The Aviators

by W. E. B Griffin

  "Yes, Sir," Oliver said, wondering if there was some kind of a reprimand in that decision. Rand had seemed as happy as a ten-year-old playing with his Christmas electric trains.

  Oliver put his hands and feet on the controls and said, "I've got it." He trimmed it up for a five-hundred-feet-a-minute descent, turned on the autopilot, and turned around in his seat to dig into his Jeppesen case, on the seat behind him, for the Lawson Approach Chart.

  "I was about to ask you what the hell you were doing;" General Rand said. "It would have been a dumb question. You obviously turned on the autopilot. So maybe I am learning a little."

  "Sir, when you go to the Blue Course, I don't think you'll have any trouble."

  "That brings us back to the old dog/new tricks business" Rand said. "But thank you, Captain, for letting me fly, if it could fairly be called that."

  "What I was doing just then, General, was dumb. I was , getting the Lawson Approach Chart" he waved it in his hand, which I should have taken out before I took off. I've been here before, of course, and I know the field. But the, whole idea of the Jeppesen system is to have the latest information-not what you think it is-in front of you. It's little dumb mistakes that ordinarily wouldn't matter-like that, that kill people." Rand grunted again. He thought. An interesting man. Most junior officers wouldn't make a confession the way he just did to themselves, much less to a senior officer who would never have known the difference.

  [TWO]

  Headquarters,

  11th Air Assault Division [Test]

  Harmony Church Fort Benning, Georgia

  1330 Hours 13 January 1964

  "Thank you very much, Captain," Major General Harrison O. K. Wendall said. Oliver had just shown the photographs of the crashed Chinook to Wendall and half a dozen other senior officers, including Brigadier General William R.

  Roberts. At the same time he had explained what the experts at Rucker thought had caused the crash.

  "The thing to do is check everything here and see if any other blades are about to come off in flight," Brigadier General Roberts said.

  Wendall glared at him. That Roberts was right did not, in his judgment, give him any right to tell the 11th Air Assault Division [Test] Commander what to do.

  Roberts seemed immune to the cold look.

  "I find it hard to accept that the safety wiring would fail," Roberts said. "What I think we're going to find is that some mechanic screwed up. But we have to look."

  "Dave," General Wendall said to a man who was in golf clothing. Oliver came to understand he was a colonel. "Get the-maintenance officers on it right away. 1 want every Chinook pylon inspected right now."

  "Yes, Sir."

  "I think that's all we'll need you for, Captain," General Wendall said. "Thank you again."

  "Sit, if it would be all right, I'd like to hang around until that's done. I know General Bellmon would like to know what you..find."

  "Help yourself," Wendall said. "We'll get you a ride back to the airfield."

  "I'll take him," General Rand said. "After I take him home and feed him some lunch."

  Susan Rand did not seem at all surprised or annoyed when her husband showed up with a strange captain to feed. But, she said, since she hadn't known when her husband would be back, she and the kids had just finished eating. She could come up with something edible, though, in half an hour. "In the meantime," she said to Oliver, "there's beer or anything harder you might like."

  "I'm flying," Oliver said. "But thank you anyway."

  "I'll make some coffee," General Rand said. "I shouldn't be drinking anyway."

  Oliver had expected the "something edible" to be either cold cuts or maybe a hamburger, but it turned out-to be stuffed pork chops, spinach, rice, fresh biscuits, and apple pie a la mode.

  Mrs. Rand sat down with them while they ate, but when she served the coffee and the apple pie, she left them alone.

  Oliver immediately sensed that Rand wanted to pick his brain, not so much about the Chinook crash, but about Vietnam, and combat flying versus' flying anywhere else. It was a debriefing, Oliver realized, skillfully administered, and designed to fill what Rand obviously considered blank spaces in his fund of knowledge.

  It was flattering that Rand would want his opinion of so much, but it was also disconcerting, for Oliver was afraid he would paint an inaccurate picture: Thus he found himself carefully thinking over his answers before he gave them. The process forced him to think for the first time about many things he had learned in Vietnam. . and temporarily put out of his mind.

  The discussion lasted more than an hour, though Oliver didn't notice the time passing. But he did realize how tired he was when Rand finally said, "Unless you want more coffee, Johnny, maybe we had better go down to Lawson and see how the inspection is coming." He wondered "how long Rand had been calling him by his first name.

  As if on cue, Mrs. Rand reappeared and told Johnny that it had been nice to meet him, that he should give her very best to the Bellmons when he got' "home," and that she hoped she would see him soon again. When she was done, Oliver had the somewhat cynical thought that this was not the first time the Rands had managed a debriefing like this-with his wife first putting you at ease, and then Rand himself skillfully picking your brain.

  These two are bright as hell, like the Bellmons. Why am I surprised?

  When they got to Lawson Field, the Colonel who had been in golf clothes was now in uniform. He walked up and announced that every pylon had been examined. No belts were loose; every nut and bolt in the pylons that was supposed to be safety wired had been safety wired. And then he said, "I really hate to do this to you, Captain, but I have as many Chinook maintenance people as we could round up, plus a flock of Chinook pilots and crew chiefs, in the hangar next door. Do you suppose you could give them the briefing you gave the General?" Oh, shit!

  "Yes, Sir," he said. "I'd be happy to."

  It was a quarter after six when be finally "got in the air again, and a little after seven when he parked the U-8E on the ramp at Cairns. He went in Base Ops and" turned in the paperwork; then he called the General.

  "General Rand called me and said he was finally letting you go," Bellmon said. "And he said you did a first-rate job of briefing the senior people and then the flight crews and maintenance people. Good job, Johnny."

  "Thank you, Sir." Well, I guess I'm off the shit list.

  "Did General Rand mention they inspected their Chinooks, and there was safety wire all over?"

  "Yes," Bellmon said. "And we inspected the fleet here and found three-unwired bolts. I've got the maintenance contractor coming in for a chat at eight 0' clock.." Well, God help that poor bastard.

  "Yes, Sir."

  "See you in the morning, Johnny," General-Bellmen said and hung up.

  The telephone he'd used to speak with Bellmon was a B-line; that is, it was not connected to the civilian. trunk to Ozark. There was a pay phone in the lobby of Base Operations, but there was a TEMPORARILY QUT OF SERVICE sign hanging from its mouthpiece. There was -an A-line in the Operations Officer's office. and he called Liza Wood from there, under the disapproving eye of the AOD.

  "Hello," he said.

  "Who's this?"

  "John Oliver."

  "Oh. I didn't recognize your voice."

  "I just got in," he said. "Otherwise I would have called earlier. "

  "Why?"

  "I thought we could. have a drink Or something."

  "I don't think that would be possible. Sunday is the only full day I have with Allan."

  "Sorry, I didn't think about that. How about tomorrow?"

  "I don't see how we could. I'm going to Jack Dant's memorial service, and then Ursula Craig and I are going to help her with the people who call afterward."

  You are being shot down, Oliver. What you hear in those bullshit excuses is the polite way a lady says piss off. What did you expect?

  In his mind's eat he heard her say, "I've never been raped before," and "I think you had better go
, Johnny." He closed his eyes.

  "I understand," he said. "Well, I'll call again sometime. "

  "Why don't you?" she said. "Good night, John." He put the telephone in its cradle.

  Why the hell am I so disappointed? Why the hell did I call in the first place?

  "Captain," the AOD said, "I don't want to be a prick about it, but that phone is not for personal calls." Oliver looked at him.

  Good little aides-de-camp do not tell AODs who are majors to go fuck themselves.

  "Yes, Sir," Oliver said. "Sorry, Sir." When he got to the BOQ, Jose Newell's MG of Many Colors was in the parking lot, but he was not in his room.

  Oliver found him and Charley Stevens in Annex #1, telling Fort Monmouth stories. Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, is the home of the Signal-Corps. He remembered that Stevens was another flag-waver. Charley was drunk.

  "I'm celebrating my transfer," Stevens said. "You can buy me a drink."

  "Transfer where?" Oliver asked as he waved the bartender over.

  "SCATSA," Stevens said. "They need a replacement for Jack Dant. Guess who is the only Signal Corps first john checked out in Chinooks on the post?"

  "I thought Jack Dant was assigned to Aviation Board?"

  "He was," Stevens replied. "But SCA TSA pools their pilots with the Board, and they just happen to be one first john short of their TO and E."

  "When are you going over there?" Oliver asked, aware that something was bothering him about what Stevens was telling him.

  "TDY effective tomorrow, the orders will catch up with me later."

  "Are you happy about it?"

  "I'm fucking ecstatic, doesn't it show?"

  Oliver suddenly understood.

  "You, sonofabitch, you volunteered, didn't' you?" Oliver challenged."

  "You called Colonel Augustus and volunteered!" Stevens didn't reply.

  "What the hell is the matter with you? We only think it's missing safety wire on those bolts. It could be metal fatigue or something else."

  "Somebody has to fly the sonsofbitches," Stevens said.

  "Why not me?"

  "Because you stuck your neck out often enough in 'Nam," Oliver said. "Let somebody else have a turn."

  "'Yeah, but I didn't get on the five-percent list like some people I know," Stevens said thickly. "Now maybe I can." Oliver shook his head. "You're crazy, Charley."

  "Up yours, Johnny. And, fuck you-I'll buy my own drink."

  "Give this asshole whatever he wants," Oliver said to the bartender.

  Charley Stevens wrapped an arm around Oliver's shoulder and kissed him wetly on the forehead. "For a dog robber, you ain't so bad yourself, asshole."

  [THREE]

  With less effort than he thought it would take, and with an assist from Second Lieutenant Jose Newell, Captain John S. Oliver managed to convince First Lieutenant Charles J. Stevens that the path of wisdom was to get something to eat, and then go to bed, so that when he reported for his first day of duty with SCATSA, he would be bright-eyed ,and bushytailed rather than bloody-eyed and reeking of booze.

  They went to a fast-food joint in Daleville, just outside the main gate. And they ate greasy hamburgers and french fries 'under the disapproving eyes of' a dozen or more enlisted men who without saying anything managed to convey that they thought the three officers had invaded their turf.

  Oliver's unlisted phone was ringing when he walked into his room. "

  "Captain Oliver," he said, answering it.

  "Sergeant James, Sir. How nice to find the Captain at home," the sergeant major said cheerfully."

  "And on my very first try."

  "You're in a very good mood. for an old man this time of night, Sergeant Major," Oliver said. "May I thus infer that I'm in trouble?"

  "Not now you're not," James said. "'Now that I've found you. Would you care to guess who couldn't find you and who assigned me the job?"

  "I was having a hamburger."

  "I'm disappointed," Sergeant Major James said solemnly.

  "The General and I had visions of you surrounded by half-naked women, drinking from the neck of a bottle of hard liquor." Oliver chuckled "Why was he looking for me'?"

  "'You bring his plane back in one piece from Benning? "

  "Yes. "

  "You think they serviced it?"

  "They always do, but I'll check. Am I, are we, going some where?"

  "The General will meet you at Cainis at 0400 tomorrow morning. You will by then have filed a flight plan Cairns-Lawson-Eustis." The Army Airfield at the U.S. Army Engineer Center, Fort Eustis, Virginia, near Washington, D.C., served as the de facto Pentagon air terminal. Army aircraft were, for all practical purposes, denied use of Washington's National Airport.

  "How long are we going to be gone?"

  "Up and back in time for Lieutenant Dant's memorial services," Sergeant James said. "You'll be cutting it close."

  "You know what's going on?"

  "You ever meet the DCSOPS, Captain?"

  "No. "

  "Prepare yourself," Sergeant James said. "And a very good night, with many pleasant dreams, to you, Sir." Then he, hung up.

  When Oliver called the AOD at Cairns, the prick who had jumped on him about using" the telephone identified himself.

  Oliver asked him if 917 had been serviced., "I really don't know," the AOD said.

  "Sir, could you find out?"

  "Is it important?"

  "Yes, Sir, I think so."

  "You dog-robbers think a lot of things are important that aren't," the AOD informed him.

  "General Bellmon expects to take off in that airplane at 0400 tomorrow," Oliver said. "He won't be able to do that unless it gets serviced between now and then." After a moment he added, "Will he, Sir?"

  "I'll take care of it, Captain," the AOD said.

  "Thank you very much, Sir."

  "As he wound his alarm clock, Oliver considered that the AOD was a particular type: Prick, Officer, Bald-headed, Field Grade, Mark Three. That being true, it's entirely possible that if he discovers that Nine One Seven hadn't been serviced, he'll forget that I called him rather than take the time and trouble to find someone to top off the tanks and replenish the oil and wipe the windshield.

  And that being the case, Oliver decided it would be prudent to set his alarm for 0230 rather than 0300. Bellmon wanted the plane ready to go; he would not be interested in how Oliver arranged that; and he would not be sympathetic to an excuse that the AOD had promised to do it.

  When he got to the field a few minutes after three, his face festooned with tiny squares of toilet paper from a disastrous session with a dull razor blade, he discovered that 919 had not been serviced. The NCO in Base Ops told him the AOD had gone to meet with the FOD. He could, the sergeant said, get him on the radio if it was important.

  "Scare up a fuel truck, Sergeant please," Oliver said, "and have them top off Nine One Seven. "