by Dale Brown
The radar crosshairs were less than a hundred meters off the aimpoint—the COBRA DANE antenna itself—so the bombardier laid them back on, magnified the image to ensure they were on the right spot—the northernmost corner of the massive array—checked the aimpoint coordinates, and then pressed the RADAR FIX button. The precise radar fix, combined with GLONASS satellite-navigation signals, would help keep the Tu-160’s inertial navigator properly aligned. Thirty seconds later the navigation computer dumped velocity, heading, and position information to the four remaining Kh-15 nuclear missiles in the forward bomb bay.
“Fix complete,” he reported. “Stand by for TAL maneuver. Left turn, thirty degrees of bank, ten seconds…now.” The pilot commanded the autopilot to accomplish the turn. The TAL, or transfer alignment maneuver, “exercised” the inertial-navigation system and allowed a known quantity of velocity readings to fine-tune it. “Hold heading for twelve seconds…. Good, now right turn, center up the heading bug. Remaining on this heading. Three minutes to launch point. TAL complete, all remaining missiles reporting ready for launch. Confidence is high.”
The Tu-160 was traveling at one thousand kilometers per hour at an altitude of one hundred meters above the Bering Sea. His course would take him about a hundred kilometers north of Shemya, out of range of any Patriot surface-to-air missiles the Americans may have placed there. The American naval base at Adak Island had been closed for a few years now, but there was no use taking chances; besides, they had plenty of fuel to make it back to the refueling anchor and to the first alternate landing site if they couldn’t make their refueling. They’d had training missions twice as long and many times more complex than this. But it was strange that the Americans didn’t place defensive weapon systems around their own bases. Obviously, they thought themselves invincible to attack—even way out here along the Aleutian Islands, where Shemya was half as close to Russia than it was to Juneau, the Alaskan capital.
Russia had proved this day how very wrong the Americans were. America was not invincible. In fact, this attack was unbelievably easy. They had detected just two American fighters during their entire two-hour attack run into Alaska, and the fighters had zoomed right over them without locking on even for a second. True, the electromagnetic pulses created by the multiple nuclear detonations around Fairbanks had helped degrade their radar. But launching only two fighters for the entire state of Alaska? Didn’t the United States have any love or respect for their forty-ninth state? Did they think so little of this big, beautiful, mineral-rich place that they chose not to defend it with every weapon system in their arsenal? Heading outbound toward Shemya was even easier, as if the Americans never even tried to look for them. Could they really be this completely disorganized?
The bombardier took a few radar sweeps of the ocean, scanning for American warships. Nothing straight ahead, just a few small vessels, probably fishing or patrol vessels—nothing with the size to suggest they had the surface-to-air missile capacity to threaten a Tupolev-160. “This is lead. You see that surface target at eleven o’clock, fifty kilometers?” the bombardier radioed.
“I see it,” the bombardier aboard the number-two Tu-160 responded. “Less than twenty-five meters long, I’d say. Shaped like a trawler. No threat.”
“We’ll keep our distance anyway,” the lead bombardier responded. But he did not alter his flight-plan routing. They would be at least five kilometers north of the sea target at their closest point—well out of range of Stinger or other shoulder-fired antiaircraft weapons, which were not very much of a threat to a Tupolev-160 anyway. “Two minutes to launch.”
“Acknowledged. Search-radar contact only—no targeting radars.”
“EWO?” the pilot radioed to the electronic-warfare officer. “Check those radar contacts.”
“Search radars only,” the electronic-warfare officer aboard the lead Tu-160 reported after double-checking his readouts. “Echo-band air-traffic control radar from Shemya, X-ray band phased array search radar also from Shemya—the COBRA DANE long-range radar—and F-band search radar from just offshore, probably a surface-search radar from that trawler. No height finders.”
“One minute to missile launch.”
The pilot’s voice sounded much more apprehensive. “Where’s that trawler?” he asked.
“Eleven o’clock, thirty-two kilometers.”
“And you say it’s painting us with radar?”
“Search radar only, pilot,” the EWO responded.
“Can he see us?”
“Probably.”
“Then let’s deviate around him,” the pilot said. “Bombardier, give me a vector.”
“Negative. Less than forty seconds to launch. Deviating might put us outside the footprint. Hold heading.”
“If that trawler lights us up with a height finder, I want him blown out of the water,” the pilot ordered.
“With a one-kiloton nuclear warhead? You want to nuke a little fishing boat with a ten-million-ruble nuclear missile?”
“Have number two target that trawler—he’s got four missiles to spare. That’s an order.”
“Roger.” On the interplane radio, the bombardier relayed the order from the flight commander. The number-two Blackjack’s bombardier laid his radar crosshairs on the radar return, hit a button to engage the moving-target designation mode, waited thirty seconds for the crosshairs to drift off, then placed them back on the target. The attack computers automatically calculated the trawler’s speed—less than ten knots—and computed a set of target coordinates for where the trawler would be at the end of the missile’s very short flight time.
Not that it mattered much: A one-kiloton nuclear warhead would create an eight-cubic-kilometer hole in the ocean that would suck millions of kilos of seawater into it within seconds, crushing anything inside that was not already vaporized in the blast. The missile could miss by several kilometers and still destroy the little trawler.
“Stand by for missile launch,” the lead bombardier reported. “Missile counting down…Doors coming open…Missile one away…Launcher rotating…Missile two away…Doors coming closed…All missiles away.”
At this range it would take just over one minute for the first missile to hit. “Double-check curtain seals,” the pilot ordered. The pilots made sure that the silver-and-lead-lined anti–flash blindness curtains covering the cockpit windows were closed and securely fastened in place. “Crew, sunglasses secure, dark helmet visors down, interior lights full bright.” They turned the inside lights full bright so they could see their instruments through all the eye protection and to constrict their irises as much as possible. “Autopilot is off, climbing to one thousand meters. Prepare for—”
Just then the bombardier radioed, “Lost contact with missile one…Missile two still on track…Thirty seconds to second missile impact…twenty…Stand by for shock wave from first missile detonation…ten…Shit, I lost contact with the second missile…. Shock wave impact, now.” There was nothing. “Stand by for shock wave from missile two….”
“What happened, bombardier?” the pilot asked.
“Unknown. I just lost contact…. Shock wave coming up, now.” Still nothing. “No detonation. I don’t understand it, pilot. I had two good missiles until just before detonation, and then nothing.”
The pilot started pulling off the anti–flash blindness curtains from his cockpit windscreen. “I’m going to look for a mushroom cloud or signs of detonation. Copilot, shield your eyes.” The pilot gingerly opened his curtains a few centimeters. There was no sign of a nuclear explosion. “Nothing! What could have happened?”
“Want me to launch the last two missiles at Shemya?”
“We were supposed to save the last two for surface targets we’d encounter on our way back,” the pilot reminded him, “and then save any unexpended weapons for contingencies.” But Shemya was a very important target, he thought. “Have our wingman cancel his attack on that surface target and launch two missiles at Shemya—then we’ll both have two mis
siles remaining. That’s better than one plane having four left but being unable to launch.”
“Acknowledged. Break. Two, this is lead, put a couple on Shemya. Our two missiles malfunctioned.”
“Acknowledged. Changing to left-echelon formation.” Since his missiles would be flying south, the number-two Blackjack bomber crossed over to the lead bomber’s left side and prepared to launch two Kh-15 missiles at Shemya.
“Zagavn’at!” the pilot swore aloud. “How could we fuck up that bad?”
“We didn’t do anything wrong, pilot,” the bombardier said. “Who knows? Maybe the missile’s electronics got beat up too badly during the long low-level cruising. Maybe the fuze malfunctioned.”
“Any air defenses on Shemya?”
“None whatsoever,” the electronic-warfare officer responded, puzzled.
“And even if there were, even a Patriot missile would have a hard time shooting down a Kh-15,” the bombardier says. “The Kh-15 flies faster and lower than the Patriot can—”
“Uyobyvay!” the copilot suddenly swore. “What in hell was that?”
The pilot saw it too—a streak of blue-yellow flashed by the windscreen, so fast that it seemed like a beam of light—except the streak left a thin, white, steamy contrail. “Was that a surface-to-air missile?”
“I’m not picking up any uplink or height-finder radars,” the electronic-warfare officer said immediately. “Scope’s clear except for a surface-search radar at eleven o’clock, ten kilometers.”
“That trawler is still painting us?”
“It’s not a SAM radar, just a—”
At that instant the crew felt a tremendous bang! reverberate through the aircraft—very quick and sharp, almost like clear-air turbulence. “Station check, crew!” the pilot ordered as he snapped his oxygen mask in place. “Everyone on oxygen.”
“Offense in the green.”
“Defense in the green.”
“Copilot is in the—Wait, I’ve got a tank low-pressure warning in the fuselage number-two fuel tank,” the copilot reported as he continued scanning his instruments. “Pressure is down to ten kilopascals…. Fuel quantity is dropping, too. I’m initiating transfer to the main body and transferring wing main fuel to the outboards.”
“Any other malfunctions?”
“Negative, just the fuel pressure and—”
At that moment there was another sharp bang! The air inside the cabin turned instantly cloudy, as if a thick fog had appeared out of nowhere. The pilot felt air gush out of his nostrils and mouth so loudly that he barked like a dog. “What was that? Station check again! Report!”
“My God!” the electronic-warfare officer screamed. “Oh, my God…!”
“What is it? Report!”
“Igor…the bombardier…God, he’s been hit…Jesus, his entire body exploded!” the EWO screamed over the intercom. “I felt that second thud, and I looked over, and…oh, God, it looks like his body was blown in half from head to toe. Something came up from the bottom of the aircraft and blew Igor into pieces!”
“Copilot…?”
“Explosive decompression, two alternators and generators offline, and I feel a tremor in the fuselage,” the copilot reported.
“I have the airplane,” the pilot said. “I’m turning north.” He keyed the mike button. “Two, this is lead, I think we’ve been hit by ground fire. We’re taking evasive action north.”
“We’re thirty seconds to missile launch, lead,” the second Blackjack bomber pilot responded. “We’re not picking up any threats. We’ll stay on the missile run and rendezvous when—”
And the radio went dead.
The pilot strained forward in his seat to look as far to his left as he could—and he saw the second Blackjack bomber start a tail-over-head forward spin, flames tearing through the bomb bay, its burning wings breaking off and cartwheeling across the sky. “Oh, shit, two just got hit!” he cried out. “He’s on fire!” He shoved his control stick farther right. “We’re getting out of here!”
He’s turning, Top—don’t let him get away,” Hal Briggs radioed.
“I can see that, sir,” Sergeant Major Chris Wohl said. He was standing atop the MV-32 Pave Dasher tilt-rotor aircraft as it bobbed in the choppy and gently rolling Bering Sea, sixty miles north of Shemya Island. Wohl, along with one more commando in Tin Man battle armor and eight more commandos in advanced ballistic infantry armor seated in the cargo compartment, had raced across the Bering Sea to a spot where they predicted they could intercept any Russian attack aircraft returning from Alaska that might launch a similar attack against Shemya. The MV-32 crew then deployed its emergency-survival flotation bags, which resembled a gigantic raft surrounding the entire lower half of the tilt-jet aircraft, and set the aircraft down on the Bering Sea.
Wohl smoothly tracked the target through his Tin Man electronic visor display, which showed the Russian Blackjack bomber in a steep right turn. The display also showed the predicted impact point for one of his hypersonic electromagnetic projectiles, fired from his rail gun. Wohl’s microhydraulically powered exoskeleton covering his Tin Man electronic body armor allowed him to easily track the bomber while holding the large, fifty-eight-pound weapon. He lined up the impact reticle onto the radar depiction of the bomber as precisely as a conventional soldier would sight the main gun on an Abrams battle tank.
“Fire five,” he said, and he squeezed the trigger. A pulse of electricity sent a seven-pound aerodynamic depleted-uranium projectile out of the large rail-gun weapon at a muzzle velocity of over eighteen thousand feet per second. The heat generated by the projectile’s movement through the atmosphere turned it into blue-and-yellow molten metal, but the supersonic slipstream kept the bolus together, leaving a long, hot vapor trail in its wake. When the molten uranium hit the Blackjack bomber, the bolus cooled and decelerated. The collapsing supersonic cone caused the bolus to break apart, scattering thousands of pellets of red-hot uranium in a wide circular pattern through the Blackjack’s fuselage, like an immense shotgun blast.
The Blackjack was obviously hit, but it unsteadily continued its northbound turn. In a few seconds, it would be out of range. “Crap, not a fatal shot.”
“Don’t let it get away, Top,” Hal Briggs warned. He and another of his Tin Man commandos had returned to Shemya from Attu Island to help defend the island against the expected Russian attack. They had successfully shot both Kh-15 missiles out of the sky with their rail guns. The other Battle Force commandos, along with as many of the island’s personnel as they could carry in several trips with the MV-32, had evacuated Shemya for Attu.
“Don’t worry, sir,” Wohl responded. “Got it, Sergeant?”
“Roger that, sir,” responded the second commando in Tin Man armor, alongside Wohl. “Fire six.” Even at such a great distance, it only took three seconds for the projectile to hit. This time the shot had a more spectacular effect—the entire aft end of the fuselage sheared off the aircraft, sending the big bomber tumbling out of control.
“Good shooting, boys,” Hal Briggs said. “Control, splash two Blackjacks and a couple cruise missiles. Sensors are clear.”
“Copy that,” Patrick McLanahan responded. “Nice work. Glad you made it out there in time.”
“We couldn’t just sit out there on Attu and watch Shemya get blown to bits by those Russian muthas,” Hal said. “So what’s the plan now, boss?”
“You guys are on,” Patrick said. “I need you refueled, equipped, and on your way as soon as possible. We’re in the process of recovering all our planes and loading them up. The Dragons will be headed out from Dreamland in a couple hours.”
“All right!” Briggs exclaimed. “Those are my honeys!”
“We’re going to launch everything we got and get some help from a few planes from off-station,” Patrick went on. “You’ll have as much backup as we can provide, but you guys are going to have to be the pointy end of the spear. Take those bastards down, and get the place ready for visitors.”
“You got it, boss,” Hal Briggs said. “Good to have you back on the team.”
“Good to be back, guys,” Patrick said proudly. “It’s damn good to be back.”
8
Ryazan’ Alternate Military Command Center,
Russian Federation
A short time later
First indications are confirmed, sir,” said Chief of the General Staff and Minister of State Security Nikolai Stepashin. “Two Tupolev-160s missing after they successfully attacked their targets on the Alaskan mainland. Presumably lost while making their final run on Eareckson Air Base in the Aleutians. Probably surviving fighter jets from Eielson or Elmendorf, deployed or dispersed to Eareckson because it’s the only surviving military base in Alaska.”
Gryzlov thought for a moment, then shook his head. “It has begun, Stepashin. American fighters who survived the attacks on the mainland would not deploy fifteen hundred kilometers out to a windswept island at the end of the Aleutians. I believe the counteroffensive has begun, Nikolai—McLanahan’s war.”
“Who, sir?”
“McLanahan. Thorn will send Patrick McLanahan and his modified long-range bombers into battle. They will deploy to Eareckson Air Base and launch attacks on us in the far east.”
“Perhaps the bombers were shot down by a Patriot or I-Hawk surface-to-air missile?…”
“We have been watching Eareckson Air Base for months—there was never any indication they were going to install Patriots on that rock. We would have seen it,” Gryzlov said. “No. I believe that McLanahan has been activated—his planes are already on Shemya, or soon will be. He will commence attacks on our Siberian bomber bases very soon—they may already be under way.”
“That’s crazy, sir,” Stepashin said. “Why attack bases in the far east? Why not Moscow, St. Petersburg, or any of dozens of active bases in the west?”
“Because McLanahan has discovered our secret—that we are using long-range bombers launched from Siberian bases,” Gryzlov said. “It was he that sent those small satellites over our bomber bases.” He thought hard for a moment, then said, “You must assume that all of our eastern sub bases will be attacked soon, probably first by long-range bombers launching cruise missiles, followed by commandos—if McLanahan is involved, they’ll probably use their Tin Man commandos in small groups.” He paused again, then corrected himself. “No—McLanahan will attack air bases, not naval bases. He’ll go after Anadyr, Blagoveshchensk, Ulan-Ude, Bratsk, or maybe even Kavaznya again.”
