22
They came fast, hard, and without warning.
One after the other, the two F-18s swooped down from the night sky and buzzed the deck of the Liberian freighter at Mach 1.8, nearly twice the speed of sound. They shattered the windows of the bridge and knocked everyone on deck off their feet, sending them scrambling for safety. Seconds later, the fighter pilots were radioing back to NORAD.
“Crystal Palace, this is Canyon One-Niner. We have a visual on the target; do you copy? Over.”
“Canyon One-Niner, this is Crystal Palace. What do you see, son?”
The pilot of the lead Super Hornet from the 105th Strike Fighter Squadron quickly confirmed all the details Coast Guard Specialist Carrie Sanders had sent up the system. It was a massive ship — at least three football fields in length — with a black hull marked with large white letters, a Liberian flag, and plenty of containers, several of them open. He saw no evidence of missile contrails. The winds had probably erased them. But what really terrified him was what was happening at the stern.
“Crystal Palace, this is Canyon One-Niner. The crew has set up another mobile launcher. I repeat, they have set up another mobile launcher. They’ve got a missile in place. It looks ready to go. It looks like they’ll be ready to fire again any moment.”
Briggs gasped.
He had dozens of fighter jets, navy destroyers, fast attack subs, and Coast Guard cutters heading into the air and waters off New York, New Jersey, Maryland, California, Oregon, and Washington State in the frantic hunt for the ships that had fired upon American cities. But suddenly he had a live target and only seconds to act.
Two large-screen monitors mounted on the far wall of the NORAD Operations Center showed him live streaming video from each of the F-18s. A third screen displayed a newly acquired live satellite feed of the Liberian frigate, just coming into view. Sure enough, Briggs thought, he was staring down the barrel of a Scud C ballistic missile, armed and ready for launch. He could see the billows of smoke pouring out from its engines, and every muscle in his body tightened.
“Canyon One-Niner, Canyon Two-Zero, this is Lieutenant General Charles Briggs, commander of NORAD. I order you to take that missile out and sink that ship immediately. Take that ship down immediately. Do you copy?”
There was a flash of static.
“Canyon One-Niner, Canyon Two-Zero, this is Crystal Palace. Do you copy?”
But all he heard was more static.
“Canyon One-Niner and Canyon Two-Zero, this is Lieutenant General Briggs at NORAD. Do you copy? I repeat, do you copy?”
A transmission came in, but garbled. Briggs’s mouth went dry. His face was covered with sweat. From the satellite image he could see the crew on the deck of the Liberian ship scrambling for cover. The launch was imminent. They were out of time.
Every eye in the ops center was riveted to the video screens. Several staffers clasped their hands to pray. They all knew what Briggs knew. A few seconds more and it would be too late. Another American city could be obliterated.
Briggs blinked hard. He ordered a glass of water and wiped his brow. This couldn’t be happening again. But it was. His vision was blurring. He felt light-headed and dizzy. Just like he had before, on a day seared into his memory forever.
Instead of a Liberian frigate, Briggs suddenly found himself staring at a live video feed of a Russian jumbo jet, thirty-five miles from Washington and coming in red-hot. He found himself listening to the voice of Bob Corsetti, the White House chief of staff, pleading with the president to make a decision.
“Sir, you don’t have a choice. You need to take this guy out fast.”
Briggs could feel his pulse skyrocketing as he waited for the president to speak, to act, and quickly. Corsetti was right. MacPherson had been out of options, out of time. It was his constitutional duty to defend the country. What was taking so long? Why was he hesitating? Didn’t he understand the stakes?
Seconds passed, though they felt like an eternity. Then MacPherson had finally come to his senses. He gave the order and it was quickly passed down the chain of command. Briggs could still see images like they were yesterday. He could still hear the audio. How could he ever forget?
“Devil One-One, POTUS declares the target is hostile. You are cleared to engage.”
“CONR Command, do I understand you right? Target is hostile? You want me to engage? You want me to fire on an unarmed civilian jetliner?”
He could still hear the tremor in the flight leader’s voice. It wasn’t just nerves. It was something else — hesitation, resistance. But why? It wasn’t a pilot’s job to wrestle through the moral justification of a call like this. It was the president’s. It was the commander in chief’s. And now that commander had just issued an order. Why wasn’t it being executed?
The Aeroflot jet was now twenty-five miles out. They were out of time.
As though he were hovering outside his own body, Briggs could see himself lunge forward, grab the radio, and scream at the lead pilot.
“Devil One-One, this is Lieutenant General Charles Briggs at NORAD. Son, you are ordered to take this Russian jet down. Repeat, take the target down — now.”
For the longest moment, there was nothing but silence.
Then the lead pilot said, “I can’t, sir…. I’m sorry, sir. I… I just can’t do it…. It’s not right.”
With the Russian aircraft closing in on Washington, Briggs had grabbed the radio. All this time later, he could once again feel his heart pounding in his chest as it had on that day. He had already had three heart attacks. He couldn’t afford a fourth. Certainly not now.
MacPherson had spoken before Briggs could. “General Briggs, this is the president of the United States. The capital of the country is under attack. I am ordering you to take that plane down — now.”
Briggs had never heard the president so angry. Nor would he ever again.
Aeroflot 6617 was just fourteen miles out and picking up speed. Briggs could still feel the cold radio receiver in his hand.
“Devil One-One, this is General Briggs at NORAD. Peel off immediately. Devil One-Two, do you have a shot?”
There was nothing but silence.
“Devil One-Two, do you have a shot?”
Suddenly a flash of static, a garbled transmission, and then, finally, “Roger that, General — I have a shot.”
“Then take it, son — before ten thousand people die.”
Until the day he died, Briggs would never forget the image of that Russian jumbo jet, screaming down the Potomac River, on a suicide mission into the heart of the capital, an American F-16 flown by a twenty-five-year-old kid hot on his tail.
“Sir, I have radar lock….”
The Russian plane was just eight miles from the White House.
“I have tone….”
It was now or never. Take the shot, Briggs screamed inwardly. Take the shot.
“Fox two!”
But now the memory — painful though it was — faded, replaced by the reality of an ongoing operation somewhere over the Atlantic, just off the coast of Maryland. Briggs winced as he watched an air-to-ground missile explode from the right side of one of the F-18s, and then another, and a third. And a fourth. The second jet fired as well — again and again.