Viper Pilot_ A Memoi..

defense components with hard bombs, CBUs, Mavericks, and the cannon. These
included SA-2s, SA-3s, SA-6s, and ROLANDs. Twenty-eight radars, thirty-seven
Triple-A pits, and eight surface-to-surface missiles were also knocked off. Of
course, we did other things, too. Forty-six aircraft and helicopters were destroyed
on the ground along with sixty-five tanks, trucks, and armored personnel-carriers.
So, if we’d succumbed to the HARM suppression-only mind-set advocated by
some, how many friendly aircraft might have been lost Amazingly, there were
several CeeJay units that hadn’t embraced the concept of destruction of enemy air
defense. They largely spent their war thirty miles from the action, at 30,000 feet,
and brought their HARM missiles home each day.
No, thanks.
A MONTH LATER, THE GAMBLERS LEFT PRINCE SULTAN and never returned. On the
way home, we stopped over for a night at Lajes Air Base in the Azores Islands off
the Portuguese coast. The Air Force support folks and their families gave us a real
American cookout—hamburgers, hot dogs, and margaritas. It was heaven. We ate
and drank, thrilled to be alive and happy to be going all the way home the next day.
I’d survived another war.
I knew that, occasionally, in later years, paths would cross again, and those of
us who knew the Elephant could talk about it. The combat bond is like no other,
and there’s really no way to explain it. But for now, I knew, all was well. So, as an
afternoon rain squall popped over the rolling green hills, I lay down in the cool
grass, let the rain fall on my face, and smiled.
Endgame.