HOGS #5: TARGET SADDAM (Jim DeFelice’s HOGS First Gulf War series) (31 page)

Davis
had lost considerable blood but had been stabilized; the odds were fifty-fifty
that he would make it. Salt was cursing up a storm, complaining about his
ankle, which he had whacked against something as he was hauled in. But if the
volume of his obscenities were a rough gauge of his prognosis, he’d be walking
in the morning.

The
plane’s pilot was resting as well, apparently after suffering a heart attack.
His pulse was erratic, but the crew said he actually seemed to have gotten much
better.

Dixon
sat on the floor of the plane, head back against a metal spar. Worn and
battered from his ordeal, he sipped water from a plastic bottle.

“We
should be landing shortly,” Wong told the others. “There will be a helicopter
waiting to take us home to King Fahd, where we’ll be debriefed.”

“That
can’t fucking wait until tomorrow?” asked Salt.

“Command
wants to know what we’ve seen ASAP,” Wong said.

“Fuck
them.”

“A
suggestion that has been proposed in the past,” said Wong. “But one which they
do not seem prepared to follow.”

Wong
had meant that as a joke, the first he had made since coming to the Gulf. But
no one laughed, not even Sergeant Salt.

“We
will tell them what we saw,” said Wong, sighing. “I would imagine that
Lieutenant Dixon’s testimony will be most crucial.”

“Testimony,
geez.” Salt laughed uproariously, the ripping sound rising above the roar of
the Herk’s engines.

Exasperated,
Wong looked at Dixon. “Lieutenant?”

Dixon
stared at the floor.

“We’ll
be taken in to Riyadh after we land,” Wong said.

Dixon
turned and looked at him as if he were staring across a distant field. “The kid
saved us,” he said.

Wong
got up and slid down on his knees in front of him to hear better.

“Budge
saved us,” Dixon repeated.

“True,”
said Wong. “As you saved him.”

“He
didn’t know what he was doing.”

“War
is not a pretty thing,” Wong said. “That’s why we’re here.”

“He
was just a kid.”

Wong
frowned. The thoughts of many wise men flickered through his head— Nietzsche, Kierkegaard,
Plato, St. Paul. None seemed quite to fit. And so he said nothing.

HOME DROME

27 JANUARY 1991

0300

Doberman
sat at
the edge
of the couch, wedged there with his feet up on the cushion. He’d finished
debriefing only a few minutes before; normally he’d have gone either straight
to bed or over to the Cavern, a just-off-the-base den of inequity and booze.
But he was too wound up and too worried about the others, so he’d wandered over
to Cineplex. More than two dozen other squadron members, officers and NCOS,
milled around the crowded room, waiting word of the Strawman mission. The
television was playing something off the VCR— an old Godzilla movie someone had
bootlegged. Every so often, they’d hit pause and check CNN. Not that they
expected the news station to find out about the mission, but you never could
tell.

Among
the NCOs clustered near the food table was Technical Sergeant Becky Rosen, whom
Doberman realized was looking particularly gorgeous tonight. She smiled at him
as she walked nearby, said something along the lines of “Thanks for risking
your neck up there.”

He
felt like a thirteen-year-old, unable to say anything intelligent in response.
He watched her walk away, imagining what she might look like in a dress.

Damn,
he was horny.

“So
what’s Preston like?” asked Jeff “Truck” Lewis, leaning against the nearby chair
with a glass of seltzer. Lewis, a black guy who’d grown up in New Jersey, was a
captain who’d flown Hogs for about a year and a half. No one, including Jeff,
was exactly sure where his nickname had come from.

“I
don’t know,” Doberman told him.

“He
flew wing for you, right?”

Doberman
shrugged.

“I
hear he’s a jerk,” offered Lewis.

“Who
knows?”

“He
talks nice about you, Glenon,” said Terry Morris. Morris was attached to the
intelligence unit that shared some of the trailer office space with Devil
Squadron. “He was raving about what a great pilot you were.”

“I’m
not in any mood for you guys to pull my chain, okay?”

“No,
it’s what he said,” insisted Morris. “Said you kicked butt. Some of the best
flying he’s ever seen.”

“Probably
wants Doberman to replace him in that fast-mover squadron he came from,” said
Lewis.

“Screw
off.”

“Hey,
Dog, take it easy.”

“You
ain’t A-Bomb, Truck. Don’t call me Dog.”

Lewis
whistled, but backed off.

“Godzilla’s
gonna eat them,” laughed someone, looking at the TV. “Use your slime, Rhodan.”

“Okay,
here it is,” said Major Preston, appearing in the doorway. His hair was slicked
back from a shower and he’d obviously just shaved. Doberman couldn’t help
shaking his head.

“Colonel
Knowlington and Captain O’Rourke are spending the night at King Khalid,”
announced Hack. “Apparently they tanked with about five seconds to spare. But
they’re fine, planes are intact.”

“They
better be,” said Chief Master Sergeant Clyston. The pilots laughed, though it
wasn’t entirely clear he was kidding.

“What
about Dixon?” shouted someone.

“Captain
Wong and the two Delta troopers were successfully recovered by the MC-130,”
continued Preston. He held up his hands. He was grinning. “And they have
Lieutenant Dixon, a bit tired and beat-up, but okay.”

No
one said anything, the room suddenly still.

“Dixon’s
alive,”
said Preston.

“Yes!
Yes!” shouted Morris, and everyone began cheering at once. Doberman couldn’t
believe it for a second— it was too much to hope for.

Dixon
was alive. He was
alive.

Yeah,
shit yeah.

He
jumped up from the couch. Everyone was slapping high-fives and hugging each
other, as if they’d won the World Series or the Super Bowl.

The
Chief loomed before him.

“Way
to go, Captain,” said the Capo.

“Kick
ass,” replied Doberman. He patted the sergeant’s broad back, then turned.

Sergeant
Rosen was smiling next to him. He hugged her, folding her body into his. Glenon
was short, but Rosen was even shorter. And though he knew she was strong— had
in fact seen her haul a hundred-pound tool box and carry a knapsack without
breaking a sweat— her body felt soft and light in his arms.

Light
and soft and delicious.

He
leaned over and kissed her. It was a long, long kiss, a dream thing, the kind
of kiss you want on the perfect night. He held it, felt her lips against his, felt
his heart fading into oblivion.

She
pulled away gently. He pulled away, looking into her face.

Her
slap nearly knocked him over.

Doberman
stared at her as she walked quickly from the room. The celebration continued on
around him.

Had
he imagined the kiss? Or the slap?

“Captain,
I got bad news,” said Preston behind him. He nudged him aside. “It’s not really
bad, I guess, just disappointing.”

Doberman,
still stunned, listened as Preston told him they hadn’t gotten Saddam.

“The
car we hit— the car you hit— it wasn’t Saddam. It was an impostor, part of
their ruse. You nailed it though. You nailed it good. You’re a hell of a shot,
Glenon. You’re a damn good pilot, one of the best I’ve ever seen. A hell of a
lot better than me.”

Without
saying anything, Doberman turned and started after Rosen. A meaty hand grabbed
him from behind. Doberman snapped around, expecting to see Preston, ready to
floor him with a roundhouse.

But
it was Clyston who’d grabbed him.

“No
offense, Captain. But you’re much better off letting her be. Honest.”

The
way the chief said it, the only thing Doberman could do was nod.

KING KHALID MILITARY CITY, SAUDI ARABIA

27 JANUARY 1991

0300

King
Khalid, aka
the
Emerald City, was near the border with Kuwait, right on the so-called neutral
zone and well within striking distance of Saddam’s troops. As such, it was
officially a forward operating area, a place for warplanes like the A-10 to use
as temporary bases, a kind of scratch in the earth.

On
the other hand, it was a fairly large base in a sophisticated international
settlement, home to a large U.S. Army contingent and a massive helicopter
force, to say nothing of some of the friendliest Air Force ground crew dogs and
Spec Ops Do-it Dudes— A-Bomb’s term— in the world. So Colonel Knowlington
wasn’t all that surprised by the warm welcome they received when Devils One and
Two touched down. He’d already decided they’d get some sleep there; King Fahd
was a good hour’s flight away, and A-Bomb looked like he hadn’t slept in a
month.

“Don’t
worry about me, Skip,” A-Bomb insisted after they checked over their Hogs on
the ground. “I know where I can get some real joe here— there’s a secret
Dunkin’ Donuts outpost on the other side of the sports dome.”

The
sports dome being a nearby mosque.

“Colonel
Knowlington, I’m Captain Hobbes,” said an Air Force officer, hopping from a
Hummer as it pulled to a stop in the A-10 parking area. “I’m here to make sure
you’re comfortable.”

“You
debriefing us?” Skull asked.

“I’m
just hospitality,” grinned Hobbes. “I do have a couple of goofy-looking
intelligence types interested in talking to you about the missiles you came up
against. Guy from CentCom, too, carrying around a clipboard. First I thought he
was just doing inventory, but he kept asking pointed questions on what time you
guys were supposed to land, so he may think you were trying to steal one of
these planes. Couple of Delta types looking to add a squiggle or two to their
maps, Spec Ops lieutenant with some adoption papers I think, and a French
general who says you saved his son. Can’t tell if it’s really his son, though.
I’m not too good with French this time of day.”

Skull
and A-Bomb boarded the Humvee without getting out of their flight gear.

Their
tour of the flight support shop turned into an international jawboning session
as the welcome wagon crowded in to help them out of their fancy dress.

A
French helicopter unit based at King Khalid had heard about Skull’s persistence
in rescuing their fellow countryman and was determined— “
qui insiste,”
in
all its various and sundry conjugations— to show its appreciation. Their
efforts were augmented by a French army general and his entourage, who were
convinced that Skull and A-Bomb deserved either medals or the Eiffel Tower for
their exploits— it was hard to hear, let alone translate, in the din.

Besides
the base contingent, a half-dozen RAF and U.S. intel officers crowded around to
ask what it was like to fly against the SA-11s. A Hog driver from another
squadron wandered in to find out what was shaking. A colonel came by to ask
about a nephew doing maintenance in Devil Squadron. A Saudi sergeant who knew A-Bomb
from somewhere walked up to pay off an old debt. Knowlington and O’Rourke were
the guests of honor at a ragtag UN meeting. As people continued to materialize,
someone decided to move it first to an empty hangar and then off-base to a
building commandeered by the French.

Somewhere
along the way, someone put a Styrofoam cup in Knowlington’s hand. He got
halfway through before realizing it was a beer.

No.
That was a lie. He realized it on the first sip. He realized it and felt the
light tingle on his tongue. A voice in his head screamed to spit it out, but a
louder voice just laughed and said, “drink.”

When
he finished the cup, someone put another in his hand, and then another and
another. He drank them all, the tingle melting into a steady hum, a pleasant,
familiar vibration that warmed his brain and rubbed his back, loosened the
knots in his shoulders and asked why he had waited so damn long to feel so damn
good again.

The
operations described in the book, while in some respects inspired by actual
events, are all invented and should be treated as fiction. Officially, the U.S.
and its allies did not target Saddam for capture or execution.

In
a few instances, details relating to procedures that could conceivably assist
an enemy have either been omitted or obscured. These did not materially affect
the story. And of course actions depicted in the book that are contrary to
military law and procedures, not to mention good sense, are all fictional.