Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 03 (51 page)

           
The last missile hit the carrier
Ranger
just aft of the port bow.

           
The missile’s titanium nosecap
pierced the outer hull of the carrier before the eleven-hundred-pound
high-explosive warhead detonated, ensuring that most of the missile’s deadly
force was directed inside the vessel.

Aboard Bullet Six

           
“Bullet Six flight, say your bingo
status,” the controller aboard the Air Force E-3C AWACS plane radioed.

           
“Bullet Six is seven minutes to
bingo,” Lieutenant Jason “Razor” Penrose reported.

           
“Ditto for Bullet Seven.”

           
“Copy. Stand by... Bullet flight,
code is ‘slippery,’ repeat, ‘slippery.’ ”

           
Razor Penrose couldn’t believe what
he just heard. The code word “slippery” meant that their carrier
Ranger
was damaged, extent unknown, and
no one would either launch or land. Dammit all to hell. They missed and it had
cost them! Because they couldn’t get the fighters or the big missiles,
Ranger
was hit.

           
Fortunately, there were other code
words for more serious damage, so there was a possibility that they wouldn’t
have to divert—it could be something as noncritical as a damaged aircraft on
the deck or foul arresting gear. There were a few nearby divert runways
available, and dozens more as long as the K-10 tanker was still available. The
closest landing facility was a small runway on the
island
of
Sangihe
, one hundred and thirty miles to the
southeast. With a KC-10,

           
however, they could reach and rearm
on
Guam
, fourteen hundred miles to the northeast.
They still had lots of options. . . .

           
But Penrose had no plans on
diverting right now. As long as he had gas and guns, he was going to stay
aloft. Their primary job now was to protect their damaged carrier.

           
“Three bandits at
twelve o’clock
, forty miles, high, northwest-bound at high
speed, they appear to be withdrawing,” the AWACS controller continued as calmly
as if he were reporting the weather. The three surviving first-wave fighters
had done their job—deliver the big antiship missiles—so they were bugging out.
“Four additional bandits,
one o’clock
, Blue plus twenty miles, southeast bound,
looks like they want to engage.”

           
“Basket, give me a SITREP. Who do we
get up?”

           
“Bullet Two, Four and Five are
emergency fuel and are rendezvousing with Shamu,” the AWACS controller
reported. “They report nine AIM-7s and five AIM-9s between them. They will stay
with Shamu and Basket after refueling.” No report on Bullet Three, Penrose
noted—the Chink bastards got Kelly, damn them. “Bullet Eight and Nine are
airborne, ETE ten minutes; they are staying within a hundred miles from home
plate for inner defense. They are max loaded with four AIM-54s, two AIM-7s, and
two AIM- 9s apiece. You’ve got two KA-6s up but they’ll have to tank with Shamu
before you can use them. One Hawkeye up, range one-niner-zero miles east.
Flashlight is at your
three o’clock
, eight miles, low, southeast bound at
vee-max.” The big spy plane was on the deck, trying to lose itself in the radar
clutter of the sea. “Basket is southeast of your position, one-one-zero miles.
Say your load and fuel.”

           
“Bullet Six flight of two, two -7s,
two -9s, seven minutes to bingo.”

           
“Copy, Bullet Six flight. Vector to
join on Flashlight, starboard to heading one-one-zero, take angels eight.”

           
“Negative. Bullet Six flight wants a
vector to the inbounds.” Penrose had had enough of screwing with trying to
protect the Air Force’s radar plane—his job was to protect the fleet and keep
any more Chinks from lobbing missiles at his home.

           
“Your OPORD says to escort the RC,
Bullet flight...”

           
“Fuck the ops orders, Basket. I want
a vector to the inbounds.” On interphone, he told his
RIO
, Lieutenant Commander John Watson, “Lion
Tamer, lock those inbounds up if this bozo doesn’t give us a vector . .

           
That was usually not very good
practice—they would keep the element of surprise if Penrose’s
RIO
kept his radar off—but if he had to, they
would go it alone. . . .

           
There was a brief pause from the
AWACS controller, but he was obviously not in the mood or not authorized to
argue. “Roger . . . Bullet Six flight, four bandits at
one o’clock
, fifty miles, take angels three-five,
that’ll put you ten thousand above them.”

           
“Six flight.” Penrose held his
heading and started his climb. “Bogey-dope.”

           
“Bandits at your
one o’clock
, level, fifty miles, closure rate eleven
hundred. Be advised, Bullet flight, Flashlight reported naval radar and
possible naval antiair at your
twelve o’clock
, two hundred miles. You may be coming within
detection range.”

           
“Six copies.” Well, if that
happened, they’d be about even—it was a two-vee-four, but there was not yet any
sign that they’d been detected. Penrose wasn’t going to turn on his radar until
absolutely necessary.

           
“Two.”

           
“
One o’clock
, moving to one-thirty, forty miles ...
thirty miles,
two o’clock
,
low ...”

           
They weren’t going in completely
blind. Penrose’s RIO was adjusting his IRSTS, or Infrared Search and Track
System, a long-range heat-seeking imager that could detect and display hot
targets at medium to short range; his was one of the few older F-14A models
with both an IRSTS sensor as well as the typical TCS telescopic camera system,
in side-byside chin pods. IRSTS allowed the crew to launch missiles against
targets at long range and activate their AWG-9 radar only a few seconds before
the missiles impacted—that was precisely what they were trying to do now.

           
“Two-thirty position, thirty miles
...” Penrose corrected his course to keep the bandits within the 30-degree
limit of the IRSTS seeker. “Cowboy, can you get an IR track on these guys?”

           
“We got ’em all the way,” Penrose’s
wingman, Lieutenant Commander Paul “Cowboy” Bowman, replied. “Ready when you
are.”

           
“Stand by.” On interphone Penrose
asked, “Got ’em yet, Lion Tamer?”

           
“Hold on . . . tally-ho, finally got
’em . . . IR track. Compiling data... got a good data feed. Wish we had a laser
ranger right now—their guys would be dog meat. Be advised, Razor, my radar’s
coming on three seconds after missile launch. We won’t be invisible no more . .
. okay. I got a firing solution. Clear to launch.”

           
“Good. Lock up the rest as soon as
the radar’s on.” On the interplane frequency, he called out, “Seven, give it to
’em. Bullet Six, fox one.”

           
“Seven, fox one.”

           
Penrose squeezed the launch button
on his radar, and the light-gray outline of his Tomcat fighter lit up again as
the big Sparrow missile leaped into the dark sky. He could see a missile from
his wingman slash through the sky just a few hundred feet away—the two missiles
appeared to be flying in formation as they streaked toward their targets. The
missiles seemed to track perfectly . . .

           
But suddenly Penrose’s missile
seemed to diverge away faster and faster—his wingman’s missile curved to the
right, tracking all the way, but Penrose’s Sparrow was going off in the weeds.
“Lion Tamer, what’s going on . . . ?”

           
“Damn! Radar’s not coming up!”
Watson shouted. “Shit, it cooled down too much!” A status light to the right of
the
RIO
’s tactical information display read
ENV STBY,
meaning that the system would
stay in nonradiating mode until the electronics fully warmed up.

           
“Two! Take the lead! Six is
gadget-bent!”

           
“Seven’s taking the lead.” Penrose
began searching to his right, hoping he could see his wingman, but he made it
easy for him: Bullet Seven had his left engine in min afterburner, both to help
Penrose find him and start closing in on the Chinese fighters faster.

           
“Cowboy, got a tally on you, kill
your burner,” Penrose said. The burner flicked off. They continued their right
turn to put themselves right on the four Chinese fighters’ tails.

           
Lion Tamer’s APR-45 radar threat
scope suddenly came to life. It showed first a friendly search radar directly
ahead—Bullet Seven—and, seconds later, several bat-wing symbols appeared off to
the right as the Chinese fighters, after detecting the Tomcat’s radars,
activated their own search radars to find their ambushers. All four bat-wings
were superimposed, with a diamond around the closest one.

           
As Penrose searched out his canopy
bubble to see if he could see any of the enemy fighters, he saw a tiny puff of
fire in the distance—Bullet Seven’s Sparrow missile had exploded.

           
One of the bat-wings promptly
disappeared.

           
“Bullet flight, splash one bandit,”
the AWACS controller reported. “Dead bandit descending rapidly, turning right,
decelerating. Two bandits breaking left, same altitude, nine miles. One bandit
looks like he’s descending, heading straight ahead ... lone bandit is thirty
miles from Flashlight, appears to be closing on him.”

           
“Six, go after the solo. I’ll take
these two.”

           
“Negative. I’m bent. I’m staying
with you.”

           
“I can take these two. Use your IR
and the AWACS. Get the solo.”

           
“Dammit, Cowboy, if those two are
bugging out, let ’em. Don’t get sucked into a one-vee-two. Let’s go get the solo
together.”

           
“We got these two locked up, no
sweat. Take the solo. I’ll be back in a flash.” He punctuated his sentence by
banking hard left in pursuit. Penrose and Watson were suddenly right between
two enemy cells.

           
“You gotta protect the recon plane,
Razor,” Watson told him.

           
“Fuck the recon plane. My wingman
might be in trouble ...”

           
“So what happens when that bandit
smokes that RC-135? There’s eighteen guys on that thing.”

           
He was right—he had no choice.
“Shit. We’re going after the solo. Basket, Bullet Six, vector to the solo
inbound.”

           
“Bullet Six, bandit at your twelve
to one o’clock, eleven miles, five thousand below you, airspeed six hundred
thirty.” Penrose shoved his throttles to full military power, anxious to get
within missile-firing range but not enough to risk using afterburners and
getting himself in a low-fuel situation—he fully intended to go back and see to
Cowboy after dealing with the lone bandit. “Lion Tamer, what’s with the radar?
Can’t you get it going?”

           
“Keeps resetting. I’m recycling it .
. .”

           
This is going from bad to worse,
Penrose thought. On interplane, he asked, “Cowboy, how goes it?”

           
“We got one in the kill zone,”
Penrose and Watson heard on the interplane frequency. “Looks like the other
guy’s bugging out—he’s out of it. Thirty seconds and I’m back with you.”

           
“Don’t get cocky,” Penrose said.
“Shoot and clear. Basket, dammit, keep an eye out for Seven’s trailer.”

           
“Basket copies. Second bandit on
Bullet Seven is
two o’clock
,
eleven miles, accelerating, descending. Bullet Six, your bandit is
twelve o’clock
, ten miles. Your bandit is twenty-five
miles from Flashlight and closing . . .”

           
Watson manually slewed the IRSTS
along the bearing given by the AWACS controller and finally found the Chinese
fighter, a tiny green dot on his screen. He hit the “Lock” button, and a big
square superimposed itself on the dot; a second later as the IRSTS refined its
aiming and stabilized its gyro platform, the square compressed to slightly
larger than the dot, and a stream of tracking figures appeared on the screen.
Watson slaved one AIM-9R Sidewinder missile to the IRSTS boresight, and Penrose
heard a low, menacing growl as the missile’s seeker head locked on. “Got the
Chink on IR, Razor,” Watson said. “Select a Sidewinder and nail this bugger.”