Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 06 (62 page)

 
          
“Yes,
sir,” Sun responded. “As expected, the Nationalists attacked Juidongshan with
conventional bombs and air-dropped mines. The base was moderately damaged, but
we suffered no casualties. Four of our J-6 air defense fighters were shot down,
with four presumed casualties. The Nationalist attack on
Xiamen
was stopped completely, with an estimated
thirty-two Nationalist F-16 fighters obliterated. No estimates on Nationalist
casualties on Quemoy Dao, but observed aboveground damage was extensive. No
damage, no casualties at
Xiamen
. All of our invasion forces are intact and awaiting your orders for the
second phase of our attack.”

 
          
President
Jiang hesitated. This was easily the most monumental decision of his life. Up
until now, he had almost completely escaped criticism for the People’s
Liberation Army’s activities in the
Formosa Strait
or
South
China Sea
region
since these conflicts had begun about a month ago. He had been roundly
criticized for bringing the former Russian, former Iranian aircraft carrier
into the western Pacific; he had been criticized for amassing an attack fleet
against
Quemoy
; he had been criticized for his policies
against allowing more home rule of
Hong Kong
.
But ever since Admiral Sun had begun his unconventional-warfare campaign
against Taiwan, very little criticism had been directed against him—it had all
been directed against the United States and against the rebels on Formosa, even
though Admiral Sun and the People’s Liberation Army under his command had
precipitated everything that had occurred!

 
          
But
from here on,
China
’s true designs would become evident— there would be no more feigned
innocence, no more pointing fingers at the Nationalists and the Americans for
their aggressive acts. Although some of what had occurred could be explained
away as acts of selfdefense, it would be much harder to cry “Foul! ” in the future
if he gave the order that Admiral Sun Ji Guoming was seeking.

 
          
“I
want reports on American, Japanese, Korean, and ASEAN member reactions to the
attacks on Juidongshan and
Xiamen
,” President Jiang ordered his staff. “I want a media statement
prepared, explaining that our activities were purely defensive in nature and
provoked by the Nationalists’ aggression. I want reports from our ground forces
commanders near
Xiamen
, asking about the readiness of our forces. I want an intelligence
report on the Nationalists’ troop situation on
Quemoy
and Matsu Dao.” Jiang turned to the radio:
“Admiral Sun, I have ordered reports from
Xiamen
and from our embassies and information
offices in the Pacific to get reaction on the attacks. I will issue my orders
when these reports are transmitted to me and I have had a chance to evaluate
them.”

           
“With all due respect, Comrade
President, you cannot wait—you must give the order now, or abandon the invasion
plans,” Admiral Sun replied. “This decision must be made immediately. Our
bombers must strike while the rebels are confused and stunned by the aftermath
of the attack on
Xiamen
, and before they disperse their aircraft or hide them in reinforced
underground storage facilities. We can cripple the rebels’ air forces in one
night if we strike right now, comrade. We must not hesitate. Our bombers are
airborne and can only remain in this orbit, below the Nationalists’ long-range
radar coverage, for a few minutes longer before our fuel status will render us
non-mission effective. We can midair refuel the H-6 bombers, but the other
bombers must return to base to refuel, which will upset our strike timing and
prevent success. I need an order right now, sir. ”

 
          
The
overcrowded, stuffy, noisy, smelly underground bunker suddenly became as quiet
as a grave, as if everyone could somehow hear the conversation between their
Paramount Leader and the enigmatic, almost legendary navy admiral who had
turned their tranquil, blissfully isolated lives upside down these past few
weeks. They all knew that the conflict between the People’s Republic of China
and the rebel Nationalists on Formosa was about to move to a whole new
level—and they were glad to be sixty feet underground right now, too.

ABOARD AN H-7 GANGFANG BOMBER,
OVER THE
WUYI
MOUNTAINS
,
EASTERN
CHINA
MOMENTS LATER

           
Sun Ji Guoming was a career navy
man, but he had to admit that the power and the speed of the heavy bomber was
something to behold, something that could easily make a sailor trade in his
slickers and sea bag for a flight suit.

 
          
Admiral
Sun was strapped into the instructor pilot’s seat of an H-7 Gangfang H-7
supersonic bomber, one of six ex-Soviet Tupolev-26 “Backfire” bombers the
Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force purchased from
Russia
in 1993. Sun was leading an attack
formation of thirty Xian H-6 bombers, Chinese-built copies of the Soviet
Tupolev-16 bomber, which launched from Wuhan People’s Liberation Army Air Force
Base, three hundred miles west of
Shanghai
, about an hour before sunset. Along with
the bombers were six HT-6 Xian tankers, which were H-6 bombers configured to
act as aerial refueling tankers.

 
          
Once
reaching the air refueling orbit areas, each bomber took on a token on-load of
fuel, around thirty thousand pounds each. The HT-6 tanker unreeled a long,
six-inch-diameter hose with a large three-foot- diameter basketlike drogue at
the end from each wingtip, and the H-6 bombers engaged the drogue with a probe
protruding from their wingtips. Even with an observer guiding the two planes to
the contact position from observation blisters near the tail of the HT-6s,
Admiral Sun was astounded by the precision of the bomber pilots, able to stick
the six-inch probe into the drogue in the semidarkness and then stay in
formation long enough to successfully transfer the fuel, even in a turn—it took
almost ten minutes, with the two planes flying less than thirty feet apart at
over three hundred miles an hour, to transfer a relatively small amount of
fuel. Sun’s H-7 bomber used a long refueling probe that extended far ahead of
the nose, so they did not need an observer—they simply flew right up into the
basket and plugged in. How the pilot could maneuver a 250,000-pound aircraft
inflight to within three feet of a moving point in space was amazing.

 
          
After
refueling, the gaggle of bombers broke up into three cells of ten planes and
proceeded to orbit points on the west side of the
Wuyi
Mountains
, about two hundred miles from the
Formosa Strait
, staying at 5,000 feet to keep below the
top of the Wuyi range. The reason: Le Shan, or
Happy
Mountain
. The Taiwanese Le Shan air defense system
was one of the most sophisticated in the world. Radar information from three
long-range radar arrays based in the Chungyang Mountains of central Taiwan,
along with radar data from radar planes, ships, civilian air- traffic-control
radar systems, and even some fighter radars, were combined in the Happy
Mountain underground air defense center located south of Taipei. One hundred
military controllers scanned over a million and a half cubic miles of airspace,
from the surface to 60,000 feet, and directed almost one hundred American-made
F-5E Tiger II air defense fighters, ten Taiwanese-made Ching Kuo fighters, more
than fifty Hawk air defense missile sites, twenty Tien Kung I and II surface-to-air
missile sites, fifty Chaparral short-range antiaircraft missile sites, and more
than two hundred antiaircraft artillery sites located throughout the Republic
of China’s islands. Le Shan’s mountaintop radars could see deep into mainland
China
, and its air defense weapons were
first-class. The Tien Kung II antiaircraft missile system, based on the
American Patriot antiaircraft system, had a kill range so great that the
missile battery located at Makung on the Pescadores Island thirty miles west of
Formosa could shoot down Chinese aircraft launching from three major coastal
bases in eastern China shortly after takeoff!

 
          
After
the order was received from
Beijing
, Admiral Sun ordered the bombers to start moving eastward out of their
staging orbits and begin their attack runs, and he radioed for the first phase
of the attack to begin. More than three hundred fighters, mostly J-6 fighters
led by radar- equipped J-7 or J-8 fighters, lifted off from
Shantou
and Fuzhou Air Bases and streamed
eastward—launching two or three planes at a time, it took nearly twenty minutes
for each base to launch its full complement of planes. In that time, the H-6
bombers accelerated to attack speed of 360 miles per hour, streaming over the
Wuyi
Mountains
in three different tracks. One hundred
Chinese fighters therefore became the “spearhead” for each ten-plane bomber
formation, with the three spears headed right for the heart of
Taiwan
. With the fighters three to five minutes
ahead of the bombers, the six large formations rendezvoused over the coastline
and move en masse toward
Taiwan
.

 
          
The
first target was the
Pescadores
Islands
, about three-fourths of the way across the
Formosa Strait
. The first Chinese attack formation,
directed by a Ilyushin-76 Candid radar plane, occupied the high- and mid-CAPs,
or Combat Air Patrols, and were met by five formations of four F-5E Tiger
fighters at their same altitude. Although the Taiwanese F-5s were outnumbered
five to one, the Chinese 11-76 radar planes could give only an accurate range
and bearing to the Taiwanese fighters, not altitude, so an accurate fix on the
Taiwanese fighters’ position was hard to establish. Also, because the
formations of Chinese fighters was so large and they were inexperienced in
night intercepts, it was difficult for the Chinese fighters to maneuver in
position to attack. The Taiwanese fighters were able to use their speed and
maneuverability to get in an ideal counterattack position, and the fight was
on.

 
          
The
massive formations of Chinese fighter planes fired their Pen- Lung-2 air-to-air
missiles at extreme range, whether they had a radar or heat-seeking lock-on or
not. The sky was soon filled with Chinese air-to- air missiles screaming toward
the Taiwanese defenders, but most were simply unguided projectiles, more
distractions than threats. One by one, the Chinese attackers fired, closed
range, fired more missiles, then turned and headed back to the mainland just
before reaching optimum AIM-9 Sidewinder missile range. When the Taiwanese
fighters pursued the retreating Chinese fighters, the Chinese fighters
occupying the mid-CAP started a climb, hoping to get behind the Taiwanese
fighters and into the PL-2’s lethal cone, but this attack was broken up* by
Taiwanese fighters coming in lower and chasing the newcomers away.

 
          
There
were some brief “dogfights,” with Chinese and Taiwanese fighters turning and
dodging one another trying to get into attack position, but the Taiwanese
pilots and their superior air defense radar system had the upper hand.
Seventeen Chinese fighters were shot down, versus one Taiwanese F-5E. The
Taiwanese defenders easily pursued the Chinese fighters across the Formosa
Strait nearly all the way back to the Asian coastline, picking off J-6 and J-7
fighters one by one, then darting away before getting in range of Chinese
long-range air defense sites that dotted the coast.

 
          
But
while the Chinese fighters engaged and diverted the bulk of the Taiwanese
fighter force, the first formation of ten Xian H-6 bombers was able to stream
in just a few dozen feet above the dark waters of the Formosa Strait in toward
the Pescadores Islands. The air defense radar controllers were concentrating on
the huge numbers of fighters and gave all their attention to them, and so they
didn’t see the bombers until it was too late. Taiwanese Tien Kung II
surface-to-air missile sites at Makung and Paisha in the
Pescadores
attacked the incoming bombers at over forty
miles, but the H-6 bombers attacked first.