Shadows of steel pm-5 Page 36

  “Right about now,” McLanahan said. “If we decided to abort from here, we’d reverse course and bug out over Burma, head east, and pick up a tanker just east of Manila. We can probably abort later on in the sortie and bug out over India, but then we’d have to bootleg a tanker out of Diego Garcia to meet us over the Arabian Sea or Bay of Bengal. Any way you cook it, AC, we’ll be skosh on gas from here on in. The last time we’ll have the right amount of fuel on board is right now.”

  “Shit,” Jamieson swore on interphone. “You know, this is exactly the situation I warned General Samson not to get into. Don’t get backed into corners. Don’t do stupid stunts. I guess it’s true—you never learn anything new when you’re yakking.” He paused, then looked at McLanahan. “It’s your call, mission commander. I’ll drive the bus anywhere you want.”

  McLanahan looked at Jamieson in surprise. “First time you’ve said that without the words dripping in sarcasm, Tiger.”

  “Yeah, maybe I should check my oxygen—I might be getting hypoxic.” He shrugged, then nodded. “You’re a pretty good stick after all, Mack. You got us this far. Make the call.”

  McLanahan paused, thinking; then: “You know, I just found out I’m going to be a father. Wendy’s pregnant.”

  “No shit? That’s great. Congrats. I got three of my own. Those critters will change your life, believe me.” He looked hard at McLanahan. “So you thinking about bagging this mission?”

  “Couldn’t think of a better reason He hesitated, thought for a short moment, then added, “… except there’s troops on the ground counting on us. We gotta do it, Tiger. We go.”

  “Then we go,” Jamieson agreed. “We’re committed.”

  The trip across Afghanistan was quiet and uneventful, but things changed immediately as the Spirit approached southeastern Iran.

  Their original chosen flight path had them flying through the less populated parts of the provinces of northeastern Kerman and northern Baluchistan va Sistan, but the closer they got to the Iranian army air base at Zahedran, they realized they could not put the left wing toward any emitters, so they flew east of Zahedan through western Pakistan.

  Before reaching the city of Zahedan, they briefly deactivated the “cloaking device” to get a last GPS satellite navigation update to the inertial navigation system, use the SAR radar to input an accurate pressure altitude into the flight computer, and to pick up any last-minute satellite intelligence and targeting data, including updates on the Iranian attacks on the United Arab Emirates and Oman. “The battle is going into phase two,” McLanahan reported as he read the retrieved messages. “Kamza Omani Naval Base on Musandam in the Strait of Hormuz, destroyed.

  Sib Air Base in Oman, heavily damaged along with nearly all of Oman’s air force. Mina Sultan Naval Base in the UAE, heavily damaged—that’s where Madcap Magician was based. God, I hope they’re okay.”

  “Your spy buddies made it this far, didn’t they?”

  “Yep … and I’d say they kicked some butt, too,” McLanahan said with a smile. “Listen: Peninsula Shield reports a counterattack by commando forces out of Mina Sultan on the rebuilt Iranian air defense emplacements on Abu Musa Island. Some injuries, no casualties, but the Iranian defenses were destroyed—two Hawk, one Rapier SAM emplacements, the command-and-control center destroyed, and the runway cratered. That sounds like my friends, all right.”

  As the B-2A flew southwest past Zahedan, they picked up the first indications of the air defense radar at Chah Bahar.

  “Let’s head on down,” McLanahan said, punching in commands to the flight-control computer. “COLA mode engaged.” He configured his supercockpit display to provide a God’s-eye view of the sky and terrain around the B-2A bomber.

  “Ready,” Jamieson said. “Deaf, dumb, and blind, we’re going hunting.” He engaged the autopilot to the new commands being entered into the flight-control system, and the B-2A bomber headed earthward at 15,000 feet per minute. Because the B-2A bomber used BEADS, the so-called cloaking device, it could not use a conventional terrain-following or terrain-avoidance radar system as with the B-52, F-111, F-15E, or B-1B bombers—it could not even use a radar altimeter to measure the distance below it, because BEADS would absorb all the outgoing energy.

  Instead, this B-2A bomber used a system developed by the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center called COLA, or COmputer-generated Lowest Attitude. First used on an experimental B-52H bomber nicknamed the “Megafortress”—so called because it had pioneered many of the advanced stealth and attack systems used on future war machines—the B-2A’s flight computers split up the entire globe into one-mile blocks, then had the highest terrain elevation within that block programmed into it. Using its inertial navigation system, accurate to 200 to 300 feet per hour, the B-2A’s flight-control system knew what terrain was coming up all along its flight path, and it would choose the lowest possible altitude while still avoiding the terrain. The flight-control computer could look “into” an upcoming turn, evaluate its airspeed, gross weight, outside air data, and flight performance, and fly as close as possible to the earth—sometimes as low as 100 feet—even though neither crew member could see out the cockpit windows! As the accuracy of the inertial navigation system degraded over time—there was no way to update the inertial navigation system with the “cloaking device” activated—COLA would select a higher altitude to provide a greater margin of safety while still flying as low as possible.

  The terrain in southeastern Iran was flat, with occasional high razorback ridgelines plunging down into flat valleys, many with marshes or dry lake beds at the bottom. Fifty miles south of Zahedan, they crossed a major superhighway, the Mashhad-Chah Bahar Highway. Their flight path took them about forty miles west of it, far enough to stay away from any detection from populated areas along the highway but close enough that Jamieson could see it. “Lots of traffic out there, heading north,” Jamieson said.

  “Good idea to get away from the coast these days.”

  About 180 miles north of Chah Bahar, they picked up the first threat indications from radar sites out in the Gulf of Oman. They saw a bat-wing symbol with a small circle on the apex—the symbol for an airborne early-warning radar. “There’s the Iranian A-10 radar plane,” McLanahan said. “About two hundred fifty miles away—seventy miles offshore. The radar guys say that if they’re going to pick us up, we’ll be within one hundred twenty miles of the second site. That means we might be visible to them for seventy to one hundred miles—ten, maybe fifteen minutes.”

  Just then, another bat-wing symbol appeared on the scope—not an A-10 radar plane, but an Iranian F-14 Tomcat fighter. “F-14 off the nose, about one hundred miles,” McLanahan said. “Not locked on yet, but he’s headed right for us …”

  “It’s that loose screw or rivet or joint on the left wing,” Jamieson said. “It’s screwing up our stealthy stuff. And the F-14’s designed to look for low-flying targets as small as a cruise missile.”

  “So let’s start giving them something to shoot at,” McLanahan said. “It’s a little earlier than we wanted, but we’re definitely an item of interest. I’m setting five hundred feet—stand by for missile launch.” McLanahan switched the terrain-avoidance system to 500 feet, then commanded the first launch of an AGM-86C cruise missile. The subsonic AGM-86C cruise missile had a turbojet engine that flew the missile at six miles per minute for 500 miles; this one had no warhead, only radio transmitters that gave it the radar cross-section and electronic profile of a large bomber. The cruise missile made an immediate right turn and headed west toward Bandar Abbas—and the F-14 Tomcat turned west to pursue. “He took the bait,” McLanahan said. “Let’s make a jog east, put Iranshahr off our right wing.” McLanahan reselected COLA on the terrain-avoidance computer, and they recrossed the Chah Bahar-Mashhad Highway again, heading east along the ridgelines.

  “One hundred twenty miles to go,” McLanahan said. “Threat scope’s clear … got an SA-10 site at Chah Bahar searching, but so far we’re …” And jus
t then, the F-14 Tomcat appeared on the threat scope again.

  “Shit, the F-14’s back—he must’ve downed the cruise missile and is searching for wingmen.”

  “Let’s give him one—this time, bugging out,” McLanahan said. He commanded 500 feet on the terrain-avoidance system again and launched the second AGM-86C, this one programmed to head north, toward Beghin Airport. “Missile away, resetting COLA …”

  Just then, they heard the computer-synthesized voice in their headphones shouting. “WARNING, MISSILE LAUNCH, WARNING, MISSILE LAUNCH!” The SA-10 Grumble surface-to-air missile site had opened fire on them—and with their bomb doors open, the B-2A bomber was a very inviting target, even at very long range. “MAWS activated!” McLanahan shouted. “Track-breakers active!” But it was the wrong decision—McLanahan recognized it seconds later.

  “No, the SA-10 launched against the cruise missile!” But it was too late—when he activated the missile defense system and jammers, it briefly deactivated the BEADS cloaking device, and the F-14 Tomcat, which had not yet detected the decoy cruise missile, locked on to the B-2A.

  “MAWS down, track breakers in standby,” McLanahan reported—but they could see the F-14 barreling down on them now, coming “down the ramp” from its high-altitude combat air patrol straight at the B-2A bomber. “He’s still headed for us. Stand by to …”

  Suddenly they received another “WARNING, MISSILE LAUNCH!” as the F-14 fired.

  McLanahan reactivated the MAWS missile defense system, and the system immediately dumped chaff from the left ejectors as Jamieson broke hard right. “Track breakers active, MAWS tracking!” They could actually see the first missile, probably a Phoenix or air-launched Hawk missile, depicted on the threat scope, getting closer every second … then another “WARNING, MISSILE LAUNCH!”

  as a second missile was fired from long range.

  The’HAVE GLANCE defense system started firing its high-power laser “blinding” system only three seconds before the first missile hit—but it was enough. The Phoenix missile’s active terminal radar overheated, causing a safety self-destruct. The Phoenix missile exploded less than 500 feet from the B-2A bomber. “Break left, second missile coming in!” McLanahan shouted, and Jamieson executed a hard left turn, pulling on the control stick to tighten the turn even more. The MAWS system pumped out chaff from the right ejectors in response.

  The second Phoenix missile was momentarily decoyed by the chaff and by the loss of radar lock when the damaged left wing dipped from view, but reacquired a lock when the chaff cloud dissipated—however, it locked on to Kuhiri Mountain, south of Iran-shahr, not on the B-2A. Again, the second missile missed by less than 300 feet—one-tenth of a second of missile flight time!—and exploded on the barren desert highlands below.

  But now the F-14 itself was moving in. “Fighter at one o’clock high, range less than three miles, closing at seven hundred knots … HAVE GLANCE active!”

  The HAVE GLANCE system, the high-powered laser emitter married to a missile-tracking radar, had a deadly effect on delicate, sensitive combat sensors such as those found on heat-seeking missiles, passive and active radar-homing missiles—and the human eyeball. The F-14 pilot had just zoomed down the ramp through 15,000 feet and was arming up his 20-millimeter cannon when the HAVE GLANCE laser blinder locked on to his aircraft and fired.

  The helium-argon laser, only the size of a large videotape camera but just as powerful as an industrial-strength diamond-cutting laser, didn’t cause any pain when the orange-blue beam hit the pilot’s eyes. He saw a quick flash of dirty blue light that temporarily obscured his vision, like a waft of smoke or sand. He blinked—the spot was still there. He blinked again—ah, the spot was beginning to clear, still fuzzy but getting better. The Iranian pilot could see the radar range click down on his heads-up display … 3,000 meters to fire … 2,000 meters to fire … ready to fire … now!

  But he wasn’t locked on to the target anymore—like the Phoenix missile, his fire-control radar had first locked on to a cloud of chaff, then on a piece of terrain when the bomber jinked away.

  The radar wasn’t counting down to his shoot point … it was counting down to when his fighter would hit the ground. A light from a passing car near the town of Chanf was the first indication to the pilot of how close he was to the ground—a split second before he impacted, traveling at almost the speed of sound straight down.

  “Scope’s clear,” McLanahan said. “Chah Bahar’s off the nose, forty miles. We’re well inside radar range of that A-10 radar plane now.”

  ABOARD THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN AIRCRAFT CARRIER AYATOLLAH RUHOLLAH KHOMEINI THAT SAME TIME “Combined radar reports a low-flying aircraft now two hundred fifty kilometers north of our position, heading south at very low altitude—less than two hundred meters, speed seven hundred kilometers per hour,” Brigadier General Muhammad Badi, Major Admiral Akbar Tufayli’s chief of staff aboard the carrier Khomeini, reported. “Chah Bahar air defense forces have engaged numerous unidentified air targets south of Iranshahr, destroying one believed to be a decoy.”

  “Good,” Tufayli said confidently. “This new radar system seems to be working perfectly.”

  “Shall we commit any of our fighters to the pursuit?”

  “No, Badi, not yet,” the Pasdaran naval commander replied. “We shall wait until the aircraft is over water before committing our forces.” He paused to think for a moment. “The bomber is over eastern Iran now? That means it must have flown westward across Afghanistan … and across India and China, too, perhaps? This means that the Americans may have violated Chinese airspace to attack from the Asian side, rather than attempt another attack from over-water! I think our Chinese friends would be very interested to learn about this new development, wouldn’t you say, Badi? Get me the Chinese group commander at Chah Babar immediately.”

  ABOARD AIR VEHICLE-01 I “It worked once before—let’s see if they work again,” McLanahan said. “Missile launch, ready … ready … now … doors open …

  one away … two away … doors closed …” At that instant, there was another missile launch warning from the SA-10 site—again, when the bomb doors were open, the B-2A bomber was at its most vulnerable position.

  The SA-10 Grumble missile flew a high ballistic flight path over the rugged terrain of southeast Iran, flying up to 50,000 feet before starting its terminal dive into the “basket,” where its quarry was supposed to fly. When it turned on its active terminal radar and flashed it into the target “basket,” it acquired the B-2A bomber immediately. The SA-10 Grumble missile actually had two seeker heads—an active radar seeker in the nose and, since the missile actually flew “sideways” into a lead-computing intercept, it also had an infrared seeker head mounted in the body of the missile that looked sideways at its target as it got closer, acting as a backup and as a terminal fine-tuning device for a precision kill. With two seeker heads, the SA-10 was very difficult to decoy.

  But the bomber’s HAVE GLANCE laser immediately destroyed the infrared seeker, allowing the IR seeker’s computers to deliver false aim-correcting data to the missile—just for about a second, but long enough to knock the missile out of its nice, smooth intercept. At the same instant that the HAVE GLANCE laser hit, Jamieson threw the bomber into another hard left break, just as McLanahan dumped chaff. The SA-10 missile wobbled, reacquired, locked on to the chaff, decided it wasn’t moving fast enough and rejected that lock, reacquired the bomber—and hit the right wing, near the tip just forward of the trailing edge. The shaped-charge missile warhead punched a two-foot-wide hole in the wing, destroying the right wing ruddervators and rupturing the right wing fuel tank.

  The B-2A bomber heeled sharply to the right, flipping over at nearly a ninety-degree bank, throwing the bomber nearly into a full accelerated stall. Jamieson tried to correct the turn, but had trouble controlling the aircraft. “Controls not responding!”

  he shouted at McLanahan. “We lost the right niddervators …

  c’mon, dammit, g
ive it to me, give it to me!” It took both men on the control stick, then full left rudder trim, to straighten the bomber out.

  “Lost the right ruddervators,” McLanahan confirmed. “Left ruddervators are deployed fifty, sixty percent. Power plants, all other systems OK. Fuel looks like it’s draining out the right wing … right wing valves are closed, all engines feeding off the left wing, boost pumps on, system still in AuTo but I’ll watch it.

  Hydraulics OK.”

  Meanwhile, the two JSOW cruise missiles were on their way, and as expected, the “screamers” did their magic once again. Two JSOW “screamers,” one east and one west of Chah Bahar, created so many false targets, emergency radar locks, and close-in automatic engagements that a dozen air defense sites within twenty miles of Chah Bahar opened up all at once—and all of them shooting east or west, instead of north, toward the B-2A.

  At ten miles from Chah Bahar, McLanahan and Jamieson launched the next two missiles—these were AGM-88 HARMs (High-speed Anti-Radiation Missiles), supersonic radar seekers loaded with a 150-pound conventional high-explosive warhead with tungsten alloy steel cubes embedded in the explosive to triple the warhead’s destructive power. The rotary launcher ejected two HARM missiles out into the slipstream, the missiles fired ahead of the bomber, then quickly locked onto the Chah Bahar radar straight ahead and homed in. With the radar at Chah Bahar on full-cycle duty to counter the JSOW “screamers” and direct Chah Bahar’s murderous antiaircraft defenses, the HARM missile had a clear shot all the way, and seconds later the search radar had been destroyed for good.

  “Okay, Mack,” Jamieson said. “We’re at the IP. We can turn back and hightail it for the hills, and we got a pretty good chance to make it outta here. We can E and E through the Pakistani or Afghan hills, then bug out over the Gulf of Oman and catch our tanker.”

  “You don’t want to do that, Tiger,” McLanahan said. “You want to see that carrier go down. So do I.”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” Jamieson said. “Hell, I didn’t want to live forever anyway. Let’s take care of business and get the hell outta here.” He began pushing up the throttles to full military power while McLanahan cut off the COLA terrain-avoidance system, and they started a steep climb over the Gulf of Oman toward the carrier.