One by one the group commanders and key members of the Wing staff hurried into the battle staff room. When Daren Mace entered the room, his first look was at the main projection screen, which had the words DEFCON FOUR TIMELINES at the top and a series of times penciled in. “DEFCON schedules? We changing the Bravo exercise?”
“No exercise, Daren,” Cole said to his new MG. “This is the real thing. A shooting war has broken out in Europe, and LOOKING GLASS and the NEACAP are airborne.”
“They’re— Ho-ly shit. “ He hurried into his seat at the conference table and opened up his own binder of checklists. The first thing he did was call Alena Porter. “Captain, I need you over here in the command post on the double. The exercise is over, and we have an A-Hour.” Mace heard a slight intake of breath on the other end. Porter was sharp: she would know what an A-Hour was and she would hustle. “Make sure the sergeant stays put and near the phone — we’re starting a recall. Hurry.” It took about ten minutes for Porter to dash over to the command post with a briefcase full of slides and transparencies, fill in the spaces from the main DEFCON time schedule slide, and get an update on the status of the Wing aircraft from Maintenance Control to complete the slides.
“Okay, Daren, you’re in the hot seat now,” General Cole said. “We need to put the brakes on the Bravo exercise, generate six bomber airframes and four tankers for SIOP missions, and begin predeployment ops.” SIOP, or Single Integrated Operations Plan, was the nuclear warfighting “master plan” that would be executed by the White House and Pentagon in case of war, coordinating attacks against thousands of targets by hundreds of weapon systems — bombers, land-based missiles, and sea-launched missiles — over several weeks. “What have we got?”
Mace stood up, took the slides prepared for him by Captain Porter, and put them on the overhead projector. “I feel pretty certain we can meet the twelve-hour time limit for sorties one through four,” Mace said confidently. “Alpha Flight’s planes, which were in tactical deployment configuration, can be reconfigured for SIOP rather quickly — they have fuel, tanks, racks, expendables, all that stuff ready to go. Fortunately, Charlie Flight’s bombers were not uploaded with training ordnance when the message came down, so those bombers should take less time to generate.”
“We’ll need to get Bravo Flight back on the ground as fast as we can,” Cole said. “Will it be a problem downloading their training stores while you’re uploading the … special weapons on Alpha Flight?” Another euphemism — the military, even the men and women trained to handle nuclear weapons, hardly ever called them “nuclear weapons”—they were usually called “special” or “unconventional” weapons.
“If the weather holds up, it shouldn’t be a problem,” Mace said. “If we get that snowstorm later today or tonight, our weapons handlers will be under the gun. We may have to do all loading and preflight actions in hangars and then tow them to their parking spots.”
Major Laughlin stepped right in front of General Cole: “Sir, message from NEACAP — we’re going to DEFCON Three.”
“Jesus,” Cole exclaimed as Laughlin put up the DEFCON Three slides and updated all of the Wing’s schedule times — the group commanders could see Laughlin’s fingers trembling as he put the slides on the projector. DEFCON Three was a medium-threat war-readiness level, not far from all-out nuclear war. “What the hell is going on?”
“Sir, Russia is bombing the Ukraine and Romania,” Laughlin said. “I heard it on the news. Massive waves of bombers are attacking several military bases in the Ukraine, Romania, and Moldova. Initial reports suggest that the Russians used low-yield nuclear devices against some Ukrainian air bases.” Voices fell silent, and every head turned toward Laughlin and Cole. “Sir, STRATCOM is directing all units near the coastline to disperse their fleets as much as possible, to protect them in case of a preemptive attack.”
“I know, I know,” Cole said, flipping his binder to the DEFCON Three checklists. DEFCON Three was usually issued when a major conflict began overseas in which the United States or its allies could possibly be affected or involved — or in case nuclear weapons were employed against any nation. The speed at which the U.S. military had moved from total peacetime to DEFCON Three indicated the seriousness of the emergency — it was not unreasonable to assume the worst, that all of Eastern Europe could be at war in the next few hours. Whereas DEFCON Four directed only the Alpha-alert bombers — the first six planes — to be loaded and placed on round-the-clock alert, the DEFCON Three message would direct Cole’s entire fleet of Vampire bombers and Stratotanker tankers be made ready for war. Security, crew integrity, safety, nuclear surety, federalization of the Reserve force — it was going to be a nightmare.
Martin Cole had something else to worry about. As commander of the 134th Fighter Squadron at Burlington International Airport, Cole’s F-16 fighters were already shadowing Russian Tupolev-22M Backfire bombers out of Cuba that were flying up and down the Atlantic coast. He hadn’t thought too much about those sleek, deadly behemoths — until now. Although Plattsburgh was about two hundred miles from the coast and almost three hundred miles from where those Backfire bombers were traveling, it was possible for those surveillance planes to pinpoint each and every one of Cole’s planes — and if they were carrying nuclear cruise missiles, they could destroy all of Plattsburgh’s planes in one shot.
“All right.” Cole sighed. “This may screw up your day, Daren, but those Bravo Flight planes won’t be coming back for a while. Jim,” he said, turning to Operations Group commander McGuire, “those crews don’t have the OCCULT EAGLE orbit-area charts with them, but I want the Bravo Flight crews that are airborne into those orbit areas, at the right altitudes.”
“Excuse me, sir, but I need those bombers on the ground,” Mace said. He pointed to the updated slide put up on the screen. Instead of only 4 planes in twelve hours and 6 planes within twenty-four hours, now the first 6 bombers had to be ready within eighteen hours, the first 12 bombers ready within thirty-six hours, and the entire fleet at Plattsburgh ready to go to war within three days. Everything was speeded up by 50 percent, and they hadn’t even started to move one weapon yet. “Look at those timelines for DEFCON Three. I needed those planes on the ground three hours ago.”
“Daren, it can’t happen,” Cole insisted irritably.
“Dammit, General, this DEFCON Three status won’t last long,” Mace said. “It’s a political thing — they’re trying to scare Russia into stopping the fighting. We should at least stay with the DEFCON Four timelines and—”
“Colonel, listen to me, we are at war!” Cole snapped angrily, pounding the table with his fist. The battle staff, the entire command center, fell silent. Cole’s angry gaze bored into every man’s face in the room before affixing on Mace. “The Russians actually nuked the fucking Ukraine, dammit — they dropped a goddamned nuclear bomb. We could be next, Colonel Mace. This is not some Tom Clancy fantasy. We can’t second-guess them.”
“Then you have no choice but to inform Fifth Air Battle Force that we can’t make the timelines,” Mace interjected.
Cole’s face reddened and his mouth dropped open in surprise. “What did you say …?”
“Sir, we’d have a tough time generating all our aircraft to full SIOP readiness in three days in peacetime, with all our planes on the ground ready to go,” Mace explained. “We cannot do it in time with planes and weapons scattered all over the ramp.”
“Colonel, I am the one who will determine whether we can or cannot make our deadlines, not you,” Cole retorted. “I’ll inform General Layton of any delays. But DEFCON Three says preserve any combat-ready assets to the maximum extent possible, and I’m thinking of those damned Backfire bombers out there — if they’re carrying cruise missiles, bringing those bombers back to Plattsburgh would be a tactical mistake. I’ve got to think about the survival of my forces. Request to land the four Thunder bombers denied. Every two aircraft generated under DEFCON Three will be launched under positive control into the airborne alert orbit areas as soon as possible.”