Viper Pilot_ A Memoi..

eathing matched my heart rate as the mountains slid away under my wings and
the great plain of northern Iraq opened up before me. Contrails appeared overhead
as the escort F-15s zoomed up above 30,000 feet and headed south to deal with
any MiGs.
“CHAINSAW, this is RAZOR One. Pushing . . . picture.”
RAZOR One was the Mission Commander. He was asking the orbiting AWACS
what the situation, or picture, was south of us in Iraq. I’d heard communications
like this all the time in training. It was familiar and comforting. What happened
next was not.
“RAZOR . . . picture . . . three groups, Bull’s-eye One-Five-Zero for forty-five,
angels medium . . . northbound. Bandits.”
Every tactical area had a common reference point on the ground called a Bull’seye.
It could be geographically significant, like a mountaintop, or tactically
significant, like an airfield. In any event, the idea was that all aircraft could give
their compass bearing and distance from the point and everyone listening would
have a decent idea of their position. Today the Bull’s-eye was the city of Mosul.
Obviously, the bad guys didn’t know this. We also generally used special radios,
called HAVE QUICK radios, that the enemy couldn’t listen to. The HAVE QUICK
frequencies changed every day and, once loaded properly, would jump around in
an unbreakable coded sequence. Anyone listening would hear only broken bits of
words, if anything. I froze for an instant as my brain processed that there were
three distinct groups of unknown enemy fighters, called Bandits, southeast of
Mosul and heading north.
Toward us.
The Mission Commander, an F-16 squadron commander from Torrejon Air
Base, calmly replied. I heard the F-15 Eagle flight lead acknowledge and the
contrails got longer as they lit their afterburners and raced south to fight the MiGs.
“Lucky bastards . . .” I muttered. But we were certain we’d have enough
fighting of our own in a few minutes, when we got within range of the surface-toair
missiles around Mosul.
Everything got quiet for roughly thirty seconds. The Eagles were working out
among themselves who would kill which group of Iraqis, and everyone else was
listening. Then it all came apart as the strikers broke through the SAM engagement
zones.
“CONAN One . . . spiked south.” The F-15 flight lead radioed that an enemy
fighter had locked onto him.
“RAZOR Three . . . Mud . . . SA-2 . . . southwest!” One of the F-16s up front