Interesting, combining submarine and air attacks was something quite new. Then deal with the troopships as appropriate. Another interesting thing, detailed instructions on what to do if the Chipanese interfered with the Australians (summarized as “do whatever it takes” ) but not a word on what to do if the Australians tried to interfere with the Chipanese. There was an unspoken message there.
OK, he'd need to get his torpedoes checked out. He had a mix of Mark 14s straight-runners and the new Mark 37 homing torpedoes up forward. Skipjack had no stern tubes, her new hull form didn't allow it. Runken decided to get all the Mark 14s stripped and checked over, he had an ingrained mistrust of his torpedoes, based on too many bad experiences. According to the Torpedo Factory and the NUWC, all the problems had been fixed and the torpedoes were as good as any in the world. The Mark 37s, they were another matter. If they worked, they'd be truly deadly. If. They were new and untested. That had been the next item on the original trials schedule.
Suddenly Runken had an inspiration. One of the Torpedomen was Long Tree, a full-blooded Apache Indian. It was rumored he'd joined the Navy after doing something unimaginably horrible to a man who had abused his sister. When he went down to the torpedo room, he'd consult with Long Tree, get some expert advice on a suitable fate for his father. With that satisfying thought in mind, he gave the orders for the speed run.
Nellis AFB, Nevada. Primary Operating Base of “Red Sun” Combat Training Range
The sun was setting, the cloud-streaked red globe just touching the horizon. The evening was already darkening as the F-106A interceptors flared on final approach and touched down, landing lights shining from the shadowed fighters like stars, the last of the sunlight coloring their drogue chutes a rich crimson. Originally, it had been planned that the first of the F-106 units, the 498th Fighter Interceptor Squadron based at Geiger AFB in Washington would take part on this year's Red Sun but it hadn't happened. Tension was flaring in the Pacific and the powers that be hadn't wanted to move NORADs latest and most capable interceptors from the West Coast. Instead, the second operational F-106 unit, from the Eastern USA, was taking its place.
As the interceptors landed and taxied to their revetments, the base personnel saw the tailcodes and nose art on the aircraft. Word spread like wildfire across Nellis where concessionaires anxiously compared anticipated revenues with likely damage and the base police grimly resigned themselves to a lively few days. The news didn't even hesitate at the base perimeter and howled into Las Vegas, sweeping through the Strip and its associated “entertainment” areas. Bar owners frantically contacted their wholesalers, quadrupling their orders for every alcoholic beverage known to man. The Casinos doubled their staff and put everybody on overtime. The showgirls readied themselves for long shifts and made inquiries about buying new convertibles and fur coats on the anticipated proceeds. The word surged on, spreading across the residential areas that surrounded the Strip. Anxious fathers sat by their front doors with loaded shotguns while their nubile daughters climbed out their bedroom windows and set off for Nellis. The Louisiana Air National Guard 122nd Fighter Interceptor Squadron, better known as The Bayou Militia had arrived.
Nike-Hercules Test and Evaluation Battery, “Red Sun” Combat Training Range
One of the merits of Red Sun was that things happened very fast once the exercises made their necessity clear. The lesson of the first four days of the exercise had been very clear. The old Ajax missiles were hopelessly outclassed by the new high-flying supersonic bombers. Their range was too short and their performance too low, the new RB-58s simply blasted straight through their coverage arcs. By the time the Ajax missiles were off and on their way, the bombers had fired their own weapons at the launching sites - and the projected nuclear explosions left few survivors. That left the Ajax flying ballistic and the bombers ducked them easily. As a result, word had already come down that the Ajax withdrawal was being accelerated and the batteries would all be converted to Here by the end of next year.
Major James and his Ajax battery crews were in the Here control battery facility gaining initial experience with the new missiles. The new missiles were a great advance on the old Ajax, faster, effective up to 100,000 feet and 100 miles range. Even better, they had a nuclear warhead. With a little luck, they would be able to cope with the new aircraft SAC had brought to the battle. Today would be their major trial, already the sky was filling up with aircraft and the cumulative electronic emissions from radar sets and jamming were causing the desert air to sizzle. It was the first of the big, no-holds-barred exercises. It was the Day of the Big Gorilla.
The Big Gorilla was the lineal descendent of the exercises that had started Red Sun. The bombers had to get through by whatever means they could, the defenses had to stop them by any means they could. Nobody was in any doubt that, by the end of the day, they would be counting crashed aircraft and mourning lost pilots and crews. Already, an F-I02 had been lost; its engine had started to suffer power failure on takeoff and the pilot had realized he lacked the thrust to get over the ridge ahead. So he'd ejected. Unfortunately for his professional reputation, the reduction in weight caused by the loss of himself and his seat just allowed the F-102 to clear the ridge before progressive power loss caused it to belly in the other side. It had landed in soft sand and, although written off, was strippable for spares. The initial accident report already concluded that “on this occasion the aircraft did much better without the services of a pilot.”
Mow, the main action of The Big Gorilla was starting. The long range acquisition radars of the Here battery were showing formations of SAC bombers approaching the exercise area. The main body, B-52s and a few B-60s were still far back but a number of smaller groups were racing ahead. Those would be the RB-58Cs that had been the stars of the exercise so far.
The problem they presented was, conceptually, quite simple. The RB-58 moved high and very fast. From the time the long range search radars had picked them up, it would take eight minutes for them to get overhead. That was a great improvement over the Ajax experience, there the batteries had had less than a minute to respond and they had proved incapable of meeting the challenge. Now, could the new Hercs do any better? The flight path of the Here was an up-and-over, peaking out at 100,000 feet and diving on the formation beneath. That had an unexpected advantage, warned of a surface-to-air missile attack, pilots tended to took down to see the threat, not up. The catch was that the missile trajectory had to be such as to bring the target within the lethal radius of the warhead.
James saw that the radar screens had already exploded into a jagged mass of electronic noise and pinwheels, the effects of the Hustlers using jamming to buy time for their attack runs. The Here operators were dancing around with frequencies, adjusting the jitter factors to try and exclude the radar energy being poured into their sets. The Nike radars were tagging their transmissions now, applying specific shifts of frequency and pulse repetition factors to make the genuine transmissions distinct from the white noise that tried to drown them out.
The screens cleared, the radar images showed that the racing RB-58s had already closed much of the gap. The operators initiated launch and James was stunned to see the big Here missiles lifting off their rails as they hurtled downrange. For an insane moment he thought the battery was shooting live rounds and had a nightmare picture of what might be coming back the other way. Then the words “Smoky Sams” forced their way into his mind. The launches were Here boosters with dummy second stages, designed to give the sound and visual signature of the launch without being a danger to the real aircraft overhead.