Far below and to the northeast, a Redfleet Surface Action Group was cruising the waters of the North Atlantic: four submarines, three cruisers, and six destroyers in escort of the Kiev-class carrier Minsk.
A radar operator in the Minsk’s attack center had picked up the F-111’s signal. Its speed indicated he was tracking a military jet. The chance to observe American military aircraft wasn’t taken lightly.
Three Yak-36 VTOL interceptors had been scrambled. They were far from the cutting edge of technology. But advanced Soviet interceptors hadn’t been engineered to withstand the stress of catapult launches and arrester-hook landings like their American counterparts, and the vertical-takeoff-and-landing Forgers were the only aircraft deployed on Redfleet carriers.
In the F-111’s cockpit, Shepherd was intently studying the three blips on his radar screen. “Nothing coming back on the IFF,” he observed. Identification friend or foe transponders were carried on all NATO aircraft; radar blips not accompanied by an IFF symbol were considered hostile. “Have to be Forgers,” he concluded. “Under or over? What do you say?”
“We have twenty angels on their ceiling,” Brancato replied, suggesting they climb to avoid contact.
“Going to be tight,” Shepherd said.
He pulled back on the stick, putting the F-111 into a climb. The Forger’s ceiling was 41,000 feet, the F-111’s 60,000. At a rate of climb of 3,592 feet per minute, the F-111 would reach clear air in 3 minutes 10 seconds. The F-111 kept streaking upward through the blinding whiteness. The beeps from the radar detector were coming faster. The altimeter had just ticked 37,000 when they blended into a screech.
“Three bogies dead ahead fifteen miles,” Brancato announced. “We’re not going to make it.”
At a combined closing speed of 40 miles a minute, the 15-mile gap closed in just over 20 seconds.
The two lead Forgers split at the last instant and screamed past; one above, followed an eyeblink later by the second below. The passes were dangerously close.
The F-111 shuddered and bounced, emitting loud, thumping protests as it slammed into the vortex of turbulent air that spiraled off the Forgers.
“Crazy bastards,” Brancato growled.
“Six months on a carrier’ll do it to you.”
The third Forger was still 10 miles away, closing on the F-111’s nose from below.
“I got a lock on the trailer,” Brancato said, which meant the F-111’s computerized attack radar system was targeted on the approaching Forger. It was a warning, a game of one-upmanship, a deadly way of making a point. Hell, the Russian had it coming.
“Squirm, turkey, squirm,” Shepherd drawled, at the thought of the Soviet pilot’s radar detector letting him know that, but for an aversion to starting World War III and a clean plane, he and Brancato would have blown him out of the skies.
They had no way of knowing that the Russian was a kid; that his wingmen had purposely set him up for an initiation, fully expecting he would get the “treatment” for their harassment of the F-111. Unfortunately, the treatment had an effect his wing-men hadn’t anticipated. The novice pilot froze in the cockpit, his eyes wide with terror at the thought of his young life being ended by one of the Sidewinder missiles he imagined hung from the hardpoints beneath the F-111’s wings.
“What the hell?” Shepherd exclaimed, realizing the planes were on a collision course, seconds from impact.
He turned hard right, executing the standard avoidance maneuver, expecting the Russian to do the same. He didn’t. Instead, he panicked and turned left across the F-111’s path, just beneath its nose.
The Forger’s wingtip slashed into the underside of the bomber’s fuselage just forward of the cockpit. A hailstorm of metal fragments filled the air as the wingtip disintegrated and the Forger continued past. Several of the projectiles punctured the F-111’s skin. One tore through the left sidewall beneath the auxiliary gauge panel and slammed into Brancato’s right shoulder.
“Al? Al?” Shepherd shouted, over the piercing whistle of rushing air as the cockpit depressurized.
Brancato groaned in pain. His hand clutched the blood-soaked shoulder of his flight suit. A crimson splash was creeping up the side of the canopy, turning it into a garish stained-glass window that gave a red glow to the cockpit.
Shepherd scanned the instrument paneclass="underline" the master caution light was full on; the left engine tachometer was surging erratically, indicating the whirling turbine had ingested metal fragments; the utility pressure gauge had dropped to well below 1,000 psi, which meant the hydraulic system that deployed landing gear and activated speed brakes was also damaged.
Shepherd shut the malfunctioning engine down, pushed his oxygen mask bayonets tight into the receivers, then did the same to Brancato’s. “Al? Come on, Alfredo, talk to me!”
“I don’t know, I feel real weird,” Brancato muttered. “Better head home.”
“We’re past the PNR,” Shepherd replied, making reference to the point of no return, which meant they were closer to England than the United States. “Hang in there,” he said. He thumbed the radio transmit button and began broadcasting. “Four-eight TAC? This is Viper-Two. Four-eight TAC, this is Viper-Two. I have an in-flight emergency. Do you read?”
“This is Four-eight TAC,” Lakenheath tower replied. “Affirmative, Viper-Two. Go ahead.”
“Harassed and struck in midair by hostile aircraft. Assume Soviet Forger. My wizzo’s injured. We have frag penetration in the capsule; left engine and utility pump are out. ETA nineteen-thirty zulu.”
“Copy, Viper-Two. You have an immediate CTL. Repeat, immediate CTL. We’ll monitor.”
The three Forgers were nowhere in sight now.
Shepherd brought the wings forward to 16 degrees and set the throttle of the working engine to cruise speed; then he engaged the autopilot and unzipped Brancato’s flight suit, peeling it away from the wound. “How’re you doing?”
“Nothing a dish of fettuccine wouldn’t cure,” Brancato growled, fighting the pain.
Shepherd removed his squadron scarf, folded it into a thick wad, and pressed it against the bloody puncture. “That one T or two?”
“Huh?”
“How many Ts in fettuccine?”
“Two, dammit. You going to do this all the way in?”
“Yeah. Somebody once told me it’s impossible for a Sicilian to die while he’s talking.”
“God.” Brancato groaned, adjusting his position in the flight couch.
“That big G or little g?”
3
That same morning in Washington, D.C., while shock waves from the bombing of the TWA jetliner reverberated round the world, armored limousines converged on the White House. They snaked between the concrete barricades, depositing solemn passengers at the South Portico.
The hastily convened group sat with the president in the cabinet room as he read a memorandum. It listed the names, hometowns, and ages of the four Americans who had been killed. One was a fourteen-month-old child. The president’s lips tightened in anger; then, he set down the memo and looked up at his advisers.
“Is this Qaddafi’s work?” he asked softly.
“We can’t prove he gave the order, sir,” National Security Adviser Kenneth Lancaster said, “but we know he did.”
“I think it’s time to consider an air strike against Libya,” the secretary of state chimed in.
“Not in my book,” the chairman of the Joint Chiefs said firmly. “I’m going on record right now as opposed to any military response to terrorism. Frankly, I’m far more interested in talking about the Soviets,” he went on, chafing over the incident with the Forgers.