Bark was clearly in charge of the group. He looked at their bright, eager faces then said, “If we’re going into Iran, the plan has to be perfect.” He stared at the chart that covered the table. It was an ONC, an Operational Navigational Chart, that when folded out was four feet square. It showed the area from the eastern Mediterranean to the Black Sea to western Iran where it met Syria and Turkey. Pritch had placed the most recent information on Syrian and Lebanese SAMs directly on the chart. The red circles, representing ranges of SAMs in question, overlapped in many areas. AAA sites were noted by large red dots and Syrian Army positions were done in the traditional infantry notation understood by very few on the ship. Bark spoke again. “Trey set up the plan, along with Wink. They think it will work. I think they’re right. You are the best flight planners in the squadron. I want us to give this plan a murder board. Shoot it full of holes. Tear it apart. Ask every question that comes to your mind. I want it to be the best possible plan.”
“Sir, do we have any indication that we can get the 28s in time for them to make a difference?” Blankenship, the Machine, asked.
“They’re already on their way,” Wink said excitedly. “The Gunner reached deep. Or someone did. It’s like someone from Washington picked up the phone and told them to make this happen. Either that, or the Gunner must have incriminating photos of the Air Force pukes at Eglin. They couldn’t get them to us fast enough. They’re in the air on a C-17 right now. Two of them. There’s a COD waiting for them in Signonella after the ordies in Signonella build the bombs. They’ll come to us as all up rounds. The COD OIC has stripped the inside of the COD of the seats. ETA is 2200 tonight.”
“Shit hot,” one of the officers said, smiling.
“The Gunner also said that Eglin is shipping five of them to the Air Force B-2 base in Missouri,” Bark added. “If we don’t smoke this guy the Joint Chiefs are going to let the batmobile carry the bomb. Let the big boys take care of the problem, after the good little Navy boys have had their fun. But someone has told them to let us go first.” Bark had an idea suddenly. He looked at Woods. “You e-mail anybody else today? Anybody in Washington?”
Woods made a face, as if it was a silly idea, and said nothing.
“Air Force,” Blankenship said. “Always got to stick their nose in everything. This is our fight. They went after our officer.”
“Frankly,” Bark said, “I think that’s why we’re going to get a shot at it. The Air Force would never let us do it without elbowing us out of their way if it was up to them.”
Wink replied. “Right — until the B-2 dropped its highly accurate laser-guided bombs on the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, it had never seen combat. And that was with all those hot Air Force targeteers working the problem.”
“Trey,” Bark said, “run through the plan.”
“Yes, sir.” Woods picked up the chart and crossed to the sliding corkboard. He took the left side as Big stood at the right. The two men pinned it tightly to the board. “One of the keys is to make sure Iran doesn’t know we’re coming. We recommend that we launch with a diversionary strike. We need to keep up the impression of focusing on those two targets, and keep pounding them. But on one of those sorties, two Tomcats will peel off and head east. Way east. We go down to the deck and do a Night Vision Devices low level in the weeds all the way.” He took a pointer and showed where they would peel off. “As you can see, we avoid the SAMs most of the way to Iran and back. We’ll have to go through them on initial ingress and egress, but once into Syria, it should be clear sailing.” Woods looked at the chart as if having some new thoughts. “Then we drop these five-thousand-pound hogs and egress north and west,” he said, pointing to the chart, tracing the route that had been drawn in pencil including time on target and times over each way-point.
“Load-out?” the Maintenance Officer demanded.
“Each Tomcat will have one GBU-28. That’s about five thousand pounds. Limit ourselves to two Sidewinders each — another four hundred pounds — download the Phoenix rails, and we’ll both carry tanks. On the way in we’ll refuel feet dry as far east as we can sell it as part of a diversionary strike, and immediately on return, once feet wet. The four-hundred-fifty-mile transit will just allow us to pop-up and drop the 28s, then return low level. There isn’t much room for error.”
The MO scratched his chin. “That doesn’t leave you any afterburner at all.”
“True.”
“Fighter escort?”
“We want to minimize our radar signature. Four or five planes are much more likely to be seen.”
“We ought to at least think about some dedicated fighters. Never know who will show up.”
“You think the Iranians are going to show up?” Woods asked, implying the answer with his tone. He continued, skeptical. “They’d have to know we’re coming, or be awfully quick to get someone airborne. Their closest fighter base is Isfahan, and that’s three hundred miles away. Then they’d have to find us and intercept us at two hundred feet over the desert. At night. I like those chances, especially compared to sending in four big fighters instead of two.”
“Fair enough. We can think about it.”
“Anyway, there’s the route. We’ll pop up to altitude for the drop about a half-mile apart. If things go according to plan we’ll have somebody on ground lasing the target for us.” Woods glanced over his shoulder at Pritch. “Any word yet?”
Pritch shook her head. She was extremely uncomfortable, unhappy with Woods for even bringing it up.
Bark looked at the other officers. “Anybody see any problems with this plan?”
“Fuel,” Blankenship said. “How can you go into a mission like this and not have fuel for any afterburner? Too tight.”
“We’ve got to get in and out undetected.”
“You can’t even get shot at by one SAM. You can’t touch your burners at all. I don’t like it.”
“The only alternative is to send a tanker with them part of the way on the route—”
“Never happen. They’d all be sitting ducks.”
“Exactly. That’s why we ended up where we did. There’s no other choice. The plan kind of wrote itself.”
“Anybody else?” Bark asked.
“Who’s on the ground?”
“We’re not going to talk about that,” Pritch interrupted.
“Tell me how sure you are it will happen. How reliable is this… ground unit.”
“Unsure, sir.”
“Well, that doesn’t give me warm feelings. Fly a million miles in the dark on the deck with night-vision devices so someone or something that we’re ‘unsure’ about will be there to finish it for us? How much of this plan is based on the guy being there? ’Cause if it were my skin at risk, I’d be real unenthusiastic.”
“We don’t even know if… someone will be there. It is a possibility. I wouldn’t count on it.”
“So what if he isn’t? Can the LANTIRN god here,” Bark said, indicating Wink, “put it down the guy’s throat?”
Woods and all the others looked at Wink. He was the only one who could answer the question with any confidence. Wink thought about it for what seemed to those waiting like a long time. He knew the mission hung on his answer. “We’ll hit where we’re aiming. I can guaran-damn-tee you that. The problem is knowing where to aim to put it in the Sheikh’s ready room. I’d say the chances of getting him if we do it ourselves are low.”