by Dale Brown
report the position of any attackers-and now the sites were off the air,
which in General Calvin Jarrel's make-believe world on the Strategic
Training Complex meant that the sites had been "destroyed." But someone
was out there, and the Happy Hooligans were going to find them. ...
ABOARD WHISPER ONE-SEVEN "Twenty minutes to first launch point, Henry, "
Patrick McLanahan announced. "Awaiting final range clearance. The B-2
Black Knight stealth bomber pilot, Major Henry Cobb, replied with a
simple "Rog" on the interphone. Patrick McLanahan looked over at his
pilot. Cobb was not young-he had spent nearly seventeen years in the
Air Force, most of it as a B-52 or B- 1 aircraft commander-and had been
with the HAWC at Dreamland for only a year, specifically to fly HAWC's
B-2 bomber test article. Cobb was a most talented but, to McLanahan's
way of thinking, unusual pilot. Except to push a mode button on the main
multi-function display, Cobb sat silently, unmoving, with one hand on
the side-stick controller and the other on the throttles, from takeoff
to landing. He flew the B-2 as if he, the human, were just another
"black box, " as integral a part of the massive four-engine bomber as
the wings. If he hadn't been in a military aircraft with the threat of
an "enemy" attack so imminent, Cobb seemed so calm and relaxed that it
would have looked natural for him to cross his legs or recline in his
seat and put his feet up. In contrast to Cobb, Patrick McLanahan's hands
and body seemed in an almost constant state of motion, due mostly to the
high-tech cockpit layout in the right-seat mission commander's area.
Dominating the entire right instrument panel was a single four-color
multi-function display, called an SMFD, or Super Multi Function Display,
measuring three feet across and eighteen inches wide, surrounded by
function switchlights. The massive monitor had adjustable shades that
could block out most of the light in the cockpit and reduce glare, but
the big screen was so bright and had such sharp high-resolution images
that glare shields were generally unnecessaryMcLanahan kept them
retracted so Cobb could easily see the big screen. The right-side
cockpit had several metal bars around the SMFD that acted as handholds
or arm-steadying devices so the screen could still be accurately
manipulated even during radical flight maneuvers. The main display on
the huge SMFD was a three-dimensional view of the terrain surrounding
the Black Knight, along with an undulating ribbon that depicted the
bomber's planned course. The B-2 was depicted riding the flight-path
ribbon like a car on a roller coaster. The ribbon had "walls" on it,
depicting the minimum and maximum suggested altitudes they should fly to
avoid terrain or enemy threats-as long as they stayed within the
confines of the computer-generated track, they could be on course, safe
from all known or radar-detected obstructions and avoiding all known
threats. Messages flashed on the screen in various places, several
timers were running in a couple of corners of the screen, and
"signposts" along the undulating flight-plan route ribbon flashed to
warn McLanahan of upcoming events. The "landscape" in the God's-eye
view display was checkered with colored boxes, each depicting one square
nautical mile, and small diamonds occasionally flashed on the screen to
highlight radar aimpoints or visual navigation checkpoints. To General
John Ormack, the deputy commander of the High Technology Aerospace
Weapons Center, seated in the instructor pilot's seat between the two
cockpit crew members, it seemed like a completely incomprehensible
jumble of information flitting across the big screen. Ormack was along
to observe this very important test of the Sky Masters NIRTSat
reconnaissance system interface on an Air Battle Force bombing exercise,
but for most of this incredible mission he had been hard-pressed to keep
up with the flurry of data. Patrick McLanahan, the B-2's mission
commander, seemed to drink it all in with ease. McLanahan was using
three different methods to change the display or call up information.
The two primary methods were eye-pointing and voice-recognition
commands. Tiny sensors in McLanahan's helmet tracked his eye movements
and could tell a computer exactly where his eyes were focused. When his
eyes were on the SMFD, McLanahan could call up information simply by
looking at something and speaking a command-the computer would correlate
the position of his eyes, the image on the screen, a set of commands
associated with that image, then compare the digitized spoken command
with the preprogrammed set of allowable commands and execute the proper
one. All this would occur in less than a second. McLanahan could also
point to the SMFD and touch a symbol or image to get more information or
move the image where he wanted it. It was actually funny for Ormack to
watch and listen to McLanahan as he worked-his interphone sounded like a
series of unintelligible grunts and incomplete sentences. Ormack would
see a cursor zip across the big screen, and he would hear a guttural
"Pick." A submenu would appear, and Patrick would read the information,
then utter a quick "Close" to erase the display and return it to the
main God's-eye display. Every second was like that. McLanahan would be
manipulating several different windows on the SMFD at once, zooming
around each window, calling up streams of data that would be visible for
only seconds at a time, and all while letting fly with a stream of
seemingly random words: "Radar . . . pick . . . close... zoom...
zoom... close... one... five... close... pick . . . pick one . .
. close . . . track . . . one . . . left . . close. .
Weapon-status information was arranged along the bottom of the display
so both crew members could check their weapon status instantly.
McLanahan could resize any display, move displays around the SMFD, and
even program certain displays to appear or disappear when a timer
expired or when he switched in or out of certain modes. He was getting
very adept at using his left index finger to move or change displays
while his right hand worked a keyboard or hit the voice-command button
mounted on the control stick on the side instrument panel. To Ormack, it
was like watching a kid play six different video games at once.
McLanahan was flashing the different screens around the SMFD at an
astounding rate. He was calling up radar images, scanning for fighters,
setting up his bombing systems, talking on the radio, monitoring
terrain, and sending messages on SATCOM, all with incredible speed and
without missing one bit of information. "Wait a minute, Patrick, wait a
minute, " Ormack said over the interphone in absolute frustration. "You
had the radar screen up for just a few seconds and then you took it
down. Why?" McLanahan put the radar image back on the left side of the
SMFD so Ormack could see it clearly and explained, "Because all I need
to check on that screen is whether or not the crosshairs fell close to
the offset aimpoint-here.. ." He pointed to t
he screen. "I don't see
anything." McLanahan touched the circular crosshairs on the radar
display and a menu appeared. He slid his finger down to a legend that
read, 1110 MRES. The screen instantly changed to show a tiny white dot
near a cluster of buildings. A circular cursor was superimposed over
the dot, with a set of thin crosshairs lying right on it. "Here's the
offset, a grain storage bin." He motioned to a set of numbers in a
corner of the enlarged display. "Crosshairs are within a hundred feet
of the offset, so I know the system is good. I also check for terrain,
but since we're VFR and heads out of the cockpit, and it's so flat
around here anyway, I don't have to spend too much time worrying about
the terrain-the nearest high terrain is Devil's Tower, over fifty miles
away. "I get it, " Ormack said. "You also don't want to be transmit
ting that long either, right? The fighters can pick up your radar
emissions... "I was transmitting for about three seconds, " McLanahan
explained. "I was in 'Radiate' on the radar long enough to get this
image, then shut down. But the bombing computer digitizes the radar
image and stores it in screen memory until I release it. I can complete
the rest of the bomb run with a radar image that's over two minutes old,
and aim on it right up to release. When we get closer to the target
I'll start fine-aiming on the release offsets, which are much more
precise, but right now I'm trying to find those fighters."
"How does that compare with the satellite data you received?"
"There is no comparison, " McLanahan said with true enthusiasm in his
voice. "The NIRTSat stuff is incredible-and I thought, sitting here in
the most incredible machine I've ever seen, that I'd seen it all. I
can't wait to see the data from the Philippines that we're supposed to
be collecting as well." He punched instructions into a keyboard, and the
graphic display of the terrain and symbols on the SMFD changed-it was as
if he had switched from a fuzzy turn-of-the-century snapshot to a
high-resolution color laser photo. The image was slightly different
from the main SMFD display, but it still showed the ribbon "highway" of
the pre-planned route, the timing and mileage icons, and target markers
throughout the area. "The strike computer has already redrawn the route
to real-time data-our route of flight goes farther west, and the launch
point for the SLAM missile is earlier than before." McLanahan zoomed in
on the target area and switched from a bird's-eye view to a God's-eye
view, which showed the target area from directly above but enhanced to
show objects in three dimensions. "There's a whole row of simulated
mobile-missile launchers out here... ?" McLanahan touched the screen
and zoomed in closer to rows of cylinders on flatbed trailers. "They
all look the same, but I think we can break out the real ones on the
next NIRTSat pass. We should be receiving the new data in a few
minutes. "Watch this, John-with the NIRTSat data, I've already seen what
the bomb run and missile launch will look like." McLana han changed the
screen again to show a photograph-quality view of the same cylinders.
"Here's what the computer thinks the SLAM missile will see a few seconds
before impact-the computer doesn't know which one is the real one, so
it's aiming for the middle one in the group." He changed screens again,
this time to a more conventional-looking green and white high-res radar
image. "Here's the computer's predictions for the target-area
radar-release offsets, based on the NIRTSat data. Here's the mountain
peak and grain-storage bins I was just using... here are the two release
offsets. I can start aiming on these offsets and not touch anything
until release."
"Amazing, " Ormack said. "Friggin' amazing. The NIRTSat system does
away with shadow graphs, year-old intelligence data, hand-drawn
predictions, even charts-you have everything you need to do a bomb run
right here... "And I received it only thirty minutes ago, " McLanahan
added. "You can launch NIRTSat-equipped bombers on a mission with no
pre-planned targets whatsoever. You no longer need to build a sortie
package, brief crews, schedule simulator missions, or get intelligence
briefings. You just load up a bomber with gas and bombs and send it
off. One NIRTSat pass later, the crew gets all its charts, all its
intelligence, all its weapon-release aimpoints, all its terrain data,
and all its threat data in one instant-and the computer will plot out a
strike route based on the new data, build a flight plan, then fly the
flight plan with the autopilot plugged into the strike computers. The
crew can replay the satellite data from the point of view of the flight
plan and can even dry-run the bomb run hours before the real bomb run
begins." McLanahan then switched the SMFD screen back to the original
tactical display, but this time with NIRTSat data inserted into it.
"Unfortunately, you can't search for fighters with the NIRTSat data, "
he said, "and it takes a few seconds of radar time to update the screen.
. Suddenly several symbols popped onto the right side of the big screen,
resembling bat's wings, far to the west of the B-2's position. Each
bat-wing symbol had a small column of numerals near it, along with a
two-colored wedge-shaped symbol on the front. The wider edge of the
outer yellow-colored portion of the wedge seemed to be aimed right for
the symbol of the B-2 in the center of the SMFD, while the red inner
portion of the wedge seemed to be undulating in and out as if trying to
decide whether to touch the B-2 icon. "And there they are, " McLanahan
announced. "Fighters at two o'clock. Two F-23s. Doppler frequency
shift processing estimates they're twenty miles out and above us. Signal
strength is increasing-their search radar might pick us up any second. I
don't think they got a radar lock on us yet, Henry... their flight path
is taking them behind us, but that could be a feint." Cobb seemed not to
have heard McLanahan-he remained as motionless as ever, as if frozen in
place with his hands on the throttles and control stick and his eyes
riveted forward-but he asked, "Got jammers set up?"
"Not yet, " McLanahan said, double-checking the SMFD display of the
fighter's radar signal. The colored portions of the fighter's radar
wedges, which represented the sweep area, detection range, and estimated
kill range of the fighters, was still not solidly covering the B-2's
icon, which meant that the stealth characteristics of the B-2 were
allowing it to continue toward the target without using active
transmitting jammers. He selected the ECM display and put it on the
right side of the SMFD, ready to activate the electronic jammers at the
proper time. "PRF is still in search range, and power level is too
weak. If we buzz them too early, they can get a bearing on us. "If you
buzz them too late, they'll get a visual on us."
"Maybe, maybe not, " McLanahan said. "In any case, they're too late."
He brought the communications screen forward and activated a
pre-programmed SATCOM m
essage, then transmitted it. "Sending
range-clearance request in now, " he said. Sent by SATCOM and coded
like normal SAC message traffic, the message or its response would not
alert the fighters searching for them. The reply came thirty seconds
later: "Range clearance received, all targets clear, " McLanahan
reported. "Less than fifteen minutes to first launch point." He
enlarged the weapons screen and brought it higher up on the large SMFD
screen so Cobb could check it as well. The B-2 carried one AGM-84E SLAM
conventional standoff missile in the left bomb bay and a
three-thousand-pound concrete shape, which simulated a second SLAM
missile but was not intended to be released. With its turbojet engine,
the AGM84E SLAM, the acronym for the Standoff Land Attack Missile, could
carry a one-thousand-pound warhead over sixty miles. It had an imaging
infrared camera in the nose that transmitted pictures back to its
carrier aircraft, and it could be flown and locked on target with
pinpoint precision. It was designed to give SAC's bombers a precision,
high-powered, long-range conventional bombing capability without
exposing the bomber to stiff target-area defenses. The right bomb bay
carried two AGM- 130 Striker rocket-powered glide bombs, which had a
range of only fifteen miles but carried a two-thousandpound bomb with
the same precision as the SLAM. Striker worked in conjunction with SLAM
to destroy area defenses and strike hardened targets with one bomber-and
with the B-2 stealth bomber, which could penetrate closer to heavily
defended targets than any other bomber in the world, it was a lethal
combination. McLanahan glanced at the weapons arranged along the SMFD,
then spoke, "Unsafe... ready, " to ready all weapons. Each weapon icon
changed from red to green, indicating all were ready for release.
"Weapon status verified, full connectivity." Cobb turned to look, then
nodded his agreement. "Checks." McLanahan relocked all weapons, then
unlocked the SLAM rocket bomb only. "Left bay SLAM selected, " he told
Cobb. Another quick glance from Cobb, then he resumed his seemingly
petrified position. "Checks. Left bay weapon unlocked. All others
locked." McLanahan thought Cobb looked a little like the Lincoln
