Red Metal

CHAPTER 53

Captain Diana DelVecchio paced the control room, hands on her hips.

“Captain,” her communications officer said, “we’re not getting any real uplink to SATCOM. Radio Division says it’s not us: our equipment tests fine. There are one or two birds that seem to be responding, but they are too far on or over the horizon to get a decent handshake.”

“Do we think we got any data out about the flotilla?” DelVecchio asked.

“Possible, Captain, but no guarantees.”

DelVecchio nodded. She pointed to the LCD screens on the navigation officer’s briefing table, where newer, better images of the flotilla were on display. “XO, Nav, what do you think of that?”

“Ma’am… looks like three fuel ships.”

“Yes, but look in between these two.”

“That’s an Iranian frigate and an Iranian corvette. Sabalan-class, and the other… tough to make out.”

She scrolled with the mouse and zoomed in on the image captured by the UMM. “Look at the bow profile. The side-strapped torpedo rockets. The forward gun.”

The Nav said, “Is that what I think it is? A Tarantul-class corvette?”

“No, it doesn’t have a slanted masthead,” countered the executive officer.

DelVecchio said, “The newest modification is the Tarantul III. It has a straight masthead.”

“But Iran doesn’t have the Tarantul III.”

DelVecchio looked up at the XO now. “And that’s my point.”

The XO blinked in surprise. “You’re right. Ma’am, that’s a Russian Tarantul-class — I’m sure of it! When I was in PACOM, we tracked a ton of Tarantuls. They’re also all over the Black Sea and we saw a bunch in the Pacific, escorting convoys.”

DelVecchio asked, “But what’s she doing here in the Gulf of Aden? Russians don’t have any Tarantuls this far south of their Southern Military District.”

DelVecchio pointed to a ship near the back of the convoy. Another gray hulk, this one with a more pointed bow, sailed along with the merchant ships, nearly blending into the gloomy, rainy weather.

“That’s her — that’s their flagship. My guess is that’s the Sabalan. One of Iran’s newest Moudge-class frigates. But why is she hiding in the back and not leading from the front? Why is there a Russian escort craft in her midst? What’s their destination?”

The navigation/operations officer said, “Ma’am, escorting oil maybe?”

“Too big a convoy for that. Also, most of those are cargo ships, not tankers,” she said.

“Maybe the Russians sold Iran some more nuclear material. The last few times they assembled fleets outside the Persian Gulf, they were trading with our pals in North Korea.”

DelVecchio shook her head. “No, usually the nuclear material is going the other way. Into Iran, not out of, and the Russians just send it across the Caspian Sea. No reason to go under everyone’s noses through the Strait of Hormuz, the Suez Canal, and all the way past Europe. No, this is something else.”

The navigator said, “Russians are fair targets after what happened in Europe, no?”

“No,” she answered, perhaps too bluntly. “That conflict remains localized. We’re not at war with Russia per se. But having said that, we don’t know their intentions, so they are definitely a threat.”

“Track them?” asked the XO.

“Yes, let’s follow them. They’re up to something — that’s for sure…”

Captain Ray “Shank” Vance stepped down the small retractable steps on the left side of his aircraft and dropped the last three feet onto the S127 highway northwest of the town of Görlitz, Germany. The Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II required more than a kilometer of runway when fully loaded, so this straight stretch of the S127 had been selected by the Air Force tech, radar, and munitions quartering party as the best location to serve as an expeditionary runway.

The hills around the area were filled with several huge, spinning turbines that provided power to the town and were initially assessed to be a big risk to low-flying aircraft, and therefore the highway was deemed unsuitable. But no sane enemy looking to hit the expeditionary airfield would risk low passes in and among the windmills to drop bombs.

The ground crew still hadn’t established any antiair missile batteries, but Shank could see those were being trucked in now.

Both Zoomer and Nooner had landed before him while he provided air overwatch. Zoomer’s wingman, Furball, had bailed out in western Poland, but he’d already been picked up by locals and had called back to his squadron.

Shank, Zoomer, and Nooner entered an Air Force general-purpose medium tent. The expeditionary team had rigged up electricity to power some heaters and radios, and the men, steaming cups of coffee in hand, tuned out the sounds of the pop star Pink blaring outside the tent. It wasn’t the only loud noise they could hear; it sounded like fifty men and women were pounding hammer-driven impact tools here at the expeditionary airfield.

The noise of the construction work was more music to the pilots’ ears than Pink; but if the sounds of pop rock blaring got the ground guys to turn wrenches, then Shank had no problem with it at all.

The men looked over the maps on the table, and their colonel pointed out the latest known locations of the Russians as they worked their way out of Wrocław and tried to push again to the east.

The discussion was short and to the point. The squadron was bringing up more fuel, and two more A-10s would be here within the hour. They were to link up with the two operational aircraft, Shank would take the lead, and together they would hit the Russian armor with everything they had.

The cease-fire was over. Russia and Poland were fighting, and the U.S. president knew he’d been played, so the U.S. was fighting, too.

This was war.

Senior Master Sergeant Hernandez walked over to the planning meeting, looking for an opportunity to break into the conversation. He waited till the men paused to refresh their coffee from the big steel pots.

Hernandez addressed the colonel. “Hey, sir, I needed to talk to Major Vance.” He turned to Shank. “Sir, we’ve got pretty much everyone turning and burning, but a few guys were looking for some way to help. We’re a little overmanned until the rest of the squadron arrives. You want us to paint a kill on your bird? And we can put some tiger’s teeth on your planes. We have enough red, white, and blue to paint a whole unit.”

The colonel squinted, clearly thinking about the fallout and weighing the risk of some general seeing an unauthorized paint job. Then he just shrugged and nodded assent to Shank.

“Thanks, Senior. That’d be great.”

“Heard you all ran into some enemy aircraft with a red eagle claw painted on the tail. I figured we could use something to let those guys know who they were up against.”

“Everything else in order?” Shank asked.

Hernandez said, “Just need you to try to bring them back the same way we gave them to you next time. No BS or hot-dogging out there. Just do your jobs so my men can do theirs. Deal?”

In the maintenance team’s minds, planes were only on loan to the pilots; the maintenance crew were the ones who actually owned them.

Sarcastically, Shank said, “We’ll keep trying to dodge those pesky missiles.”

On the other side of the map table, the colonel said, “Every minute that Russian convoy slips closer to Belarus. I want to spank their asses all the way to the border.”

“Copy that,” Shank said, and looked to the other pilots. “Back to work.”

Three hours after the shooting down of his regimental commander and the resumption of fighting in Europe, Lieutenant Colonel Tom Grant received official orders to close with and engage the Russian forces. The order made him smile a little, because at that moment the lead elements of his brigade were already doing just that, west of Wrocław proper. Leopard 2 tanks had just picked off a platoon of GAZ Tigr scout cars that had made it out of the Polish ambush in the city and back onto the main road.

Ott was forward with his men, but he relayed back to Grant that five scout cars had been blown to bits in the past ten minutes, and three more were racing for their lives away from the long-range German Rheinmetall tanks’ cannons.

The fight was back on, and Lieutenant Colonel Grant was damn sure he’d make Sabaneyev and his men pay for every single inch of Polish ground they crossed.

Grant’s radio in his Humvee crackled to life. It was his lead reconnaissance team, a couple miles ahead of him on the highway that led around the big Polish city of Wrocław. “Hey, sir, we’re seeing a lot of combat in the city.”

“Confirm in the city? Still?” asked Grant.

“Yes, sir. There’s one hell of a battle goin’ on, from the looks of it.”

“Can you tell who’s fighting?”

“Uh… I’m pretty sure it’s those Russians we’ve been chasing.”

“No shit, it’s the Russians. I mean, who are they fighting against? Militia, PLF, some random NATO unit that got caught in the middle of this?”

Grant thought for a moment. Who the hell did he have on the lead reconnaissance team? Someone particularly thick, obviously. Then he remembered it was Lieutenant Macarter, who was a brave and hardworking young man but not known for his intelligence.

Macarter said, “Oh, roger that. Wait one.” Grant heard the young man call his lead scout. “Hey, Davis, they need to know who the Russkies are fighting. Do you have anyone close enough to assess?”

“Yes, sir, I have an element that’s entered the city and is engaging and observing now.”

Lieutenant Colonel Grant turned to Captain Spillane, his acting operations officer, who had heard the exchange and was reddening with fury.

“Did you authorize anyone into the city?” Grant asked.

“No, sir. Would be stupid, given the circumstances. Likelihood of getting blown up by either side, let alone figuring out who’s who, is pretty high. Macarter must’ve done it on his own initiative.”

“Well, shit,” Grant said. “Get on the net and find out why Macarter thinks taking initiative for the first time in his life was a good idea today.” He thought for a moment. “On second thought, just tell him to get his ass out of there. I’m going up. Tell Bandits to send a company’s worth of tanks to reconnoiter with me and to send his own reconnaissance element forward. I’ll go with him to the edge of the city and see things for myself.”

“Sir, you think that’s a good idea? Macarter has gotten himself into something now. It’ll be tricky.”

“He’s not reporting enough for us to get a clearer picture. I’ll go forward and see if I can pull him back and make some kind of linkup with the Poles in contact with the Russians. Anyway, I’m not exactly sure Macarter has any clue who he’s engaging. Do you?”

“No, sir.”

“I’ll be back. We’ll skirt the suburbs a bit and see if we can make contact with the Poles.”

“Check, sir. I’ll be here on the net when you get your ass killed.”

Grant gave a half smile. “Way to dish out the enthusiasm. Organize security for the HQ element and prepare all the command-and-control functions we’ll need. Have 2nd Battalion set up a hasty perimeter and push up whatever they need for resupply. Get the German battalion to pull into our perimeter and support HQ. They need to prepare to be a ready response force. Meanwhile, tell everyone I want them topped off with fuel and cross-leveling all ammo. Major Ott is in command in my absence. I want him to ensure we have a tight perimeter, and you all have to remain hidden from any possible enemy air attack.”

“Wilco, sir. Good luck. Make sure you let 2nd Battalion commander run his own battalion. Try to remember that you, sir, are the regimental commander.”

Lieutenant Colonel Grant mounted up on his tank, thinking about that last statement. Spillane was right. He would have to be more careful about stepping on his commander’s toes. They were all in this together, and there wasn’t a lot of time for egos, but he could still learn a thing or two from his subordinates on how to lead.

Meanwhile, he was going to show them his style on where to lead: from the front.

When Grant got his headset on, he heard his gunner Sergeant Anderson’s voice. “Where to, sir?”

“Keep heading east, toward the fighting. Link up with 2nd Battalion.” He sat down in his seat and closed the hatch above him. “We’re gonna start killin’ Russians again.”

“Hooah, sir!”