Red Phoenix

CHAPTER 34 Crossings

McLaren focused his binoculars on the far side and listened to the tempo of the shelling. It was shifting, moving back from the rear areas toward the river, and increasing in volume as heavy mortars and other guns joined in. He nodded to himself. His instincts had been right. The North Koreans were trying to bull their way across the Han quickly — without a prolonged preparatory barrage.

He glanced at Hansen, who lay flat on the snowbank beside him. “Doug, make sure all commands are on their toes. It’s going to hit the fan any minute now.”

Hansen nodded and wriggled away toward the M577 command vehicle sheltered in a clump of trees. He dropped back into the snow a moment later.

“They’re as ready as they can be, General.” Hansen stopped talking and lowered his face as a shell whirred overhead and exploded two hundred meters behind them. When he looked up again, McLaren saw a deep frown. “Look, General. Staying around is crazy. There isn’t anything more you can do here — ’cept get killed, that is.”

McLaren knew his aide was right. He had an army to run, and he couldn’t do it with North Korean shells dropping all around his ears. But something in him resisted the idea of leaving. He’d grown tired of watching pins move back and forth across a bloodless map. It had grown too clinical, made him feel too detached from reality.

He’d come up to see the battle, to get a feel for what his troops were really going through. And McLaren was convinced that he needed that understanding. How else could he realistically appraise his units’ ability to carry out his orders? Prewar staff analyses of things like the effects of heavy artillery fire on unit morale and cohesion were one thing. It was quite another to hear the shells coming in, to see the explosions, and to witness the terrible carnage they could cause. Nothing he’d seen during his three tours in South Vietnam had quite prepared him for the terrible reality of this full-scale, flat-out war. That had been a different kind of fighting.

KARRUMPH. KARRUMMPH. KARRUMPH. Shells burst in the ice on the edge of the river, spewing clouds of gray smoke that drifted and merged with the freshening wind. The North Koreans were trying to build a smoke screen to cover their assault force.

They were unlucky in the wind. It was strong enough to thin and rip any screen almost as fast as it was laid. McLaren kept his binoculars on where he knew the far bank to be, waiting for a gap in the acrid-smelling smoke big enough to see through.

There. Squat, boat-hulled vehicles swarmed into view and trundled down the slope to slide into Han. They bellied through the ice-choked river, moving fast on twin engine-driven waterjets. McLaren identified them as BTR-60s — amphibious, wheeled APCs that could carry sixteen troops each. They vanished into gray obscurity as more smoke shells exploded along the near bank.

He hadn’t been able to get a good fix on their numbers, but if the NKs were following Soviet doctrine as rigidly as they had up till now, there was at least a battalion’s worth of armored vehicles out there swimming the river toward his position. Other North Korean battalions were undoubtedly attacking at other points along the Han — all probing for the weak spot.

McLaren smiled grimly to himself. If they got across, they’d soon realize that his defense line was weak along its entire length. In some places battalions were defending frontages that staff theoreticians would have thought too wide for brigades. And that meant that his troops couldn’t afford to lose this fight on the Han. Every enemy assault had to be driven back into the river before the NKs could start laying pontoon bridges to bring their heavy armor across.

He shook his head. If his men could just blunt this North Korean drive, they’d buy him a badly needed day to strengthen his defenses and assemble more of the reinforcements arriving hourly from the States and from South Korea’s reserve depots.

The engine noises from the river were audible now, even under the noise of the barrage. McLaren rose to his knees, studying the slit trenches and foxholes occupied by his first line of defense — Dragon teams and the infantry to guard them. The Dragon launchers were equipped with thermal sights that would let their crews see clearly through the now-ragged North Korean smoke screen. They would carry the fight to the NK assault force while his M-48 and M-60 tanks stayed hidden.

Seconds passed. C’mon, c’mon. Let ’em have it. Don’t let ’em get in too close. The Dragons couldn’t hit anything within three hundred meters. McLaren willed himself to patience. He had to assume that the infantry commanders below him knew what they were doing.

A team fired off to his left, the flame from its missile reaching through the smoke for an unseen target. McLaren followed it with his eyes and saw the gray smoke wall glow orange for a moment. A hit! Then another Dragon team fired. And another after that. Others followed suit, too fast to keep track of.

A rift appeared in the rapidly thinning screen, and through it McLaren could see the shattered remains of the North Korean assault force. Three BTR-60s were dead in the water, spinning rapidly downstream with the current. Several others were on fire, tilted over half-in and half-out of the water along the far bank. Another rolled over and capsized, the flames that cloaked it bubbling into white, hissing steam. Swirling foam marked the watery graves of still other APCs. Survivors splashed vainly in the icy water for moments before being pulled under, overcome by the cold and weighed down by their equipment. Only a handful of BTRs still came on, emerging from the smoke as they neared the riverbank.

The lead North Korean vehicle reared up out of the water and exploded as a round from an M-60 tank found its target. Others were marked down and destroyed in the shallows. It was a slaughter. The BTRs had armor that could stop machine gun fire. They weren’t intended to stand up to tank cannon — and they didn’t, at least not for long.

McLaren sat watching the last BTR-60s burn on the water’s edge while Hansen reported the results of the other attacks. They were all the same. The North Korean hasty assault had failed. Now they would have to spend precious time assembling their heavy artillery and armor before making another attempt.

McLaren had his day.

Colonel General Cho slowly lowered his binoculars. The 27th Mechanized Infantry had been one of his best battalions. He turned and looked steadily at his deputy, who now commanded Cho’s old II Corps. “I fear the smoke screen was an error in judgment.”

Lieutenant General Chyong nodded, his face carefully impassive. “I agree. The smoke didn’t interfere with the fascists’ missile systems at all. Instead, it only ensured that our own tanks and support weapons couldn’t provide sufficient covering fire.”

The two men turned and walked side by side down the hill toward their waiting command vehicles. They ignored the ambulances racing across the ground ahead of them, each filled with maimed survivors of the failed attack. Deaths and wounds were the currency of war, and neither Cho nor Chyong knew of any way to avoid them.

“You know the imperialists will use this delay to strengthen their defenses.”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Pyongyang will want our full assessment of this setback. Can I assure the General Staff and the Dear Leader that your next attack will succeed?”

Chyong didn’t hesitate. “Yes.” He saw Cho’s raised eyebrow and continued on, “Given twenty-four hours to deploy and zero in, my heavy artillery should be able to pound the enemy’s forward defenses to pieces. In addition, I shall not repeat this morning’s mistake. There will be no smoke screen blinding us the next time. My assault waves will go in covered by direct fire from our own tanks and missile teams.”

Cho nodded in satisfaction. “Excellent. I shall inform Pyongyang of your confidence.”

Chyong held out a hand. “There is one thing more, however, my friend.”

“Yes?”

“The Americans will undoubtedly send their aircraft to attack my bridging units in their staging areas. I have concentrated all my available SAMs and mobile flak batteries to protect them, but that may not be enough. It would be helpful if our Air Force could lend a more active hand in this battle.”

Cho nodded again, more slowly this time. Chyong’s carefully phrased point was well-taken. At this crucial stage of the campaign, friendly air cover was even more important than usual. And so far at least, North Korea’s MiGs had been less successful than he would have liked. They were inflicting losses on the Americans and their South Korean puppets, but their own casualties had been horrendous.

Fortunately it appeared that steps were at last being taken to remedy their deficiencies. Or so Pyongyang had promised in its latest string of dispatches to his field HQ. He glanced sidelong at Chyong as they reached the parked command vehicles. “I will see what I can do, comrade. “More than that I cannot promise.”

Chyong smiled gravely. “More than that I cannot ask.”

He glanced back at the last vestiges of smoke drifting downwind and then saluted. “Very well, then. Give me twenty-four hours to prepare and I shall give you a firm bridgehead across the Han.”

Cho noted how the setting sun burnished the stars on his subordinate’s shoulders. For his own sake, he hoped that Chyong’s confidence was warranted. Every passing day gave the imperialists more time to recognize the trap he was preparing to spring. Cho also knew that every day that passed without significant territorial gains would be viewed as a day of failure by Kim Jong-Il. It was unfortunate that the Dear Leader’s definition of military success was so limited. Unfortunate, but too late to change.

Cho returned Chyong’s salute and then climbed back into his command vehicle for the ride back to headquarters. He had more work to do before the evening staff meeting.

Colonel Sergei Ivanovitch Borodin strode confidently onto the stage, noting the mood of the assembled squadron. He was pleased by what he could see in their eyes — eagerness, anticipation, determination. These North Koreans were by no means the best pilots he had ever commanded, but they were unsurpassed in their ability to absorb losses and remain undaunted. And now he had something to give them that was worthy of their courage.

He reached the center of the stage and stood without speaking for a second, aware that all eyes were on him. Finally he lifted a single hand and signaled the five armament technicians waiting just offstage. They came forward, pushing a dolly occupied by a single long, narrow wooden crate.

Borodin waited while murmurs swept through the crowded auditorium. Then he spoke. “Comrades! I present to you the weapon that will help us win this battle for command of the air. Will you do the honors, Comrade Captain Kutusov?”

The senior armament technician nodded and bent to release the base of the crate so that the other four men could lift the casing up and bring the object inside into view.

The air-to-air missile they lifted was two meters long and weighted about sixty kilograms. Its four large rear delta fins gave it maximum maneuverability — maneuverability reinforced by triangular canard controls indexed in line and by the four small rectangular fins spaced around its IR seeker head.

Borodin let his enthusiasm for the weapon show in his voice. “Comrades, this is the AA-11, arguably among the world’s most advanced infrared homing missiles! It has a maximum front aspect range of approximately eight kilometers, and a rear aspect range of nearly five kilometers. It does not limit you to a rear attack. With it mounted on your aircraft, you will have a weapon that matches the performance of the American Sidewinder!”

Borodin paused, seeing sharklike grins appear on the face of every combat pilot in the room. So far in the war, they’d been forced to sit helpless while closing with the enemy as all-aspect American IR missiles knocked their comrades out of the sky. Now all that would change. They, too, would carry a weapon with a seeker head sensitive enough to home in on the heat emitted from the front of an enemy plane. And they would no longer be sitting ducks from the front.

Borodin matched their smiles with one of his own. “The first shipment of these missiles has arrived from the Soviet Union, comrades. We will carry them on our next mission against the imperialists!”

He stepped off the stage as his North Korean counterpart moved up to brief the squadrons on the new set of tactics they’d devised to take advantage of their new missiles’ capabilities. While the North Korean spoke, Borodin fished a small notepad out of his flight suit and finished writing up a rough account of his last action. The South Korean F-5E he’d downed this morning made his score four so far — two F’5s, an American F-16, and an F-4 Phantom. One more and he would be an ace, one of only a handful since the Great Patriotic War. The thought brought another smile to the Russian pilot’s lips.

Commander Kerwin “Corky” Bouchard, USN, scanned the sky around his F-14A Tomcat, counting aircraft as they launched from either Nimitz or Constellation and orbited about five miles from the two carriers. He shook his head in wonder at the number of planes filling the airspace around him. Twelve F-14 Tomcats and ten F-18A Hornets as escorts. Twelve F-18s carrying HARM antiradar missiles for use against NK SAM and antiaircraft fire control systems. Eight more Hornets flying as flak suppressors armed with rocket pods and cluster bombs. Then the strike force itself, twenty-two A-7E Corsairs and 18 A-6E Intruders. All accompanied by four EA-6B Prowler electronic warfare aircraft. Four fat-bellied KA-6D tankers circled as the formation assembled, passing fuel to planes that had been launched first. Finally an E-2C Hawkeye was aloft to control the strike.

Ninety aircraft all massing for a single, maximum-effort Alpha strike against the North Korean bridging units moving toward the Han River. There would only be time for this one, mammoth attack. U.S. weather satellites in geosynchronous orbit showed a storm front moving down out of the Siberian wastes — bringing with it high winds, hail, and snow that would put an end to normal flight operations until the skies cleared.

“Red Dog Lead and Duster Lead, this is Roundup. Proceed.” The strike commander’s voice came through Bouchard’s earphones.

He keyed his radio mike twice to acknowledge and waggled the Tomcat’s wings to signal the rest of the strike escort. Then he banked right, heading for the Korean coastline one hundred and fifty miles ahead at four hundred and fifty knots. The F-18s slid lower and out in front, while his F-14s stayed high and behind. Two Prowlers followed, ready to jam enemy radars and radar-guided missiles if MiGs appeared to contest the air.

“Corky, I’m still getting that goddamned Mainstay on my scope. Even with the jamming, it’s got us for sure.” Lieutenant Mike Esteban, his RIO, radar intercept officer, sounded pissed.

His frustration was understandable. The Soviet AWACS plane had been loitering arrogantly just outside the task force’s declared exclusion zone for hours, escorted by a pair of Su-27 Flanker fighters out of Vladivostok. Everyone aboard the two American carriers knew that the data the converted Il-76 transport was collecting was being passed straight back to the North Koreans, but there wasn’t anything they could do about it — outside of assigning a pair of Tomcats to keep a close watch on the single Prowler now busy trying to jam the Mainstay’s powerful radar. That was bad enough. But then to top it all off, the Soviets also had a Tu-16 Badger F aircraft aloft. The Badger F was an electronic intelligence aircraft capable of keeping tabs on every signal the task force emitted.

Bouchard clicked his intercom switch. “Yeah. Well, life’s rough, I guess. Keep an eye peeled. The next-door neighbors are gonna come knocking at our door anytime now.”

The four-engined Ilyushin-76TD made another gentle turn, cruising in a racetrack holding pattern at forty thousand feet. As the AWACS plane banked, the large radar dish mounted horizontally atop its fuselage reflected the sunlight, and one of the Su-27 fighter pilots escorting it turned his eyes away, half-blinded.

It was dark inside the Mainstay’s main Air Command and Control compartment.

“The American jamming is degrading our systems greatly, Comrade Colonel, but we have firm contact with an estimated ninety-plus aircraft. All heading for the coast. This is clearly what we’ve been waiting for.”

Colonel Lushev frowned at Kornilov’s impertinence, but he bit down the harsh reply that first leaped into his mind. The lieutenant was undeniably the best radar operator aboard, and his skills demanded a certain amount of tolerance for his unorthodox behavior. The colonel leaned closer to the repeater scope in front of him, trying to make something out himself of the glowing green splotches and sweeping strobes it showed. He couldn’t and shook his head. Kornilov’s abilities were remarkable.

Lushev swiveled his chair to face the plane’s radioman. “Transmit this information to Pyongyang immediately.” He hoped that the little yellow bastards could make good use of it. The Americans needed to be taught a lesson.

He swung back to face the repeater scope, fighting down an all-too-familiar craving for nicotine. The Mainstay’s electronics were too delicate to cope with an atmosphere laced with cigarette smoke. He would have to wait until they were back on the ground in Vladivostok.

Bouchard could feel the tension increasing. They were sixty miles out and closing rapidly on the South Korean coast. The strike target was only fifteen miles inland, so if the North Koreans were going to pull anything it would have to be soon. He glanced to either side. The eleven other Tomcats were perfectly positioned. Sunlight glinted off canopies ahead and below. The F-18s were still keeping pace.

“Red Dog, this is Roundup.” Bouchard tensed at the sudden transmission from the Navy strike controller. “Multiple bogies bearing three one zero, seventy miles, level forty. Out.” The E-2C’s radar had just detected enemy fighters slipping into the open from out of Korea’s rugged mountains.

Bouchard made an instant decision and keyed his mike. It was pretty clear that the North Koreans knew exactly where they were. There wasn’t any further point in trying to stay hidden. “Red Dog flights, this is Red Dog Lead. Light ’em off and let ’em have it.”

His F-14s would turn on their powerful radars and engage the enemy at maximum distance with their AIM-54C Phoenix missiles. The F-18s would stay silent, and Bouchard hoped they might be able to slip in closer without being noticed by the oncoming North Koreans.

Behind him, Esteban flicked the switches needed to activate the Tomcat’s AWG-9 radar and bent over his scope, studying the information it showed. “Corky, I read two groups of bogies. Twenty-two in the first, and twenty following ten miles behind.”

“Rog. Get me a lock on two of the lead group.” Bouchard arched his thumb toward the firing switch on his stick. Each Tomcat in the escort group carried two Phoenix missiles for just such an occasion.

“Coming up.”

The Badger’s twin turbojets had been droning for hours, lulling many among the huge plane’s flight crew into a kind of stupor made up as much of boredom as it was of fatigue. There was little enough to look at. Just scattered clouds in a brilliant blue sky. And two American F-14s keeping station on them as they orbited. The Badger’s crew had seen their share of the twin-tailed American fighters before. The Tomcats were always nearby whenever a mission took the converted bomber near a U.S. Navy carrier task force.

None of the signals intelligence crewmen seated at the consoles jamming the Badger’s fuselage was the least bit bored. This was the opportunity of a professional lifetime. They were kept busy intercepting and recording every burst of electronic noise the Americans sent out. Radar emissions. Radio transmissions. Everything. Watching two American aircraft carriers launch a real combat mission was proving most instructive.

Suddenly the senior technician’s fingers stopped drumming the face of his console and he sat bolt upright. “Comrade Major! I’m picking up midcourse guidance signals for American missiles. Phoenix missiles aimed at our fighters!”

The major was an intelligent man and he didn’t waste time going through the chain of command. Instead he leaped for the radio himself.

Borodin heard the distinctive tone of the American radar in his earphones as it swept over his MiG-29 and smiled. His plan was working. He’d deployed two squadrons of MiG-21s out in front of his twenty MiG-29s, hoping that the Americans would waste their long-range missiles on the older and less capable planes. It was hard on the MiG-21 pilots, but what the hell. None of them were Russians.

“Fulcrum Lead, this is Badger Four! Missiles inbound from American fighters!”

Borodin keyed his mike to acknowledge and switched frequencies. “Fishbed Lead, this is Fulcrum Lead. Red Sector!” He gave the code phrase that would alert the MiG-21s to their danger. At the same time, he hit the MiG-29’s throttle, accelerating to close with the lead group. The other Fulcrums followed him as his airspeed crept closer to six hundred knots.

They would mingle with the survivors of the first group as it came within standard radar missile range of the American escort force.

The North Korean colonel leading the MiG-21 squadrons squinted into the nearly cloudless blue sky, searching desperately for signs of the incoming Phoenixes. With a top speed of nearly 2,400 miles an hour, the American missiles could be expected to reach him in less than ninety seconds from launch.

There. He saw contrails streaking down out of the sky ahead, just as his radar warning receiver burst into a high-pitched beep-beep-beep. At least one of the American active homing missiles had locked onto his plane.

“All aircraft! Take evasive action, now!” The colonel yanked his MiG-21 into a hard, seven-g climb to the left, putting Soviet theory into practice. The theory said a rapid pitch-up maneuver could defeat the Phoenix. The twenty-one other planes under his command followed suit, pulling tightly to the left or right and climbing as they worked to evade the enemy missiles.

Most were successful. The AIM-54C Phoenix was designed primarily to kill lumbering bombers, not agile fighters. Its incredibly powerful motor gave it tremendous speed and range, but the motor burned out within seconds after launch. As a result, the missile often lacked the “oompf” needed to follow a highly maneuverable fighter at long range as it climbed.

Theory only went so far, however, and six pilots weren’t fast enough or lucky enough. They died as missiles slammed home.

“Red Dog Lead, this is Roundup. Splash six bogies.”

Bouchard shook his head angrily. He’d hoped for more kills from the Phoenixes. There were still thirty-six enemy fighters out there and now they were much closer. He’d have to bring the F-18s into play sooner than he’d wanted to.

Esteban called from the backseat. “Corky, the rear group is merging with the lead batch. Range now forty-five miles. One thousand knots closure.” The rival groups of fighters were racing toward each other at incredible speed, covering nearly seventeen nautical miles with every passing minute.

He keyed the mike again, this time calling the Hornet commander ahead of him. “Black Dog Lead, this is Red Dog Lead. Engage the enemy at maximum range.”

He heard twin clicks as the F-18s signaled that they’d heard and understood him. Behind him, Esteban muttered to himself as he selected new targets for the Tomcat’s four AIM-7M Sparrow missiles. This wasn’t going to be as easy as firing Phoenixes. The Sparrow was a semiactive radar homer. In other words, the missile guided on the radar beam sent out by the plane that launched it. And that meant a plane firing Sparrows had to keep its target “painted” with a radar beam until the missiles hit. All of which required flying straight and comparatively level right into the teeth of the enemy. Esteban had always defined that as a real hard way to earn your flight pay.

Borodin pulled his Fulcrum alongside the MiG-21 belonging to the North Korean colonel just long enough to give him a thumbs-up signal. Then he dropped back and to the left as the formation spread out, seeking room for the wild evasive maneuvers they would soon have to make. The last transmission from the Mainstay had shown that they were coming into the launch envelope of the Americans’ Sparrow missiles.

He glanced down quickly at his own radar screen. Nothing. Just a myriad assembly of randomly moving splotches and dots. The American jammer aircraft were really very good. Still, they should soon reach the point at which his Fulcrums’ radars would be strong enough to “burn through” the jamming and lock on to the enemy fighters up ahead. And when that happened, he would have a little present for them — the two AA-7 Apex radar-guided missiles slung under each MiG-29.

Beep-beep-beep. Shit. The Americans had a lock-on. Borodin looked up from the inside of the cockpit and started scanning the sky in the arcs his radar warning receivers showed the attack would come from.

“Red Dog Lead, this is Black Dog Lead. We show MiG-29s intermingled with the MiG-21s.” The F-18 squadron CO’s calm voice crackled in Bouchard’s ears. MiG-29s! All right, Corky my boy, he thought, you’re gonna be hassling with the primo of the primo today.

Estenban called from the backseat, “Got ’em. We’ve got lock-ons! Range now thirty miles!”

Yeah. Bouchard thumbed the firing switch twice and felt the F-14 shudder slightly as two Sparrows dropped out from under the wings and ignited. His eyes followed the bright, white smoke and flame trails as they tore toward the still unseen oncoming MiGs. Other missile trails reached out from his Tomcats and from the Hornets. Happy New Year, Uncle Kim.

Borodin saw it, slicing down out of the sky right toward him. A tiny speck growing larger and larger through his MiG-29’s canopy. He tensed his stomach muscles and held his course, watching the missile come for him. There were other trails in the sky, but he didn’t care about those. Under this kind of attack, it was every pilot for himself.

Now! Borodin yanked hard left on his stick and pulled sharply back, throwing his Fulcrum into a tight, climbing high-g turn. He grunted as the g’s hit but kept his head cocked to keep an eye on the American missile through the turn. At the same time he kept his thumb busy on the stick’s decoy dispenser button, popping out bundle after bundle of chaff — clouds of thin strips of metalized Mylar film that would look like an airplane to the enemy radar.

Yes! Borodin saw the missile trail bend away, following one of his chaff clouds. He craned his neck around and saw the Sparrow explode well behind and below his plane. Then he snapped his head back around, searching rapidly for any more missiles targeted on his Fulcrum. There weren’t any.

Voices came over the radio. Desperate voices. “Ten, turn right. Right! You’ve got one after you!”

“I can’t shake it!”

“Turn harder, you fool!”

Borodin looked to his right and saw a MiG-29 diving away, afterburner blazing. A billowing white smoke trail suddenly crossed his vision and merged with the fleeing MiG. The Sparrow exploded in a ball of orange-red flame and the frantic voice in his radio stopped.

He came wings level and looked all around. The sky was crisscrossed with smoke trails and dodging aircraft. He looked down and saw another burning MiG tumbling out of control toward the water. Damnit.

Borodin counted noses quickly as his squadrons reformed, still heading for the American fighters. They’d lost three MiG-29s and another two MiG-21s. Eleven planes lost without knocking a single American bastard out of the sky.

He felt a cold rage gripping him and fought it down. Don’t go berserk, Sergei, he told himself, your turn is coming. As if in proof, a box suddenly appeared on his HUD, up and to the right. His radar had at last locked on to an American aircraft! The range was now eighteen miles — inside his AA-7 envelope. Borodin tapped the trigger twice and smiled as his own missiles flared off toward the enemy. Now they would hit back and hit hard. Other Fulcrums were launching as well.

“Oh, shit!” Bouchard spun the Tomcat up and away as an Apex streaked past and started turning after him. “Do something, Mike!”

“Doing it!” Esteban was already busy punching out a stream of chaff to confuse the incoming Russian-made missile.

Bouchard tightened his turn and saw his airspeed bleeding away. Crap, they might dodge this missile, but they’d be dangerously slow if another one came after them. He went to afterburner.

Other Tomcats and Hornets were busy dodging, too, spiraling away from the radar missiles launched by the MiG-29s. Esteban had his head craned practically all the way round, watching the Apex turning after them. “It’s still coming, Corky!”

Fuck this. Bouchard rolled back out of his right turn to the left and pulled up even more sharply. The missile lost track of the F-14 and veered off into nowhere.

Two Tomcats and an F-18 weren’t so fortunate and fell into the ocean wreathed in flames. The score was evening out. Now there were nineteen American fighters left to tangle with the thirty-one NK planes closing on them. The Hornets reduced speed to let the F-14s catch up. They would go in together.

Eight miles. Borodin throttled back slightly. They would be in IR missile range shortly, and he didn’t want to have too big a heat signature when the missiles started flying. He glanced back behind him and made sure that Moskvin, his wingman, was still in position. Satisfied, he brought his eyes back to the MiG-29’s HUD, searching the box his radar had placed around the closest American plane. Six miles.

Ah. Borodin’s mouth tightened as the enemy fighter came into view, rushing toward him at over five hundred knots. Twin tails, swept-back swing wings. An F-14! It would be his fifth confirmed kill. He slid his thumb over to the switch that would fire an AA-11 Archer right into the Tomcat’s face.

Three miles. The missile warbled in his earphones. Its seeker head had found the enemy and was tracking. He fired and saw a similar streak of flame pop out from under the F-14’s starboard wing.

“God!” Bouchard couldn’t believe it. The MiG-29 had fired an IR missile at him from the front and it was guiding on him. Where’d these bastards get those things? He pulled hard left, grunting as his weight quintupled in seconds, trying to follow the MiG and line up for a shot while Esteban popped flares to decoy away the enemy missile. It swung away and exploded one hundred yards behind the turning Tomcat. Bouchard felt the shock wave ripple through the F-14 and ignored it as he fought to bring the plane around on the MiG’s tail.

C’mon round, baby. C’mon round. Almost. Bouchard’s thumb reached for the firing button.

“Left!” Esteban’s frantic shout brought his head around as orange-white tracers sprayed across the Tomcat’s flight path. He jerked the stick hard left, turning toward the new threat. There. A gray-white camouflaged MiG flashed past and rolled away. He’d lost the first MiG somewhere in the sun. Jesus, this was turning into a mess.

Jets were all over the sky, turning, diving, climbing, weaving, and falling in flames. The air battle between the MiGs and the American fighters had turned into a constantly changing series of deadly, short-range duels. Move and countermove. Shot and return shot. At such close range the North Korean and Soviet edge in numbers more than made up for their slightly inferior aircraft and weapons.

An F-14 blundered into the path of an AA-11 and blew up, throwing pieces of itself in an arc hundreds of yards across. Seconds later an F-18 avenged its counterpart with a quick cannon burst into the belly of a rolling MiG-21. A second MiG soon fell prey to a Tomcat-launched Sidewinder, and another nine lima tore the wings off a scissoring Fulcrum.

The edge shifted back quickly, though, as a Soviet-piloted MiG-29 turned inside an F-18 and got off a high deflection shot that shredded the Hornet’s cockpit and sent it spiraling down into the sea.

As the air battle continued, more planes on both sides tumbled away on fire or simply blew up. Losses, fuel consumption, and missile and cannon ammo expenditure were all appalling. But the American F-14s and F-18s were doing their job. They were keeping the MiGs fully engaged, protecting the heavily laden strike aircraft now approaching the Korean coast.

Commander John “Smokey” Piper, USN, glanced down out the cockpit of his A-6E Intruder as it crossed the coast, six thousand feet above the spray-marked merger of slate-gray seas and white, snow-covered land. He clicked his mike and said, “Duster is feet dry.” His message confirmed to the carriers at sea and the E-2C aloft that the strike planes were over land and just fifteen miles away from their targets.

Piper looked ahead into a maelstrom of white, gray, and black smoke puffs dotting the sky as North Korean antiaircraft guns sought out the incoming strike. He saw hundreds of tiny flashes on the ground and watched an F-18 pull up and away from its bursting cluster bombs. Another far off to the right fired a HARM missile toward some unseen, but still-operating radar site. The missile ignited on the rail, then seemed to disappear as it flew forward and climbed. It would dive on its victim from high altitude. The Iron Hand flak suppressors had their hands full on this one.

Voices over the radio told their own story.

“Strawman, this is Comanche. You’ve got a SAM launch in your six, break left now! I’ll hit the site.”

“Breaking! Can you see any others?”

“Nega… SAM! SAM! Five o’clock low. Keep breaking left!”

Piper heard the second pilot’s voice quavering under the heavy g’s he was pulling. “Can’t shake it! Can’t — ”

There it was. A flash low on the horizon, followed by a searing orange ball of flame as the American plane slammed into the ground at over five hundred knots.

“Pirate, this is Comanche. Strawman’s down. No chute.”

“Affirmative, Comanche. Watch the Triple-A on that hill to the left. I’m rolling in on it now.”

A new INS prompt came up on Piper’s HUD, and he turned his attention away from the radio. They were within seconds of starting their attack run. He glanced across the Intruder’s crowded cockpit and his eyes met those of his bombardier, Lieutenant Commander Mitch “Priest” Parrish. Parrish lifted his oxygen mask for a moment and grinned at him. Then the bombardier bent forward again to stare at the A-6’s radar screen, while one hand stayed busy configuring the attack computer for their run.

Piper checked to make sure his wingman was still in position just aft and to the right. “Orca” Jones would stay there through the whole attack to watch for SAMs or unexpected flak positions.

He pulled the Intruder into a gentle left turn, aware that behind him nineteen other pairs of A-6s and A-7s were arcing around to come in on the target area from all points of the compass. The “wagon wheel” attack had worked well for the Navy over Vietnam. Now they’d see how well it did over Korea.

Piper started searching the rolling hills and open rice paddies ahead for signs of the truck-mounted pontoon bridges and GSP amphibious ferries they’d come to destroy.

Lieutenant General Chyong crouched lower in his slit trench as an American attack plane roared low overhead, streaming flares behind it. Another followed seconds later. He cursed when he saw that they were aimed straight for a small stand of trees occupied by some of his precious bridging units.

The lead American plane climbed sharply and then banked away, flinging a pair of bombs off its racks. Both flew straight into the woods and exploded. The second aircraft began its turn away and then shuddered as shells from a nearby ZSU-23-4 battery found the mark at last, though too late to save their engineer comrades in the woods.

The wounded American jet flew on for several seconds with heavy, black smoke pouring out of its belly, then rolled over onto its back and nose-dived into a hill. Its companion accelerated away, chased futilely by several shoulder-launched SAMs.

Chyong rose from his crouch, staring at the bomb-splintered woods. Four more of his invaluable PMP bridge sections had been destroyed. How many more had fallen prey to the gray-painted American jets crisscrossing his operations area?

He started to climb out of the trench to find out, but an aide knocked him down as another American plane suddenly appeared out of a small valley to the left and turned toward them. Chyong and the young captain clung to the bottom of the trench while the jet’s cannon roared, smashing a camouflaged radio van parked less than fifty meters away.

Then, as quickly as it had come, the plane disappeared. And as Chyong’s hearing came back to normal, he was conscious first of the fading sound of jet engines from the west and then of the crackling flames consuming his bridges. The American air raid was over.

Piper keyed his mike. “Duster is feet wet.”

Then he scanned the air around his Intruder, counting noses as the strike planes, Iron Hands, and flak suppressors reformed for the flight back to the carriers. Five were gone, counting Orca Jones, and another seven trailed smoke, showing that they’d been hit by North Korean guns or SAMs.

Piper was shocked by their losses. Seven of Corky Bouchard’s defending fighters had also been splashed, and several others had been recovered on board either Nimitz or Constellation in a near-crippled condition. His A-6s and A-7s had hit their assigned targets, hit them real hard in fact. But the results were Pyrrhic to say the least. With twelve aircraft downed and an unknown number of others permanently wrecked, the two carrier air wings operating off Korea were going to be mighty fragile instruments of war until they got replacements.

He glanced across the cockpit and saw that Parrish had at last pulled his face away from the radar screen. The bombardier’s eyes were closed, and he had his left hand tightly wrapped around the small, gold crucifix he always wore round his neck. Piper quickly returned his eyes to his instruments. He could pray later. Right now, he had to get this bird back on the deck.

Chyong moved out of earshot of the field hospital where medics were working on the badly wounded.

“Well? What do you have to report, Colonel?”

The engineer’s face was grim. Many of those screaming under the doctors’ knives were his own men. “The Americans have wrecked more than half of my pontoons and nearly half of my amphibious ferries. With what I’ve got left, I can’t support both crossing operations you have planned.”

“What about the spares back with our second echelon?”

The engineer shook his shaved head. “I’m sorry, Comrade General. If you could postpone the attack for another day, we could have them in place, but not otherwise.”

Chyong considered that, but only for a moment. Cho’s words had made it clear that further delays wouldn’t be tolerated by Pyongyang. So he would have to gamble. He’d wanted to launch both a primary and an alternate attack across the Han in order to divide the enemy’s attention and defenses. It had been a good plan, but happenstance, as always in war, dictated a change in plans. So be it.

He stared at the engineer. “Do you have enough equipment to support a single-crossing operation?”

The man nodded cautiously.

“Very well, then. We’ll attack tonight. As scheduled. Make sure your bridges and your men are ready. I’ll want heavy tanks crossing the river by first light.”

“And the storm, Comrade General?”

Chyong studied the sky. Heavy, dark clouds were rolling in from the north and the wind was rising again. Small flecks of snow were starting to fall, with more said to be on the way. He turned back to face the engineer. “The weather will be the same on both sides of the Han, Colonel. We attack as planned.”

Major General Frank Connor turned angrily on his ops officer, “Goddamnit, Art! It doesn’t make sense!”

The shorter man spread his hands. “I agree, sir. But General McLaren confirmed our orders personally.”

“Shit!” Something was way off base here, Connor thought. He’d seen the daily situation maps. The allied forces needed every man they could spare up along the Han River defense line and pronto. And what were he and more than two-thirds of his troops doing? Sitting on their backsides in the same, camouflaged camps they’d been sent to just after arriving by air from the States. And that, according to his ops officer, was just what McLaren wanted.

Conner paced past the headquarters tent entrance and stopped, watching the last, red rays of sunlight streaming over the mountains surrounding Ch’ungju. He frowned. What was Mad Jack McLaren waiting for?

“Sir?”

Kevin Little came instantly awake and reached for the M16 at his side. “What is it?”

Montoya stuck his head through the tent flap. “It’s Major Donaldson, L-T. On the radio.”

Kevin wormed out of his sleeping bag, teeth already starting to chatter as the cold hit him again. His eyes and mouth felt gritty, as though they were filled with sand. Six hours of uninterrupted sleep had helped, but it couldn’t make up for everything that he had lost since the war started.

He rose to a crouch, threw on his parka, and followed Montoya out of the pup tent.

Echo Company lay at rest in a small hollow between two hills several kilometers south of the river line. The hills weren’t much to speak of, but they were high enough to block the wind, and Kevin was thankful for small favors. His men had been on the edge when they’d been pulled out of the line. Another few hours of straight duty and they would have been too slaphappy to do much more than wave hello to the North Koreans.

It was snowing again. Kevin felt the soft, wet flakes striking his face, but he couldn’t see them. The moon was down and it was pitch-dark under clouds that covered the whole sky.

The only light came from the north, a flickering, eerie half-light reflected in the clouds that Kevin would once have thought was lightning. Now he knew it was only North Korean heavy artillery pounding the poor bastards deployed right up along the Han.

But the battle noises seemed louder than they had when he’d gone to sleep. And now the faraway rattle of small arms fire mingled with the crashing sounds made by impacting artillery.

“Here, L-T.” Montoya led him over to a truck with its engine idling. The RTO had obviously decided to set his radio watch up in something that had a heater. Smart thinking.

Kevin clambered into the cab and picked up the handset. “India One Two, this is Echo Five Six. Over.”

“Echo Five Six, wait one.” An unfamiliar voice.

Then Donaldson came on the circuit. “Kev? Sorry to wake you, but we’ve got a situation here. A Bravo Oscar situation, understand?”

For a second, Kevin didn’t. His brain seemed to be working at about half-speed, or maybe less. Then it clicked. Bravo Oscar. The military phonetics for the letters b and o. Bug-out. Retreat.

He pressed the transmit button. “Two, this is Six. Message understood. Over.” He wanted to ask why, but this didn’t seem like a good time to play “20 Questions.”

Donaldson answered him anyway. “The NKs are across the river, Kev. J-2 said they couldn’t do it without bringing up replacement bridges, but they did it anyway. Only came across at one point, but they’ve thrown everything into it and our guys can’t stop them. Both the Second of the Thirty-Sixth and an ROK battalion have wrecked themselves trying. Anyway, the NKs will have their armor across by morning.”

Damn. “Understood.”

“Okay, then, Kev. Get your people saddled up. Brigade wants us on the road in two zero minutes. We’re going back to Point Little Rock to set up a new line. Out.”

Kevin signed off and then fumbled inside his tunic for the list of new geographic code names they’d been issued just that morning. He ran his finger down the columns until he found Point Little Rock. Jesus Christ. They were going all the way back to Suwon, an ancient, walled city south of Seoul.

He sat in the truck cab for a moment, feeling cold despite warm air blowing through the dashboard vents. He was caught up in a total disaster. They were losing Seoul. Hell, they were losing the war.

General Carpenter’s soft Georgia drawl rolled easily across the ear. His words weren’t so comforting. “There’s no way round it. Out projections show our pilot losses reaching the critical point. These strikes against hardened targets in North Korea are bleeding us dry.”

The Air Force Chief of Staff clicked to the next slide. “To keep our squadrons in the ROK up to strength, we’re going to have to start cutting into the pool of combat-qualified pilots we’ve earmarked for Europe should a crisis erupt there.” Carpenter paused and looked over at his Navy counterpart. “I understand the Navy’s in a similar fix.”

Admiral Fox nodded somberly. “A few more raids like this last one and we’ll have to start stripping pilots out of our Atlantic Fleet squadrons.” Fox, the Chief of Naval Operations, was a medium-sized man who still wore his white hair in a crew cut. He also wore aviator wings on his uniform.

Carpenter studied the assembled NSC crisis team carefully, measuring out each of his next words. “Put simply, ladies and gentlemen, we no longer have the human resources to be everywhere at once.”

Murmurs swept through the Situation Room. The implications of Carpenter’s report were both clear and troubling. The longer the war in Korea went on, the more pilots would be lost. The more pilots lost, the weaker the U.S. Air Force and the Navy’s carrier air wings would be if the conflict escalated. And the longer the war went on, the more likely it would escalate.

The assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs stopped tamping down his pipe and looked up, impatience clearly written across his face. “Why can’t you meet your needs by calling up some of your reserves, General? I’d always heard that most of the airline pilots in this country learned how to fly in the Air Force. Surely you’ve kept track of those men?”

Carpenter kept his tone level. “Yes, we have. A lot of ’em are in the Air National Guard squadrons that we’ve already called up. But those who weren’t will have to get some pretty intensive refresher training. And that takes time — time we’re not likely to get.”

Blake Fowler leaned forward in his chair. The President had asked him to chair the crisis team in Putnam’s place. Putnam, meanwhile, was up on the Hill soothing Congress, and the President had made it clear that he was expected to stay up there until further notice. The Chief Executive apparently didn’t want his so-called national security adviser in a position to cause more damage to the nation’s interests. At the same time, he wanted to avoid a messy personnel crisis while trying to cope with a major war. So, officially, Putnam still had his job, even though Blake had to all intents and purposes replaced him.

Blake found it an uncomfortable position to be in. It smacked too much of the kind of petty political infighting and intrigue that he’d always despised. And he wondered, now that backroom maneuvering had worked to his advantage, whether or not his outlook would change. He hoped not. He’d rather reside in academic obscurity somewhere than turn into something resembling George Putnam.

He nodded to the Air Force general. “Have you got anything else to give us right now, General?”

Carpenter shook his head. “No. Not right now. I just want to make sure that the President knows how thin we’re getting stretched. This thing is sliding across the edge of being a purely local crisis.”

Blake nodded. Carpenter’s assessment on narrow grounds matched his own broader-based view of the situation. The Soviets were growing ever bolder in their support of North Korea. Satellite photos clearly showed trains loaded with new artillery, replacement tanks, and aircraft rolling across the border at Hongui. And Warsaw Pact merchant ships laden with military gear crowded North Korea’s ports.

China’s support for Kim Il-Sung’s invasion was somewhat more tepid. But it was there, nonetheless. Chinese munitions trains packed the yards at Sinuiju. Blake had seen the transcript of the meeting between the PRC’s premier and the American ambassador to Beijing. The language used had been convoluted, carefully obscure, but the message it conveyed had been clearer. Continued North Korean victories would bring continued Chinese support.

And now the North Koreans were across the Han River barrier and driving south. McLaren’s latest telex made it clear that he expected Seoul to be completely surrounded within hours. Where things went from there, Blake couldn’t imagine. So far, every success the allied forces had gained had been only temporary — with each small victory followed short hours later by some new setback.

Blake shook his head and turned to the crisis team’s next agenda item. The U.S. and South Korea were going to have to start winning some soon, or this war was going to flare out of control.