Fort Apache

AN HISTORICAL NOTE:

While inspired by actual A-10A missions conducted during the Gulf War, this book is fiction. All characters, commands and locations are to be interpreted as such, and in no case are meant to reflect on anyone living or dead, actual military procedures, practices or whims.

Readers familiar with the A-10A facilities at King Fahd and Al Jouf will realize I’ve moved a few things around in the interest of the yarn. We haven’t gotten the Jacuzzi yet, but Chief Clyston is working on it.

While Special Ops— Delta Force in particular— infiltrated a number of teams into various parts of Iraq prior to the ground portion of the campaign, Fort Apache and its command structure is entirely a figment of my imagination. No documents released after the war include any reference to a permanent base of its size in Iraq. While the A-10As did at times operate in support of the Special Ops teams, no official documents support the theory that they operated from inside Iraq. A discrepancy in declassified records has tended to reinforce certain rumors about classified A-10A Forward Operating Areas or bases, but none of the official documents I’ve seen to date specifically prove that Hogs operated from enemy territory. In any event, all activities north of the border in this book are fictitious.

As for the Special Ops missions, we will probably have to wait years for the full story to be declassified— and for the guys who were there to say what really happened. But readers can find some details of the Special Ops missions in Iraq in several books.

Among my favorites, because they cast the operations in their historical framework, are Commandos by Douglas C. Waller, and From a Dark Sky by Orr Kelly. Kelly’s book focuses on the Air Force’s contribution to Special Ops, a perspective often missed.

Terry Griswold and D.M. Giangreco also include some stories in their book, Delta, America’s Elite Counterterrorist Force; if you’ve never seen how small an AH-6G is, you can get an idea from the photos included in their book.

Some of the behind-the-scenes political maneuvering is hinted at in Rick Atkinson’s larger history to the war, Crusade, a much different book than the others. And a personal look at the British SAS contribution to special operations in Iraq is told by Andy McNab in his first-person memoir Bravo Two Zero. McNab managed to survive capture; his true story is more harrowing than fiction.

A final note: Don’t try Doberman’s approach to short-field landings on your local shopping mall parking lot. It beats the hell out of the landing gear and results in a lot of broken glass.

— Jim DeFelice