In the distance, Wilson saw the mountains of Oman rise out of the northwest horizon, and aided by his NVGs, he could see the glow of cultural lighting from the Iranian coastline. Scanning the sky, he saw no aircraft lights over Iran, but he did see a few over the GOO. He surmised they were American, and those he saw over the Persian Gulf could be American or civilian. On his moving-map, the distance to the coastline was 45 miles, but it looked much closer on goggles as the moon backlit the rising terrain. To his right, he sensed a muted flash and noted Weed’s Hornet was now without its drop tanks. When he looked left, he saw Blade punch off his tanks and watched them tumble away. Wilson noted he had only a few hundred pounds remaining in each of his tanks and prepared to jettison them once they were dry. This would reduce both his weight and drag and would increase maneuverability.
As the little formation continued through the darkness in silence, each pilot busied himself in the cockpit monitoring the navigation and thinking about their individual weapon deliveries and the enemy threats they might face.
As they approached the coast, Wilson hit SELECT JETT, and, as he felt his tanks leave the aircraft, he cracked the throttle back to compensate for the increased airspeed. He veered the formation left to lead them into a fissure in the rising Omani wilderness, which offered a place of concealment from visual or electronic detection. He looked back to see Dutch clean off his tanks, just in time, as the coastline loomed ahead.
Low-altitude on NVGs in mountainous terrain — in the wee hours — was varsity flying, and each of the Ravens worked hard to accomplish three things: to keep position on Wilson, keep themselves out of the rocks, and look for threats. The half-moon bathed the terrain in all the light they needed as they turned their heads right and left to scan through the green-tinted spotlight their goggles provided. Wilson led them up the illuminated side of the ridge face, and the wingmen held tight positions above their leader, which allowed them to maintain formation and monitor ground clearance as well. The nearby Sledge and Tron formations did likewise over a moonscape of rugged, uninhabited land. As they transited over the ridgelines, they maintained radio silence, avoided the shadows and stayed as far away as possible from scattered settlements that would be alarmed at the sudden thunderous rumble from the jet formations breaking the stillness of the desert night.
The Anvils made an easy left turn on a westerly course. Wilson led them down the backside of the Omani range to the sea as he increased his groundspeed for the next leg, which led into the Persian Gulf. He noted that the cultural lighting from Dubai dominated the southwest horizon and bounced off a high overcast that bathed everything in a greenish NVG glow. Numerous lights from shipping and oil platforms dotted the Gulf ahead of them.
He checked the clock… Inside 30 minutes to go.
Losses are acceptable. He remembered CAG’s words and the punch they sent to his stomach. Air Wing Four was going to take no chances. The strikers were loaded with laser-guided bombs each pilot would manually guide into their assigned aimpoint with a laser beam… all while flying formation and monitoring the threat. Because they still didn’t know why the Raven division had NO GPS indications over Bandar Abbas, the strikers needed a weapon that didn’t depend on GPS guidance. Laser deliveries, however, required clear line-of-sight, so if a cloud deck got in the way over the target, the Anvils and Sledges would be forced to get underneath it. That would mean exposing themselves to the threat to a much greater degree deep inside a hostile country. Looking in the direction of Yaz Kernoum, Wilson couldn’t see any weather. They were on time and Wilson’s fuel was as planned. Things were looking good.
Now on the water, Wilson took them down as low as he dared, his obedient wingmen still in loose cruise as the eastern sky began to lighten behind them. He looked under his goggles to assess the ambient light and decided to keep them on as long as he could before the rising sun compelled him to remove them.
Wilson reached down to find the fuel dump switch and held it for a second before he secured it. He then switched on his radar. The others saw a shot of fuel burst from Wilson’s fuel dump masts: a welcome sight, their briefed signal to energize their own emitters. Now led by the radar, it was as if they had been blind and could suddenly see. Each of the pilots immediately devoured the tactical information the electronic eye provided them about the surface and the air contacts ahead. They avoided the islands in the Gulf, some Iranian and some Arab, as they continued west just above the tranquil waters. Wilson was struck by the lack of tanker traffic — there wasn’t any.
A new voice filled his radio headset. “Thor, picture clean.”
Wilson transmitted, “Anvil” to answer the AWACS controller orbiting high over the Gulf in an E-3 Sentry, the Air Force aircraft providing early warning and tactical control for the strike package with an aircrew he had communicated the strike plan to the day prior. In succession, he heard the others.
“Sledge.”
“Tron.”
All were up strike common and another potential disconnect appeared to be solved. Thor responded with “Houseboat,” the code-word to continue. No last-minute reprieve from Washington; the strike was going to go.
Wilson got to the end of the navigation leg and turned northwest on the established route. When he could see Weed’s helmet next to him with his unaided eye, he decided it was time for his goggles to come off. The first warm rays of sunlight creeped up from the eastern horizon and silhouetted the sharp shadows of Hornets next to him. The formation sped closer to a remote area of the Iranian coastline where they would enter the Islamic Republic to begin their final run-in for Yaz Kernoum.
CHAPTER 65
In his alert facility bed, Reza Hariri had finally gone to sleep after another restless night of waiting in vain for the Americans to come to him. It had been a long and frustrating two nights at the Shiraz alert strip, his armed and fueled MiG-35 parked in a shelter off the end of the runway, just beyond the wall of his small sleeping area. The setup allowed him and the other alert pilots to be in their aircraft and taxiing for takeoff within minutes.
The action around Hormuz had been disappointing, with IRIAF fighters recording no kills and maintaining CAPs far from the American strike groups in an effort to distract them and lure them away from the targeted areas — and into the teeth of the defenses. To Hariri it was all foolishness. No, idiocy. Iran possessed dozens of modern fighters with beyond visual range weapons, including the MiG-35!
Let me get down there, at night, and every one of my missiles will have a target, he thought, railing against the Iranian leadership that kept the MiGs here on strip alert, hundreds of miles from the action — while his F-14s and Phantoms were given worthless CAPs well inland. It was like a bullfighter waving a red cape at a charging bull from the safety of the grandstands. No, we need to get down there, take some losses, but bloody their nose — much more than we did two nights ago.