by Dale Brown
“Dave, listen…”
“You take it easy, sir. Air Battle Force, clear.” And Luger abruptly terminated the connection.
David Luger sat upright in his chair, hands on the armrests, staring straight ahead, feet flat on the floor. Anyone who might look in on him at that moment might think he was catatonic—and in a sense that’s exactly what he was.
Almost twenty years earlier, David Luger had been part of a secret bombing mission into the Soviet Union, along with Brad Elliott, Patrick McLanahan, and three others. After completing the mission by bombing a ground-based laser site, the crew was forced to land their crippled EB-52 Megafortress bomber on an isolated Soviet air base to refuel. Dave Luger sacrificed himself to draw the defenders away, which allowed the Megafortress and its crew to escape.
Luger was captured and held in a secret location in Siberia for many years. Brainwashed into thinking he was a Soviet scientist, Luger helped the Soviets design and build aircraft and weapons that advanced the Soviet state of the art by several years, perhaps several generations. Eventually Patrick McLanahan and the crew of the EB-52 “Old Dog” helped rescue him, but by then he had been held against his will, psychologically and physically tortured, for almost seven years.
During his captivity the rigid position he was in now was a sort of psychological and emotional “happy place”—when he was not being tortured or brainwashed, he was ordered to assume that position, which he equated with rest or relief. To Luger it actually felt good to assume that stiff, tense position. After his rescue and rehabilitation, his doctors and psychologists saw this posture as a manifestation of his emotional damage. But after years of therapy, David was fully aware of what he was doing when he put himself in this rather awkward-looking seated position. In a strange way, it was still a “happy place” for him—in fact, it helped him focus his thoughts more clearly.
Yes, he was angry at Patrick. Yes, Patrick was wrong for not following the proper chain of command, and it was exceedingly unfair of him to use their close personal relationship to break the rules and do something they’d both have to answer for later.
But…Patrick McLanahan was the best strategic planner and the best strategic-bombing task-force commander he had ever known. If he had a hunch about where those Russian bombers came from, he was probably correct.
“Luger to Briggs, Luger to Furness,” Dave spoke into thin air.
“Briggs here,” Colonel Hal Briggs responded via the subcutaneous transceiver system. All of the former Dreamland officers were “wired” with the global satellite datalink and communications system.
“Can you stop by for a chat?”
“I can be there in ten,” Hal said.
“I’m in the box and ten minutes to the high fix, Dave,” Rebecca Furness responded. “Give me twenty.” Furness, the commander of the 111th Wing, in charge of Battle Mountain’s fleet of airborne-laser and flying-battleship aircraft, was returning from a pilot-proficiency flight in the “virtual cockpit,” the control station for Battle Mountain’s fleet of remotely piloted aircraft. With Battle Mountain’s combat fleet grounded, the crews maintained proficiency by flying unmanned QF-4 Phantom jet-fighter drones, which were the closest to the unmanned QB-1C Vampire drone’s performance. “Get Daren, unless it can wait.”
“Roger. Luger to Mace.”
“Go ahead, sir.”
“You and Hal meet me in the BATMAN. I have a mission I want planned.”
“Are we getting a recert?”
“Soon—I hope. Luger to Masters.”
“For Pete’s sake, Dave, I just sat down to breakfast,” responded Jon Masters, one of the partners of Sky Masters Inc., a high-tech defense contractor that developed many of the weapon systems and aircraft used at Battle Mountain. “I’m going to program this thing to send callers to voice mail when it detects my mouth full of food.”
“Breakfast was over three hours ago for most of the civilized world, Jon,” Dave said. “I want one of your DC-10s for a couple weeks. I’m planning on launching some boosters.”
“About time you guys started doing something,” Masters said. “Send me your equipment list, and I’ll load her up for you.”
“I’ll send over my list, but I’m not ready to upload yet,” Luger said. “You’ll get the go-ahead from the chief.”
“You mean you’re actually going to have a budget and I might actually get paid for my gear before the mission kicks off?” Masters asked incredulously. “With all due respect to the Old Man, I like the way you do business, Dave.” Masters liked to call Patrick McLanahan the “Old Man,” an appellation Patrick never seemed to mind.
“Just be ready to go ASAP, Jon,” Luger said. “It’s important.”
At that moment there was a knock on the door, and Colonel Daren Mace, the deputy commander of the 111th Wing, entered Luger’s office. He noticed Luger’s stiff posture in his chair and tried not to show how sorrowful he felt that Luger had to endure that psychological burden, apparently for the rest of his life. “What’s the target, sir?” Daren asked. Dave put his computer-generated map of Russia on the wall monitor and overlaid several satellite tracks on it. “Looks like Russian ICBM bases in the south. Entire country. Are we doing a treaty-verification run? Or does this have to do with that raid on Bukhara?”
“We’re looking for Backfire bombers,” Luger responded. “We need to find out where the Backfires came from that raided Bukhara. I want a look at all the known bases.”
“Are there that many?” Mace asked. “The Russians only have seventy strategic bombers in their entire fleet.”
“Which bases are you aware of?”
“Khabarovsk in the east, Novgorod in the west, Arkhangel’sk in the northwest, and Mozdok taking over from Engels in the southwest,” Mace replied after a moment’s thought.
“So where did those Backfire bombers come from?”
“My guess would be one of those bases.”
“Patrick said not. He said AIA has checked, and there’s no evidence that any Backfires launched from known bases.”
“Well, Backfires are considered tactical bombers, not strategic ones….”
“I’d love to hear the logic the Russkies used to convince us of that,” Luger remarked.
“The Tupolev-22M bomber is a pig, and everyone knows it—that’s why the Russians have been deactivating them in favor of tactical fighter-bombers like the Sukhoi-35,” Mace said. Daren Mace had worked around medium bombers most of his Air Force career and, in the past few years, had worked closely with the secretary of defense and the Air Force on developing new bomber technologies. “They’d waste too many resources trying to fly one more than a thousand miles. Sure, they might be able to refuel them, but it would take one Ilyushin-76 tanker for every Backfire to make it across the pole. It’s not worth it. The Tupolev-160s and -95s already have much longer legs.”
“They have speed, and they have a big payload,” Luger pointed out. “Obviously the Russians changed their minds on the Backfires, because they’ve used them extensively recently over Chechnya, Turkmenistan, and now Uzbekistan. They could easily upgrade the engine and sacrifice a little of payload for added fuel. Screw in the air-refueling probe, reset the circuit breakers, then retrain your crews in how to do a hose-and-drogue refueling—”
“Not easy in a big mother like a Backfire.”
“But doable.”
“Sure.”
“So you agree that it’s possible to put a Backfire force together in Siberia, fly them across Central Asia to bomb Bukhara, and fly them back without anyone seeing them?” Luger asked.
“Why not? No one would ever see them coming,” Mace surmised. “The Backfires were supposed to dash across Western Europe and destroy NATO airfields with cruise missiles and NATO ships in the Baltic with big-ass antiship cruise missiles. They were forward-deployed in Warsaw Pact countries close to the frontier because they didn’t have the range of a Tupolev-95 Bear bomber; hence, they were never considered strategic weapons with the ab
ility to threaten North America.”
“Are they a threat?” Luger asked.
“Top one off over Moscow and it can launch a cruise missile against every country in NATO—except the U.S. and Canada, of course,” Daren said. “Yes, I’d say it’s a threat. If the Russians are turning tactical jets like Backfires out as long-range strategic weapons, that shifts the balance of power significantly in their favor, especially in Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia. We’ve assumed that the Russians were mothballing them as they got older and they ran out of money to support them—we’d be in real trouble if it turned out they were not only rehabilitating them but giving them a much greater warfighting capability.”
Luger nodded, lost in thought for a moment. He then got up and headed to the battle-staff room to meet the others.
The BATMAN, or Battle Management area, was a large, theaterlike room with a stage flanked by sixteen large full-color computer monitors. The senior staff sat behind computer workstations in the “orchestra” section. Arrayed behind the senior staff were the support-staff members, and in two separate enclosures were the control stations for Battle Mountain’s unmanned aircraft. Hal Briggs was already waiting for Luger, and Rebecca Furness was just logging off her QF-4 drone training session. They all met at the commander’s workstation in the front row, where Dave Luger quickly ran down the situation.
“Wonder why Air Intelligence Agency won’t give Patrick satellite support?” Daren Mace asked.
“I can think of lots of reasons—none of them flattering to the general,” Rebecca Furness said. “His reputation has definitely preceded him.”
“I told Patrick that an unofficial request for support is not good enough for me—I needed the request to come from either ACC or the Pentagon,” Luger said.
“I’ll bet he was thrilled to hear you say that, sir,” Briggs quipped.
“Nonetheless, that’s how I see it,” Dave said. “I want to help, but I want the mission to be fully authorized and budgeted. I’m not going to spend money I don’t have and use assets I haven’t paid for.” Rebecca Furness made a show of clearing out her ears, as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. “Knock it off, Rebecca. But that doesn’t mean I can’t plan a mission right now.”
He turned to his console and called up the computer images he’d been working with in his office on the “Big Board” in front of the BATMAN. “Assume I’m getting two constellations of NIRTSats aloft in the next few days, and we find something in one of the Siberian or Sakha provinces—I want a plan of action to take a closer look by the Tin Men and, if necessary, destroy the bases.”
“A secret Russian base filled with intercontinental bombers?” Furness asked. “The Russians haven’t relied on bombers to threaten North America for decades.”
“But just in the past year they’ve used heavy bombers three times, in Chechnya, Turkmenistan, and now against Uzbekistan,” Dave pointed out. “Plus, the new president of Russia is the former military chief of staff and a bomber aficionado. Patrick thinks there are too many coincidences, and I agree. Let’s build a plan that I can show to Langley right now.”
It did not take long—working together and relying on their digital catalogs of preplanned space and aircraft missions along with the computer’s real-time inventory of aircraft and weapons, the team had two preliminary plans drafted within an hour: one relying on the 111th’s bombers and special-operations transports, which were currently grounded but were ready to go on short notice; and one relying only on Sky Masters Inc.’s research-and-development aircraft and Air Force special-ops transports. Once the plans were signed off on by each element of the Air Battle Force and finally by Dave Luger himself, he spoke, “Duty Officer, get me the deputy commander of Air Combat Command, secure.”
“Please stand by, General Luger,” the voice of the “Duty Officer,” the omnipresent computerized clerk and assistant for everyone at Battle Mountain, responded.
After Luger was routed through several clerks, aides, and chiefs of staff, he finally heard, “General Fortuna, secure.”
“General, how are you, ma’am? This is General Luger, Air Battle Force, Battle Mountain, secure.”
“Dave! Good to hear from you,” General Leah “Skyy” Fortuna, the deputy commander of Air Combat Command, responded happily, her thick New York accent still obvious despite the distortion from the secure telephone line. Leah Fortuna got her call sign “Skyy” both from her love of flying—she’d been a bomber pilot and flight instructor—and her love of blue American-made vodka. “How the heck is the smartest guy ever to graduate from the Air Force Academy?”
“I’m doing okay, thanks.”
“Congrats on getting the command out there,” Leah said, “although I’m sure you hoped it would be under happier circumstances. No one deserves it more than you, though.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
“You’re making me feel old with that ‘ma’am’ crap, Dave—or is this a ‘ma’am’ phone call?”
“Sort of, yes.”
“Okay. So what can I do you for?”
“I received an unofficial request for support from General McLanahan at Air Intelligence Agency,” Dave said.
“ ‘Unofficial request,’ huh?”
“That’s why I’m calling, ma’am. I have a request for overhead-imagery support that I’d like you to take to General Muskoka.” General Thomas “Turbo” Muskoka, a former F-15E Strike Eagle and F-117A stealth fighter pilot and deputy chief of staff of the Air Force, was the new commander of Air Combat Command, the Air Force’s largest major command. “Patrick made the request directly to me. I was not comfortable taking that request outside the chain of command, so I denied it. But I believe that Patrick does have a legitimate operational need for the data, and I firmly believe I have the sensors and equipment that can get him the information he needs.”
“Why not take it to Eighth Air Force?”
“Air Battle Force’s taskings don’t normally come from Eighth Air Force,” Dave said. He knew it sounded lame, but it was the best excuse he could think of at the moment. Although the EB-52 and EB-1C bombers in the Air Battle Force were not nuclear-weapon-capable, the unit came under the command of Eighth Air Force—although Terrill Samson definitely treated the unit from Battle Mountain, Nevada, as the long-lost ugly stepchild.
“I never really understood exactly whom Air Battle Force reports to,” Leah admitted. “I assumed it was directly to the Air Force chief of staff’s office. But it’s okay with me for now—I don’t mind being your boss.”
“Thank you,” Dave said. “Besides, I think Patrick already made the request to his command and was denied. As I said, I think he has a legitimate need that we can fulfill.”
“So you decided to go right to Air Combat Command,” Fortuna said. “I don’t appreciate McLanahan’s using you to go over his bosses’ heads. You were smart to upchannel his request, Dave. I hate to say this of Patrick McLanahan, but that man is snake-bit these days. No one wants anything to do with him, because they’re afraid he’ll do something on his own that’ll bite them in the ass. I know he’s a good friend of yours, but I think you should know the buzz about him. He’s gone way beyond what even Brad Elliott supposedly did.”
“I hear what you’re saying, Leah, and I agree,” Dave said, “but he’s much more than just a good friend of mine.”
“I know. A word to the wise, that’s all. What kind of satellite support is he requesting?”
“Two constellations of NIRTSats, launched from a Sky Masters carrier aircraft or from one of the One-eleventh Wing’s Megafortresses, if I can get them recertified; a mix of visual and synthetic-aperture radar, short duration, low altitude, targeting southern Siberia and Sakha provinces. I also want to forward-position a Battle Force ground team to Shemya for possible ground ops in eastern Siberia.”
“Russia, huh? That’s going to have to go right up to the Pentagon, probably right past the chief’s office to SECDEF himself. And you said that Patr
ick McLanahan requested it?”
“Is that what I said?” Dave asked. “I believe what I said was I was requesting it on behalf of the Air Battle Force, in support of the United Nations peacekeeping operation in Turkmenistan.”
“There you go, Dave,” Leah said. “I think you’ll find that an easier sell, especially after that attack on the CIA base at Bukhara. A little piece of friendly advice, Dave? Don’t tie your star too tightly to Patrick McLanahan. He can be your friend—just don’t let him be your mentor.”
“Can I share the data I get with him?”
General Fortuna chuckled lightly into the secure connection. “Loyal to the end, eh, Dave? Okay, it’s your funeral. And it’s your data—you do with it whatever you want. Air Intelligence Agency gets a copy of all overhead imagery for its databases anyway. Send me your ops plan ASAP, and I’ll give the boss a heads-up and a recommendation for approval to pass to the Pentagon. Don’t send those ground forces farther west than Shemya, or the boss will have your ass for breakfast—after he gets done kicking mine.”
“Understood.”
“Your request will probably need to go to the White House, too—just so you know,” Fortuna continued as she made notes on her tablet PC computer. “Your name and McLanahan’s will be seen by all the suits as well as the brass. Get ready to take the heat. How soon can you have the plan over here?”
Luger tapped a button on his computer. “Transmitting it now.”
“Good. I’ll look it over, but if it’s coming from you, I don’t see a problem.”
“Thanks, Leah.”
“Hey, I still owe you big-time for all the help you gave me in computer-science and math classes at the Zoo,” Fortuna said. “I never would’ve passed without your help.”
“Bull.”
“Maybe, but I still owe you,” she said. “You were so damned smart—and you are so damned cute. Good thing you’re way the hell out there in Nevada.”
