Viper Pilot_ A Memoi..

To my astonishment, the radar actually grabbed a contact. I stared, wide-eyed,
at a dark speck coming straight down the “snot locker”—between us—at over 500
knots. It was eight miles away and charging up at us from below.
I snapped the master arm back to ARM and strained forward against my straps to
see over the F-16’s nose. The Target Designator (TD) box was there, sliding over
the mountaintops as the strange jet raced toward us.
“CONAN One is visual . . . bogey . . . ten o’clock low!”
“CONAN . . . CHAINSAW . . . say again”
AWACS was doing its normal bang-up job. Out of the corner of my eye, I
caught a flash of sunlight on something shiny and saw the Eagles, about four miles
in front of me, sweeping down from the north. The F-4 and I were split apart by
about five miles but now beginning to turn in. This unknown fighter was
sandwiched in three dimensions. It was the perfect intercept.
He was screwed, whoever he was. It was just a matter of who would kill him
first.
I grinned and uncaged my AIM-9 Sidewinder. This let the missile’s infrared
seeker to try to track whatever target I was locked to. It just growled at me though,
unable to tell jet from earth, so I’d have to get closer. That wasn’t a problem at
these speeds, since we’d close the eight miles to shooting range in about fifteen
seconds.
There! In the TD box, I could see an aircraft. It was tiny and its exhaust left a
smoke trail. With the exception of the Phantom, no U.S. aircraft smoked. And this
was no Phantom. I kept trying to lock the Sidewinder but it wouldn’t.
Shit.
If an Eagle killed this MiG in front of me, I’d never forgive myself. Probably
spend all my money in therapy.
I’d descended a few thousand feet when we broke apart so I wouldn’t give this
asshole a nice, look-up shot at me. I’d also been able to pull my power back as I’d
glided down, and this cooled my engine off so any infrared missile shot against me
would have a tough time. I didn’t put out any preemptive flares, because if he
hadn’t seen me yet, flares would certainly give away my position. It was risky
though, because if he shot, I’d have only a second or two to pop the flares. I didn’t
like thinking defensively.
Fuck it. Shoving the throttle up to mil power, I pulled back and up toward the
oncoming jet.
He was about four miles in front of me and slightly high, so I uncaged the
Sidewinder and the clear, steady tone said it finally liked what it saw. With a good