Plan of Attack

and keep a cool head, and you’ll come out of it okay. Hell, you might even star on one of their television reality shows, sign a Hollywood movie deal, marry Pamela Anderson, and get famous defense lawyer Johnny Cochran to represent you in court within a day or two.” That got a laugh that Leborov could hear even in the noisy cabin.

“If you escape, your chance of finding support from the civilian population is unknown,” the aircraft commander went on. “You may encounter some Russian-speaking individuals, but don’t assume they are pro- Russian. Generally, people who live in the Arctic, as in Russia, support strangers they find in the wilderness — it is an unwritten code for those who live in inhospitable regions. Still, it is best to stay away from strangers and make contact only if your situation becomes desperate. We assume you’ll be treated as an evading combatant as defined in the Geneva Conventions; as such, remember that if you kill a civilian while evading or in custody, even if you are being pursued by armed individuals or are being mistreated or tortured, you may be subject to the death penalty, even though Canada does not have it. Is that understood?”

Leborov asked for questions. They discussed this and that, mostly the weather and ground conditions in northern Canada and a little about their poststrike refueling base. Norman Wells was in the heart of Canada’s vast western oil fields, so there was a lot of jet traffic and a lot of aviation fuel stored there. It was doubtful they’d be able to steal enough gas for all twenty-one Tupolev-95 bombers to refuel — in that case they’d pick the best planes, fill them up with crew members, and take whomever they could. The SPETZNAZ commandos would be exfiltrated by submarine from Mackenzie Bay, so some of the crew members could go with them if they chose.

“Fuck all that,” Borodev said cross-cockpit after their discussions were concluded. “I’m staying in Canada.”

Leborov couldn’t believe his ears. “What did you say?”

“I said, if I can’t fly out, I’m staying,” the copilot said. “I speak pretty good English — I can even speak some Canadian, hey? I’ll be a bush pilot. I’ll fly tourists in the summer and supplies in the winter. Or maybe I’ll put on a Russian fur-trapper music show with a dancing bear in Sitka, Alaska, for the tourists coming off the cruise ships. I’ll hide out right under their noses.”

“You’re crazy,” Leborov said. “Do you think they’ll still have dancing bears and music shows after what we’ll do to them today?”

“More than ever,” Borodev said.

“You have a life back in Russia, my friend, remember? You’re an airman and an officer in the Russian air force.”

“You made a life for yourself back home — if they let you have one,” Borodev said, turning serious. “Wherever they send us after this is over, at least you’ll have your family with you. I won’t have shit.”

“You’ll be a hero,” Leborov said. “You’ll spend the rest of your military career explaining how in hell you survived penetrating Canadian and American air defenses and bombing the shit out of them.”

The copilot laughed. “I think I prefer the dancing bear, Joey,” he said. “But I’ll make sure you’re on your way home first, don’t worry.” Leborov didn’t respond — he didn’t want to continue this line of discussion at all.

“Coming up on the turnpoint,” the navigator said.

“There’s another good reason to stay in Canada, my friend,” Borodev said. “Great Bear Lake. One of the largest freshwater lakes in the world, and by far the best trout fishing on Earth. I read they catch trout out of that lake that take two men to carry. A busboy at one of their fishing lodges makes more money in one month than flying officers in the Russian air force make all year.”

“You’re fucked in the head, pal.”

The navigator gave a heading correction that would take them east of the lake. Although there was nothing in the area this time of year except caribou, grizzly bears, and oil rigs, overflying the lake would highlight them from any air patrols they might encounter.

“Forty minutes to launch point, crew,” the navigator said.

“Stop with the damned countdown, nav,” Leborov said irritably. He took a few whiffs of oxygen to try to calm his nerves. “Just let us know when you’re starting your checklists — everyone else is configured for weapon release. Let’s do a station check and then—”

Suddenly they all heard the slow warning tone over their headphones. “UHF search radar, two o’clock,” the electronic-warfare officer reported.

“Search radar? From where?”

“Airborne radar, probably an AWACS,” the EWO said.

“Want to step it down to one hundred meters?” Borodev asked.

“If it’s an AWACS, it won’t matter how low we go — it’ll find us,” Leborov said grimly. “Our only hope is to try to shoot it down before they—”

Just then they heard another warning tone. “Fighter radar sweep, two o’clock,” the EWO reported. “X-band, probably a Canadian CF-18 Hornet. It’s down — AWACs will take over the hunt.”

“—send in fighters,” Leborov said, finishing his sentence. “Let’s get up to launch altitude.” They had no choice. They had to climb to one thousand meters aboveground to launch a Kh-31 from the bomb bay.

“Airborne search radar changing from long-range scan to fast PRF height-finder scan. I think they spotted us. Jammers on. All countermeasures active.”

“I need a fire-control solution right now, EWO,” Leborov said.

“No azimuth or range data yet.”

“Damn it, EWO, you gave me the azimuth a moment ago!”

“That was a rough estimate off the warning receiver,” the electronic-warfare officer retorted. “The fire- control receiver hasn’t computed a launch bearing.”

“I don’t want excuses, I need to attack!” Leborov shouted. “That Hornet will be on us any moment now!”

“No azimuth yet…”

“Don’t wait for the fire-control computer!” Leborov screamed. “Fire a missile at the last known azimuth. Make them take the first move!”

There was a short pause, then, “Stand by for missile launch, crew! Consent switches.”

“Consent!” Leborov shouted, flipping three red guarded switches up. “Shoot, damn it!”

“Bomb doors coming open!” the EWO shouted. Seconds later there was a deep rumbling sound as the Tupolev-95’s massive bomb doors swung open. “Missile away!” Both pilots shielded their eyes as a tremendous streak of fire illuminated the cabin and an impossibly loud roaring sound drowned out even the thunder of the Tu-95’s turbo-props. The first Kh-31P missile fired ahead of the bomber on its solid rocket booster, then started its climb.

Seconds later: “AWACS radar down!” the EWO crowed. The missile launch had its desired effect — the AWACS crew shut down its radar to escape the missile. Moments later: “X-band radar, CF-18 Hornet, three o’clock!”

Leborov immediately performed a “notch,” turning the Tu-95 hard right, directly over Great Bear Lake. He was hoping to maneuver until he was flying perpendicular to the Hornet’s flight path, which would blank out the Russian bomber from the Hornet’s pulse-Doppler radar. It seemed a little ridiculous trying to hide a huge, lumbering rhinoceros like the Tu-95 from an advanced interceptor like the CF-18 Hornet, but for the sake of his crew, he had to try everything.

“Hornet’s at nine o’clock…wait…fast PRF, Hornet has reacquired…Hornet is locked on…chaff, chaff, pilot hard turn left.” Leborov threw the Tupolev-95 into a hard left turn, hoping now to cut down on their radar cross-section and make the enemy fighter’s radar track the decoy chaff and not the plane. “Hornet’s…wait…Hornet’s turning northeast…Hornet’s locked on…missile launch, missile launch, break…Wait…he’s not tracking us…I’m picking up the uplink for an AMRAAM launch, but it’s not aimed at us…another missile launch!”

Leborov twisted the microphone-select switch on his intercom panel to the formation frequency. “Heads up, guys, the bastard’s firing!”

“Second Hornet, eight o’clock. Hard turn left, heading one-two-zero…possibly a third Hornet in formation…”

Suddenly they heard on the command channel, “We’re hit, we’re hit, One-seven. Initiating bailout. We are—” And the radio went dead.

“We lost One-seven,” Borodev said.