Chapter 6
Strikes
Three days later...
“Today, we strike at the rebel navy assets.” The CAG told the assembled
aviators, “As I said at the start of this operation, the rebels have
possession several Navy vessels of the Russian Pacific Fleet. Among them is
a Kiev-class assault carrier. This CVA, as you know, is really a modified
Kirvak II with an angled deck and abridged superstructure. This one is home
to a squadron of Yak-41 ‘Freestyle’ V/Stols. It is escorted by two
Sovremennyy-class destroyers. These should be the only threats to the
striking aircraft, but you can’t ignore the possibility of MiGs and Sukhois
in the area.
“Gunslinger will carry out the strike on the carrier while the Wildcats
suppress the destroyers. Tomcats from VF-31 will provide top cover and
TarCAP for this mission. Even so, keep your head on a swivel and do the
Linda Blair often. Go to it.”
Super Hornet 106...
“Contact, pair of Freestyles, bearing three-three-seven.”
“Roger, Spyglass. We got ‘em.” Amy heard Tomcatter 212 say over the radio.
She watched the pair of F-14s speed away toward the enemy fighters before
releasing their missiles.
Amy, on the other hand, had her F/A-18’s radar set to air-ground mode. Her
wings were loaded down with four AGM-84E Stand-off Land Attack Munition
(SLAM) missiles which she and Dutch would use to take out the Kiev.
All said, it was a pretty simple idea. Get in, kill, get out. This was the
kind of fight her aircraft was made for.
Still, she didn’t like the idea of having to face down a dozen Yak-41s with
only the Sidewinders on her wingtips. What if the Tomcats were taken down?
What if the MiG-29s or Su-27s arrived on scene? What then?
Just then, the SAM warning light came on. The flipped the ECM switch to jam
the radar and the light flickered out. She checked her radar and placed the
cursor over a small green dot. The query came back as the Kiev.
“Gunslinger 106, I have target. Rolling in.” She smiled, knowing Dutch had
picked up the carrier as well. She would wait till his authorization to
fire.
“Gunslinger 102, winchester!” came over the radio. She watched a SLAM drop
from its launch rail before igniting and shooting away on a trail of smoke.
Amy began launching hers as Robinson got off his second missile.
“Wildcat 415, mudspike, mudspike!” a wild cry pierced Mercury’s eardrums.
Someone had launched a SAM. There was no indication she was the target, but
just to make sure, she launched some countermeasures and manouvered.
“Whoooh!” She heard Dutch scream into the com. “An tell Davy Jones he can
kiss my ass!” She looked up at the ocean above her and found the Kiev on
fire and nosing under. The Yak-41s on deck were either making hasty
take-offs or being abandoned by pilots.
The first strike was a success.
NAF Vepr
The next afternoon...
“How far away is the 688 now?” Captain First Rank Viktor Paulskanyi asked
his sonarman.
“Bearing zero-three-zero, depth six hundred feet, fifteen hundred meters.
Her towed array is out and seeking” came the response.
“Weapons.”
“Da, captain?”
“Are the tubes flooded?”
“Da, captain.”
“Good, gentlemen.” Paulskanyi smiled, “We shall soon be taking down our
second kill of the engagement.”
Down in one of the accessways of the ship, a junior engineer was attending
to some chaffed wires in a bulkhead. On any other ship, such things could be
saw too later. However, on a submarine, everything was geared around being
undetectable. A spark arching between one wire and the bulkhead could charge
the ship just enough to be picked up on an enemy’s magnetic resonance
scanner. These boats had to be constantly under maintainance, lest a nut or
bolt clank on the floor at the wrong moment.
Now where had he but the insulating tape? He couldn’t find it anywhere on
his person or in his toolbox. Hmmph.
It was in his cabin! No big deal, that was only up one deck. He could be
gone and back in no time. But where had he put it exactly. It was with this
thought that his mind was distracted as he lay his wrench on the deck before
walking off.
“Slow open tubes two through five.” Paulskanyi ordered.
“Openning two through five, bonyo!”
“Increase speed to thirty knots. Prepare to bring us above the thermal
layer.”
“Increasing speed to thirty knots. Preparing to rise above the layer.”
The Akula-class hunter-killer quietly opened her torpedo tubes and began
increasing his speed. He would close to a thousand meters, point blank range
in submarine terms, before opening fire. As he increased speed, he began to
vibrate. Under most circumstances, this was of no consequence.
But someone had left a wrench on the floor.
“Con, sonar. I’ve got a submerged contact bearing two-one-zero, heading
zero-three-zero and plus five degrees.”
The Pasedena’s captain wasted no time before reacting. “Weaps, conn, what’s
the status on our aft torpedo tubes?”
“Loaded and ready, sir.”
“Okay, gentlemen, let’s open ‘em up!”
“Con, sonar. Fish in the water, I say again, we have torpedoes in the
water.”
“Mr. COB,” he called to the Cheif of the Boat, “come starboard, make your
heading zero-eight-zero, five degrees up bubble! Increase speed to thirty
knots.”
“Coming starboard to zero-eight-zero and plus five. Increasing speed to
thirty knots, aye sir!”
“Launch six inch room.”
“Six inch room away!” there was a thump as two six-inch wide cylendars were
launched from their tubes. These cylendars then began swirling and making
bubbles. The Russian torpedoes took them as bait and sliced through the
cloud of bubbles, ignoring the hard-churning screw of the Los Angeles-class
sub.
“Sonar, conn, get me a solution on that contact.”
“Aye, sir!”
“We missed, Captain.”
“Let them have tubes three and four!”
“Three and four away, sir.”
“Con, Sonar, we’ve got more torpedoes in the water, I say again, two more
torpedoes have just been fired.”
“Understood. Do you have that solution yet?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Weaps, con, open bow tubes one and two. Fire when ready!”
“Aye, sir!”
“Mr. COB, come to one-three-zero and seven positive.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Countermeasures ready and away, sir.”
“Missed again, sir.”
“Open up one and six. Fire when ready.”
“Bonyo, captain.”
“How many forward tubes does an Akula have?” the captain asked.
“Six, sir. Why?” one of the helmsmen answered.
“So after the next two, she’s empty?”
“Yes, sir.”
A momentary smile crept across the captain’s face. “Mr. COB, come about.
Make your speed thirty-five knots. Conar, conn, tell me when the Akula is
within a thousand yards.”
“Why does the captain want us to close within a thousand yards?” on of the
junior sonarmen asked.
“Because it takes a thousand yards for a torpedo to arm! Jesus, how the
fuck did you get your dolphins?” the cheif sonar operator snapped. he looked
up on one of his screens. Two red dots were now gliding straight at them.
“Conn, sonar, he just put his last two fish in the water. His forward tubes
are empty!”
“Have we passed the thousand yard mark yet?”
“Give us a first-down length, aaaaaaaaaaand. Got it. Ten seconds to impact.
Nine...eight..seven...six...five...four...three...two...one...” CLANG! the
pair of torpedoes smacked into the Pasadena’s steel hull, fragmenting into
useless shrapnel before they could arm. “Conn, sonar, captain, he’s moving
into position to give us his aft tubes.”
“Not so fast, he doesn’t. Mr. COB, bring us around again to one-one-five,
zero on bubble. Weaps, fire aft tubes three and four on my mark.”
“Aye sir.”
“Conn, sonar, he’s in arming range, still turning.”
“At one-one-five now sir.”
“Weaps, fire!”
“Torpedoes away!”
“Captain, torpedoes in the water, torpedoes in the water!”
“Launch countermeasures! Hard starboard and up twelve degrees!”
“Bonyo, captain.” Even as his crew tried to keep the Vepr from being hit,
Paulskanyi knew avoiding the torpedoes was an impossiblility. He could only
hope some of his crew survived.
“Impact in five...four...three...two...” as he counted down, the Pasadena’s
chief sonar operator lifted his headset off. He was holding them to his
chest when what would have been a deafening thunder blared through them. The
American Mark 48 torpedoes had found their target.
No one cheered.
“Conn, sonar, the Akula has been neutralized.”
USS John C. Stennis
next morning...
“Well, we can let half our worry about ending up like the Reagan go.”
Muldoon reported to the pilots the next morning. “Yetserday the USS Pasadena
engaged and sank one of the Akula-class hunter killers the rebels are
operating. Unfortunately, there’s still one more.
“About that, I have good news and bad news. The good news is that
apparently some Japanese timber barge dropped a nice fat tree trunk in the
water and the Akula collided with it. An Aurora spy plane flying from Guam
located her surfaced about two hundred miles north of the task force. She is
apparently immobile and thus voulnerable.
“The bad news is that there are three Sanrancha hydrofoils and probably a
number of MiGs or Sukhois in the area. That means we have SAMs and AAMs to
worry about.
“I will be leading two flights from Gunslinger squadron to get a hold of
this little bastard before the repair boats can get to her. Four Tomcats
from VF-31 will provide top cover and two vikings from VS-54 will be tagging
along to make sure the job is done and done well.
“Other than that, there is just the mix of strike missions and BarCAPs for
the rest of you. It’s going to be a long day. Let’s get it started.”
Super Hornet 106...
“Gunslinger 101, this is Eagle Eye, I have a surface contact bearing
zero-two-zero, eighty miles. There are two Fulcrums in slow orbit above.”
“Roger, Eagle Eye.” the CAG acknowledged. “Tomcatter flight, clear the
ingress route.”
“Yes sir.” and the Tomcats raced ahead of the small armada of planes,
afterburners on full.
Once again, Amy was stuck with AGMs, this time two AGM-65 Mavericks and two
AGM-88 HARM anti-radiation missiles. Thankfully she had AMRAAMs, but only
two. The two sidewinders were on her wingtips, as usual. Unfortunately, her
Hornet was weighed down by three 150 gallon fuel tanks. The engines were
using her internal fuel first, pumping the extra fuel into the internal
tanks so the externals could be ejected as quickly as possible, but that
would still take a while.
“Tomcatter 207, fox one!”
“Tomcatter 219, fox one!”
With these reports, Amy could almost feel herself going green with envy.
She wanted part of the action and was almost kicking herself for not going
out for the F-14. She reminded herself that the Tomcat would be retired from
service within the next few years, and by 2010, the Hornet would have taken
over of carrier launched interception, combat air patrol, and air
superiority. The tasks that had once been the Tomcats would belong solely to
the F/A-18.
“Tomcatter 207, splash my bandit!”
“Tomcatter 219, splash two Fulcrum.”
“Tomcatter flight, Eagle Eye, I show blue skies. Gunslinger, you are clear
for strike.”
“Roger, Eagle Eye, Gunslinger rolling in” On Dutch’s command, the pair of
Hornets oriented towards the three Sarancha hydrofoils now lighting the sky
up with their radars. SAM tubes were probably already being oriented.
“Gunslinger 106, spike SAM our twelve. I have target.” Amy reported. She
waited a second, making sure the HARM seeker was warm. On her HUD, a small
green diamond appeared over the target. “Gunslinger 106, magnum!”
“Gunslinger 102, magnum.” The high-speed anti-radiation missiles leapt from
the launch rails trailing white propellant smoke.
Mercury wasted no time getting her TV seeker hot for the Mavericks. She
placed the cursor on her AG moded radar over her target and clicked on. The
screen of her foward-looking infra-red showed her a blurry black-and-white
picture of the stationary hydrofoil. It was sitting hull-down in the water,
its radar array pointed right at her. Not a moment later, the dot on her SA
screen blinked out. It was a good tactic, and just in time to save the small
ship. The AGM-88 splashed hard into the water not ten yards off target,
pelting the craft with spray.
“Whooh! Fyurbawl!” Dutch shouted. Apparently, he had hit target.
“Gunslinger 106, rifle!” and the AGM-65 dropped loose of its pylon before
lighting up like a candle. This time, the missile came in dead on the ship,
smashing through the bridge’s bulkhead before exploding, throwing the boxy
superstructure into ruin.
“Tomcatter 219, mudspike, mudspike!”
“Mercury, somebody got off a SAM. Take him out please.”
“Yes, sir.” she complied, “Gunslinger 106, magnum.” The Sarancha fired a
naval variant of the SA-19 Grison surface-to-air missile. This missile is of
semi-active radar homing design, meaning the SAM unit must keep its radar
locked on the target while the missile is in flight. This constant radar
beam gave the HARM missile the signal it needed to find its target.
“Gunslinger flight, the Akula is submerging, the Akula is submerging.”
Dutch reported, “Take her out.”
“Gunslinger 101, ducks gone!”
“Gunslinger 115, ducks away!” two pairs of anti-submarine charges dropped
from the wings of the fighter-bombers, splashing into the water. Inspite of
its strength, titanium is notoriously difficult to weld and cracks often.
The depth charges were ideally suited to causing cracks in the skin of a
sub. As each depth charge exploded, the hunter/killer was sandwiched between
four shockwaves. The concussion literally shattered the hull and the Akula
quickly began a nosedive for the bottom.
“Tomcatter 219 is engaged defensive Archer!”
Mercury’s mind froze as he said that. “Tomcatter219, confirm!”
“Tomcatter 219, confirming, engaged defensive Arche...” there was a bright
flash above her as a fireball puffed from beside the Tomcat. The stricken
fighter tossed a vertical and horizontal stabalizer, plus a large chunk of
the starboard wing into the air.
“Tomcatter 219, we’re punching out!” and two ejection seats were launched
into the air.
“Eagle Eye, confirm blue skies!” CAG cried.
“Blue skies confirmed, Gunslinger 101...er...wait. Contact, Flankers, four
ship formation your ten o’clock, angels two-point-five and red hot! They
just lit their radars up!”
“Gunslinger 115 is engaged defensive Alamo!”
“Gunslinger flight, Combat one! Engage incoming Flankers!” At the order for
Combat one, all four of the Hornets dropped their wing tanks and sped up.
“Roger, I’m on ‘em.” Mercury called in. She flipped her panel to air-air
mode and selected the AIM-120s from her armament. She targeted an incoming
Su-27 and got an almost immediate lock. “Gunslinger 106, fox three!”
“Gunslinger 102, fox three!” apparently, Dutch had gotten one as well.
Unfortunately, both missiles missed.
“Diamond, Gunslinger, this is gonna be a furball! We need some help up
here!”
The Su-27 was one of the most advanced, powerful, and agile aircraft in
existance. Due to a small thrust-to-weight ratio, it is one of only four
aircraft that can actually accelerate while vertical. The F-15, F-22, and
EF-2000 are the only other aircraft with that capability. The Su-27 can
out-maneuver all but the F-22. And it had been a Sukhoi 27 that had first
broke the sound barrier in a full vertical climb. Not only was that a
problem, but many Flankers had rearward facing radars and IR seekers, making
them capable of directing missiles at pursuing aircraft. The rule was stay
off the beam and off the six. There wasn’t much room to work with.
The starboard wing root of each of the four Flankers flashed rapidly and
Amy saw tracer fire streak past her cockpit. She and Dutch passed in between
the lead element of Sukhois, and already Mercury rolled right and put her
airbrake out, yanking hard back on the stick, grunting against
unconsciousness. She flipped her weapons to the M-61 multi-barrel cannon in
the nose and searched for a target. One of them was coming about on her
already.
If she’d had a mirror, Lieutenant Anderson would have realized that her
sigil was glowing a bright electric blue on her forehead. Had she been
paying any attention, she would have seen her flightsuit melting away into
the white leotard with blue skirt and bows of Sailor Mercury. If she had
bothered, she might have noticed she was pressing on the rudder pedals with
blue high-heeled boots.
Instinctively, she reached up and tapped her earring underneath her helmet.
The blue visor flashed into place. She flipped her HUD and IR seeker to
helmet boresight control, and selected the AIM-9X advanced sidewinder on her
wingtips. She looked up, padlocked on the Flanker as it dove in, GSh-30-1
cannon blazing. Amy heard the tink of 30mm gun rounds smacking into her
fighter. Suddenly, there was a blue streak across her nose and the Sukhoi
was below her. She stepped on the port pedal, rolled left, and put the sea
above her, nosing down while tracking the enemy jet with her eyes. The
boresight ring fell over the retreating Flanker and she got the grinding
drone of an IR lock. “Gunsliger two-two, fox two!”
The AIM-9X Sidewinder shot off the wingtip rail, then twisted sideways,
following Mercury’s boresight. Another problem with the Flanker was that it
was a tough bird. The missile flew right in between the twin tails of the
big blue jet and exploded, blowing the starboard tail to shrapnel and
jarring the engine. The mis-aimed engine nozzel sent the Su-27 into a slow,
lazy roll. The pilot was trying to compensate, but with no accurate
maneouverability, he should be easy prey.
Mercury let loose a burst from her M-61. The gun’s raspy reply sounded like
a throat being cleared as it ejected 20 millimeter tracers at the target.
Small Explosions peppered the Flanker’s engine nozzles and tail cone. Amy
was right on his tail.
Big mistake.
There was a puff of smoke from his port wingtip. Mercury didn’t have enough
time to shout the warning and barely enough to roll away as the R-73B
‘Archer’ streaked past her Hornet’s belly. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!” She
pulled away, going vertical and rolling her cockpit toward him, looking up
with her visor again and catching him in the boresight circle. He was
becoming quite adept at compensating for that dammaged engine.
“Gunslinger 106, fox two!” Amy heard over the radio. Not a moment later,
there was an explosion behind her. She glanced up in her rearview mirror
just in time to see another Flanker pull away from her tail with a wing on
fire. She returned her attention to the HUD, pulling the trigger once again.
The Sukhoi was once again peppered with the shells. The pilot finally
decided he’d had enough and punched out. “Sierra Hotel!”
Amy watched with some relief as she peeled away. Enemy or no, at least he
was safe.
“Dodger, watch him!” That was the CAGs voice. Visually, Mercury located his
specially painted plane. He was talking to that new kid Amy had been
training with. She located Dodger’s Hornet, which was pulling around on the
six o’clock of his targeted Su-27.
The enemy pilot was letting him.
“Gunslinger 115, disengage!” Amy shouted in her radio. “Gunsliger 115,
disengage now!” The set her reticle over the distant Flanker and tapped a
key on her throttle. A green box formed around the big blue fighter.
“Don’t worry boss, I got ‘im!”
“Dodger, disengage! Get out of there!” now Dutch was trying to get the
newbie to his senses.
Suddenly, there was a stream of smoke from the Flanker’s wingtip rail.
Everything stood still. There was no movement, no noise, only fury. Amy
reported “fox two,” but though she screamed the words, didn’t even hear
herself.
The black dot at the end of the smoke trail reached for the oncoming Hornet
with agonizing slowness. It swept right beneath the port “cobra hood”
fairing and into the intake, were it exploded. The compressor blades were
shattered, being thrown in a dozen directions. The fuel ignited, blowing
upward and outward. The wings spiraled in opposite directions and the
cockpit section was thrust foreward, the canopy belching fire.
And everything was panic.
Mercury twisted her aircraft to get a leading shot on the retreating Su-27
as flares burst from its tail. The Sidewinder she had fired was diverted
with this cloud of countermeasures. Trying to keep herself off the
thirty-degree radius of the Flanker’s rear firing zone, she manouverd in an
landed a series of bursts just aft of the airbrake. Another burst of shells
tore through the primary hydraulic pumps of the ailerons, locking them into
position. The Russian fighter yawed left and began a dive. Mercury pulled
away, not bothering to report the splash.
She looked back to see the canopy still in place. The pilot had not
ejected. “Come on!” she encouraged, “Get out of there!” On closer
inspection, she realized he was slumped in his seat. One of her cannon
rounds must have found him. “Come on you stupid sonovabitch! Wake up and get
out!” The pilot didn’t stir as the slope of the dive steppened. “Eject, you
Russkie idiot. Eject!” She watched, hopeless, as the Sukhoi glided into a
stepper and stepper dive until it crashed into the water at five hundred
knots. The black ocean seemed to open up and swallow the plane, vomiting out
white spray and a cloud of vapor.
“Gunslinger flight,” CAG choked into the radio, “RTB.”
She was sitting in her cockpit, leaned over with her head between her
knees. Her arms were wrapped around her to shut out all light. She was
trembling and breathing hard as the adrenaline withdrew from her
bloodstream.
“Mercury, you okay?” Dutch Robinson asked from the boarding ladder. “The
yellow shirts say you ain’t coming down.” He got only a head shake in reply.
“You can’t stay up here forever.” He watched her and listened to the sound
of her breath. She wasn’t crying. That was obvious. He’d seen her cry only
once, but he knew the signs. “Come on, Amy. You’re holding up deck
operations.”
“I would.” she said raggedly, “but I can’t get up.”
“What!?” Robinson asked, worried, “Are you injured? You didn have kind of a
hard trap...”
“No.” the blue-haired pilot shook her head, “I just can’t feel my legs.
They’re like Jell-o.”
“Need help up?”
“No. I just need to calm down and hope CAG won’t get mad for the delay.”
“I don’t think so.” Robinson said, “He’s locked his office door. He’s
taking it pretty hard.”
“What about Hasely?” Commander Lewis “Duke” Hasely was the VFA-105 squadron
commander.
“He’s writing the letter now.” Dutch watched her sit up, her eyes closed.
The trembling had stopped, but he noticed she was sweating. “It can’t be all
that’s bothering you.”
“It’s not that.” Amy replied, “Well, it is, but what’s really gotten to me
is that last Flanker I shot down. I made a close pass and saw the pilot.”
She choked a moment, “And, he was slumped over in in his seat. I shot him.”
“But you’ve killed before.” Dutch pointed out, “Why does it bother you
now?”
“Because for the first time, I realized that there are people in those
other jets. I mean, I knew it all along, but I’ve never thought about it. It
just hit me today that my enemy is...human.”
Dutch thought about how to respond. He understood where she came from. Back
in his Gulf War days he had often seen the Iraqi tanks he was bombing as
just machines to be broken. It never hit him that he was actually killing
people until he made a low assesment pass on a battered platoon and saw the
bodies. That instant had churned his stomach so that when he set down on the
Independence he threw up several times. He had considerd turning in his
wings right then. It was only the relief that he was not the only one with
those realizations that kept him from quitting. And only after several
visits to psychiatrists and preists had he been able to keep those thoughts
from affecting his performance.
“I guess Rei was right.” the female aviator sagged, “I am a murderer.”
“No.” Dutch said, “You’re a warrior. This isn’t glitzy, and glamorous, and
Hollywood. This isn’t Tom Cruise walking around with his nuts banging
together. This is war. This is pain, suffering, and blood. This is killing
people and breaking things. That’s all war is: violence.”
“It doesn’t make it any easier.”
“No.” Robinson agreed, “It doesn’t.”
