by Tom Wilson
The reporter opened his mouth to speak, but Sam raised a large, threatening finger to his face.
"I just flew to a place in North Vietnam where they're shooting like hell. I saw a kid no more than twenty-four years old get killed. A sad kid, who'd worked like hell to pay his own way through college so he could fly jets."
"And was he black?" eagerly asked the reporter.
Sam stared at him incredulously.
The reporter stared back.
"You don't really want an interview. You're just here trying to make trouble."
The reporter began to look frightened as Sam continued his withering stare. If he'd been able to read Sam's mind he would have known his feeling was warranted.
They heard loud laughing outside just as Sam thought of a proper ending for the interview. He leaned close to the reporter's face and said in a low voice, "Don't write something dumb about me or any of my friends here, or I promise you I'll get in touch with my friends at the NAACP and tell them you're a prejudiced honkie bastard. Once that word's out, you'll never get another story from a black anywhere."
Sam didn't know a soul connected with the NAACP. But the reporter's jaw dropped, and Sam knew he'd gotten through.
"Now, get the hell out of my squadron, because you piss me off!" he roared.
The bus had just returned from Bangkok and the Bear's wedding, and several pilots came in wearing civvies, looking hot and dusty from the ride.
Pudge Holden tried to say something to the reporter, but he was too busy trying to get out the door.
Mack came in and grinned. "How'd it go today, Sam? We still got a squadron?"
Sam went to the refrigerator and took out a beer.
07/1830L—Takhli RTAFB, Thailand
Colonel Mack
Mack had been about to leave the squadron to go to dinner when Colonel Parker's admin sergeant rang him and told him the wing commander required his presence at the command post.
As Mack clapped on his go-to-hell hat and started toward the command post, he guessed at the subject. He'd seen a silver T-39 Sabreliner land ten minutes earlier and it had been all shined up, like a general's aircraft.
He saw Colonel Parker entering the command post then, and with him was the same lieutenant colonel who'd announced the attack on the first Thai Nguyen target. Mack shook his head grimly, and continued to walk.
The same group was assembled that B. J. had brought in before the previous big mission on Thai Nguyen. This time, though, they were quieter.
The lieutenant colonel from Saigon had just made his pitch.
"Any questions?" Parker asked the group.
"I've got one." The deputy for operations looked angry.
"Yes, sir?" asked Lieutenant Colonel Gates.
"What the hell are we doing? For ten days we've gone back and forth to the rail siding, hitting them with everything we've got, until now they've brought in every gun, SAM, and MiG in North Vietnam just to protect Thai Nguyen. 'Don't hit the damned steel mill!' they told us, so we threatened the pilots with everything from court-martials to closing the club if they harmed the steel mill. Now you're telling us the pilots are to bomb the steel mill, with only a one-day pause? Goddammit!"
Mack glanced at the wing commander. Parker never allowed this sort of arguing. Tonight, though, he simply stared at the button colonel and waited for his answer.
"Well, sir," said Gates easily, prepared for just that complaint, "I can't answer for the president, and this target was directed by executive order. I can tell you that the argument you just made was passed to CINCPAC, with an info copy forwarded to CINCUSAF. Since I can't speak for them either, I can't answer your question, sir."
"We've lost twelve birds since we started hitting Thai Nguyen," said the maintenance colonel. "It would make more sense if we could get a few days of down time to work on the aircraft. I've had my men working fifteen-hour days to try to keep up."
"And then," growled the operations colonel again, "a week of bombing other targets so they'd move some of their damned defenses out of Thai Nguyen."
Gates looked at Colonel Parker. "Both Korat and the Navy have asked to drop the first bombs on the steel mill, sir, but the general was adamant that Takhli get first crack at it."
Silence. At times like this, Parker normally would crow about his wing's capability.
Gates continued, "Your pilots always come through with results."
Parker nodded, but did not smile as he usually did when he heard his wing applauded by headquarters.
"The general also knows you've taken considerable losses at the rail facility target, and that the enemy has built up formidable defenses at Thai Nguyen. I'm sure he'd be sympathetic if you requested to forgo being first this time and let someone else soften up the target defenses."
Parker stared back at him. "We'll be first on target, like always."
"But Colonel— " started the deputy commander for operations.
Parker pinned him with his stare. The matter was resolved and he was back to his old self. "We'll discuss it after Colonel Gates leaves." He turned back to Gates. "When you get back to Saigon, thank the general for his confidence and tell him we'll get the job done. Do you have anything else?"
"No, sir." Gates handed the Air Tasking Order to Parker and departed.
Later, when the meeting was finished, Parker kept Mack behind as he had done the previous time. Colonel Parker was going to lead the mission, so Mack wondered why.
Parker remained at the podium as the room emptied, staring at the big map of North Vietnam. Finally he turned to Mack. "What do you think?"
"It's going to be tougher than the loading facility. The mill's a large, sturdy target. It's going to take a lot of sorties to take it all down, and they're going to fight to protect it."
"Do you think I was wrong in not asking for someone else to go first?"
Mack sighed. "That's too hard a question, Colonel. I'm paid to prepare my pilots to fly and fight."
"The DCO was right, you know. They've got half the weapons in North Vietnam gathered at Thai Nguyen to protect that one target."
"We'd have to fight it out some day, anyway. Sooner's probably better than later. And somehow I think the guys like being first. At least we've got tomorrow to prepare."
Parker nodded abruptly.
"I'd better go and make sure my men are ready."
"You do that, Mack." Parker stared at the map again, eyes riveted on the city thirty-five nautical miles due north of Hanoi. "Keep it quiet about the steel mill."
"I will, but they always seem to know when a big mission's coming."
"Well," said B. J. Parker grimly, "this time they've got a no-shit big one."
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Thursday, March 9th—0440 Local, Takhli RTAFB, Thailand
Colonel Mack
Mack watched as the men filed into the mission briefing theater with their steaming coffee cups. B. J. Parker would be mission commander, but Mack had been unable to stay away. It was not morbid curiosity, but the protectiveness a commander feels when his men are in jeopardy.
They'd called in the all-star chorus, the same group that had first bombed the rail loading facility. As they came in and read the target on the board, most of them grew thoughtful and drew into themselves. There was little of the usual bantering.
When Lieutenant DeWalt entered and wrote the execution word for the Thai Nguyen steel mill, there were a few mutters. Then it grew quiet as the pilots wrote down the code words and flight information on their lineup cards. Too quiet, thought Mack. A pilot coughed and the sound seemed obscenely loud. He could hear the pencils scrawling on the cards.
Finally the Bear broke the silence. In his loud baritone, he told Benny Lewis that he wished to hell they'd change the term EXECUTION WORD.
A pilot told the Bear to quit acting like he could read and to go back to his comic book.
The Bear said he'd wanted to be a fighter pilot, but he couldn't qualify since his parents had been married
to each other when he was born.
Duffy Spencer told his second element leader that they were going to swing around north as they exited the target area, because he'd like to look for MiG's up there.
Swede Swendler told Toki Takahara that he had hated fucking steel mills since he'd been a kid in Detroit, and that he'd always dreamed of bombing the damned things.
The gossiping and tactics talk grew louder, the jokes more obscene.
Tiny Bechler joked that the Bear should probably be replaced on the schedule because he was probably weak from all that honeymoon fucking.
The Bear told Tiny Bechler to yell a lot when he got shot down, because he would have his recorder going and that would add a little drama to the boring tapes.
They're okay, Mack said to himself. They'd taken their lumps at the rail facility, had lost some good comrades there. Now they were going back to Thai Nguyen, but this time they were going after a good target. That fact made the difference. Their excitement mounted, and the noise level in the room continued to rise.
A flight leader from the 354th squadron recapped some of the things they had discussed during the tactics tutorial, and that especially pleased Mack.
Lieutenant DeWalt took over the podium, waited nervously for quiet, then gave them the target overview. He briefed them that this morning they were to concentrate on bombing the southernmost building, the first huge blast furnace of the mill. When that was destroyed, they would concentrate on the middle structures. Last, they'd take out the northern building, the new blast furnace still under construction. Headquarters felt it would take numerous bombing sorties before the target was leveled.
Mack kept out of it, just watched the individual pilots in the room who were about to go out and bet their asses on a fast airplane and their skill. He decided to leave before Colonel Parker took over and the mission briefing got down to the gritty details.
Back in the big war, he'd had a commander who would get up before them now and make a speech about duty, honor, and country, about the importance of the contribution they were about to make, about how America was depending on them. In Korea, he'd had a squadron commander who led a prayer before each big mission.
Instead, Mack walked casually toward the door, then stopped. He turned to glance around at them, then grinned and growled loudly, "Kick 'em in the ass!"
09/0500L—Thai Nguyen, DRV
Lt Col Tran Van Ngo
Yesterday's quiet, with no air strikes at Thai Nguyen, had not served to refresh Tran. He had only fretted and wondered when the Thunder planes and Intruders would return. During the ten days since he'd been placed in charge of the siting, provisioning, and care of the three full battalions of rocket batteries and dozens of artillery companies, he had worked night and day and was near exhaustion.
Official word of his promotion to lieutenant colonel had been sent from the People's Army headquarters to his makeshift office at Thai Nguyen soon after Xuan Nha had returned to Hanoi. Then Tran had craved action to show them all that the promotion was warranted. Now he longed for respite.
He was Commandant of Area Defenses for Thai Nguyen, of equal position with the area commanders at Hanoi, Haiphong, and Vinh. A grand title for a man who reeked of sweat, dirt, and toil like a rice farmer. For ten days he had not dared to waste time with such luxuries as bathing. He'd worked relentlessly, visiting each of the batteries, companies, and support units often, determining their needs, exhorting them all to move quickly and react boldly to Wisdom's guidance, returning to his office to plan, coordinate matters and send reports, and to capture bits of sleep. He'd ignore the others working in the room, unceremoniously unroll a mat at the corner of his office, and collapse upon it to immediately succumb to exhaustion.
Major Nguy had been promoted the same day as he, and was now Commandant of Absolute Control. It was a new title, meant to show the new way of things. Nguy had remained his old, steadfast self throughout the ten-day ordeal. Whenever Tran Van Ngo made yet another call for support, reliable Nguy had been there. It was unlikely that Nguy was getting more rest than he.
The combat had been obscenely frantic, yet now the calm seemed even more unnerving. Yesterday the Americans had bombed west of Hanoi and south of Haiphong, and had carefully avoided Thai Nguyen.
Was it over?
Xuan Nha had sent a short message from Hanoi, saying it was probable they had driven the Americans away. The enemy had likely counted their losses and decided the price of attacking Thai Nguyen was too high. He had intimated that the steel mill was now a less likely target, for the Americans were not as willing to give their lives for their cause. He praised the defenders at Thai Nguyen, but exhorted them to remain vigilant.
The last was unnecessary. The radar operators and rocket technicians were depressed and sick with worry about the next attack. They were made so alert by their fear that they could only sleep when utterly exhausted. Tran Van Ngo knew he should worry more about their fatigue, but he could not because he was like that himself.
In the ten days of their defense of the Thai Nguyen rail facility, three rocket batteries had been bombed unmercifully. Terror missiles had homed on and destroyed four other rocket site antenna vans and three SON-9 artillery radars, including one of the new training models brought down from Wisdom. Thirty-seven S-60 medium and eight KS-12 heavy artillery guns and their gun crews had been destroyed by bombs. Some seventy-five other guns had been damaged by cluster bombs and their crews killed.
He estimated that more than 1,400 men had been killed manning the defenses. The wounded had been taken into fields to await truck transportation as they bled from their mouths, eyes, and ears, and from terrible wounds. Tran did not know how many of those there had been. There was no official accounting, or at least none that he knew of. The Lao Dong party would not permit such pessimism. In times of military hardship they tended to hold massive victory celebrations at Ba Dinh Square in Hanoi, outside their party headquarters.
As each battery, gun, launcher, or van was destroyed, Tran Van Ngo had rushed other units in to replace them, whether in daylight or darkness, during an attack or a lull. Replacement operators and technicians were tight-lipped and nervous, some wide-eyed with fear.
Eleven men at a KS-12 85mm artillery battery had suddenly run, bolting when a Thunder plane attacked. The radar operators at a rocket battery had deserted their command van and fled when they'd come under attack by a radar-hunter. Dozens of men, at various times during the raids, had simply stopped working, curling up into protective balls on the ground.
Those who had not been summarily executed by on-scene commanders had been brought to him bound with ropes, examples of cowardice, and he had done his duty. One of them, a very young, bright radar operator who had once worked for him, had been incoherent and had trembled uncontrollably. Tran spoke soothingly to calm him before remembering that he had no reason to. He spat contemptuously then and told the party representative to shoot him with the others who had been brought to him that day.
But they had destroyed many enemy aircraft, more than ever before in such a small area and short time, and Tran forwarded daily reports of the heroism of his men, never mentioning their frailties.
Was defense of the railroad loading facility, bombed again and again after it was already destroyed, worth the loss of so many men and the shooting of once-brave soldiers?
He thought not.
They should have committed their forces more cautiously, bided their time, and waited until the Americans came to bomb the steel mill. He knew they would come, regardless of Xuan Nha's message. Now they would have no surprises for the enemy. The Americans knew what they had, for they'd laid it all out before them as they'd come back each day to drop more bombs on the mangled rail siding.
Where, Tran wearily wondered, would they drop their bombs this morning?
09/0545L—Takhli RTAFB, Thailand
Benny Lewis
He taxied into position at the end of the active runway and waited until Tiny Bechler p
ulled in beside. They lowered canopies, and Benny's ears popped as the cockpit began to pressurize. Throttle forward and the engine revved. His gauges were normal. Throttle to idle.
"You ready back there?" he asked.
"There you go," joked the Bear, "waking me up again."
The tower called, "Red Dog, you're cleared for takeoff. Climb and maintain five . . ."
He pushed the throttle forward, then outboard to A/B, and released brakes. The big fighter began to roll.
09/0620L—Thai Nguyen, DRV
Tran Van Ngo
Thirty minutes earlier observers near the two Thunder plane bases in Thailand had reported that very large numbers of aircraft were being launched with full combat loads of bombs. Their targets were unknown.
Tran told his communications officer, a lieutenant who worked at his radios set up on a table near the door, to wake him when the Americans were closer, but only if it appeared they might be coming to Thai Nguyen. He curled up on the mat and slept dreamlessly.
09/0715L—Route Pack Six, North Vietnam
Bear Stewart
They were out five miles in front of Colonel Parker's Eagle flight. He'd harped at them some, said he liked the Weasels farther out in front, but Benny and Pudge had convinced him their new tactic worked best when they were closer and they could start working over the target area defenses just as the strike force arrived. He'd relented.
Given the capability the gomers were showing with their integrated defenses, the Bear was thankful they weren't flying twenty miles out in front, like they used to do. He was not so happy, however, with what he was seeing on his scopes.
Benny had just called for the flight to split. They'd swung south, Pudge and Sloppy north, and suddenly it seemed the whole world was looking at them.
"We've got Fansongs in all directions, at seven, nine, ten, one, and three . . . the one at ten acts serious. Tracking. Lots of Firecans. I'm not going to call guns anymore."
"Roger."
"The SAM site at seven is probably just north of the target area. We'll see when we turn back inbound."
