Battle Born (10 page)

“Fireman flight, stand by for launch,” the B-1 bomber crew radioed. Moments after Samson acknowledged the warning, a second Wolverine missile dropped free from the B-1’s aft bomb bay.

“Two JASSMs!” Hayes exclaimed. “Now we really got a show going!”

“This is how we envision employing Coronet Tiger one-plus—in a hunter-killer role,” Samson explained. “Obviously, the B-1 becomes an item of interest after it first launches an antiballistic missile missile and then attacks the launch site. Any area defenses will light up like crazy. That’s when the bomber shifts from a rocket killer to SEAD—suppression of enemy air defenses—role.

“The B-1 can carry up to twenty-four Wolverine or Lancelot missiles internally, plus four more externally. A typical weapons load would be eight Lancelots and eight Wolverines on internal rotary launchers, and one internal fuel tank or eight more JASSMs. Externally, it can carry eight HARM antiradar missiles or twelve Scorpion air-to-air missiles, depending on support, range to the target, and the threat. The B-1 can carry up to one hundred and fifty thousand pounds of ordnance—as much as five F-15E Strike Eagles, with much greater range and equal speed.”

“Scorpion? HARM?” Hayes asked. “The B-1 can carry antiradar or air-to-air missiles?”

“It always could, sir,” Samson replied. “The B-1 has
four external hardpoints with a standard data bus—it can carry any missile, bomb, or sensor package in the inventory. It also has two external fuel tank hardpoints. But when the B-1 was disqualified from carrying cruise missiles because of the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaties, everyone seemed to forget about the hardpoints. Everyone except HAWC, of course. External stores destroy the Bone’s stealth capabilities, but once the external stores and racks are used or jettisoned, it has full stealth capability again.”

Hayes watched in utter fascination as the attack continued. Both Navy ships were launching Standard antiair missiles now. The Wolverines were skimming the ocean so low it looked as if they would crash into it any second.

The second Wolverine missile passed within one mile of the easternmost Navy warship. “That’s a kill,” Samson said.

“But it missed.”

“It was programmed not to fly closer than one mile,” Samson explained. “Range safety rules. It’ll try to go after the second Navy ship now.” But the missile’s luck ran out. Because the first Navy ship was still “alive,” it and the second warship bracketed the second Wolverine missile with a flight of four Standard missiles and shot it down long before it could approach the second ship.

“Not fair,” Samson protested. “That first ship was ‘dead.’”

“All’s fair in love and ship defense,” Hayes said.

“It’s still unfair,” Samson said. “But the first Wolverine missile has a live warhead. You’ll see—it’s going all the way to the target.”

It did. Samson and Hayes watched as it streaked over the launch barge, the imaging infrared view of the barge flipping upside down as the IIR sensor stayed locked on the target. Three small cylindrical canisters
appeared on the image, spinning under a small stabilizing parachute. Suddenly, all three canisters separated from the parachute, and moments later there were several bright flashes of light that completely obscured the barge. When the image cleared, the barge was on fire and half submerged.

“Man, I love watching those things,” Hayes admitted. The BLU-108 “Shredder” sensor-fused weapon, or SFW, was the Air Force’s new air-delivered antivehicle weapon. Each Shredder canister contained four copper skeets, aimed by an infrared sensor. As the canisters spin, they find a target, and at the proper instant they detonate. The explosion sends a molten copper slug out each skeet at the target at supersonic speed, fast enough and hot enough to cut even three-inch steel armor into Swiss cheese within a half mile of ground zero. Because the launch barge was the only target in the area, all twelve slugs hit the barge.

“Me too,” Samson said. “I love the smell of molten copper slugs in the morning.”

“Very, very impressive, Earthmover,” Hayes went on, writing notes in a small notebook. “First a successful ABM test, then a successful counterattack test. Excellent. Interesting to think what it’d have been like if you’d had one of those plasma-yield weapons on a Wolverine.”

Samson looked at Hayes, then hit the radio button on his throttle quadrant: “Fireman, this is Two, get us extended range clearance for second launch sequence.”

“Roger, Fireman Two. Break. Neptune, Fireman flight, requesting extended range clearance for final launch sequence. Ten-mile minimum clearance all vessels.”

“Roger, Fireman flight, this is Neptune control, the range is extended-radius clear. You are cleared hot for final missile series.”

“Fireman flight copies extended-range clear, Fireman flight check.”

“Two,” Samson said. “Fireman, Neptune, stand by.” He turned to Hayes. “Anytime you’re ready, sir.”

“Ready for . . .?” Hayes stopped, dropping his oxygen mask in surprise. “You’re shitting me, Samson. Don’t tell me you’ve got a plasma-yield weapon onboard that B-1 right now?”

“No—I’ve got
two
,” Samson replied. “I’ve got one Lancelot ABM and one Wolverine cruise missile armed with a THAAD plasma-yield warhead, ready to go.”

“By whose authority?” said a stunned Hayes, his voice rising in fury. “Who the hell authorized you to do that, Samson?”

“Sir, as you said at that Senate subcommittee hearing, I did it under the authority given me by the President and the secretary of defense,” Samson replied. “We developed the weapon, did some mating, release, jettison, and captive launch tests, and certified it ready for launch. It’s never been tested before on a live launch. We own the airspace for two hundred miles in all directions; we’ve only got a couple of Navy ships in the area, and we’ve got a target. I think we should let ’er rip and see what we got.”

“You’re
crazy
, Samson,” Hayes shot back. He was so red-hot angry that he thought he would explode. “You have got to be off your rocker. This is the most blatant form of insubordination I’ve seen since . . . shit, since Brad Elliott. You just think that you can load up a missile with an experimental subatomic warhead and shoot it into the sky anytime you feel like it? We can cause a major military crisis! We can cause an international incident! We can both lose our jobs and spend the rest of our lives in Fort Leavenworth! Goddammit, Samson, you scare me! I’m going to take a good hard
look at your suitability for your position and your continued service after we get on the ground!”

The tactical action officer, or TAO, aboard the U.S. Navy
Ticonderoga-class
Aegis guided missile cruiser USS
Grand Island
, who was acting as range controller, attack officer, and supervisor for the morning’s tests, watched his electronic displays carefully. The Combat Information Center—CIC—of the
Grand Island
had four large multicolor electronic displays forward, which integrated all electronic signals from ships, planes, and shore stations, giving the TAO a three-dimensional picture of his “battlefield” for hundreds of miles in all directions. He and his deputy sat in the middle of the CIC compartment, surrounded by weapons officers, sensor operators, and communications technicians.

He thought what he saw was a glitch in the two displays that gave him horizontal and vertical plots of the missile tracks. He turned to his radar technician and asked, “Radar, what happened to those missile tracks? What do you get?”

“Don’t know, sir,” the radar technician replied. “I saw the target rocket launch, then the airborne missile launch, then the cruise missile launch to attack the launch barge, same as the first test sequence. It looked like a good intercept. Then poof. Nothing. Both tracks disappeared. No debris.”

“Comm, did the zoomies broadcast an abort warning?” the TAO asked a communications technician.

“No, sir,” the communications specialist confirmed.

“Damn Air Force weenies,” the TAO muttered. “Too embarrassed by a faulty flight to tell us they self-destructed both missiles.” He paused for a moment, then asked, “Radar, you say you’re not picking up any debris?”

“No, sir,” said the radar technician. “Usually, the SPY-1B will track debris pretty good, enough so we can clear a specific piece of airspace or ocean.” The SPY-1B was the three-dimensional phased-array radar on the
Aegis-class
warships, powerful enough to track a target as small as a bird two hundred miles away. “Nothing this time.”

“Humpf,” the TAO grunted. Both missiles might have splashed down. He didn’t know enough about either of them to know if they floated, if the warheads became more unstable in seawater, what they looked like when they broke apart, how to disarm a ditched missile—and a hundred other things he would’ve been briefed on if the Air Force had done its job correctly. “Comm, tell all vessels to stay east of the second launch barge. Radar, clear all aircraft out of the range via the shortest way possible away from the missile tracks. Then do a systems check, find out why we can’t see their debris.” On the intercom, he radioed, “Bridge, Combat.”

“Go ahead.” The TAO recognized the captain’s voice.

“We lost track of the missile debris, sir, so we’re clearing all aircraft away from the missiles’ flight paths and terminating all activity. We’re done for the day.”

“Copy that. We’ll form up and head back to the barn.”

“What did you see up there, sir?”

“We saw . . .” There was a very long pause, then: “We don’t quite know what we saw, Combat. We saw two good missile plumes heading toward each other, then . . . well, we’re not sure after that. We saw a flash of light, and some of the lookouts say they saw a big silver globe. But we didn’t hear or pick up anything. No explosion, no nothing.”

“Checks down here, sir,” said the TAO.

“What did it look like to you, Combat?”

“About the same.”

“What about the cruise missile? Did it hit its target?”

“Stand by,” the TAO said. “Radar, what have you got on the second launch barge? Did the zoomies hit it?”

“I . . . I don’t know, sir,” the radar technician stammered. “It’s like the ABM intercept. It looked normal, heading right for the target, then . . . gone.”

“Gone? The target? Gone like blew up? Gone like sunk?”

“Gone like . . . gone, sir,” the technician said. “I pick up nothing. The missile has disappeared . . . shit, and the barge disappeared too!”

“What the hell are you talking about? Surface range thirty, high res,” he demanded, and checked the short-range surface radar depiction. There was no sign of the barge.

“I’ve got a good radar lock on the first launch barge, sir,” the technician said, “but zilch on the second. It must’ve broke apart and sunk like a stone.”

“That barge was almost two hundred feet long, eighty feet wide, and weighed ninety tons. Those things do not just disappear,” the TAO said aloud to no one in particular. Even the first launch barge, which was hit dead-on by the sensor-fused weapon dropped by the cruise missile, was still partially afloat. The TAO hit the intercom button: “Bridge, Combat. We don’t have a fix on the second launch pad. It must’ve sunk. What kind of warhead did they have on that thing? It must’ve been a two-thousand-pounder at least.”

“Negative, Combat,” the captain responded. “We didn’t hear or see any explosion.”

The TAO looked at his CIC crew members in shock. “How is that possible, sir?” was all he could think to ask.

“I don’t know,” the captain said, feeling the anger rise in his throat. He had a suspicion that the Air Force had pulled a fast one on him—that they had tested a new weapon in the wide-open daylight skies and seas, in a well-used military weapons range that belonged to the U.S. Navy. To the officer of the deck, the captain said, “How long for us to get to that second launch barge’s last position?”

“About thirty minutes at standard, sir.”

“Officer of the deck, plot a course to the second launch barge’s position,” the captain ordered. “All ahead full. I want a full investigation on what kind of weapon sunk that barge. Air, water, electromagnetic, debris analysis, the works.” He paused, then added, “And have the corpsmen prepare to do a full radiation scan as well.”

The last order froze everyone on the bridge in their tracks. The captain was silent for a long moment, then said, “Get to it, gentlemen. Keep your damn eyes open.”

It took less than twenty minutes for the two Air Force jets to fly back to Elliott Air Force Base. The base, ninety miles northwest of Las Vegas, was situated near a dry lake bed named Groom Lake. Anyone who viewed the lake bed—which would have been both difficult and illegal, since the airspace for fifty miles around the base was restricted from ground level to
infinity
—would have seen a roughly five-mile sheet of hard, sunbaked sand. But seconds before the planes touched down, sprinklers popped on and highlighted a long strip of sand-colored concrete in the lake bed. Less than three minutes later Terrill Samson had turned off the runway and the sun evaporated the water. The runway disappeared once again.

Bradley James Elliott Air Force Base was the name of the installation built next to the dry lake. It resembled a cross between a small, old, nearly abandoned air base and a modern industrial development facility. It had some old wooden buildings and many modern concrete buildings. Because it was so far from the nearest town, it had dormitory-style enlisted, officer, and civilian quarters. There were few amenities: a mess hall, only a small shopette instead of a full commissary and exchange, a little-used outdoor pool, and no base theater.

The roads were well maintained and the sidewalks were lined with cactus and Joshua trees. The roads had typical Air Force base names, honoring Air Force legends: military aviation pioneers like Rickenbacker and Mitchell, leaders like Spaatz and LeMay, Air Force Medal of Honor recipients like Loring and Sijan, and air combat aces like Bong and DeBellevue. Other streets had names that most people new at the base might not immediately recognize, like Ormack and Powell—names of dead test pilots who had been assigned to the base. About two thousand men and women worked at the base, typically four days on, three days off. They were either bused in in convoys of air-conditioned Greyhound buses, making the 110-mile drive in under two hours, or flown in on unmarked jet airliners from Nellis Air Force Base north of Las Vegas in a matter of minutes.