Dale Brown, Jim DeFelice
Collateral Damage
Dreamland: Duty Roster
Libya, Sicily (Italy)
Americans
Breanna Stockard, director DoD Office of Special Technology (Whiplash supervisor)
Jonathon Reid, special assistant to CIA deputy director (Whiplash supervisor)
Colonel Danny Freah, commander, Whiplash
Captain Turk Mako, U.S. Air Force pilot, assigned to Office Special Technology/Whiplash
Chief Master Sergeant Ben “Boston” Rockland, senior NCO, Whiplash
Ray Rubeo, president and CEO, Applied Intelligence, key contractor to the Office of Special Technology
Colonel Ginella Ernesto, commander A–10E squadron “Shooters”
President Christine Todd
Senator Jeff “Zen” Stockard
The Rebels
Princess Idris al-Nussoi, leader of the rebel alliance
Others
Foma Mitreski, Russian chief of station, Libya and northern Africa
Neil Kharon, freelance technical operative employed by Russians
MALFUNCTION
1
The vision unfolding before Turk Mako’s eyes was one part natural beauty and one part high-tech phenomenon. Flying over central Libya at just under the speed of sound, he had a 360-degree view of the desert and scrubland that made up the country’s interior. He could see every detail — leaves on low bushes starting to droop from the lack of water as the season turned dry, tumbled rocks that had been placed thousands of millennia ago by tectonic displacement, the parched side of an irrigation ditch abandoned to nature.
There were other things as well — the hull of an antiaircraft gun abandoned two years before, the picked bones of a body — not human — at the edge of a paved road that seemingly ran for miles to nowhere.
That was the ground. Turk had a similarly long and clear view of the sky as well — light blue, freckled with white in the distance, black retreating above as the sun edged upward in the east.
Turk saw all these things on a visor in his helmet. Though the images looked absolutely real, what he saw was actually synthesized from six different optical cameras placed around the fuselage of his aircraft. The image was supplemented by other sensors — infrared, radar — and augmented by interpretations from the computer that helped him fly the Tigershark II. The computer could provide useful information instantly, whether it was simply identifying captions for the aircraft flying with him — four small unmanned fighter-bombers known as Sabres — or analysis of objects that could be weapons.
For Turk, an Air Force test pilot assigned to the CIA — Department of Defense Office of Special Projects, the synthesized reality portrayed in his helmet was real. It was what war looked like.
He checked his instruments — an old-school habit for the young pilot, still in his early twenties. The computer would alert him to the slightest problem in the plane, or in his escorts.
Everything was “in the green”—operating at prime spec.
The planes he was guiding were two minutes from the start of their bombing run. Turk gestured with his hand, and instantly had a visual of the target.
“Zoom,” he told the computer.
As the screen began to change, a warning blared in his ears.
“Four aircraft, taking off from government airfield marked as A–3,” declared the computer. “Located at Ghat.”
Turk’s first thought was that it was a false alarm. He’d been flying the Tigershark and its accompanying Sabre unmanned attack planes over Libya for more than a week. Never in that time had he even gotten any indications of ground radar, let alone airplanes being scrambled. The alliance helping the rebel forces had established a strict no-fly zone in the northern portion of the country, and a challenge area in the rest of the country. The Libyan government air force had responded by keeping its planes on the ground practically everywhere, fearing they would be shot down.
When he realized it wasn’t a mistake, Turk’s next thought was that the planes weren’t coming for him — the Tigershark and the four UAVs she was guiding were relatively stealthy aircraft, difficult to detect even with the most modern radar. The Libyan government, which had inherited most of its equipment from Muammar Gaddafi’s regime, mostly relied on gear two decades old.
But the long-range scan in his helmet visor showed that the four Mirages taking off from the airfield were in fact headed in his direction.
All presumed hostile, declared the computer. It had automatically queried the planes’ friend or foe ID system and failed to find friendly matches. But even if that information hadn’t been available, it didn’t take much silicon to guess whose side they were on.
“Weapons ID on Bandits One through Four,” said Turk.
“All bandit aircraft similarly configured,” declared the computer. “Carrying four Matra Super 530F antiair radar missiles. Carrying two Sidewinder missiles. Sidewinder type not identified. Computing.”
The Matra Super missiles were medium-range, radar-guided antiaircraft weapons; while it wouldn’t be fair to call them impotent, they were many years old. Similar to American Sparrows, the missiles used a semiactive radar system, taking their initial target data from their launch ship. The missiles would then continue to home in on the reflected signal, following the radar to the kill.
There were several limitations with such a system, starting with the fact that the launch ship had to lock on its target and then stay in a flight pattern that would keep it illuminated for a fair amount of time. The latter often meant that it was making itself a target.
There was no indication yet that the enemy planes even knew the Tigershark and her four escorts were there. Finding the planes, let alone locking them up for missiles, was not easy. The Tigershark and the Sabres had radar profiles smaller than an F–35. In fact, Turk had a hard time believing that the Mirages even knew his flight was in the air — right up until the moment he got a missile launch warning.
He double-checked with the computer. The Mirages had not locked onto the Tigershark or any of the four attack planes flying with him. Nonetheless, the four missiles — one from each Mirage — were all heading in their direction.
While ostensibly under his control, the four robot aircraft took evasive maneuvers without waiting for him to react. They dove toward the ground, making it even harder for the enemy to track them. They also altered course slightly, further diminishing the radar profile the enemy might see.
While each Sabre had ECM capabilities — electronic countermeasures that could be used to confuse the enemy missiles — these remained off. Under some circumstances, using the ECMs would be counterproductive, tipping an opponent off to their presence and even showing him where the target aircraft was.
The Tigershark’s computer, meanwhile, began suggesting strategy for countering the attack. For Turk, this was the most annoying and intrusive aspect of the advanced flight system. He felt he was being lectured on what to do.
The fact that the computer was inevitably right only heightened the pain.
The computer suggested that he take a hard right turn, snapping onto a flight vector that would put his aircraft at a right angle to the incoming fighters. It then suggested another hard turn into them, where he would fire four AMRAAM-pluses. Missiles away, he would head back toward the UAVs.
He couldn’t have drawn it up better himself.
But was he allowed to shoot them down? His ROEs — rules for engagement — directed that he not fire until he found himself or other nearby allies “in imminent danger.”