Force of Eagles

by Richard Herman

  “Wait outside,” O’Brian told the men. “Stansell, this had better be good.”

  The chief closed the door behind the departing officers. “General O’Brian, we’re here to put together a team to rescue the POWs out of Iran.’

  The general sucked in his breath. “You’re part of JSOA? Why didn’t someone tell me that?”

  “We’re forming as a separate unit. We’ll be chopped to JSOA’s command later.”

  “Now I’m not so impressed.” The hard look on O’Brian’s face made his feelings clear.

  Stansell thought, he’s really going to be skeptical when he hears about the Army. “General O’Brian, I was planning on setting up a forward operation location on one of the dry lake beds you own. The Army contingent, most of our people, and the C-130s would operate out of there. We’d use Nellis primarily for support.”

  Pullman’s back stiffened when he heard what Stansell was proposing, knowing who would have to get it organized.

  O’Brian’s fingers drummed his desk. “When?”

  “Tomorrow latest.”

  The general walked over to a wall map of the Tactical Fighter Weapons Center. Nellis was a large Air Force Base, and when the bombing ranges and the Military Operating Areas were tacked on, the general controlled a piece of southern Nevada about the size of Switzerland. “I’m putting you at Delamar Lake. We renamed it Texas Lake for Red Flag. It’s a dry lake bed seventy-four miles to the north we use for C-130 operations. You should pass for a routine exercise. I’ll run cover for you but I’ll have to tell the Office of Special Investigations to be on the lookout for anyone interested in what you’re doing…When does Delta Force get here?”

  Gawdamn, Pullman thought, the gray-haired fox doesn’t miss much.

  “We’re getting Rangers and I plan to bring them tomorrow, no later than Wednesday.”

  “Stansell, when you decide where to build a mock-up of your target let me know. You’ll need camouflage netting to hide it from the satellite the Russians monitor us with. And Mort, next time you want trailers ask.” The general drilled an astonished Pullman with his hard blue eyes. “I do talk to my troops. Now get the hell out of here. Your C-130s are landing in thirty minutes.”

  As they retreated from the general’s office Stansell said, “Chief, why didn’t you tell me you knew him?”

  “It didn’t seem important…I got his ass out of a crack when he was a second lieutenant. He was responsible for a big supply kit during a deployment exercise and some expensive tools were stolen. I found them.” Pullman wanted to change the subject before Stansell asked more questions. Actually, the chief had had to beat an airman almost senseless before he learned where the tools had been hidden. “What are you going to do with the 130s?”

  “Find out how good they are and have them haul some valuable cargo.”

  *

  Lieutenant Colonel Paul “Duck”—what else?—Mallard followed the other four members of his C-130 crew into Red Flag’s auditorium. He had been there during Red Flag 85-1—the first exercise of 1985. Something’s strange, he thought. Normally a unit knew months in advance if it was going to be part of Red Flag. He looked around the large room, walls covered with plaques, flags and mementoes of past Red Flag exercises. He found the other seven aircraft commanders, each surrounded by his own crew. All of his forty crew members were there.

  Mallard sat down next to his navigator, Captain Percy Dunkin. The tall skinny navigator was already asleep, probably still hung-over, Mallard figured.

  “Room, ten-hut.” Pullman’s voice rang out from the back as Stansell walked down the aisle. Everyone but Dunkin jumped to attention. Mallard didn’t bother to disturb him.

  Stansell proceeded to tell Mallard and his men that he needed volunteers for a tough, hazardous operation. It would include risky low-level flying, paradrops and short field landings. There might be casualties. Mallard spoke for his 463rd Wing. They were all in.

  “Good. Welcome to Task Force Alpha. We start now. You’re going to launch out of here in one hour and fly a first-look low-level route to a dry lake. You’ve got to hit your Time Over Target plus or minus a minute, paradrop a dummy load on the panels that will be staked out there and do an assault landing on the lake bed. After you’ve landed you’ll be launched on your second mission. Captain Jack Locke will brief you on the route and target.”

  Mallard’s copilot, First Lieutenant Don Larson, was staring at Locke. He almost twisted his head off when he made the connection and turned to look at the departing Stansell. “Colonel Mallard, I’ll bet my sweet black ass this is a biggy. Stansell is the guy that escaped out of Ras Assanya and Locke was the 45th’s Top Gun. We’re playing big leagues.”

  “And you just may be lucky enough to get your ‘sweet black ass’ shot off,” Mallard said straight-faced, and punched on Dunkin until he woke up.

  Forty-five minutes later Mallard’s loadmaster was signaling him to crank the C-130’s number-three engine. Dunkin was hunched over the navigator’s table still working on his map. I’ve got the world’s tallest troll for a navigator, Mallard thought. Not only is he an alcoholic, he walks around like the hunchback of Notre Dame. He also reminded himself that Captain Percy “Drunkin” Dunkin was also just about the best lead navigator in the Air Force.

  Chief Pullman had a UH-1F helicopter, the venerable Huey, waiting on the ramp when Locke was finished with the C-130 crews. The captain was surprised when Pullman told him it was there to fly them to Texas Lake. “Don’t ask, Captain. How else you expect to get there before the Herky Birds and stake out the drop panels?” The chief threw a bundled-up parachute canopy and a bag of steel pins into the Huey and clambered on board. “Come on, we got work to do.”

  As the helicopter lifted off and headed for Texas Lake seventy-four miles north of Nellis, Pullman unfolded a 1:50,000 scale map and pointed to a spot on the dry lake. He had to shout to be heard over the noise. “This is where Captain Bryant wants us to stake out the panels. He said to cut the parachute up and make a big cross.” When they reached Texas Lake the pilot sat the Huey down near the spot Pullman had marked on the map. Locke tapped the pilot on the shoulder and pointed to the southern end of the lake.

  “What the hell?” Pullman yelled.

  “Stansell said to throw them a curve,” Locke shouted at him as the Huey lifted off. “He was expecting C-1303 from the First Special Ops Wing. He’s really pissed.”

  *

  Dunkin was standing behind the copilot’s seat, clutching a map in one hand and steadying himself with the other. He had a death grip on the left side of Larson’s seat. Two stop watches were dangling from his neck, bouncing up and down from the light turbulence, and his battered yellow baseball cap was on backward. He claimed it was lucky.

  “Where the hell is the lake?” Mallard shouted over the intercom.

  “Over the next ridge. Trust me,” Dunkin answered. “We’re on time.” They were the first in the string of C-130s flying five minutes in-trail. “After you pop over the ridge in front of us level off at sixty-two twenty. That will give us thirteen hundred fifty feet above the ground just like a troop drop,” Dunkin said. “The panels will be on the nose. Loadmaster, six minute warning.”

  “Rog. Six minute check complete.” Master Sergeant Glen Moore had the door over the C-130’s ramp raised and a 150-pound canister of concrete with a T-10 parachute ready. He would lower the ramp to a level position after they popped.

  Dunkin grabbed the back of the copilot’s seat with both hands as the ridge line filled their windscreen. “Pop…now.”

  Mallard ballooned the Hercules over the ridge, trading off his airspeed for altitude and slowing from 240 to 130 knots.

  When he could see the lake Dunkin shouted, “Those bastards got the panels at the wrong end of the lake. Abort the drop, circle south for another run.”

  “Rog,” Moore said, “aborting the drop.” Nothing ever seemed to upset the old sergeant.

  Dunkin reached back to his station and rotated
his intercom switch to UHF radio. He looked over the dry lake bed as Mallard turned away, then hit his transmit button. “Ruff flight, Ruff One-One aborting first drop. The panels are at the south end of the lake. New UTMs are”—he paused while he picked off the coordinates from his map—“8150-3080. Use the western edge of the lake for a timing point.” He paused before he rattled off another eight-digit set of coordinates. “Duck, reverse course and fall in behind tail-end Charlie. We drop last.”

  “Hell, Dunk, we ought’a abort the whole shoot’n match and land,” Mallard said, thinking about their time over target and hitting the target.

  “No,” the navigator told him. “All they got to do is slip south on the last leg and recompute a new elapsed time from the-timing point to green light for the drop. They’ll only lose a few seconds so they’ll be okay on their TOTs. Everything else is the same. We’ll drop last.” He reached into his navigation bag and pulled out the gadget he had made for emergencies like this one…

  Locke was standing beside the helicopter monitoring the C-130 frequency on the Huey’s radio. He watched the first Hercules turn away and head back to the west. “Looks like an abort for number one,” he told the chief.

  Another C-130 popped over the low ridge in front of them like some pterodactyl rising from its desert nest with the sun at its back. It leveled off at its drop altitude and flew straight for the panels. A small bundle dropped off the ramp under its tail and arched behind the C-130, the parachute streaming out and snapping open when it reached the end of its static line. The canister swung back and forth until it bounced on the hard crust of the lake bed. “Looks short about seventy yards,” Pullman said. “That’s good for a free drop.”

  One after another the C-130s popped over the ridge to drop their loads. Locke listened on the radio as each crew fed information back to the trailing birds about the winds. Most of the drops were inside a hundred yards. Finally the lead ship reappeared, popping over the ridge slightly north of the others. “He’s off course and too low,” Locke said, expecting the big cargo plane to slip south. Instead it headed straight for the helicopter. The load dropped off the back and the parachute blossomed out.

  The helicopter pilot shouted, “It’s gonna hit us,” and the three men scattered away. The concrete-filled canister swung once before it bounced twenty feet short of the helicopter, and the parachute canopy collapsed over the rotor blades.

  “They blew the hell out of that drop,” Locke said.

  Pullman shook his head. “Someone up there was sending us a message, Captain. They may not be what the colonel was expecting, but these guys are good.”

  The first C-130 to drop was circling to land on the dry bed and came down a short final, nose high in the air. The pilot slammed the big bird down onto the hardpan of the dry lake and reversed props, sending a dust storm in advance—a giant announcing its arrival with a roar and gust of breath.

  “You want me to marshal them into parking?” the helicopter pilot asked.

  “Nope,” Locke said, “let’s see how they handle it.”

  The C-130 completed its landing roll-out and turned toward the helicopter. The pilot played a tune on the engines, varying the prop pitch by jockeying the throttles. The bird stopped, the crew-entrance door flopped down, and a green-suited crew member with shoulder-length hair climbed down the three steps built into the door. The door snapped closed, and the woman directed the pilot into a parking position next to the helicopter, signaling the pilot to set the brakes and cut the engines.

  The pilot climbed down the steps and walked toward them. “Looks like your women did the first drop,” Pullman said.

  The C-130 pilot, a captain, was a woman slightly taller than Locke. Her nametag announced she was Lydia Kowalski. “Dirty pool, Captain, moving the panels like that. Any more nasties up your sleeve?”

  Locke shrugged. “Just routine cargo hauling. We’re sending most of you to Elgin Air Force Base to pick up a Harvest Eagle kit—want you back tomorrow. Then you’ll all be going to Fort Benning to bring some army troops and their equipment in Wednesday.”

  “What’s a Harvest Eagle kit?” Kowalski asked.

  “A whole tent city,” Pullman told her. “We’re goin’ to be camping here for a while.” He didn’t add that she and the others would appreciate their time here once they got to Iran…

  *

  After turning the C-130 crews over to Locke and explaining to Bryant what he wanted done, Stansell headed for Rahimi’s office, his mouth set. He had to work his way through the crowd of Red Flag players jamming the corridors of Building 201.

  “Yo, Colonel,” a familiar voice called from one of the briefing rooms. It was Snake Houserman from Luke: “Didn’t know you were here.” Snake stuck his skinny face around the door. His features alternated between elfish and demonic depending on the situation.

  “Not a player, Snake. I’m a coordinator.”

  “Oh, no,” he laughed, the elf emerging, “another Warlord.” He disappeared back into the briefing room.

  The sign on the door to the Intelligence section said, “Open” but the combination on the four-key cipher-lock had been changed. Stansell buzzed for admittance and Dewa unlocked the door. She was alone in the office. “Wild bunch, colonel. I had to change the combination to get a little work done. You know a Captain Houserman? He doesn’t waste any time.”

  “I’ll put some salt on his tail if he’s bothering you.”

  “I can handle him. How’d the briefing go?”

  “I’m worried.” He poured coffee and followed Dewa into her office. She sat at one end of the Air Force issue couch. He sat at the other end and told her about the meeting with General O’Brian and the C-130 crews.

  “It doesn’t make sense,” he said, “we should be working with Delta Force and Combat Talon C-130s from the 1st Special Operations Wing.”

  “Why Combat Talon C-130s?”

  “They train for deep-penetration missions like this one. Their aircraft are specially configured. They’ve got terrain-following radars, upgraded inertial navigation systems and computers for precision navigation and airdrops, not to mention more powerful engines, armor plating, jamming capability…”

  Dewa went over to her desk while Stansell stared at the floor, annoyed and frustrated. She sat and faced her computer, fingers moving over the keyboard. “Let’s see if I can find out what the 1st Special Ops Wing is doing with its aircraft,”. she said as she called up the data banks she could access. “Nothing, so far.” She sat back. “I don’t have access to aircraft movement. What command does the First belong to and where’s it based?”

  “Military Airlift Command, 23rd Air Force, out of Hurlburt Field,” he told her.

  Again her fingers went over the keyboard. “Bingo. I’m talking to the Resource Management computer at Hurlburt through MAC’s logistic supply computer. Bureaucracies are wonderful things. They like to keep track of everything. Let’s see how Hurlburt’s Resource Management office is reporting their aircraft.” She studied the screen. “What does UE stand for?”

  “Unit Equipment, how many aircraft an outfit owns.”

  “Colonel, Hurlburt’s computer is reporting all but two of the First’s C-130s on station. I’d say that they’re all home.”

  “They should be here. We’re not getting the support we were promised…”

  Dewa heard the frustration in his voice. He badly wants to be part of this, she thought, not wanting to tell him what she saw. She was a trained analyst, and evaluated all the evidence, friendly and hostile, good and bad, on both sides of the fence. And she had drawn the only logical conclusion, which she was obliged to report to Stansell, an engaging pattern that was sure to add pain to his frustration. “Rupe”—she tried to make her voice sympathetic—“deception is part of what we do…it seems you’re not going to rescue the POW’s.”

  Stansell stared at her.

  “Task Force Alpha is a decoy operation,” she told him. “A cover for the real mission. We get to pla
y Quaker cannon.”

  Like hell, he thought. Cunningham might seem to be playing along, but Stansell didn’t believe he’d let his Alpha go down the drain.

  *

  Kermanshah, Iran

  Mary Hauser sat in the cracked bathtub scrubbing her hair, hoping the soap they gave her was strong enough to kill the lice. She couldn’t quite believe it, she had not been interrogated since the general had left, the food was improving and now this—a bath. Either they’re getting ready to release us—possible?—or an important visitor is coming for an inspection, she decided. She sank down into the tepid water and let it wash over her. As she reached for the ragged towel the guard had left her when he took her clothes the door swung open and Mokhtari stood there, holding a dark blanket. Two guards were behind him.

  “Put this on. Now.” It was not a blanket but a chador, the shroudlike robe all Iranian women wore.

  She stood, drying herself. They’d seen her like this before, she reminded herself, trying not to be upset by what the chador meant—a symbol of subservience. Part of the technique, don’t read too much into it. “I want my uniform back,” she said, slipping the chador over her head and letting the rough cloth fall over her body.

  “The hood,” Mokhtari ordered.

  She raised the hood and covered her head, and the two guards stepped around the commandant and took hold of her, dragging her out of the bathroom and down the stairs toward her cell. Mokhtari, leading the way, turned into the interrogation room short of her cell. The guards followed, dragging-carrying her. Mokhtari turned, sat behind the desk. One of the guards grabbed the chador and jerked it off.

  Mokhtari ignored her, looked into a corner of the room. She followed his eyes, to a man standing in the corner. A dirt-stained shirt barely covered his barrel chest and potbelly. He had massive arms, and fists that slowly clenched and unclenched as he watched her. His pants were unbuttoned. He was barefoot.

  “One of my former prisoners,” Mokhtari told her. “He has learned to do what I tell him.” He then spoke to the man in Farsi, after which the man exposed himself, and as Mokhtari watched, reached out and grabbed Mary Hauser, pushed her against the desk and proceeded to perform as ordered.