Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 03 (17 page)

           
But that was Patrick McLanahan.

           
Ormack stepped over the center
console and into the leftside pilot’s seat. McLanahan noticed him, straightened
himself up in his seat, and slid the headsets off. “Hey, sir,” McLanahan
greeted him. “What brings you here this evening?”

           
“Looking for you,” Ormack said. He
motioned to the SMFD. “Route study?”

           
“A little mission planning with the
PACER SKY processor,” McLanahan said. “I fed the STRC attack route through the
system to see what it might come up with, and it turns out if we attack this
target here from the west instead of from the northeast, the MUTES in Powder
River MOA site won’t see us for an extra twenty-one seconds. We’ve got to gain
sixty seconds after the Baker bomb site to get the extra time to get around to
the west, so we’ll lose a few points on timing, but if this works we’ll gain even
more points on bomber defense.” He shook his head as he flipped through the
computer-generated graphics on the big screen. “The rest of the crews in the
Air Battle Force would kill me if they knew I had something like PACER SKY
doing my mission planning.”

           
“That reminds me,” Ormack said.
“General Elliott got a tasking for NIRTSat time for a Joint Chiefs surveillance
operation. Something to do with what’s going on in the
Philippines
. You might get tapped to show your stuff
for the J-staff.”

           
“Fine. I’ll water their eyes.”

           
“The guard said you’ve been up here
for three hours working on this,” Ormack said. “You spent three hours just to
save twenty seconds on one bomb run?”

           
“Twenty seconds—and maybe I take
down a target without getting ‘shot’ at.” He motioned to the SMFD and issued a
command, which caused the scene to go into motion. A B-2 symbol on the bottom
of the screen began reading along an undulating ribbon over low hills and dry
valleys. Dead ahead was a small pyramid symbol of a target complex— small
“signposts” on the ribbon marked off seconds and miles to go to weapon release.
Off to the right of the screen, a yellow dome suddenly appeared. “There’s the
threat site at one o’clock, but this hillock blocks me out from the west—
whoever surveyed the site for positioning this MUTES site obviously didn’t
think crews would deviate this far west.”

           
The computerized mission “preview”
continued as the yellow dome began to grow, eventually engulfing the B-2 bomber
icon and turning red. McLanahan pointed to a countdown readout. “Bingo—I
release weapons ten seconds after I come under lethal range of the MUTES site.
If I carry antiradar missiles, I can pick him off right now, or I just turn
westbound around the hillock to escape.”

           
Ormack nodded in fascination at the
presentation, but he was more interested in studying McLanahan than watching
the computer. “There’s quite a party at the O-Club, Patrick,” he said. “This is
your last night of partying before the weekend, and a lot of your old cronies
from Ford Air Force Base asked about you. Why don’t you knock off and join us?”

           
McLanahan shrugged and began
reconfiguring the SMFD for another replay. “Crew rest starts in about an hour .
. .”

           
“One beer won’t hurt. I’ll buy.”

           
McLanahan hesitated, then glanced at
Ormack and shook his head. “I don’t think so, sir . .

           
“Something wrong, Patrick? Something
you’re not telling me?”

           
“No ... nothing’s wrong.” Patrick
hesitated, then issued voice commands to the computer to shut down the system.
“I just ... I don’t really feel part of them, you know?”

           
“No, I don’t.”

           
“These guys are the real crew dogs,
the real aviators,” Patrick said. “They’re young, they’re talented, they’re so
cocky they think they can take on the whole world.”

           
“Just like you were when I first met
you,” Ormack said with a laugh. “We used to think you had an attitude, but that
was before we knew how good you really were.” He looked at McLanahan with a
hint of concern. “You were pretty excited about coming to the
Strategic
Warfare
Center
, about getting back to the ‘real world’ . .
.”

           
“But I’m not back,” Patrick said.
“I’m farther from them than I ever thought I’d be. I feel like I’ve abandoned
them. I feel like I should be out there pulling a crew or running a bomb-nav
shop, but instead I’m . . .” He shrugged again, then concluded, “Like I’m
playing around with gadgets that probably won’t have anything to do with the
‘real world’ ...”

           
“That’s not what you’re down about,”
Ormack said. “I know you better than that. You’re down because you somehow
don’t think you deserve what you’ve got. I see you around your buddies out
there: they’re old captains or majors, and you’re a lieutenant colonel; they’re
still on line crews, flying dawn patrols and red eyes and pulling alert, doing
the same thing they did ten years ago, while you’re flying starships that most
of those guys will never see in their careers, let alone
fly
—they’re talking about their last bomb- competition mission or
their last Operational Readiness Inspection, while your job is so classified
that you can’t talk about it at all. You’re down because you can’t share what
you have with them, so you hole yourself up in here thinking that maybe you
don’t really have what it takes to be a good crew dog.

           
“Patrick, you’re where you are
because you’re the best. You did more than be chosen for a job: you excelled,
you never gave up, you survived, and you saved others. Then when we stuck you
in Dreamland to keep you quiet, you didn’t just vegetate until completing your
twenty years—you excelled again and made yourself invaluable to the
organization.

           
“You deserve what you have. You
earned it. You should go out and enjoy it. And you should also buy your boss a
beer before he drags your ass out of this cockpit. Now move it, Colonel.”

Near Phu Qui Island, in the
Spratly Island chain South China Sea

Thursday, 22 September 1994,
2344 hours local

           
The number-two task force of Admiral
Yin Po L’un’s Spratly Island flotilla was again cruising within radar range of
Phu Qui Island, the large rock and coral formation in the disputed neutral zone
between the Philippine-occupied islands to the north and the Chinese-held
islands to the south. Unlike the more powerful ten-ship task force that
surrounded Admiral Yin’s flagship, this one had only four ships—two
Hainan-class patrol boats, a Lienyun-class minesweeper, and a Huangfen-class
fast attack missile craft, the
Chagda,
which acted as the command vessel for this faster, shallow-draft patrol group.

           
Commander Chow Ti U, skipper of the
Chagda,
felt uneasy with his latest
series of orders. It had been over three months since the attack on the
Philippine oil-drilling barge, and the tension in the region had been
escalating on a weekly basis. Now it was so thick one could cut it with a
knife—and much of the heightened tensions could be directly attributed to the
way Admiral Yin had handled the entire affair.

           
Despite what was originally and
officially reported, Yin had departed the area after attacking the oil barges;
his contention that the seas were too rough to begin rescue operations did not
sit well with anyone. When the weather cleared, it was found that Yin had
steamed back to the Chinese side of the neutral zone, well away from Phu Qui
Island—again, his contention that he was concerned about retaliatory attacks
from Philippine warships did not explain why he did not offer to assist in
rescue operations.

           
Chow would never say so to anyone,
but Yin’s actions could be characterized as unprofessional, exhibiting a total disregard
for the rules of naval warfare, international law, and common decency between
sailors. Chow felt that the Admiral had every right to confront the illegally
placed oildrilling rig, and he was well within his responsibilities when he
returned fire—even such devastating return fire as he used. But to simply slink
away from the area without offering any. help or without radioing for help was
very suspicious.

           
Since then, while there’d been no
skirmishes, there had been a few close calls. Everyone was on edge, looking,
waiting, wondering. . . . Chow and his fellow Chinese crewmen privately felt it
was only a matter of time before something else happened, and after witnessing
the way Admiral Yin had handled the first skirmish, everyone was skittish about
how he would proceed in an escalated conflict.

           
“Range to
Phu
Qui
Island
, navigator,” Chow called out.

           
His crewmen were obviously keeping
very close track themselves, for the answer was almost instantaneous: “Sir ...
we are presently twenty-five kilometers southwest of
Phu
Qui
Island
. We will be in radar range within minutes.”

           
“Very well,” Chow grunted.
Twenty-five kilometers— they were right on the edge of the neutral zone—perhaps
inside it by no more than a kilometer. Unlike Admiral Yin, Chow had no
intention of tempting fate by openly cruising the neutral zone. Pearson Reef
was indisputably the property of the People’s Republic of
China
, so he would stay close to it. His radar
could survey enough of the neutral zone to check for any other intruders.

           
Still ... he was uneasy. Perhaps
because Admiral Yin chose not to continue operating his larger, more powerful
task force along the border as before—but had instead chosen to operate farther
south, well in undisputed Chinese waters. The first explanation was, of course,
that Yin had been ordered to keep away from the neutral zone, but as weeks went
by, the rumor was that Yin simply did not want to risk the wrath of the
Philippine Navy and put his precious flagship
Hong Lung
in harm’s way. -Instead, he had ordered Chow’s smaller,
less powerful, less capable task force to patrol the area. Admiral Yin’s task
force was seventy-two kilometers to the southwest, fairly close to
Nansha
Dao
Island
itself, which meant Yin was in very real
danger of running aground in the shallow waters. Commander Chow’s force was
better suited for those interreef patrols—but if that was where the Admiral
preferred to stay . . .

           
“Surface contact, sir,” an officer
in the Combat section of the bridge crew blurted out. “Bearing, zero-five-zero
degrees, range twenty kilometers. Speed zero.” Chow turned to the plotting
board as another crewman penciled in the contact on the clear Plexiglas board.

           
Phu
Qui
Island
.

           
“Confirm that contact,” Chow
ordered. “Make sure you’re not painting the island itself.” But he knew it was
not possible for his radar to paint the shallow, half-submerged outline of a
coral “island” at this extreme range. Someone was on or near the disputed
island. The Filipino salvage crews, along with the inevitable warships, had
long since departed—there had been no large vessels near the island now for
several weeks. Since Yin’s attack, ships transiting the neutral zone, including
Chow’s small task force, had been careful to report their movements to the
governments of each country that had claims on the islands—Chow had a list of
every ship that planned on plying these waters in the next several days.

           
There had been no reports of any
vessels that sought to anchor on
Phu
Qui
Island
.

           
“Radar confirms contact as a
vessel,” the Combat officer replied a few moments later. “Definite cultural
return. Unable to get an ISAR reading on the contact, but it is not terrain or
sea shadows.” ISAR, or Inverse Synthetic Aperture Radar, was a new feature of
the “Square Tie” surface- search radar that could combine vertical and
horizontal radar scans with Doppler-frequency shift information to get a
two-dimensional “picture” of a surface return; ISAR could usually identify a
vessel at ten to fifteen miles, well beyond visual range.

           
Commander Chow hesitated—he couldn’t
believe the Filipinos would actually attempt to set up their oil-drilling rigs
on the island again. It was tantamount to a declaration of war. He was also
reluctant to cruise farther into the neutral zone without specific orders from
Admiral Yin. Let
him
take the
responsibility for another attack.