Red Metal

by Mark Greaney

• • •

  OVER THE GULF OF ADEN

  27 DECEMBER

  1720

  Inside the lead craft of the four-ship flight of B-1B Lancers, the defensive combat systems officer’s voice was tight with tension over the radio. “Captain, I have missile launch. There are multiple . . . I count twelve inbound missile systems headed our way.”

  The two pilots looked at each other quickly. The commander said, “What the hell? There’s nothing in the Iranian navy that can launch from that far out. How close are we to the maximum engagement distance?”

  “Sir, we’re still way outside the radius of our missiles.”

  The copilot flicked his seat belt nervously. There were only seconds, not minutes, to make the decision.

  The commander keyed his headset to transmit to all four aircraft. “Abort, abort, abort. Come to heading two-eight-nine. Increase to maximum speeds. Take evasive action. Maintain altitude, but individual actions are authorized. We’ll have to get them another day.

  “Okay,” he said, turning back to the crew. “Tom, pull us to that heading. Weapons, give me a report.”

  “Sir, these things are fast. Tough to tell without GPS, but they’ll be on us in less than two minutes—I say about a minute and a half. We’ll add a little time once we’re running from them.”

  The Air Force officers all turned back to their duties and listened to the aircraft’s weapons officer as he ticked off the distances. In each of the other three bombers, their crews would be doing the same thing.

  “One hundred fifty nautical miles and closing.”

  Sweat formed on the men’s foreheads. They didn’t dare glance at one another; they remained focused on their individual duties. The commander had resumed control of the aircraft, and he looked out the windshield at the Egyptian coast as they retreated.

  “One hundred nautical miles,” said the combat systems officer, his tone now ominous and dire. The missiles were approaching, streaking at more than four times the speed of sound.

  “Copy. Prep countermeasures,” replied the commander. “We can spoof them and see if they are too fast to turn around. Chaff and flares ready?” It was an unnecessary question.

  The defensive combat systems officer said, “Yes, sir. We’re ready.”

  “Use everything. I’ll radio the split.”

  The captain got on and relayed to the other aircraft to split. By splitting up they would stand a better chance of confusing the missiles. If they all released a cloud of chaff and banks of flares, their distance from one another would force the missiles to choose between the maximum number of targets, hopefully overloading their puny brains. The tactic was designed for Russian-style weapons and counted on the warheads picking the hottest and surest of the targets.

  Unfortunately for these pilots, that was not how the Chinese missiles screaming toward them operated.

  “Sir, distance thirty nautical miles and closing.”

  “Copy. Coordinate that release of CM.”

  “Releasing countermeasures now!” The four airplanes, now separated by over ten nautical miles apiece, each released the tiny tinfoil strips along with beads after beads of flares. The flares fanned out below the aircraft, tracks of fire and smoke following as they fell slowly.

  One missile turned toward the flares, but after a moment it corrected itself and again began tracking the bomber it had been pursuing.

  The bombers tried another round of flares and chaff, to no avail. As the missiles closed within three nautical miles and the aircraft fired a constant stream of flares and chaff, the missiles remained undeterred.

  “Fuck!” shouted the commander. “I’m slowing to two hundred miles per hour. Stand by to eject! Check harnesses!”

  Out their right window a bright flash of light signaled the destruction of one of the other bombers. Another flash outside their left window indicated a second hit.

  The pilot realized he would not be able to slow down before they, too, were blown to bits.

  “Eject! Eject!” They were flying at nearly five times the recommended ejection speed.

  Each of the four officers punched out at about the same time. Their ejector seats were not designed to eject at speeds so high, and they failed to fire them clear. Three crew members were killed by the speed of the jet and their impact with the skin of the airplane. The fourth crew member survived for a brief moment, but the explosion of three HQ-9B Chinese missiles, each with over four hundred pounds of polymer-bonded HMX explosive, blasted apart thick chunks of the American aircraft and spun shrapnel through the air. Among an enormous amount of flying metal, a five-foot section of intake fan blade of number three engine blew out of its housing while still spinning like a commercial blender, slicing through the plane’s copilot and killing him.

  * * *

  • • •

  WROCŁAW, POLAND

  27 DECEMBER

  Shank pulled left pitch and looked through his canopy down at the large Polish city of Wrocław. He could see tracers, explosions, and smoke. It was tough to discern who was who, but he was pretty clear that the armor he could make out was all Russian. The Poles seemed to be attacking with anti-tank weapons, using buildings for cover, and a thick pall of gray hung low in the air.

  A platoon of Russian tanks advanced across an open square in front of a set of high-rise apartments. Behind them, Shank could see another company of tanks and a company-sized element of infantry in and around some BTRs. He took their stance to mean they were being held back, waiting for the right moment to be called forward.

  Armored reconnaissance in force, thought Shank as he watched. A classic Russian tactic.

  He saw damaged and destroyed Russian armor, but the different columns of tanks and APCs now seemed to be moving out of the city with authority. He suspected the Poles had expended their biggest and best anti-tank weapons, and they had little way of pestering the Russian armor further.

  The fleeing Russians hammered the militia, dropping entire buildings in the process. From his vantage point up here he got the feeling they were minutes away from crashing through the remnants of the militia on the eastern and northern sides of the Oder, and from there they would be able to race out of the kill zone and continue their push back to the safety of neutral Belarus.

  Shank was certain the Poles did not have any tanks down there in the city, so all the armor below him was fair game, but without someone on the ground to clear him hot onto Russian tanks, firing on them would be going against procedure.

  If there even was a procedure. Manuals didn’t cover situations like this: a mix between conventional and nonconventional forces in close contact.

  Shank knew he’d have to do what the A-10 community did best: improvise.

  Through his mic he called the other pilots in his flight. “Here’s the pattern of attack. We’re going to set up a round-robin. Loiter with our battle position as the center. Give me a wide, seven-craft Hog circle. Keep spotting and IDing the enemy ground targets. Keep the net alive with chatter; we’re all responsible for everyone’s situational awareness. I want to hear you all cross-talking every new item you see on the battlefield.”

  The other pilots rogered up.

  “Then we go in one at a time. One dive-bomb run, one missile, one gun. Rinse and repeat. I want to keep up a continuous pressure on the armor, hopefully force them to withdraw and relieve the Poles. As you come off the target, you call your shot away and ID the targets; then immediately the next man in the stack peels off and attacks. We’ve got the fuel to keep us drilling armor targets for up to an hour. Watch the MANPADS. Copy?”

  In quick succession, the other pilots in his understrength squadron confirmed their readiness to commit to Shank’s plan.

  Shank searched for his first victim.

  He spotted a set of high-rise apartments and a broad courtyard, but it was an explosion on about the tenth flo
or that caught his attention. A Russian main tank round pounded the building, and he could see an armored company moving up to the edge of the courtyard opposite the high-rise.

  Shank circled back and skyrocketed up to 8,000 feet; then he entered into a stomach-lurching dive directly onto the square. He couldn’t make out individual tank targets yet, but within a few seconds he saw white puffs of smoke as two Russian T-14s fired in rapid succession. Diving rapidly below 5,000 feet, he locked his Maverick onto one of the hot spots at the edge of the square and flipped off the gun’s safety.

  At 4,000 feet, he continued his dive, the g-forces pinning him back into his seat as he pushed the throttle forward.

  At 3,000 feet, Shank fine-tuned his lock for the lead tank. The most forward T-14 in the square would get a big, fat Maverick through its turret as a reward for advancing first.

  At 2,500 feet, he punched the button, launching one Raytheon AGM-65 precision-guided missile. The smoke and flame of the missile’s booster rockets momentarily blinded him. Then the Maverick accelerated to 600 knots as Shank followed in its smoky trail.

  Shank let rip with the 30mm main gun as he dove below 2,000 feet.

  The tank’s reactive armor fired an instant before the missile hit in order to destroy it, but it didn’t save the big Armata. A spout of flame and a large fireball told him the Maverick had penetrated the turret and blown everything inside to bits. Holding down the trigger, he could see the impacts of his gun in the middle of the company. He shifted his feet to slew the aircraft left and right, peppering the target area with high-explosive rounds. The bursts looked to have caught the second T-14 in the blast.

  At 1,000 feet Shank pulled back on the stick, sinking deep into his seat as the g-forces counteracted the dive. He checked his altitude and leveled off. Coming off the target area, he would power glide flat to lessen the chance of any MANPADS lock ons, skimming the building tops to mask his egress and foil any antiair attack.

  He keyed the radio and called out the position of the Russian tanks, then looked over his left shoulder as he began climbing back into the circle to watch another of his A-10s diving onto the target.

  He smiled as he pushed the throttle up. Keying his radio, he said, “Keep up the heat!”

  CHAPTER 55

  THE WHITE HOUSE

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  27 DECEMBER

  President of the United States Jonathan Henry hung up the phone, placing it back on the cradle on the Resolute desk, which dominated the Oval Office. He then breathed out a slow sigh of relief.

  He’d done it. He’d bought his forces some time.

  The call to the Taiwanese president had been masterful in its subtext. Henry was friendly but persuasive, at once encouraging and supportive as well as faintly threatening while maintaining plausible deniability of being so.

  He’d explained that he had been forced to redirect a carrier battle group that had been steaming toward Taiwan. Right now it was north of Jakarta, Indonesia, but it had just been ordered to turn 180 degrees and race at top speed to the African coast.

  Removing this carrier battle group and all its firepower from Asia just at the moment when China was set to invade had been necessary, but it meant America’s response to any Chinese aggression would be weakened.

  The Taiwanese president simply inquired as to what he was being asked to do, and Jonathan Henry did not hesitate to extend his request.

  “I need you to postpone your elections, just by one month. It’s in your constitution: you can do it in the case of national crisis.”

  There was a long silence on the line after the translation was delivered. Finally the Taiwanese president said, “Postponing an election is a dramatic move in a democracy such as the Republic of China. This will make me appear weak to my supporters and enemies alike.”

  Henry had a good relationship with the president, and he hoped that would remain the case after he took the gloves off now. “Sir . . . not as weak as you will look if China conquers your island and puts you up against a wall to be shot.”

  The delay in the response this time was much longer than before—so long that Henry continued. “Mr. President, it’s one month. You will take some heat for the decision, I agree, but I truly believe it is in your best interests.”

  “And what if your other carrier cannot return in a month? What if your forces are defeated by the Russians?”

  To this Henry simply said, “Then God help us both, Mr. President.”

  There was no immediate commitment, and Henry put the odds at 50 percent, but within hours the Taiwanese president held a live televised address and postponed the election for thirty days.

  The Chinese troopships turned back to ports on the mainland within hours. The soldiers had been at sea for months; conditions were miserable, and this bought them some time as well.

  Henry was pleased with what he’d done, but geography and math were not in America’s favor. The USS John Warner, tracking the Russian-Iranian flotilla in the Gulf of Aden, sent a flash message that the enemy ships had turned shortly after shooting down the B-1B Lancers, and they now appeared to be heading to port, not in Mombasa, but in Djibouti City. This would take nearly a day off their time on the water, and hinder the West from targeting them again from the air.

  The Pentagon quickly calculated it would take the Russians two full days to get from Djibouti to southern Kenya. The Marines heading to the mine at Mrima Hill on board the USS Boxer would get there first, but they would be seriously outgunned and outmanned.

  The carrier battle group on the way to the Marines’ rescue, on the other hand, needed a full three and a half days to get close enough to begin air ops in Kenya.

  No, Henry realized. If the Marines raced across the ocean and then up to Mrima Hill, they would have just enough time to dig in. And then, for at least an entire day, the Marines would be on their own as Boris Lazar attacked.

  * * *

  • • •

  WROCŁAW, POLAND

  27 DECEMBER

  The battle around the Old Town of Wrocław was finally over, but Paulina Tobiasz could still hear explosions off to the east and northeast. The fighting moved farther and farther away each minute, and this was comforting, but the occasional sounds of fighter aircraft over the city were much less so.

  She’d been involved in three more brief engagements since she’d fired from the window of the office building next to the town hall, each time when retreating Russian scout cars had raced back through Market Square, alone and frantic to get away from the attack. She hadn’t destroyed another vehicle, but she’d fired her RPG at a group of dismounts fleeing a downed GAZ Tigr while a dozen AKs simultaneously opened up on the young men, and she felt reasonably certain her rocket killed at least one or two of them.

  Only now, after nine in the evening, did the Polish Land Forces move through the wrecked streets of the Old Town and declare over loudspeakers that the danger had passed, other than continued potential for Russian aerial attacks. Paulina left her position and crossed the road between the city hall and the bank, walking through the smoke and stench and utter chaos. She’d been handed a radio by a section commander of the militia, and on it she was told the militia was to be picked up by school buses in the next hour. But she’d left her purple backpack with her personal belongings in it at her initial fighting position in the bank, and she needed to go back and retrieve it and whoever remained, if anyone did, from her small squad.

  Fires burned all around, smoke and the smell of burned rubber choked her, and she had to stop suddenly as an ambulance raced past along the sidewalk to get around the wreckage of a Tigr utility vehicle lying on its side.

  There were bodies in the street; she hadn’t been counting but she’d passed two dozen at least. Some dead Russian soldiers, their burned skin black, more than a few with appendages missing.

  She walked past a handsome Polish sol
dier in the uniform of a special forces sergeant, slumped against the wall on the sidewalk. His positioning made it appear as if he were sleeping, but Paulina could see death in his pallid face.

  It wasn’t until she was halfway up the stairs to the bank that she remembered the girl she’d met just before the battle began. She wondered if she’d made it, but from the broken masonry and smoke-filled hallway of the bank offices, she thought the chances were slim.

  She entered the room in the corner and saw bloody handprints on the wall. The windows that looked out to the town hall were blown in, office furniture smoldered still, and a group of militia sat huddled together, although Paulina was too far away to hear any talking.

  A pair of bodies lay just inside the door; they were already covered with vinyl ponchos, and from the small boots of one of them she could tell a female corpse lay on its back.

  Paulina Tobiasz had no idea why she was still alive when so many around her had died.

  Again.

  A voice spoke to her from behind.

  “Not today.”

  She turned. The small dark-haired girl from her team sat there, back against the wall. Her face was black, smeared with weapon grease and smoke and bits of burned paper.

  Paulina nodded. “Not today. I’m glad to see you.”

  “We lost two.”

  Just two? Paulina thought but did not say. “Can you walk?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Let me help you downstairs. Buses are coming to pick us up.”

  “Where are we going?”

  Paulina shrugged, aggravating her two-day-old shoulder wound yet again. “Don’t know. I guess we chase the Russians.”

  * * *

  • • •

  DJIBOUTI CITY, DJIBOUTI

  28 DECEMBER

  French special forces captain Apollo Arc-Blanchette was seated near enough to the front window to look out of the Airbus A400M Atlas as it descended through the clouds. The dark brown rocks of the northern mountains of Djibouti were visible to the west, but in front of them was a seemingly endless expanse of brown flatlands interspersed here and there with tiny villages. It was a wholly different terrain, weather, and population from where he had been fighting just days earlier, and he found it surreal to be in Africa while there was a war going on in Europe.