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looked like a Scrabble board. I took a deep breath and exhaled. It could be a lot<br />
worse. It—<br />
“BEEP . . . BEEP . . . BEEP . . .”<br />
My eyes locked on the display. SA-3. Close!<br />
Reacting instantly, I rolled inverted and pulled straight down into the blackness,<br />
pumping out chaff bundles.<br />
“STOIC One . . . defending SA-3 . . . close!”<br />
Iraq was black—except for the parts that were burning, that is. There I was,<br />
upside down, at night, over enemy territory. The <strong>Viper</strong>’s nose was pointed straight<br />
down and I was hanging in my seat facing the brightly lit Iranian border.<br />
“STOIC One . . . break! SAM under you . . . break!”<br />
Slapping the throttle to IDLE, my right wrist strained against the stick and the<br />
fighter pirouetted. Spinning 180 degrees in about two seconds, I pulled hard on the<br />
stick while smacking the chaff button with the back of my left hand and began<br />
counting.<br />
“C’mon . . .” I muttered as the jet fought gravity to come back up through the<br />
horizon. Slamming the throttle forward, I kept pulling and looked back for the<br />
SAM. As the F-16’s nose came through the horizon, I pushed the throttle into full<br />
afterburner.<br />
“STOIC 2 . . . Ma . . . Magnum SA-3!”<br />
Poor kid sounded like he was being strangled, but he got the HARM off. I<br />
caught an absurdly bright flash, and for a split second I saw the pointed nose of an<br />
F-16 before the darkness swallowed it again.<br />
Two. . .<br />
My head swiveled like it was on a stick. But without seeing the launch, I didn’t<br />
know what direction the damn thing had gone, and so I had no real idea where it<br />
was coming in from.<br />
“STOIC Two . . . any posit on the missile”<br />
Four. . .<br />
“Negative . . . lost it . . . Two is blind!”<br />
Perfect.<br />
Sixty degrees nose high, I was pointing back up at the stars. Pulling the throttle<br />
back to IDLE, I again flipped onto my back and stared at the sky. Nothing. Pumping<br />
out more chaff, I glanced at the HUD. Nineteen thousand feet and 390 knots.<br />
“STOIC Two . . . come south above twenty K.”<br />
“MOXIE are southbound . . . Bingo.”<br />
Pirouetting again, I pulled the fighter around to the south and leveled off at
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