised if Loco or Bottger come out of the battle with enough troops to ever be a serious force again.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Claire said, surprising everyone with her agreement. “And, evidently, Bruno Bottger knows he doesn’t stand a chance with conventional warfare, because my news sources inform me that three jets bearing BW bombs were launched last evening.”
“What?” Stevens said, sitting forward in his chair.
Claire nodded. “That’s correct. Bottger has finally launched a BW attack against both Mexico and the SUSA, though his bombers only got as far as Chihuahua and Monterrey before they were forced to drop their plague bombs prematurely.”
“Jesus,” Harlan Millard said as he took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face. “It’s a good thing Raines shared their vaccine with us, or we’d be facing death and destruction on a major scale.”
“Yes, it is,” Claire said, still smiling for an unknown reason. “Which brings me to the point of tonight’s meeting. Now that the plague is afoot, Mexico is going to be devastated. Even if the SUSA manages to get the vaccine down there, it’s going to take a couple of weeks before it’s effective. In the meantime, thousands, perhaps millions of Mexicans are going to be infected.”
“Do you want us to send some of our medical teams down there?” Millard asked.
Claire looked at him as if he had suddenly gone crazy. “Not exactly,” she said. “It appears to me that Ben Raines is going to be extremely busy for the next few weeks, perhaps even months. Even if he wins the upcoming battle for
Durango, he’s then going to be forced to help the Mexicans treat all their plague-infected peons.”
Stevens leaned back in his chair and bit his lip. He had a feeling he knew where this was going.
Claire didn’t disappoint him. “I think this would be a perfect time to reassess our decision to pull our troops back from the borders with the SUSA. Raines has already pulled his battalions back, and even sent some of them south to help out on the Mexican border. If we reversed our troop movements and pressed on past the borders, I think it would take Raines by surprise and by the time he could react, we’d have taken control of quite a bit of his territory.”
“But, Claire,” Millard said, “we can’t do that. You said yourself, you gave Raines your word you would pull our troops back and cease the hostilities if he provided us with the anthrax vaccine against Bottger’s biological weapons.”
“Harlan, you’re such a wimp!” Claire said with sudden fervor. “Do you really think I consider myself bound by a promise given under duress? That son of a bitch Raines blackmailed me into promising to pull our troops back, and I don’t consider blackmail an honorable way to conduct affairs of state.”
Stevens glanced at King and took a deep breath. “Madame President, may I remind you we are rather far along in the pullback process? Our troops are already loaded up, and most have already started to move away from the borders.”
“All the better,” Claire said, slamming her hand down on her desktop. “If the troops are already loaded up, then all it will take is an order from you for them to turn around and head them back the way they came. The only difference this time is that they won’t stop at the borders, but will continue on as far as they can, smashing the token resistance along the way.”
“But, Madame President . . .” Stevens began.
“General Stevens,” Claire interrupted, her voice as harsh and as hard as he’d ever heard it, “if you are unwilling to give the order, or to support it with all your heart, I am sure I can find another officer who is not afraid to do as I say.”
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