Sky Masters pm-2 Page 6

  “A fitting end to a perfectly lousy day, ” Stone said, straightening his uniform and heading toward the reviewing stand for the ceremony. Major General Richard “Rat” Stone was the commander of the now disbanded Thirteenth Air Force-the principal American air defense, air support, and logistics support organization in the Republic of the Philippines. General Stone-whose nickname was short for “Rat Killer” after a strafing run in his F-4 along the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Vietnam had killed dozens of rats with 20-millimeter cannon fire-commanded the twenty different organizations from five major operating commands at Clark Air Base. Principal of all the organizations on his base was the Third Tactical Fighter Wing, composed ofF- 16 fighter-bombers and F-4G “Advanced Wild Weasel” electronic warfare and defense suppression fighters; and the 6200th Tactical Fighter Training Group, who operated the various tactical training ranges and fighter weapons schools in the Philippines and who ran the seven annual “Cope Thunder” combat exercises to train American and allied pilots from all over the Pacific. The Third Tactical Fighter Wing, whose planes had the distinctive “PN” letters on the tail plus either the black “Peugeots” of the Third Tactical Fighter Squadron or the “Pair-O-Dice” of the Ninetieth Tactical Fighter Squadron, flew air-to-air and air-to-ground strike missions in support of American interests from Australia to Japan and from India to Hawaii. Clark Air Base had also been home to a very large Military Airlift Command contingent of C-130 Hercules transports, C-9 Nightingale flying hospitals, C- 12 Huron light transport shut tIes, and HH-53 Super Jolly and HH-3 Jolly Green Giant rescue and special-operations helicopters. The 374th Tactical Airlift Wing shuttled supplies and personnel all across the South Pacific and would, in wartime, deliver troops and supplies behind enemy lines. The Ninth Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron, the Twentieth Aeromedical Airlift Squadron, and the Thirty-first Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron all provided medical airlift support and would fly rescue missions over land or water to recover downed aircrews-these were the organizations that first welcomed the American prisoners of war from Vietnam in 1972. Clark also housed the 353rd Special Operations Wing, whose MC-130E Combat Talon aircrews trained to fly psychological warfare, covert resupply, and other “black” missions all across the Pacific. The base also supported the other American and Filipino military installations, including Subic Bay Naval Station, Sangley Point Naval Station, Point San Miguel Air Force Station, Camp O’Donnell, Camp John Hay, Wallace Air Station, Mount Cabuyo, Mactan Airfield, and dozens of Philippine Coast Guard and National Guard bases. In essence, Clark Air Base had been a vital link to the Pacific and a major forward base for the United States and its allies since it opened in 1903. Now it was all being handed back to the Philippineshanded back to them during some of the most volatile and dangerous times in the country’s history. Stone’s gaze moved from his country’s flag to the throngs of noisy protesters outside the perimeter fence less than a kilometer away. At least ten thousand protesters pressed against the barbed wire-topped fences, shouting anti-American slogans and tossing garbage over the brick wall; Stone had arranged armored personnel carriers every one hundred yards along the wall surrounding the base to counter just such a demonstration. The Americans inside those carriers were armed only with sidearms and tear-gas-grenade launchers, and the Filipino troops and riot police outside the gates had nothing more lethal than fat rubber bullets. They were being pelted by rocks and bottles so badly that the carrier’s crews dared not poke their heads out or even open one of the thin eye-portals. The throngs could easily overrun them all if they were stirred up. Occasionally a shot could be heard ringing out over the din of the crowd. Stone realized that, after weeks of these protests, he no longer jumped when he heard the gunfire. The Thirteenth Air Force commander had aged far beyond his fifty years in just the last few months. Of no more than medium height, with close-cropped silver hair, piercing blue eyes, broad shoulders narrowing quickly to a trim waist, and thin racehorse ankles, Stone was a soft-spoken yet energetic fighter pilot who had risen through the ranks from a “ninetyday-wonder” Officer Training School pilot candidate during the Vietnam War to a two-star general and commander of a major military installation defending a principal democratic ally and guarding America’s western flank. In the past year, however, he had found himself supervising a degrading, ignoble withdrawal from the base and the country he had learned to love so well. It was deeply depressing. From a contingent of nearly eleven thousand men and women only twelve months earlier, Stone had assembled the last remaining two hundred American military personnel on the mall in front of the reviewing stand, to march one last time in parade. Although there were supposed to be ten persons from each of the twenty resident and tenant organizations on the base, Stone knew that most of the two hundred men and women who marched before him were security policemen, who had been hand-picked to ensure the safety of General Stone and the other Americans from Clark AB as they departed that day. Part of the reason for the huge demonstration outside the perimeter fence was the presence of the two Filipino men on the reviewing stand with Stone: Philippine President Arturo Mikaso, and First Vice President Daniel Teguina. Teguina had carried the cry for the Philippines to cut all ties with the West and to not renew the leases on American military bases. Unlike the refined and elderly Mikaso, Daniel Teguina liked to be in the public eye, and he carefully polished his image to reflect the young radical students and peasants that he believed he represented. He dressed in more colorful, contemporary clothes, dyed his hair to hide the gray, and liked to appear in nightclubs and at soccer matches. The National Democratic Front, despite reputed ties to the New People’s Army, the organization that controlled the Communist-led Huk insurgents in the outlying provinces, flourished under the Mikaso-Teguina coalition government. Under Mikaso’s strong popular leadership, the military threat to the government from the extremist Communist forces subsided, but the new, more radical voices in the government were harder to ignore. It didn’t take long for a national referendum to be called after the 1994 elections, which forbade the President to extend the leases for American bases any further. The referendum passed by a narrow margin, and the United States was ordered to withdraw all permanent military forces from the Philippines and turn control of the installations to the Philippine government within six months. Second Vice President General Jose Trujillo Samar, who was not present at the ceremonies, shared the majority of Filipinos’ distaste for American hegemony, and he fought hard for removal of the bases. Leaving, Rat Stone was out of a job. Over the slowly rising screaming and yelling from the protesters, the American airmen marched in front of the reviewing stand, formed into four groups of fifty, and were ordered to parade rest by Colonel Krieg, acting as the parade adjutant general. Surrounding the grassy mall were two sets of bleachers, where guests of the government and a few American family members and embassy personnel watched with long faces the lowering of the colors for the last time over Clark Air Base. Banks of photographers, television cameras, and reporters were clustered all around the reviewing stand to capture the ceremonies. While several network news companies were on hand, no live broadcast of the ceremony was permitted. General Stone had felt, and the Air Force concurred, that a live broadcast might cause widespread demonstrations all across the country. That was also the reason no high-level American politicians were on hand. The official transfer had been made in the safety of Washington, D.C., weeks ago. President Mikaso stepped forward to the podium as a taped trumpet call was played. The crowd began to cheer, and an appreciative ripple of applause issued from the bleachers. When the music stopped, Mikaso spoke in flawless English: “My friends and fellow Filipinos, we are here to mark a historic end, and a historic beginning, in the relations between the Republic of the Philippines and the United States of America. On this day of freedom and independence, we also mark a significant milestone in the future of the Philippines. “For over ninety years, we have relied on the courage, the generosity, and the strength of the people of the United States for our security.
Such an arrangement has greatly benefited our country and all its people. For this, we will be eternally grateful. “But we have learned much over these long years. We have studied the sacred values of democracy and justice, and we have strived to become not just a dependency of our good friends in the United States, but a strong, trusted ally. We are here today to celebrate an important final stage of that education, as the people of the Philippines take the reins of authority of our national security responsibilities. We are thankful for the help from our American friends, and we gratefully recognize the sacrifices you have made to our security and prosperity. With your guidance and with God’s help, we take the first great step toward being a genuine world power. . Mikaso spoke eloquently for several more minutes, and when he was done, appreciative applause made its way from the bleachers all the way out beyond the wall, over the crowds. The people clearly loved their President. But Teguina listened to the speech and Mikaso’s praise for the United States with growing impatience and disgust. He loathed the Americans and had always resented their presence. As for Mikaso, he owed him nothing. He’d agreed to this hybrid coalition only after he’d realized he didn’t have enough votes to win the presidency himself. As taped music was played over the PA system, Mikaso, Stone, and, reluctantly, Teguina, positioned themselves in front of a special set of three flagpoles behind the reviewing stands. An honor guard stepped onto the stand and positioned themselves around the flagpoles. As Mikaso placed a hand over his heart in tribute, the Philippine flag was lowered a few feet in respect. Then, as “Retreat” was played, the American flag was raised to the top of the staff, then slowly lowered. “Why is our flag lowered?” Teguina whispered, as if to himself. When no one paid him any attention, he raised his voice: “I ask, why is the Philippine flag lowered first? I do not understand “Silence, Mr. Teguina, ” Mikaso whispered. “Raise the Philippine flag back to the top of the staff, , ” he said, his voice now carrying clearly over the music. “It is disrespectful for any national flag to be lowered in such a way. “We are paying honor to the Americans-“

  “Bah!” Teguina spat. “They are foreigners returning home, nothing more.” But he fell silent as the American flag was lowered and the honor guard began folding it into the distinctive triangle. When the flag was folded, the honor guard passed it to General Stone, who stepped to Arturo Mikaso, saluted, and presented it to him. “With thanks from a grateful nation, Mr. President, ” Stone said. Mikaso smiled. “It will be kept in a place of honor in the capital, General Stone, as a symbol of our friendship and fidelity.”

  “Thank you, sir.” At that, the two men looked skyward as a gentle roar of jet engines began to be heard. Flying over the base and directly down the mall over the reviewing stand were four flights of four F-4 Phantom fighters, followed by a flight of three B-52 bombers, all no more than two thousand feet above ground-and everyone could clearly see the twelve Harpoon antiship missiles hanging off the wings of each B-52. The audience in the bleachers applauded and cheered; the crowd outside the gate was restlessly cheering and shouting at the impressive display. But Daniel Teguina decided he had had enough. This… this American love feast was too much for a native Filipino. He pushed past Stone and Mikaso and quickly low ered the Philippine flag from its pole, unclipped it, and reattached it to the empty center pole where the American flag had just been removed. “What in God’s name are you doing, Teguina?” Mikaso shouted over the roar of the planes. Teguina ordered one of his bodyguards to raise the Philippine flag. He turned, glaring at Stone, and said, “We are not going to defer to Americans any longer. This is our land, our skies, our countryand our flag!” As the flag traveled up the pole, Stone heard one of the most chilling sounds he’d ever experienced-the screams of fury, anger and, ultimately, jubilation coming from the thousands outside the gates. As the Philippine flag reached the top of the pole, the screams reached a deafening, roaring crescendo. Teguina and Stone stared long and hard at each other, while President Mikaso began babbling apologies for his First Vice President’s behavior. Thus ended the American presence in the Philippines. After the ceremonies quickly ended, Rat Stone made his way to the air terminal to supervise the final departure-he still preferred not to call it an evacuation-of American military personnel from Clark Air Base. He couldn’t shake the feeling deep in his gut that this cessation of mutual defense arrangements had happened too quickly, too abruptly. The skirmish just last week in the Spratly Islands was still fresh in his mind. And so was the look in Daniel Teguina’s eyes… it chilled him to the bone. No, Rat Stone decided, this would not be the last time he would see the Philippines. … The question was when. HIGH TECHNOLOGY AEROSPACE WEAPONS CENTER (HAWC), NEVADA MONDAY, 13 JUNE 1994, 0715 HOURS LOCAL “Tell me this is a joke, sir, ” Lieutenant Colonel Patrick McLanahan said to Brigadier General John Ormack, “andwith all due respect, of course-I’ll beat your face in.” John Ormack, the deputy commander of the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center-nicknamed HAWC, the Air Force’s secret flight-test research center that was a part of the Dreamland complex-didn’t have to look at the wide grin on McLanahan’s face to know that he wasn’t seriously threatening bodily harm to anyone. He could tell by McLanahan’s voice, wavering with pure excitement, that the thirty-nine-year-old radar navigator and flight-test project officer was genuinely thrilled. They were standing in front of the newest, most high-tech aircraft in the world, the B-2 stealth bomber. And best of all, for the next several months, this B-2-nicknamed the “Black Knight”belonged to him. “No joke, Patrick, ” Ormack said, putting an arm around McLanahan’s broad shoulders. “Don’t ask me how he did it, but General Elliott got one of the first B-2A test articles assigned to Dreamland. That’s one nice thing about being director of HAWC-Elliott gets to pull strings. This one has been stripped down quite a bit, but it’s a fully operational modelthis was the bomber that launched the first SRAM-II attack missile a few months back.”

  “But they just made the B-2 operational, ” McLanahan pointed out. “They don’t have that many B-2s out there-just one squadron, the 393rd, right?” Ormack nodded. “What are we doing with one?” McLanahan asked. “Knowing Elliott, he put the squeeze on Systems Command to begin more advanced weapons tests on the B-2, in case they begin full-scale deployment. Air Force stopped deployment, as you know, because of budget cutbacks-but, as we both know, General Elliott’s projects aren’t under public scrutiny.” Ormack went on. “He was pushing the shift from nuclear to conventional warfighting strategy to Congress, just as Air Force did. It was hard for the Air Force to sell the B-2 as a conventional weapons platform-that is, until Elliott spoke up. He wants to turn this B-2 into another Megafortress-a flying battleship. The man managed to convince the powers-that-be to let him use one for advanced testing. “Of course we need a senior project officer with bomber experience, experience on EB-series strategic-escort concepts, and someone with a warped imagination and a real bulldogtype attitude. Naturally, we thought of you.” McLanahan was speechless, which made Ormack smile even more. Ormack was an Air Force Academy graduate, medium height, rapidly graying brown hair, lean and wiry, and although he was a command pilot with several thousand hours’ flying time in dozens of different aircraft, he was more at home in a laboratory, flight simulator, or in front of a computer console. All of the young men he worked with were either quiet, studious engineers-everyone called them “geeks” or “computer weenies”-or they were flashy, cocky, swaggering test pilots full of attitude because they had been chosen above 99.99 percent of the rest of the free world’s aviators to work at HAWC. McLanahan was neither. He wasn’t an Academy grad, not an engineer, not a test pilot. What McLanahan was was a six-foot blond with an air of understated strength and power; a hardworking, intelligent, well-organized, efficient aviator. The eldest son of Irish immigrants, McLanahan had been born in New York but raised in Sacramento where he attended Air Force ROTC at Cal State and received his commission in 1973. After navigator training at Mather AFB in Sacramento he was assigned to the B-52s of the 320th
Bomb Wing there. After uprating to radar navigator, he was again assigned to Mather Air Force Base. Along the way, McLanahan became the best radar bombardier in the United States, a fact demonstrated by long lines of trophies he’d received in annual navigation and bombing exercises in his six years as a B-52 crew member. His prowess with the forty-year-old bomber, lovingly nicknamed the BUFF (for Big Ugly Fat Fucker) or StratoPig, had attracted the attention of HAWC’s commanding officer, Air Force Lieutenant General Brad Elliott, who had brought him to the desert test ranges of Nevada to develop a “Megafortress, ” a highly modified B-52 used to flight-test high-tech weapons and stealth hardware. Through an unlikely but terrifying chain of events, McLanahan had taken the Megafortress, idiomatically nicknamed the Old Dog, and its ragtag engineer crew into the Soviet Union to destroy a renegade ground-based antisatellite laser site. Rather than risk discovery of the highly classified and politically explosive mission, McLanahan had been strongly encouraged to remain at HAWC and, in effect, accept an American high-tech version of the Gulag Archipelago. The upside was that it was a chance to work with the newest aircraft and weapons in the world. McLanahan had happily accepted the position even though it was obvious to all that he had little choice. The Old Dog mission, one of the more deadly events that ultimately drove the Soviet Union to glasnost, had to be buried forever-one way or another. Many successful, career-minded men might have resented the isolation, lack of recognition, and de facto imprisonment. Not Patrick McLanahan. Because he was not an engineer and had very little technical training, his job description for his first years at HAWC consisted mainly of answering phones, acting as aide and secretary for General Elliott and General Ormack, and rewriting tech orders and checklists. But he educated himself in the hard sciences, visited the labs and test centers to talk with engineers, begged and pleaded for every minute of flying time he could, and, more important, performed each given assignment as if it were the free world’s most vital research project. Whether it was programming checklists into a cockpit computer terminal or managing the unit’s coffee fund and snack bar, Patrick McLanahan did his work efficiently and professionally. Things began to change very quickly. The Air Force promoted him to Major two years below the zone. He was given an executive officer, then a clerk, than an assistant, a staff, and finally his own office complex, complete with flight-test crews and dedicated maintenance shops. The projects began to change. Instead of being in charge of documentation and records, he was heading more concept teams, then more contractor-MAJCOM liaison jobs, then more subsystem projects, and finally full-weapon systems. Before the ink was dry on his promotion papers to Major, he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. His “exile” was occasionally broken, and the young “fastburner” was frequently “loaned” with assignments with other research, development, and government agencies, including Border Security Force, Special Operations, and the Aerospace Defense Command. Very soon, McLanahan had become a fixture in any new project dealing with aviation or aerospace. He was now one of the most highly respected program managers in the Department of Defense. The mission of the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center had changed as well. With budget cutbacks and greater downsizing in all strategic bombardment units, some place had to be designated to keep all these inactive aircraft until they might be needed again. Although most were sent to the “boneyard, ” the Air Force Aerospace Maintenance and Restoration Center at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base near Tucson, Arizona, to be stored for spare parts or for scrap, a few were secretly sent to Dreamland, in the desert of central Nevada, for research and special missions. The place was the Strategic Air Reserve Group, commanded by General Elliott. SARG took the work of the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center one step furtherlt created an operational unit out of exotic research experiments. Whereas the Old Dog became an operational mission completely by accident, now other “Old Dogs” were being created and held in reserve until needed. The new Old Dogs collected over the years now included six B-52 bombers; two B-1 bombers-both original A-models; six F-111G fighter-bombers, which were formerly SAC FB-1 11A strategic bombers; and the newest arrival, McLanahan’s B-2 Black Knight bomber. “The other task you’ve got is ASIS, ” Ormack continued. “Air Force is finally considering putting a pilot-trained navigatorbombardier on board the B-2 instead of the current navigatortrained ‘mission commander’ layout. The cockpit is designed for two pilots; you have to redesign it for a weapons system officer and defensive systems operator, but retain the dual pilot control capability. You’ve got a few months, no more than four, to get ASIS ready for full-scale production and retrofit, including engineering blueprints and work plan.” He smiled mischievously and added, “The B-2 pilot ‘union’ is not too happy about this, as you might expect. They think ASIS is a bunch of crap, that the B-2 is automated enough to not need a navigator, and the B-2 should keep its two pilots. I think our experience with the Old Dog proved otherwise.” McLanahan laughed. “That’s an understatement. Now, what’s ASIS stand for?”