by Dale Brown
“I’ll explain everything, sir,” Patrick said.
“I doubt it,” Phoenix said with a wry smile, “but I still want to talk to you about them. Good-bye, General.”
“Have a safe trip, sir.” The vice president nodded, loaded aboard the CV-22, and the big twin rotors were turning moments later.
It was hard for Patrick to hear at first over the roar of the Osprey’s twin rotors in full vertical takeoff power, but he did, and he opened his radio. Wilhelm was doing the same at that very moment. “Go ahead, Boomer,” he said.
“Bandits!” Hunter Noble shouted. At that moment the air raid sirens sounded. “Two formations of ten bombers, supersonic, just crossed the Turkey-Iraq border, headed this way, five minutes out!”
“Get the Osprey out of here!” Patrick shouted. He waved at Jon Masters and Kris Thompson to follow him. “Get him the hell away from the base!”
Wilhelm was shouting into his radio as well: “Shelters, shelters, shelters!” he cried. “Everyone into air raid shelters, now!”
As they ran for open ground, they could still see the CV-22 as it took off and headed south. At first its flight path looked totally normal—standard climb-out, gradual acceleration, smooth transition from vertical to turboprop flight. But moments later the Osprey banked hard left and dove for the ground, and they could hear the engines whine in protest as the big transport changed from turboprop to helicopter mode. It dodged left and right and made a low approach to a group of buildings in Tall Kayf, hoping to hide in the radar ground clutter.
But it was too late—the Turkish missiles were already in the air. The Turkish F-15Es had already locked up the CV-22 over a hundred miles away and had launched two Turkish-modified AIM-54 missiles—ironically nicknamed “Phoenix”—at the Osprey. Formerly serving with the U.S. Navy to provide long-range defense of an aircraft carrier battle group, the AIM-54 had been the mainstay of the U.S. Navy’s carrier-based air wings, capable of destroying massive formations of Russian bombers before they could get within range to launch antiship cruise missiles. After it was retired in 2004, the U.S. military’s inventory of its longest-range, hardest-hitting air-to-air missiles was put up for auction, and the Turkish air force snapped them up.
After launch, the Phoenix missiles climbed to an altitude of eighty thousand feet at a speed of almost five times the speed of sound and then began a dive toward the target area, guided by the Turkish F-15E’s powerful radar. Within a few seconds of impact, the AIM-54 activated its own terminal guidance radar to close in for the kill. One missile malfunctioned and self-destructed, but the second missile hit the CV-22 Osprey’s right rotor disk as the aircraft was maneuvering to land in a parking lot. The right engine exploded, sending the aircraft into a violent left spin for a few seconds before crashing to the ground, then flipping upside down from the force of the explosion.
Back at Nahla, the scene was complete mayhem. With the Command and Control Center already destroyed, the main targets for the Turkish bombers were the flight line and barracks. Every hangar, including the XC-57 Loser’s storage hangar and the makeshift morgue containing the remains of the fallen American and Iraqi soldiers, was hit by at least one two-thousand-pound Joint Direct Attack Munitions bomb, a satellite-guided upgrade to a conventional radar-delivered gravity bomb. The parking ramps and taxiways that had not been hit before by the Turks in their initial invasion were hit this time.
The soldiers at Nahla were on edge and ready for anything following their battle the night before, so when the air-raid siren went off, the men were out the barracks doors immediately and headed to shelters. A few soldiers stayed behind too long to collect weapons or personal items and were killed by the bombs, and a few other soldiers helping the wounded evacuate the building were caught in the open. Overall, casualties were light.
But the devastation was complete. Within minutes, most of Allied Air Base Nahla was destroyed.
THE SITUATION ROOM, THE WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON, D.C.
A SHORT TIME LATER
President Gardner hurried into the Situation Room, a high-tech conference room in the West Wing used for high-level national security meetings, and he took his place. “Take seats,” he said. “Someone talk to me, right now. What happened?”
“Turkey declared martial law and executed a number of air strikes throughout northern Iraq,” National Security Adviser Conrad Carlyle said. “The Turkish minister of defense, Cizek, says he was placed in charge of the military and ordered to launch a full-scale attack against the PKK and their supporters in Iraq and Turkey.” An electronic map of northern Iraq was displayed on the large wall-size computer monitor in the front of the room. “Twenty cities and towns were hit by fighter-bombers, including Kirkuk, Irbil, Dahuk, and Mosul. Three joint Iraqi-American military bases were struck in Irbil, Kirkuk, and near Mosul. Casualty reports are coming in now. The bases had just minutes of warning time.” He paused just long enough to draw the president’s attention to him fully, then added, “And the vice president’s aircraft is missing.”
“Missing?” the president shouted.
“The vice president took off for Baghdad just minutes before the attack took place,” Carlyle said. “The pilot was executing evasive maneuvers and looking for a place to make an emergency landing when they lost contact. The commander of Allied Air Base Nahla has organized a search and rescue team, but that base was hit hard and almost destroyed. It had already been hit last night by a Turkish air raid. An Air Force search and rescue team is being dispatched from Samarra but it’ll take a few hours to get there.”
“Good God,” the president breathed. “Get Hirsiz or Cizek or whoever’s really in charge in Ankara on the phone. I don’t want any more Turkish planes flying over Iraq—none! Where are the carriers? What can we get up there?”
“We have the Abraham Lincoln carrier battle group in the Persian Gulf,” chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Taylor Bain responded. “It’ll be a stretch because of the distance involved, but we can start setting up air patrols over Iraq with E-2 Hawkeye radar planes doing C4I and pairs of F/A-18 Hornet fighters in patrol orbits.”
“Do it,” the president ordered. “Keep them over Iraq unless they are attacked.” Secretary of Defense Miller Turner picked up his phone to issue the orders.
“Turkey has a very large air force, with a lot of surplus American warplanes and weapons,” Carlyle pointed out. “Some of them, like the F-15 Eagles, can be a match for the Hornet.”
“If Turkey wants to get into a shooting war with the United States, I’m ready to play,” Gardner said angrily. “What about land attack assets? Tomahawks?”
“The conventional sea-launched cruise missiles in the Persian Gulf are out of range,” Bain said. “We would have to move the ships and subs in the Mediterranean closer to get within range of the eastern Turkish air bases.”
“Any ships or subs in the Black Sea?”
“No submarines, per treaty,” Bain aid. “We have a single Surface Action Group on patrol in the Black Sea, also per treaty, and they do have T-LAMs, but they’re also the most vulnerable ships out there right now. We would have to assume that if the Turks want to fight, they’d attack that group first.”
“What else do we have?”
“We have some tactical air based in various places in Europe—Greece, Romania, Italy, Germany, and the U.K., but those wouldn’t be quick-strike options,” Bain said. “Our only other option is conventionally armed B-2 Spirit stealth bombers launched from Diego Garcia. We have six surviving planes ready to go.”
“Get them armed and ready,” the president said. “That’s all we have? Six?”
“Afraid so, Mr. President,” Bain said. “We have two XR-A9 Black Stallion space planes that can launch precision-guided weapons, and they can be armed and hitting targets within hours, and we also have a few conventionally armed intercontinental ballistic missiles that can hit targets in Turkey quickly.”
“Get them briefed and ready, too,” Gardner said. “I d
on’t know what Ankara has in mind, or if they even have a mind, but if they want to take us on, I want everything ready to go.”
The phone beside White House chief of staff Walter Kordus blinked, and he picked it up. “Turkish prime minister Ays¸e Akas for you, sir.”
The president picked up the phone immediately. “Prime Minister Akas, this is President Gardner. What in hell is going on out there? Twelve hours ago you announced a cease-fire. Now you’ve attacked three American military bases! Are you out of your minds?”
“I’m afraid Minister of National Defense Cizek and General Abdullah Guzlev may be, Mr. President,” she said. “Last night they arrested President Hirsiz, engineered a military coup d’état, and took over the Presidential Palace. They were unhappy about the president’s decision to pull back to the border before the PKK and their supporters were eliminated.”
“So why attack American bases?”
“Retaliation for the defeat near Tall Kayf,” Akas said. “Two thousand Turks were killed or wounded in that battle. Cizek and the generals thought it was cowardly to retreat to the border after such a loss.”
“Are you still prime minister, Mrs. Akas?”
“No, I am not,” Akas said. “I was allowed use of my cellular telephone, which I am sure is being monitored, but I am not free to travel or go to my office. Under the state of emergency, the National Assembly has been dismissed. Cizek and the generals are in charge.”
“I want to speak with them immediately,” Gardner said. “If you can get Cizek a message, tell him that the United States is going to set up a no-fly zone in northern Iraq, and I warn them not to violate it or try to attack any of our planes, or we will consider it an act of war and retaliate immediately. We are readying all of our military resources and will respond with everything we have. Is that clear?”
“It is clear to me, Mr. President,” Akas said, “but I do not know if it will be seen by Cizek as anything more than a clear threat of imminent attack. Are you sure you wish me to deliver this message, sir?”
“I don’t have any intention of attacking Turkey unless they violate Iraqi airspace again,” Gardner said. “All of our other responses will be by other means. But if Turkey intends to fight, we’ll give them a fight.” And he hung up.
OUTSIDE TALL KAYF, IRAQ
A SHORT TIME LATER
The two Humvees rushed to the scene of the CV-22 crash and immediately surrounded the area with security forces while Kris Thompson and a medic rushed to the tilt-rotor aircraft. Fortunately the Osprey’s fire suppression system had stopped a major fire, and Iraqi citizens put out the others. They found the vice president, the flight crew, and a Secret Service agent being treated by a local doctor, with another Secret Service agent covered by a rug. “Thank God you’re alive, sir,” Kris said.
“Thanks to these people,” Ken Phoenix said. “If they hadn’t helped, we probably would’ve all been killed in the fire. What’s happened?”
“The Turks bombed the base—again,” Kris said. “Pretty much destroyed it this time. A few casualties; we got just enough warning. The Turks are carrying out bombing raids all over northern Iraq.”
“So much for the cease-fire—if there ever was one,” Phoenix said.
“We’re setting up an evacuation center here in town,” Kris said. “The colonel plans to join up with friendly forces in Mosul. I’ll get you out of here and then we’ll figure out a way to get you to Baghdad.”
Ten minutes later, they met up with some of the survivors from Nahla, including Patrick McLanahan, Hunter Noble, Jon Masters, and a handful of contractors and soldiers, most of them injured. “Glad you made it, Mr. Vice President,” Patrick said.
“Where’s the colonel?”
“Supervising the evacuation,” Patrick said. “He’s going to send us down to Mosul and await a convoy out. Just about every building that was still standing after last night isn’t standing any longer.”
“Your plane, the XC-57?”
“They got all the hangars, even the one we were using as the morgue.”
Ken Phoenix motioned Patrick to walk with him, and they stepped away from the others. Phoenix reached into his pocket and pulled out the plastic carrying case containing the Secure Digital card Patrick had given him. “What about this?” he asked. “Can we still do this?”
Patrick’s eyes widened. He thought quickly, and his head began to nod. “We won’t have the netrusion systems running,” he said, “and I’ll have to check the status of the Lancers in the UAE—”
“Find a phone and do it,” Phoenix said. “I’m going to talk with the president.”
THE PRESIDENTIAL PALACE, ÇANCAYA, ANKARA, TURKEY
A SHORT TIME LATER
“He said what?” Hasan Cizek shouted. “Is Gardner threatening war with Turkey?”
“What did you expect him to say, Hasan?” Turkish Prime Minister Ays¸e Akas asked. With them was former Turkish chief of the general staff General Abdullah Guzlev. “You killed a lot of Americans today, after Turkey declared a cease-fire! Did you expect him to say ‘I understand’ or ‘It’s no worry’?”
“What I did was retaliation for what he, his robots, and his Iraqi goons did to my troops!” Cizek cried. “They killed thousands!”
“Calm yourself, Hasan,” Akas said. “The president said he’s going to set up a no-fly zone in northern Iraq, and he doesn’t want you to cross it. If you try, he’ll consider it an act of war.”
“He’s threatening war with Turkey? Is he crazy, or just suffering from delusions of grandeur? He doesn’t have enough forces in this part of the world to take on Turkey!”
“Does he plan to use nuclear weapons against us?” Guzlev asked.
“Hasan, be quiet and think,” Akas said. “We’re talking about the United States of America. They may be less strong because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but they are still the most powerful military machine in the world. You may be able to get away with attacking two or three bases in Iraq, but you can’t withstand the full force of their military power. They can flatten this building a hundred different ways in the blink of an eye. You know this. Why are you denying it?”
“I’m not denying it, but I’m not backing away from my mission until it’s completed,” Cizek said. “The United States will have to use their vaunted military power to stop me.” He paused to think for a moment, then said to Guzlev: “The quickest way he can set up a no-fly zone in northern Iraq is with carrier-based aircraft flying out of the Persian Gulf.”
“Yes,” Guzlev said. “The Mediterranean and bases in Europe are too far.”
“How long?”
“Fighters, tankers, radar planes—it’ll take a few hours to get them briefed and ready to deploy, maybe longer, then at least an hour or two to fly to northern Iraq,” Guzlev said.
“That means we have only a few hours, maybe five or six, to act. Can we do it?”
“About half the force is just recovering at Diyarbakir and Malatya,” Guzlev said, checking his watch. “The other half is being armed. If there are no delays or accidents…yes, I think we can have them airborne again in five or six hours.”
“What do you intend to do?” Akas asked.
“I’m not going to violate the American no-fly zone; I’ll just be sure to have my tasks completed before they set it up,” Cizek said. To Guzlev: “I want every available plane loaded and launched to attack the final target sets in Irbil, Kirkuk, and Mosul. Every known or suspected PKK and peshmerga base, every known PKK supporter, and every Iraqi and American military base that might threaten Turkish occupation of Iraq gets destroyed as soon as possible.”
OVER THE PACIFIC OCEAN, THREE HUNDRED MILES WEST OF LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
A SHORT TIME LATER
“Stand by for release,” the mission commander said. He was aboard a Sky Masters Inc. Boeing DC-10 carrier aircraft, high above the Pacific Ocean. “Let’s make this a good one, and I’ll buy the first round.”
The aircraft, initially built by
McDonnell Douglas Aircraft before that company was purchased by Boeing, was highly modified for many purposes, including aerial refueling and instrument tests, but its major modification gave it the ability to launch satellite boosters into space. The booster, called ALARM or Air Launched Alert Response Missile, resembled a large cruise missile. It had three solid rocket motors and folding wings to give it lift while in the atmosphere. ALARM, in effect, used the DC-10 as its first stage engine.
The ALARM boosters carried four satellites internally. The satellites, called NIRTSats, or Need It Right This Second Satellites, were washing-machine-size multipurpose reconnaissance satellites designed to stay in orbit for less than a month; they carried very little maneuvering fuel and were meant to stay in one set orbit, with only a few minor orbit changes or realignments allowed. These satellites were being placed into orbit to serve field commanders in Afghanistan.
“Pretty friggin’ amazing,” the mission commander, a U.S. Air Force major from the Thirtieth Space Wing at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, said. “Less than twelve hours ago I got the call to launch this constellation. Now, we’re about to do it. Normally it takes the Air Force a week to do something like this.”
“That’s why you should just call on us from now on,” the aircraft commander, a civilian working for Sky Masters Inc., said proudly.
“Yeah, but you guys are too expensive.”
“You want the job done fast and right, you gotta pay for the best,” the pilot said. “Besides, it’s not your money, it’s the Air Force’s.”
“Well, however you guys do it and however much we’re paying you, it’s worth it,” the mission commander said.
“We aim to please,” the pilot said. He flipped a page on his multifunction display when he received a blinking message annunciation, read the incoming satellite message, cleared it back to the main navigation page, switched his intercom to “private,” and spoke.
