by Tom Wilson
Viking flight and all the others made it back to the ridge, where Colonel Mack pulled them together into the big ECM pod formation and herded them westward.
"This is Cowboy lead," radioed Colonel Mack as they approached the Red River. "Anyone hit the bridge?"
Max Foley said he thought he'd hit a northern span, but hadn't knocked it down.
It was Manny's turn. For Christs's sake, he bitched to himself, I didn't even look. He was pretty sure he'd missed, because he'd not corrected enough, but as lead he should know if anyone in his flight had hit the target.
He queried his Vikings. Henry Horn, who was Viking four and last on the target, said Billy Bowes's bombs had narrowly missed the southern span, but the bridge was still standing.
Manny critiqued his performance a dozen times on the trip back. He'd clanked up only once, by delaying his roll-in, but in the face of all the defenses, that once could have been a killer. Viking was fortunate not to have lost anyone, and it wasn't his fault they hadn't.
Then his embarrassment grew, for when they looked the birds over, Manny had not been hit at all. Two others had suffered flak damage, but he'd just been shaken by a near miss.
Life remained miserable for the Supersonic Wetback. But he remembered what Lucky had told him, and he began to think of how he'd do it next time.
Asshole bridge!
0940 Local—Command Post, Takhli RTAFB, Thailand
Major Lucky Anderson
The pilot reports were gloomy. Two Mk-83 bombs, each capable of laying waste to a city block, had either hit or exploded just beside the Paul Doumer bridge, yet it was still standing. Possibly damaged, but no one knew how badly.
It was downright and utterly disappointing, except for one fact. The gomers had shot like hell, yet the strike force had taken no losses.
Manny DeVera remained quiet about his role, but a couple of the guys from the 333rd squadron who'd been behind Viking bitched. He'd delayed so long with his roll-in, they'd had to fly back toward the target to get a proper setup for their bombs.
But the Vikings hadn't done badly. Henry Horn told Lucky that all their bombs had been close, that Manny's had been a bit short, Joe's had straddled the bridge, and one of Bowes's bombs had either hit or been so close it should've done the trick. His own bombs had been a little long.
"How'd the rest of the mission go?" Lucky asked Henry, fishing for a report on how well Manny had led the thing without actually asking for it.
Looking tired and drawn, feeling the postmission low as they did when the adrenaline was pumped dry, Henry just shrugged and said that except for the delayed roll-in it was pretty much of a standard, "one tenth of an air medal" mission.
Since they received an air medal for every ten missions they flew, Henry meant it had been routine and uneventful. And that made Lucky feel better about things. He liked it when missions went off as planned and there were so few surprises that everything appeared routine.
As soon as they'd collected the pilot debriefings, Lucky followed Pearly Gates out to the waiting T-39 Sabreliner.
An hour later they were at Udorn Air Base, walking toward one of the trailers at the ready area near the end of the runway. It was a "photo-processing intelligence facility," shortened to PPIF and called "pee piff" by the recce pilots. Each PPIF housed automated film-processing equipment and specialists. The RF-4C that was just then landing carried exposed poststrike assessment film of the Doumer bridge in its camera bays.
Two reconnaissance birds had been sent out, but one had been shot down by intense AAA fire near the bridge.
"Those guys have balls of steel," said Lucky, looking at the RF-4C slowing as it rolled down the runway. "They've gotta fly straight and level over the target to get their photos."
Pearly Gates, huffing to keep up, agreed.
"Just maybe," said Lucky on a more cheerful note, "the bridge was damaged worse than the guys thought."
"God, I hope you're right," said Gates, and Lucky was reminded that the bridges campaign was Gates's project.
"Wish we could have given you better results," he said.
Pearly nodded. "We've got a window of opportunity to be turned loose on a campaign to really sting the North Vietnamese. We wait much longer and they'll get cold feet."
"Who's they?"
"The big leaguers. The Secretary of Defense and the President."
Lucky whistled. He couldn't think that high.
"Mainly the President. He and the Secretary of State have to prod the SecDef a lot, because he says we can't beat the North Vietnamese with air power, and it's like he keeps throwing roadblocks at us so it'll come true. What do the pilots think of the Secretary of Defense?"
"They believe he should go back to building Edsels. At Korat they've got a full-size teakwood Edsel grill hanging in the O' Club bar."
Pearly chuckled. "I told General Moss about that, and he laughed for ten minutes. He'd like to see it, but they take it down when he visits. He distrusts all politicians, but he's got a big-time dislike for the SecDef, and although he'd never say it out loud, he doesn't think much of the President."
Lucky frowned. He thought Johnson was trying his damndest, that he was just hamstrung with lousy advice from the Wunderkinder cabinet left over from the Camelot years. It was difficult to think badly of the President, who was also his commander in chief.
They arrived at the PPIF and watched the RF-4C turn off the runway and release its drag chute, then swing around and brake to a stop beside the PPIF. A crew chief threw chocks in place under the tires, and while both engines were still running, film technicians unbuttoned camera bays to retrieve the film canisters.
Lucky was impressed. "They're real pros," he said.
But Pearly Gates was just frowning and waiting, hoping for better news than the Takhli pilots had given him.
Early the next morning, as they finalized the inch-thick report with its photos and diagrams and pages of initial analysis, Lucky looked wearily at Pearly Gates.
They were in a small back room of the Udorn command post, working in short sleeves and beginning to smell ripe from their night-long efforts.
"You think we need another recce run?"
Pearly Gates shook his head. "No use to endanger more recce crews, having 'em run the gauntlet again. One RF-4C's enough to lose."
Lucky sat back in his chair. "You going to see General Moss when you get back?"
"He'll be my second stop. First will be a place called the Recce Tech, where they'll blow up portions of the film we've got here."
"Tell the general I owe him a six-pack. He was right about the bombs being too small. But tell him we've got our tactic. Most of the guys released high and stayed out of the worst of the gunfire, and we still got some near hits."
"I'll tell him," Pearly said gloomily.
"What's next, Pearly? We going to try again right away?"
Gates rubbed his eyes, then ran his hand through his close-shorn, kinky hair. "I don't think so. It'll take a while to get approval, now that we've got two failures in a row. The guys at PACAF and Air Force have to do their Monday-morning quarterbacking and tell us 'see there, I told you so,' and all that."
Lucky stood up. "Then I can get back to doing other things."
"You just keep working this thing, Lucky. Stay in contact with Benny Lewis at Nellis and with me in Saigon, because next time we go for it, we've got to get it right. This makes two strikes, and if we get another chance and blow that one, they'll stop us for sure."
Lucky walked over and poured himself one last cup of coffee from the pot on the warmer, then refilled Pearly's cup. All the while he was thinking how happy he was that he didn't live in a world of politics and bullshit like General Moss and Pearly Gates.
Pearly sipped hot coffee and sighed. "Thanks."
"You think this campaign will be a good one, once we get started?"
"Hell, Lucky, I don't know, but at least we'll be doing something to sting 'em. This is one crazy war, trying to get the pol
iticians to let us fight. It took three years before they let us go after their little air bases. General Moss is still fighting an uphill battle to turn you guys loose on their main MiG bases."
"Unbelievable."
"When I talk to my buddy at OSD, that's the SecDef's office, he tells me how the Secretary's convinced we should stop bombing North Vietnam, saying we're just strengthening their resolve like the Germans did with the British during World War II. It doesn't matter that we have a potful of intelligence reports saying different, that every time we hit something new, they squeal, Ho Chi Minh gets sicker, and Giap pulls in more troops."
That outburst made Lucky even more determined—he didn't ever want to go to work at a headquarters.
"Which means," summarized Pearly, "that if we can't begin a good campaign that shows the President the SecDef is full of crap, he'll probably listen to him and stop the bombing. And that means it'll be one hell of a long and tough fight for our ground troops."
Lucky sipped coffee.
"So I want you to stay on top of it, Lucky. We lose this one, we lose big-time."
"You just get us another chance. We'll knock the damned bridge down." He stared evenly at Pearly Gates. "That's a promise."
Thursday, July 20th, 0730 Local—TFWC/TAF, Nellis AFB, Nevada
Major Benny Lewis
Benny and Moods were already at work, had been there for an hour working on reports and preparing correspondence. The civilian analyst would come in at eight, take his hourly breaks, and at four-thirty he'd be out the door. He made half again as much money as Benny and was not nearly as good with his figures as Moods Diller on a bad day. Benny used him for trivial tasks and was fortunate the civilian didn't refuse to do them. It was almost impossible to fire civilian employees. That was the way it had been with feather merchants since the Second World War.
Benny finished reading the message summarizing the results of the latest CROSSFIRE ZULU test, and muttered about excrement.
"They miss again?" asked Moods.
Benny nodded, feeling grumpy.
Moods hesitated before machine-gunning. "Another few weeks, I'll have my smart bombs ready."
Benny told him to just shut the fuck up about his fucking smart bombs, then stalked down the hall to get a cup of coffee and perhaps put himself in better humor.
At the coffee nook the secretary brandished the pot, saying she had to make a new one. The last taker had left the pot empty and the burner on, so she'd have to scour it.
"Men!" she exclaimed, and he ducked away.
He went up to the first floor and wished the colonel well on his morning-long meeting with two visiting senators. After he'd left, Benny poured coffee from the colonel's private pot and returned to the basement.
Moods tried to soothe him. "I read th' message. They're really not bad results."
"Bullshit." Benny snatched the message back and read it again. Damage to structure . . . photos show loss of concrete and rebar hanging down . . . est. 36 hrs to repair structure, 24 hrs to rpr tracks & roadway sfc.
At the end of the message was an added paragraph that made little sense until he thought a bit harder.
4. (U) FOR L.A. AND B.L. FM R.M. RESULTS INDICATE U 0 6 BUD. THNX. 3000'S?
He laughed, and the shitty mood partially evaporated.
"General Moss passed a message to Lucky and me," he told Moods.
Moods looked harder before smiling his understanding.
"He bet us a six-pack we were wrong," said Benny. "This makes it seven times he's been right when he's bet a six-pack. We've won twice."
"When'll th' guys get their next chance at th' bridge?"
"I dunno," said Benny. "Colonel Gates says it has to be within the next month or the whole program might be shut off. Some high-level politics are involved."
They both worked on their various paperwork drills for the next fifteen minutes, then grunted greetings to the civilian number cruncher who came in with his paperbag lunch in one hand and a steaming cup of coffee in the other.
Benny put the civilian to work filling out reports before going back upstairs for another cup of coffee, since the downstairs pot was empty again.
The colonel's secretary was in, a thirtyish brunette with a nice smile and breasts that swung like cantaloupes in her loose sweater. She asked if he was doing anything that night . . . there was this great show at Caesar's Palace she'd love to see.
He said he already had something going, which he didn't, and left.
You sure? asked the inner voice. Those are damned nice cantaloupes.
She'd attended the parade where he'd risen from his wheelchair to be awarded a total of sixteen medals, including three Silver Stars, four Distinguished Flying Crosses, and a Bronze Star. Afterward she'd breathlessly told him how wonderful and brave he'd looked, and asked him out for the first time.
She was separated from her husband, she'd said, and the voice inside him had said she sounded horny. He'd not taken her up on that offer or the others she'd made since.
Each time he begged out, the voice inside him had been increasingly disgusted.
As he cautiously descended the stairs to the basement, he thought again about last night's telephone conversation. Julie had said there was still no change in the Bear's status, and she was going through a heavy, melancholy mood. She'd been dreaming again that the Bear was hurt and trying to get out of North Vietnam.
It just wasn't right, what they were putting her through.
Neither Colonel Mack nor B. J. Parker had responded to his letters. It wasn't like them just to ignore him like that.
It came to him then, as he was walked back into his office and took his seat, what he had to do.
Moods was talking on his telephone, and the number cruncher was still working at the task he'd given him. Benny picked up the message from Pearly Gates and reread it.
Moods put down his phone and whooped. "They're shippin' five laser-guidance kits . . . be here in two weeks for testing. . . . Hot damn!"
Moods was ecstatic over any development with his projects, depressed about almost everything else. Benny ignored him and thought more about the idea spawning in his mind.
He walked down the hall to the secretary's office.
"I need a set of travel orders," he told her.
She peered morosely at him. "You the one who forgot to make coffee when you drained the pot again?"
"Nope. I've been stealing my coffee from upstairs."
"Hmmph. I've had to clean the thing twice now and it's only eight-fifteen. You guys are as forgetful as my husband. Bad enough having one, now I got ten of you guys screwing things up. Men are good for only one thing."
He grinned.
She glared. "And not what you're thinking, Major."
"Then what are we good for?"
"Parallel parking. Women have a mental block about parallel parking. If it wasn't for that, we could do without you because everything else we do better."
"I need a request for TDY travel orders."
She sighed and picked up her pencil and a blank Temporary Duty Order request form. "Where to?"
"Seventh Air Force in Saigon, then to Takhli, Thailand."
Her eyebrows furrowed. She still played sheriff for Julie, telling him when she thought he was overdoing it. "Purpose of trip?"
"Classified. And keep the itinerary open so I can go back and forth between the bases as required."
"The colonel's got to sign the request. Since you're traveling out of country, it'll come out of his travel fund."
"I know."
She smiled meanly. "And you've got to submit a waiver signed by the hospital commander with the request for orders. You're still on limited duty, y'know."
Shit, said the voice.
"A waiver? You're kidding," he lamented.
"Nope," she said with a hint of triumph. "Still want me to type up the request?"
Benny nodded glumly. He knew there was not a chance in hell his flight surgeon would recommend that he wa
s ready to travel. "The hospital commander, you say?"
She nodded, looking smug.
He wondered how the Bear would have handled it. Mal Stewart had been a brazen master at this sort of skulduggery.
C'mon Benny, think, the voice inside him said.
He'd heard something about the colonel who commanded the Nellis Hospital.
That's it.
He got the unsigned Medical Waiver/Authorization to Travel form from the secretary, who gave him an exasperated look, and told her, "Be back in a while."
You'll need an accomplice, said the voice.
He went upstairs and waited for the colonel's secretary to get off the phone.
Good thinking.
Benny was bold. First he asked her to meet him after work for a drink at the O' Club.
"Oh, yeah," she said breathlessly.
This one's a piece of cake, said the voice.
"Something else," he said in a more confidential tone. "I need you to find out some information for me."
First she verified what he'd been told about the hospital commander. After five more minutes of telephone work, she handed Benny a detailed account of the colonel's schedule.
Efficient.
"One more thing," he asked her.
She stared at him with eager eyes.
Not bad looking, the voice said. Maybe a little skinny in the shank, but the tits are great.
"If you can get just a little time off now, I need some help with something in my BOQ room."
She almost crumpled. "Oh, yeah." She immediately called another secretary and asked her to take her calls until she got back from an "important" meeting.
Then she accompanied him to his room and giggled constantly as she helped him remove the back brace.
"I can't get the thing off by myself," he apologized.
As he began very cautiously to slip back into his shirt, she stopped giggling and purred that he had a wonderful build.
