Countdown c-6, page 31
part #6 of Carrier Series
"Ninety-nine aircraft, ninety-nine aircraft" sounded over the tactical frequency. "This is Echo-Whiskey Two-one. We're picking up large numbers of bogies coming in from the south, probably from the airfields at Kirovsk and Revda. This could be a general attack."
"What, more bandits?" Tomboy asked. "You'd think they'd be running out of MiGs by now."
"Haven't you heard, Tomboy? They've got an inexhaustible supply.
Somewhere they've got factories cranking out MiGs as fast as we can shoot them down. Check weapons."
"Hot and ready. Shame the bird farm was out of AIM-54s."
"That's okay. We'll just have to sucker them in close."
"Wonderful plan, CAG. You have anything else in mind?"
Tombstone was scanning the surface of the water. Sunlight flashed from a silvery something skimming over the inlet. "Yes, actually. Let's ride in with that A-6 flight down there."
"That'll be Red Hammer One," his RIO told him. "Some of our boys off the Jeff."
"Good enough. We'll ride shotgun for them for a ways. Call the leader and let him know we're here."
"Rog."
More Russian aircraft, mustering to the south. Obviously, the hammer-blow air and cruise-missile strikes over the past twenty-four hours had not been as successful as originally thought. That was often the pattern in modern warfare; high-tech weapons were wonderfully destructive and accurate… but the enemy always seemed to have reserves, an adaptability, a cleverness, not accounted for in the original planning. Too, weapons thought to give ninety-per-cent-plus accuracy were later found to be sixty-percent accurate or less. Men grew tired or careless. Or discouraged.
Of course, the same morale problems would be affecting the other side as well. One of the real challenges of military strategy was knowing when the enemy had reached the end of his reserves, to the point where one more small push might topple his seemingly faultless defenses and bring them crashing down.
Which side, he wondered, would break first in this contest?
1319 hours
Intruder 504
Over the Kola Inlet
"CAG?" Willis Payne twisted in his seat, trying to see behind and above the low-flying A-6. "What the shit is he doing out here?"
"Slumming?" Sunshine replied, her face buried in her radar scope. "Or maybe they're really getting hard up back in Ops. They're sending in the REMFs."
"Hey, lady, from what I've heard, Magruder's no rear-echelon mother-"
"Aw, shit, he's a four-striper, ain't he? Sits at a desk, writes up fitness reports, fills out requisitions, wipes noses. Coming up on nine miles to Polyamyy. Weapons armed. Pickle's hot."
"Rog. Listen, I hear that guy was flying the Hornet that took down the Kreml last year. You know, the big Russian carrier? The guy's got more medals than you could push with zone-five burners, and a combat record as long as Jefferson's flight deck. He's not a prick and he's a damned hot aviator.
That makes the son of a bitch fuckin' A-okay in my book!"
"I COPY."
"Why're you so bitter about four-stripers anyway?"
"Oh, I don't know. The morale aboard the Jefferson's gotten pretty grim lately."
"The morale aboard the Jefferson sucks."
"Like I said. Maybe I just figured it was his fault."
"Shit, guys like him may be all that's holding Jefferson's people together right now. You should've seen him at the Blue Nose initiation last week."
"The what?"
"Uh, never mind. Old news. Whatcha got on the scope?"
"Lots of stuff coming up. Inlets to the right. You should be seeing some smokestacks up ahead. That'll be Polyamyy."
"Got it. God, there's a lot of smoke."
"That won't stop us. I'm switching to FLIR."
The Intruder shrieked south toward Russia's most vital submarine facilities.
1319 hours
Tretyevo Peschera
Near Polyamyy, Russia
The huge, massive barrier separating the Third cavern from the outside world had slid ponderously up and out of the way. Beyond, sunlight danced on the waters of the Polyamyy Inlet.
Holding his binoculars to his eyes, squinting against the dazzling light, Chelyag picked out some of the submarines that had been moored outside the sheltering rock walls of the cavern. That was Kolosov's boat, a humpbacked PLARB of the type known to the West as a Delta IV. The boat was listing thirty degrees against its pier and had settled somewhat by the bow. It looked like a cruise missile had arrowed in just ahead of the sail.
Damn! Over there was Lovchikov's boat, one of the fast-attack subs.
Known as the Alfa in the West, those high-technology boats were so expensive the Russians called them Zolotaya Ryba, the Golden Fish. God, what had they done to it? The sail crumpled, the periscopes bent like matchsticks. That Golden Fish would never swim the ocean depths again. And Leninskiy Nesokrushi Pravda would be in no better condition very soon, if Karelin did not honor his promise to send additional Frontal Aviation interceptors.
"Clear the weather bridge," he snapped. "Everyone below."
A spiral staircase, incongruously trimmed with wooden railings, led down from the weather bridge, through massive double hulls and all the way to Pravda's attack center, which rested between and astride the Typhoon's side-by-side inner hulls like a saddle on a swaybacked horse.
"Captain on deck!" a rating cried as Chelyag stepped off the ladder.
From consoles around the compartment, pale faces watched him, some expectant, some fearful. "Missile Officer!" he barked.
"Sir!"
"Missile status."
"Hatch number one is open, Captain. Prelaunch check is complete, and all codes have been verified and authenticated. The missile is targeted and ready to fire."
"Very well. Stand by. We will launch as soon as we are clear of the mooring bay." He at least wanted water enough beneath him that the shock of launching the sixty-ton missile would not slam his keel against the bottom.
On a television screen above the helm officer's station, the entrance to open water was looming larger.
1319 hours
Tomcat 200
Over the Kola Inlet
"Bandits, Tombstone! Multiple bandits!"
"How many and where?"
"Ten… twelve… A hell of a lot, coming in at low altitude, from one-six-oh to one-eight-oh! Range, five miles!"
"Here's one," Tombstone said, choosing one target out of many displayed on his HUD. He flipped a selector. "Going with AMRAA.M." There was a pause, then the satisfying warble of a radar lock in his earphones. "Lock! And that's a fox one!"
Below him, the Intruders had spread out but were still bearing south, arrowing scant yards ahead of their own shadows on the water. Elsewhere, the sky was empty, save for wisps of contrails far overhead.
"This is Tomcat Two-zero-zero," Tombstone called. "Coming in north of Polyamyy. I've got a flight of Intruders that could use some help about now."
"Two-double-oh, this is Shotgun One-one. Tombstone, what the hell are you doing out here?"
"Getting my ass into trouble, Coyote. Where the hell are you?"
"Retanking at angels base plus ten, Delta Three-five-five, Charlie One-eight-one." Tombstone glanced at his map. That put Shotgun about eighteen miles to the northwest. "We're on our way back to the Jeff after covering White Lightning."
"Any of you already tanked up?"
"That's a roger. Three of us are anyway."
"If you're still armed, we could use you at Polyamyy. Multiple bogies coming out of one-eight-zero."
"I see 'em. Okay, Tombstone. Cavalry's on the way."
"Good to hear that, Coyote." Tombstone locked onto a second target, then squeezed the trigger. "Fox one!"
"Hey, leave a few for the rest of us."
But as the MiGs exploded out of the southern sky, Tombstone knew that Coyote needn't have worried on that score.
In seconds, MiG-29 Fulcrums were everywhere, sleek aircraft with twin stabilizers, clutching deadly pods of weapons beneath their wings.
Then Tombstone and Tomboy were fighting for their lives.
CHAPTER 29
Tuesday, 17 March
1320 hours (Zulu +2)
Near Polyamyy, Russia
Lieutenant Ben Rivera balanced himself against the ragged top of the wall, staring down into the dock facility at the base of the hill. From his vantage point, at the top of a seventy-degree slope perhaps two hundred feet above the waters of Polyamyy Inlet, it looked as though a monster was sliding out of the rock beneath his feet.
Dark gray, most of its surface covered with a brickwork effect, or tiles like those on a space shuttle, it was Leviathan himself. Even before half of it had moved into the open water, Rivera knew that he must be standing directly above the entrance to one of the secret Russian submarine pens he'd been briefed on before the landing. There were supposed to be a number of caverns piercing the cliffs overlooking the tangled inlets near Polyamyy, each sheltering some of Russia's most powerful boomers, and by chance he'd been dropped right on top of one.
That monster sliding into the inlet was as long as forever! A Typhoon ballistic-missile sub, it had to be! Nothing else could be so huge. As Rivera watched, that long, long forward deck continued to slide out from beneath the rocks, its upper surface showing the sharply chiseled grooves of two rows of missile hatches down the forward deck.
And… most merciful God in heaven… one of those hatches was open!
Rivera nearly lost his hold on the wall as he found himself staring down into the gaping hatch, meeting the gaze of the round, white eye of an SS-N-20 ICBM peering back from its depths.
"Larson!" He scrambled back from the edge of the cliff, the spell of awe and surprise that had pinned him there broken at last. "Gunny!"
The Typhoon's sail slid into view, and then the afterdeck, shorter by far than the forward missile deck. The rudder had the span of an A-6, and that broad, flattened, eighty-two-foot beam that made it look as fat as an aircraft carrier. Hell, with an LOA of 557 feet, it was two thirds the length overall of the Nassau, well over half the length of the Jefferson or the Eisenhower.
Larson handed him the radio phone, and he clutched it to his head with a trembling hand.
"King Three! King Three!" he called. "This is White Knight Five!
Over!"
There was no immediate answer.
"King Three! This is White Knight. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, answer me!"
1322 hours
Intruder 504
Over the Kola Inlet
"Red Hammer, Red Hammer," the Intruder flight leader called. "This is Red Hammer One-one. Target change. We have a new target request from Marine Air Control."
"Red Hammer One-three, we copy," Willis said. Then, "God, what do they want now?"
"Probably another truck park," Sunshine replied. "Shit, you'd think they'd find something interesting for us to clobber once in a while."
But as Willis listened to the new instructions from One-one, he realized that this target was nothing if not interesting.
It was almost damned dangerous. He brought the aircraft slightly to the right, carefully studying the panorama of mountains and water unfolding ahead.
1322 hours
Tomcat 200
Over the Kola Inlet
"Hit!" Tombstone yelled. "Splash that MiG!"
"Watch it, Tombstone!" Tomboy called from the back seat. "Two are coming around behind us!"
"I see 'em! Hold on!" He jinked right, then rolled to the left, sending the F-14 into a high, floating barrel roll that took him up and out of the two Fulcrums' aim. The sky was filled with aircraft, all of them Fulcrums, it seemed. Ahead, there was a flash and an angry puff of orange disgorging a burning meteor plunging toward the waters of the Kola Inlet. Their second AMRAAM had scored.
"That's two… oof!" his RIO said as Tombstone kicked in his afterburners in a hard, tight turn pulling out of the barrel roll. The two MiGs on their tail had just flashed past on the left, then split apart, one cutting to the left, the other toward the right, almost directly in front of the Tomcat. Tombstone started to follow, then abruptly pulled back and swung left again, letting the F-14 drop a thousand feet toward the water.
"Hey, CAG!" Tomboy called. "What… are you feeling generous? You had a great setup there. Why'd you let him go?"
"Take a look up ahead!"
Red Hammer, the A-6 flight, had split up their original tight formation, but each aircraft was maintaining speed and altitude, already into the beginning of their approach run. A Fulcrum coming in from the south had spotted them, wheeled about, and dropped onto the six of one of the Intruders.
And Tombstone was bearing down on the six of the Fulcrum.
"I'm going to Sidewinder," he called. "I've got a good shot here, right up his tail."
He let the Sidewinder glimpse the MiG's hot tail pipes, then squeezed the trigger. "Fox two!"
"We've got another one behind us, Stoney. No, make that two!"
"How long till the cavalry gets here?"
"They're coming. Another thirty seconds. Threat warning! They have a lock!"
Tombstone pulled up violently, dumping chaff into his slipstream as he climbed.
He needed to cover Red Hammer's tail while they made their attack, at least until Coyote and the others arrived. Right now, though, the chances of Tomcat 200 surviving those next thirty seconds were not very good at all.
1323 hours
Intruder 504
Over the Kola Inlet
The Intruder rocked violently, and Willis had to pull the nose up slightly to steady it.
"What the hell was that?" Sunshine asked, her face still buried in her scope.
"Fulcrum on our tail," Willis said, glancing back over his shoulder.
"Someone just took it out with a heat-seeker up the ass."
"Rog. Thirty seconds!"
Eight hundred feet.
"On manual." The target, according to the Marine air controller who'd fed the data to Red Hammer, was moving… and surrounded by numerous other targets. Willis wasn't going to trust the computer on this one. At his side, Sunshine was flipping rapidly back and forth between search radar and FLIR mode; if his own system crashed or if he became disoriented, she would be able to keep him on track.
Seven hundred feet…
1323 hours
Tomcat 200
Over the Kola Inlet
The radar homer sliced past to the right, seduced by Tombstone's chaff and Tomboy's vigorous ECM jamming. Now tracer rounds slashed past their canopy, high and leading the Tomcat by a good hundred yards. Tombstone hit the F-14's air brakes and pulled the nose up sharply. Floating at the ragged edge of a stall, the Tomcat slewed to the right just as the Fulcrum, surprised by Tombstone's maneuver, flashed past, so close that Tombstone could read the regimental markings on the other plane's fuselage.
"Guns!" he snapped, and the HUD shifted to gun mode just as the MiG started a hard, climbing turn to port. The maneuver spoiled Tombstone's shot.
He was now in what was called a lag pursuit, behind his opponent but with his nose aiming to the rear of the other aircraft instead of leading it. As the MiG continued his left-hand turn, Tombstone decided to counter with a low yo-yo, going briefly to afterburners and diving to the left, picking up speed as he cut beneath the Fulcrum's track, then pulling up hard, coming out of his dive just after the MiG passed overhead. He kept his eyes on the other plane as it passed overhead; a sharp opponent would ease his turn, then plunge on the other plane from above ― the preferred counter to a low yo-yo ― but it looked like the MiG's pilot had lost sight of the Tomcat. Yes! He was holding his turn, angling back toward the Intruders. Tombstone brought the Tomcat up, using gravity to kill his speed, sliding neatly onto the MiG's tail at point-blank range, less than four hundred feet behind him.
Tombstone squeezed the trigger and the Tomcat's M61 cannon thundered, yellow tracers floating across the gap between MiG and F-14. For a moment, the MiG absorbed those globes of light, holding course, lining up with an Intruder just ahead and below… and then Tombstone saw bits of metal flaking off and a shimmering haze spilling from the Fulcrum.
Then they were past, the MiG sliding off to the left.
"He's smoking," Tomboy told him as he brought the F-14's nose up. "He's going down. He's ejected!"
"Tomcat Two-oh-oh, this is Shotgun One-one. Nice shooting, Stoney!"
"Coyote! It's about time you got here!"
"Thought you would hog all the fun for yourself, did you?" Batman's voice chimed in.
"Just like these superCAG types," a woman's voice added. "Always grabbing the glory for himself!"
"Roger that, Brewer. Heads up! Bandits at two o'clock high!"
"tombstone!" Coyote called. "Watch it! You've got two coming around on your six!"
"Never mind us," Tombstone replied. "Just help me keep those MiGs off the Intruders!"
1323 hours
Intruder 504
Over the Kola Inlet
"There! Target acquired," Sunshine said. "Come left two degrees. Range one mile."
Another seven seconds. Excitement pounded in his breast, and he could hear the mingled rasps of both his and Sunshine's breathing over the ICS.
Damn, they were using the O. His own pucker factor was damned high, fifty psi at least; he figured the lip-lock he had on his seat right now would keep him anchored against a minus-five G outside loop. Sunshine sounded as cool and as hard as the ice clinging to the hillsides flashing past either side of the hurtling A-6. On his VDI, his bomb-release marker slid rapidly down his course line.
Five hundred feet…
1324 hours
Tretyevo Peschera
