Target Utopia (31 page)

South China Sea

B
RAXTON WAS LESS
than four miles from the island, but he wasn't going to make it before the Chinese reached him.

He'd gone through nearly all of his ammunition trying to push the helicopters away. At least ninety percent of his bullets had missed—the robots were quick and small, and he was shooting from a moving boat. They ducked and weaved and moved off, and when one finally went down, a fourth took its place.

He had a single box of ammunition and an RPG launcher with a single grenade. But that wasn't going to do it. Sensing that he was running low on ammo, the helicopters moved across their bow, egging him to fire.

Braxton picked up the rifle, then decided against firing it. He guessed that they wouldn't actually allow a collision and told Talbot to keep the throttle wide-open. The aircraft zoomed close, the lead helicopter coming within inches of striking the forward prow of the launch before edging upward.

Maybe he could shoot it down on the next pass, but what was the point? The two motor torpedo boats chasing them were now practically even with them, flanking their sides. Small craft with a machine gun dominating the forward deck and a pair of stubby torpedoes on either side of their gunwales, the boats looked like souped-up versions of World War II American PT boats, with long platforms at the rear for the robot helicopters. The Chinese boats had sleek, speedboat-style hulls and open cockpit-style wheelhouses—and, more ominously, three or four sailors aboard each, pointing Chinese ZH-05 assault rifles at them. They flew Chinese flags from their masts.

“You will stop or be sunk,” said the Chinese commander over a loudspeaker.

“You gonna use the grenade launcher?” Talbot asked him. His face had grown increasingly pale as they'd fled; Braxton thought it might turn transparent soon.

“If I do that, they'll rake us with their guns. I can't sink them both.”

“Right. But what do we do?”

“Keep steady. Once we're on the island they can't touch us.”

Another two miles and they would be there,
and then he could do just about anything. But it might just as well be 2,000 miles. Braxton grabbed the radio and called Fortine back on the cargo vessel.

“We are about to come under attack from the Americans,” said Fortine, before Braxton could say anything. “They've warned us they're going to board.”

Braxton was taken by surprise, and momentarily forgot about his own predicament. “Are you sure it's the Americans?”

“Yes. They've said as much. We're fighting back,” Fortine added. “I'm not going to be taken prisoner.”

“The Chinese have caught up to us,” said Braxton. “Do what you think is best.”

He was talking more to himself than to Fortine. He might have tried to talk someone else into surrendering, but he'd known from the start that the fatalist captain would never give in to any government.

“We will win in the end,” said Fortine.

The line was covered with static—one of the Chinese boats was blocking the transmission.

“You will surrender!” said the Chinese commander over his loudspeaker. “There will be no other warnings!”

Just in case they didn't get the message, the machine gunner in the boat on the starboard side fired a dozen shots into the launch's bow. They weren't simply warning shots—the bullets splintered the side of the craft.

“All right,” Braxton told Talbot. “We'll let them
take us. We'll have to think of something on the fly.”

Talbot frowned, but he, too, had reached that conclusion. He put his hand on the throttle and slowly killed the engine.

South China Sea

T
URK HAD BEEN
fired on dozens of times before. But that didn't lessen the amount of sweat rolling from the back of his head down his neck, or keep a knot from forming in his stomach. A cloud of small decoy flares automatically exploded behind his aircraft as a laser-detonating system hunted for the enemy warhead, but even so, he and his aircraft were perilously close to twenty-some pounds of high explosive.

It might not sound like a lot, but up close and personal with an airplane, it was more than enough to ruin a day. The Tigershark's small engine red-lined as Turk pushed the aircraft away from the missile; he held steady until he saw the missile explode harmlessly behind him, far enough away that the shock blast was lost in the wake of the aircraft's escape.

Now it was his turn. Turk banked out of his climb, lining up on the rear deck of the cargo container ship. There were three men there, one with a bino, and two others working over a case.

The computer ID'ed the kit as a 9K38 Igla, a Russian-made antiaircraft missile known to the U.S. and NATO as the SA-18 Grouse.

“I have two targets preparing a MANPAD,” said Turk, recording what he was seeing as well as broadcasting it to Danny. “Preparing to take them out.”

“Cleared hot,” said Danny. “They've ignored our warning.”

Actually, thought Turk, they'd answered it, pretty emphatically.

The rail gun shook the aircraft as he fired, its slugs accelerating to several times the speed of sound as they left the plane. The first one struck the missile's solid propellant. The explosion obscured the rest of the target area, and Turk couldn't see that the next two slugs killed the men.

He was already aiming at the radar above the superstructure. He took it out, then wiped out the radio mast and the compartment directly below it. The big ship ceased transmitting any radio signals at all.

But it was far from dead.

“Container G7—roof opening,”
said the computer.

It took Turk a few seconds to understand what the Tigershark was telling him—one of the containers was hiding a weapon.

“Radar active,”
warned the computer.

Turk was ready. Accelerating toward the ship, he aimed his nose at the container highlighted on the screen. He got off three rounds before he passed; the last slug ignited an explosion and small fire.

Three more containers popped their tops in the
time it took for the Tigershark to climb and then turn back.

“Aircraft launching,”
warned the Tigershark computer.

“Whiplash assault team, hold back,” radioed Turk. “We have resistance—they're launching three UAVs, combat UAVs similar to the ones encountered last night by Basher flight.”

“Roger that,” replied Danny. “Standing by.”

C
OWBOY COULD SEE
the aircraft shooting upward from the cargo vessel like arrows suddenly appearing from small puffs of black-fringed white smoke. The three aircraft attacked the sky at seventy-degree angles, propelled by rocket motors that quickly lifted them several thousand feet.

“Request permission to engage enemy aircraft,” he asked Greenstreet.

“Do it!” said Greenstreet. “I have One and Three. You're on Two.”

Cowboy designated the second target. But before either he or Greenstreet could fire, the first UAV exploded in the air—Turk had taken it out with his rail gun.

“The UAVs are mine,” radioed the Dreamland pilot. “You guys wipe out those containers on the foredeck.”

“Acknowledged,” said Greenstreet.

F
OR ALL THEIR
sophistication, the enemy UAVs were using a simple and relatively primitive
launching system. Fitted with a booster section, they were lifted on a vertical gantry about forty-five degrees, then fired into the air. The rocket at their rear propelled them for a little more than sixty seconds before their own engines took over. Only then could they maneuver.

Taking the first two aircraft down was like hitting ducks on a carnival firing range. Turk brought the Tigershark onto a line just above the first UAV, put two shots into the body of the aircraft and a third into its booster, then turned hard to his right to get on the tail of the second UAV.

The enemy aircraft slipped out of his targeting cone before he could line up. He held on, following as it continued to climb. The Tigershark couldn't match its speed, and after a few seconds Turk realized he'd have a better chance at getting it after the booster separated. Leaving it for last, he slid down on his wing toward the fourth and final aircraft to launch, just now climbing below him to the south. The computer had already dotted out an intercept; all Turk had to do was follow it.

Danny Freah was asking him something over the radio, but Turk couldn't spare the attention. Greenstreet radioed something else about staying clear, but Turk lost it in the background noise.

Now,
he told himself as the aircraft came up into the middle of his targeting cue.

The Tigershark rumbled with the shock of three slugs firing in quick succession. Only the first one hit: the other two passed through the debris field where the aircraft had been.

As Turk turned his head to look for the UAV he'd given up on earlier, the Tigershark shrieked at him—the enemy was diving from above, training its laser weapon on his fuselage.

D
ANNY
F
REAH FROZE
the image of the cargo ship and the tug. A machine gun had been brought up to the forward deck of the tug. More ominously, there was a man running along the starboard side with what looked like a grenade launcher in his hands.

“Basher One, we have individuals running along the starboard side of the cargo ship,” he said, radioing the Marine aircraft. “They appear armed. We'd like to take them out before the Ospreys come in.”

“Affirmative, Whiplash,” replied Greenstreet. “We're going to unzip some of those cargo containers and then we'll clear the rest of the vermin off the decks.”

Danny thought of ordering them not to bomb the containers; he would have greatly preferred getting whatever was in them intact. But they weren't worth risking the lives of the Marines.

“Understood, Basher. We're holding position until all clear.”

“Won't be long, Colonel. Hang tight.”

C
OWBOY TILTED HIS
nose toward the cargo aircraft and pickled his bombs, dropping a dozen of the backpack-sized weapons in quick succession.
Each pair of the bombs had been programmed to hit a different cargo container. He was so close and the ship moving so slowly that he probably didn't even have to use any guidance at all. But why take chances? The weapons system in the Lightning II had locked on to each container via its radar and optical guidance system, and subtly steered each bomb directly to the programmed sweet spot. In quick succession six large containers blew up on the forward deck of the ship. One began to burn, sending a large plume of smoke into the air.

Greenstreet had already made his run and was circling back.

“Freah said there's a guy on the starboard side with an RPG,” said Greenstreet. “You see him?”

“No.”

“Let's take a closer look. Follow me in.”

W
ITH ONLY A
fraction of a second to react, Turk started to dive away from the pursuing aircraft, pushing the Tigershark's nose down steeply and ramming the throttle. But the UAV had anticipated this, and while it lost its aim point for a moment, it was quickly back on Turk's tail.

It's flying a pattern and I can beat it,
Turk reminded himself.

I'm flying against a Flighthawk. What do I do?

Up and roll back.

He jerked his stick back, abruptly putting the Tigershark into a climb. At the same time, he hit his chaff, blowing out a cloud of tiny strips and
pieces of metal foil intended to confuse radar missiles homing in on the fighter. It also confused the Dreamland-designed UAVs at close range because of a peculiarity in how they flew in close pursuit: since the target's maneuvers were bound to be extremely rapid, the original C
³
computer programming took over the flight at close range, following the locked target and enabling the remote pilot to concentrate on firing.

Dishing out chaff when pursued at close range by a normal fighter wouldn't do much; the pilot would simply use his eyes to guide the plane. But here the computer had to switch from its radar guidance to infrared or video mode. Either way, there was a delay—only a few seconds in this case but long enough for Turk to put his Sabre on its back and roll behind the enemy UAV. As he did, he noticed an entirely unexpected result—the UAV was now trailing smoke from its right wing.

How had that happened?

The only explanation—or at least the only thing he could think of—was that its laser weapon had heated the chaff, which damaged the aircraft as it flew into the cloud.

There was only one way to test his theory—try it again.

That meant not only giving up his position now, which with a flick of the wrist would put him in the perfect spot to shoot down the enemy drone, but letting the UAV get back on his tail and zero in on him.

That was exactly the sort of trade-off Turk had been taught
not
to make as a combat pilot. Take
the sure kill, leave the experimenting to someone else. But if he didn't do it, he wouldn't be sure it worked.

He held tight to the UAV's tail. The UAV started a tight turn left. Turk suspected this was a deke—generally, when surprised by the up and rollback sequence, the Flighthawks would fake left and then break right, trying to accelerate away to reprocess the threat's abilities. He waited a moment before reacting; sure enough, the UAV tucked back toward him. But instead of rolling to keep it in his gunsights, Turk stayed straight.

It took the UAV a second to realize it was not being followed. It took another half moment to evaluate what that meant—was it a trick, or was it flying against someone who was dumb? Because all it had to do was come back left and it would find itself in a perfect position to eviscerate its foe.

Turk waited. He was no more than a mile ahead of the aircraft, a fat target for the laser.

It began to fire. Turk hit the chaff. This time he held his course but accelerated, wanting to make sure the UAV flew directly into the chaff, or at least had reason to.

There was an explosion behind him strong enough to send a shock wave against his wings.

“Bogie Two destroyed,”
declared the computer.

Turk banked back in time to see the UAV disappearing in a fireball.

“All UAVs destroyed,” he radioed Danny.

C
OWBOY SAW A
figure running near the rail on the starboard side of the cargo ship as he approached. Just as Greenstreet cleared the ship's stern, the man stopped. Something flared from the rail—the man had fired an RPG at Basher One.

It was an act of complete futility, as the F-35 was well beyond the reach of the rocket-propelled grenade. But it also sealed the man's fate. Cowboy, his gun selected on the armament panel, pressed the trigger and danced a few dozen bullets into the side of the ship and the enemy standing there.

He was past the spot before he could see what happened. Greenstreet radioed, asking what was going on.

“You had somebody firing on your tailpipe,” replied Cowboy. “Little grenade launcher.”

“Did you get him?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“We need to run in again before we clear the Ospreys.”

“Roger.”

Cowboy followed his flight leader into a wide arc that took them back around to the bow of the cargo container. Smoke was rising from several areas on the ship, and there was now a gaping hole and mangled metal where the man with the RPG had been.

“No threats obvious,” said Greenstreet as they cleared.

“Roger.”

Rising back in the sky after the pass, Cowboy tried to sort out what he'd seen. He didn't feel bad
about having killed the man—he was an enemy, and had obviously been trying to kill him. He did, however, feel a certain touch of sadness or maybe regret that he had to do that.

“Whiplash, Marine Force, container ship is on fire,” radioed Greenstreet. “You have people on deck on both ships. No missiles seen. Machine guns and launchers down.”

“Acknowledged,” said Danny.