“The money was nothing but a token of good faith — or call it a bribe,” the President said. “Sen’kov knew we had won anyway — he had to save face in front of his generals, and a hundred million bucks goes a long way toward doing just that. Plus, he realizes now we had the goods on him. The incident is over, and everyone wants it that way. Let’s all go home.” He stood and headed for the door. But before he departed, he turned back toward the videoteleconference screen and said, “General Samson?”
“Yes, sir?”
“I want a full report on this incident from you and from General McLanahan as soon as he returns from his trip through Russia. I assume he will actually come back this time?”
“I’ll see to it, sir.”
“The only matter we still need to discuss is what to do about my military officers who plan and execute military operations in foreign countries without permission,” the President said grimly. “That kind of insubordinate, illegal bullshit needs to be dealt with right away, once and for all. I hope I’m making myself clear to everyone.”
Over southern Russia
The threat warning receiver was a wild, confusing mixture of signals, and Gennadi Yegorov was having a tough time sorting them out. “I can’t quite make out what all the fuss is about,” he said to Ion Stoica. They were both listening intently to Belgorod Radar Center, trying to coordinate the flight paths and defensive alignment of at least six Russian jet fighters and one SA-10 surface-to-air missile site. “I can’t tell if they haven’t found the intruder, or if they’ve found him but can’t lock onto him, or found him but aren’t authorized to attack.”
Stoica, piloting the Metyor-179 Tyenee stealth fighter-bomber, readjusted his grip on the control stick and worriedly shifted in his ejection seat. “I think we’re too late,” he said. “Whatever it was got away.”
“I’m not so sure,” Yegorov said. “I just heard another message about unidentified aircraft heading southwest.”
“Well, that’s right toward us,” Stoica said. “Let’s hope we get lucky. How’s the infrared sensor this morning?”
“Atleechna, “ Yegorov said. “Better than usual-must not be very much humidity in the air. Range is about sixteen kilometers.” He paused, listening to the busy, often confusing cacophony of radio transmissions, then said excitedly, “There! A traffic warning to another aircraft, unidentified intermittent radar target, ten kilometers south of Boriskova, heading westbound, altitude unknown.” Stoica banked hard left and headed for that spot. “Very indistinct radar fixes — he’s less than thirty miles from the air defense radar site at Belgorod, but they can’t lock him up.”
“It must be a stealth aircraft,” Stoica said. “Could it be an American stealth aircraft?”
“They can’t get a good fix on him — but the detection threshold is getting closer for us the farther we head northeast,” Yegorov warned his aircraft commander. “Thirty kilometers more and they’ll be able to see us.”
“Those weapon pylons are as bad as radar reflectors,” Stoica said.
“That answers our question — we wear pylons, and our stealthiness goes away,” Yegorov summarized. “I suggest we go home and bring Comrade Kazakov’s plane back to him before we dent a fender.”
“You say we have thirty kilometers before we need to turn south again — let’s take it,” Stoica said. “My dogfight antennae are going nuts. Whoever’s out there, he’s close.”
“Did I ever tell you what I think of your so-called dogfight antenn—” But Yegorov stopped before finishing — because a target had just appeared on the infrared search-and-track sensor. “Wait a minute … contact!” he crowed. “Eleven o’clock low, range unknown. Weak infrared return, but it does not correlate to any other radar targets.” He reached up and patted Stoica’s shoulder. “I’ll never bad-mouth your antennae again.”
“Congratulate me later — let’s first see if we can eyeball this guy,” Stoica said. He offset himself slightly south of the target.
“If we can see him on the IRSTS, he’s well within R-60 range,” Yegorov said. “I’m ready.”
“I’d like to get a visual on him first,” Stoica said. “I don’t want to waste any missiles on just a cargo plane.”
“We’re not on a mission, Ion — we’re joyriding over Ukraine and Russia aboard a five-hundred-million-ruble stealth fighter,” Yegorov told him. “We came here to see how close we can touch air defense radars with loaded pylons aboard. We know now — not very close at all. Let’s go home before we break something major.”
“We finally get a fix on this guy, something it looks like the rest of the Russian Air Force could not do, and you want to let him go and go back home?” Stoica said, with not a little humor in his voice. “What happened to the bloodthirsty aerial assassin I met dropping bombs on Afghan villages a few years back?”
“He makes too much money and is too afraid of having his nuts cut off by his gangster boss,” Yegorov said.
“This guy shot down some fighters and helicopters,” Stoica reminded his backseater. “If you tell me you’re not the least bit curious about who he is, we’ll go home.” There was no reply. “Ha! I thought so. Hang on!” Stoica began a gentle left turn as the target began passing off their left side, beginning a tail chase to better line up on the target’s hot engine exhausts.
“Sleeshkam Pabol’she, “ Yegorov said, as he studied the infrared image. “He’s a big one. Four engines? I think he has four engines!”
“Four engines — he’s got to be a stealth bomber!” Stoica said. “It doesn’t explain who shot down the Russian aircraft, but this is a pretty big catch. We’ll deal with his escort after we take this big bastard down. What do you say, partner?”
“I’m with you,” Yegorov said excitedly. He entered commands into the weapon computers and immediately received a TARGET LOCK indication. “Two external R-60s ready and in range. Your trigger is hot.”
“Missiles away!” Stoica lifted the trigger guard off the control stick and squeezed the trigger. Two R-60 air-to-air missiles, one from each wing pylon, screamed off into space after their quarry less than five kilometers away….
As soon as the two R-60 missile motors ignited, a supercooled electronic eye in the tail of the EB-1C Vampire bomber detected them and issued a MISSILE LAUNCH warning, and at the same time automatically ejected decoys and activated the bomber’s electronic countermeasures system. “Missile launch! Break left! Now!” Patrick shouted.
The Vampire’s attack countermeasures systems were the most advanced in the world. Instead of simple chaff and flare decoy bundles, the Vampire ejected small cylindrical gliders that carried wide-spectrum electromagnetic transmitters that simulated the heat and radar signatures of a real plane. It also carried a towed transmitter array from which all the radar jamming signals were sent — in case the enemy launched home-on-jam weapons, the array would be destroyed, not the Vampire.
But the Metyor-179 was too close, and the decoys didn’t have time to power up to full illumination. While the first R-60 missile missed by a few dozen yards, the second R-60 did not. It briefly veered right after one of the decoys, then turned back left toward the Vampire. As it passed over the tail, its proximity fuse detected a near miss and detonated the seven-pound fragmentation warhead. The high-energy burst of shrapnel blew the upper half of the EB-1C’s vertical stabilizer completely away just above the horizontal stabilizer.