“Dammit, Mado. What in the hell were you thinking of in there?” Mado and Stansell were standing in front of Cunningham’s desk, and the general’s cigar was smoking. “The only reason we’re still in business is because Stansell here managed to spread a little dust over your gut feelings. Is your head up your ass and locked?”
“You want me to lie to the President?” Mado shot back.
“No. But I don’t want unsubstantiated doubts surfaced either.” At any other time he would have fired Mado on the spot. But time did not permit him that luxury now. “We hash out our doubts and differences in here — among ourselves. We present a united front to the President. He’s got enough on his mind without having to referee our differences. That’s my job. Stansell, get the hell back to Nellis. Mado, I want you here.” The two men left.
Cunningham’s aide appeared at the door. “Meeting with the Joint Chiefs in five minutes, General. In the tank.”
“Dick, keep an eye on Mado. I don’t trust that son of a bitch.”
The six men sat in the small briefing room in Red Flag’s building watching the TV. Torch Doucette hit the rewind button when the VCR tape was finished. “Let’s look at it again,” he told the other five F-111 crew members. Doucette’s WSO, Ramon Contreraz, wanted to escape from the room. He had caught the embarrassment of Von Drexler’s WSO when they ran the Audio Visual Tracking Record of Von Drexler’s last mission. The other F-111 crew tried to fade into the woodwork.
Doucette started the tape and let it run a few moments before he hit the pause button. “Right here, Colonel,” he told Von Drexler, “when the two F-16s jumped you and came to your six o’clock, you should have milked it a little lower and simulated pickling off a single high-drag bomb.”
“And what good would that have done?” Von Drexler rasped. “We’re supposed to put those bombs on a target.”
“In the real world,” Doucette told him, “it would explode behind you. Because it’s retarded you would escape the frag pattern but the bandits might fly right through it — nailing ‘em. If nothing else, it does tend to break the bad guy’s concentration when he’s rooting around in the rocks working on a low-level intercept and a bomb explodes in his face.”
Von Drexler shook his head. “Too much seat of the pants …”
Contreraz could hear the patronizing tone in Doucette’s voice. It was going to be a classic face-off between the best pilot in an Air Force wing who only knew how to fly the jet and the worst pilot who only knew how to get promoted.
The tape was rolling again. “You flew down this canyon at almost eight hundred feet,” Doucette said. The sarcasm in his voice left no doubt about what he thought of flying that high above the ground.
“I don’t trust the TFR in 399,” Von Drexler tried. The other pilot stifled his reply in time. He had flown the same aircraft, tail number 399, the day before and the APQ-146 Terrain Following Radar had worked perfectly.
“Colonel Von Drexler,” Doucette said, sweetness dripping from every word, “the terrain-following radar is our raison d’etre. Either use the damn feature or get used to hand flying the jet down in the rocks.”
“If I experience a malfunction at the altitude you’re suggesting I won’t have time to take corrective action—”
“Then it’s not your day. Flying low and TFing is what we get paid for.”
“Too many birds migrate through here this time of year,” Von Drexler complained. “I don’t need a damn bird strike.”
“The birds have all been briefed to break down when they see an F-111,” Doucette said with a straight face but also reminding the lieutenant colonel that the natural tendency of any bird was to drop downward. “You pull up, that’s your part of the contract with birds.”
The wall of the prison mock-up that Chief Pullman had built in the desert appeared on the TV screen. “You had an early acquisition of the target because of your altitude. In the real world, you wouldn’t get a video through the Pave Tack until you’re inside six miles …”
“Damnit, Doucette, quit talking about the real world. This is the real world—”
“Then after you tossed the bomb and pulled off to downwind, you broke off too fast. The bomb’s time of flight is approximately thirty seconds and you’ve got to gauge your turnaway so your wizzo can lase the target during the last eight or ten seconds. Also, you need to do your own bomb-damage assessment to see if you need to reattack.”
“I was simulating a high-threat environment—”
“That’s what we’ve got electronic countermeasures for,” Von Drexler’s WSO said, “to take care of those threats.” He felt he had to speak up. “Colonel, you’re job is to drive the truck, mine is to deliver the mail. We’ve got to stick around the target long enough for me to do that.”
“I think that about says it all,” Doucette said.
CHAPTER 29
The section of E Ring near the Secretary of Defense’s office was a highly restricted and well-guarded stretch of corridor. Cunningham normally barreled through the security post expecting the guards to recognize him and not challenge him. But on this day a new corporal was on duty, a nineteen-year-old who did not recognize the Air Force Chief of Staff. “Sir, may I please see your restricted area badge?”
Cunningham looked at him. “Your name?”
“Corporal Thomas Naylor, sir.”
“First day on the job, Naylor?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Son, there are a few of us you’re supposed to recognize on sight. I’m one of that crowd.” He glanced down the hall, making sure no one other than his aide could hear. “I’m supposed to do animal acts on troops who screwed up.” He produced his badge for inspection.
“Thank you, sir,” Naylor said, passing Cunningham through.
“Dick, am I getting soft in my old age?”
“Probably.” Stevens had given his total loyalty to Cunningham when he discovered the general’s ego had not swelled with self-importance when he pinned stars on his shoulders. It was a rare condition in E Ring. Stevens held the door open to the tank, the conference room where the Joint Chiefs had at each other. The general gave a grump, snapping his mask into place as he entered.
Admiral Scovill entered the room behind him and took his place at the head of the table. “Charlie, Lawrence,” he nodded at Leachmeyer and Cunningham. “The President wants a daily update on the status of the POWs and how we’re progressing. I don’t want a repeat of yesterday so I’ll be doing the briefing. We’ll meet here before I go across the river. So, what do I tell him today?”
“We’re moving Delta Force to Howard Air Force Base in the Canal Zone tonight,” Leachmeyer said. “We’ll keep Delta there for a week and make it look like they’re exercising with Southern Command. We’ll have the sixty helicopters in place next week and move Delta once more before we position them in Saudi Arabia. We’ll be ready for a Go in ten to fourteen days.”
“Sixty helicopters, Charlie?” Scovill looked worried. “That’s one hell of an insertion.”
“We need that many to transport the POWs and position a blocking force in case that armored regiment forty miles southwest of Kermanshah responds and moves on us.”
“It will look like an invasion,” Cunningham said. “Quantity, not quality—”