Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 05 (24 page)

 
          
“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 screwup. 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. Then we would’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
“attaboy” 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 independent 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 allranks, 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 cocksure ring to it,
a hint of defiance, perhaps?

           
Jamieson did not reply. The guy was
better than he had let on, Jamieson had to admit. Yeah, decision making was
important, but that’s why God had invented aircraft commanders and crew
coordination. Jamieson would prefer to have a knowledgeable systems man in the
right seat any day over a second-guesser or a self-anointed tactics expert.
Jamieson reluctantly admitted that he regretted the Air Force’s decision to put
a second pilot in the right seat of the B-2A stealth bomber rather than a
pilot-trained navigator or engineer; or, even better, leaving the third seat in
and bringing a navigator- engineer-bombardier along. He had criticized the guy
for knowing a little about a lot; in fact, the man knew quite a bit about
almost everything, and that made him a valuable asset on a bomber crew, no
matter what kind of wings he wore—or even if he wore no wings at all.

 
          
The
door to the cockpit cab opened, and the crew chief for
The Spirit of Hell
met up with Jamieson. “We’re done for the day,
chief,” Jamieson said, as he stepped from the cab to the steel platform
surrounding the full-motion simulator. “You’re cleared to reset the box after
the printout’s ready.”

 
          
“Uh,
sir .. . ?”

 
          
“Where’s
the printout?” Jamieson asked—then he stopped short when he saw the armed
guards in the doorway to the simulator room. “What’s going on, chief?” he
snapped. “What in hell are those security guys doing in here?”

 
          
“I
asked them,” Lieutenant General Terrill Samson said. The big three-star general
was in the simulator instructor’s control room, carrying the mission-data
printout and a large catalog case with a large combination lock on it. Jesus,
Jamieson thought, the guy is
huge!
How
did he ever fit into the cockpit of a military jet trainer? “Thank you, chief.
If you’ll excuse us, I need to talk with Colonel Jamieson. Let me know when the
maintenance troops arrive, please.” Soon they were alone in the control room.
Jamieson noticed that everyone in the entire simulator bay had departed, except
for the guards, who were armed with Uzi submachine guns.

 
          
Jamieson
was tall, but the commander of Eighth Air Force towered over him. It was a
little intimidating even for a guy like Jamieson, who was not easily scared by
other men. Tony Jamieson had over four thousand hours’ flying time in a dozen
different Air Force combat aircraft, including more than sixty combat sorties over
Iraq, and anyone who could beat those numbers got Jamieson’s instant respect
and attention. Terrill Samson was such a man. “Hello, General,” Jamieson said
to Samson. “What’s with the guards?” “We’re going to be doing a few
modifications to this simulator,” Samson said, “testing out a few new items.
It’ll be down for only a day or two; you’ll have to use the second box by
itself for the time being. How did it go with our boy?”

 
          
“Fair
to poor,” Jamieson replied. “He’s knowledgeable and all— book stuff, numbers,
some good systems knowledge, not a bad stick—but he doesn’t know tac doctrine
and procedures.”

 
          
“Could
he be a B-2A Combat Crew Training Unit student?” Samson asked. CCTU was the
509th Bomb Wing’s B-2A six-month initial training program. “If so, what stage
would he be in?”

 
          
“His
pilot skills are average, but based on his systems knowledge, I’d say he was a
second- or third-stage student, upper level...”

 
          
“So
you’re saying he’s as good as an average pilot who’s been through about half
the CCTU program, Tiger?”

 
          
“There
are lots of candidates out there with better piloting skills,” Jamieson said
quickly, still not wanting to admit that the guy was pretty good for fear of
appearing to compromise on his deliberately set lofty standards for B-2A crew members.
“He seems to have lost a lot of heavy iron piloting skills.”

 
          
“He
never
was
a pilot, Tiger,” Samson
said with a smile. “He’s an ex-bomber-
navigator,
B-52s mostly.”

 
          
Jamieson
was surprised—no, shocked was the word. The bomber part didn’t surprise him,
but Jamieson would’ve bet that the guy had been flying nothing but a desk for
years. “Where’d he learn to fly, then?”

 
          
“HAWC,”
Samson replied, “and that’s classified.
Highly
classified.”

 
          
“HAWC?”
Jamieson sputtered. “You’re shitting me . . . er, sorry, sir, I mean . .. man,
this guy used to fly for HAWC? When? What did he fly?”

 
          
Samson
closed his eyes, as if the very mention of the word
HAWC
caused him great physical or mental stress. “Tony, do me a big
damned favor and keep your questions to yourself,” Samson said impatiently.

 
          
Jamieson
did exactly as he was told—he knew as well as Samson what the Department of
Defense did to those who breathed a word about its most super-secret research
facility. Only the best engineers and fliers got to work at HAWC—even hotshot
veteran sticks like Tony Jamieson didn’t dare apply to work there for fear
they’d be rejected or that working under such a constant level of strict
security would destroy their private lives.

 
          
The
aircraft and weapons HAWC worked on were classified at the highest levels of
national security, and any inquiries or even a casual mention of the place or
the organization required a report to the Air Force Office of Special
Investigations. Jamieson knew that Samson had to report him to AFOSI just for
having this conversation— and that such a report would change Jamieson’s life
forever, because of the level of official scrutiny he’d be under from now on.
With all of the recent security breaches rumored to have occurred at HAWC,
everyone even remotely involved in the facility would be closely monitored;
their public and private lives would no longer be their own, but would be
documented and examined by the Department of Defense until death closed the
file.

 
          
“Excuse
me, sir, but there’s a whole lot you’re not telling me,” Jamieson probed. “You
say this guy is ex-military, a civilian, but he’s got access to B-2A tech
orders, weapons manuals, and he’s riding the sim with the radar on? No person
without a special-access clearance has ever seen the radar in operation
before—he not only watched it work, but
knew
how to work it in a combat situation
/”

           
“No more questions, Tiger,” Samson
said. “I need to know one thing: would you fly with him, right now, in combat?”

 
          
“Not
in a million friggin’ years!” Jamieson retorted. “Why should I, sir? Fve got
thirty of the worlds best pilots in my wing, already fully trained and
qualified to fly the Beak. Why should I fly with someone who’s not checked
out?”

 
          
“I’m
not asking you to choose between a mission-ready crew member and him,” Samson
urged. “I’m asking you, would you fly with him if—”

 
          
“If
he was the last man on earth?” Jamieson interjected. He had no idea where this
was leading, but it wasn’t good. “He could back me up on most tasks, but... no,
sir, I wouldn’t fly with him. It’d be a waste of a good airframe.”