Air Battle Force Read online

  “My God,” Martindale breathed. “Thorn should expect the Russians to counterattack, maybe try to land some commandos behind the Taliban forces in the city, maybe send some long-range bombers to pound the crap out of them like they did in Chechnya—”

  “The Russians apparently tried to airlift about three hundred commandos into the outskirts of Mary,” Maureen said. “Some Taliban forces ambushed them with shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles. All of the Russians were either killed or captured.”

  “So it’s war,” Martindale muttered. “Have we been ordered to turn around? Have our landing or overflight rights been canceled?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Did Thorn order you to turn around?”

  “The president advised me to postpone the trip,” Hershel replied, “but he said it was my call.”

  “And?”

  “The conflict happened almost two hundred miles from the capital—I think we’ll be all right,” Hershel said. “But I’m more concerned about your safety, Mr. President. I’m concerned about not making it to Turkmenistan.”

  “I only need to know one thing: Is Patrick McLanahan on the case?” Martindale asked.

  Maureen Hershel blinked in surprise. “He happened to be the first person I called when I planned this trip.”

  “You did exactly the right thing, Maureen,” Martindale said, barely disguising a sigh of relief. “I can guarantee that the general has been doing little else but watching over things in Turkmenistan since you first called.”

  That made Maureen Hershel feel very good, and she wasn’t ashamed to let everyone see it. “Then I recommend we continue the mission,” she said. “If overflight or landing privileges are revoked, we’ll need to reassess.” She turned to Briggs and Wohl. “What do you gents need from me? Satellite phones? Computers?”

  “Access to our equipment,” Briggs said. “We may have you take a few folks off the manifest in Bahrain and make the necessary calls to Ashkhabad.”

  “Some of you aren’t going to Turkmenistan with us?”

  “Oh, we’ll be there, ma’am—just not as part of your contingent,” Briggs said with a smile. “We might have the need to move rapidly, and it would be easier if we weren’t forced to stay with the group.”

  Maureen held up a hand. “I didn’t hear that,” she said. “You’re sick, you need a wisdom tooth pulled, you’re going to have a baby—just tell me what I’m supposed to tell the Turkmen government and I’ll do it.”

  “Don’t worry, ma’am, we’ll be nearby,” Briggs said. “You just make all your visits and keep to your schedule—we’ll do the rest.”

  “We especially want you to insist that the Turkmen government allow you to travel outside the capital to meet with the Taliban fighters,” Wohl added.

  “I wouldn’t count on that.”

  “Then we’ll take a meeting anyway—our way,” Wohl said.

  His voice made Maureen Hershel’s skin turn cold and break into goose bumps. She was amused to see it had the same effect on Isadora Meiling—except hers didn’t appear to be goose bumps of fear, but goose bumps of pleasure. Izzy Meiling, who had her pick of any man in Washington, D.C.—falling for a broken-faced, gravel-voiced, jarhead Marine? Well, why the hell not?

  NORTHWEST OF MARY, TURKMENISTAN

  That same time

  The twelve Russian Tupolev-160 “Blackjack” bombers had flown all the way from Engels Air Base for this mission. The Blackjacks carried a maximum load of twenty-four Kh-15P long-range attack missiles on rotary launchers. Each of the missiles had three-hundred-kilogram fuel-air explosive warheads, designed to knock down and kill any Taliban forces not in the safety of shelters. The Russians wanted to preserve as much as possible of the infrastructure at the two major airports at Mary for the eventual invasion forces that would soon follow.

  The Blackjacks attacked from long range and low altitude. The Taliban and Turkmen defenders, manning early-warning radars and air-defense missile and artillery units, had virtually no warning. Coming in at supersonic speeds in an almost vertical dive onto their preprogrammed targets, the Kh-15 missiles were almost undetectable. All the missiles were programmed to explode about three hundred meters aboveground so the blast and fire effects of the fuel-air warheads would not create large craters in the runways or aircraft parking areas but would be sure to kill anyone unlucky enough to be out in the open.

  The Blackjacks, however, were only the first wave. Twelve Tupolev-22M bombers, also from Engels Air Base, swept in behind the Blackjack bombers. The “Backfires” carried twelve Kh-25MP medium-range antiradar missiles on external pylons under the engine intakes and on the fixed-wing pivot points, plus an APK-8 radar-emitter pod on the centerline hardpoint that would feed precise range and bearing information to the missiles. Cruising in a low-altitude orbit north of Mary, the Backfires acted as “red rovers” for each other: When one bomber was targeted by an air-defense missile or antiaircraft artillery radar, another Backfire would swoop in from a different direction and fire a missile. Operating in four three-ship hunter-killer packs, the Backfire bombers made short work of dozens of air-defense units operated by the relatively inexperienced Taliban fighters.

  With the radar-guided air defenses down around Mary, the third wave of bombers cruised in—twelve more Backfire bombers, each carrying twelve RBK-500 dispensers bearing area-denial mines and antitank and antipersonnel cluster bombs. They flew virtually unopposed over Mary Airport. Each cluster bomb was designed to explode either on contact, if it was disturbed, or automatically within seven days. If any Taliban should escape the first two attacks and were rushed enough not to sweep carefully for mines, the cluster bombs and mines would get them—but each one would destroy itself before the Russian invasion forces moved in.

  “I have heard the blessed news!” Wakil Mohammad Zarazi exclaimed as he strode into his alternate headquarters, which was far from the airfield and had survived the assault.

  Major Aman Orazov did not try to rise from his seat as his commanding officer entered the room. His head and neck were wrapped tightly in bandages, and he winced from the pain of shrapnel wounds to his neck and shoulders as he took deep drags on a thick hand-rolled cigarette, which had a little opium sprinkled in with the tobacco to help dull the pain.

  “An entire company of Russian commandos, sent to hell by Turabi and his soldiers.” Zarazi looked at Orazov as if it was the first time he had seen him. “What happened to you, Major?”

  “I was caught in the initial firebomb attack,” Orazov replied. “I watched an entire truckload of our soldiers incinerated before my eyes.” He did not bother looking up at Zarazi. “Where were you, General?” he asked.

  “In the shelters, of course,” Zarazi replied. “You saw to the deployment of the mobile antiaircraft units, as I directed?”

  “Most of them made it out,” Orazov said. “I ordered the operators not to turn on their radars until someone spotted aircraft near the airfields.”

  “You told them not to engage the Russians? Why?”

  “Because if it was just a standoff antiradar-missile attack, General, the Russian missiles can kill each radar-equipped unit from over thirty kilometers away,” Orazov said angrily. “The launch aircraft would be well out of range of our air-defense weapons, but our radars would be easy targets for their antiradar weapons.”

  “Then you countermanded my order, Major,” Zarazi said, “because I ordered the men to attack and keep on attacking until every one of those godless Russian scum were dead.”

  “Then you sealed their fates, Zarazi,” Orazov said, “because I would guess that every unit that turned on its radar was hit by a missile and destroyed.”

  If Zarazi noticed that Orazov had not addressed him as “sir,” “General,” or “master,” as he usually did, he did not indicate it. “Deploy the rest of the air-defense units around the airfields,” he ordered, “and this time make sure they get hits—radar or no radar.”

  Orazov winced, not just from the pain now,
but from Zarazi’s completely ridiculous order. “Where is Colonel Turabi?” he asked, ignoring the order.

  “Colonel Turabi informed me that he wished to stay on patrol in the northeast in case the Russians try another assault,” Zarazi replied. “He asked for more supplies, enough for perhaps another week, and then he asked for his task force to be relieved.”

  “You should recall Turabi immediately to help with defending this base,” Orazov said tersely. “He is out in the desert safe and plinking off simple Russian probes, while we sit on this airfield and have our heads handed to us by the Russians!”

  “I agreed with the colonel’s reasoning that the Russians will very likely try another heliborne assault,” Zarazi said. “Their air bombardment was not nearly as effective as I’m sure they anticipated. Turabi thinks they desperately need to open up another front.”

  Orazov wiped sweat from his forehead caused by the excruciating pain and suppressed a disgusted laugh. Easy for this Afghan desert rat to think the Russians’ air assault was “not nearly as effective”—he was safe in a deep underground shelter while Orazov and his men were on the surface trying to defend their base and getting the hell blasted out of them. The only way the Russians had been ineffective was in not wiping them out of existence completely. “Is Turabi still deployed around Nishan?”

  “I believe he has shifted his forces farther north and west, near Yagtyyol,” Zarazi said. “Turabi surmised that the Russians used the Chärjew pipeline to navigate to their infiltration point and that they will not make the same mistake again—they’ll stay far away from roads and pipelines.”

  “I have to give him credit. Colonel Turabi is a very clever and resourceful fighter.”

  “It takes more than being clever to win favor in the eyes of God, Major,” Zarazi said. “The colonel is a capable fighter, but he needs to learn the relationship between being a good soldier and being a true servant of God. Fighting just for the sake of earthly goals is a waste of spirit and not a true calling at all.”

  “Oh, really?” Orazov said bitterly.

  “You yourself are a true and loyal servant of God, Major—you know this very well,” Zarazi said. “Fighting for other than the glory of God is the definition of evil.”

  Orazov took another puff, then painfully shifted himself in his chair so he could look at Zarazi out of the corner of his eye. Zarazi, as usual, was off in some transcendental fog. “Well, I think Turabi should be running out of fuel and water soon,” Orazov said. “He’ll be expecting a resupply mission today. I shall fly out and meet him. But first there is an important matter I must attend to.”

  “You will go out and see to the redeployment of our air defenses and then organize burial and rebuilding parties,” Zarazi said. “We must be prepared for when the Russians strike again.”

  No response.

  “Did you hear what I said, Major? Carry out my orders immediately.”

  Still no response.

  Zarazi glanced back—and saw Orazov aiming a pistol directly at his head. “What in God’s name is this, Major?” he barked, thunderstruck. “Put that weapon away immediately! Are you insane?”

  “Not insane—just smart,” Orazov said. “Smart enough to realize that you are no longer in command here.”

  “No longer in command? Of course I am in command here! This is my operation, my mission!”

  “Not any longer,” Orazov said. “From now on I am in charge.”

  Zarazi looked at Orazov, his eyes bulging in outrage. “How dare you point that weapon at me, Major,” he breathed. “I am the leader here. You will obey my orders or you will be eliminated.”

  “You are no longer in control here, you old fool,” Orazov said. “You are nothing but a religious fanatic who was fortunate enough to score a few meaningless victories against incompetent Turkmen soldiers. Your victories were just dumb luck. Now that the Russians are coming, you are nothing but a walking corpse. I was a fool to follow you. I think if I deliver you, Turabi, and a good number of your Taliban fighters to the Russians—alive or dead, it probably won’t matter—they’ll let me live. They may even make me an officer in their occupation army.”

  “I have been appointed by God to carry out His plan for a safe haven and training ground for all true believers!” Zarazi cried. “Do you think that God will look as favorably on you?”

  “God doesn’t give a shit if you or I believe in Him or not,” Orazov said. “The plans have changed, and you are not included in my new plans.”

  “God will strike you down for blaspheming His name—”

  “But I shall strike you down now,” Orazov said, grinning as he pulled the trigger.

  The entire back of Zarazi’s head splattered on the door to Orazov’s office, and the nearly headless corpse of the Taliban chief dropped to the ground like a puppet whose strings had suddenly been cut.

  That job done, there was only one mission left to accomplish before getting the hell out of here and making contact with the Russians: eliminate Jalaluddin Turabi and his men. Until Zarazi’s body was found, Orazov had plenty of authority to organize an attack mission. Once Zarazi was found dead, these quasi-Neanderthal Taliban fighters would search every square centimeter of the desert for him. But for now they would obey him, even to the point of executing an assault on their own patrol camp. Orazov had fooled Wakil Zarazi well enough that he was able to get almost as much authority as Turabi himself.

  Finally, Jalaluddin Turabi was going to die.

  TIGRESS MILITARY OPERATING AREA, FALLON NAVAL AIR STATION, NEVADA

  That same time

  “Kazoo, Devil flight up, base plus zero,” the lead F/A-18 Hornet pilot reported to the E-2C Hawkeye radar aircraft. The pair of Hornets from VMFA-232 “Red Devils,” Marine Air Group Twenty-four, Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, had been on a predeployment workup at Fallon NAS in Nevada when they were given a great opportunity: chase some Air Force bombers around the training ranges. That was a deal no American fighter pilot would ever pass up.

  “Roger, Devil flight,” the air-control officer aboard the Hawkeye replied. At the same time he was electronically passing the latest target information to both Hornets’ strike computers—the Hornets were still running radar-silent. One fast-moving target was to the southwest at about fifty miles, very low—less than a thousand feet above the high desert, trying to sneak past the Hornets by flying in fast between and parallel to the steep, rocky ridges that crisscrossed the Fallon ranges. By selecting the bogey with his target cursor, the lead Hornet pilot acknowledged the datalink and the vectors being received in the Hornets’ Data Display Indicators. The two Hornets remained in combat-spread formation, wingtip to wingtip, separated by about a mile so they could watch each other’s six.

  It was definitely an unfair fight, especially with a Hawkeye in the mix, the Hornet pilots thought—the Air Force pukes didn’t have a chance.

  At the right moment the lead Hornet pilot pushed his nose over to accelerate, waited until the range to the target decreased to about thirty miles, then flicked on his APG-73 attack radar. Immediately afterward the pilot got the last datalinked target-deconfliction message: That’s your bandit, cleared in hot. At the same time the pilot selected his AIM-120 AMRAAM radar-guided air-to-air missiles—making certain that the weapons themselves were safe—and watched as the fire-control system presented his missile-engagement envelopes and attack-solution vectors.

  The target started a turn to the north—obviously his threat-warning receivers had picked up the Hornet’s radar impulses and the crew had finally reacted. The turn was not very sharp. The bomber decreased altitude, now flying about four hundred feet off the deck. No doubt they’re using terrain-following radar, the Hornet pilot surmised, but having all that granite right in front of their faces must still create big-time pucker factor. The bomber reversed direction—again it was a good healthy turn, but not a very aggressive one. Now the surrounding terrain made it difficult for the APG-73 to stay locked on, but after lining up again on the bandi
t and dialing in a little antenna-scan correction, the radar quickly reacquired, the target-indicator box locked on again, and an in range indication appeared on the heads-up display.

  One last correction, just a slight one using a little rudder, and the flashing shoot indication appeared. Gotcha, fat boy, the Hornet pilot breathed. He checked one more time to be sure his master arm switch was safe—didn’t want to fire the real thing at the good guys—then placed his finger on the pistol trigger. “Devil Zero-one, Fox—”

  “Bandit! Bandit! Pop-up target, one o’clock, four miles!” the air-intercept officer on the Hawkeye radar plane shouted on the frequency. Another aircraft had appeared out of nowhere and was right in front of him.

  “Devil Zero-two engaging! Hard left break and dive, Woolly!” the pilot of the second Hornet called out. The leader had absolutely no choice. Before he could pull the trigger, he was forced to break off the attack. As he turned, he hoped the newcomer would follow him, which should put him right in his wingman’s gun sights. Where in hell did he come from?

  But instead of turning hard right to pursue the leader, the bandit switched tactics—it rolled left, waited a few seconds, then turned right in a spectacular high-G climbing, twisting maneuver that placed the second Hornet right off his nose. There was no radio transmission. There didn’t need to be. He could see a tiny dark shape off his right wingtip, low, with a bright blinking strobe light on it—the newcomer “shooting” at him. He was in front of the guy for only less than two seconds, but in the dogfighting game that was an eternity.

  “Devil leader, Devil Zero-two got waxed,” he radioed.

  “No shit?” the leader replied incredulously. “What is it? The Air Farts didn’t say anything about fighter escorts.”

  The second Hornet pilot tried to get a visual ID, but he couldn’t see it. “It must be small as hell. I can’t get a visual on it. I’m proceeding to the high CAP.”