Is this
what death feels like?
(updated July 29, 2016)
by
Ed Benjamin
Harry now
realized this was a two-phased battle. He had been wildly successful in the
initial phase. He had scored three victories and caused the fourth plane he faced
off against to choose discretion and turn away from the battle rather than face
the threat posed by the longer range of Harry’s air-to-air missiles. He felt
relief because in what he would come to consider a stupid move, he had expended
all four of his long range air-to-air missiles to attain the three victories.
Hence, his dilemma!
Do I go in
with the Sidewinders or exit?
He had
committed earlier and was not inclined to change his mind. He still faced another echelon of four more
Flankers . . . maybe five, if asshole turned back to resume the fight. . His armament included four short-range
Sidewinder heat-seeking missiles; four missiles against five aircraft! And then, he had the 20 millimeter gun to use
for really close in work. No doubt his adversaries would have plenty of
long-range missiles remaining. He
realized no one would blame him if he refused to engage, exited, and headed
home.
The deadly
engagement had begun when, out of the blue, an air-to-air missile had stuck his
wingman’s plane causing Mike to bail out and the plane to crash. The Airborne
Early Warning and Control Systems (AWACS) aircraft with its advanced radar had
informed Harry two flights of four Su-27 (NATO code-named ‘Flanker’) aircraft
were inbound to challenge Harry.
A few
moments earlier, with the help of the missile controllers in the AWACS
aircraft, he successfully engaged the first flight of four aircraft. Most analysts considered the Su-27 Flanker
aircraft superior to his F-15C Eagle in individual air-to-air combat. He had been out-numbered and out-gunned. Maybe he did not need the help of the AWACS
controllers and the data-link to help guide his missiles, but he played a
deadly game of tag with his long-range air-to-air AARAM missiles and scored
three hits. His long range air-to-air
missiles held a slightly longer range of lethality than his foes so he used it
to his advantage. Three aircraft destroyed.
Three air-to-air victories.
His
thoughts did not linger on victories but his mistake. He had wasted two of his
missiles on one aircraft. If he lived through
the situation in which he found himself, he would never allow himself to forget
this error.
Dumb! Dumb!
Dumb! You dumb shit!
For a few
milliseconds, he realized he would take a ragging about that for years. At the
moment all he could was pass the thought out of his mind and focus on then
situation at hand.
After the
sneak attack downing his wingman, he determined the opposing Flankers bearing
down on him still needed to close the gap before they could launch their
long-range radar guided missiles. With
the assistance of the data link systems built into AWACS aircraft, he decided
he was in range and his opponents had not closed the gap within range of their
missiles. Having been attacked, he claimed the advantage and launched his long-range
missiles.
Since the
planes he opposed were out of range with their missiles, the question bugging
him and would continue to bug Air Force analysts for months still
remained.
Where in the hell did the first missile come from
which had destroyed Mike’s plane?
Harry had
answered.
Now, with
his long-range advantage gone, the second flight of four Flankers was closing on
him. They had the advantage now. Their long range missiles would be in range
soon. He had to decide whether to engage or not engage in the fight again . . .
soon!
If he
departed, no harm no foul.
Fear,
adrenalin, and confidence surged though his body. Like most people, he did not want to die. Truth be told, fear of failure rather than the
fear of harm colored his approach to this decision. His background and training emphasized
pressing the attack whenever possible.
He realized he could leave the area without any loss of honor or respect
or the nagging idea he would feel he had failed in following his sense of
duty.
Honor
played an important part in his life. At
the same time, he did not want to be shot down and possibly die, like
Mike.
God! I hope he
made it.
It was not
a matter of being considered cowardly although part of him felt he would rather
die than be considered a coward by his peers.
Simply stated, overriding these emotions, there was another feeling. His
adoptive father had always told him, “Do the right thing.” He always did his
duty. His eleven months as an enlisted
driver in the Motor Pool; two years in the Academy Prep School, and then the
four years at the “Zoo,” the Air Force Academy, had reinforced that dogma,
drilling it deep, deep, deep into his subconscious.
This trait
had served him well once he entered the service - particularly after he began
to fly. He didn’t like leaving any job
unfinished. It seemed to him, if he did
not engage the second flight, a part of him would feel he had left a job
unfinished. To him, leaving a job
unfinished was tantamount to failure.
He could
not deny the fear of physical harm he felt.
His mind seemed to be operating at a thousand miles an hour. The thought of a missile finding his
plane and the fireball inevitably ensuing worried him kept intruding into his
thoughts. He wondered if he would be
conscious when the flames encircled his body should he be unlucky enough not to
eject and escape the carnage. He worked
hard to push those feelings away and deal with the matter at hand. They kept popping up like unwanted volunteer
plants in a garden. His mind worked on several channels at once and olne
channels worked hard to push the fear away.
There was
also the matter of his wingman. He had
lost his wingman to the unprovoked attack. Once again, he worried; “How did that missile get in undetected?” He put that thought out of his mind. That was a question for another day and if he
didn’t make it back today, it would be someone else’s question. Right now,
Harry felt Mike deserved everything he could give to resolve the current situation.
After all, when someone attacks your wingman, you have
to do something about it.
He climbed
to 55,000 feet to give himself some perspective on the scene and pondered the
matter. He was still outnumbered and
outgunned. A plan formed hastily in his
mind. They would be coming after him deployed in two flights of two – a lead
and a wingman each. His notion was to
get between them so they would be unable to launch for fear of hitting their
fellow fighters. then he could maneuver, launch his Sidewinders, fire his gun
and maybe get another victory or two. He would then get the hell out of Dodge,
find a tanker, and head home.
He
realized he would have to endure a gauntlet of long-range air-to-air missiles
before he executed his plan, but he had some tricks up his sleeve to defeat
their effectiveness.
Baron
Manfred von Richthofen’s book had heavily influenced his training, particularly
the following quote.
“ In my opinion the aggressive spirit is everything.”
He did not
lack an aggressive spirit but calculated the approach he wanted to take. His training taught him the conventional
wisdom in battling one versus many aircraft situations dictated that if the
enemy possess long range air-to-air missiles as these foes certainly did, he should
descend to a lower altitude so the ground clutter might confuse the missiles
when launched.
What he
should do and what he would do; however, were two different things.
He knew,
however, to maintain his high speed at lower altitudes would be very costly in
terms of fuel usage and maneuverability. He glanced at the fuel indicators and noted he
had used a significant amount of fuel in the first salvos he had launched. He considered
the advisability of remaining at high altitudes versus diving to lower
altitudes and made the decision to remain at the high altitude. He decided the additional maneuverability,
speed, and fuel efficiency at higher altitudes would outweigh any advantages of
flying at lower altitudes trying deceive any missiles launched at him as ground
clutter. He needed speed.
After all,
the powers that be had drilled the mantra “Speed is Life” into him ever since
he had entered fighter lead-in training after his graduation from flying
training. All his training told him in no uncertain terms – “Speed is Life”!
At the
moment, his body reflected the ‘speed of life’ mantra as well. His heart beat furiously. His airspeed
indicator measured 450 knots per hour. His eardrums hurt. It felt like a
thousand tom toms beating the walls of his inner ear. Sweat rolled down his
forehead, blurred his vision, and pooled around his oxygen mask. Focusing on
his breathing, Harry breathed in deep breaths of 100% oxygen and hoped the deep
breaths would help calm his body down.
He had to
pee. He felt like he needed to fart. He peed in his relief tube but tightened
his abdomen to hold the fart in.
God, if it’s a wet fart, there’ll be a mess. Everyone
will say I got so scared, I shit himself!
Harry
laughed mentally at his attempt at humor and that served to calm him down
somewhat.
That’s not half wrong! If I weren’t so busy, I would
be scared shitless! S shit, I am scared shitless!
He did
another quick re-assessment.
What are my odds?
Maybe 50/50? Is that
realistic? Am I being overconfident?
He selected
a heading taking him on a vector toward the last known location of the enemy
flight. He had decided. If they wanted a fight, he was going to give
it to them.
Arming one
Sidewinder, he prepared to engage. With
the missile armed, when the missile detected a heat signature emanating from
the exhaust of another plane, a tone would sound in his earphones telling him
he was in range. He waited anticipating
the tone. He had practiced going up
against two enemy fighters in training.
The trick was to get between them, confuse them, and keep them from
launching for fear they would hit their compatriots. If he could do this now, he would have an
edge. He was in what others termed a
“target-rich” environment. Every target in
the sky would be an enemy. He could
launch without fear of any friendly fire incident. Confusion was his friend. He faced four Flankers.
Maybe
five, if that asshole in the first flight turns and decides to re-engage.
He knew he
needed all the confusion he could endenger in his opponents. Once again, he
told himself; if he could get between them, they wouldn’t launch for fear to
hitting their comrades. He would be the one in a target-rich environment, not
his enemy. His mental calculations told
him he had better than a 50% chance of getting in and then getting out. he
questioned his decision again. He asked himself if he were overconfident. Had
he made an accurate assessment or was it just wishful thinking?
He would
never know.
* * *
Things changed
quickly. Warbling tones filled his
ear. These were not the steady tones
telling him the Sidewinder was in range.
These sounds broadcast a dreaded warning.
Missiles
inbound!
His
Heads-Up-Display (HUD) tracked 3 air-to-air missiles headed his way.
Holy shit!
No choice
now. He was in the shit storm. He wondered if he had lingered too long with
the decision. He felt some bile in his
throat. It tasted bitter. His vision
once again blurred from sweat.
The
remaining Flankers had gotten within launch range. The streaky lines on his HUD marked the deadly
spears shooting toward him. He imagined
the flames exiting the rear of the missiles from their rocket motors. More importantly, he noted two of the
missiles tracking from 30 degrees port and the other tracking from 45 degrees
starboard. The converging missiles made
him feel he was flying into a bear trap with no way out. Evasion from one source endangered him from
the other. His HUD indicated the two
port missiles loomed closer than the third.
He knew instinctively three of the four ship formation had launched
against him.
When he
engaged the first flight, he had hit three ships of the first four-ship
formation. It appeared the fourth
Flanker had turned and hightailed it back toward Iran. He didn’t blame him. He had a slight edge
using the long range missiles and there was no way the Iranian pilot could know
there wasn’t a fourth missile heading to destroy his fighter. Harry wondered if the fifth pilot had turned
and by taking advantage of the protection afforded by the second flight of
Flankers, had decided to re-engage Harry to avenge his comrades.
No worries, mate! I’m between a rock and a hard place
no matter how you figure it!
At 55,000
feet, the young man jammed his stick forward and drove his airplane down and to
the right as he began evasive maneuvers to get away from the danger. Spiraling down, he jammed his stick hard
right to push his craft into a series of tight spins to confuse the missile
radars. He failed to notice the
twirling, swirling kaleidoscope of browns and yellows of the desert sands as
the plane twisted downward toward the ground.
On training flights when he practiced spins and spin recoveries, this
pattern always entranced him. On those
occasions, there had been swirling patterns of greens, blues and brownish
hues. The swirling colors fascinated him
and he would marvel at it like he was a twelve or thirteen year boy
experiencing it for the first time. He did
not enjoy it now. He was too busy with
the task at hand.
This
maneuver enabled him to break the radar lock from the first two missiles and
they sailed off to wherever useless missiles flew to die. The third had been far enough away and it re-adjusted
its flight path and continued its inexorable path toward him. He began to doubt if he was going to lose the
third.
At 20,000 feet, he pulled the
stick back at full afterburners and climbed reaching 45,000 feet but it didn't
seem to do any good. The missile followed
like stink on shit. He pulled up to
57,000 feet. He would have gone higher
but knew his engine performance would degrade quickly at any higher altitude. He pumped the rudder pedals and yawed his
aircraft from right to left trying to evade the missile and break its radar
lock on his craft. He desperately tried
some 60 degree turns while dropping a couple of thousand feet then some more
high speed pull ups back to altitude.
The engineers who designed his airplane had incorporated low wing
loading (the ratio of aircraft weight to its wing area) in the aircraft design. His engines provided him with intimidating
thrust. These two factors provided him
with immense power available for acceleration and superior maneuverability at
his fingertips. In his training, he had
discovered he could turn the aircraft in tight turns without losing
airspeed.
These
evasion tactics seemed to work. Climbing
back to 60,000 feet, the warning tones had disappeared and he failed to notice
any threats on his display. Still
planning to engage with his Sidewinders, he started the process of trying to
determine the enemy's location.
Where the hell are they?
* * *
He noticed
he felt badly. He realized he had a
physical problem. It was more than the
stress of combat. He had not felt quite
100 percent when he took off but, then again, sorties were sorties. Harry knew that the medical guidelines
dictated he should have declared that he didn't feel well enough to fly. The squadron operations officer would have
assigned another pilot to take his place. He really couldn't put a finger on
anything specific. That morning, he had
noticed a shortness of breath and a general feeling of malaise. He knew his squadron would rotate back to the
States soon and he wanted all the sorties he could get. He wasn’t going to let a mild feeling of
disorder keep him from flying a combat sortie. With tensions increasing between
Iran and the US, there was small chance of an encounter. Beside, if there were a chance for any
action, he damn sure was not going to miss it.
He told
himself nothing was a better cure whatever else ails you than 100% oxygen. So while waiting for takeoff clearance, he
selected 100% oxygen. The cure had
seemed to work but now, with a Sidewinder armed and preparing to take the
battle to the enemy flying at 550 knots, he noticed things were not as good as
he might hope.
At that
point in time, he became dimly aware of another set of warbling tones in his
headset signaling another deadly missile headed toward him. His deteriorating condition distracted
him. He knew he had to do something;
take some evasive maneuvers against the incoming missile; but he could not give
it his full attention. All he could
focus on was the way he felt physically.
He felt
his throat constricting and tightening.
Tunnel vision crept into his consciousness. He noticed the clouds
turning grey. He felt like he was 'greying
out' - a feeling not unlike the feeling one would get experiencing high-G turns
in an aircraft without benefit of a G-suit and/or training or experience. A ‘grey out’ normally occurred when a person
is flying in an aircraft and certain maneuvers create positive g-forces forcing
blood from the abdomen and lower extremities of the body and lowering blood pressure
in the brain. As the blood drains from the brain, this creates restricted
vision and can lead to a loss of consciousness.
Harry wore a G-suit, which helped ameliorate the effects of the gravity forces fighter pilots endured during maneuvers. The g-suit were a pair of tightly-fitting trousers fitted with inflatable bladders which, when pressurized through a g-sensitive valve in the airplane pressed firmly on the abdomen and legs and restricted the draining of blood away from the brain during periods of high acceleration.
He had
flown this type aircraft many times before under stressful g-forces and had
trained his body to activate its muscle memory so his muscles would tighten
automatically to compensate for the g-forces he encountered. In addition, along with his peers, he
regularly exercised his legs and abdomen to strengthen those muscles he needed
to fly in the high g-force environment. He had developed a muscle memory to counteract
the g-forces.
He had
experienced the "grey out" phenomenon before in the altitude chamber
when he removed his oxygen mask at his instructor’s behest so he could
experience oxygen deprivation in a controlled environment. In addition, early on in his flight training,
he had experienced a ‘grey out’ under controlled conditions so he knew what to
expect.
This was
not it. It was something different.
"Maybe
it'll pass."
Harry
checked his oxygen mask. Operating
normally pumping 100% life-giving, life-saving oxygen. No problem there.
The
warbling tones signifying the oncoming deadly missile continued. He hardly
noticed them. His mind focused on the scene within his consciousness. Nothing
happening outside seemed to matter. Not
even the impending death signaled by that high pitched warbling tone.
He felt
his consciousness was jammed into a square, boxlike structure. Some giant force seemed to push the sides of
the structure together closing the gap of his consciousness. It was a strange Kafka-like novel sensation where
one remained trapped inside a box which kept becoming smaller and smaller. As the box reduced in size, he felt his consciousness
diminishing.
Next, it
seemed there were these two giant hands pushing at his lungs expelling all the
air. The air would not go anywhere. His larynx had closed and the stale air
remained trapped in his lungs and not a milliliter of the 100% oxygen coming
through his facemask could enter. The
edges of his mask bulged as the oxygen released over his cheeks out the sides
of the mask. With his throat closed,
lungs trapped, and the box pressing in; fear gnawed at him. His world spun. Lack of oxygen caused
everything to turn gray.
Another
warbling warning tone blasted in his ears.
It sounded faint and far off. He
glanced at his Heads Up Display and saw another missile headed for his
airplane.
Damn.
Everything's spinning. Everything is going black. Did I get hit?
His body
had a spasm and Harry jerked. When he
did so, the spasm caused his hands to pull back on the throttle taking the
plane out of afterburner. He had lost
control of his airspeed. He was
violating the cardinal mantra of air-to-air combat.
Speed is Life.
He didn’t
have time to remember that mantra. He
was unconscious. And then, the
unthinkable occurred. His airplane entered into a flat spin.
The
designers had fashioned his Eagle’s wings to aggressively take high-speed turns
without losing speed. Had he remained in
afterburner, he could have maneuvered more effectively, stayed at a high speed,
and possibly avoided falling into a spin.
He flew comparatively slower. His
F-15 Eagle was not immune to the phenomena of unrecoverable spin
characteristics. With the decrease in
thrust and his high-speed turns, his plane hit the combination of forces all
pilots dreaded. His airplane began to
spin and gyrate in a 360-degree circle on a horizontal axis while careening
down as gravity worked its unstoppable force.
Known as a "flat spin," most pilots considered it the kiss of
death. The textbook answer requires the pilot to eject as soon as possible for
there was no recovery.
Harry
didn't consider ejecting. He wasn't even
aware his plane had gone into a "flat spin." His constricted throat and lack of oxygen had
caused him to black out and lose consciousness.
His loss
of consciousness came in stages. The
warbling warning sound, while continuing, faded into the background as he became
acutely aware of a regular, pulsing sound.
It persisted and resonated like a drumbeat inside his head. Had he paid
more attention, he would have realized it was the sound of his pulse beating
through his carotid arteries as blood tried to rush into his brain. The pounding continued . . . KER-THUNK . . .
KER-THUNK . . . KER-THUNK; then Ker Thunk . . . Ker Thunk . . . Ker Thunk . . .
then, ker-thunk . . . ker-thunk . . . then . . . silence.
As the
airplane continued its horizontal spins, he would have noticed the clouds and
the horizon spinning as the plane circled and dipped its nose down five or ten
degrees in its descending rotations.
Since he loved flying so much the horizon bobbing up and down in
five-degree increments as he swung around and around would have entranced
him. He did not notice anything.
Were he
conscious, he would have marveled at the way his plane rocked and rolled as it
spun round and round descending. If he
were able to see, he might have noticed the five-degree up and down motion as
the plane spun caused the horizon to bob up and down. This experience may have spurred a memory of
a similar experience.
It was a
hot summer day at Virginia Beach and he and the Swedish girl he met the night
before had decided to scuba just outside the breakers. He rented a rubber inflatable raft with an
outboard motor and took it outside the surf about a thousand yards and dropped
the anchor just where the swells were before they turned into the breakers
headed for the beach. He had gone in
first and while he swam, he discovered the Swedish girl liked to scuba
topless. When they surfaced, they had
shared some wine and had lain in the bottom of the rubber boat and learned more
about each other. He might have recalled
later lying in the rubber boat, his head on her shoulder seeing the shoreline
bob on and out of sight he looked over the edge of the rubber boat wall, their
boat bobbing up and down in the ocean swells.
He might
have remembered that morning on the sea near the beach. He did not remember. His consciousness, his inner mind, focused
upon other things.
All of a
sudden, the young man found himself in a black hallway moving swiftly down the
corridor. He didn’t think about the
airplane. He appeared to be floating
rather than walking. There was a black luster covering the floor, walls, and
ceiling. At the end of the hallway, he
saw a door. A white, high intensity light seeped through the edges outlining
the door against the dark hall. Even though it was behind the door and he could
not grasp it all, he knew it was one of the brightest lights he had ever
seen.
What will it be like on the other side of the door?
Unaware of
the plane’s deadly spiral, he was only conscious of the feeling of floating
toward the door. He floated, glided with
an ease he had never felt before. It was a slow controlled journey drifting
toward that door. some part of him wondered if he could do cartwheels.
It was a
sold oak door with a heavy brass handle and scalloped panels. He marveled at
the heavy burnished finish on the oak.
He noticed a brass knocker positioned about three quarters up the door
on the center scallop.
No need to knock.
It seemed
to Harry there were others on the other side of the door.
People are
waiting! Who are they? Are they waiting for me?
He sensed
they were waiting for him to open the door.
Harry
instinctively knew if he opened the door and entered, there would be no turning
back. He didn't see any other options at
this point. The pain in his throat had
disappeared. He noticed he wasn’t
breathing. No need to breathe.
He noticed
a bight point of light focused on the top left side of the door. As he watched the point of light began to
travel downward toward the handle. At
the same time, a black dot began to travel upward from the bottom left hand of
the door. The light and the dark point
moved at the same speed. He tracked the
paths mentally and knew as they converged; they would meet at the same time on
the door handle.
When they meet, I don’t think, I will have a choice.
He
realized he still had a choice. He felt rather than heard voices calling to him
from the other side of the door. There
was something familiar to him about those voices. They seemed to urge him on
more and more.
Harry
started to reach for the doorknob. His
fingers touched the handle. He felt the
cool metal of the brass handle of burnished metal as his hand encircled the
loop and his thumb reached for the latch.
Harry began the motion to press his thumb down to open the door. Once he pressed his thumb down, the door
latch would engage and he would open the door.
I read
about this. Is it oxygen deprivation
working on my brain? Seems real.
Is this
what death feels like?
* * *
Before he
could answer his question, the plane shuddered.
A violent energy shook his airplane.
When the plane shook, it seemed as if his
consciousness, extended out of his body by a thin silvery sinew of elastic
string, had snapped back into his body. It jolted him, making him aware once
again of his body and physical condition. He felt as if a giant finger had
released a taut rubber band propelling his consciousness from the beyond into
his skull.
Instantaneously, his windpipe opened up. 100% oxygen flowed into his lungs. His breath came back. The capillaries in his lungs began a fierce,
herculean effort to exchange the carbon dioxide built up inside the lobes for
the life-giving oxygen. A mucus of
sticky phlegm found its way upward and out into his throat. Harry cleared his throat. He felt the mucus
in his mouth. He swallowed the mucus to
provide room for more oxygen to enter. His
vision cleared. In a matter of seconds, he became whole.
The plane
buffeted and shook. Harry came back to
full consciousness. He grabbed for the
throttles and pushed them forward engaging the afterburners. Power propelled
the aircraft. Then, he pushed the stick forward and nosed down to build speed.
Speed is life.
The
buffeting had shaken the F-15 enough so these actions negated the forces
causing the flat spin. The plane nosed
down and gained speed. As oxygen
returned to his lungs, his situational awareness returned and he swiftly
regained control of the airplane.
Shit, 7,000 feet AGL (Above Ground Level).
Looking
out the windscreen, he felt so close, it seemed to him he was so close to the
ground, he could have reached out and let his fingers skim the desert sands.
He pulled
the stick back and when he reached 20,000 feet, leveled off momentarily.
He did not
hear the warbling warning noise he had listened to before.
What the fuck?
He pulled
the nose up and added power. The two
engines responded and Harry climbed back to 35,000 feet. Then he heard the steady
tone indicating his heat seeking Sidewinder had secured a target.
Time to fire.
While
climbing, he turned and spotted the bluish-gray shape of another F-15 on his
left.
Harry
quickly disengaged his heat-seeking missile.
No friendly fire today! If I had been just a little
less alert, I would have pranged his ass!
"You
owe me one."
The voice
sounded slightly familiar.
"Who
be you?"
"Polar
29."
Okay. One of the Elmendorf bunch.
"I
got one bogie. I think you got three.”
You don’t know
how close I came to getting four.
Harry
learned the AWACS had contacted another two plane flight flying an orientation
mission to the area to help out. The other jet’s wingman had developed engine
problems and returned to base but Polar 29 had continued on to join the fray. Harry was to determine later, Polar 29’s
actions proved lucky for him.
The AWACS
mission director advised the two aviators they would remain on patrol. Harry realized
the two jets needed to stay on station.
Even though Harry had expended his long range missiles, he knew any
enemy radar would not know the status of his munitions and a flight of two
Eagles flying Combat Air Patrol flight profiles above Iraq near the Iranian
border may dissuade any further enemy attacks. The enemy ground radar would
show the United States Air Force remained on patrol. It was a gamble but a
necessary one. Now it was a question of
who was going to lead this gaggle.
"Who
be lead?" Polar 29 asked, trying to
determine who would serve as flight lead during the remainder of the
patrol. The remaining Eagle pilot would
serve as wingman.
His throat
gripped him for a second and he felt like it was closing up on him again, but
Harry would be damned if he was going to turn over the lead to some jock from
Elmendorf who had happened along into his airspace. After all the work he had put into it, this
was his mission.
"I be
lead." Harry hoped his voice was
sounding okay.
"Rebel
3, this is Early Bird. Turn over lead to
Polar 29. Do you need to RTB?"
That settles that!
Since the
AWACS served as a Mission Director, Harry didn’t question the decision.
The
controller aboard the AWACS was also asking Harry if he wanted to return to his
base in Saudi immediately.
If he did
return to his base, he would leave Polar 29 alone to continue on the
patrol. It seemed highly unlikely there
would be further action but if there were, Harry didn't want to leave anybody
out here alone. After all, he felt he owed
this guy. His mind quickly scanned his
body. His throat ached and he felt like
a team of horses had dragged his body over a streambed full of river stones. But, in the final analysis he felt fit enough
to continue the combat mission. He keyed
his mike button.
"Negative,
Early Bird, Rebel 3 is back on station. Find us a tanker."
Since the
AWACS served as an airborne command post of sorts and was technically in charge
of the battle area, Harry proceeded to position himself as wingman to the other
Eagle. As they headed for the tanker,
the AWACS aircraft informed them the Flanker Su-27 aircraft had turned back and
escaped over the Iranian border.
Good
thing. We had damn little to discourage
them.
A few
minutes later, as the two-plane flight approached the tanker, another flight of
four Eagles showed up on station so the AWACS directed Harry and Polar 29 to
return to their respective air bases in Saudi Arabia.
As they
neared the base, Harry asked the other pilot for his call sign.
"Norseman."
Harry knew
him. He was an Air Force Academy
graduate and the son of a retired Air Force colonel. The other pilot's name was Leif Baker. Harry had encountered Leif or “Norseman,” as
he was known, about 14 months previous when he and Norseman flew Dissimilar Air
Combat Training sorties at Nellis Air Force Base in training exercises known as
"Red Flag". The same quiet
reticence, with his underlying confidence, continued to mark Leif. Harry found him to be an excellent
pilot. Leif was able to take his
fighter to the edge of the envelope and wring out the systems during training
flights so, in an actual combat situation, he would have the full grasp of
experience regarding the capabilities of his aircraft.
"This
is Scrub."
Click.
Click. Norseman clicked his mike switch
twice to acknowledge he had heard the transmission. Norseman didn't waste words on the ground or
in the air.
The AWACS
informed Harry his wingman had ejected safely and Search and Rescue was on the
way to pick him up. He had some bruises
but overall was none the worse for wear.
Harry knew Mike’s pride was hurt more than anything. The F-15 aircraft had a history of one
hundred and one air-to-air combat engagements without any losses. This series
of engagements would go down in the history books as the one hundred and second
air engagement in the history of the airplane, if the historians logged
everything occurring that day as one engagement. It was possible they could log
today’s actions as two engagements.
Nevertheless,
no matter how the historians scored the day; Mike’s plane would go down in the
history of the Eagle as the only F-15 ever downed by enemy action. In the
previous engagements, no air force had ever lost an F-15 aircraft in air-to air
combat. It wasn’t his fault, being a sneak attack but Mike would never live it
down. He would go though his Air Force
flying career feeling the oblong glances his fellow fighter pilots would give
him.
Leif had
accomplished another remarkable feat. He
had observed Harry's plane go into the flat spin and begin to sink. Noticing Harry had not ejected, the younger
fighter correctly surmised Harry was unable to eject for some reason. He knew a
change in the center of gravity would sometimes change the aerodynamic forces
and help stabilize the airplane.
So Leif
had accelerated his Eagle to supersonic in such a manner as to create a sonic
boom, which washed against Harry’s jet.
This sonic boom created enough of a jolt to change the center of gravity
in his plane and jar it out of the spin.
Harry, having come back to a state of semi-consciousness, had been able
to wrest back control of the jet.
Harry
reviewed the action in his mind as he approached the base and entered the
landing pattern. He knew the AWACS had
captured everything on radar and stored it digitally. In addition, they had encrypted the
information and transmitted it in microbursts to his base in Saudi Arabia and
to the headquarters back in the States.
In the
landing pattern, once again, the question once again popped into Harry’s
mind.
Where did
the first missile come from? They got my
wingman and almost got me. Someone’s got
to be all over it.
Harry was
correct. Many people questioned the
origin of the missile, initially fired at him and his wingman. Analysts reviewed the AWACS digital radar
record in depth. The analysis pointed to
two potential problems contributing to the inability to detect the attack. At first the analysts focused on a hole in
the AWACS radar net. After many hours of research and testing, the Air Force
came up with a fix on the problem. The
second theory speculated the Iranians had somehow developed or acquired radar-guided
missiles using an undetectable bandwidth radar signal. Air Force Intelligence began an operation to
find out.
As Harry
entered the landing sequence, Norseman wiggled his wings and headed toward his
own base 59 kilometers south. In the pattern, Harry’s mind drifted to other
things. He remembered launching two
AARAM missiles at his first target.
Crap, I’m
going to take a ragging for years for wasting the missile. Three victories and I could have had
four. Can’t worry about it now. Could have had a V-8.
Harry
flared his jet and his wheels slid smoothly on the runway.
He didn’t
realize it was to be his last flight in the Air Force.
His plane
taxied to the parking slot and a military van waited. An intelligence officer escorted Harry into
the van and took him to debriefing.
After
debriefing, the Flight Surgeon came by and talked to him. During the conversation, he violated a
cardinal rule. He had admitted he had
blacked out.
Any
fighter pilot worth his salt realized one never told a Flight Surgeon you had
lost consciousness. Even when the loss
occurred on the ground, if you were on flying status, the Air Force did not
take chances. They grounded the pilot
immediately and the individual had a very slim chance of ever climbing into a
cockpit again. Harry's incident occurred
while flying. DOUBLE BAD! The Flight Surgeon took him to the
infirmary.
Soon, he
found himself on a Medical Evacuation flight headed for Germany still wearing
the sweat stained flying suit in which he had flown the mission. After the
medical evacuation flight had taken off and reached altitude, Harry began to
notice the sick smell of his own fear and adrenaline-pumped sweat. He knew he had not peed himself since his
piddle pack was still connected when he landed.
During the flight they allowed him to change in a set of hospital
scrubs. He noticed the medical
technician put his flight suit into a plastic bag.
Good thing I didn’t fart!
Meanwhile,
word of multiple air victories spread throughout the base and to Harry’s
squadron area. Bottles of champagne
mysteriously appeared, compliments of the Squadron Commander. His squadron mates waited in the squadron
area to congratulate him for his three "victories" by dousing him
with champagne.
Harry
didn’t return to the squadron. After
awhile they learned he would not be returning to the squadron area but was
airborne to a hospital in Europe.
They drank
the champagne in a toast to Harry's "victories." No sense in letting good champagne go to
waste.
* * * * * * *
* * * *
An analyst is born
Harry
stayed at the Hospital in Landsthul Army Regional Medical Center, Germany for
two nights. Then he traveled to San
Antonio, Texas where the Air Force admitted him to the Wilford Hall Medical
Center at Lackland Air Force Base south of San Antonio. Once the medical center performed its initial
evaluations, they released him as an outpatient. They tasked the Air Force Personnel Center
with finding Harry a position while he awaited the medical decision.
It would
be a conditional assignment; one in which Harry could be productive and yet return
to the hospital when called upon for more tests.
The
personnel officer who received the job of finding Harry a temporary assignment
while he underwent medical examination knew him. He had been a year ahead of
Harry at the Air Force Academy Prep School. He remembered an incident occurring
while Harry was in his first year at the Prep School. A Barracks Thief had been active in Harry’s
dormitory. Someone had ransacked rooms
at various times and stolen money and other valuable items. The cadets were required to keep their rooms
open and ready for inspection at all times. They had been provided secure lockboxes for
money and other items of value, but in a hurry to get to formations for
military drills and physical conditioning, many didn’t use the boxes.
Harry
had spent a day analyzing the movements of the other cadets in his flight and
another adjacent flight. After reviewing
their actions in his mind, he concluded the possible culprit was a fellow cadet
named Harold. After a little homework,
he discussed the situation with his fellow cadets.
The
Prep School followed the same honor code as the Air Force Academy.
“I will not lie, steal or cheat nor tolerate
among us anyone who does.”
The
next Saturday morning Harry invited Harold to join him for breakfast at a
Denny’s restaurant near the Prep School.
When
they ordered Harold ordered a stack of pancakes and Harry very casually ordered
two eggs, one over easy and the other scrambled, hash brown potatoes and
bacon. When the waitress brought the
order, Harry looked down at the food solemnly, sighed, looked up at the
waitress, and in a very sincere voice, said; “You scrambled the wrong egg.”
The
waitress’ mouth dropped open and Harry laughed and quickly said; “Just
kidding.”
She left, shaking her head, and Harold said;
“What was that all about?”
“Well,
Harold, you can’t fry an egg cleanly if you break it the wrong way and then you
have to scramble it. When you scramble
an egg, it’s like someone’s brain got caught in a mixer . . . all messed
up. But we’ll talk more about that
subject later. Both you and I know
there’s been some stuff taken from the dorm rooms. I know you’ve said that you’ve had some stuff
missing also. Thinking about it, if I
were the one taking stuff, then I would tell people that I was missing stuff
too. But, fact of the matter is, over
the last two days or so; we’ve been keeping an eye on when things went missing
and where everyone was at the time things disappeared. For example, on Wednesday, when Jones
reported his IPod gone, we were all at Drill and Ceremonies, marching like good
little cadets. All except you; you
weren’t there. You signed out for a
medical appointment but I spotted you leaving the barracks. Then, we compared notes, it seems that when
things go missing, you’re missing too for one reason or another.”
“I
don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Harold poured syrup on his pancakes.
Harry
held his phone out. “You might want to
take a look at this video.”
By
the way, we had something like this happen at the high school where I played
football. Our school didn’t have an
honor code to speak of but, when something happened, the team got together and
resolved the situation.”
Harry
stared at Harold and then looked down at his plate. He picked up a fork and very deliberately
picked up his fork, suck it into the yolk of the sunny side of the egg. He began twirling his fork rapidly mixing the
yellow yolk material into the white of the egg until it was a gooey mess.
“You
know, this always reminds me of scrambled brains for some reason.”
“You
know, one thing I like about this Prep School program is the fact that anyone
can self-eliminate themselves from the program here. All they have to do is contact the administration
and say they want out and BOOM, they’re out!
Oh look, there are some more guys from the flight here, Pete, Shorty and
Junior.”
Harold
stood promptly and left the restaurant.
Harry
and the others went to the movies in Colorado Springs and when they returned,
they were greeted with the news that Harold had contacted the Commandant and
eliminated himself from the program for “personal reasons”. Some said he left the Air Force and some said
he was sent back to his former duty station.
Afterwards,
his fellow cadets called Harry, “Egghead”, for a few months after that. But then, in the crush of qualifying for entry
into the Academy, their sole purpose for being in the Prep School, everyone got
busy, they forgot.
The
personnel officer remembered this incident and first conducted the Security
Police Squadrons at both Lackland and Randolph Air Force Base to see if they could
use him in the Investigations Section of the squadron. Both demurred.
Looking
further, the personnel officer remembered seeing a memo about a need for
additional analysts within the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI)
headquarters. Since the OSI had its
headquarters at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, that wouldn’t work.
The
personnel officer played a hunch and made a telephone call to the regional OSI
office at Randolph Air Force Base and found the local commander knee deep in
investigations. He was in dire need of
an analyst, but normally analysts were full-fledged OSI agents. He checked Harry’s records and agreed that
would not work. Harry would never qualify to become a full-fledged OSI agent. Due to his medical history, they didn’t want
to take the chance he would lose consciousness while on an investigation in the
field.
After
some discussion, he agreed to take Harry on as an analyst on a temporary basis as
long as the personnel center agreed to keep looking for a full fledged agent
who could serve and fill the vacancy. Basically
the deal he made with Personnel gave him Harry as free labor without hurting
his staffing. The OSI Commander thought
it was a good deal. He could use all the
extra help pushing paper he could get even it was ‘warm meat.’
The
Personnel Office assigned Harry duty as an analyst at the regional OSI office at
Randolph Air Force Base, north of San Antonio. Harry would have the opportunity to travel to
Wilford Hall whenever he was needed for his medical tests and evaluations.
Initially,
Harry disliked the work. Although he had
been informed he was an analyst, he got stuck with cleaning up the paperwork
after cases had been resolved and turned over to the Judge Advocate General’s
office for adjudication. He felt like a
glorified file clerk.
Early on,
by happenstance, Harry got full credit for launching an investigation resulting
in the resolution of a major case. Two
months after having been assigned to Randolph, Harry moved out of the Bachelors
Officer Quarters on base. He had found a
small house under foreclosure near the base in Universal City and bought it. Later, he visited the Base Exchange department
store to purchase some linens and other necessities.
As he
walked down the hallway toward the main shopping area, he heard some raised
voices. Looking over, he noticed an Army
Major and an Air Force Lieutenant Colonel involved in a discussion in the Snack
Bar adjacent to the Exchange department store. He continued walking but there was something odd
about the two he couldn’t place.
He stopped
at the entrance to the main shopping area of the Exchange and pondered. It was not the fact they were discussing
something or loudly disagreeing. There
was something odd and he couldn’t figure it out. He shook his head and continued his shopping.
Later,
while loading his car in the parking lot, he saw the Lieutenant Colonel getting
into a new Mercedes. He noticed a glint
of light hit his eyes as the fading sunlight reflected off the Colonel’s watch.
Later, in
bed that evening, Harry suddenly sat upright.
That’s it!
At that moment he realized he had noticed both of the officers had been wearing gold Rolex watches - distinctive Rolexes. The watches had gemstones looking suspiciously like diamonds mounted around the face of the watch. Harry figured the stones were Cubic Zirconia, fake diamonds, but impressive no less.
Umm, he
thought, a Rolex and now a new Mercedes, the Lieutenant Colonel was not wearing
wings. Harry had noted the license
number and although it was late, he returned to the OSI office and got on the
computer. It took him about an hour to locate the
Lieutenant Colonel and figure out the colonel was assigned to the Procurement
Office on base. The Procurement Office website
listed the Colonel as a warranted Contracting Officer, meaning he has authority
to award contracts and spend money on behalf of the United States government.
He dug
further and determined the Colonel had recently been assigned to the Joint
Contracting Office in Afghanistan, one of a team of Contracting Officers
assigned to issue contracts to local Afghan transportation companies for the $3
billion of contract awards for transporting goods and supplies within
Afghanistan.
Joint command? Air Force, Army and Navy?
Harry was
able to access the Colonel’s address from his military records and noted it was
in a section northwest of San Antonio known as the “Dominion.”
Harry then
accessed real estate sites and soon determined the minimum anyone could
purchase a house for in the Dominion subdivision was $2 million and that was
rock bottom.
Having
just purchased a foreclosure, he wondered if there was such a thing as a
foreclosed house going for just two million. The real estate site listed other
houses for sale in the subdivision in the three to five three to five million range.
How much did the Colonel pay for his house? That’s a pretty expensive neighborhood. Maybe if I get promoted to Lieutenant Colonel
then I could afford a house like that!
Harry
tried digging further in to things but found his access to records limited.
The next
day, he had an appointment at Wilford Hall and when they finished with another
trip down the MRI tunnel, resulting in a headache from the headgear the orderlies
had strapped to his head. Going back to
the parking lot, he realized the hospital on the southern side of San Antonio
afforded him the opportunity to visit the Dominion residential area.
He drove
out Interstate 10 and found the Dominion. It was a gated community. Harry drove
up to the gate and a guard asked him his business. Harry gave him the name of a
San Antonio Spurs basketball player and said he was expected. The guard told
him the basketball star was not a resident and invited Harry to leave before he
called the police. Harry left.
Early the
next morning, he knocked on the Commanding Officer’s door and asked for
clearance to access records fully including national law enforcement databases
and intra-service databases. The
Commander granted his access without asking many questions.
The
commander did point out there could be a logical explanation for the Colonel’s
ostentatious display of wealth. He
suggested the Colonel might have received an inheritance, perhaps. After Harry pointed out that did not explain
the coincidence of both officers wearing similar Rolexes, he shrugged and told
Harry to continue his research.
“Knock
yourself out.”
Harry went
to his cubicle and armed with access codes to many federal databases, started
digging. It didn’t take long for Harry
to figure out the Colonel had not declared any extra income and there did not
seem to be any deductions for mortgage payments.
Did he pay cash for that house?
As Harry
continued his research, he learned the name of the Army Major and started
researching information on the Army Major as well.
Three days
later, he received an email from the OSI commander to prepare a briefing on his
findings and deliver it the next morning. He wasn’t ready but the Commander had asked
him to come brief him.
The
Commander had received a query from the Army Criminal Investigation Division (otherwise
known as CID) relayed through the OSI national headquarters in the Washington
area wondering why the OSI was seeking information for one of its field grade
officers. Harry’s research had not gone unnoticed.
Harry felt
a little uncomfortable because he thought he should have more information
before delivering his report. But, he had been ordered to give a summary of his
findings so he did. He stayed up until midnight collecting his information and
summarized the facts as he saw them.
Both the
Major and the Lieutenant Colonel had served as Contracting Officers at the
Joint Contracting Officer and both had extended their tours in Afghanistan. A normal tour of duty in the region, considered
a combat zone, was 12 months. The Major
had extended his tour for an extra 12 months se3rving a total of 24 months and
the Lieutenant Colonel had extended his tour by an extra 18 months serving a
total of 30 months. Combined, they had issued
contracts totaling over 6 billion dollars to Afghan firms providing goods and
services to Coalition Forces. They had
awarded over 3 billion dollars for transportation contracts and contracts
providing security services for the transportation convoys.
Harry had
also noted that both officers also performed as review authorities. Whenever a firm protested an award, the review
authority would determine if the protest has merit or if the award would stand.
As an objective review of the contract
award process, it determined whether or not the contract had been awarded
fairly in accordance with the Federal Acquisition Regulations and Department of
Defense guidelines. By tracking the
cases the two officers reviewed, he found they had reviewed many of each
other’s awards when a rival Afghan company protested. Without exception, it seemed the officers
would determine a protest did not have merit when reviewing the other’s award.
Harry
informed the commander it appeared the Contracting Officers had received bribes
to award contracts to favored companies. If there were protests, they would back each
other up. They advertised and awarded the
contracts as ‘Best Value’ contracts meaning the lowest bid did not necessarily
win the contract.
Harry
didn’t have access to all the bids for the contracts but he noted the companies
protesting the awards had stated they offered comparable services at lower
prices.
Harry also
determined another potential crime existed. One of the officers would award a
contract to an Afghan company to provide both transportation and security services
under a contract for a certain route and then the other would issue a
requirement and award a contract for security for the same route. Harry felt the security contracts were, in
effect, bogus contracts since the transportation company had already received a
contract to provide security services for the route. Harry suspected the security companies could
be traced to either one or both of the Contracting Officers, who were receiving
payments and transferring the monies to offshore banking accounts. They collected millions for these contracts.
Harry
explained his report was incomplete. He
suspected both the Major and the Lieutenant Colonel has used their positions to
accept lucrative bribes to award contracts to favored companies. He also felt they had created false Afghan companies
to funnel money into their bank accounts while defrauding the Government.
He shared
his suspicions with the Commanding Officer and presented the facts as he had
determined them
The Commander
listened with interest. He told Harry it
seemed to him there was a strong possibility a major crime existed here. He explained there was some high level
headquarters interest in the case due to the Army CID request. Harry has triggered an inter-service interest
that attracted major attention.
He asked
Harry to hold off for a couple of days. A day later, he called Harry into his
office and informed him the OSI Headquarters at Andrews near Washington had
assumed jurisdiction over the case. Since the case involved officers from both
the Army and the Air Force and most of the illegal activity had taken place in
Afghanistan, the OSI headquarters was going to follow up on the case. He ordered
Harry to put all the data he had collected on a disc and to bundle up all the
paperwork for a special courier arriving that evening from Washington.
The next day,
two agents from Washington showed up and collected the data. They spent three hours with Harry going over
the data and getting his impressions. Ten days later, the Commander called Harry
into his office and presented him with a Letter of Commendation from the
Commandant of the OSI, a female Brigadier General.
It took
another two and a half months before the government arrested and filed charges
against both the Lieutenant Colonel and the Major. When they did arrest the two officers, the
story made national news. News reports
indicated the two had taken over 4 million dollars in bribes and fraudulent
claims while in Afghanistan.
Reading
the news as it filtered through the local San Antonio Express News and the
television, Harry suspected more money had been embezzled but those two were
looking at long term assignment in the military prison at the United States
Disciplinary Barracks at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. They wouldn’t be able to spend any money for a
long time.
After he
had handed over the files in the case to the Washington couriers, word traveled
fast throughout the office. His
reputation as an analyst grew. Harry
didn’t have to worry about being utilized in a productive manner. Agents started coming by with requests for
help on active cases. As the requests
mounted, the Commanding Officer had to intervene and establish a system to schedule
his assistance on active investigations.
He became
proficient tracking spending habits of Air Force members suspected of dealing
illegal drugs within the military. He
noted that whenever the local office stumbled upon anything that linked any Air
Force member to espionage or terrorism, investigators from headquarters soon
showed up and the casework disappeared.
One day,
an agent had asked him to review his investigation of a case the Procurement
Office had referred to the OSI. They had
received a complaint a small minority owned machine shop in San Antonio was
overcharging the Defense Department for nuts and bolts it manufactured under
contract with the Government. After his
review Harry concurred with the agent the items the shop manufactured met the
standards established under the contract. They jointly concluded the complaint against
the business was baseless and the agent had prepared paperwork to that effect.
When Harry
was packaging the paperwork, he notices an invoice for shipping.
That’s odd. $498.36 for shipping a $36.57 order?
At Harry’s
request, the agent re-opened the investigation. They soon discovered an anomaly in Department of
Defense procurement rules requiring businesses to submit separate invoices for
items purchased and shipping. Subsequently, they discovered three years
previous, the machine shop had made an honest, typographical mistake and
received $479.00 for shipping when the original shipping invoice should have
been for $47.90.
The owners
had promptly refunded the difference to the Government, but their bookkeeper
made another mistake and they received payment again. This time, they did not return the money and soon
discovered they could charge excessive shipping and would receive payment.
The
temptation proved too great. The shop
then embarked on a practice of padding the shipping invoices with excessive
charges and pocketing the difference between the actual shipping costs and the
invoiced amount.
To keep
orders flowing in, they submitted bids undercutting their competitors and let
it be known they would specialize in filling fill small quantities. Soon their business flourished and they
received order after order from government warehouses and delivered promptly. They were soon netting over $600,000.00 per
year in excessive shipping charges.
Once the
OSI completed their investigation, the practice stopped and the owners received
suspended sentences and were ordered to pay restitution to the United States
Government.
Subsequently
Harry and the agent both received a letter from an Assistant Secretary to the
Secretary of Defense thanking them for their work and informing them their efforts
had resulted in changes to the Department’s procurement regulations.
Harry
became known as the “go-to” person to contact when agents needed help with
cases. He was a quick study and
considered “free labor” since he was not counted against the unit’s manning
documents. Whenever he didn’t travel to
Wilford Hall for medical tests, he remained available to help out. Although he enjoyed solving the puzzles, his
focus remained returning to an assignment flying fighters. It felt good to be needed and valued. The work was interesting but it wasn’t flying.
When
flying Harry had possessed a security clearance and because the Air Force
consider him an OSI asset, albeit temporary, The Air Force kept his clearance
active. After his success with the case
involving the Procurement Officers, the OSI issued him his own set of access
codes permitting him to roam freely through all Air Force databases.
In his
spare time and sometimes after normal duty hours, Harry started searching the
databases of the Air Force Foreign Technology Division. That agency tracked weapons systems
developments of foreign government’s air forces. Harry sought information regarding the
development of air-to-air missile technology in the Iranian Air Force. The mystery of the missile downing Mike’s
airplane haunted him.
He did not
learn much about the missile but did learn about the Su-27 aircraft the Iranian
Air Force had gained as the result of breakaway states in the Caucasus region. After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991,
Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia became independent states and the resulting
turmoil created chaos particularly during the two Chechen Wars. During this period, Muslin elements had
succeeded on spiriting away 24 Su-27 Russian fighters, along with parts, tools
and logistical supplies, which had formerly belonged to the Russian Air Force.
These
aircraft ended up not in the Iranian Air Force, but in the Aerospace Force of
the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, or more simply the
Revolutionary Guards Air Branch. Harry
was surprised to learn the Revolutionary Guards had an air force but they did. The Revolutionary guard air arm possessed many
assault helicopters to support ground forces, fighter aircraft, and control of
the Iranian strategic missile forces.
While political
correctness proved primary to serving as a member of the Revolutionary Guard
Air Branch, Harry learned the standards demanded of its pilots were high. The Branch had engaged former Soviet Su-27
fighter pilots as mercenary flying instructors to teach the Iranian pilots the
necessary skills associated with the air-to-air capability of its fighter
aircraft.
Harry
learned of one pilot, rumored to have shot down an Eagle, who had mastered a
maneuver known as the ‘cobra.’ This maneuver
called for the pilot to turn the Su-27 up on its axis in a 90 degree stall like
position causing enemy flyers to overshoot their plane placing themselves in front
of the Su-27 in easy range of the heat seeking missiles.
Harry knew
instantly this maneuver violated the ‘Speed
is Life’ mantra fighter pilots lived by. He considered the maneuver a pretty dumb move
for any fighter pilot to make.
Harry also
learned they called this pilot “Mar”, the Farsi name for snake.
Since
rumor held Mar had shot down an Eagle, Harry surmised this must the asshole who
had gotten Mike.
Before
Harry could learn more, Air Force Foreign Technology Intelligence cyber
security team detected his curiosity and blocked his access into the Foreign
Technology Division saying he did not have the requisite ”need to know” to
access the information. The information he sought was not relevant to any OSI
investigations. therefore, they decreed, he didn’t have a need to know.
The hell I don’t.
He didn’t
press the issue because he felt there was little else he could learn. The sneak
attack would remain a mystery. At least, now he had a name.
Mar
It didn’t
seem to Harry to matter much. He was beginning to give up hope of ever flying
again.
* * *
As it
turned out, Harry never flew again in the Air Force. His medical problem proved mysterious and
unable to duplicate. The Air Force
conducted every test conceivable. He
underwent so many EEG tests, he felt like an expert. Once when a hospital technician made a
mistake attaching the leads, Harry corrected her and showed her the proper
sequence. They ran him through the MRI
machine so many times wearing that tight headband he thought he would have a
permanent headache. They eliminated the
possibility of panic attacks.
In the
meantime, four months after arriving in the San Antonio area, the Air Force
notified Harry he would receive the Air Force Cross, the nation’s second
highest military award, second only to the Medal of Honor. The top general in the Air Force, the Air
Force Chief of Staff, flew down to San Antonio, pinned on new Major’s leaves on
Harry, and presented the medal at a parade at Lackland Air Force Base. The Air Force general gave him the honor of
reviewing the troops as they marched by.
He didn’t care. All he wanted was
to return to flying fighters. When the
Chief of Staff shook his hand, all Harry could do was ask when he was returning
to flying fighters.
Eleven
general officers attended the parade and the reception at the Lackland Club following
the parade. When the Air Force Chief of
Staff shows up at an event, he draws a crowd. Harry lobbied every one of them
to assist him in his return to flying. He regarded the event as an opportunity. He was in a target-rich environment and he
was not going to waste it. He made a
note of all those who attended and followed up with a letter writing campaign
to each of the attendees. He looked at
the letters as his long-range missiles and considered his campaign to return to
flying fighters as an extended air campaign. His appeals did not go unnoticed or
unanswered.
As time
passed, he became more and more discouraged.
He kept up his letter writing campaign for a few months but recognized
he was growing increasingly angry at his situation. His frustration, anger and bitterness was boiling
over and seeping into the letters. He
knew the people who would read the letters would detect some of this bitterness
and be repelled just as he was repelled when he read the letters over to
himself. He would tear the letter up and
start again.
Soon
the one letter a month became one letter every two months. After a while, he
stopped writing them altogether.
Old
demons he felt he had vanquished began to re-appear. These demons encroached on
his thoughts and enhanced his sense of futility and deepened his sense of
hopelessness. His self worth plummeted down like a rock dropping down a
bottomless pit.
He began
to mull over his situation as he lay in bed at night and there were many nights
when he would still be awake when the alarm went off the next morning. It was a standing joke when he was in the
Academy, he and his fellow cadets could sleep anywhere; even standing up if
they had the time. One of his fellow cadets had even mastered the ability to
sleep during sporting events amid the roar if the crowd.
So much for the Academy cadet who could sleep
anywhere.
Although
the fighter pilot mystique portrayed fighter pilots as hard drinkers, Harry and
his peers were actually very conservative.
They needed their wits in the air and early on, many soon discovered
drinking the night before slowed their reflexes to the point where they would
find themselves on the losing end of their mock air battles in the sky the next
day. Despite their reputation of
partying hard, most pilots allowed the fighter pilot heavy drinking myth to continue
but maintained a conservative lifestyle.
Most found
the “high” others sought in alcohol in the thrill of flying and taking their
bodies and airplanes to the limit in mock combat. They pushed themselves and the airplanes to
the edge while training and flying their mock combat missions and received
rewards of a high sense of accomplishment.
The mixtures of adrenalin, dopamine and serotonin flooding brains and
bodies stretched to the limit provided more satisfaction in an afternoon than others
received in a lifetime. The “high”
others received from sniffing cocaine or using other stimulants paled in
comparison.
One night,
restless, unable to sleep, emotions overtook him. The pain he felt at the loss of flying began to
remind him of the emotional loss he had suffered in high school when he lost
his family; his adoptive parents and his sister. An automobile accident had taken them midway
through his senior year in high school.
He had left school, enlisted in the Air Force and worked through his
grief and loss. That had served to
remind him of the first accident claiming the lives of his natural parents when
he was ten.
The loss
of flying affected him emotionally. It
seemed as if he had lost his family a third time. As he lay there, his feelings felt like they
were cleaving his mind in half and hurt him more than any physical pain he had ever
felt. It was a Wednesday and he had been
sleepless for two nights running. When
he went to the Air Base to the OSI office, he wore his uniform with his wings
displayed. This served to remind him he
had once been a fighter pilot but he was no longer on flying status. According to regulations, he had to wear his
wings or be considered “out of uniform.”
Additionally,
while on the base, he was constantly exposed to the whine of the jet engine
noise emanating from the flight line. These subconscious cues served to remind him his
hopes of regaining status as a fighter pilot were more and more forlorn. He started to consider his case hopeless and himself a washed-up fighter
pilot.
He
instinctively knew deep inside he was a natural flyer. Every time, he strapped
himself into a cockpit, be it a light plane like he flew when he earned his
private pilot's license while a cadet at the Air Force Academy Prep School; he
always felt he became part of the plane he flew. The aircraft felt like it was an extension of
his body.
It
took work to excel in the flying arena, but work he loved. All that work, all that training, earning his
private ticket, excelling in the Initial Flight Screening program while at the
Academy, scoring first in his class during the first phase of pilot training to
get selected do the fighter track and then studying, learning and refining his
talent to graduate from Undergraduate Pilot Training second in his class. Due to his ranking in Pilot Training, the Air
Force allowed him to select the airplane he wanted to fly. He surprised everyone by selecting the F-15
Eagle instead of the F-22. He had
excelled in his initial training and received an assignment to the 1st Tactical
Fighter Wing and his talent caught the attention of the Wing commander, Colonel
James "Bulldog" Rippenger, a fighter ace from the Gulf War in 1991. The memories of these achievements only deepened
his despair.
Discouraged
by the failure of his efforts to regain a position as a fighter pilot in the
Air Force he began to feel like the situation regarding his return to flying
seemed more and more hopeless. They had
presented him with the nation's second highest medal for bravery and yet, they
still refused to let him fly again. He felt stymied by this intransigence on
the part of the institution he had devoted every fiber of his being to serving
his country doing something he loved to do.
Now,
because he had told the Flight Surgeon the truth that he had lost
consciousness, he found himself medically grounded; barred from flying and he
found himself in the fight of his life. He
was in a battle greater than the one he fought in the skies over Iran. Only, this time he felt he had lost the
initiative and was in a losing battle.
He
kept telling himself,
It's just not fair! It's just not fucking fair.
Night after night, he lay in his bed at night, his
mind racing, focusing on his situation. The more he thought about things, the more
negative things seemed to him. Resentment
overshadowed his thinking and feelings.
As he so often did, he battled the covers, twisting and turning, trying
to calm his mind so he could go to sleep. Typically, he would wake up the next morning
realizing he had only slept an hour or two.
This
Wednesday night, however, around midnight he arose and drank two beers but that
didn’t seem to help. He still felt the
restlessness and the emotional pain. Then
at one in the morning, he walked into his kitchen, pulled a bottle of bourbon
from the cabinet, broke the seal and poured himself a shot. The first belt of whiskey didn’t seem to do
much for him. He gagged. The second drink seemed to relax him a bit
but the third dollop did the truck.
Seconds
after the third shot hit his stomach; it felt like loose, limp rubber bands
inside his tangled brain let go. The
emotions and tensions knotting his gut relaxed. Resentment dissipated. He instantly felt relaxed and slept.
On
Thursday, after the late news, he went straight for the bourbon. He drank another three shots. He initially stopped at two, but felt the
pull to take the third. He seemed to
sleep better but woke a little early.
Friday night, he watched a ball game and helped himself to three drinks
while watching. Then, he had a fourth
before he went to bed. He slept well.
On
Saturday, he went to the liquor store and stocked up. By the end of the next week, he had developed
a habit of taking a few “toddies” each night to help him sleep. On the third week, he noticed he did not feel
the sense of relaxation he had initially felt after three so the three shots become four and on some
nights, five.
Harry
started the drinking to escape from the emotional pain he felt at being removed
from flying. This rapidly turned into a
two-edged sword – a Sword of Damocles hanging over his head. The alcohol began to take over.
As
he continued the pattern of drinking to calm him down and sleep, he became more
dependent on its effects. However, the
emotional pain he felt intensified. Without
his realizing it the alcohol served an accelerant to his negative feelings much
like adding gasoline to a fire. To
counter this increased turmoil, he drank more and when he did not drink, the
need for alcohol fed his insecurity; playing a trick on him. So without realizing it, the alcohol caused
his emotional pain to surface and intensify until he drank to counter the
feeling. He was unable to tell the real
distraught feelings from the ones created by the alcohol.
Some
nights, he took an over the counter sleeping pill with the whisky but noticed
he awoke with a really severe headache so he soon discontinued that practice.
He enjoyed
his work with the OSI. He worried
initially his work might suffer from his nightly drinks. He soon discovered a few drinks each night
to help him get to sleep did not seem seriously impact his work as an
analyst. He told himself he was actually
much more rested while on duty. He
convinced himself he was actually a better analyst.
He soon
found he was taking Friday afternoons off “to play golf.” He never played golf but sometimes did stop
off at the 19th Hole – a Casual Bar near the golf course. He acquired a taste for Mexican food and some Fridays,
when he was playing “golf’,” it would turn out he had stopped at Felix’s
Mexican restaurant on Pat Booker Boulevard and have lunch. Lunch often included a couple of beers and then
he would gravitate to the bar and watch golf on TV.
Golf
entailed a margarita or two or three.
He was
careful. He knew the ramifications
resulting from a Driving While Under the Influence (DUI) or Driving While
Intoxicated (DWI) charge on an Air Force career. He had a security clearance for his work at
the OSI. Even though things looked
hopeless, he still held on to the hope of returning to an active flying
job. A Driving Under the Influence (DUI)
or a Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) would most certainly smash that dream into
oblivion. He also realized the combination
of alcohol and driving had played a major factor which had claimed the lives of
his close family twice before in his life. Both his natural, biological parents
and subsequently, his adoptive parents had died as a result of automobile
accidents caused by drunk drivers.
Those
times he felt he had exceeded the legal limit he would call a cab. Universal City was a relatively small bedroom
community nestled next to the base. He
got to know many of the taxi drivers in town.
Then one evening after he had spent “lunch” at Felix’s, a waitress gave
him a ride. She was his type, buxom and
easygoing. He invited her to spend the night
and she gave him a ride back to his car in the morning.
He soon
discovered other females willing to give him a ride whenever he stopped at the Casual
Bar at the Officers’ Club. This activity
soon developed into a pattern. Many considered
him a womanizer. It was only partially
true. He looked at many of these
liaisons as opportunities to save what was left of his Air Force career and to
support his personal distain for driving while drunk..
He was
actually indifferent to women and this quality proved attractive to them. His indifference served like a magnet to
attract members of the opposite sex, his primary focus was returning to flying
status. When he flew fighters, he
concentrated on improving his flying skills and devoted much of his time
perfecting his skill. At the same time,
he did not turn away any opportunity to spend time with women, especially those
with big bosoms, who drifted into his orbit. There were enough of those occasions, so he
did not even think about it.
Meanwhile,
many officers in the tactical flying arena continued to work behind the scenes
to secure his return to flying duties. Though the assistance of his former
flying mentor, Brigadier General James “Bulldog” Rippenger, many top generals
went to bat for him trying to persuade the medical community to let him fly
again. It was not an easy decision. Predictably, a fierce debate ensued between the
Air Force medical community and the generals advocating Harry’s cause. At last, the Secretary of the Air Force intervened
and pronounced the final verdict.
Medical protocols trumped rank and two years and one month after the
incident, the Air Force issued Harry a medical retirement.
After
twenty-five months of evaluation, despite his protests and appeals to
high-ranking officials, the Air Force Flight Surgeons refused to reinstate him
to flying duties.
* * * * * * * * * * *
Trashed
In the meantime,
Harry had continued his work as an analyst with the OSI. He did well and when
it seemed inevitable the Air Force was gong to discharge him, the local OSI
commander asked him to sign on as a Civil Service analyst on a full-time
basis. Harry refused. He felt if he were going to be in the Air
Force, he would only serve as a fighter pilot, a warrior. He felt he would just as soon go back to
being an enlisted driver in the Motor Pool as he would a civil servant
analyzing cases for the OSI. He didn’t want
to be a driver again either. That assignment, driving pilots back and forth
from the squadron areas to their planes, had kindled his desire to be an Air
Force fighter pilot and started him on his journey which had ended in the sky
above Iraq.
His persistence,
his inner drive to succeed, had enabled him to take the journey from a driver
in the Motor Pool to the position of an ace fighter pilot.
This
dogged determination wore thin one Friday. The day started off auspiciously enough. Harry entered the OSI Building and went to his
cubicle to continue his research for another agent investigating a major drug
case. At 10 AM, a secretary came be and told him, he
was needed in the conference room. As he
walked to the conference room, he noticed the other cubicles were empty. He opened the door to the conference room and
the room was crowded with agents and the local OSI commander was standing at
the end of the room with a female Major General. Harry recognized her as Helen Parchment, the
first woman to command the Air Force Office of Special Investigation. They directed Harry to the end of the room and
the Commander shouted, “Attention to Orders.”
General Parchment
then presented Harry with the Air Force Legion of Merit. The citation, read by the local Commander,
cited his diligence in uncovering a major corruption case, his assistance in
unraveling major narcotics crimes, and his work on a classified case (a
reference to an espionage case).
Afterward,
General Parchment asked Harry for a provide meeting in the Commander’s office. There she gave Harry the news. The Secretary of the Air Force had approved
his discharge. He was to report to the
Base Personnel Office for processing at 10:00 AM the following Tuesday morning,
the end of the month.
General
Parchment then reiterated the offer for Harry to accept a Civil Service
position as an analyst and once again, Harry refused. The General muttered.
”That’s
what Jim said you would say.” Harry
recognized she referred to his former commanding officer and fighter pilot, Jim
“Bulldog” Rippenger, now a General Officer managing space operations at the
United States Space Command.
She then
invited Harry to lunch with her at the club before she flew back to Washington.
He declined, announcing he was off to
“play golf” because he had an early tee time. Then he went to Felix’s and watched golf on
television while he drank some beers and had a few margaritas.
There was
no ceremony when he retired. He showed
up in a uniform, as required, hung over, needing a haircut and with a three-day
stubble of beard. He did not wear his
wings, as required. He reported to the
base personnel office, received his paperwork from a Master Sergeant who
thanked him for his service, and pointed out the exit.
The personnel
people told him the Air Force had automatically processed some paperwork with
the VA for his disability pension. When
it was all said and done, he would receive about 50% of the base pay he had
been receiving as a Major. The Secretary
of the Air Force had insisted the Air Force do everything it could in the way
of ensuring he received all the possible benefits the country could offer him.
He drove
his second hand car out the front gate. As
he rolled his car through the light onto Pat Booker road, Harry’s mind flashed
back twenty-six months to those few seconds over Iraq when, near death, in his
consciousness, he faced a solid oak door.
He had understood at the time if he opened the door, he would be leaving
the world he knew and entering into a vast unknown full of light on the other
side of the door. He had blocked the
memory of those few seconds from his consciousness in the ensuing days, weeks,
and months. He remembered now.
As he cleared
the traffic light unto Pat Booker Boulevard, one thought entered his mind.
Maybe I would have been better off if I had opened
that damn door!
Author’s note -
I hope you
enjoyed this story. I am considering
using a modified version in my next HARRY’S WAR book. I would appreciate your comments either here
on you can email me at EdBenjamin.author@Gmail.com
Ed
You can also find more Harry Miles' adventures in Harry's War on Amazon or wherever digital books are sold.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00794LZTU/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00794LZTU&linkCode=as2&tag=flowatpre-20
You can also find more Harry Miles' adventures in Harry's War on Amazon or wherever digital books are sold.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00794LZTU/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00794LZTU&linkCode=as2&tag=flowatpre-20