In any case, invisibility was a state of mind more than anything else. Not being noticed was a skill, not a matter of technology. Science helped, the SEAL’S uniforms were the result of years of research into how the eye worked. Here, for the desert where everything was curved, the pattern was a strange mixture of gentle curves that subtly, but irresistibly, lead the eye across them, away to something else. The muted colors blended and eddied in ways that were downright disturbing when taken out of their proper context. If the SEALs had been going into a built-up area, they would have used different uniforms, one’s with straight lines and jagged contrasts. Against the angles and corners of man-made structures blasted into rubble, the soft billowing curves would have been inappropriate and unhelpful.
Their equipment had the same elusive quality. Popular films of the SEALs had them covered with special equipment and deadly weaponry, their faces covered with masks or balaclavas. Here, where it mattered, such pretensions weren’t even considered. They would catch an observer’s eye, jar his attention and that would be fatal. Everything about the SEALs was nondescript and impalpable, designed to do everything but draw attention.
But, it was still the state of mind that was important. The SEALs looked at the rocks, the sand, the straggling plants and thought of them with affection and respect. They mentally apologized for disturbing them and, as they moved, they tried to tried to inconvenience them as little as possible. They thought kindly of the things that surrounded them, admired them and thought how much they wanted to be just like them. Treating their surrounding with affection and respect, they became part of them. On some intangible, miasmic level they ceased to be there at all. They became voids, an extension of their surroundings. They could walk into crowded rooms and people would look at them without seeing them because they had blended into the background so effectively.
In the bars around Norfolk and the other SEAL bases, it was a standing joke that the big men with tattoos and loud voices who occupied the bar, boasting of their exploits as SEALs were wannabee frauds. The real SEALs were the quiet, mundane men sitting in a corner - only you couldn’t quite see them.
And so it was on the beach that was part of the Sinai coast. As the sun slipped below the horizon, Commander Jeff Thomas’s SEAL Team Two slipped ashore. Even if anybody had been watching, they wouldn’t have seen anything. Or, to be more precise, they wouldn’t have been aware they’d seen anything.
Sinai Coast, North of “Marisol” crash site.
The Marines weren’t SEALs. Their skills were entirely different. When their lead element hit the beach, there was no doubt about it. They were in amphibious tractors, LVTs, ungainly vehicles that were neither landing craft nor armored personnel carriers but somewhere in between. They swam through the surf then crawled up the beach taking the lead platoon towards the rock fields inland. More swam ashore and headed to the flanks. By the time all the LVTs were ashore, the Marine Company had established a perimeter that protected the landing beach against direct fire. Behind them came a pair of landing craft, LCTs, that unloaded a platoon of five M60 tanks, a Marine company headquarters, the heavy weapons platoon and a detachment from the battalion support company. By the time the last element came ashore, more than 250 men were on the beach.
The landing site had been carefully chosen. It was straight, smooth, and small enough to be protected by a company-sized perimeter. It was surrounded by a ridge of jumbled rock that provided cover for the Marines on that perimeter yet allowed the mortars on the beach to give them supporting fire. In fact, it was such a perfect beach for a night landing that the planners had guessed it had been used by smugglers back to Biblical days. There was supporting evidence for that, the one thing the planners hadn’t liked, an old track that lead through the rocks to the north.
That was why the tanks were on the beach, along with two 106 millimeter recoilless rifles. Together with the company’s 60 millimeter mortars and a pair of 81s detached from the battalion heavy weapons company, the firepower covering the beach was enough to hold it solid - or so the planners hoped. The Marine infantry were already nesting down into firing positions on the outer edge of the rock-pile, sheltered by the boulders but with a clear field of fire outwards. Now, it was just a question of waiting.
AC-133A “Buffy”, Eastern Mediterranean.
When asked, Buffy’s crew always explained that the name stood for Big Ugly Fat Fellow. Which was almost right, except the last F didn’t stand for Fellow. The first production C-133 Cargomasters had been built without an unloading ramp in the rear, that feature had been introduced with the B-model. Only 24 C-l33As had been built, and two of them had crashed. The rest of them had been retired with only a few dozen flying hours on them and sent to the boneyard.
One night, all 22 had mysteriously vanished. Their new owners were Special Operations Command, a tri-service organization that existed to provide the various special forces groups with the equipment they needed. They’d modified the C-133s in ways the original designers would never have credited, ways that were merely suggested by their modified designation.
From outside, the AC-133A Slayers didn’t look that odd. There were some strange bumps and bulges, that was for sure, but a lot of transport aircraft had those. They were painted an odd color as well, a very dark bluish gray that camouflaged them at night much better than black would have done. It was only when visitors went on board and stood on the cargo deck they realized what the SOCOM had done. The cargo deck looked like something out of an eighteenth century ship of the line.
At the front was Battery A, three 20 millimeter M61 Vulcans, six-barreled Gatling guns that poured out 6,000 rounds per minute each. They were the guns tasked with area saturation, as the Slayer circled an area, those guns would pour shells into the target. Nothing survived a blast from Battery A unless it was under armor or in deep cover. The center of the aircraft was occupied by Battery B, three old Navy 40 millimeter Bofors guns. They’d been modified and were on trainable mounts that were keyed to unusually complex targeting systems. They also fired some very sophisticated ammunition that could slice through the thinner top armor of even a heavily-protected tank. But behind them was Battery C. At this point, every visitor, without exception, stopped dead and said the same thing “This is a joke right?” Because Battery C had three 105 millimeter howitzers. They’d been stripped of wheels of course and were on special mounts that absorbed most of their recoil. Even then, even an aircraft as big as an AC-133 couldn’t fire all three at once, they were there so one could be firing while the other two were reloaded.
Most outsiders had pictures of all three batteries firing at once, the Slayer flying over a target with a cloud of smoke issuing from the nine guns firing out of her port side. In fact, all three batteries required different approaches and different flight paths, different altitudes and different turn rates, for maximum effectiveness. They were an either/or proposition. Despite her massive brute-force gun battery, the Slayer was a precision instrument and, like most precision instruments, she required extreme skill if she was to deliver results.