Brown, Dale - Independent 02 (68 page)

 
          
“It
doesn’t matter what the orders are,” Salazar said. “None of those spineless
pilots will fire on an airplane or vessel carrying those urchins.” He shrugged.
“They are dead anyway. If the Americans don’t kill them they will die of
starvation in this damned country—” “They take up space on the plane that could
be used for cargo—” “Pick skinnier ones next time. They’re also weaker, easier
to get into our plane, take up less space and weight ...”

 
          
And
easier to throw out, thought Hermosa, who thought he was going to be sick. His
hands holding his briefing notes trembled, beads of sweat glistened on his
forehead. The Cuchillos had turned into mindless robots, capable of anything,
it seemed. Salazar could probably convince them to tie their own mothers to the
planes’ wings if that’s what it took to complete the mission.

 
          
“Our
unit’s best pilots flew in the worst possible weather and they were intercepted
by the Hammerheads,” Hermosa said. “We lost a shipment and the distribution
network in
Louisiana
was breached. Our plane was followed back
to this area, which threatens security ...”

 
          
Salazar
gave him a head-shake warning and he hurried on. “I have compiled information
from all intelligence reports and the conclusions are these: to avoid losses we
should stop sorties into the American southeast and concentrate on finding and
developing new routes over land in
Texas
,
New Mexico
and
Arizona
, sparsely monitored and not yet patrolled
by the Border Security Forces.
Southern California
may be another possibility, since our distribution routes are better
developed there—”

 
          
“You
say avoid the confusion and run?” Salazar said. “Run and hide, eh?”

 
          
“Not
run and hide, sir. Withdraw and use our resources to find more secure ingress
routes. We risk our manpower if we—”

 
          
“But
we also make
no money,
Hermosa.” A
knife had appeared in Salazar’s hand, and just as suddenly it was quivering in
the wooden molding around the chart—missing Hermosa’s left ear by a hair. “Get
out of my sight, idiot!” Hermosa did, praying that a knife wasn’t on its way to
the middle of his back as he retreated.

 
          
Salazar
now came to the front of the room and faced his flight commanders and pilots.
His eyes blazed with theatrical intensity. He was good, and he knew it. “Forget
all talk about retreat and hiding. You are the
Cuchillos,
the elite, the best pilots in the entire western
hemisphere—no, the best in the
world.
We do not run and hide from the enemy. We challenge them. We
defeat
them . . .

 
          
“I
will tell you what we will do. The platform called Hammerhead One is the Border
Security Force’s main base, the center of operations for their long-range
drones and the main radar monitoring our most lucrative ingress routes and
distribution points. The platform protects the coast, but
nothing
protects the platform. I want an operation to attack this
platform, to render it useless for at least the next several months or destroy it
completely. During that time, we can boost our deliveries to our best
distribution points in
Florida
. The American appetite for cocaine has not dropped an ounce in the past
year—the cartels will pay us hugely for our deliveries . . . Major Trujillo!”

 
          
A
tall, powerfully built pilot with burn scars on the left side of his face and a
slump in his left shoulder shot to his feet.

           
“You are my best flight commander,
my oldest and most experienced pilot. I want you to plan an operation against
the Hammerhead One platform, with a secondary attack target against the
aerostat unit on
Grand Bahama
Island
. I want this attack to begin at the
earliest opportunity and I want the damage to be severe. Can you do it?”

 
          
“It’s
as good as scrap metal, Colonel. My staff and myself thank you for this
opportunity.”

 
          
“All
of you make me proud,” Salazar said to the rest of the crewmen. “You have
demonstrated time and again that there is no challenge, no obstacle, that you
cannot overcome. But the enemy we face now is stronger than ever. That’s why we
must use all of our courage, all of our skill, to crush the opposition and
complete the mission. You men are the Cuchillos. You cannot fail—”

 
          
At
that moment a loudspeaker blared: “Attention. Attention. Unidentified
high-speed aircraft inbound to base. All air defense units to condition red.”

 
          
The
pilots ran outside as the air-attack sirens began their shrill warning. Salazar
began to follow behind his men, then decided to head instead for the
underground command post, probably the safest place in the
Caribbean
outside of Fidel Castro’s own
Havana
command bunker.

 
          
He
found two terrified operators on duty in the dank, musty command center—it was
used as a survivable alternate command center and usually manned only by a
skeleton crew. “Report,” Salazar ordered.

 
          
The
old-style American-made TPS-17G airport surveillance radar had just completed
its warm-up cycle and was being retuned by one of the operators. “Sir, we have
a report of a high-speed aircraft, identifcation and origin unknown, heading
toward the base from the south at high speed.”

 
          
“I
heard the warning, I want details.”

 
          
Luckily
for the operator, the radar set had finished warming up and he quickly acquired
the target. The short-range radar reported the target’s flight data: “Sir, the
target is at two hundred feet, speed four hundred knots ... altitude
decreasing, now at one hundred feet. Range eight miles and closing fast—”

 
          
“Air
attack,” Salazar called out. Inside he was thanking his stars he had not run
outside with the rest of his brave pilots—even a lone fighter or attack plane
such as an American F-lll or British Jaguar could carry enough ordnance to
decimate their flight line. “Order air defense ground units to engage the
target at maximum range.”

 
          
“Should
we wait for visual identification . . . ?”

 
          
“It’s
not one of ours, and
Haiti
has nothing that flies at four hundred
knots,” Salazar said. “Everything else that has not reported its arrival to me
is an enemy. Destroy it.”

 
          
“Yes,
sir.”

 
          
The
base at Verrettes was capable of fending off everything but a sustained aerial
attack. Salazar had invested mostly in older-model Soviet-made SA-7
shoulder-fired heat-seeking missiles, which had been mounted on Jeeps and other
small personnel carriers for better mobility around the base. He also had
acquired air-to-air artillery pieces, mortars, assault weapons and armored
vehicles. But his prize piece was a small surplus UH-1 Huey helicopter parked
within easy running distance of the bunker and command center. The Huey, fueled,
serviced and ready to go, could take him to
Jamaica
, the
Cayman Islands
, the
Turks and Caicos Islands
or the
Bahamas
. Once in hiding, he could gain access to
his private
Caribbean
and European bank accounts.

 
          
He
thought now about the Huey and when the best time to make his escape would be
as the reports began to filter in from his deployed forces:

 
          
“Range
four miles,” the radar operator reported. “Still at one hundred feet, slowing
to just above three hundred knots. He’s aligning himself with the main runway,
just inside the runway boundaries along the main taxiway ...”

 
          
“Standard
anti-runway operation,” Salazar said. “Sidestep between taxiway and runway
while delivering ordnance, and you can put a crater in both surfaces every two
thousand feet. One aircraft can shut down the base’s flight operations in
seconds. The aircraft should not be allowed to cross the perimeter. Are the
SA-7 crews in position?”

 
          
“No
report yet. Sir . . . the south crew says they have visual confirmation of the
target. They say . . . they report it is a Soviet fighter . . . a Sukhoi-27—”

 
          
A
Soviet
plane? “What the hell. . . ?
Order the south crew to hold their fire. All units, track but do not engage.
But if the fighter attacks our positions, order all units to open fire.”

 
          
Salazar
thought about this new development for a moment before heading for the exits to
make his way to the flight line. A
Soviet
plane overflying
Haiti
and his base? Could it be a visit by some of his old buddies? Although
he knew the Russians had the advanced long- range Sukhoi-27 fighter based in
Cuba
, to his knowledge none were flown by Cuban
pilots, except perhaps for training or to show off for a Cuban politician. But
why was a Russian pilot taking an advanced fighter to an outlaw base in
Haiti
? Was he defecting? In
Haiti
? Did he want to sell his plane to Salazar
and the Cuchillos? A Sukhoi-27 would be a valuable asset, of course, but it
would attract far too much attention from the wrong people—about ten thousand
very angry Russian soldiers only a hundred miles away, who would not look
kindly on the loss of their plane . . .

 
          
A
Jeep with a rifleman and driver, waiting for him outside the command bunker,
drove him quickly to the flight line—Salazar carefully directing the driver
away from potential targets such as hangars and the control tower in case it
was
an air attack. They parked under one
of the few trees near the flight line and watched as the Sukhoi-27 crossed the
airfield’s perimeter fence and began its pass.

 
          
To
his and everyone else's surprise, the fighter began a series of remarkably
agile turns, twists, aileron rolls and high-speed passes, all no more than a
hundred meters above ground. The Sukhoi-27, combining the best features of the
American F-15 Eagle and Navy F-14 Tomcat fighters, was without question one of
the world’s premier fighter-interceptors, and it was putting on an amazing
aerial display right in front of the astonished rebel Cuban troops. Even if the
gunners with their SA-7 missiles or thirty-seven-millimeter cannons could keep up
with the plane’s moves, it was unlikely that a shell or missile would even come
close to the aircraft.

 
          
The
fighter’s last maneuver was its most unbelievable . . . The Sukhoi-27 raced
down the runway, again at no more than a hundred meters off the ground and well
over three hundred nautical miles per hour, when it heeled sharply upward, its
nose rising rapidly as if it was going to do another high-performance
climb-out—but this time its altitude did not change. The nose kept on rotating
upward and backward until it reached, then passed the vertical—and suddenly the
Sukhoi-27 fighter was flying
tail-first
straight down the runway, with its nose inverted and pointing backward, and its
twin tails upside-down but pointed forward. The fighter held this flip-flop
maneuver for several seconds, its engines screaming, until the airspeed
decreased to well below normal landing speed; then the fighter seemed to relax
as it rotated forward, righted itself and accelerated quickly away by the end
of the runway.

 
          
Salazar
shook his head. “I’ve never seen anything like it in my life ...”

 
          
The
Russian fighter now began a lazy left turn on the downward side of the runway,
ready for another pass, when Salazar’s walkie- talkie crackled to life:
“Control, Squad One taxiing, ready for release.”