“Lookout, Snipers engaged with that missile.” Lookout rogered, unable to do more than listen and monitor — and warn Iwo Jima tower.
The lead Super Hornet pilot got a BORESIGHT lock and pulled lead for a shot at the edge of the envelope as the missile continued to accelerate away. He pulled the trigger with a shoot cue, but, with the YJ-18 accelerating faster than the Sidewinder, the heatseeker came up short and fell into the sea a half mile behind the streaking cruise missile. “Lookout from Sniper, we can’t catch it. Inbound to home plate.”
At Iwo Jima, Wilson, unable to stay put after the first missile detonation, scrambled up to the control tower to get what situational awareness he could. He got there in time to hear the E-2 warn the tower of another inbound missile.
“Where are they coming from?” Wilson asked the Japanese air traffic controllers.
One pointed. “Southwest! Take cover!”
Wilson looked to the southwest, toward Mount Suribachi, and scanned the horizon. Nothing. On the flight line he saw men scrambling to hook up tractors to drag airplanes into the hangar. It would take an hour to cram even half the jets into the hangars, and they had seconds. “Tell those men to take cover!” he barked. “Do you have a loudspeaker?” The Japanese looked at him, not comprehending his question.
When he looked back toward the horizon, Wilson saw the missile pass north of the mountain, flashing shock waves and trailing a white plume. Awestruck, he watched the pinpoint travelling toward them at Mach 3, and he knew there was nothing he could do. As it neared, he saw it was going to overfly the parking apron next to the tower where a dozen men were scrambling to pull jets to safety. “Get out of there!” he shouted in vain.
The linesmen never heard the weapon that killed them. It shot over two parked Rhinos and the warhead exploded like a shotgun blast, shredding the Super Hornets an instant before they also exploded. This set a Growler next to them on fire at the same time an E-2 parked opposite was riddled with fragments and began to burn. A tractor, with what was left of its driver slumped over the wheel, slammed into the pilot’s door of a parked Romeo and damaged the right main to the point the aircraft fell down. As sailors and firefighters ran to the scene to pull the wounded to safety, other jets were damaged and one cooked off. Wilson and the horrified controllers stood to grasp what had happened. By instinct Wilson looked to Suribachi.
Here comes another one!
The scene on the flight line was pandemonium: sailors running through thick black smoke, sharp explosions, bursting fuel tanks, and sirens. All Wilson could do was watch as the next missile approached. This one veered north and exploded over the taxiway that to the runway, sparing lives but spreading debris all over the apron and throat aircraft had to transit to the runway. Black smoke whipped around the aircraft and rose hundreds of feet in the air.
Wilson grabbed a handset radio to inform the E-2. “Lookout, this is Wolfpack. We’ve been hit and cannot launch. Max conserve… are there others inbound?”
“Wolfpack from Lookout…. We’re trying, but yes, sir, expect another one!”
Wilson looked west in time to see another shock wave flash white. The explosion, a mile away, was followed by a huge yellow fireball. Seconds later, the thunderclap knocked everyone off their feet as the deafening BOOM echoed off buildings and the island’s lone mountain, a peak that had already seen too much death since formed by a volcano millions of years ago.
Wilson grabbed the handset. “Lookout, they hit the fuel farm.”
After a few seconds, the E-2 controller responded. “Yes, sir… the pilots say they can see it.”
CHAPTER 38
As the frantic American and Japanese forces on Iwo Jima raced to fight fires and defend from further attack, Shen took Changzheng 8 under the layer and continued south. He would transit on this heading for 12 hours, then set course for the Luzon Strait and home. He did not know how many, or if any, of his cruise missiles had hit their intended targets or even the cursed island. It didn’t matter — he had done his job. He was required to make a launch report by broadcasting a code word that a nearby sonobuoy could pick up. Too dangerous now, it could wait.
In Zhanjiang, Watch Officers noted the time of Changzheng 8’s expected attack. An hour passed with no word, and nearby sonobuoy broadcasts had no reports of unusual underwater activity. One buoy then reported acoustic signatures of the submarine’s cruise missile launches, on time, but they still didn’t know of any damage to Iwo Jima.
Two hours passed, and all-source reporting revealed that a Japanese merchant ship near Iwo Jima had called in a sighting of towering black smoke on the island. Later in the evening, a social media image of the burning island was posted by an airline passenger from a window seat twenty miles away. Analysis showed two palls of smoke and bright flames coming from where the island’s fuel farm was located. Zhanjiang had notified Beijing of each new development. PLA Intelligence was confident that Iwo Jima suffered major damage and was not operational. The fate of the People’s nuclear submarine Changzheng 8 remained unknown. With no other PRC forces nearby for follow-on attack and not knowing if any American carrier aircraft were destroyed or even damaged, a discussion to hit Iwo again — this time with long-range bombers from the PLA(AF) — took place at midnight.
At Iwo Jima, the two Marine Hornets, the two Rhino’s, and the E-2 that defended the island from attack landed amid black smoke over the eastern part of the island. Despite following tower instructions to taxi clear and stop at the end of the runway, one of the FA-18E engines received foreign object damage anyway. Pieces of FOD were all over the runway approach end and covered the flight line. All hands in Air Wing Fifteen and JSDF worked through the night with flashlights as they walked shoulder-to-shoulder to find and remove pieces of metal ranging in size from an aircraft main-mount strut to ball bearings. In the distance, the fuel farm blazed.
Ten of Wilson’s air wing personnel were dead, among them two teenage plane captains. Only one Japanese perished: a civilian working in the fuel farm. Eighteen of his sailors and Marines were wounded, including a chief who would probably lose a leg. The island’s lone doctor was not confident it could be saved, but was certain he could not save it alone.
LT Williams found Wilson in the damaged control tower and gave his report.
“CAG, here’s the tally so far. Four Supers are destroyed, three Echos and one Fox, a Growler is destroyed, one E-2 is strike damage, another has a damaged dome and wire antennas and some superficial nicks we can fix, one Romeo is toast and a Sierra is hard down for rotor and transmission replacement. One Rhino has a fodded right motor, one of the Marine Hornets has a flight control anomaly we are troubleshooting, and we’re out parts for two other Rhinos, and a Sierra needs a new mission computer. The Japanese lost two F-15s, and their P-3 was pelted with shrapnel; hard down.”
Wilson nodded. “Is there more?” he asked, knowing what the answer would be. There was always more.
“Ah, yes, sir,” Williams answered as he gestured at the blazing fuel farm. “The flames are so hot the Japanese can’t even get a hose on the fuel tanks, and they are just going to let them burn out. We have no fuel… but the good news is we have three full trucks that escaped damage, and most of our jets were already topped off — except for the birds that were flying.”