The moist clouds would throw off the missile"s heat-seeking guidance system by diffusing the heat from the attacking jet"s tailpipe.
"Roger, copy. Standing by." If Howie Joseph had any fear of a missile, it didn"t appear in his voice.
"Ah, Phantom Zero One, this is Moonbeam. Can you come up Fox Mike?"
Court changed radios and called back. Moonbeam answered.
"Didn"t want to clutter up Guard any more than we had to.
Got a question for you from Seventh. Sorry "bout that, know you"re busy. They want to know who are the attackers and what is their Order of Battle?"
Court told them it was thirty or so Spetsnaz.
"Spet-who?"
Court spelled it out phonetically. There was a pause, then Moonbeam came back on. "Unh, Phantom, we got a phone patch for you from Seventh.
Some, ah, Oh Seven wants to talk to you." Oh Seven was part of a numbering system denoting an officer"s rank. Oh One was a second lieutenant, six grades higher was a brigadier general: an Oh Seven.
"Go," Court said.
A very faint and garbled voice came through the headset.
"Phantom, this is Blue Chip. Do you read?" Blue Chip was the call sign for the air support command post run by 7di Air Force.
On instinct Court did not answer. Blue Chip called twice more, then said, "Phantom, this is Blue Chip transmitting in the blind. You are not to engage foreign nationals, repeat, you are not to engage foreign nationals. Under no circ.u.mstances are you to engage or cause casualties to foreign nationals. This is Blue Chip at 2015 Zulu Hours, 2 November 1968." Foreign nationals was the current euphemism for, Court guessed, Russians.
Wolf gave a low whistle. "Is that how your generals operate a war?"
Even in the humid night, Court felt his face flame. He couldn"t tell if it was from anger or embarra.s.sment. A little of each, he decided. He realized he had to make some response, then decided no response was best, as if he had not received the message.
"Phantom, this is Moonbeam. Did you copy the message?"
"It was pretty garbled, Moonbeam," Court waffled.
"Blue Chip wants to know if you copied or not."
"Tell them ... tell them I copied but will act as required to save the mission."
There was a pause, then Moonbeam came back on. "They want your initials, Phantom."
"Charley Baker."
Another pause. "They"re happy now."
"What was that all about?" Wolf asked.
"A little game of CYA--Cover Your a.s.s. Some brigadier will sleep better tonight knowing he"s carrying out regulations."
Wolf made a faint snort. "Okay," he said, "time to go. It"ll take us at least ten minutes to get up to those guys. It"s critical for you to get the noise in to their west so we can slip by on their east."
Although the faint starlight from the cloud break to the west gave overall form, it was much too dark to make out substance.
Wolf kept the night goggles on and led Court down the side of the rock pile. He carried his AK-47 and wore the rucksack he had taken from the dead Russian. They walked in a crouch, Court"s hands on the pack on Wolf"s back. Each step was done almost in cadence, to help Court put his feet where Wolf had put his and to avoid noise. Court carried the PRC-25 on his back and the RT-10 in his pocket. They kept the firing to their left and stayed off the path as they headed north. Twice Wolf eased them to a halt and they crouched down and waited for a movement to their left to subside. When they were almost abreast of the firing, Wolf veered behind a limestone outcropping.
"Now," he said, "put your man to work."
Court pulled out the RT-10 and called Phantom Zero Two.
"Okay," he told him, "put four w.i.l.l.y Petes below the ridge, west side."
For his night mission Howie Joseph had turned all the instrument lights off in the front c.o.c.kpit of the big F-4D Phantom jet he was flying. The lights were simply too bright even when turned to "dim," and destroyed the pilot"s night vision. Howie had the red-filtered c.o.c.kpit lamp attached to a swivel over his right elbow at its lowest setting. The soft glow barely illuritinated the att.i.tude indicator that showed Howie the position of his airplane relative to the horizon: diving, climbing, banking.
He could not read his airspeed or alt.i.tude. He relied on his GIB--Guy in Back-for that information. He reached around the control stick to a panel and by feel selected the proper switches to fire his w.i.l.l.y Pete rockets. w.i.l.l.y Pete was pilot slang for the white phosphorus head of the rocket that exploded in a blinding white flash and issued huge volumes of thick smoke to mark targets for fighters to strike. His GIB was First Lieutenant John Martin.
"Got that Eagle Station on your scope, John?" Howie was asking if Martin had broken out the mile-high karst on his ground radar screen. Howie had a repeater scope up front but kept it off to protect his night vision.
"Got it. One o"clock for ten."
They were ten miles south of the karst. Howie turned northwest until he was in position to roll in west to east and fire his rockets at the west face. They were three miles above the ground in the night sky, flitting in and out of clouds that were black shadows against starlight made dim by a high, thin overcast.
"Thirty-degree dive," Howie alerted Martin on the intercom.
"I"ll pickle at eight thou."
"Pickle" was slang left over from World War II bombardiers, meaning to push the b.u.t.ton that released the ordnance. A good bombardier, it was said, could put a bomb in a pickle barrel.
"Rodg," Martin answered. His job now was to monitor the situation and call out the dive angle, airspeed, and alt.i.tudes as his frontseater made his pa.s.s.
"Zero Two"s in, west to east, rockets," Howie transmitted to Court in the stylized cadence of a combat pilot. "Wish I could say "FAC in sight,"" he added. That was a normal call for a day-strike pilot to let his FAC know he wouldn"t be overrun.
Tonight it was Howie"s attempt at humor, for he knew his boss was in deep s.h.i.t without a stepladder. He heard the two clicks in his headset as Court punched his mike b.u.t.ton in the standard abbreviated response that meant "I understand."
"Alt.i.tude 12 thou, airspeed 425 and increasing, dive angle 25 and increasing."
"Unh, huh." Howie Joseph concentrated on trying to pierce the black night in front of him, to break out the bulk of the huge karst piece into which he wanted to slam his rockets.
"Going through 10, you got 450 and 30 degrees. Looking good."
"Unh, huh." Howie strained against his harness as his plane plunged through the black clouds, now in a cloud, now in the clear. "G.o.d- d.a.m.n," he said to himself. Where is thatfrapping mountain? Something niggled in his mind. He had forgotten something. This was not the normal sequence for him to strike a target. Normally he was either the FAC or the strike pilot.
Tonight he was a little of each, but something had been left out of the ritual. Some piece of information.
"Eight thou," John Martin said. "Pickle and pull, pickle and pull."
"s.h.i.t-don"t see it yet," Howie Joseph breathed into his mask. He held the dive. "Give me another 500." Those were his last words. His last thought in the split second when the black karst appeared in front of his airplane and when he reflexively jerked the stick full back in his lap was the absolutely clear revelation that they had never gotten an altimeter setting for their descent below orbit alt.i.tude.
The 50,000-pound airplane slammed into the karst in a nosehigh att.i.tude, driving the white-hot engines into the remaining 8,000 pounds of JP-4 fuel, causing a blinding flash and a rolling, boiling red fireball that lit up the entire karst ridge as it climbed skyward borne on its own heat. The high tail section of the F-4 broke off at impact and whistled and spun though the air up the slope and over the top and cracked into the rock surface in the radar compound.
"Oh G.o.d," Court Bannister yowled in agony.
"Move it," Wolf barked and grabbed Court by the sleeve and pulled him running and stumbling to the safety of the sandbagged Flaming Arrow pit.
He had jerked the goggles down to his neck the instant they had bloomed in the green incandescence caused by the fireball which lit the terrain for the time Wolf needed to make the run. He had had time to note the position of several of the Spetsnaz troops as he ran behind them while they all looked up to the horrid rising sun in the west. As the fireball climbed and faded, Wolf had time to swing the arrow toward the enemy, pull an oil-soaked rag from the nearest can, tear it in two, hand half to Court, and say, "Time to light up."
Almost in a trance, Court put down the radio he had clutched in his hand and reached in his pocket and pulled out the lighter.
Darkness lit only by the fire down the slope settled on the pit, but he still saw in his mind the roaring flame that meant the death of two of his men. Mechanically he held the lighter out, flipped open the top, and was about to spin the wheel when he stopped. Reality had suddenly replaced tragedy.
"Wait," he said to Wolf. "No point in lighting this thing and calling attention to ourselves until we get Spectre set up." He had his mind back on business.
"Right-Ao it," Wolf said over his shoulder. Court could just make out Wolf"s form as he lay p.r.o.ne behind the sandbags, aiming his rifle in the direction of the firing Flames below the lip of the cliff illuminated the low clouds to the west, which acted as a soft backdrop to the scene.
"We don"t have much time. I think they"re getting ready to rush the bunker," Wolf called.
Court unslung the PRC-25 radio from his back, turned it on, and called Spectre 24.
"My G.o.d, man, what happened down there?" the table nav responded. "I"ve got more IR light than Times Square."
"Spectre, relay to Moonbeam that Phantom Zero Two impacted with the ground at 0315 Hours local with no survivors."
"Wilco," a sober voice acknowledged.
"And, Spectre, have you got a clear read on the easternmost fire?" Court had put the crash of Phantom 02 out of his mind and dealt with the problems at hand.
"Affirmative, but it"s not consistent."
"That"s okay. I"m going to light a Flaming Arrow about 200 meters east of that flame. Hose down the area from fifty meters in front of the Arrow westerly to the other flame. Copy?"
"Roger," Spectre said. "Good copy." He repeated the instructions.
"I"ll have the arrow lit in two secs," Court said and flicked a flame to his lighter and torched off the rag he held. He could easily see the whole arrow as he moved quickly from can to can, igniting the rags within. He heard Wolf fire three shots.
"They"re onto us now," he called out. "Get those guys shooting, Schnell."
"Okay, Spectre, have at it. We"ll take all you got."
Before he could reply, a new voice cut in. "Phantom, Spectre, this is Moonbeam senior controller, do not fire. Repeat, do not fire. You are not cleared by Blue Chip."
0330 Hours LOCAL, SAt.u.r.dAY 2 NOVEMBER 1968 EAGLE STATION AT LIMA SITE 85.
ROYALTY OF LAOS.
"What"s going on?" Wolf yelled back to Court. "We need that firepower now."
"What do you mean?" Court roared into the handset to the Moonbeam controller. "Not cleared? Jesus Christ, man, we"re under attack here.
Give us Spectre or we"re dead meat."
"You got to answer some questions," the senior controller said, his voice less certain. "It"s for the ROE. Do you have a TIC?"
"ROE, TIC. Jesus Christ, YES, for G.o.d"s sake, yes."
There was a man in the Blue Chip command post, it was theorized, whose sole job it was to conjure up acronyms. ROE for Rules of Engagement and TIC for Troops in Contact were a couple he had done just for warmup one day before breakfast.
"Are American lives and/or property in danger?"
"Jesus Christ, YES, you n.u.m.b.n.u.t.s. Will you give Spectre permission to shoot?"
"What are your initials?"
Wolf was firing steadily now. Court had to duck down as bullets whistled over the rim of the pit. He had the crazy urge to run about and put out the telltale flames in the cans with his hands. If Spectre couldn"t shoot, the flaming arrow worked in reverse, putting him and Wolf under fire from Spetznaz.
"Shoot, G.o.dd.a.m.n it, shoot."
"Your initials?"
"Charlie Baker, you a.s.shole," Court thundered into the hand set.
"Stand by."
"Get that thing from the ruck," Wolf yelled. "The mine. Open it up.
Hurry."
Court tore into the rucksack and jerked out a black metal container the size of four cigarette cartons. He fumbled until he found a key like a Spam can and peeled back the top, which opened with a hiss of air. He took out a convex plastic device, some wire, and a small plunger. The plunger spun a tiny generator to send a charge of electricity down the wire to detonate the mine.
"Hook up the wires, then hold the plunger and give me the mine," Wolf said between bursts.
Court did as he was told in the flickering light. Wolf took the mine, yelled at Court to hold tight to the plunger while the wires unwound, fired a long burst, then heaved the mine in the direction of the enemy.
"Push on that thing when I tell you," he yelled at Court. He leaned back to his AK-47 and fired a long burst. "Scheiss," he yelled. "Here they come. Push the plunger."
The flickering flames from the arrow accentuated the sweat and grime on his face and the deep furrows of his brow. "Push it NOW," he bellowed.
"Phantom, this is Moonbeam senior controller relaying for Blue Chip, do you read?"
Court ducked as more bullets flew over the edge of the pit and jammed down on the plunger. Nothing happened. He frantically pulled it up and slammed it down twice more. There was no answering explosion. He checked that he had wound the wires correctly around the posts. He had.
"Phantom, do you read Moonbeam?"
"Yes, yes, G.o.dd.a.m.n it. Tell Spectre to fire." Court s.n.a.t.c.hed at the handset, his voice ragged with tension and frustration.
"Spectre, do you read Moonbeam?"
"Jesus Christ, YES. Can we shoot or not?"
"Spectre, this is the Moonbeam senior controller. Blue Chip clears you to--2"