Armageddon Mode

CHAPTER 21

Batman took the Tomcat up to twenty thousand feet, giving Malibu a clear view on the radar for sixty miles in every direction as they searched for the Indian fighter that had given them the slip. There were plenty of targets in the area, but the unidentified bogies seemed to be drawing off toward the east and Batman wasn’t about to follow them, not when there were at least ten of them and only one of him.

“Any sign of the bastard, Mal?” He was still feeling stupid for having forgotten about the Sea Harrier’s incredible maneuvering capability.

“He could be one of those guys on the run,” Malibu said. “Or he could be wave-hopping to hide in the surface clutter. What you wanna do?”

“I don’t know,” Batman said. He was still feeling shaken by the encounter, and more shaken still by the sudden loss of Army and Dixie.

That Sea Harrier must have put a heat-seeker into Army just as he was breaking off from his pursuit of the enemy missile. Two-oh-one had dropped from the screen like a stone. Then, nothing.

Batman had already made one quick pass over the area looking for chutes, but had seen nothing before Jefferson’s CATCC chased them away. A helo, they’d been tersely informed, was on its way to look for the downed aviators. The carrier’s automated point defense was on and random overflights of the area would be dangerous. “We’re picking up a ninety-nine-aircraft alert,” Malibu informed him. “Those Indie planes up north. They’re moving.”

“Great,” Batman replied. “And us with one rock left to throw.”

He put the Tomcat into a hard turn, heading north.

Colonel Jamall Rajiv Singh felt himself pressed back into his ejection seat as his SEPECAT Jaguar hurtled down the runway, then lifted into a morning sky of blue and gold. The runway vanished beneath the belly of his aircraft, replaced immediately by the murky blue-green waters of the Gulf of Kutch.

“Okha tower, Jaguar One-zero-two airborne,” he said over the radio.

“Coming right to one-seven-five.”

“Roger, One-zero-two,” the control tower replied. “Switch to tactical command, three-five-five point three. Over.”

He put the aircraft into a gentle right-hand turn. Water gave way to gravel, scrub brush, and palm trees as he circled back over the Kathiawar Peninsula. Looking up through his canopy, he could see other elements of the massive Indian air armada gathering above him.

“Switching to three-five-five point three, roger.” He adjusted the frequency on his radio. “Rama Command, Rama Command,” he called. “This is Python Strike Leader, Jaguar One-zero-two. Do you read, over?”

“Python Strike Leader, this is Rama Command. We read you. You are clear to proceed.” The new voice sounded tense, even harsh.

What do you have to be worried about? Singh thought, silently questioning the voice. “Very well, Rama. We’re on our way.”

Below, the dun-colored wastes of the western tip of Kathiawar blurred past, then gave way once more to the sea, the deep, cobalt blue of the Arabian Sea this time instead of the muddy shallows of Kutch. Around him, the other Jaguars of his flight group closed up, settling into the tight formation that they would hold for most of the trip to the target.

Singh was uncomfortably aware that this mission would have little in common with his strike against the American supply ships two days before. That attack had been against relatively undefended targets and in the confusion of night. This time, the enemy was fully warned and prepared, aircraft in the sky and ready, ships on full alert. It was going to be a blood-bath.

He was afraid.

Sixty miles to the east of Okha, a pair of sleek Indian Air Force Mig-29 Fulcrums lifted into the sky above the airfield at Jamnagar, their landing gear folding into their bellies while they were still a few meters above the tarmac.

Lieutenant Colonel Ramadutta cleared his flight with Jamnagar Tower and set his fighter on a south-southwesterly course.

For Ramadutta, the coming battle would be a chance at recovering some measure of his pride. The near-encounter with the American Tomcat in the dark night sky thirty-five hours before had left him shaken, questioning his own abilities as one of India’s elite pilot corps. In his last encounter, he’d run. Nothing had been said officially, but the knowledge that his failure could have led to the destruction of several Indian Jaguars during their successful strike against the American supply ships had left him with a burning shame … and a need to clear his honor, before his family, his comrades, and himself.

When his squadron, what was left of it, had been transferred back to Jamnagar the evening before, he’d wondered if he was going to be able to fly again.

As fighters and strike planes scrambled, he knew the answer. He would face his fear … and the American enemy in the skies above India.

His mission this time, the mission of his squadron, was to protect the Indian naval and air force strike aircraft that were deploying to attack the American and Soviet squadrons. But it would be more than that. He knew, beyond any doubt, that within minutes he would again be engaged in single combat.

He was having difficulty sorting out his own fiercely intertwined emotions — determination, fear, shame.

But more than anything else, Lieutenant Colonel Munir Ramadutta was angry.

Admiral Vaughn was angry, and he didn’t know how much longer he could control it. He raised his fist, shaking it under the nose of a startled Soviet Chief of Staff.

“You Commie son of a bitch!” he shouted. Heads turned throughout the Aegis cruiser’s command center. “If this damned alliance is going to amount to anything, Captain, then you people had better get off your asses and into the air, don’t you think?”

“Please, Admiral,” Captain First Rank Sharov said. “I have no authority.”

“Then get some authority, damn it! You’re in touch with your carrier now?”

“Da, Admiral. But the necessary permission from Moskva …” He shrugged helplessly. “We have received no orders.”

Vaughn stopped himself, took a deep breath, then swallowed. He allowed his voice to drop, to become dangerous. “Son, if you don’t clear things so that Kremlin can start launching planes and help defend this so-called joint task force-” He paused once more and licked his lips.

When he spoke again, it was with a blast of raw fury that forced the Russian back a step. “I’m going to open fire on your fucking fleet myself!”

“I … will see what is to be done, Admiral.”

“Do it! Get out of my sight and don’t show yourself until you have some aircraft in the sky doing their part!” He whirled as an American lieutenant cleared his throat at his back. “What the hell do you want?”

“Sir! The Indian aircraft seem to be making their move.”

Until now, the armada that had been rising from airfields from Okha to Bombay had simply been gathering, waiting and circling beyond Jefferson’s air defense zone like a flock of buzzards.

“You’re sure?”

“Yes, sir. We have an estimated twelve strike aircraft — probably Jaguars — crossing into our outer defense zone south of Okha. We have ten more out of Jamnagar, big ones, possibly old Canberras. Range is now eighty miles.”

“What about the Sea Harriers?”

“They’ve engaged with our BARCAP thirty to fifty miles southeast of the Jefferson. No news yet.”

“Okay,” Vaughn said. He wiped his face with his hand and was surprised at how cold it felt. “Okay. How’s the Jeff doing?”

“Ten Tomcats are aloft now, sir, and they’re continuing launch operations from their waist cats. That’s in addition to two Hawkeyes, four Prowlers, two tankers, and a couple of ASW Vikings.”

“Good, good.” But it wasn’t good. He hoped the people in Jefferson’s CATCC knew what the hell they were doing. With that many planes in the sky, keeping them all fueled was going to be a bitch with only two working catapults.

And there were no bingo fields ashore if someone miscalculated and planes started running out of gas.

“Things sound pretty confused over there, Admiral,” the lieutenant continued. “But CATCC reports that they’ll have sixteen Tomcats up within the next ten minutes.”

Sixteen? He tallied them in his mind. Right. Ten from VF-97 and eight from VF-95. Minus one shot down a few minutes ago, and another tipped into the drink by a catapult malfunction.

Against an aerial armada of well over a hundred Indian aircraft. Most of those would be strike planes, clumsy with bombs and rockets for the fleet. But still … “Very well,” Vaughn said. “Keep me posted.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

Vaughn watched the lieutenant hurry away and found himself, unaccountably, thinking of the Battle of Midway.

It was strange comparing that battle with what would probably go down in the history books as the Battle of the Arabian Sea. Midway, remembered now as the turning point in the Pacific campaign of World War II, was the subject of intensive study by every Naval cadet at Annapolis, and its lessons were part of the training and background of every U.S. Naval command and staff officer.

Beyond the obvious — the facts that this battle, like Midway, would probably be fought with the two fleets never coming within sight of one another, and that air power would be the dominant arm in the clash — there were few similarities. The Indians would be relying primarily on their airfields ashore to smash the American force. At Midway, American land-based aircraft had been largely ineffectual.

There was one important comparison, however, Vaughn realized. The lieutenant had said it: confusion. The Naval Academy’s teachings on Midway emphasized the fact that both sides had made plenty of mistakes, usually because of poor intelligence.

Victory had gone to the side that made the fewer mistakes.

“Admiral?” Captain Bersticer said, approaching. He handed a message-transmittal sheet to Vaughn. “This just in from the Jefferson.

They want to know if they should stand down from the preflighting for Mongoose.”

Vaughn scowled, reading the message. Jefferson’s crew had been working straight through the night readying the carrier’s Hornets and Intruders for the air strike against the Indian supply lines. With the carrier’s flight operations sharply curtailed by the damage to her forward catapults, space and equipment would be at a premium. To continue with the strike might cripple their ability to get all of the Tomcats aloft and keep them up.

Yes, it might be best to abort Mongoose completely. No one would blame him, least of all his peers in Washington. The defense of the carrier and her consorts came first … and by breaking down the bomb-laden F/A-18 Hornets and loading them with Sidewinders and Sparrows, he could increase the battle group’s air defense strength by two more squadrons.

The idea was tempting … Something made him hold back. “Negative,” he said, handing the message back to Bersticer. “They can concentrate on getting the Tomcats up, but let’s keep moving with Mongoose. I don’t want to give up on that yet.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

He continued toying with the idea. What was familiar about rearming the F/A-18s? Why shouldn’t he …?

Then he remembered. Only moments earlier, he’d been thinking about Midway, and the part confusion had played in the battle that reversed the trend of Japanese victory in the Pacific.

Confusion. Orders to unload the bombs and ground-strike missiles from the Hornets and replace them with air-to-air missiles would create incredible confusion among flight crews already exhausted by working some twenty-four hours straight. By giving those orders, he would be begging for a catastrophic accident, like the one that crippled the Forrestal off the coast of Vietnam in 1977.

But there was more.

At the Battle of Midway, the commander-in-chief of the Imperial Japanese carrier force, Admiral Chuichi Nagumo, had opened the battle by launching a bombing raid against the American naval base and airstrip on Midway Island. A second strike force of ninety-three aircraft was ready on the decks of his carriers, armed with torpedoes in case the American fleet appeared.

But the returning planes of the first strike force reported that damage to the island’s facilities was not as extensive as had been hoped.

Nagumo, unaware that the Americans were in the area, had ordered the second strike force to unload its torpedoes and rearm with incendiary and fragmentation bombs for another attack on the island.

Within the next thirty minutes, reports had come in locating the American fleet. Nagumo then issued new orders: rearm the strike force yet again with torpedoes to sink the American ships.

The flurry of orders and counterorders, reasonable at the time, had proved to be an appalling blunder. The Japanese strike was delayed long enough to be delayed again by the recovery and refueling of the first attack wave.

The American dive bombers that struck just after 1000 hours that morning could not have asked for better targets: four Japanese carriers loaded with refueling planes, with strike aircraft waiting to launch, with bombs and torpedoes carelessly stacked on the decks by ordnance crews too hurried to observe proper safety procedures. Nagumo lost three aircraft carriers within the next few hours, and a fourth the following day. It was a disaster from which the Imperial Japanese Navy never recovered and could easily be identified as the defeat that doomed Japan’s war in the Pacific.

There were lessons to be learned from history, Vaughn reflected. Not that history ever repeated itself exactly, but to try now, in the middle of an air assault, to rearm the Hornets with air-to-air weapons was inviting a disaster as great as that suffered by Nagumo at Midway.

Perhaps later there would be time to reassess the plan. Later, if the carrier battle group survived … For now, though, they would follow through with what they’d begun.

Tombstone watched as the mule driver herded his flat yellow vehicle clear of the catapult. Green-shirted hook-and-cat men completed attaching the catapult shuttle to the aircraft’s nose-gear as Tombstone and Hitman ran down the checklist.

“I’ve got a fault warning on the electrical system,” Tombstone said. The red light on his right side advisory display was an ominous warning that this particular aircraft had not flown in many months.

“Wait a sec,” Hitman said over the ICS. Tombstone could feel the slight shifting of the aircraft as Hitman moved around in the backseat. The fuzes for the plane’s electrical system were located on a board behind the RIO’s seat. Part of his preflight routine was to reach behind him and check each fuze by hand.

“Got it,” Hitman said.

Tombstone watched the advisory panel light go out, then worked the electrical main switch several times. If popping the fuze back did not correct the problem, they would have to signal to the deck crew to break down the aircraft.

The light remained off.

On the deck outside, the hook runner, satisfied with the setup, pumped his fist up and down, signaling to the Cat Officer to bring the aircraft under tension. Tombstone heard a metallic creak as the Tomcat took the strain. A green shirt held up the chalkboard with number 200’s launch weight: 62,000. That checked with the figure on Tombstone’s thigh board and he acknowledged with a thumbs-up signal. Somewhere below decks the catapult crew would be adjusting their controls to deliver the proper amount of steam pressure to Cat Four in order to launch thirty-one tons of aircraft.

An ordie walked up alongside the cockpit, holding aloft a bundle of wires, each with a red tag. Tombstone counted eight tags and nodded.

The F-14 was loaded with four Sparrow and four Sidewinder missiles.

Everything was ready. The light on the island had gone from red to amber. The jet-blast deflector came up astern, and Tombstone eased the throttle forward, feeling his high-tech steed tremble beneath him, aching to touch the sky. He took another look at the bridge. He could see men at the Pri-Fly windows, watching … and other figures, less distinct, forward at the carrier’s bridge.

“All set back there?” he called to Hitman.

“Set, Tombstone. All green.”

And the light on the island was green as well.

Tombstone saluted the Cat Officer, the signal that they were ready for launch. The Cat Officer took another look up and down the deck, checking his men, checking with the white-shirted Safety Officers who were in turn signaling readiness. The intimate dance of the carrier’s team of professionals continued. The Cat Officer dropped to his knee and touched the deck.

The 5-G acceleration slammed Tombstone into his seat as it always did, his Tomcat speeding down the deck, hitting 150 knots in less than three seconds. The island flashed past on his right, then the expanse of deck where damage control teams were working on the warped deck and broken cats.

“Two double-oh airborne,” the Air Boss said. There was a pause. “Luck, Stoney.” And Tombstone clawed for blue sky.