The Warbirds (55 page)

“No, sir, their objective was the base.”

“Oil…it always rears its ugly head.”

The room was silent. Then the colonel picked it up: “Our fleet is moving into position, the vanguard, two destroyers and a frigate, passed through the Strait of Hormuz an hour ago. They’re moving at flank speed toward Ras Assanya. The rest of the fleet is on-station in the Gulf of Oman.” He pointed to an area southeast of the strait. “The Carrier Air Group is on standby waiting for the Go to launch a strike at the PSI.”

The President wanted to be alone, have a little time to think before he acted. But time was what he did not have. The pain was turning to anger. He had, after all, the means to destroy the PSI. Give the order and send more people into harm’s way. He turned to Cagliari, who was now sitting next to him. “If I brought us up to DEFCON Two, would they get the signal how serious we are?”

“Wrong signal, sir. That would be announcing we’re on the verge of a major war. The Russians couldn’t ignore it; they’d increase their state of alert. They might even opt for preemptive moves…”

“Mr. President”—Cyrus Piccard, Secretary of State, broke into the conversation—“I’ve some room to negotiate here and try to stabilize the situation, the region…
But I need a
restrained
military response.” He waited, anxious to see if the President would consider other options.

“What do you need, Cy?” the President asked. The Secretary of State was a master at hiding his sharklike nature behind a facade of courtly manners and polite words.

“If you use the Navy and the United Arab Command, you can trap the PSI
at
Ras Assanya. Which makes them a bargaining chip.”

“But they’re holding over three hundred of our people prisoners,” Cagliari said.

“True, which makes the situation more delicate,” Piccard told him. “My people are in contact with the International Red Cross. We’re asking for them to monitor the status of the prisoners. If you bring the Rapid Deployment Force to full alert and start moving advance elements toward the Gulf, that will send the signal we’re considering military intervention. But we can send other messages. The Soviet ambassador is waiting for me in my office. The channels are open. Mr. President, if we do this right, we can hope to achieve our immediate objective: an end to the fighting.”

“And that’s a victory?”

“It’s the best we can get without a war.”

“But the cost…” The President’s pain would not go away. Or his anger. It seemed so much for so little…

7 September: 1400 hours, Greenwich Mean Time 1700 hours, Moscow, USSR

The men waiting in the ornate room the Kremlin reserved for Politburo meetings could hear the new General Secretary’s footsteps echo down the hall, and they all stood and applauded when he entered the room.

Viktor Rokossovksy, formerly the youngest and now the first among them, nodded, acknowledging the applause, and walked to the chair at the head of the table. He nodded again and sat down while the men continued to clap. He swept the table with an appreciative eye, stopping when he saw his old seat, now empty. Soon, he thought, one of
my people will be sitting there. He could see the hard, satisfied look on Rafik Ulyanoff’s face. Even Kalin-Tegov, the party’s theoretician, looked pleased.

“Thank you, comrades,” Rokossovsky said; his first official words as General Secretary. “Please be seated. We must not waste valuable time.” The applause slowly died as the men sat down. “I’m concerned about the American reaction to their defeat in the Persian Gulf.”

Ulyanoff leaped forward. “We’re getting mixed signals. They’ve placed their Rapid Deployment Force on full alert but are not moving in mass. Our ambassador in Washington reports that the President seems to be looking for a negotiated settlement. There is a growing concern in the American press over the prisoners taken by the People’s Soldiers of Islam. The situation is fluid.”

“And the KGB?” Rokossovsky asked.

The pleasant-looking man who headed the KGB smiled. “Our agents report that the Iranians must negotiate. They no longer have the means to continue fighting.”

“I’m considering that it would be in our interests to stabilize the Persian Gulf for now,” Rokossovsky told them. “Especially if we can participate in the negotiations for a peace treaty. Your thoughts, please.”

“That would be consistent with our philosophy,” Kalin-Tegov said, “but we must reinforce any expansion of our influence in the diplomatic area with concrete developments inside Iran. Perhaps more non-military support to the Tudeh Party.”

He did not add, nor did he need to, “For the time being.”

Rokossovsky listened carefully to what Kalin-Tegov said. As the party’s theoretician, he had made it possible for Rokossovsky to depose the former General Secretary. “Then this is an opportunity to show the world that we can be peacemakers.”

“When it suits our needs,” the party theoretician said.

9 September: 0905 hours, Greenwich Mean Time 1005 hours, Stonewood, England

Cunningham had to walk. The protocol officer at Stonewood had set up a welcoming brief, a tour and a luncheon to keep the general occupied until the F-4s arrived, and out of politeness he had sat through the welcome by Brigadier General Shaw. But during a coffee break he sought out Mort Pullman. “Chief, let’s walk over to base Ops.”

The general walked in silence, reflecting on the irony of the situation. The fighting had ended and the antagonists were scrambling to find a new way to live with each other while the press looked for scapegoats to blame for the “defeat.” Yes, the PSI had overrun Ras Assanya and taken over three hundred prisoners, but now with the fleet standing offshore they couldn’t give them back quick enough. The Saudis wanted the remnants of the 45th out of Dhahran, but were demanding the U.S. fleet remain in the Gulf. Most of the press in Europe was claiming that the U.S. had started World War III, but the NATO governments were mightily pleased that oil was still flowing. And then a newly promoted Vice Air Marshall, Sir David Childs, had appeared in his office, telling him that the Prime Minister was under attack in Parliament because of British involvement in the Persian Gulf. But Her Majesty’s government would not object if five F-4s happened to recover at Stonewood under routine training operations in the next few days. The general had thanked Childs and scheduled a C-137B to take him to Stonewood.

As they made the short walk to the flight line, a staff sergeant saluted them, saying, “Forty-fifth, sir.” It was not the loud shout of the Army’s “Airborne, sir,” but a
quiet statement of pride. More men and women passed them, each demanding a salute.

“Your people look sharp, Pullman. How do you do it?”

“I don’t. They do it, General. They’re proud of what they did.”

The general shook his head. “I almost destroyed them and they’re proud of it…”

“They don’t see it that way, sir. You gave them a job to do without starting World War III, and they
did
it. The fighting has stopped. They’re ready for next time.”

Shaw met them as they entered base Ops saying the fighters were ten minutes out. The three men went out onto the flight line.

“General,” Shaw said, “can we do something more for them?”

“You have something in mind?”

“I was thinking of a memorial…”

“You mean like the
Arizona
in Pearl Harbor? Something to remember a defeat? Lest we forget?” Even his own generals did not understand that for the last forty years his Air Force had not won a war. “No. A memorial marks the end to something. This is not over. Death and waste and stupidity don’t need memorials, only memory so we won’t underestimate an enemy again. I don’t know about you, but there’s nothing wrong with my memory. I won’t make that mistake again.”

“Will we have a second chance?” Shaw asked.

Cunningham was silent. He was fifty-eight years old, beyond normal retirement age, serving only at the pleasure of the President, who did not seem overly pleased with him. He studied Shaw, trying to fathom what was behind his troubled eyes.

“I was thinking of Waters, the others. Their chances are gone.”

“Yes, and we don’t have many like them left. Waters was a real combat commander. He could lead and people would follow. Do you know how rare that is? I had to tell his wife about his death. It was something I couldn’t let anyone else do. You know, she was more understanding and stronger about it than I was. She said, ‘Anthony understood the risks. He wouldn’t have it any other way.’”

An honor roll of names scrolled through Cunningham’s mind: Fairly, Nelson, Gomez, Conlan, Benton, Luna, D’Angelo, Belfort, Henderson, McCray, Morgan…He felt a deep
personal
accountability that he couldn’t shove into a bureaucratic niche. Human beings had been killed because of the decisions he had made…

“No, I was wrong,” he said. “They do need a memorial. Maybe not now, but in a few years when time has put this mess in perspective. When we can remember them for who they were and what they did.”

The three men stood there together, silently committed to making it happen.

Jack sharply rocked the wings of his Phantom, signaling his flight to rejoin into close formation. The four jets started to collapse together into finger-tip formation when Jack’s words broke the radio silence. “Echelon right.” Smoothly and with precision the two wingmen on the left joined up and slid under the other three. The four wingmen then stretched out to Jack’s right, each slightly behind the Phantom on his left, their wing tips almost touching.

Without scanning his flight, Jack checked in with Eastern Control. “Eastern, Poppa Kilo with four…” He stopped. He wasn’t a Poppa Kilo on a routine training mission. Who was he kidding? And why? To appease the politicians? He was a Wolf, leading the 45th.

“Go ahead, Poppa Kilo, you are coming through broken,” Eastern replied, a voice Jack recognized from a long time ago. Now he remembered the face that went with the voice, a warm, humorous man with the deep-seated professionalism characteristic of a British controller.

“Correction, Eastern.
This is Wolf Zero-One with four.
Request clearance direct to Stonewood for an overhead recovery.”

Inside the control center every controller looked at the man directing the five fighters. They had, of course, heard what had happened to the 45th. They understood the political implications of acknowledging that now famous call sign. It would be one thing for Her Majesty’s government to explain the transit of five fighters under normal operations; it was an entirely different matter giving aid to five
of the combatants in a war that was being widely condemned by the opposition party in Parliament. The thought of what the press would do to the RAF was sobering.

The Englishman stood up, nearly at attention. “Roger,
Wolf Flight
. Cleared direct Stonewood. Descend to sixteen hundred feet at your discretion. I will clear all traffic.”

“Roger, Eastern.” Jack acknowledged the clearance.

“Welcome home, Wolf Flight,” the controller added, looking around the room at the approving faces, and said quietly, “Bloody hell, it might be interesting here tonight.”

The sound of the fighters turning onto final echoed through Gillian’s salon, drowning out conversation. Margaret stopped her work and looked at her employer. “That’s the wing. They’re home. Jack’s with them.” She made it an announcement.

Gillian looked at the older woman, not quite believing her. “How can you be so sure?”

“I just am; he’s a survivor.” Margaret was carefully combing the woman’s hair in front of her, her voice matter-of-fact.

“I don’t know…he’s probably dead like the rest of them. Look at those wives at Stonewood. Hoping and waiting…”

“Gillian, for God’s sake,
go
. If he’s there, he’s going to need you.”

Gillian stared at her, tears beginning to form in her eyes. What if Margaret was right? That Jack was back? “Oh, bloody hell,” she said, running out of the salon to find him…

General Cunningham watched the Phantoms’ final turn. He had been briefed that it would be a radar recovery with one aircraft landing at a time and about five minutes apart. But like every flyer on the ramp he knew that Jack was bringing the flight down final for an overhead pattern. Cunningham looked at Brigadier General Shaw, not concerned about the unauthorized change in landing. “You trained most of the crews at Alexandria South.”

“Yes, sir. But Egypt was some time ago.”

“What were they like then?” Cunningham asked.

“Typical fighter jocks, General. Hair on fire, young hell-raisers. That Captain Locke, especially. Got tangled up with the ambassador’s daughter.” Shaw paused, remembering not only Locke but Mike Fairly too…

“A regular skirt-chaser?”

“No, sir. A regular fighter pilot. One of the best.”

Cunningham nodded and watched Jack execute a sharp break to the left as he crossed thirteen hundred feet above the approach end of the runway. Every five seconds a Phantom would peel off to the left, circling onto a short downwind leg, bleeding off airspeed and lowering flaps and gear before circling to land at intervals of two thousand feet. The symmetry and grace of the recovery pattern was testimony to the skill of the pilots. Cunningham knew how battle weary the birds were, and knowing, especially appreciated the precision of the maneuver. He also knew the scars the pilots and WSOs would carry for the rest of their lives.

On downwind Thunder called the landing checks, then added: “Looks like they’ve got a reception committee for us.”

Jack extended his downwind leg, retracted the gear and flaps and held his airspeed. He rolled out on final and stroked the afterburners, accelerating straight ahead.

“Do it,” Thunder said.

“Tower, Wolf Zero-One on the go,” Jack radioed.

“Roger, Wolf Zero-One, report Initial.”

Jack leveled 512 off at a thousand feet and shoved the throttles into full afterburner, touching 450 knots as he passed the tower. He snapped the stick to the right, executing a neat aileron roll. Neither he nor Thunder said a word—the roll itself announced the 45th had returned home. Winners. One after another the warbirds went around, each doing a victory roll as they passed down the runway. The noise was overpowering and constant.

“They did good, Shaw,” Cunningham said.

“Good enough, General.”