Bill Carroll was waiting in a pickup truck when Waters shut down his engines. The wing commander had never seen the Intel officer so agitated in the two years he had known the young man. Bill’s got the job of giving me the bad news or taking it to me, he told himself. He clambered down the side of the fuselage, determined at least to show his wing how to meet serious personal adversity, which. he calculated, would be his last lesson for them. Carroll held the door open for him and rushed around to the driver’s side. Before starting the engine, he blurted his news.
“We’ve got our first frag order.”
Waters stared at him in disbelief, feeling like a condemned man getting a stay of execution. A frag order — the operational message sending fighter aircraft into combat, detailing the missions the aircraft would fly, identifying specific targets, time over target, call signs and ordnance. Now here it was…
The Intel officer told him that the 45th was ordered to attack a supply dump at Bandar seventy-five miles east of Basra and a troop concentration at Ramshir twenty-five miles northeast of the supply dump. “Sir, we don’t have reccy photos, no threat estimates, nothing. They want us to hit ASAP but no later than tomorrow morning.”
“Bill, it fits with the Intelligence Summary we got from the Watch Center. Those troops are probably headed to the dump for resupply. From there they’ll move up and attack Basra.” He fought down a feeling of exultation and concentrated on how to use his one chance to lead his wing into combat…
The COIC, Combined Operations Intelligence Center, was in disarray when Waters and Carroll came in. Waters was ready with his first orders: “I need three runners.” Carroll pointed out three sergeants. “Find Maintenance, the 377th and the 378th. Tell them to send a liaison officer or NCO here with a radio to relay orders. Go.” The three sergeants ran out of the room. “Bill, have your troops find the charts, plotters, markers, whatever the crews are going to need to plan the attacks. Get a weatherman up here, show me the targets on a map — and the frag order.”
Chief Master Sergeant George Gonzaga from Maintenance hurried into the room three steps ahead of C.J. and the two squadron commanders. “George,” Waters said, “turn the first two squadrons for an air-to-ground mission. Load the 377th’s birds with Mark-82s, the 378th’s with CBUs, the Weasels with Shrikes.”
While Maintenance downloaded the centerline fuel tanks, refueled the birds and uploaded the ordnance Waters had ordered, the men clustered around the map and studied their targets. Bull Morgan lumbered into the room with the weatherman in his wake. Rapidly Waters explained the situation: “I want to hit these two targets ASAP, but we are dealing with a lot of unknowns. Brief your crews to attack the targets like we did Woensdrecht. Here’s where our practice runs can pay off. The 377th will go against the supply dump at Bandar with Mark-82s, the 378th will attack the troop concentration at Ramshir with CBUs.”
Chief Gonzaga stuck his head in the door. “The first four birds are loaded out for air-to-air like you said at Stonewood, the crews are standing by. We can launch them using the radio in Maintenance Control’s van or reload them with Mark-82s.” Waters could have kissed the man for not forgetting and becoming confused. He needed the four jets for a Base CAP, a Combat Air Patrol flying a protective umbrella over the base.
“Good. Have Maintenance Control launch the first two into a Base CAP. Tell them to set up a radar search pattern. I don’t want any uninvited guests to overfly the base right now.” Gonzaga took off to relay the message on his brick. Within minutes they heard the two aircraft take off while two airmen from Communications hooked up three UHF radios in the COIC.
“There are two major differences on this attack,” Waters said. “First, we don’t need tanker support. The supply dump at Bandar is one hundred and thirty nautical miles away; the troop concentration at Ramshir is one hundred and fifty-five. Both are within low-level range. Brief to ingress at low level and to recover at high level after coasting out, threats permitting. Second, we don’t know what the threats are around those targets. So expect a normal Soviet defense array of SAMs and Triple A.”
Waters turned to the weatherman, a major. “What’s the weather doing?” The major was ready. The weather was clear and would remain so, and the moon was almost full and would be up at 2010 that evening. “Okay, gentlemen,” Waters said, looking at the group, “you know what your men can hack better than me and you know the three times we can attack — now, during the night or in the morning. Ideas?”
The group was unanimous they should try for a launch in one hour while surprise was still on their side, and hit the targets just before evening twilight obscured the ground. The men hurried out to make it happen.
Outside, Chief Gonzaga reported to Waters that eighteen birds were loaded, four more would be in five minutes. “Major Conlan has checked in on status, ready to launch,” the Chief added. Waters was impressed by the fast response of his wing.
“Okay, Chief, level with me. How are you getting the birds turned so fast? You’re taking a short cut. What is it?”
A smile split Gonzaga’s brown face. “We’re downloading the centerline tanks, then uploading the munitions while we refuel. About half the bunkers have refueling points in them so we don’t need to use refueling trucks.” Waters said something about uploading munitions and refueling at the same time being dangerous. “Colonel, we’re using Israeli wartime procedures. We figured if they can make it work so can we. Of course, the Air Force wouldn’t approve since it wasn’t their idea.”
Bill Carroll joined them as they listened to the first of the Phantoms crank their engines. “Colonel” — Carroll had to yell to be heard above the crescendoing noise — “we’ve got sixty-seven birds in from Stonewood. There are five stragglers that Lieutenant Locke will bring in tomorrow.”
C.J. was the first to take off and never lifted above two hundred feet as he led his wingmen north over the Gulf toward their target, the troop concentration at Ramshir. The 378th was launching first since they had to penetrate the deepest to reach their target. C.J. kept scanning the sky, looking for hostile aircraft that might try to intercept them. Since they were flying without a CAP, they would have to jettison their loads and fight their way home. Stan’s constant flow of “no activity, weak search radar, no sector searches, no activity, nothing” was nice to hear… Fifteen minutes after takeoff he coasted in over the point of land they had selected as the split-point for the two arms of their attack on to Ramshir. They were feet dry and in bad-guy land — Iran.
He lifted his bird to eight hundred feet to insure that the string of aircraft stretching behind him to Ras Assanya would hear his transmission. “It’s a go on Hot Dog,” he transmitted, committing the 45th to battle. Unless they were jumped by MiGs, the attack would continue. He dropped his bird back on the deck.
“They got us with a search-radar and tried to interrogate our IFF,” Stan now reported. “Lost us now, but someone is very good on that end.”
C.J. thought, We’re seven minutes out. He pushed the throttles up, touching 540 knots and descended to one hundred feet. Sweat poured down his face. “Thirteen miles south of Ramshir,” he told Stan as he lifted his bird to eight hundred feet and started to circle the target, challenging the SAMs and Triple A to come active, to turn their radars on. Nothing. He continued his arc, visually acquiring the target. “Goddamn, look at that!” He was circling a mass of people running for trucks and buildings. He did not see a single slit-trench or bunker.