“Vector One and Vector Two are airborne,” said Chris. Pushed to top speed, the tilt-wing rotorcraft transports could approach four hundred knots, more than twice as fast as ‘normal’ helicopters. They were coming in right behind the Megafortress.
Breanna checked her instruments, scanning the glass panels of the cockpit as slowly as she could manage. Time was starting to blur by as quickly as her heat was pounding.
Jeff had told her about the first time he’d been in combat, flying over Iraq. He’d tried to keep calm by counting slowly to himself as he looked at each instrument in his F-15C, counting it off.
That was Mack Smith who’d told her that. Jeff hadn’t flown Eagles in the Gulf.
“Interceptor radar ahead,” said Chris.
Breanna looked at the left MUD, which painted the sky ahead with different colors, indicating the presence of enemy radars. A green blob hung halfway down the screen dripping and fading. The computer was processing signals received by the enemy and plotting them in real time on the screen, color-coding then seriousness of the threat. Green meant that the enemy could not detect them, generally because it was out of range due to the Megafortress’s stealthy configuration or, as in this case, low altitude. Yellow meant that they could potentially be detected but hadn’t been. Red meant that they were being actively targeted.
“We have a MiG-29, two MiG-29’s,” said Chris, working with the computer to ID the threats. At this point they used only passive sensors – active radar would be like using a flashlight in a darkened room. “They’re well out of range. Seem to be tracking north. Thirty miles. Thirty-two. Other side of the border.”
“Keep an eye on them for the Ospreys,” Bree told him.
“Gotcha, Captain.”
Breanna hit her way-point just south of the Somalian border, adjusting her course to track northeastward.
“Lost the MiGs,” said Chris. “Think they were from A-1?”
“A-1’s supposed to be too small for anything bigger than a Piper Cherokee,” said Breanna. The airstrip was located about twenty miles northwest of their target area, right on the coast.
“Maybe from Sudan then. Or Yemen. They have to be working at the very edge of their range.” Chris checked through the paperwork, double-checking their intelligence reports and satellite maps, making sure the MiGs couldn’t have landed anywhere nearby.
“Mark Two in zero-one minutes. Border in zero-one minutes,” the computer told Breanna. It also have her a cue on the HUD that they were nearing the danger zone, spitting back the flight data they had programmed before.
“Stand by to contact Vector flight,” she told Chris. “We’re looking good.”
“Hell of a moon,” he said.
Breanna had not time to admire the scenery. She edged the Megafortress lower toward the ragged steppes and jagged rocks of the African Horn, glancing quickly at the MUD to make sure no enemy radars had suddenly snapped to life. The Megafortress was now skimming over the rocky savanna at a blistering 558 nautical miles an hour. She had to be careful and alert – the EB-52 lacked terrain-following radar. Even with the improved power plants the Megafortress lacked the oomph of, say, an F-111, which could pull up instantly if an obstacle loomed. The computer and sensors helped her stay low along a carefully mapped route.
“Border,” said Breanna. They passed into Somalia, apparently undetected. Their target lay approximately 150 miles dead ahead.
“Preparing to launch cruise missiles,” said Chris, selecting the weapons-control module on his computer display. “Bay.”
The Megafortress was equipped with a rotary launcher in the bomb bay similar to the devices installed in B- 52Hs. In a stock B-52, up to eight cruise missiles could be mounted, rotated into position, and then launched. Fort Two’s launcher allowed for a variety of weapons beside the cruise missiles; in this case, two Scorpions AMRAAM- plus air-to-air missiles and four JSOW weapons, which had imaging infrared target seekers. The AGM-86c cruise missiles had to be preprogrammed, a relatively laborious task for someone like Chris who wasn’t used to doing it. But once they were launched they did all the work.
“Bomb bay is open,” the computer reported to Breanna. The open bay made them visible to radar, though their low altitude made it extremely unlikely they would be spotted.
“Launch at will,” Breanna told Chris.
The computer made the process almost idiot-proof, but Chris worked through the procedure carefully, making sure they were at the preprogrammed launch points and altitudes before pushing each of the large missiles off. The twenty-foot-long flying bombs lit their engines as they slipped below the Megafortress, popping up briefly before descending even lower, guided by radar altimeters and sophisticated on-board maps.
“No turning back now,” said Chris as he closed the bomb bay door.
“We can always turn back,” said Bree. “Let’s hope we don’t have to.”
Danny felt the rest of his assault team starting to tense as the Osprey passed over the border into Somalia. Talk had gotten sparse and sparse since takeoff; no one had spoken now for at least five minutes.
No matter how much you trained for combat, or thought about it, or dreamed about it, you were never ready for it when it arrived. You punched the buttons like you were trained to, reacted the way you’d taught your body to react. But that didn’t mean you were really, truly ready. There was no way to erase the millisecond of fear, the quick surge of adrenaline that leaped at you the instant you came under fire.
These guys knew it. they’d been there before.
“Vector One has peeled off. We’re ten minutes from our target,” said the pilot.
Some of the others tried peering out the windows, cranking their heads toward the front. The cruise missiles would be finding their targets any second now; in theory they’d see the flashes.
