“Break left! Break left!” Terekhov screamed the order into the radio. Captain Second Rank Stralbo, commander of the second MiG squadron, had been dodging a team of aggressive American fighters, but somehow one of them had still wound up on Stralbo’s tail. Luckily the American cowboy had already used up his infrared homing missiles. Two long bursts of gunfire hadn’t scored any hits on Stralbo’s MiG as yet, but it was only a matter of time. It was clear that Stralbo was completely outclassed.
Terekhov rolled his plane into position above and behind the American, still shouting for Stralbo to break to the left so he could line up his shot. The targeting diamond centered on the F-14 and turned red, the locking tone sounded in his ear, but Terekhov held his fire. “Roll left, Stralbo!” he bellowed again.
It was as if the American pilot had a charmed life. Just as Stralbo started his turn the Tomcat banked in the opposite direction, as if suddenly aware of the threat. Terekhov stabbed at the firing stud, but too late. He had lost the target, and the missile streaked off into the distance, harmless.
Then his threat indicator lit up.
Turning his head back and forth, he spotted the second F14 angling in from his aft port quarter. He had forgotten the American fighting style, the “loose deuce” that allowed wingmen to cover each other flexibly. Soviet fliers rarely used anything but a tight “welded wing” formation, and it was easy to forget that not all adversaries followed the tactics he had become used to in half a lifetime in the cockpit.
He caught sight of a plume of flame below the Tomcat’s wing. This one still had missiles.
Terekhov wrenched his stick back and shoved his throttles full forward. Acceleration pressed him into his seat as he climbed. Fighting to retain consciousness, he watched his radar through a red haze, saw the blip that was the heat-seeker closing … closing …
In a smooth motion he cut his power with a swift jerk of the throttles and triggered a pair of flares. It was a risky move that could lead to a flame-out or an uncontrolled spin, but by suddenly killing his hot afterburners and throwing out the flares he stood a good chance of defeating the American A-9M.
The missile went off a good hundred meters behind and below him, and he instantly shoved the throttles into the highest afterburner zone and turned sharply toward the American plane.
“It’s getting too damned thick here, Mal,” Batman said. “There’s too many of the bastards!”
The RIO’s reply was all business. “That MiG’s coming down on Trapper! Three o’clock!”
Batman cursed and accelerated into a turn. “This guy’s starting to piss me off,” he commented. The same MiG had spoiled his chances of taking out another Russian a few moments before. The Russkie was good, that much was certain. The guy had dodged Martin’s Sidewinder and then turned to carry the attack back to the Americans.
“Watch him, Trap!” he warned. “I’m on the way!”
“He’s all over me!” the lieutenant responded, sounding worried. “Hurry up, Batman! Hurry up!”
He spotted the two planes, Martin climbing sharply, the Russian matching him move for move. “Lead him this way! Come left! Left!” Then a missile leapt from the MiG’s wing. Martin’s Tomcat was turning, climbing … And then there was nothing left but a fireball.
CHAPTER 17
“They got Trapper! Trapper’s hit!”
Coyote heard the edge in Batman’s voice. Wayne had already fired both Sidewinders, so he was down to nothing but guns … and now his wingman had been hit. “Get the hell out of there, Batman!” he called. “Disengage! Disengage!”
“No can do, man,” Batman replied, sounding calmer now, grim and determined. “They’d be all over me if I tried.”
“We’ll get you some support.” Grant cursed under his breath. Powers was still clear of the fighting after his first brush with Russian missiles, but he hadn’t made much of an effort to get back into the game, and Coyote wasn’t about to depend on him for anything. That left it to Grant … or to Stramaglia. “CAG … can you give Batman some backup?”
There was a moment’s pause. “On my way,” Stramaglia said at last, sounding more animated than before. On the radar monitor the blip that represented the double-nuts bird was already angling to the left.
Coyote let out a sigh and hoped he’d done the right thing. But he couldn’t waste time on the might-have-beens. For good or ill the choice was made, and he had a battle to fight.
Terekhov heard exultant shouts over his radio and smiled. It was strictly against regulations for pilots to clutter up the communications channels with useless noise, but he wasn’t about to reprimand anyone. The sight of the American fighter engulfed by his missile’s fireball had given him the same feeling of elation. The plan was working. The Americans had fallen into the trap and this time they would be defeated.
“Svirepyy Leader, this is Cossack,” Captain First Rank Glushko’s voice grated over the radio. “The An-74 now reports ten more American planes in the air. We cannot afford to continue to leave Soyuz uncovered. Cancel Operation Kutuzov and return to base. Repeat, return to base!”
“Nyet!” Terekhov muttered under his breath. They were so close to making this work. One enemy plane destroyed … six to go. And not all of them were flying aggressively enough to press in close and use the short-range firepower that was all any of them had left. To turn back now when they had the opportunity to defeat these Americans in detail was worse than foolish. It was suicide. The best way to guarantee that the Americans would keep their distance from the fighting in Norway was to cripple their combat power here and now. With the bombers taking out Keflavik and a large chunk of their carrier air wing crippled, they would be stymied for the critical weeks it would take to finish off the Norwegian resistance. Then the Rodina could consolidate her gains with little hope of a Western counterattack.
Didn’t Glushko realize that the Americans couldn’t possibly be planning an attack on the carrier? It took time to plan a strike mission, arm attack aircraft, brief pilots … such an effort couldn’t be mounted in the short time since the first strike on Keflavik. Even if the Americans had been foolish enough to keep fully armed strike aircraft ready on the flight line just in case they might be needed — an there was no way anyone would do something that dangerous except in the direst emergency — the reaction time was just too short. These were fighters, kept on a high state of alert, being dispatched to shore up the weak squadron facing Terekhov now. That was the only possible explanation.
He reached for the radio mike. “Cossack, Cossack, this is Svirepyy Leader. We cannot break off now! The enemy is running low on ammunition. We can sweep the sky if you just give us a few more minutes!”