That was the theory. To Captain Lars Warren, stroking the control column to avoid yet another Iraqi SAM site, the reality was very different. As long as he stayed where he was — fifty feet above the increasingly bumpy and varied terrain — his Herk couldn’t be seen by radar. It could be heard, however, and the night wasn’t nearly so dark that it couldn’t be seen — as a row of tracers erupting to his left vigorously demonstrated.
“We’re okay,” said the navigator, presumably meaning that the gun was being fired simply by sight, and not very well.
Lars didn’t answer. He held his flight path steady, passing the tracers without getting hit.
Or at least, without knowing if he was hit.
“The A-10s have engaged the target vehicle,” Kelly told him. “Destroyed. Everything’s moving ahead, just with the timetable pushed up. Two Hogs coming west to cover us. F-16s en route as well.”
Lars grunted. He didn’t want a play-by-play. He didn’t want to hear anything except for the loud drone of the Herk’s four-bladed engines.
“Thirty-five minutes to show time,” said the navigator.
“Okay.”
“GPS looks good.”
“Okay.”
They were headed toward the Euphrates, not far from the heart of the country. They’d take one more turn, get on a direct course to the target area. They’d pop up about sixty seconds before hitting the target area and take a hard turn southwest. The balloon ought to be right in front of him, sitting pretty at five hundred feet.
Right.
They’d hook the line with the prong at their nose. A guideline ran from the wingtips to the forward fuselage to protect the line from the propellers. After the rope was snared, the crew would winch in the first two members of the team. He’d then come around and repeat the process for the last man. It would take between six and ten minutes to get them in.
Right.
There were a million Iraqis below, every single one of them armed to the teeth. There were a million anti-aircraft weapons of every description — 23mm, 56mm, shoulder-fired heat seekers, high-altitude SA-2s, Rolands, SA-6s, SA-9s, machine-guns, and pistols. Even a stinking slingshot could nail them this low, this slow, this straight.
At least one flight of MiGs had taken off earlier and was still inexplicably unaccounted for. The AWACS and the interceptors scrambled to meet them lost them near their air base. Did that mean they had landed — or were they simply flying low like Lars was?
Lars heard himself give the crew a briefing on the situation. They were on course and in the green.
“Cool,” he said. “Everything’s cool.”
Where the hell did that BS come from?
He checked his course again, careful to keep an eye on the terrain-following radar. The flight engineer went through the systems readouts. The navigator counted down to the turn. They hit the way-marker and he banked, fighting off some unexpected turbulence. His hands turned to jelly. He told himself he was sticking with it, and heard the pilot gasping for air.
He was the pilot now. He was the one who couldn’t breathe.
“Thirty minutes,” said the navigator.
“Thirty,” said Lars. “Everything’s cool.”
CHAPTER 57
A-Bomb began closing the distance between himself and Skull as they came up on the initial target area south of Kajuk. The ground team had finally checked in with the controller; Devils One and Two were going to take a pass and knock down any units that might try and follow Wong and the boys back to their pickup spot.
The way A-Bomb saw it, the mission had been among the most boring he’d ever flown. Sure, they’d hit a heavily armed SAM site and saved a French guy, but he personally hadn’t done much more than wreck two trucks. Hell, he could have gotten that at home.
Often had, come to think about it.
But that was the way your luck went. Sometimes you got the short straw and diddled around with pickup trucks and a ZSU that couldn’t hit a BUFF flying at a thousand feet with four engines out. Other days you got to nail down a Scud, fry a dozen T-72s and duck a battery of SA-6s, all before you finished drinking your coffee.
Would be nice to nail the Mercedes, he thought, focusing in on the sedan with his IR viewer. The doors were open, it was off the side of the road, and it was obviously not a threat, but there was nothing like poking holes in over-priced German sheet metal to puff up your chest. Frenchie woulda liked it, too.
“A-Bomb, I got some vehicles on that highway at the base of the hill. You see ‘em?”
“Not yet,” he told Skull, pulling the viewer back out to what passed for wide-screen.
“Some sort of gun on one of them. I’m not sure if it’s a tank or what, but it seems to be the only thing big left down there. Armored car or BMP, maybe.”
“Could be,” agreed A-Bomb, still trying to find them.
“I’m going to sweep around and run south toward those vehicles Doberman hit before they left. If you can’t find anything else, take out the gun.”
“It’s what I’m talkin’ about,” said A-Bomb.
“Watch your fuel.”
“Always.”
“Vipers claim they’ll be here in zero-five.”
“Tell ‘em to take their time.”
A-Bomb checked his position against the INS and his paper map. He knew which hill Skull meant — it ought to be just left of center at the bottom of his windscreen, which should put the road right across the center of the Maverick’s targeting video. But damned if all he had there were a few rocks.
Problem was, he was too high — eight thousand feet. Hog didn’t like to fly this stinking high. Eight hundred, now that was an altitude to fly at.
A-Bomb did the ol’ tuck and roll, plummeting toward the earth as the plane squealed with delight.
And hot damn, there were the vehicles Skull had told him about, definitely a BMP and something smaller, transport or an oversized pickup. Hot spots on both suddenly flared, guns blazing away on the ground.
A-Bomb wanted to reserve one missile so he’d be able to see the ground without resorting to a flare if things got hot again. On the other hand, it looked to be impossible to hit both with one shot; they were separated by five yards.
Hit the side of the BMP and go for the bounce.
He dialed in the Maverick and fired. Something on the ground blinked as the AGM’s motor lit. Gunfire sparkled all around.
Iraqis couldn’t be firing at themselves.
Shit. His guys must have wandered up there where they didn’t belong. They were going to be damn close to the BMP went it went boom.
All he could do was watch.
CHAPTER 58
Dixon grabbed for his rifle as he fell backwards into the trench, expecting the Iraqi who had just opened fire to run forward spraying his automatic rifle. But the man’s first shots had been mistaken by the troops near the BMP as the enemy’s and they began shooting. The armored vehicle rolled forward a few yards from its hiding spot, splattering bullets from its machine-gun and 73 mm cannon. Dixon squirreled around to his stomach, clutching Budge as the gunfire crescendoed; a small truck parked ten yards beyond where the man had been burst into flame. Only then did the shooting stop. There were shouts, screams — two Iraqis ran from the BMP, talking and huffing for breathe. Dixon looked at Budge as they passed, then back at his rifle. The tone of the men’s words turned harsh and then anguished as they neared the truck; they realized they had just killed their own men.