Brown, Dale - Independent 02 (83 page)

 
          
“If
you can make it to
Key West
from your present position you can make it to
Marathon
,” the Hammerheads controller told him. He
was right—the two Mirage FICs were almost equidistant between
Key West
and
Marathon
. The ruse was over. “Turn right immediately
to heading one-two-zero. Over.”

 
          
“
Key West
has a longer runway and crash equipment,
sir,” the Cuchillo pilot persisted. “
Marathon
is
unacceptable. I want to land in
Key West
. Get me your supervisor—”

 
          
“My
supervisor is unavailable, fix-six mike-mike. You are endangering yourself,
your passengers and other air traffic on your present course. No flight plan is
on file for you and identification has not been established. You are not
authorized, repeat, not authorized to proceed. Turn right heading one-two-zero,
vectors clear of restricted airspace. Acknowledge and comply. Over.”

 
          
Well,
thought the lead Cuchillo pilot, at least they had bought a few precious
minutes. He flashed his wingtip position-lights on and off, a signal for the
wingman to take spacing. When the bomber moved out, he turned on the rotating
beacon once, then off, then flashed the lights once again—the signal to
jettison the external fuel tank and arm weapons. He quickly safed all weapons,
selected the centerline stores station, jettisoned the empty centerline
ten-thousand-liter fuel tank, then reselected and rearmed all offensive weapons.

 
          
He
could only assume that his wingman had done the same ... he couldn’t see the
other plane in the darkness. He would have to assume everything else about his
wingman for the next few minutes—assume he would stay on course, assume he
would strike his target, assume he would get out safely—because from now on
they were all on their own. The bomb-equipped Mirage would descend to less than
a hundred meters above the water and start his target run, and the leader would
try to destroy all attackers until he ran out of weapons and it was time to
run.

 
          
He
began to push the throttle up to full power, checked once again that his
weapons were armed and ready, then activated his jamming pod and attack radar.

 
          
Another
bleep on the warning receiver, this time longer and strong enough to trigger
the automatic jamming pod—it meant the American planes were getting their final
radar fixes before starting their attack . . .

 
          
Border
Security
Force
Headquarters
Command
Center

 
          
“Challenger
five-six mike-mike, acknowledge and comply. Over . . . Five-six mike-mike, you
are in danger of coming under attack without further warning. Turn right
immediately. Over.” Panic seized Fjelmann and he lunged for the interphone
button, searching for the duty controller at the same time.

 
          
“That
Challenger plane just started accelerating,” Fjelmann shouted out to anyone on
interphone who would listen. “He’s up to Mach point eight.” The warning came
unbidden and was unnecessary—he was controlling the intercept. Others would
report to him or keep silent. “Trap two and three, this is Aladdin, vector to
intercept, right turn heading one-niner-zero, altitude five hundred feet,
range, mark, forty miles.”

 
          
“Aladdin,
please stand by,” the lead pilot in the F-16 formation said. He was obviously confused
too—he was itching to get into the fight but uncertain whether to take commands
from a non-Air Force controller. “Sir, we do not have authorization or
authentication to take vectors from you. We’re waiting for instructions.”

 
          
“Dammitall...”
Fjelmann exploded but choked down his protest just in time. Fields rushed over
to study the radar display. “Trap flight, you had better make a decision right
now or I’m going to clear you out of my airspace for Hammerhead aircraft to
respond. Take the vectors or reverse course. Now!”

 
          
There
was another pause, then: “Aladdin, can you give me a data link to your target?”

 
          
“Do
it,” Fields said. Fjelmann began furiously typing on his computer keyboard. A
data link between the ground radar and the aircraft gave steering signals to
the fighter. The F-16 pilot could, if he wanted, engage his autopilot and let
the fighter fly itself to an intercept. But it also provided a quick way to
test the authenticity of a controller’s instructions, because only an
authorized agency would have the equipment and expertise to use a data link. On
the F-16 pilot’s heads-up display the data link would appear as a small circle
with a channel number superimposed over it—in the Border Security Force’s case,
a circle with an 8 in the middle—where the target was.

 
          
Moments
later, Fjelmann heard, “Aladdin, we have your uplink. Trap Two flight of two in
a right turn.” Seconds later: “Trap Two contact, twelve ’clock, twenty-seven
miles. Judy.” “Judy” meaning that the F-16 pilot was using his own attack radar
to intercept the target and that he was ready to take over on his own.

 
          
“Negative,
Trap Two.” Sweat popped out on Fjelmann’s forehead. “Negative. Your bogey’s at
thirty-five miles, heading north at five hundred feet.” A spike of white
streaked across the digital screen, and the message “WARNING FREQ AGILE WAIT
WAIT” appeared on the screen. Fjelmann cursed on interphone. “That
Mexicali
flight is right in the goddamned way, and
the bastard’s jamming us—”

 
          
“Trap
Two flight is negative contact... Trap flight has music.” The F-16 fighters
were reporting that they had received jamming as well. “Trap flight has radar
contact, radar contact . . . stand by . . . stand by, Hammerhead.” The jamming
would only get stronger as the F-16 got closer.

 
          
“Trap
flight, your bogey’s at
twelve o’clock
, twenty miles. Additional traffic moving to
your
ten o’clock
,
fifteen miles and high, use caution. Target at eighteen miles,
twelve o’clock
low, moving to
eleven o’clock
, call Judy.”

 
          
“Trap
Two is popeye . . . dammitall . . . two, I think I’m knocked up, take the
lead.” Like the Hammerhead’s radar system, the F-16’s attack radar could
counter jamming by switching frequencies away from a jamming signal—but
apparently the lead F-16’s anti-jamming system wasn’t working. The number-two
plane would now have to take the lead and search for the target.

 
          
“Don’t
do that, don’t do that,” Fjelmann muttered to himself. “You don’t have time
...”

 
          
And,
as if the F-16 pilots had heard him: “Disregard, two. I’ll stay in the lead. No
room for a lead change. Hammerhead, sing out.” “Roger, Trap flight.
Eleven o’clock
, eight miles, offset one half mile, low,
target altitude now eight hundred feet, ten-thirty, seven miles, offset
three-quarters of a mile ...”

 
          
“Trap
leader has a Judy, Aladdin. Judy. Ten-thirty, six miles.” “That’s your target,
Trap flight. Ten seconds to feet wet.”

 
          
“How
far from that civilian, Aladdin?”

 
          
“Seven
miles at your nine-thirty position, offset seven miles.” Then, just as the
F-16s crossed over the Keys: “Feet wet, Trap flight. Cleared in hot. Caution,
there might be two bogeys. Cleared in hot.”

 
          
Aboard the Lead Cuchillo Mirage F1C Fighter

 
          
The
Mirage’s threat-warning system was squawking so loud that the pilot finally
turned it off. No use overstating the obvious—the fight was on for real.

 
          
The
aggressor always has the advantage, at least so they had been taught by Colonel
Salazar. No matter what the odds, no matter how great the deficiency in weapons
or technology, a sudden, aggressive attacker always had the upper hand. It was
time to put the colonel’s idea to the test.

 
          
Aboard the Lead F-16 Fighter

 
          
The
Hammerheads controller’s last warning was met by the scream of the F-16’s
Threat Warning System, a radar detector that not only revealed the presence of
enemy radar transmissions but could pinpoint the relative direction of the
radar beam and determine if the signal was a search radar, a target tracking
radar or a missile-guidance signal. This time, at such close range, the lead
F-16 pilot got all three almost immediately—the radar signal started out as a
search radar, quickly changed to a target-tracking signal as it acquired and
locked onto the F-16s, then switched to missile-lock seconds later. A large
“LOCK” light flashed on the instrument panel, and the words “MISSILE LAUNCH”
appeared in the pilot’s heads-up display.

 
          
“Trap
flight, breaking right,” the lead pilot called out. For the moment the attack
was forgotten and the pilot’s concentration was on saving himself and his
plane. He hadn’t expected the missile- launch signal at all—a reliable missile
hit with two fighters heading directly toward each other was almost impossible
unless the attacker had very sophisticated weapons . . .

 
          
Whatever
the reason, a missile-launch warning was nothing to ignore. The lead F-16 pilot
ejected chaff—radar decoys—from his left ejector and yanked his nose hard right
and up in a hard, fast, six-G maneuver. After gaining over a thousand feet in
seconds the pilot rolled his F-16 inverted with a quick snap and dove for the
water, straining to execute the tightest possible turn without blacking out.
Just before making the dive he ejected more chaff, hoping that the missile
would lock onto the slow-drifting tinsel-like decoy instead of his fast-moving
Falcon.

 
          
But
the Cuchillo’s Mirage fighter had not launched a missile. He had simulated a
missile-launch indication, designed to force an enemy fighter prematurely to
maneuver and go into a defensive posture— which was what the lead F-16 fighter
did. When the lead Cuchillo pilot saw the F-16 go into a sharp snap-climb he
immediately switched from his longer-range radar-guided missiles to his
shorter- range heat-seeking missiles, accelerated and climbed right behind and
up with the F-16. Now, instead of going head-to-head, the Cuchillo fighter had
managed to slip behind the maneuvering F-16, getting into missile-firing
position . . .

 
          
But
the trick of using a false missile-launch indication was an old one, and the
two F-16s had made sure they used the proper defense— lagging the wingman
behind a little farther when making a defensive maneuver with the enemy in
front. When the lead F-16 made its sharp climb, his wingman waited two long,
agonizing seconds—agonizing because there really
could
be a missile in the air heading for him—scanned the skies for
another plane, then began a climb behind the attacker when he appeared. The
maneuver worked. When the Mirage pulled in behind the lead F-16, the second
F-16 was right behind him. When the lead F-16 began its dive, the less maneuverable
Mirage could not follow as sharply or accelerate as quickly and remained
vulnerable for the several seconds it took for the second F-16 to close within
range of its multibarrel Vulcan cannon and open fire.

 
          
“Fox
three, fox three!” the second F-16 pilot called over the phone as he squeezed
the trigger on his control stick. “There he is ... I can’t see who it is but it
sure moves like a sonofabitch . . .”

 
          
Aboard the Attacking Mirage F1C Fighter