Sky Masters

by Dale Brown

  nuclear deterrent force was something that was not to be advertised or

  bragged about. Certainly, the critics thought, SAC's twenty thousand

  aircrew members had little to boast about and nothing to look forward to

  for the next century-the fifty B-2s and one hundred rail-garrisoned

  Peacekeeper ICBMs planned to be operational by then might very well be

  the only nuclear-armed weapons in SAC's inventory. Virtually all of the

  B-52s, B-1B bombers, cruise missiles, and reconnaissance aircraft were

  rumored to be headed for conventionally armed tactical-support roles, in

  the inactive reserves-or, worse, in the boneyard. It was a winding-down

  period for SAC, which created questions about readiness, training, and

  motivation. That's where Jarrel's Strategic Warfare Center School, and

  the Air Battle Force, came in. "Seats, " General Cal Jarrel said in a

  loud voice as he made his way to the stage. The aircrew members in the

  room took their seats and restlessly murmured comments among themselves

  as Jarrel stepped up to the podium. He was there to give the welcoming

  speech to a new crop of aircrew members that were to begin an intensive

  three-week course on strategic air combat-SAC's "graduate school" on how

  to fly and fight. As was the case for the past year since becoming

  director of the Strategic Warfare Center, he had to convince each and

  every one of these men and women of the importance of what they were

  about to learn-and, in a very real sense, to convince the rest of the

  country and perhaps himself as well. Lieutenant Colonel McLanahan

  listened to General Jarrel's comments, sitting on the edge of his

  auditorium seat. All around him were stealth bomber crews, who, like

  him, were there to attend the Strategic Warfare Center school. When

  General Jarrel acknowledged the B-2 crews in his opening remarks, a

  ripple of applause-and a few Bronx cheers-passed over the crowd for the

  B-2 crews. This is where I belong, McLanahan thought: in a flight suit,

  getting briefed with these other crew dogs. He had, he realized, been

  isolated at Dreamland far too long. Sure, he was one of the most

  dedicated and successful aircrew members and weapon-systems project

  managers in the entire military. But where had that gotten him? Flying

  a battle-scarred B-52 fully renovated with modern hardware deep into

  Soviet airspace to knock out Russia's state-of-the-art armaments? It

  should have been the most rewarding mission in his career. Instead it

  had landed him at HAWC, where he'd been ever since. But flying was in

  his blood. McLanahan knew the score-because of the highly classified

  nature of his work he'd probably never get beyond 0-6 (Colonel), or if

  he was lucky, 0-7 (Brigadier-General). But at least they were letting

  him fly a dream plane. The only problem was he couldn't tell anyone

  about it. His cover story was that he was "observing" the school for

  the Pentagon. Still . . . he was here. And the real excitement was

  coming. . General Jarrel was well into his talk. "SAC is being tasked

  with much more than delivering nuclear weapons-we are being tasked with

  providing many different elements of support for a wide variety of

  conflict scenarios, " Jarrel went on, speaking without a script and from

  his heart as well as from the numerous times he'd given this speech.

  "The way we do it is through the Air Battle Force, " Jarrel continued.

  "From this moment on, you are not members of any bomb squadron, or

  fighter squadron, or airlift group-you are members of the First Air

  Battle Wing. You will learn to fly and fight as a team. Each of you

  will have knowledge of not only his or her own capabilities, but those

  of your colleagues. The Air Battle Force marks the beginning of the

  first truly integrated strike force-several different weapon systems,

  several different tactical missions, training, deploying, and fighting

  together as one. "Because the Air Battle Force concept is new and not

  yet fully operational, we have to disband each task force class and

  return you to your home units. When you leave this Center, you will

  still belong to the Air Battle Force, and you are expected to continue

  your studies and perfect your combat skills from within your own units.

  If a crisis should develop, you can be brought back here to be placed

  back within the Air Battle Force system, ready to form the Second or

  Third Air Battle Wings. Eventually, Air Battle Wings will be formed on

  a fulltime basis for extended tours." Jarrel talked for several more

  minutes, giving the history of the Strategic Warfare Center's mission,

  which since 1989 had conducted strategic combat training exercises

  through sorties that were spread over three thousand miles of low- and

  highaltitude military training routes over nine Midwestern states. When

  he had finished, he said, "All right, ladies and gentlemen, get out

  there and show us how a strategic battle can be fought by America's best

  and brightest!" The auditorium erupted in cheers, and somewhere in the

  middle of the crowd, Patrick McLanahan was cheering the loudest. Late

  one night a couple of days after General Jarrel's Strategic Warfare

  Training Program was under way, Brigadier General John Ormack, who had

  come with Cobb, McLanahan, the EB-52 and B-2 bombers, and the rest of

  the support crew from HAWC, found Patrick McLanahan sitting in the

  cockpit of his Black Knight. External power and air had been hooked up,

  and McLanahan was reclining in the mission commander's seat with a

  computer-generated chart of the Strategic Training Range Complex on the

  three-by-two-foot Super Multi Function Display before him. Patrick had

  a headset on and was issuing commands to the B-2's sophisticated

  voice-recognition computer; he was so engrossed in his work-or so deep

  in daydream, Ormack couldn't quite tell which-that the HAWC vice

  commander was able to spend a few moments watching his junior chief

  officer from just behind the pilot's seat. The guy had always been like

  this, Ormack remembered-a little spacy, quiet, introverted, always

  preferring to work alone even though it was a genuine pleasure being

  around him and he seemed to enjoy working with others. He had the

  ability to tune out all sound and activity around him and to focus all

  his attention and brainpower on the matter at hand, whether that was a

  mission-planning chart, a bomb run at Mach one and a hundred feet off

  the ground, or a Voltron cartoon on television. But ever since arriving

  here at Ellsworth, McLanahan had become even more hardworking, even more

  focused, even more tuned out-to everything else but the task at hand,

  which was completing the curriculum at the Strategic Warfare Center and

  the Air Battle Force with the highest possible grade. Even though

  McLanahan himself was not being "graded" because the HAWC crews were not

  official participants, he was slamming away at the session as if he were

  a young captain getting ready to meet a promotion board. It was hard to

  tell if Patrick was working this hard because he enjoyed it or because

  he was trying to prove to himself and others that he could still do the

  job.
. But that was Patrick McLanahan. Ormack stepped over the center

  console and into the leftside pilot's seat. McLanahan noticed him,

  straightened himself up in his seat, and slid the headsets off. "Hey,

  sir, " McLanahan greeted him. "What brings you here this evening?"

  "Looking for you, " Ormack said. He motioned to the SMFD. "Route

  study?"

  "A little mission planning with the PACER SKY processor, " McLanahan

  said. "I fed the STRC attack route through the system to see what it

  might come up with, and it turns out if we attack this target here from

  the west instead of from the northeast, the MUTES in Powder River MOA

  site won't see us for an extra twenty-one seconds. We've got to gain

  sixty seconds after the Baker bomb site to get the extra time to get

  around to the west, so we'll lose a few points on timing, but if this

  works we'll gain even more points on bomber defense." He shook his head

  as he flipped through the computer-generated graphics on the big screen.

  "The rest of the crews in the Air Battle Force would kill me if they

  knew I had something like PACER SKY doing my mission planning." "That

  reminds me, " Ormack said. "General Elliott got a tasking for NIRTSat

  time for a Joint Chiefs surveillance operation. Something to do with

  what's going on in the Philippines. You might get tapped to show your

  stuff for the J-staff."

  "Fine. I'll water their eyes. "The guard said you've been up here for

  three hours working on this, " Ormack said. "You spent three hours just

  to save twenty seconds on one bomb run?" "Twenty seconds-and maybe I

  take down a target without getting 'shot' at." He motioned to the SMFD

  and issued a command, which caused the scene to go into motion. A B-2

  symbol on the bottom of the screen began reading along an undulating

  ribbon over low hills and dry valleys. Dead ahead was a small pyramid

  symbol of a target complex-small "signposts' on the ribbon marked off

  seconds and miles to go to weapon release. Off to the right of the

  screen, a yellow dome suddenly appeared. "There's the threat site at

  one o'clock, but this hillock blocks me out from the west-whoever

  surveyed the site for positioning this MUTES site obviously didn't think

  crews would deviate this far west." The computerized mission "preview"

  continued as the yellow dome began to grow, eventually engulfing the B-2

  bomber icon and turning red. McLanahan pointed to a countdown readout.

  "Bingo-I release weapons ten seconds after I come under lethal range of

  the MUTES site. If I carry antiradar missiles, I can pick him off right

  now, or I just turn westbound around the hillock to escape. Ormack

  nodded in fascination at the presentation, but he was more interested in

  studying McLanahan than watching the computer. "There's quite a party at

  the 0-Club, Patrick, " he said. "This is your last night of partying

  before the weekend, and a lot of your old cronies from Ford Air Force

  Base asked about you. Why don't you knock off and join us?" McLanahan

  shrugged and began reconfiguring the SMFD for another replay. "Crew

  rest starts in about an hour . "One beer won't hurt. I'll buy."

  McLanahan hesitated, then glanced at Ormack and shook his head. "I

  don't think so, sir... "Something wrong, Patrick? Something you're not

  telling me?"

  "No . . . nothing's wrong." Patrick hesitated, then issued voice

  commands to the computer to shut down the system. "I just. . . I

  don't really feel part of them, you know?" "No, I don't."

  "These guys are the real crew dogs, the real aviators, " Patrick said.

  "They're young, they're talented, they're so cocky they think they can

  take on the whole world."

  "Just like you were when I first met you, " Ormack said with a laugh.

  "We used to think you had an attitude, but that was before we knew how

  good you really were." He looked at McLanahan with a hint of concern.

  "You were pretty excited about coming to the Strategic Warfare Center,

  about getting back to the 'real world' . "But I'm not back, " Patrick

  said. "I'm farther from them than I ever thought I'd be. I feel like

  I've abandoned them. I feel like I should be out there pulling a crew

  or running a bomb-nav shop, but instead I'm.. ." He shrugged again,

  then concluded, "Like I'm playing around with gadgets that probably

  won't have anything to do with the 'real world'. "That's not what you're

  down about, " Ormack said. "I know you better than that. You're down

  because you somehow don't think you deserve what you've got. I see you

  around your buddies out there: they're old captains or majors, and

  you're a lieutenant colonel; they're still on line crews, flying dawn

  patrols and red eyes and pulling alert, doing the same thing they did

  ten years ago, while you're flying starships that most of those guys

  will never see in their careers, let alone flythey're talking about

  their last bomb-competition mission or their last Operational Readiness

  Inspection, while your job is so classified that you can't talk about it

  at all. You're down because you can't share what you have with them, so

  you hole yourself up in here thinking that maybe you don't really have

  what it takes to be a good crew dog. "Patrick, you're where you are

  because you're the best. You did more than be chosen for a job: you

  excelled, you never gave up, you survived, and you saved others. Then

  when we stuck you in Dreamland to keep you quiet, you didn't just

  vegetate until completing your twenty years-you excelled again and made

  yourself invaluable to the organization. "You deserve what you have. You

  earned it. You should go out and enjoy it. And you should also buy

  your boss a beer before he drags your ass out of this cockpit. Now move

  it, Colonel." NEAR PHU QUI ISLAND, IN THE SPRATLY ISLAND CHAIN SOUTH

  CHINA SEA THURSDAY, 22 SEPTEMBER 1994, 2344 HOURS LOCAL The number-two

  task force of Admiral Yin Po L'un's Spratly Island flotilla was again

  cruising within radar range of Phu Qui Island, the large rock and coral

  formation in the disputed neutral zone between the Philippine-occupied

  islands to the north and the Chinese-held islands to the south. Unlike

  the more powerful ten-ship task force that surrounded Admiral Yin's

  flagship, this one had only four ships-two Hainan-class patrol boats, a

  Lienyun-class minesweeper, and a Huangfen-class fast attack missile

  craft, the Chagda, which acted as the command vessel for this faster,

  shallow-draft patrol group. Commander Chow Ti U, skipper of the Chagda,

  felt uneasy with his latest series of orders. It had been over three

  months since the attack on the Philippine oil-drilling barge, and the

  tension in the region had been escalating on a weekly basis. Now it was

  so thick one could cut it with a knife-and much of the heightened

  tensions could be directly attributed to the way Admiral Yin had handled

  the entire affair. Despite what was originally and officially reported,

  Yin had departed the area after attacking the oil barges; his contention

  that the seas were too rough to begin rescue operations did not sit well

  with anyone. When the weather cleared, it was found that Yin had
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  steamed back to the Chinese side of the neutral zone, well away from Phu

  Qui Island-again, his contention that he was concerned about retaliatory

  attacks from Philippine warships did not explain why he did not offer to

  assist in rescue operations. Chow would never say so to anyone, but

  Yin's actions could be characterized as unprofessional, exhibiting a

  total disregard for the rules of naval warfare, international law, and

  common decency between sailors. Chow felt that the Admiral had every

  right to confront the illegally placed oil-drilling rig, and he was well

  within his responsibilities when he returned fire-even such devastating

  return fire as he used. But to sim ply slink away from the area without

  offering any help or without radioing for help was very suspicious.

  Since then, while there'd been no skirmishes, there had been a few close

  calls. Everyone was on edge, looking, waiting, wondering. ... Chow and

  his fellow Chinese crewmen privately felt it was only a matter of time

  before something else happened, and after witnessing the way Admiral Yin

  had handled the first skirmish, everyone was skittish about how he would

  proceed in an escalated conflict. "Range to Phu Qui Island, navigator, "

  Chow called out. His crewmen were obviously keeping very close track

  themselves, for the answer was almost instantaneous: "Sir... we are

  presently twenty-five kilometers southwest of Phu Qui Island. We will

  be in radar range within minutes."

  "Very well, " Chow grunted. Twenty-five kilometers-they were right on

  the edge of the neutral zone-perhaps inside it by no more than a

  kilometer. Unlike Admiral Yin, Chow had no intention of tempting fate

  by openly cruising the neutral zone. Pearson Reef was indisputably the

  property of the People's Republic of China, so he would stay close to

  it. His radar could survey enough of the neutral zone to check for any

  other intruders. Still... he was uneasy. Perhaps because Admiral Yin

  chose not to continue operating his larger, more powerful task force

  along the border as before-but had instead chosen to operate farther

  south, well in undisputed Chinese waters. The first explanation was, of

  course, that Yin had been ordered to keep away from the neutral zone,