Iron Wolf

TWO

Two Russian Air Force Su-34 fighter-bombers in black, white, and light blue camouflage streaked west, flying low over the flat Ukrainian countryside. Precision-guided bombs, antiradiation missiles, and air-to-air missiles hung from their external hardpoints.

The lead pilot, Major Viktor Zelin, caught sight of smoke from the wrecked helicopters rising on the horizon. He throttled back as he banked into a hard turn and climbed — a maneuver copied by his wingman, flying in loose formation aft and about two kilometers off his right wing. He craned his neck to get a quick look at the Starovoitove station as it flashed below, catching a fleeting glimpse of flashing blue lights on the highway and around the OSCE post. It looked like the Ukrainian police were on the scene, he thought. Nu i chto? Well, so what? What good were ordinary policemen going to do against a murderous terrorist gang? Especially one that was probably made up of their bastard countrymen?

“Inform Voronezh Control that we have the attack area in sight,” he told the navigation and weapons officer in the right-hand seat.

“Sending now,” Captain Nikolai Starikov acknowledged. He transmitted the message using a series of short, three-figure Morse codes, and then checked the glowing multifunction map display in front of him. “We’re right up against the border,” he warned. “We’re going to stray across into Polish airspace.”

“No shit,” Zelin grunted, continuing the turn and bleeding off more speed. Even with its superb maneuverability and flying just fast enough to stay in the air, the Su-34 had a turning radius measured in kilometers. There was no way his flight could orbit close enough to the OSCE post to keep it in sight and stay entirely on the Ukrainian side of the frontier.

Suddenly a warning tone sounded in both men’s headsets.

“Search radar spike,” Starikov said, studying his displays. “L-band. Single emitter. Computer evaluates it as a long-range Polish RAT 31DL radar. Strength is sufficient to detect us.”

“No surprise now that we’re off the deck,” the major commented. He showed his teeth. “But I bet some fucking Pole just crapped his pants when we popped up onto his screen.” Then he shrugged against his harness. “Let’s hear what they have to say.”

“Switching to GUARD channel,” Starikov reported. The international emergency channel was commonly used for communication between aircraft and ground stations belonging to different nations.

“This is the Warsaw Operations Center calling the two aircraft now turning two hundred and twenty-five degrees over Starovoitove at one thousand meters, identify yourselves. Repeat. Identify yourselves,” a Polish-accented voice said in their earphones.

“Nice of him to speak Russian,” Zelin snorted. He keyed his mike. “Warsaw Operations Center, this is Sentinel Flight Leader.”

“Sentinel Leader, you are on course to violate our airspace!” the Polish air defense controller radioed. “Withdraw to the east immediately. Repeat. Turn east immediately!”

The major glanced at his subordinate. “Find out what Voronezh wants us to do. Meanwhile, I’ll try to buy us some time.”

Starikov nodded, already tapping out another series of short Morse codes that would alert their own commander to their situation and ask for new orders.

“Warsaw Center, this is Sentinel Leader,” the Su-34 pilot said. “Regret unable to comply with your request. We are conducting an emergency antiterrorist operation.”

“That is not a request, Sentinel Flight!” the Polish air defense controller snapped.

Zelin and his comrade stiffened as another warbling tone, shriller this time, sounded in their headsets.

“X-band tracking and fire control radar. Forward right quadrant,” Starikov said tightly. “Source is an SNR-125 and it has a lock!”

“Damn it,” the major muttered. That was the radar used by S-125M Neva surface-to-air missile system, the type NATO code-named the SA-3B Goa. Though old, it was still a highly capable weapon, especially with the digital component upgrades the Poles had made. Plus, circling like this left them sitting ducks against a SAM attack. If he stayed, he was risking two billion-ruble fighter-bombers.

He shook his head. It was a losing proposition. And no one in Moscow would thank him for triggering a shooting war with Poland without positive orders.

Followed by his wingman in the second Su-34, Zelin banked harder and dove, turning back to the east. The radar warning faded away.

“Voronezh approves a withdrawal to an ACP thirty kilometers east of the frontier,” the navigator told him, entering coordinates on one of the keypads at his station. “Cue up.”

Faintly glowing bars appeared on Zelin’s HUD, above and to the right of his current course. He pulled back on the stick and turned, centering the bars on his display. These flight-director bars were a navigation cue that would lead them toward the ACP, the air control point, selected by the staff back at Voronezh’s Malshevo Air Base. Once there, the two Su-34s would fly a racetrack holding pattern designed to conserve their fuel.

“And when we get there, Nikolai? Then what?” he asked angrily, still furious at having been forced to turn tail and run. “Do we just fly around and around while those bastard Poles practice their radar search techniques against us?”

Starikov ignored his commander’s ill-tempered outburst. He was too busy reading their new orders, freshly decoded by the Su-34’s computers, as they scrolled across his display. “No, sir,” he told Zelin. “We’re ordered to provide on-call air support for a Spetnaz quick reaction force. They’ve been tasked to hunt down and kill these terrorists, and their transport helicopters and Mi-24 attack helicopters are only ten minutes out. Vornezh is also vectoring two Su-35 fighters to the ACP to back us up. Further orders will come straight from the Kremlin.”

Major Viktor Zelin took that in and then smiled broadly. “Otlichno! Excellent! Maybe somebody in the high command just grew a pair!”

Spetsnaz Captain Kirill Aristov saw his lead scout’s silent hand signal and dropped prone. The rest of his command group did the same, taking cover among the bushes, moss-covered stumps, and saplings crowding the forest floor. Off on either flank, his other squads also halted and went to ground.

Carefully cradling his AN-94 assault rifle in both arms, he wriggled quietly forward to the scout’s position behind a stunted pine tree. “Well, Chapayev?” he hissed. “What is it?”

The scout, a grizzled long-term professional soldier with combat experience in Chechnya, Georgia, and Ukraine, jabbed a thumb at a spot about a meter up the trunk of the pine tree. Something or someone had brushed up against one smaller branches, more a twig really, and almost snapped it off. The branch dangled loosely, hanging by a thin strip of bark.

Aristov reached up and rubbed his fingers across the torn bark. The break was fresh, still smelling strongly of pine sap. The scout raised a single eyebrow. You see? he mouthed silently.

The Spetsnaz officer nodded his understanding. The terrorists they were chasing were probably not far ahead.

Cautiously, he peered around the tree trunk.

They were very close to the river, within a dozen meters or so. The ground, still covered by trees and clumps of brush, sloped gently to the water’s edge. But everything was still, motionless except where a light breeze stirred the forest undergrowth. Then Aristov looked closer. At several places along the bank, flattened patches in the tall grass showed where heavy objects had been dragged along the ground.

He laid his assault rifle down and took a pair of binoculars out of one of the pouches on his tactical vest. Raising the binoculars to his eyes, he swept them slowly from side to side — scanning the opposite bank of the river. Along this stretch, the Bug was only about thirty meters wide.

Aristov could see more spots where the vegetation had been disturbed. And he just barely could make out something odd a little deeper among the woods, something dark-colored among the lighter green of the grass and bushes. He focused his binoculars on that spot.

The shape of a black rubber inflatable boat jumped out at him, roughly camouflaged with tree branches, uprooted bushes, and swaths of torn grass.

He swore under his breath. The terrorists had crossed into Polish territory.

Still scowling, Aristov crawled back to the waiting command group. He motioned his radioman over and grabbed the handset. “Hunter Group One to Hunter Command Prime.”

“Prime to Hunter One, go ahead.” Despite the hiss and crackle of static, that deep resonant voice was unmistakable. “Make your report!”

The Spetsnaz captain swallowed hard. “I’m afraid that we have a serious problem, Mr. President.”

President of the Russian Federation Gennadiy Gryzlov tightened his grip on the secure phone as he listened to Aristov’s reluctant confession of failure. The terrorists who had murdered Lieutenant General Voronov and his men had escaped — crossing into safe haven on Polish soil. When the Spetsnaz officer finished his report, Gryzlov said nothing for several moments.

This uncharacteristically calm reaction made his national security staff extremely uneasy.

In public, Russia’s forty-one-year-old president was confident, always unruffled, and charming. Those qualities, plus his youthful good looks and the vast wealth he’d earned from his family’s oil, gas, and petrochemicals companies, had brought him to power in a landslide election victory three years before. In private, however, Gryzlov was known for his fiery temper, towering rages, and utter disdain for anyone he believed had failed him.

So now the hastily assembled group of aides, cabinet ministers, generals, and intelligence chiefs waited nervously for their leader’s inevitable tirade.

It did not come.

“Very well, I understand,” Gryzlov said into the phone. He checked the nearest clock, an action slavishly imitated by his cabinet ministers and top aides. Just over an hour had passed since the terrorists butchered Voronov and the others. “Hold your force in position, Captain. I will call you back shortly with new instructions.”

He hung up and stood tapping his fingers on the table, deep in thought. Then he turned to his minister of defense, Gregor Sokolov. “Show me a map of that sector, at the largest scale you have.”

“Yes, Mr. President,” Sokolov said hurriedly. He was all too aware that Russia’s chief executive might soon be looking for a scapegoat. He motioned frantically to one of his staff officers, an elderly, gray-haired colonel from the Military Topographic Directorate. “Get it up on the big screen, Isayev! Now!”

The colonel flipped open his laptop, quickly and efficiently sorted through a series of digitized maps, selected one, and then sent it wirelessly to the conference room’s enormous flat-screen display.

Whistling tonelessly to himself, Gryzlov moved closer to the display, peering intently at the patterned landscape of woods, bogs, farmland, small villages, and roads it showed. With one finger, he traced the meandering line of the Bug River. He turned toward the colonel. “These depth markings for the river? They are accurate?”

“To a degree, Mr. President,” the staff officer agreed. He hunched his narrow shoulders, thinking out loud. “The Bug’s depth varies significantly from season to season — depending on rainfall and runoff. But those figures are a reasonable approximation. In fact, given the dry summer so far, it is probable the river is even shallower than depicted.”

“Ochen’ khorosho! Very good!” Gryzlov said drily, fighting down the urge to rip the other man apart for lecturing him as though he were a schoolboy. This cartographic colonel might be a dreary pedant, but at least he was competent.

He swung away from the map and picked up the secure phone. “Hunter One? This is Hunter Command Prime. Listen carefully. You and your troops will ford the river and continue your pursuit. You will find those terrorists and destroy them! Understood?”

“Yes, Mr. President!” Aristov’s taut voice came through the crackling background static. “It is possible that the terrorists had vehicles waiting for them on the other side of the river. If so, my men will not be able to catch them on foot.”

“Then you will follow them by air, using your helicopters.”

“And if the Poles interfere?” the young officer asked.

“You will use whatever force is necessary to clear them from your path,” Gryzlov told him. “Including the use of the fighter and bomber aircraft already on scene. Clear?”

“Very clear!” the Spetsnaz captain said crisply. “Your orders will be obeyed.”

Gryzlov hung up and turned to look at the stunned faces of his national security advisers. A predatory smile flickered across his face and then vanished. “Do any of you doubt my decision?” he asked.

“I do not doubt your right to make this decision,” Foreign Minister Daria Titeneva said slowly. “I only wonder if such haste to invade the territory of a member of the NATO alliance is wise. Poland will not turn a blind eye to the presence of our commandos.”

Gryzlov’s cold-eyed gaze caught hers for a moment and then ran up and down her lush, full body. She reddened slightly. They were occasional lovers, but apparently his dark-haired foreign minister still had a mind of her own. “Our need to act quickly is precisely why the Poles cannot stop us!” he snapped.

“You are claiming the right of hot pursuit,” Sergei Tarzarov, his chief of staff, realized. “The right to chase criminals and terrorists across international borders.”

The Russian president nodded smugly. “Exactly. The Americans have used this doctrine to excuse their intrusions into Mexico, Pakistan, and dozens of other weaker countries around the world. Now we shall apply their own legalistic reasoning against one of their own allies.”

It was no surprise that thin, plain-looking Tarzarov was ahead of the others, Gryzlov thought. The shrewd old man had been a power inside the Kremlin for decades, first as an intelligence officer, then as minister of the interior, and now as his top aide. Rumor said that Tarzarov knew where all the bodies were buried in Russian politics. Other rumors, darker ones, said that was true because he’d buried most of them personally.

“We may have such a right in law,” Tarzarov cautioned. “But this situation could easily escalate.”

“Perhaps,” Gryzlov agreed. He shrugged. “If so, we have sufficient force in hand to prevail in any localized conflict. And by the time larger Polish forces can intervene, our quick reaction force will be long gone.”

He turned back to Titeneva. “Contact the Poles. Tell them what we’re doing. Make it clear that we are not asking for their permission, and that we expect their full cooperation in this matter.”

“No matter how it turns out, Warsaw will protest vigorously,” the foreign minister told him. Her dark eyes were troubled. “They will undoubtedly contact NATO and the European Union as well.”

Gryzlov showed his teeth. “Oh, I hope the Poles do,” he said. “I would enjoy watching their new president squirm and wriggle while he whines about us going after terrorists operating from Polish soil!”

Captain Kiril Aristov waded the last few meters of the river with his assault rifle and equipment vest held high over his head. With water dripping from his soaked fatigues and boots, he came sloshing up onto the opposite bank and dropped to one knee. The rest of his commandos were close behind. Moving rapidly, they fanned out, forming a defensive perimeter around the crossing site.

He unzipped the waterproof case containing his tablet computer and pulled up the map file Moscow had transmitted moments before they crossed the Bug. At first glance, this part of the west side of the Bug River seemed much like the Ukrainian side of the border, but that was deceptive. Beyond a narrow belt of pine trees and scraggly oaks, the countryside opened up into a mix of ponds, shallow streams, and flat meadows and pastureland.

The lieutenants and senior sergeants who commanded his four ten-man teams formed a circle around him, watching closely while he sketched out their orders.

“Berezin, Dobrynin, and Larionov, take your men and scout west,” Aristov said, tracing a line with his stylus. “My command group will follow you. Look for signs of foot or vehicle traffic. Stay sharp. The terrorists who hit Voronov and our guys might not be too far ahead. So get moving!”

They nodded once and darted off, already waving their commandos into action. Soldiers bent low under the weight of their gear and weapons slipped off through the trees.

Aristov turned to his remaining team leader. “Milekhin, split your section in two. Deploy them at the north and south edge of these woods. You’re my reserve and flank guard, clear?”

“Da, Captain!” the lieutenant said. “Don’t worry. We’ll keep everyone off your back.”

Once the last of his troops were in motion, the Spetsnaz captain looked for Chapayev. The veteran scout was squatting silently a few meters away, methodically checking over his rifle and equipment.

He glanced up with a quick flash of tobacco-stained teeth. “And my orders, Captain?”

“Take a good hard look at those rubber boats and the ground around them,” Aristov said. “See if you can pick up anything that might let us identify these terrorists. But watch out for booby traps. These bastards seem to know what they’re doing.”

The scout nodded once and vanished among the trees and bushes.

Surrounded by his command group, Aristov headed west, advancing deeper into Poland.

“To szalone, Panie Poruczniku!” Polish Border Guard sergeant Konrad Malek shouted into his cell phone. “This is crazy, Lieutenant! I’ve got eight men with me and we’re mostly trained to arrest smugglers and illegals. How in hell am I supposed to stop what looks like a full-scale invasion by fucking Russian commandos?”

“No one’s asking you to stop them, Konrad,” his commander said calmly, still safely ensconced back in his cozy office at the Dorohusk Border Control Point. “We only want you to slow them down while the bigwigs in Warsaw get through to the Kremlin.”

“And how the devil do I slow them down?” Malek growled. “Write them a ticket for trespassing?”

“See if you can contact their leader and—”

“Sergeant!”

Malek turned to see one of his men pointing east across the meadow. They had parked their two patrol cars on a rutted farm track about two hundred meters west of the woods lining the Bug River. Heavily armed Russian soldiers in camouflage battle dress were exiting the trees there and shaking out in a long skirmish line.

“Never mind, Lieutenant,” said Malek grimly. “We’re out of time here. Our uninvited guests from the east have arrived.” He disconnected and turned to his corporal. “Hand me that bullhorn, Eryk. Let’s find out if we can talk some sense into these people.”

Gritting his teeth, he walked out into the open pasture. He raised the bullhorn. “Uwaga, Rosyjscy żołnierze! Attention, Russian soldiers! This is Sergeant Malek of the Border Guard. You are in violation of Polish national territory—”

Suddenly a rifle shot rang out, echoing off the distant trees and across the open fields.

Spetsnaz scout Ivan Chapayev crouched down to look more closely at the black inflatable boat his captain had spotted earlier. It had been dragged up from the riverbank and back into the shadows under the trees. Broken branches, clumps of brush, and bundles of grass were heaped across the boat in a crude attempt to conceal it.

Lips compressed in concentration, Chapayev used the thin blade of his combat knife to gently edge aside heaps of the tangled plant debris. Careful, Ivan, he told himself. Take it nice and easy. If he missed just one little booby-trap detonator wire, his wife would get a fancy embossed letter of condolence with President Gryzlov’s signature on it, suitable for framing. He chuckled. Hell, that sour bitch Yulia would probably just pawn it for a cheap bottle of vodka.

Nothing.

He sat back, frowning.

The terrorists who had tried to camouflage this boat had done a pretty piss-poor job of it. Even his captain, a decent enough officer but not the most observant of men, had picked it out from all the way across the river. On the other hand, those terrorists must have heard the clattering rotors of Russian helicopters pounding in their ears while they sculled across the water. That had probably pushed them right to the edge of panic. So it was no surprise that the terrorists had just heaped whatever vegetation they could grab on top of the boat in a frantic bid to hide it.

Then he looked more closely at the bundles of long grass he had pushed away. They were withered, already turning brown in the summer heat. Those bundles had been cut and put in place hours ago.

Chapayev’s eyes widened. He scrambled to his feet, reaching for the short-range tactical radio clipped to his collar. The terrorists had not been in a hurry when they’d hidden this boat. They’d heaped all this crap across it long before they slaughtered Voronov and his men. Which meant the inflatable raft had never been used as part of an escape across the Bug River into Poland.

Which meant—

A 7.62mm round moving at 830 meters per second hit the veteran Spetsnaz scout in the face and tore out through the back of his head.

Crack!

Ivan Chapayev was dead before the sound of the shot arrived.

Several hundred meters to the north, lying prone in a clump of brush on the Ukrainian side of the river, Pavlo Lytvyn peered through the SVD Dragunov sniper rifle’s telescopic sight for another few seconds. “No movement,” he said finally with grim satisfaction. “My target is down.”

Fedir Kravchenko clapped him on the shoulder. “Nicely done!”

The sudden crackle of automatic weapons fire brought a smile to his face. The trigger-happy Poles and Russians were shooting at each other. Killing that fat pig Voronov had been satisfying, but it was only part of a larger plan — a plan that was unfolding successfully. He had lured the Russian Federation into a direct armed confrontation with a member of the NATO alliance. Perhaps now the West would push back against the Kremlin’s domination of his beloved country!

“Time to go, Pavlo,” Kravchenko said. “We’re finished here.”

Nodding, the bigger man packed up his sniper rifle and followed his leader back through the carefully camouflaged entrance of their hideout, a concrete bunker dug deep into the riverbank. Originally built by the Soviets as part of the so-called Molotov Defense Line during their 1939–1941 occupation of eastern Poland, the half-buried bunker had moldered away for decades — forgotten by everyone except the odd Romany tramp or occasional kayaking tourists taking refuge during a thunderstorm. By the time anyone official stumbled across it, Kravchenko and his men would be long gone.

Four thousand meters above the Ukrainian countryside, Major Viktor Zelin jogged his Su-34 fighter-bomber’s stick slightly left, beginning another lazy, slow racetrack turn. His eyes flicked to the fuel indicator. They still had plenty of flying time left before they would have to break away and refuel.

He glanced out the canopy, making sure his wingman was still in position. The other Su-34 was right where it was supposed to be, hanging back about a kilometer off his wing tip. Two mottled green, brown, and tan specks were just visible off to the north, circling low above the mosaic of woods and fields. The two single-seater Su-35 fighters sent to back them up were staying well down on the deck, avoiding Polish radar detection.

“My popali v zasadu! We’ve been ambushed!” The Spetsnaz captain’s frantic radio call broke into his headset. “A sniper just killed one of my men and now we’re taking fire!”

In the seat beside him, Starikov keyed his mike. “This is Sentinel Leader, Hunter One. Do you need air support? Over.”

“Hell, yes!” the Spetsnaz commander shouted. They could hear gunfire in the background, rising steadily in volume. “We’re pinned down at the edge of the trees along the river, with terrorists to our front. Range is between two and three hundred meters. I can paint the target for you with a laser!”

Zelin frowned. That was awfully close for an air strike, even with precision-guided munitions. One little equipment or computer glitch could strew their bombs across friendly troops, not the enemy.

“Can you break contact?” Starikov asked, obviously thinking the same thing.

“Negative! Negative! We’ve practically got our backs up against the river as it is!”

“Understood, Hunter One,” the navigation and weapons officer said with a shrug. If the commandos were willing to take the risk, so be it. He saw Zelin’s confirming nod and added, “Start lasing your target. We’re approximately three minutes out from your position.”

“Did you get that, Sentinel Two?” Zelin asked his wingman.

“Two,” a laconic voice said, responding with his position in the formation.

“I’ll make the bomb run,” Zelin told the other pilot. “You hang back about five kilometers. If the Poles bring up that damned SAM radar again, get ready to nail it on my command! Clear?”

“Two.”

The major switched his attention to the leader of the Su-35 flight. “Drobovik Lead, cover us. But stay low for now.”

“Shotgun Lead acknowledges,” the fighter commander replied. “Just don’t leave us down eating dust too much longer, Major. I’ve already practically harvested some clodhopper’s wheat field for him the hard way.”

Zelin grinned. “Very good, Shotgun. Out.” He glanced at Starikov. “Let’s use two KAB-500Ls.”

“I concur,” the weapons officer said. “They’re the best option.” He began entering commands into his attack computer.

New flight-director bars appeared on Zelin’s HUD, marking the course selected by the computer’s bomb program. He pulled back on the stick and increased power to the Su-34’s two Saturn turbofan engines. The fighter-bomber climbed fast, soaring toward an altitude of seven thousand meters at more than eight hundred kilometers per hour.

The KAB-500L was a five-hundred-kilogram laser-guided bomb. In service for more than three decades, it was a powerful and accurate weapon — able to deliver its high-explosive warhead within a few meters of a chosen target. But it had weaknesses, ones it shared with other laser-guided weapons. Attacking with full precision required dropping the bomb within a relatively small “basket.” This was a zone that met two basic requirements: the KAB’s seeker head had to be able to see the targeting laser, and the bomb itself had to be high enough and falling fast enough to guide itself all the way to the laser-designated target.

In this attack, Zelin and Starikov would have to drop their bombs from an altitude of at least seven thousand meters, which meant their Su-34 would be more vulnerable to attack by Polish SAMs if Warsaw decided to escalate the situation.

“Ten kilometers to estimated release point,” Starikov reported, echoing the data shown on Zelin’s HUD.

A shrill radar warning warbled in both crewmen’s headsets.

“X-band. Single emitter,” Starikov said, peering at his displays. “It’s that same SNR-125.”

“Sentinel Lead, this is Two,” their wingman radioed. “Shall I take it out?”

“Negative,” Zelin said. “We’re still well outside Polish airspace. They’re not going to risk firing first.”

Or so he hoped.

Technically, of course, he and Starikov were not going to be attacking from inside Polish territory. Since their bombs would have to fly more than nine kilometers to reach the terrorists shooting up those Spetsnaz troops, they would be released in Ukrainian airspace. Somehow, though, he doubted the Poles would care much about that little legal nicety once bombs starting exploding on their side of the river.

Sweating now, he focused on flying his aircraft right down the path selected by the attack computer, making small adjustments with the stick and throttles to stay on course and speed.

“Five kilometers,” Starikov told him. The weapons officer keyed his mike, radioing the Spetsnaz team they were supporting. “Hunter, this is Sentinel. Keep that laser on target, but get your heads down now! We are attacking!”

Twin growling bass notes sounded in their earphones. The KAB seeker heads “saw” the targeting laser. Ten seconds later, the flight-director bars on Zelin’s HUD flashed bright green. They were in range. He punched the release button on his stick. “Weapons away!”

The Su-34 bounced upward slightly as two laser-guided bombs fell away from under its wings. Zelin yanked the stick left, rolling the aircraft into an immediate tight, high-G turn to the southeast. If the Poles reacted badly, he wanted a lot more maneuvering room.

“Weapon impact!” he heard Starikov yell.

Fighting against the g-forces they were pulling, the major turned his head all the way to the right, straining to see through the canopy beyond Starikov’s white flight helmet. There, low on the horizon, a huge cloud of smoke and tumbling debris and dirt marked the point where their bombs had slammed into the ground and exploded.

“On target! On target!” they both heard the Spetsnaz officer yelling over the radio. “The terrorists are dead! We are advancing!”

“Lead, this is Two!” their wingman snapped, drowning out the excited commando captain. “SAM launch! Two S-125s inbound at your six!”

Zelin slammed the stick even harder left and shoved his throttles into full afterburner. Accelerating past the speed of sound, the Su-34 turned tightly, breaking northeast across the path of the incoming missiles.

Beside him, Starikov frantically punched buttons to activate their countermeasures systems. The large jammer pod mounted below their fuselage went active, pouring out energy to degrade the accuracy of the Polish radars. Automated chaff dispensers fired, hurling cartridges into the air behind the fast-moving Su-34. They exploded, spewing thousands of small Mylar strips across the sky.

He looked to his left. Two plumes of dirty white smoke were visible against the light blue sky, curving toward them. Shit. Their jammer and chaff blooms weren’t working. The Polish SAMs were still locked on to their aircraft.

The major rolled the Su-34 inverted and dove for the ground. “Two, this is Lead,” he said. “Hit that goddamned radar!”

“Kh-31 away!” his wingman yelled.

Zelin rolled out of his dive at less than a thousand meters. He risked another glance to the left.

A tiny bright dot trailed by smoke streaked northwest and then winked out. Then it flared again, slashing even faster across the sky. The Kh-31P antiradiation missile had a first-stage solid-rocket motor that kicked it up to Mach 1.8 just after launch. At burnout, its rocket motor fell away and a kerosene-fueled ramjet boosted the missile past Mach 4.

Seconds later, Zelin saw a blinding flash far off in the distance.

“That SNR-125 is off the air,” Starikov reported.

And probably dead, the major thought coldly. Even if the Poles had detected his wingman’s ARM launch and switched their radar off, the Kh-31 had an inertial guidance system that would take it all the way home to the target.

Zelin glanced aft. Without command guidance from their fire control radar, the Polish SAMS were going ballistic, corkscrewing wildly high into the atmosphere.

He breathed out, starting to relax.

And then swore bitterly as another shrill radar warning sounded in his headset.

“Two airborne radars operating in the X-band,” Starikov said. “Computer evaluates them as pulse-Doppler N-O19 Phazotrons. Signal strength is weak, but increasing.”

Zelin keyed his mike, calling the two Su-35 fighters attached to his force. “Shotgun Flight, this is Sentinel Lead. It looks like you’re going to have to earn your pay after all. We have Polish MiG-29s inbound.”

Two Polish MiG-29 Fulcrum fighters, camouflaged in dark and light gray, raced southeast toward the border with Ukraine.

Inside the cockpit of the lead aircraft, Captain Marek Kaczor was trying very hard not to let his increasing exasperation boil over into rage. “Say again, Warsaw Operations Center. Exactly what kind of mess are you ordering us into?”

“The situation is unclear, Ryś Lead,” the controller said. Kaczor could almost hear the man’s apologetic shrug. “We have confused reports of Russian troops on the ground west of the Bug River. And now a SAM battery of the Sixtieth Rocketry Squadron says it has fired on Russian fighter-bombers.”

“Fired on the Russians!?” Kaczor exclaimed. “Jesus Christ! Are we at war?”

“This situation is—”

“Unclear,” the MiG-29 pilot growled, interrupting. “Fine. Great. Wonderful. Look, did the SAMs hit anything?”

“We’ve lost communication with the battery,” the controller admitted.

Briefly, Kaczor closed his eyes, fighting down the urge to cut loose with a wave of profanity that would probably deafen anyone listening in and earn him yet another reprimand from his squadron commander. Just as quickly, he opened them again. His MiG-29s were already flying blind in a figurative sense. There was no point in doing the same thing literally.

“Well, what can you tell me, then?” he asked with exaggerated patience.

“We have intermittent radar contact with two rapidly maneuvering unidentified aircraft over the border area,” the controller told him carefully. “We evaluate them as Russian Su-34s.”

Kaczor absorbed that in silence. According to the best intelligence he’d seen, the Su-34 carried a multimode phased-array radar that could pick out fighter-sized targets at up to ninety kilometers in all aspects. That was a hell of lot better than the old Soviet piece-of-shit Phazotron in his MiG-29 could do. He’d be lucky to spot the Russians at seventy kilometers and that would only be if they were flying right out in front of him. Against aircraft coming up behind, he wouldn’t get pings until they were within thirty-five kilometers.

In a short-range aerial knife fight, the Polish pilot was sure his Fulcrum and its AA-11 Archer heat-seeking missiles could defeat the bigger, somewhat less maneuverable Russian planes. The problem would be surviving long enough to get into close range. He wished again that the air force had installed a better radar as part of the major avionics upgrades they had applied to the MiG-29s.

“So… what are my orders, Center?” he asked finally.

“We need you to clarify the situation,” the controller said. This time there was no mistaking the embarrassment in his voice. “Do not engage the Russians unless you are fired upon. Observe and report only, if possible.”

“Understood, Center,” Kaczor said through gritted teeth. “Lynx Flight Leader, out.”

He checked his American-made digital navigational display. He and his wingman, Lieutenant Milosz Czarny, were already within one hundred kilometers of the border. At this speed, they should be able to detect those Russian Su-34s in just a couple of minutes.

“You heard the man, Milosz,” he radioed the other pilot. “Finger off the trigger, okay?’

“Jak dla mnie, w porządku! Fine by me!” Czarny said. “You know this stinks, right?”

“Stinks is too nice a word,” Kaczor replied. “So we do this carefully. We go in. We take a peek. And if this is a real shooting war and not some diplomatic clusterfuck, we bug out and wait for backup. Okay?”

Czarny waggled the wings of his MiG-29 in emphatic agreement. “Copy that—”

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP.

For a split second, Kaczor froze in horror. Then his eyes flashed to the readout from his radar warning receiver. They were being painted by Irbis-E phased-array radars — the kind of radar system carried by Russia’s ultra-advanced Su-35 fighters. That was bad. Very bad. What made it worse was realizing that the Su-35s were already behind them. And they were well within missile range.

“Break! Break! Break!” he screamed into the radio.

Captain Marek Kaczor threw his MiG-29 into a radical, high-G diving turn while simultaneously punching out chaff and flares to decoy radar-guided and heat-seeking missiles.

Deceived by the chaff blooms or thrown out of lock by his wild maneuvering, three long-range R-77E missiles streaked past his canopy and vanished. But three more got close enough for their laser proximity fuses to detonate. Lacerated by dozens of hits from razor-edged shrapnel, the Fulcrum tumbled out of control and then blew up. Burning fuel and fragments drifted north on the prevailing wind.

Milosz Czarny’s MiG-29 died the same way seconds later.

Against an ordinary opponent in a stand-up fight, the evasive tactics adopted by Kaczor and his wingman might have worked — or at least bought him enough time to retaliate. Unfortunately for the Poles, this was not a stand-up fight. This was a brutal and thoroughly effective ambush.

Alerted by Zelin’s Su-34s, the Russian Su-35s had swung wide to the north and then turned back southwest, darting just above trees, buildings, and power lines to come up undetected behind the Polish fighters. Once in position, they climbed fast, acquired the Poles on their radar, and fired six Mach 4+ R-77E radar-guided missiles, known to NATO as AA-12 Adders, at each Fulcrum.

The two Polish pilots never had a chance.

President Gennadiy Gryzlov paid close attention to the young Spetsnaz captain’s radioed report. The large-scale map displayed on the conference room monitor made it easy to follow the quick reaction force’s movements. After laser-guided bombs wiped out the gunmen who had ambushed them, Aristov and his troops had advanced southwest, pushing across open cropland toward a small village close to the Polish customs inspection plaza. All local farm tracks led in that direction, which strongly suggested it was the path taken by the surviving terrorists.

Scratch that suggested, Gryzlov told himself, listening to the crackle of small-arms and automatic weapons fire in the background. The Spetsnaz troops must have run straight into a terrorist hideout. After all, who else could be stupid enough to be shooting at his troops from those farmhouses and cottages?

“We’re meeting stiff resistance, Mr. President,” Aristov said, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of battle. “I have three men seriously wounded and one more dead. I’ve deployed a team to flank the village, but the ground is very difficult—”

“Mr. President?” a hesitant voice interrupted.

“Hold a moment, Captain,” Gryzlov said. Impatiently, he turned away from the map. Viktor Kazyanov, the minister of state security, stood there looking worried. “Yes? What is it?” he snapped.

“I am not sure that our troops are fighting terrorists,” his intelligence chief said reluctantly. “Our signals intelligence units have intercepted cell-phone calls which strongly suggest that village is being defended by elements of the local Polish Border Guard detachment.”

“Bullshit!” Gryzlov growled. “Since when do customs inspectors carry assault rifles and machine guns?”

“Many of the border-guard units have paramilitary training and equipment,” Kazyanov told him.

“And if these bastards killing our men are wearing nice, neat, official-looking uniforms?” Gryzlov asked coldly. “What difference does that make?”

The minister of security stared at him. “But then we are attacking forces of the Polish government, not just some ragtag band of terrorists,” he stammered.

The Russian president felt his temper rising. He stepped closer to Kazyanov, feeling some satisfaction as the taller, heavier-set man flinched and backed away. “What the hell do you think is happening out there, Viktor?” he asked.

Without waiting for an answer, he swung around and jabbed a finger at the map display. “We chase a bunch of murdering bastards back across the Polish border and they ambush our men. So what do the goddamned Poles do? They fire missiles at our planes when we strike the terrorists! Then they send MiG-29 fighters to hunt down our bombers! And now, just when we’re tracking these terrorists to their lair, they deploy so-called border guards armed with heavy weapons to stop us?” Gryzlov scowled. “How much more evidence do you need? It’s obvious that someone high up in Warsaw is in bed with these terrorists. For all I know, it could be their whole damned, stinking government!”

An uncomfortable silence fell across the crowded conference room.

The minister of defense, Gregor Sokolov, cleared his throat. “That is certainly a strong possibility, Mr. President. But if so, Captain Aristov and his men face grave danger.”

“How so?”

“Clearing defended buildings is a difficult and lengthy military task,” Sokolov said. “Regrettably, I do not believe our commandos will be given the necessary time.”

Gryzlov raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Why?”

“Even our closest bases are several hundred kilometers from this battle,” Sokolov explained. “We cannot possibly reinforce our quick reaction force before they face overwhelming odds. If elements of the Polish government are in fact siding with the terrorists who murdered Lieutenant General Voronov, they can bring heavy armor and artillery into the battle within a matter of hours. Aristov and his commandos are highly trained light infantry, but they aren’t equipped to fight tanks.”

“What about our fighters and bombers?” Gryzlov asked. “We can destroy their armored vehicles and artillery from the air.”

Sokolov shook his head. “I am afraid not, Mr. President. Major Zelin’s Su-34s will have to break off to refuel within a matter of minutes. Our Su-35s have already expended most of their long-range missiles and much of their fuel is also gone, expended in low-altitude flight. We can sortie more planes from Voronezh, but they may not arrive before it is too late.”

“I see,” Gryzlov said flatly. His cold-eyed stare let Sokolov know this most recent evidence of poor military planning and preparation would be “discussed” later.

Seething inside, but unable to deny the seeming logic of his defense minister’s argument, the Russian president spun back to the map display. Red arrows showed the positions held by Spetsnaz teams. Other symbols depicted their helicopters, three troop-carrying Mi-8s and two Mi-24 attack helicopters, currently parked in open fields across the Bug River.

He nodded to himself. So be it. If Aristov’s men did not have time to flush the terrorists out of their defenses, there was another alternative. “Sokolov!” he snapped.

“Yes, Mr. President?”

“What armament is carried by those Mi-24s?”

The defense minister quickly consulted a tablet computer handed to him by a senior staff officer. “Gun pods with twin-barrel 23mm autocannons, 80mm rocket pods, and 9K114 Storm antitank missile systems.”

Gryzlov smiled thinly. “Good. That should be sufficient.”

He turned to face Sokolov and the others. “Tell Captain Aristov to pull back. You will then order our attack helicopters to wipe that village off the map. I do not want a single building left standing! Tell them to make the rubble bounce!”

The Russian leader hardened his expression. “We will teach these terrorist-loving Poles a lesson they will not easily forget.”

One by one, the heavily loaded Mi-8 transport helicopters staggered off the ground and into the darkening sky.

Aboard the lead helicopter, Captain Kirill Aristov sat slumped near the open side door, weary beyond imagining. Behind him, blank-eyed Spetsnaz soldiers filled the tip-up seats lining the cabin walls. Blankets shrouded two dead comrades lying motionless on the metal floor at their feet. Farther aft, their medics were hard at work, trying to stabilize some of the more seriously wounded for the long flight back to Russian territory.

Rotors beating, the Mi-8s climbed slowly, spiraling up as they gained altitude.

One of their escorting Mi-24 gunships loomed up out of the gathering darkness, bristling with rocket, cannon, and missile pods. The attack helicopter veered away, taking up its assigned post on their flank.

At least the sight of the gunship gave Aristov a feeling of grim satisfaction. He leaned carefully out through the open door — peering back along their flight path.

Beneath clouds of billowing black smoke, rippling sheets of orange-red flame danced and crackled among the shattered ruins of what had once been a Polish village called Berdyszcze. The fires were bright enough to outshine even the setting sun.

No, the Spetsnaz officer decided. The Poles will not soon forget us. He sat silently in the helicopter’s door, watching the fires burn until they vanished beneath the curve of the earth.