Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 01 (38 page)

 
          
“How
would he know what route to take to avoid being spotted?” “Sir, General
Elliott, who’s now in command of the Old Dog, has spent months studying the
defenses of the Kavaznya area and the
Kamchatka
peninsula. He knows them much better than I do. I’m betting he can find a gap
in the radar coverage and get in without giving away his position. And once he
gets in the mountainous terrain of the
Kamchatka
peninsula, a whole air wing of fighters
couldn’t find him.”

 
          
The
President shook his head, turned his back to Curtis.

 
          
“Sir,
the Old Dog is already airborne,” Curtis reminded him. “It doesn’t have a
flight plan—it’s a non-mission. The Russians may even believe it was destroyed
in the attack—we can leak that it was destroyed. It can be diverted easily.”

 
          
“What
about the damage, the injuries?”

 
          
“I’ll
check on its operational status,” Curtis said. “Get a report from General
Elliott, have him make a decision whether or not he can accept this
assignment.”

 
          
“Would
Elliott say no? I know him. He’s gung-ho as they come—”

           
“But he wouldn’t risk the lives of
his crew unless he knew there was a chance of success. That I know.”

           
To Curtis’ surprise, and relief, the
President said: “Get Elliott’s decision.”

 
          
“Yes,
sir.” Curtis turned to leave the room, then hesitated a moment. “The Old Dog is
vulnerable to the same security leak that has compromised us all along. Under
the circumstances it would be wise to take certain steps—”

 
          
“Such
as?”

           
“Well, sir, such as keeping
knowledge of the Old Dog’s involvement between just the two of us.”

 
          
“No
way,” the President said. “I rely on the support of my advisers, and I’ve no
doubt about their integrity. We’ll restrict knowledge of this to the Cabinet,
but the Cabinet
must
be involved.”

 
          
“Very
well, but I would like to suggest one more thing. If the Old Dog is to get
through this, it will have to play it by ear. A set of recall options can’t be
reliably built into the mission plan without compromising it. And there’s
always the possibility of a leak if the crew had to radio back for a go-ahead.”

 
          
“What
I think I’m hearing, General, is that you want me to give the strike order now,
even with negotiations going on?” The President shook his head.

 
          
“Sir,
right from the beginning the Soviets have failed to negotiate in anything like
good faith. They’ve kept us at the bargaining table under false pretenses while
they’ve carried out their own hidden agenda. The loss of the
Midgetman
and
Ice Fortress
both happened while so-called negotiations were going
on. They’ve demonstrated that they’ve never intended to do anything but stall
for time. Negotiations are in name only.”

 
          
There
was a long silence as the President considered Curtis’ words. “There’s truth in
what you’re saying. And I’m not unaware of history . . . FDR thought that
Secretary of State Cordell Hull could work out an agreement with the Japanese
just before they attacked
Pearl Harbor
.
He underestimated their duplicity. It seems I’ve made the same mistake, and for
the same reasons. We both wanted a result so much we lost sight of realities
...”

 
          
For
a moment all that could be heard was the ticking of the brass clock on the
President’s desk and the muted sound of trees swaying in the wind outside.

 
          
“All
right, General... you ask Elliott if he’s up to this. If he is, there’ll be no
turning back ...”

 
          
McLanahan
and Luger were dozing in the downstairs offensive crew compartment when Elliott
came over the radio: “Crew, listen up. We have received orders from the Joint
Chiefs. It was why I had you accomplish a thorough equipment check a few
minutes ago. Now, I want to make another check—a people check. You all remember
earlier today when I told you about the planned B-1 sorties that launched early
this morning. Well, it seems those B-ls were discovered and intercepted just
north of Point Barrow about fifteen minutes ago.”

 
          
“Intercepted?”
Ormack asked.

           
“Somehow the Russians knew where the
B-ls would be coming from. They had a
Mainstay
early-warning and control radar plane waiting for them, dragging two MiG-31
Foxhound
fighters with it. The B-ls
didn’t have a chance to evade.”

 
          
“Did
. . . the B-ls get shot down?” Wendy asked.

 
          
“No,
but the fighters are dogging them. They’ve been ordered to hold at a fail-safe
orbit point over the
Chukchi
Sea
just outside Soviet airspace. It’s presumed
the MiGs will follow.”

 
          
“But
why are the B-ls continuing?” Luger asked. There was a long moment of silence.

 
          
“Don’t
you get it?” McLanahan said. “They want
us
to do it.” “How the hell are
we
supposed to make it if two B-ls couldn’t?” Elliott took over. “It’ll be risky
trying to get past their early-warning radar net, much less flying over the
Soviet Union
, I agree. I need your thoughts, people.
We’ve got some left wing damage but our offensive and defensive weapons and
systems are all operational. We don’t have proper military charts but we have
general aviation charts plus, fortunately, a terrain cartridge for the Kavaznya
site. We’ll also get refueling support going in and fighter coverage coming
out.”

 
          
Elliott
hoped it was sinking in, hoping his crew was buying it. . .
his
crew? It hadn’t been
his
crew until a few short hours ago
when they were close to death in that hangar in the high
Nevada
desert.

 
          
“I
won’t go on unless I have everyone’s support,” he said. “I know none of you
thought you’d be part of an actual mission, much less a raid against an
installation in the
Soviet
Union
. We’ve only
flown together a few times—hell, I wasn’t even a part of the crew. John and I
are the only ones who have ever flown in combat. If we aren’t one hundred
percent agreed, we land in
Seattle
and that’s that. But consider the situation. The Russians have
continued to use their laser at Kavaznya in spite of all our diplomatic protests.
They have, literally, crippled our ability to detect ballistic-missile launches
over the Pacific or the Pole. If they decide to launch an attack we have only a
few minutes’ warning before the warheads impact. I believe that if the B-l
mission has failed—and it has—the next step is either a cruise missile attack
from long range, a naval strike force, or an intercontinental ballistic missile
attack on Kavaznya. The laser site can probably protect itself against all
those threats. And the sight of cruise missiles or an ICBM heading toward Asia
could well result in someone pushing an even bigger button and triggering a
thermonuclear exchange ...” Was he laying it on too thick? No, dammit, he was
laying out the awful option. Speaking the unspeakable ... “I truly believe this
crew and this plane is the one answer left. I believe we have a very good
chance of getting past Russian radar, avoiding their air defense, neutralizing
that laser facility,
and
getting
back.”

 
          
It
was the longest speech he had ever given. The throbbing in his right leg that
had stopped over the past hour now was returning full force.

 
          
“If
you like the odds, say so. If you don’t say so. Without everyone pulling
together, we for sure won’t make it.”

 
          
Ten
minutes later Elliott sat back in his seat, drained. He no longer had feeling
in his right heel, and the throbbing pain had reached his knee. He thought
again of what Curtis had told him. So far the Russians had been one step ahead.
Curtis was obviously afraid that they might be tipped off to the Old Dog’s
mission too. Well, that wasn’t going to happen, the odds were too damn long.
Seattle
seemed as good a place as any to stage his
protective aerial sleight of hand . . .

 
          
“
Seattle
coastline in sight,” McLanahan reported,
returning his ten- inch radar display to the two hundred mile range. “
One o’clock
, one hundred miles.”

 
          
These
were the first words anyone in the crew had spoken since their decision.
Elliott turned to Ormack.

 
          
“Get
us clearance into
Seattle
Center
airspace, John. Wendy, see if you can raise
Boeing Field on HF. Get us permission to land.”

 
          
“
Seattle
Center
, Dog Zero-One Fox is with you at two-five
thousand.”

 
          
The
Seattle
Air
Route
Traffic
Control
Center
controller checked his radar display. He
had already received a call from McClellan Air Base’s Global Command Control
radio operator that Dog Zero-One Fox would be appearing in his sector. And
there he was—right where McClellan said he would be.

 
          
“Dog
Zero-One Fox, good evening, radar contact at two-five thousand feet.”

 
          
Earlier
the
Seattle
controller had passed along a Mode 3
“Squawk” identification code to McClellan for the airplane to set in its IFF,
its Identification Friend or Foe system. The IFF would transmit the fourdigit
code to the controller’s computer, which would display a data block near the
airplane’s radar dot with the plane’s call sign, altitude, ground- speed, and a
computer ID number. The
Seattle
controller checked the area from which McClellan said the aircraft
would be coming and, as advertised, the data block and beacon target symbols
appeared at the extreme outer edge of his one hundred and fifty-mile range
scope. There was no primary target return—a smaller symbol superimposed on the
larger beacon target symbol—but that wasn’t unusual at extreme ranges.

           
“Dog Zero-One Fox, confirm your
destination is Seattle-Boeing Field.”

 
          
“That’s
affirmative,
Seattle
. We’ll be requesting permission for a visual to an auxiliary field when
within ten miles. Boeing has been notified.”

 
          
That
was very strange, but the controller had heard of it before. To avoid attention
some experimental or classified planes used one of Boeing’s numerous auxiliary
fields scattered around
Seattle
instead of the main corporate terminal. When they did, they didn’t tell
the controller which one until in the vicinity of all of them. The approach
controller would have to clear the airspace and grant clearance to make an
approach to a very wide area, which really complicated air traffic control in
the already super-congested Seattle-Vancouver-Portland area, but at this time
of day it wasn’t too much of a hassle. The procedure wasn’t limited to military
flights, either—the private aircraft firms guarded their newest developments
almost as zealously as the military.

 
          
“I’ve
been advised, Zero-One Fox,” the controller replied. “I’ll pass it along to
Seattle Approach in—”

 
          
The
Controller saw something that made him blanche—a beacon code being changed to
7700, the emergency code. The plane’s data block was instantly surrounded by a
flashing border, and the letter “EMRG” began to flash above the beacon target.