Choosers of the Slain

28

A brace of Fuerza Aérea Rafales blazed down the main runway at Rio Grande as President Sparza descended the short stairway from the door of his plane, the crackling roar of their afterburners echoing across the base. An Antarctica-bound C-130 followed within moments, its four powerful turboprops moaning as it lifted into the rain-swept sky. The backlog of aircraft that had accumulated on the taxiways while the Executive jet had been on approach were moving out, expedited by wartime urgency.

At Sparza's own insistence, there was no honor guard standing to on the parking apron, just a staff car with a small MP escort. Likewise, none of the base's senior staff had been called away from their duties, just a single junior officer who tried futilely to shield the Argentine President from the chill downpour with an umbrella as they dashed to the waiting vehicles.

"General Arco sends his respects, Mr. President," the young Air Force man stammered as they entered the staff car. "He is awaiting you at the operations building."

"Very good, Lieutenant. Let's carry on. We haven't a great deal of time to spare."

The same sense of crisis that had been present on the flight line could be felt in the base command-and-control center. Not since the Falklands War, when Rio Grande had been at the forefront of the strike operations against the British fleet, had the facility been pushed to the limits like this. As the southernmost of Argentina's major air bases, it had been serving as the departure node for the Conquistador South supply airlift. Now it had also become the keystone in the search for the Cunningham.

Sparza was ushered into a briefing room immediately adjoining the operations center itself and separated from the ranked workstations and map displays by a glass wall. General Marcello Arco joined him there a few moments later.

"Good morning, Mr. President. May I order something for you after your journey? Coffee? A cup of chocolate?"

"No, thank you, General," Sparza replied, shedding his damp raincoat and draping it across the conference table. "I am required back in Buenos Aires this afternoon, so I regret our meeting must be brief. Is there anything new to report?"

"No, sir. We still have not developed a fix on the North American warship. There have been no contacts since 1700 hours yesterday evening."

"And our lost satellite?"

"Nothing new to report there either. San Martin Base verifies that the Aquila B was on schedule as it passed over the Antarctic. However, when our tracking station at Comodoro Rivadavia endeavored to acquire the satellite for a data download, it was gone. A possible sighting report from the Brazilian Space Agency indicates that it may have deorbited and burned up during reentry over the Andes."

"An inconvenient accident, General?" Sparza said, drawing one of his chairs back from the table and seating himself in it.

"Unlikely," Arco replied. "The safe assumption is that the Aquila B was shot down by the North Americans as it passed over Drake Passage."

"Indeed?"

"It is open knowledge that the United States has antisat weapons. What was not known is that they had the ability to deploy them aboard their naval surface units."

"And they elected to reveal this secret capacity to us," Sparza mused, reaching into his inner coat pocket for his cigarette case. "They must have had reason to fear the Aquila."

"Its thermographic cameras may have been the only sensors we had capable of detecting the Cunningham."

Sparza paused for a moment to light a Players. "The North Americans' stealth technology. It is truly that good…or bad?"

"It is," Arco replied flatly, turned to face the glass wall of the briefing room, and gestured toward the CIC beyond it. "Since last night, we have conducted two full surface-search sweeps within the sectors of Drake Passage that must contain the North American vessel. We used a mixed force of our best radar aircraft, Aeronaval's Atlantiques, our 737s, and the Prefectura Naval's Dessault Falcons. Nothing.

"If the Cunningham was detectable using conventional resources, we would have found her. Of that I am certain, Mr. President."

Sparza gestured with the tip of his cigarette. "I fully accept your statement, General. Sit, and let us discuss what options we may now have."

Arco accepted Sparza's invitation, dropping into a chair across from his Commander in Chief. "Operationally," the Air Force man continued, "we have been taken back to the 1930s. Visual search during daylight hours only. And, as you experienced on your way in, we are losing the weather. "Heavy cloud cover over the Antarctic Convergence is forcing our aircraft down to almost wave-top altitude, cutting into their range and search coverage. They are also encountering rain, snow, and heavy fog. We can expect that the North Americans are taking maximum advantage of this kind of environment."

Sparza produced a brief grunt of ironic laughter. "Only the day before yesterday I said that the weather was on our side. General Winter is proving to be a fickle ally."

"I regret the situation, sir," Arco replied, failing to suppress his own sensation of irony. "My aircrews are doing their best."

"I do not doubt it, General. Nor do I need to be reminded that it was my decision that committed us to this course of action. Now, for a moment let us assume that you do locate your target. Aeronaval was hit hard when they tried to take her on yesterday. What will your plan be?"

"We have moved our entire Rafale force south. Grupo Two and Eight are here at Rio Grande. Grupo Six is up at Rio Gallegos with what's left of our tanker force. All three squadrons are holding a full eight-plane antishipping strike on cockpit alert. If we can find her, we will kill her, but we have got to find her first."

Sparza tilted his chair back and snubbed out his cigarette in the conference table's pristine ashtray. "Arco, I am fully aware of the doubts you have had about Conquistador South. However, I also believe that for the moment, you are the man in the best position to save this operation. You have told me of all of the conventional things that you are doing. Well and good. But what about the unconventional things that might be done?"

Ironies upon ironies. "There is… something, sir," Arco began slowly. "I have been in communications with some of my technical specialists, people involved in stealth-technologies research. They say that there may be a way to penetrate the kind of antiradar defenses the North Americans are using, but it will require a great deal of manpower and equipment."

"Ah."

Sparza tilted his chair forward again. "Maybe we can have that coffee now, General. And then you can tell me what you will need, and why."