RAZOR’S EDGE
165
“Looking good, Zen,” Breanna told her husband as the second U/MF rolled off their wing and sped off to the east. The robot planes had to stay within a ten-mile radius of the Megafortress because of their wide-band communications link.
“Hawk leader,” acknowledged her husband stiffly.
“Still cranky, huh?” Chris said as they began their run south.
“He’s not much of a morning person,” said Breanna.
“Have some J bands, gun dish—looks like a ring of Zsu-23s using their radars,” said O’Brien, who was monitoring the radar intercepts. The computer system guiding him would have been the envy of any Cobra Ball operator, able to glide between a dozen different sensors, prioritizing intercepts and pointing out suspicious activity without prompting. Then again, they might not have been envious—it did the work of eight crewmen, making all of them eligible for early retirement.
“Dog Ear detected—they’re looking for low fliers at Eight-eight Bravo,” added O’Brien.
“Let’s pass that on,” said Breanna. “They’re still a good distance away.”
“Coyote Bravo leader, this is Dreamland Quicksilver,”
said Chris.
“Coyote Bravo. Go ahead Quicksilver.”
“We have an active Dog Ear looking for you at Eight-eight Bravo. Indication is they have a Gopher missile battery along with their Zeus guns.”
“Coyote Bravo acknowledges. Thanks for the heads-up, Quicksilver.”
The Gophers—also called SA-13s by NATO—were short- to medium-range SAMs that used infrared radar to lock on their target, similar to the more common SA-9s though somewhat larger and more capable. The Dog Ear radar was used to detect aircraft at a distance. After detec-
166
DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND
tion, a range-finding unit would allow the commander to launch the missiles; their all-aspect, filtered IR sensors would then take them to their target. The systems were relatively sophisticated but defeatable if you knew they were there.
“Have an E band radar that’s not on my menu,” said O’Brien. “Low power, really low power—lost it. Plotting.
Wow—never seen anything like this.”
Aboard Quicksilver , over northern Iraq 0742
ZEN WORKED THE FLIGHTHAWKS AHEAD OF QUICKSILVER, ALternating between One and Two. He was at twenty thousand feet, considerably lower than the EB-52 but well outside the range of the low-altitude AAA and shoulder-launched weapons that were ubiquitous below. His helmet visor was divided into two sections; the upper two-thirds fed an optical view from one of the Flighthawks, simulating what he would see if he were sitting in the cockpit. A HUD ghosted over altitude, speed, and other essentials.
The lower screen was divided into three smaller sections—an instrument summary for both planes at the far left, a long-distance radar plot supplied by Quicksilver in the middle, and an optical cockpit view from the other plane.
The visor display could be infinitely customized, though Zen tended to stick to this preset, using it about ninety percent of the time when he was flying two robots. The voice commands “One” and “Two” instantly changed the main view, a phenomenon he thought of as jumping into the cockpit of the plane. He controlled the small planes with the help of two joysticks, one in his right and one in his left hand. Control for the planes jumped with the view, so that his right hand always worked the plane in the main screen.
RAZOR’S EDGE
167
“O’Brien, you find that E band radar?” asked Zen.
“Negative. Threat library thinks it’s a Side Net but it’s not clear what it would be connected to. Definitely early warning. I can’t even find the source.”
“How about approximately?” Zen asked.
They plotted it below 88 Bravo and a bit to the east, which put it fifty miles away and dead on in Hawk One’s path near the Iranian border. A Side Net radar was a long-range target acquisition unit, capable of detecting a plane the size of an F-16 at roughly ninety-five miles; with its uncoated nose, the Megafortress was possibly though not definitely visible around the same range. The Flighthawk would be invisible at least to ten miles, and might not even be seen at all.
Of course, with the radar off, it could see nothing at all.
Zen’s threat radar was clean.
“What do you think it’s working with?” Zen asked O’Brien.
“Ordinarily I’d say an SA-2 and SA-3 battalion,” answered O’Brien. “But at this point it’s anybody’s guess.
There are no known sites in the area.”
“Maybe this is the sucker we’re looking for.”
“Could be. They’re not on the air. Tracking some other stuff,” added O’Brien. “Man, there are a lot of radars up here—didn’t we put these suckers out of business five years ago?”
“I’m going to get a little lower and see if I spot anything,” said Jeff. “We’ll store the video for the analysts.”
“Sounds good, Captain. I’ll alert you if I get another read.”
“Strike aircraft are zero-three from their IPs,” said Chris, indicating that the attackers were just about to start their bombing runs.
Zen concentrated on the image in his screen as he tucked toward the earth, looking for the semicircle of 168
DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND
launchers and trailers the Iraqis liked to set their missiles up in. SA-2s were large suckers always accompanied by a variety of support vehicles; they could be obscured by netting and other camouflage but not totally hidden.
SA-3s were about half the size, but they too should stick out if they were positioned to fire.
O’Brien’s rough plot was centered around a farming area on a relatively flat plain about two miles square.
With no indications of any military activity—or any activity at all—Zen nudged the Flighthawk faster and slightly farther east, widening his search pattern.
“Losing connection, ” warned the computer as he strayed a bit too far.
Zen immediately throttled back, letting Quicksilver catch up. As his speed dropped, a row of black boxes appeared in the lower left screen.
“Magnify ground image,” he told the computer. A scanner tracking his retinas interpreted exactly which images he meant.
“O’Brien, I have four stationary vehicles, look like they might be radar or telemetry vans. Not set up.”
“You see a dish?”
“Negative,” said Jeff. “No missiles.”
He slid the robot plane closer to the ground. Razor was mobile, roughly the size of a tank.
“Losing connection, ” warned the computer again.
“Bree, I need you to stay with Hawk One.”
“We’re at our turn,” Breanna told him. Her priority was the attack package, at least until they saddled up and headed home.
The first vehicle was a car, oldish, a nondescript Japa-nese sedan.
Two pickup trucks.
A flatbed.
RAZOR’S EDGE
169
Not Razor, not anything.
“Radar—something,” said O’Brien.
“Connection loss in five seconds, ” pleaded the com -
puter. “Four, three—”
Zen flicked his wrist back, bringing the Flighthawk west to stay with the Megafortress.
“Vehicles were clean,” he told Breanna.
“Acknowledged,” she said.
“Got something else,” said O’Brien. “Jayhawk—airplanes on A-1.”