Aleyev applied the brakes, coasting to a halt beside another Sukhoi Su-35S waiting on the adjacent runway, while ahead, another fighter completed final preparations for takeoff. Although Aleyev’s Su-35S was one of Russia’s most advanced multi-role fighters, designed to engage air, land, and sea targets, Aleyev’s aircraft was armed with ten R-77-1 active-radar homing missiles tonight. Like the jet beside him and the one in front, they were configured for air-to-air combat, should the American carrier strike groups in the Arabian Sea attack.
The engines of the Su-35S in front of Aleyev flared, and the aircraft accelerated down the runway. As the jet beside Aleyev pulled forward, next in line for takeoff in the alternating sequence, a bright flash at the end of Aleyev’s runway caught his attention. The Su-35S taking off disintegrated in an orange fireball, and chunks of runway and aircraft rained down on the air base.
The Su-35S beside Aleyev began streaking down its runway and Aleyev followed suit, engaging both afterburners as another explosion rocked the base. As his fighter accelerated to takeoff speed, a crater opened up just ahead of the fighter on the adjacent runway and the jet disappeared into the roiling orange-and-black cloud, with only bits and pieces of the aircraft emerging on the other side.
Another explosion bathed Aleyev’s cockpit in an orange hue, leaving a crater in his runway only fifty meters ahead. He was below takeoff speed but had no choice; he pulled back on his stick when he reached the crater. His wheels cleared the far edge with only a foot to spare, and Aleyev climbed into the night sky as additional bombs hit the air base, the explosions illuminating the landscape below in a pulsating orange glow.
As he rose into the darkness, Aleyev checked his instrumentation. Only eighteen aircraft from his cycle, launching from various bases across Iran, had made it airborne. There were another hundred above the Sea of Oman, and although they’d be running low on fuel, there were several tankers aloft. Aleyev turned southeast with a grim determination. With the assistance of the missile batteries on the Iranian coast, they would teach the Americans a lesson they would not soon forget.
69
ARABIAN SEA
Lieutenant Commander Bill Houston cruised at twelve thousand feet, headed northwest toward the Gulf of Oman, where the Russian surface combatants awaited. Houston and the other seventeen Super Hornets in Truman’s first cycle were divided into nine two-fighter packages, with each package assigned a different target. At this point in their approach, the eighteen fighters were strung out side by side at half-mile intervals, with an EA-18G Growler on each side of the formation, jamming incoming missiles and aircraft radars.
Three more waves of aircraft were headed northwest, one from each of the other carriers, forming a diamond formation with Truman’s cycle in the lead. The Russian surface combatants were arranged in a single task force resembling a two-carrier strike group, with the aircraft carrier Kuznetsov and the battle cruiser Pyotr Velikiy in the center.
Although the four waves of American fighters had been tasked with sinking the Russian surface ships, they would have to deal with the Russian combat air patrol first. The Super Hornets in his cycle were carrying a mixed load: air-to-surface missiles for the ships and air-to-air missiles for the tactical fighters. The Russian ships, aircraft, and missile batteries ashore would fire a bevy of missiles against the incoming American fighters, and defending against them would be challenging. Houston would have to rely on chaff, infrared decoys, and his organic jammers, as well as the more powerful electronic countermeasures aboard the accompanying Growlers.
Houston’s Radar Warning Receiver activated, its audible warning pulling his attention to the display. E-2C Hawkeye early warning aircraft, operating high above and to the rear, were relaying their contacts to the inbound fighters. Missiles had appeared over the Iranian coast, headed Houston’s way on an intercept course. Each missile was represented by a red 6, which indicated they were long-range 40N6 surface-to-air missiles fired by Russian mobile missile batteries. The 40N6 was designed to kill high-value targets, able to defeat EA-18G jamming.
There were four waves of outbound missiles, each wave headed toward a cycle of American fighters. In response to the incoming threat, the pilots from all four carriers did as they had been instructed to do. They banked hard left and dropped to the deck, skimming just above the ocean surface as they streaked away from the missiles.
In layman parlance, Houston and his fellow pilots turned and ran.
70
AIEA, HAWAII
In the fall of 1941, Takeo Yoshikawa stood in the grassy knolls of Aiea Heights overlooking Pearl Harbor and took notes. Assigned to the Japanese consulate in Honolulu, Yoshikawa left the consulate around 10 a.m. each day, returning to his office after lunch to review the product of his reconnaissance. In mid-November, he answered ninety-seven questions from Japan’s Foreign Ministry, including:
On what day of the week would the most ships be in Pearl Harbor on normal occasions?
Answer: Sunday.
In the early morning hours of Sunday, December 7, 1941, his efforts culminated in a succinct message sent to Vice Admiral Chūichi Nagumo, which he read in the darkened Bridge of the Japanese heavy aircraft carrier Akagi:
Vessels moored in harbor: 9 battleships, 3 class B cruisers, 3 seaplane tenders, 17 destroyers.
* * *
In the foothills of Aiea, not far from where Yoshikawa stood while surveying Pearl Harbor, is Camp H. M. Smith, home to the United States Pacific Command. Within Camp Smith, accessing satellite surveillance is the Cruise Missile Support Activity, Pacific, providing precision targeting, route planning, and strike management for Tomahawk cruise missile missions. Today, in the early morning hours, the men and women at their workstations were busy reviewing the product of their reconnaissance.
Red icons had populated their displays, and each mission planner, assigned a small section of Iran’s southern coast, was busy transmitting GPS coordinates. Thirty minutes earlier, three guided missile submarines, each loaded with a full complement of 154 Tomahawk missiles, had launched a fraction of their ordnance. However, the eighty missiles had been launched without destination coordinates. The missiles were circling just above the surface of the Arabian Sea, not far from the Iranian coast, waiting.
The Tomahawk missiles fired by the three guided missile submarines were Block IV Tactical Tomahawks, or TacToms, which could loiter after launch, doing doughnuts in the air while awaiting targeting information. Although Tomahawk missiles were extremely accurate, it took hours for launch orders to be generated, transmitted, and loaded aboard older variants prior to firing. During that time, enemy units could reposition, resulting in the Tomahawk destroying a vacant building or deserted patch of dirt. The TacTom missile overcame this deficit, already launched and loitering nearby while it waited for its final GPS coordinate, reducing the time between target identification and ordnance-on-target from hours to mere minutes.
The Tomahawk mission planners were busy sending coordinates of the Russian missile batteries that had fired on the incoming waves of F/A-18 fighters, which had been used as bait. They worked quickly, hoping each TacTom reached its target before the missile battery repositioned. For those that moved or hadn’t opened fire yet, the mission planners had several hundred more TacToms at their disposal.
71
MOSCOW
President Yuri Kalinin, accompanied by General Sergei Andropov, his chief of the general staff and senior military advisor, traveled briskly down the corridor, entering the Operations Center in the Kremlin basement. There was an eerie silence within, as the men and women monitored the red and blue symbols on their screens, with blue ones appearing at a steady rate while red ones disappeared.
The Operations Officer on duty greeted President Kalinin, then briefed him on America’s assault on Russian forces. The runways and hangars of every Iranian base housing Russian tactical aircraft had been destroyed, and they’d lost two-thirds of their mobile missile batteries on the Iranian coast.
Kalinin could barely contain his fury, both at the United States and at his senior military aide. General Andropov had assured him there would be no war between Russia and the United States. Their blackmail plan, placing a stranglehold on Western Europe’s natural resources, would restrain them. His thoughts shifted to his discussion with Christine O’Connor on the Kremlin Senate balcony, where he’d explained that Americans didn’t understand Russians. Now, it was painfully clear that Russians didn’t understand Americans either. They were cutting the throats of their allies; Kalinin would destroy their oil and natural gas pipelines and their economies would sputter, throwing their countries into chaos.
Perhaps the Americans didn’t believe him and were calling his bluff. He turned to his chief of the general staff.
“Destroy several pipelines and pumping stations, including America’s Alaskan oil pipeline. That should get their attention.”
72
GULF OF OMAN
Twenty minutes earlier, as a wave of Russian missiles surged from the Iranian coast, Houston and the other F/A-18 pilots had turned tail and run, increasing speed as they dropped close to the ocean waves. The tactic worked well. They had outrun the first barrage of missiles while the TacToms destroyed two-thirds of the Russian missile launchers. Another wave of Tactical Tomahawks was inbound, with mission planners in Hawaii assigning their targets as more Russian missile batteries revealed their locations.
With the majority of the shore-based missile batteries destroyed, Houston and the other pilots turned back toward the Russian surface ships. However, over one hundred Russian aircraft lay ahead, forming a protective ring just beyond the range of the F/A-18s’ anti-ship missiles. This time, however, Houston and his fellow pilots weren’t going to run.
Truman’s first cycle of aircraft slowed and the other three cycles pulled alongside, forming a two-level front of seventy-two F/A-18s interspersed with eight electronic jamming Growlers. The Super Hornets needed to get close enough to the Russian surface combatants to launch their AGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missiles. With only nineteen surface combatants to destroy, Houston’s fighter was loaded with a single Harpoon, with the other ten hardpoints carrying anti-air missiles. Making it through the Russian fighters was the challenge.
When the Russian aircraft were within range of his radar-homing AMRAAM anti-air missiles, Houston and the other F/A-18 pilots fired a two-missile volley, knowing the Russian pilots were doing the same, like two armies of archers shooting guided arrows at each other. Houston watched his missiles close on the Russian jets while his Radar Warning Receiver alerted, displaying incoming air-to-air missiles. He fired a second volley, keeping two AMRAAMs and four Sidewinder infrared-seeking missiles in reserve.
The Russians also fired a second volley, and as the first wave of missiles closed on the F/A-18 formation, Houston focused on avoiding them. He was fortunate, flying beside one of the EA-18G Growlers. As the missiles approached, his Radar Warning Receiver indicated the missiles had failed to lock on to his aircraft. The Growler’s electronic jamming worked well. Just in case, Houston broke left as other Super Hornets took evasive action. As the first wave of missiles passed by, pinpricks of light illuminated the darkness. After checking his radar display, Houston determined they’d lost six aircraft.
The next wave of missiles approached quickly, and Houston’s Radar Warning Receiver told him the missiles had radar-seeking heads and that at least one had locked on to his aircraft. Right before the missile arrived, Houston dispensed a burst of chaff, then broke right. His jet veered out of the way as the missile headed toward the chaff, attracted by the cloud of aluminum-coated glass fibers.
After verifying the missile continued straight ahead instead of turning back toward his aircraft, Houston examined his display again. Another five aircraft lost. Still, there were sixty-one Super Hornets remaining, and a quick scan told Houston their AMRAAM missiles had performed well, destroying twenty-two Russian fighters. The odds were starting to even, but Houston and his fellow pilots were still outnumbered.
The two formations of aircraft closed on each other, and had it been daylight, they’d have been within visual range. Houston had several targets to choose from, and after identifying a gap he’d try to slip through, he targeted the two nearest fighters with his remaining AMRAAM missiles. Houston kicked in his afterburners, increasing speed.
73
USS HARRY S. TRUMAN
Inside the aircraft carrier’s Combat Direction Center, the blue glow from the consoles illuminated Captain Brent Sites’s face as he studied the displays on the Video Wall. The left monitor was zoomed out to a bird’s-eye view of the Indian Ocean, displaying the Russian forces in the Gulf of Oman and American units in the Arabian Sea. Minutes earlier, blue inverted U’s had appeared beside the aircraft carriers as they launched their air wings, and the first cycle of eighty aircraft had sped northwest toward the Russian battle group.
As the first cycle approached the Russian combat air patrol, Sites listened to the calm, monotone reports from the strike controllers as the casualties mounted.
“Loss of alpha-two-one.”
“Loss of charlie-four-two.”
The opposing waves of aircraft finally met and the display became a jumbled mosaic of shifting red and blue icons, the concentration of both colors growing gradually thinner.
The blue icons broke through the red barrier and continued toward the Russian surface combatants while the red icons regrouped, preparing for the assault of another blue wave; the second cycle of American aircraft was approaching. As the first wave closed on the Russian surface ships, surface-to-air missiles streaked from the combatants, with the missiles reaching the F/A-18s before their Harpoons were within range. The blood drained from Sites’s face as two dozen blue icons disappeared from his display.
The surviving F/A-18s launched their Harpoons, then turned away, racing back to their carriers. Thankfully, the Russian tactical fighters were about to engage the next incoming wave of F/A-18s, and given that the outbound aircraft had expended most, if not all, of their weapons, they focused on the approaching, fully armed aircraft.
The second wave of eighty FA-18s and EA-18G Growlers penetrated the Russian combat air patrol with noticeably fewer losses, but they still paid their dues when the Russian surface combatants engaged. The longer-range Russian missiles inflicted heavy casualties, but several dozen Harpoons streaked toward the Russian battle group.
Captain Sites brought up satellite reconnaissance on the right screen of the Video Wall, displaying an infrared picture of the nighttime scene. Bright flares erupted as the second wave of Harpoons hit their mark, and when the flashes faded, Sites counted thirteen Russian combatants on fire. He couldn’t tell if they were out of commission, but they had at least been damaged, hopefully impairing their ability to defend themselves against the next wave of aircraft. The American battle plan was pretty much a wash-rinse-repeat process, with each cycle of aircraft attacking the Russian surface ships, returning to their carriers to refuel and rearm, then attacking again.
As Sites studied the satellite image, the picture deteriorated into a haze of gray-and-black static. Sites selected another satellite feed and got the same result. The Russians were jamming the American reconnaissance satellites.
The first wave of fighters returned to their carriers and Captain Sites tallied the losses: thirty-three of the eighty aircraft had been shot down. The losses were heavy, but they could trade a few aircraft for each surface combatant sunk. Plus, the American losses would decrease with each successive attack, since the Russian combat air patrol, comprising mostly land-based fighters, now had nowhere to rearm due to the destruc
tion of all nearby Iranian air bases. Kuznetsov was the only facility in the area that could refuel and rearm aircraft, which made her a priority for destruction.
Although thirteen Russian surface combatants had been hit, Kuznetsov and Pyotr Velikiy remained untouched. It was only a matter of time, however, before all of the Russian surface combatants were reduced to burning hulks.
Assuming, of course, the Russian submarines were kept at arm’s length. Sites studied the display, searching for the forty-eight Russian attack and guided missile submarines. There were no red U-shaped icons, representing hostile submarines, on the display.
So far, so good.
74
USS HARTFORD
Commander Dave Thames, standing on the Conn between the two lowered periscopes, surveyed his men in the Control Room. They were at Battle Stations and every console was manned, with supervisors standing behind them. Free to roam the Control Room was Thames’s Executive Officer, Lieutenant Commander Joe White, in charge of the Fire Control Tracking Party. The waterspace around Hartford had been quiet thus far, with Sonar reporting no submerged contacts.
USS Hartford, a Los Angeles class submarine, was in the middle of its ten-mile-wide by twenty-mile-long operating area, patrolling slowly side to side, giving Hartford’s towed array a clear view of the northern end of its operating area. With only twenty submarines to protect the four-carrier task force and ample ocean for the Russian submarines to do an end-around, the U.S. fast attacks were arranged in a single line of defense wrapping around both flanks of the task force formation, with Hartford assigned to one of the northern sectors. The battle had started an hour ago, and as Thames wondered how long it would take the Russian submarines to begin their assault, his thoughts were interrupted by a report from Sonar.
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