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  “Alfa Papa formation, November Bravo,” called the AIC. “Bogies twenty five miles; course three three zero, altitude one zero.”

  On the open privacy frequency between the two Marine Corps pilots, Panope keyed his mike. “Chris, think this is another false alarm?”

  “Probably. You know how nervous those sailors are back on the bird farm.”

  “Lose two ships in two months, and I’d be nervous, too.”

  “Alfa Papa formation, come right two zero five.”

  The two Hornet pilots eased their fighters to the left five degrees and steadied up on the new course.

  “Bogies, twenty miles; course three three zero and descending.”

  “Descending?”

  Chris glanced out of his cockpit at his wingman. There were only two reasons aircraft at that altitude descend. One was to land on the carrier and, if they were going to do that, they would have approached the bird farm through the approved corridor; the other reason was to launch air-to-surface cruise missiles.

  “Alfa Papa, this is November Bravo; request afterburners and max speed.”

  “Roger, Alfa Papa formation already on afterburners; increasing speed to Mach one point two.”

  Twenty miles at the speed of sound would be covered in less than a minute. The thrust shoved the two pilots back against their seats. Their heads pressed against the backrests. The sunlight obstructed the heads-up display on the cockpit windshield. Chris glanced down to verify weapons status. The status box showed all six Sidewinders active and ready. As they exceeded the speed of sound, silence enveloped the two pilots. Behind them, the normal flight noise followed, never quite catching up but chasing them nevertheless.

  The AIC kept the information on the bogies rolling across the airwaves until she said, “Alfa Papa formation, slow to four hundred knots. Bogies are directly ahead five miles, two thousand feet.” Her voice sounded nervous, Chris thought. / would be, too, if I was sitting on a ship the size of two football fields waiting for missiles to be launched. In the back of his mind, he expected to intercept two of their own aircraft as they did during yesterday’s bogus intercept. A loud boom rocked the two aircraft as they slowed below the speed of sound and the noise caught up.

  “I see them, Chris,” Panope said. “They are below at our eleven o’clock.”

  Chris banked the aircraft slightly to the left to open his view. The sunlight reflecting off the two silver fuselages highlighted the bogies.

  “Got them,” Chris said. He flipped the radio switch to the Stennis.

  “November Papa, we have the bogies in sight. Beginning rear hemispheric approach. Request weapons free.”

  Several seconds passed as the Hornets began a smooth approach behind the two bogies.

  “Alfa Papa, weapons free after identification pass.”

  “Identification pass! What does she want us to do? Give them a chance to shoot us down?” Panope asked. Chris shook his head. “No, they just don’t want us to shoot down one of our own. Let’s go, Marine. They’re probably Navy, and nothing gives me greater pleasure than to scare the piss out of a couple of swabbies.” The two aircraft continued their approach, leveling off three miles behind the unidentified aircraft. From their position, the sun blinded them, making it impossible to tell what the aircraft were or even if they were American. It would take several seconds to clear their vision.

  “November Papa, request ELINT information on the bogies.”

  “Alfa Papa, we have no electronic signatures on the approaching bogies.

  No IFF or radar.”

  Chris’s eyebrows bunched as the Marine captain tried to figure out who would be so dumb as to approach a carrier battle group with no IFF. If they shot them down and they were Navy, they deserved it, if for no other reason than being dumb and stupid. He shook his head, wondering with amazement how ignorant people can be.

  “Activating fire control radar at this time,” Chris announced.

  Both Hornets’ fire control radar painted the two bogies in front of them. “That should get their attent—” said Panope. “What the heck, over!”

  Contrails from under the wings of the right bogie shot out. The two Hornet pilots watched helplessly as two Exocet missiles dropped from the Mirage aircraft. Almost immediately, the enemy aircraft on the left fired two more. Four goddamn missiles! Shit!

  “November Papa; this is Alfa Bravo. I mean Alfa Papa to November Charlie. Shit! Stennis, you got missiles inbound. I say again, four cruise missiles inbound. Request permission to splash the bandits.

  Bandits identified as Mirages, believe them to be Mirage F1s.” The Mirages’ movement to the right brought them out of the bright sunlight.

  Even as he asked, Chris and Panope locked their fire control radar on the two Mirages in front of them.

  The two Mirages separated.

  “Fox one!” shouted Panope.

  “Fox two!” echoed Chris.

  “Fox three; Fox four,” Panope shouted into the helmet microphone, as four Sidewinder missiles erupted from beneath the wings of the Marine Corps fighters. Following the missiles in, the two pilots depressed the cannon trigger, filling the air behind the enemy aircraft with twenty-millimeter shells.

  The Mirage Fl on the left turned left and climbed; the other dove right, heading toward sea level.

  “Alfa Papa; November Bravo. Splash the bandits! Repeat again, you have weapons release authority. Splash the bandits.”

  “Thanks, Stennis}” Somewhat late, thought Chris as he watched his Sidewinder make a long turn to follow the descending aircraft. The dark contrail of the air-to-air missile marked a corkscrew path as Chris’s Sidewinder sought to connect with the fleeing Mirage F1.

  “Roger, November Bravo. Bandits have split. We are engaged.”

  “Panope, you take the bandit to the left. I’ve got the son of a bitch going sea level.”

  “Alfa Papa, November Bravo; be advised formation Delta Papa enroute your position,” the AIC reported, indicating a formation of F-14 Tomcats were being vectored toward their engagement zone.

  Chris clicked his mike twice, acknowledging the AIC. The AIC would keep the other formation out of the air combat maneuver zone if she believed any chance existed of a blue-on blue incident. He had his hands full with this engagement. He expected the battle group to perform as they did during exercises. You fight like you train. He just wished they had had sufficient funds to do more training before they sortied with only two days’ notice to the USS Stennis. At the time, the aircraft carrier had been in the Atlantic, heading full speed toward the Mediterranean in reaction to the Libyan sinking of the USS Gearing.

  The two Hornets banked apart. Chris dove toward the weaving Mirage, which had come out on a southwest course, taking it toward the Algerian landmass. The Sidewinder banked right, but electromagnetic scatter caused by the proximity to the sea broke up the electronic lock. Chris watched helplessly as the missile hit the water, exploding harmlessly about a quarter of a mile behind the Mirage. “Damn!”

  Burning flares erupted from the rear of the Mirage. Chris knew the pilot was trying to obscure the infrared sensors on the missiles, but he had no worry. At this angle and this close to the sea, missiles were useless. He reached down and flipped open the toggle protecting the trigger to the single cannon of the F/A18. The Hornet shook from the vibration caused by the thicker air as he descended, passing one thousand feet in an attempt to align the aircraft behind the bobbing Mirage. He glanced at the altimeter reading on his heads-up display.

  Seven hundred feet and still heading down. A new surge of adrenaline brought his senses to heightened awareness as his hands tightened on the throttle and the trigger. He felt the trouser legs tighten as compressed air squeezed his legs, reducing blood flow in the extremities to increase blood available to the brain. A simple device designed to help pilots stay conscious when pulling multiple g’s. Simultaneously as he descended, Chris fought the turbulence of the lower atmosphere as he attempted to align his cannon on the
Mirage. The heads-up display registered the decreasing height, a soft beeping sound alerting him to the low altitude.

  Chris flipped off the afterburner. Too much danger of it flaming out as he descended closer to sea level.

  He fired a few rounds of the twenty-millimeter shells and watched the tracer round pass harmlessly over the top of the Mirage. He corrected and fired again. Unexpectedly, die Mirage pulled up, causing Chris to undershoot.

  The Marine captain banked to the right, believing the Mirage to have pulled right. His head whipped back and forth as he searched for a visual on the enemy aircraft. The last thing he wanted was to pull out and discover the enemy had rolled into position behind him. One thing he noticed when the Mirage pulled up was the absence of air-to-air missiles. Even as he searched for the enemy aircraft, he realized the absence of air to-air missiles meant these two Algerian pilots had charged the battle group fully expecting to die during their mission. No fighters went out against the force these two did with just air to-surface cruise missiles and expected to survive. Look what happened to those two Iraqi Mirages during Desert Storm back in 1991.

  He rolled the Hornet to the left and immediately picked up the Mirage on his air intercept radar. The enemy was climbing for altitude, rolling right as he ascended, but as soon as Chris flew past, the enemy pilot rolled left and started a fast, controlled descent back to sea level, all the while working toward the Algerian landmass. He hoped the battle group gave permission for hot pursuit, if the enemy aircraft crossed the coastline. Their new orders were simple: “Avoid Algerian territory and national waters,” but he and his adversary were fast approaching both.

  “Avoid further entanglements” had been the second order. How in the hell did you avoid further entanglements when you had troops on the ground?

  “Answer me that,” he mumbled, his eyes searching the sky.

  He could ask, but one thing he had learned in his six years in the Marine Corps was never to ask a question if you really do not want to know the answer, because whatever answer you get, you won’t like.

  The maneuver gave the Mirage pilot breathing room, opening up the distance and giving the Algerian pilot a hope for survival. Six miles separated the two, and the Mirage pilot was only ten miles from shore.

  “Splash one bandit!” cried Panope. “You should have seen it. A missile right up the tail. A July Fourth fireworks if I ever saw one. That’s one Al-Qaida shithead who won’t need his Preparation H tonight. Christ, Chris, I am now an ace.”

  “Shut up, Panope, and get your ass over here!”

  “On my way, Chris! … Oh, Roll me over in the clover—”

  “Panope, I’m still fighting. Shut up!”

  “Alfa Papa, November Bravo; one confirmed kill. Bandit offscreen. Other is closing shore, eight miles from coast. You have permission for hot pursuit. Delta Papa formation one minute from your position, approaching from the east, altitude five zero.”

  “Roger,” replied Chris. He rolled the Hornet left, ascended a thousand feet, flipped on’ the afterburner, and in seconds closed the distance to four miles. The Algerian coastline filled more of his vision than the Mediterranean Sea. He glanced quickly to the east and up, half hoping to spot the Tomcat formation entering the combat zone at five thousand feet. He jerked his head to the front, his attention riveted on the enemy aircraft weaving below him. He rolled the Hornet to the left and dove against the slower Mirage.

  He fired his cannon as he passed the enemy aircraft and thought he saw one of the shells hit the rear of the plane. He flipped the Hornet right, pulling over a g as he turned for another pass. Chris lost visual on the Mirage. His head whirled from side to side as he fought to regain visual position on the bandit. Chris glanced down at the radar and saw no sign of the enemy. The only place it could be was behind him. “I’ve lost him!” he shouted into his helmet microphone.

  “Behind you, Chris. He’s behind you!” shouted Panope. “Get your ass out of there! Up, man. Go up! I’m coming.”

  Shells from the Mirage’s cannon passed down the left-hand side of the cockpit. Chris pulled the Hornet straight up, rolling into a loop, and as he passed overhead, the enemy passed beneath him. The pilot of the Mirage looked up, flicked two fingers at Chris, and then banked the Mirage right. Balls, thought Chris as the Mirage disappeared from his vision again. If he had been the pilot of the Mirage, he would have hingoed across the shoreline and disappeared into the land scatter.

  Instead, the Algerian pilot had opted to take advantage of Chris’s maneuver and attack the superior fighter aircraft. Balls, Chris thought again. Or just another fanatic lusting after those virgins in paradise.

  Well, he was going to give the enemy pilot his wish.

  In the middle of the loop, Chris flipped the Hornet down and around, bringing the fighter out right side up and directly behind the Mirage.

  He fired his cannon, seeing the trace lace the tail of the aircraft. The Mirage swung from side to side, attempting to evade the cannon fire.

  Chris slowed the Hornet to match the speed of the slower Mirage and started rocking the aircraft, matching the Mirage swing for swing. On the second swing, Chris depressed and held the cannon trigger, firing as the Mirage crossed his nose. He caught movement out of the corner of his eye as Panope pulled up alongside of him.

  Chris glanced through the cockpit at his wingman flying about seventy feet to his right. He nodded, and the two of them laid down a wall of continuous twenty-millimeter cannon shells at the fleeing bandit. The shells tore through the rudder, the engines, the small rear wings, and blasted the top of the cockpit off. One moment the Mirage was serving as a target and the next, a huge fireball blinded the two F/A-18 pilots.

  The Mirage, minus its tail, tumbled downward out of a cloud of debris, a huge black trail of rolling smoke marking its fall. Chris and Panope pulled up on their throttles, taking their Hornets up an dover the conflagration before turning together to commence a clockwise circle of the area. A minute later, the remains of the burning Mirage hit the shallow sea about a half mile from the shore, rolling repeatedly across the surface before exploding again. No ejection seat burst forth. Chris gave a thumbs-up to Panope as the two of them gained altitude and turned toward the battle group.

  * * *

  Exocet, French-made antishipping missiles sold widely during the 1980s to Third World nations, have a warhead with over 360 pounds of high explosives. Two Iraqi Mirages “unintentionally” launched Exocet missiles against the USS Stark in May 1987, killing nearly forty American sailors and nearly sinking the American frigate in the Persian Gulf. During the Falklands war in May 1982, Argentina’s aging Super Etendard fighter aircraft sank the British destroyer Sheffield and the British support ship Atlantic Conveyor with Exocet missiles. Thank goodness it’s August and not May.

  May is not a good month for warships, thought Chris.

  The two F/A-18 Hornets sped ahead of their sound wave toward the battle group in vain hopes of catching the missiles. The Exocets had automatically descended to ten meters’ altitude, losing themselves from aircraft radar against the sea scatter of the Mediterranean.

  “Captain, we have four missiles inbound. Target is USS Stennis,” said the Tactical Action officer to Captain Richard Holman. The acting captain of the USS Stennis, Commander Tucson Conroy, stood beside the new commander, Task Force Sixty-seven.

  Holman reached up and buttoned his helmet. “Tucson, you’re the captain.

  It’s your show,” he said, fighting the urge to take control and fight his ship. It was the hardest thing he had done since being forced to assume command of the U.S. Naval Air Forces in the Mediterranean.

  Tucson nodded. “I know,” he said, his reply acknowledging both the positional authority he held and the turmoil he knew Dick Holman was experiencing.

  “Stennis, this is Ramage,” a voice blasted over the secure circuit. “I have missile track zero six two for action!”

  The second-class petty officer sitting beneath the speaker
reached up and turned the volume down.

  “Stennis, this is Yorktown,” crackled the speaker overhead. “Missiles away!” The Aegis cruiser was not waiting for direction from the carrier and, as far as Holman was concerned, that was fine with him. He rubbed his hands on his khakis. The Yorktown had been detached from the Nassau Amphibious Task Force and assigned to the Stennis soon after they inchopped the Mediterranean. Its air defense might and Aegis sensor capabilities provided the Stennis Battle Group the defense in depth it needed. Where is the USS Hue City? he asked himself, referring to the other Aegis-class cruiser in the battle group. Dick Holman turned to the surface operator console and scanned the battle group layout, searching for a few seconds until he saw the other Aegis cruiser. Good, they overlap each other’s weapons systems.

  “Splash one inbound!” shouted a voice across the airwaves.

  “Identify yourself!” the TAO screamed into his microphone.

  Tucson Conroy reached forward and touched the young lieutenant commander on the shoulder. “Stay calm, Commander. Stay calm.”

  Dick Holman turned away and walked briskly to the EW console. He glanced at the AN/SLQ-32(V)3 electronic warfare system, where dotted lines marked the three remaining missiles tracking inbound toward the carrier.

  “Three still coming, Skipper,” he said more to himself than to Tucson, who heard his warning.

  The air operator sitting at the Naval Tactical Data System spoke up.

  “Commander, that would have been USS Ramage, sir. The radar image of their missile connected with inbound track zero six two.”

  The TAO turned to the operator. “Thanks.” His voice was calm but firm.

  “Keep the operators on the circuit identifying themselves. We need to keep a clear picture.”

  “Sir,” she said. “I show three inbound videos at speed Mach point eight.

  Time to impact two minutes.”

  “What happened to the Yorktown’s shot?” asked Holman as he started to crawl up into the captain’s chair, remembered he wasn’t the captain any longer, and stopped himself. He stroked his hands on his khaki trouser legs. It was hard to keep quiet and let someone else fight his ship. He glanced at the chair. He wanted to sit there silently and watch the well-oiled combat team fight the ship, but, by God, it was still his ship, and he was finding it hard to keep quiet. Why in the hell did Admiral Cameron promote him to CTF Sixty-seven and make him transfer command of his carrier to his XO? His stomach tightened as he waited for the answer. Several seconds passed, the missiles continued to close, and Dick Holman was surprised to discover he was holding his breath.