“That’s enough, McLanahan,” Samson said. “The test is over. Sit back and enjoy the ride back to Edwards.” He turned to look over his right shoulder at Masters. “You okay, Dr. Masters?”
“Sure . . . fine.” He looked right at the edge of losing control of his stomach’s contents, but he wore a concerned expression. “I hope you didn’t stop all that yanking and banking pilot stuff because of me. Actually, I was starting to get into it.”
“Why did you stop, Terrill?” McLanahan asked. “Why did you let those guys get us?”
“What’s the point, Patrick?” Samson asked in an angry tone. “Like you said, it was daylight, they had us visually. They got us. We didn’t have a chance. We were just rolling around down close to the ground, waiting for them to kill us. We couldn’t escape. It was inevitable.”
“Nothing is inevitable, sir,” McLanahan said. “We can beat even the F-22 Lightning down low. I’ve seen the best fighters in the world lose a B-52 when it’s down in the rocks—the more high-tech a fighter gets, the less capable it’ll be in a visual chase down low.”
“I know that, Patrick. I’ve done it myself.”
“But we can’t show the powers that be how good we are if we keep on calling ‘knock it off’ the minute we’re bombs-away, sir. We’ve got to prove that we can survive in this day and age of superfighters and high- tech air defense systems.”
“You’re preaching to the choir, Patrick,” Samson said, “but unfortunately I think the heavy bomber is going to become a thing of the past with or without the Wolverine missile. The Pentagon understands the concept of employing squadrons of fighters and fighter-bombers overseas or aboard carriers—they don’t understand, or refuse to accept, the idea that we might not be able to send a carrier into a certain part of the world, or we might not be able to establish a forward operating base close enough to the enemy to use a fighter-bomber.”
“So . . . what are you saying, sir?”
“I’m saying, as of October first, Eighth Air Force goes away—and with it, most of the heavies.”
“What?” McLanahan interjected. “The Air Force is doing away with the long-range bombers?”
“Not entirely,” Samson replied. “Twelfth Air Force gets one B-2 wing, twenty planes by the year 2000—hopefully with ten or twenty more, if Congress gets their act together, by 2010—and three B-1B wings, two Reserve wings, and one Air National Guard group.”
“No B-lBs in the active duty force—and all the BUFFs and Aardvarks go to the boneyard?” McLanahan exclaimed, referring to the B- 52s and F-llls by their crewdog-given nicknames. “Unbelievable. It doesn’t seem real. ”
“Fiscal realities,” Samson said. “You can fill the sky with F-15E fighter-bombers for the same price as a single B-2 squadron. The President looks at Mountain Home with a huge ramp full of a hundred F-15s, F-16s, and tankers, and he knows he can precision-bomb the shit out of North Korea with just that one wing for three hundred million per year; or he looks at Barksdale or Ellsworth with just twenty heavies and virtually no precision-guided stuff for the same money. Which one does he pick? Which one looks worse to the bad guys?”
“But the heavies drop more ordnance, cause more damage, inflict more psychological confusion—”
“That’s arguable, and besides, it doesn’t matter,” Samson interjected. “I can tell you that European or Central Command planners much prefer to hear that a hundred Eagles or Falcons are on their way rather than twenty B-52s or even thirty B-ls, even though a B-l can beat an F-16 any day in conventional radar bombing. Pacific Command—well, forget it. They won’t even ask for an Air Force bomber wing unless every carrier is on the bottom of the ocean—for them, almost nothing except tankers and an occasional AWACS radar plane exist outside Navy or Marine Corps fighter.”
“I just hope, sir,” McLanahan said, “that you don’t let the Pentagon kill off the heavy bombers as easily as you just let those fighters kill us. ”
“Hey, McLanahan, that’s out of line,” Samson said bitterly. “You listen to me—I believe in the heavy bombers just as much as you, probably more. I fight to keep the heavies in the arsenal every fucking day.”
“I didn’t mean to accuse or insult you, sir,” McLanahan said, iron still in his voice, “but I’m not ready to give up on the heavy-bomber program. We’d be committing national defense suicide.”
“You might want to loosen up a bit, Patrick,” Samson interjected, with a wry smile. “Those decisions are made far, far above our pay grade. Besides, it was the success of the heavy bomber that helped kill it off more than anything else.”
“What do you mean?”
“After your overflying of China with a B-2 everyone thought had been destroyed, the world is scared shitless,” Samson explained. “Any talk of using strategic bombers in a conflict, especially with China, looks like a return to the Cold War days, and it has lawmakers on both sides nervous. The President has ordered all the Beaks back to Whiteman, and he’s lying low, waiting for the ‘lynch mobs’ to quiet down.”
“Lynch mobs? Someone’s upset that we struck back at the Iranians?” “Don’t you read the papers, Patrick?” Samson asked with surprise. “Half of Congress, mostly the left side of the aisle, is howling mad at the President for authorizing those bombing missions against Iran. There’s talk of an investigation, an independent counsel, even impeachment. Nothing will come of it, of course—it’s all political mudslinging, and few outside the Pentagon or the closed-door congressional military committees know what we did over Iran—but the President’s neck is stretched way out there.”
“We proved today that the B-52 is still a first-class weapon system,” McLanahan said resolutely. “We’ve got five more EB-52s sitting in storage right now, and Sky Masters can arm them all with Wolverine attack missiles and Tacit Rainbow anti-radar missiles. The mission has changed, General, but we still need the B-52s.”
“The B-52s have already been fragged for the boneyard, Patrick, including the Megafortresses,” Samson said. “The moneys already been spent to get rid of them. Minot and Barksdale go civilian by the end of next year—-hell, my desk will be auctioned off by Christmas. Give it up, Patrick. I’ll recommend that Air Force buy Wolverines, but not to equip B-52s—that’s a losing proposition. Mate Wolverines with Beaks and Bones”—Samson used the crewdog nicknames for the B-2 A and B-1B bombers—“and I think we’ll have a deal.”
But McLanahan wasn’t listening—he was lost in thought, his eyes locked in the “thousand-yard stare” that he seemed to lapse into from time to time. Even though he ran checklists and did his duties as a B-2 bomber mission commander, he seemed to think about a hundred different things all at once. Just like Brad Elliott, Samson thought. Thinking about how he was going to twist the game to his advantage, turning over each and every possibility, no matter how weird or outlandish, until the solution presented itself. Elliott was famous . . . no, infamous ... for that.
“Twenty B-2s and sixty B-ls to cover all of the long-range strike contingencies around the world?” McLanahan muttered. “You can’t do it, sir. Deploy the force to Diego Garcia for a Middle East conflict, then swing them to Guam for an Asia conflict? Maybe for a few days, but not for more than that. Who leads the way for the little guys?”
“That’s why we got the Navy and the F-117,” Samson said. “Bombers aren’t the only answer, MC, you know that. You’re forgetting the other twenty-five Air Force, Reserve, and Guard combat strike wings, the thirteen Navy air wings, the four Marine air wings ...”
“Tactical bombers need forward airstrips, lots of tankers, and lots of ground support,” McLanahan reminded the general, “and naval bombers need carriers that can sail safely within range of the target. A conflict in Asia, for example, could do away with all of these.”
“But a B-52 can’t stand up to modern-day air defenses, Patrick,” Samson said. “All of the reports and studies prove this. Even with two- hundred mile standoff weapons, a B-52 can’t survive. Put it in a low- or zero-thre
at environment and it could chew up a lot of earth, but it’s not worth the money to support a bomber that can only be used once the war’s almost won.”
“General, the Megafortress will cream anything the Air Force, Navy, or Marines can put up against it,” Jon Masters. “All by itself, it’ll go up against a squadron of whatever you want to put up and ‘destroy’ every strategic target in the RED FLAG range—and it’ll come out alive, ready to fight again.”
“Spoken like a true salesman, Doc,” Samson said over his shoulder, with a broad smile. To McLanahan he said, “I’m not promising that anything will come of this, you two, remember that. I did this flight test as a favor to you and Dr. Masters. You and Jon might.not get a contract from the Air Force after all this is over, no matter how well your gear works or how much of your own money you spend.”
“When the Air Force sees what we can do, they’ll make a deal,” Masters said confidently. “They won’t be able to resist.”
“General, Jon’s business is making money—we all understand that,” McLanahan said earnestly. “But my objective is to build the best long- range rapid-deployment attack fleet possible with our shrinking defense budget, and I believe part of that objective is the EB-52B Megafortress, combined with smart standoff attack and defense-suppression weapons. Jon and his company are backing my ideas. All I want is a chance to show the brass what we can do, and we need your help. We’re the best, General. We need the chance to prove it.”
Samson smiled and shook his head in amusement. “You better watch yourself, Colonel—you’re starting to sound an awful lot like that old warhorse friend of yours, Brad Elliott.” McLanahan smiled at the mention of his mentor. “He’s a good buddy and one fine man, but he sure got stung by the hornets from all the nests he stirred up. A friendly word of caution: don’t be like him.”
Judging by the silence, Samson guessed that McLanahan hadn’t heard a word he said.
CENTRAL MILITARY COMMISSION CONFERENCE ROOM, GOVERNMENT HOUSE, BEIJING, PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA TUESDAY, 27 MAY 1997, 2341 HOURS LOCAL (MONDAY, 26 MAY, 1041 HOURS ET)
“Loyal fathers of the Party, stand and pay respect to our Paramount Leader!”
The assembled general officers and ministers of the People’s Liberation Army stood and bowed deeply as the president of the People’s Republic of China, Paramount Leader Jiang Zemin, entered the conference chamber, bowed slightly to the others, and took his place at the head of the table. They remained standing, all bowing at the waist except Jiang, until the Chinese anthem, “Xiang Yang Hong,” or “East Is Red,” was played. They stood at attention until after the Intonation of Strength and Solidarity was read; then the ministers applauded the Paramount Leader as he took his seat. The Intonation was a solemn promise to support and defend the Communist Party, Zhongguo Renmin Gongheguo, the People’s Republic of China, and the people; but unlike the American Pledge of Allegiance, the Intonation contained a threat of the particular punishment one might expect if he or she did not sacrifice ones life for the Party and for the people—disgrace, humiliation, death, and public dishonor of self and ones ancestors.
Jiang Zemin carefully watched the faces of the assembled ministers and generals as the Intonation was read, looking to see if anyone’s eyes glanced over toward his or to anyone else’s—the threat of death and humiliation in the Intonation was sometimes enough to make a guilty or conspiratorial man fidgety. It was of course possible to bury any outward signs of treason, but Jiang knew that a man bent on betrayal sometimes looked for reassurance from coconspirators or for evidence that he was under suspicion. Jiang was an expert in detecting such subtle, outward signs of a mans innermost fears.
Paramount Leader and President Jiang Zemin was seventy-one years old, in excellent health and looking far younger than his years. He had a square, tough-looking face with a high forehead and thick dyed black hair combed straight back. He wore a simple olive short-sleeved open-collar rough-cotton tunic shirt belted at the waist, with matching pants. His horn-rim spectacles were plain; he wore no jewelry except a wristwatch. Educated as an engineer but trained in Communist Party doctrine and theory in Moscow, formerly the mayor and Communist Party chief of Chinas second-largest city, Shanghai, Jiang was a master at power politics in China, a man well-suited to run his nation’s large and complicated Party mechanism.
Today, Jiang Zemin was president of the worlds most populous nation and, as such, arguably the most powerful man on planet Earth. Among his many responsibilities and duties, the engineer from Jiangsu Province was general secretary of the six-member Chinese Communist Party Secretariat, the genesis for all political thought in China; chairman of the Politburo, the group of twenty-one senior Party leaders who determined all Chinese political ideology and direction; chairman of the Standing Committee, the highest policy-making body in China and the body who actually wrote legislation (the 3,500-member National People’s Congress always rubber-stamped their approval of all legislation drafted by the Standing Committee and Politburo); chairman of the powerful Military Commission of the Chinese Communist Party, who determined Party policy in military affairs; chairman of the Central Military Commission, responsible for implementing Party military policy in the People’s Liberation Army; and commander in chief of the People’s Liberation Army—a force of two hundred million regular, reserve, paramilitary, and militia troops.
Jiang not only had the power to enforce laws, but also made laws and even created the philosophy and ideas behind the laws, the ideals that formed the very basis of Communist Chinese thought. He was not only leader and chief executive of the most populous nation on earth, but was also commander in chief of the largest military force on the planet—and now he was planning to set that huge machine in motion.
Jiang was presiding over a crucial late-night meeting of the Central Military Commission, made up of civilian and military members in charge of the key divisions of the military infrastructure: the Minister of National Defense, Chi Haotian; High General Chin Po Zihong, chief of the general staff of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA); General Yu Yongpo, chief of General Political Affairs of the PLA; General Fu Qanyou, chief of the PLA General Logistics Department; the chiefs of staff of the army, air force, navy, and the East China Sea Fleet; and the chiefs of China’s ten military and civilian intelligence agencies and institutes.
“Comrades, loyal ministers and generals, there is a saying in the ancient military philosophy of Zhongguo that the government must evaluate not only the enemy, but evaluate itself before pondering the beginning of hostilities,” Paramount Leader Jiang Zemin said. “I am here to inform you that the Party and the government have looked deep within ourselves, at the state of our nation and of the people and our way of life, and we have seen that our nation is being pulled apart piece by piece by the encroachment of the Western world. It is time to end the rape upon our nation, our people, and our way of life. In China, as it should be throughout the world, the government must govern, and that is the will and the task of the Party.
“The disintegration of the state is seen in the usurpation of several regions on the periphery of our nation,” Jiang went on, “including India, Kyrgyzstan, Vietnam, Mongolia, and threats against our Communist brothers in North Korea; and three critical regions belonging to China since the dawn of recorded history: Senkaku Dao, taken from us by Japan in World War Two; Nansha Dao, taken from us by European imperialists and by Asian anarchists and dictators using Western governments as their puppets; and Formosa Dao, taken from us by the Nationalists and now protected by the United States. The Party’s stated goal is simple, comrades: The twenty-third Chinese province of Taiwan will be ours once again. The Party demands that our attack plan against Taiwan be activated.”
The ministers and generals nodded dutifully, but Jiang was surprised to hear applause from the commission! Rising to his feet while continuing to applaud his president’s words was Admiral Sun Ji Guoming, the first deputy chief of the general staff and General Chin’s expected success
or. Moments later, other generals followed Sun’s lead, rising and applauding, and even some of the aged ministers clapped, their soft, withered hands making virtually no sound. It was unheard of, totally out of character for a Chinese to express himself so openly, especially a military officer.
“You dishonor yourself by such a pretentious and disrespectful display, Comrade Sun,” General Chin, the chief of staff, said in a low, croaking voice. “Be seated.”
Sun bowed to both Chin and Jiang. “Forgive me, comrades,” Sun said, without being given permission to speak. “But I welcome the Paramount Leader’s words with great joy. I meant no disrespect.” He quickly dropped back into his seat and apologetically averted his eyes—but only for a moment.
“Comrade Sun’s enthusiasm is shared by us all, Comrade Jiang,” General Chin said, after giving Sun a deadly stern warning glance. “Implementing the Party’s wishes will be a challenging but ultimately victorious task. I urge the Central Military Commission to order the aircraft carrier Mao Zedong and its new battle group into position to take Que- moy immediately, so the Taiwanese Nationalists cannot use them as staging or observation bases against us,” Chin said. Quemoy was a large Taiwanese-occupied island just a mile from the Chinese mainland, used as an observation outpost and tourist destination. “We can blockade the island with ease with our task force, cut off their supplies, and starve them into submission. The task force can land five thousand troops on Quemoy right away, and we can eventually move three thousand troops a day onto the island. In two weeks, we can retake the island and claim it.”
Jiang was surprised at Chin’s comments—he expected resistance from the People’s Liberation Army. Bloated, gargantuan, hopelessly encrusted and weighed down with decades’ worth of nameless bureaucrats, the military seemed to require a full ten years of preparation before embarking on the simplest program or operation. Under Deng Xiaoping, Jiang’s predecessor, the People’s Liberation Army had been reduced in size by one-fourth and the militias reduced by almost half, but there were still over three million active-duty troops in China and over two hundred million men and women that could be mobilized for military service.
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