Black Hole was the nickname for the command staff under Lt. General Buster Glossom in Riyadh. They prepared the daily air tasking order, essentially the daily game plan for the air war. The ATO was, in effect, Lt. General Charles A. Horner’s main tool for directing the battle, and Black Hole amounted to the right brain of USCENTAF and the allied air effort against Saddam. Everything that flew higher than a grasshopper, from Marine AV-8B Harrier jump jets to U.S. Air Force F-117 stealth fighters, got its marching orders from Black Hole.
The FIDO— a rotating assignment from each squadron— was a pilot who acted as a liaison and advisor to both the planners and the guys on the line. But as the FIDO’s sidekick, Dixon wasn’t here to liaison with anyone, much less give them advice. His squadron commander, Colonel Michael Knowlington, had shipped him over after the lieutenant had screwed up on a mission the first day of the war and then glossed over exactly what had happened. Before being shipped out, Dixon had partly redeemed himself by shooting down an Iraqi helicopter and becoming an instant celebrity— a good thing, as far as he was concerned, or he would now be cleaning latrines somewhere in Alaska.
Dixon’s contriteness after the affair had also played in his favor. Knowlington had as much told him that, if he kept his nose clean for a few days, he would rejoin Devil Squadron by the end of next week. And that meant he would find himself back in the air— the only reason to be in the Air Force at all, as far as Dixon was concerned.
So he was on more than his best behavior. Staying out of trouble wasn’t all that hard, actually, since his exile was more than just symbolic: The FIDO needed less than no help, and no one else at Black Hole had any place to put him. He’d been given a back desk in a back office carved from a custodian’s closet in an auxiliary building some distance from the main Black Hole contingent in the Royal Saudi Air Force building. He was so far from the action scorpions didn’t even bother to visit.
Which was why the knock on the outside wall literally scared the hell out of him. Dixon jerked his head up and saw the door frame filled by a six-six bruiser of an air force officer, with round, dark black cheeks and a smiling face that seemed semi-familiar.
“Ben Greer. Remember?”
“Oh, yeah,” said Dixon, rising to shake the major’s hand. He and Major Greer had shared root beers together at King Fahd his first night in Saudi Arabia— neither he nor Greer drank alcohol. “How are you?”
“In one piece. How the hell are you? I hear you’re a hero.”
“Nah. I came around behind my lead and bam, there was a chopper in my face. I don’t know which one of us was more surprised.”
“That’s not the way they tell it on CNN.”
“I wouldn’t necessarily believe everything I heard.”
“This is your reward, huh? Looks more like purgatory. I didn’t even know this was an Air Force building.”
“Kind of a long story.”
Greer flew an MH-53J Pave Low Super Jolly Green Giant chopper, a serious piece of whirly meat specially fitted for clandestine missions behind enemy lines. Based at Fahd like the A-10As, the Pave Lows were under the direction of the Special Ops command, a special group that combined army, air force and navy commandos. They were tasked with a variety of jobs, most importantly— at least as far as Dixon was concerned— SAR or search and rescue missions. They spent a lot of time in the hot and dusty regions of the war zone.
Because SAR was not specifically an air force operation, there was friction at the command level and a bit of grousing from some pilots, who questioned whether they would get the operational priority they needed when the shit hit the fan. Nonetheless, the crews who manned the Pave Lows were full-blooded members of the right-stuff fraternity, and Dixon felt a little awed by the much older Greer.
“Want to go grab dinner?” Greer asked.
“I’d love to but, uh, shit, this guy invited me to his house, and— ”
“Coffee? Just take a minute.” Greer had a strange look in his eye, as if this wasn’t completely a request.
“Well sure, what the hell.”
“Off-campus, so to speak.”
“Off-campus?”
“I wanted to talk to you about something where we won’t be disturbed. I got just the place.”
“Um, OK. Let me just tell the sergeant where I’ll be.”
Greer gave him a “you-weren’t-listening” squint.
“I mean, let me just tell her I’ll be out for a while,” said Dixon.
Ten minutes later, over some of the sweetest yet strongest coffee Dixon had experienced outside a hangar, the major laid out a plan for a Special Ops strike of Scud sites.
It was, as Dixon told him, a brilliant plan. But why, exactly, was he hearing it?
“We’ve been getting nowhere with the brass, and when I heard you were at Black Hole, I figured that was a message from God.” Greer gave Dixon a huge, Special Ops grin— his twentieth, at least, since they had sat down.
“I don’t have much influence,” Dixon told him.
“You can talk to some people, right? I heard Glossom likes you.”
“General Glossom? I’ve never even met him one-on-one.”
“Shit, guy like you? Splashes a chopper with a Hog? They’ll listen to you. Just bring it up in a meeting, offhanded kinda. We can take out the Scuds. I guarantee that. We’ll blow those little fuckers into so many pieces no one’ll even know they were there.”
“It’s just I don’t think I can talk anyone into it. Shouldn’t you guys be working on the CINC?”
“His Cincship?” Greer gave him a disrespectful grin. “Boss is working on Schwarzkopf personally. This is more a guerrilla operation me and some of the guys are drumming up.”
There was that smile again. Then something lit in Greer’s eyes, a bit too obvious to have been anything but rehearsed.
“Hey, I just thought of something,” he told Dixon. “You ought to sign up for some Special Ops yourself. As an observer. I can get you in, no sweat. We can use Hog pilots.”
“Go on.”
“No shit. A lot of pilots are bitching about the SAR flights. You could tell them what’s going on. That’s how we sell it from your end, and I’ll take care of it on mine. Shit, you’d be perfect. Forget SAR. You can come with us and blow up Scuds. I’ll pull strings and get you on board. My colonel is an A-1 guy. Man, he loves Hogs. Love ‘em. I think he creams just thinking about them.”
“I’d love to, but —”
“It’s done then. My colonel’ll make the call. In the meantime, make the pitch for us, OK? This is the kind of thing we’ve been training for.”
A half hour later, Dixon found himself in his supervisor’s office, repeating word for word— except for an occasional stutter— what Greer had told him.
The answer came quickly.
“No.”
“I’m sorry, Major, I knew you wouldn’t —”
“At ease, Dixon, relax. You’re the fifth guy who made this pitch today. Special Ops is putting on a full court press to get into the Scud game. I think they’ve assigned someone to work over everyone in Riyadh.” The major drew back in his chair, cracking his knuckles with a full finger spread. “I hear you’re getting bored around the office.”
“Who told you that?”
“Little birdie gave me a call just five minutes ago. Listen, I know the only reason you’re up here is that some general somewhere wanted to make sure the press could get a look at you. Well, they have. You’re chomping at the bit, aren’t you?”