Shadows of steel pm-5 Read online

  Jamieson scowled at the guy’s smart-ass comeback, then laughed as if dismissing the thought of this guy passing a B-2A bomber crew-member exam. But all traces of humor disappeared when the VIP picked out a folder with a red TOP SECRET cover sheet on it, and extracted a single sheet of paper—a 509BMW Form 88, “B-2A Record of Aircrew Training and Performance.” Jamieson examined the form with a dumbfounded expression, then muttered, “What is this shit?”

  “It’s all genuine, Colonel,” the VIP said, as if reading Jamieson’s mind. He had indeed finished his open-book and closed-book exams, with near-perfect marks, along with a 100 on a “bold print” emergency procedures test, a complete publications inspection—this guy apparently had a complete and up-to-date set of B-2A tech orders, including the classified ITO-B-2A-25-1 weapons-delivery manual—an oral exam, and a complete Class 1 flight physical and psychological stress exam. He was even certified under the Personnel Reliability Program, the program used to certify any person who had responsibility for nuclear weapons or components. A few of the sign-off blocks had been blacked out so he couldn’t read who the evaluator was, but all of the other blocks were signed off by Eighth Air Force Standardization/Evaluation instructors, with General Steve Shaw himself, the four-star commander of Air Combat Command, in charge of all Air Force combat air forces, as the final approving authority.

  “Yeah, right. And I’m the Prince of fucking Wales,” Jamieson snapped. He swung around to Samson and tossed the form on the table. “What’s going on, General? Who is this guy? Why is Eighth Air Force Stan/Eval signing him off?”

  “Tony, I’ll answer all the questions you have … later …

  maybe,” Samson said. “But all your questions will be moot if this gentleman can’t fly. I need you to give him an EP check ride.”

  “Excuse me, Sir. I don’t know what’s going on here, and I don’t think I care to know, but if you’re asking me to ‘pencil-whip’ this guy, General, ask someone else,” Jamieson said firmly. “We got standards to follow.”

  “I’m not asking you to sign him off if he doesn’t know the procedures, Tony,” Samson said. “If he’s not qualified, I want to know about it.”

  “He’s not qualified then, Sir,” Jamieson said resolutely, refusing to be bullied by the hulking three-star general before him. “All B-2 crew members must be U.S. Air Force pilots with at least one thousand hours’ jet flight time, they must be selected by the 509th wing commander and the commander of Air Combat Command, and they must be graduates of B-2A Combat Crew Training here at Whiteman. I help screen and select every B-2 bomber candidate, and I personally know and fly with every graduate from the 4007th CCTS. I don’t remember seeing him.”

  “Tony, I want you to evaluate this gentleman as if he were fresh out of CCTS and ready to undergo unit mission-ready qualification,” Samson said evenly. “General Wright has already certified him as ready to begin unit certification—it’s your job to evaluate his readiness to certify him mission-capable.”

  Jamieson glared at Wright, who remained impassive. Tom Wright obviously knew much more about this little con game than he had let on, and he had not shared his knowledge with his old friend and long-time wingman. Either Wright was turning into a true mindless staff weenie, or this was really heavy shit going on with this stranger. “But the fact remains, Sir,” Jamieson went on, “that I know lie hasn’t been through CCTS. If I continue, I’ll be knowingly violating the law. Are you asking me to do that?”

  “The fact is, Colonel,” Samson said, “that he has been through initial B-2 flight training—I can’t tell you which one, that’s all.”

  “But there’s only one initial B-2A flight training school, Sir.”

  “No, there isn’t, Colonel,” Samson emphasized, “and that’s all I can say about the matter. Now get out your scenario book and the rest of your evaluator shit and give this man an EP check ride, and do it quietly.” The argument ended right there, with Samson shooting an angry glare into Jamieson’s brain. The newcomer was quiet, keeping his mouth shut and his eyes averted through this discussion.

  They took a break for a half hour while Jamieson brought in the materials for an emergency-procedures simulator examination—one simulator was already set up for the evaluation, he learned—and when he was ready, he began briefing the mission profile. It was a simple profile: preflight, taxi, takeoff, an aerial refueling, a high-altitude bomb run, a low-attitude bomb run, and return to base—although these check rides never ended up looking anything like the briefed profile. The simulator instructors—there was only one man on the simulator console today, a civilian Jamieson had never seen before—could insert hundreds of different malfunctions and emergencies into the scenario at any time.

  The EP check ride concentrated mostly on “bold print” and warning items, which were actions that each crew member had to commit to memory perfectly and execute flawlessly. EP check rides were the most demanding. A bust in any “bold print” or “warning” action or more than one or two busts in a less-serious “caution” action meant instant flight decertification. Few new guys ever passed an EP check ride the first time, and even experienced crewdogs who didn’t keep up with their studies had trouble on “no-notice” checks.

  When Jamieson finished briefing, the stranger got to his feet and began to give the mission commander’s portion of the flight briefing. “Hold it,” Jamieson interrupted, totally caught off guard, “you don’t have a part to brief in this scenario. You fly the profile and-“

  “I’m your MC on this flight, sir,” the newcomer responded, in a deep, rather reserved but no-nonsense tone of voice. The MC, or mission commander, on a B-2A stealth bomber acted as copilot, offensive-systems officer, and defensive-systems officer, although either pilot could complete the mission alone in an emergency.

  “The MC always briefs his actions on takeoff and the route of flight-“

  “When I need you to give me something, mister, I’ll tell you-“

  “Let him brief, Tony,” General Wright said. “We want to hear this.”

  “Thank you, sir,” the stranger said immediately. “I’ll be briefing the mission commander’s portion of the emergency-procedures simulator flight check. I’ll be evaluated on three main areas: knowledge of all procedures and tech order directives; performance as mission commander during normal and emergency situations; and Performance as the flying crew member during emergency situations. Since Colonel Jamieson didn’t give one, let’s start off with a time hack”

  Without seeming to notice or care about Jamieson’s protests, the guy launched into a standard crew briefing, outlining his responsibilities, the mission timing, the route of flight, the attack route, the assigned targets, alternate landing bases, and his actions during all critical phases of flight. He completed the preflight briefing competently and succinctly—he clearly knew his stuff.

  Jamieson was amazed. The guy was obviously a former bomber crew member, with a lot of experience in many different combat aircraft, and he knew very technical and detailed information on the B-2A stealth bomber and current attack procedures. He had no detectable accent—not New England, not southern, not Texas, not midwest. Who was he? Why hadn’t Jamieson ever heard of him?

  Samson thought of the U.S. Air Force’s tiny fleet of B-2A stealth bombers as his own personal responsibility, almost his personal property, so no one was going to go up in one unless Tiger checked him out first. Besides, it was always a good thing to do a favor for a three-star general, especially a guy like the Earthmover.

  Terill Samson spent almost as much time testifying on Capitol Hill on behalf of an expanded heavy bomber fleet as he did at his headquarters at Barksdale Air Force Base in Bossier City, Louisiana, and one word from him in the right cars in Washington and at the Pentagon was worth perhaps another order of sophisticated “brilliant” weapons, another upgrade on a B-52 or B-1B bomber, maybe even another B-2A bomber wing—not to mention the addition of one, maybe two, stars on Jamieson’s shoulders in the not-too-dis
tant future Nobody, not even the big fearsome-looking three-star general, told “Tiger” Jamieson whom to fly with, but he was intrigued by the secrecy and urgency surrounding the stranger and this mission, so, like an idiot, he agreed to cooperate.

  “Ground position freeze The high-resolution video display out the cockpit windows froze, as did all of the cockpit instruments and readouts. “Record current switch positions and flight parameters and get me a mission printout.” Instantly the visual display shifted—they were now over a large expanse of desert, with the runway lights of a large airport complex barely visible in the distance. “Thank you. Everyone take five, then reconfigure the simulator for the next session. You too, MC. Step outside and take five.”

  The civilian sat back in his seat in the cockpit of the B-2A Weapon Systems Trainer, or WST, The Spirit of Hell (all of the B-2A bombers were nicknamed after a U.S. state except the WST, which was nicknamed after the place most crewdogs associated with their time spent in it), and consciously let his muscles relax.

  “We’ve still got an engine-out approach and landing to do, Colonel,” he said, staring at the scenery depicted on the high-resolution video screens as if he were really looking off into the distance. “I’m ready to go as soon as we reconfigure.”

  “I don’t need to see an approach,” Jamieson said. He turned to the younger man beside him and scowled. “You know just enough to be dangerous, in my opinion. You know a little about a lot of stuff in the beast, but not nearly enough to fly it in combat.

  The evaluation is over.”

  “We’re here to complete an emergency-procedures evaluation, Colonel,” the civilian said. “The curriculum calls for an engine-out.”

  “I don’t need to see an approach,” Jamieson insisted, wiping sweat from his eyebrows and scowling at the stranger beside him, “and I designed the entire B-2A initial, recurrent, upgrade, and instructor training curricular don’t need you to tell me what it says.” The B-2A WST, or Weapon Systems Trainer, was the world’s most realistic simulator, and it often left its users exhausted and stressed after even a simple combat scenario. The stranger looked completely relaxed, Jamieson noted, with not a drop of sweat anywhere on his body. Either he was sedated or he had ice water for blood. “I got no doubts you can fly an approach, run a checklist, maybe even land the thing with one engine out, even though you’re not a B-2A pilot—or any kind of pilot,” Jamieson said. “You just don’t have what it takes to fly the Beak, period.” The civilian was taking Jamieson’s words pretty well—very little reaction, just sitting still and looking at nothing in particular.

  The guy had just gone through an emergency-procedures scenario that would’ve killed most crewdogs, no matter how experienced they were. The sim operator had thrown in an emergency action message and a scramble launch—Jamieson hadn’t done that since his B-1B Lancer bomber days five years ago. They’d then had a complete failure of one of the B-2A’s primary hydraulic systems, and after a short but intense argument, they’d decided to proceed with the mission. The sim operator had thrown in what appeared to be a series of minor glitches, most of which were handled automatically by the B-2A’s sophisticated flight-control computers. In the end, on the bomb run, all those little malfunctions had turned out to be a staggering huge malfunction, one that threatened to scrub the mission or even force the crew to eject.

  They hadn’t ejected—the stranger had handled all of the malfunctions. Jamieson had to admit (to himself only, of course) that he had no idea why the B-2A hadn’t just flipped over on its back and plowed into the ground, or hadn’t been cut to ribbons by the multiple layers of air defense weaponry that had been inserted into the scenario. Normally in an EP sim, when the action in the cockpit was getting too rough and the crew coordination was breaking down, the Sim operators would begin to reduce the outside distractions—they would flatten the terrain, improve the weather, or reduce the number of threats—so the crew had at least a chance to catch up and get some productive training out of the simulator session, even if they flunked the exam, It wasn’t realistic—the number of threats usually increased as the mission went on, not decreased—but it kept the session from being a total washout.

  Not only had the stranger not flunked the exam, but the sim operator hadn’t reduced the number of threats.

  They’d somehow made it to the target area, laying a string of bunker-busting 2,000-pound bombs on a command-post complex on the high-altitude pass, and a cluster-bomb attack on an air base and radar-site complex on the low-altitude run—and gotten all of their weapons off on time and on target. Jamieson didn’t know if they would be armed weapons—the MC was running so many damned checklists, juggling so many malfunction screens, and pulling and resetting so many circuit breakers that even Jamieson couldn’t keep up—but they had made their attacks and then actually departed the target area with at least two engines and all crew members still alive. That was more than most crews could claim if they had been loaded up as they had been. Returning to base was not a requirement in an emergency-procedures sim session.

  “Listen, son, for a civilian, you’re a damned good student, and I think you’d make a great crewdog,” Jamieson went on, “but a B-2A flight-crew candidate has to attend twelve months of Air Force pilot school, spend five to seven years in combat strike aircraft, pass a screening program that accepts only one in two hundred applicants, attend a tough six-month B-2A combat-crew training course here at Whiteman, a six-month in-House qualification course, then spend at least two years as a B-2A pilot before upgrading to the right seat as mission commander. You’ve showed me a few things this morning that tell me you can handle a program like that.”

  Stop trying to stroke the guy, Jamieson shouted at himself. This guy had done none of these things necessary to fly the Spirit. He wasn’t qualified, period. Sure he knew systems, and he knew the basics of flying, but that didn’t give him the right to play MC with a billion-dollar warplane.

  “Any specific critique items, Colonel?” the guy asked quietly.

  “A few—not that it makes any difference,” Jamieson replied.

  “Go-no-go decision making was your biggest screw-up. A responsible, thinking crew never, never takes a primary hydraulic problem away from home plate. The plane’s too valuable; we have only ten of the damn things flying. If it’s a major bold-print malfunction item, bring it home and fight another day. We would’ve given you the engine-out approach right away if you had called the command post and brought the Beak back for landing like you were supposed to do. uld’ve sent you through the bomb run with only the electrical fault, and you would’ve possibly avoided the fighter attack because you would not have had the hydraulic failure or the split ruddervator. If you knew your tac doctrine, you’d know all that.” Jamieson didn’t remind the guy that they had somehow survived the fighter attack. A stealth bomber that wasn’t stealthy was a sitting duck for any air-superiority fighter-the MC had (again that word) somehow maneuvered the bomber so that it had survived the requisite two missile and two gun passes. Yes, they had been shot up, but they were still alive and still flying! The guy earned a big fat “atta boy” for his work. Unfortunately, Jamieson wasn’t the guy who was going to give it to him.

  “Maybe the persons your mission is supporting need you over the target when you said you’d be there,” the civilian said. “Maybe they’re counting on you. Maybe lives depend on-“

  “It’s not worth risking over a billion dollars’ worth of hardware, weapons, gas, and manpower,” Jamieson interrupted testily. “We’re heavy into flight safety here, son. There are always backups to every strike mission. No one plane is that valuable.”

  “That’s not always the case, sir. They put four engines, four in dependent hydraulic systems, four independent flight-control systems, and four independent electrical systems on the B-2A for a reason: to continue the mission should one, two, or even three of them fail.”

  “This is my critique of your performance, mister, not a debate.”

 
Jamieson interjected. “I’m explaining why you wouldn’t pass a check ride—we can talk about tactics and doctrine in Snobsters over a couple beers.” Snobsters was Whiteman’s old officers’ club, now the all-ranks, all-services casual bar. “You studied hard, son, and you got a good full speed-ahead attitude. It’s obvious you played on heavy bombers before, many, many years ago, but frankly, son, you don’t know shit about modern-day bombers. The days of swapping spares and using bubble gum and baling wire to keep a bomber in the air, no matter what, are dead and gone—and good riddance.

  Today, the crew’s responsibility in the new Air Force is to monitor and manage systems. If things start going tits-up, you bring the beast home and go to your backup plan. You’re good, son. You’re a good systems operator …”

  “So what’s the problem, Colonel?” the civilian asked, removing his headset and letting his longish blond hair hang loose in sweaty strands-aha, the guy’s not a friggin’ machine. He does sweat!

  “If you say I can fly the B-2A …”

  “Sir, give me a few months and I can teach a monkey to fly the Beak,” Jamieson said, unstrapping from his seat and heading for the rear entry hatch to the simulator cab, “but I wouldn’t want to go to war with the son of a bitch. A monkey can drop bombs, work the MDUS, maybe even fly an approach if you give him enough bananas—but he won’t back you up and he won’t make good decisions. I need an MC that will not just run a checklist, but make sound decisions based on tactical doctrine and years of experience in a flying unit. You don’t have it. Sorry.” He turned and headed for the exit, then turned back to the stranger and added, “I’m sure you’re a good aviator and a good student, and with time and training I’m sure you can get the job done. But not now.”

  As Jamieson was leaving, he heard the civilian say, “Thank you for the lesson, Colonel.” It was a low, sad voice—but there was a certain cock-sure ring to it, a hint of defiance, perhaps?