Chimera

They had just witnessed the impact of the rockets on the horizon in front of their advancing line of tanks. The thermal scopes sorted out the white fireballs and adjusted coloration to bring the view back under control in a few seconds.

Kulkarni keyed his comms:

“Steel-central, this is Rhino-One! B-D-A inconclusive at our end. Too much interference! Can you confirm? Over”

“Roger, Rhino-One. Enemy infantry taking heavy fire and is suppressed. Two Z-B-Ds on fire and one T-99 crew abandoning vehicle. Stand by!”

“Roger!” Kulkarni said without looking away from his sights.

“Rhino-One, flight of four Jaguars on station with precision weapons. Redirecting to point-victory for armor suppression tasking. Ensure friendly armor thermal I-D transmitters are active. Confirm last! Over.”

“Rhino copies all! Thermal I-D beacons active. Line of ten Arjun tanks forward of L-O-D. Do not engage this force! That’s us. All armor units north of this line are viable targets! Over.” Kulkarni said, and shared a look with his gunner.

It was a scary thought thinking about a laser-guided-bomb headed down amidst the smoke and dust above them. One mistake and friendly tanks could easily be hit. They were now bypassing the last known advance lines of the 10TH Mechanized from the previous day. Beyond was open terrain all the way to the objective. There was no hiding it now…

ABOVE THE LINE OF ACTUAL CONTROL

EAST OF DAULAT-BEG-OLDI

LADAKH

DAY 7 + 0550 HRS

“Weapons un-caged!” the pilot said as he checked his instruments and pulled back on the stick.

These Jaguar pilots had been to this battlefield countless times in the days before. They had aged quite a bit under the strain of continuous combat sorties. Combat losses for the Indian Jaguar force had been high given the very deadly nature of their tasks. But those loss rates had dissipated to a very small value in the last two days as the PLA and the PLAAF air-defense had been rolled back or eliminated by heavy suppression missions flown by these pilots. They could now afford to fly higher now and engage from safe distances, out of the combat envelope of the short-range surface-to-air missiles and unguided weapons.

They could not go too far to the north though with a single surviving S-300 battery still active near the PLA supply nodes, but the Ladakh frontline was clear. This localized air superiority was visible to the pilots of the four twin-seat Jaguars.

As the pilot waited for his WSO to spin up the weapons and begin target acquisition from the laser-designation pod, a flight of three Mig-29s from No. 28 Squadron on offensive-counter-air tasking cruised a couple thousand feet above them, guided with airborne intelligence from the No. 50 Squadron Phalcon further to the south.

These Jaguars had taken off from their forward deployment base at Srinagar AFB and had been waiting for their turn to deploy over the battlefield. Having tanked from a waiting Il-78 over Srinagar, the flight of four had now entered the battlefield…

“Designator active! I have acquisition. Friendly units have lit up their thermal I-D markers!” the WSO said from the rear seat as the pilot scanned the skies. He could see the ineffective lines of tracers being fired by the Chinese forces below him. None of which could reach them at this altitude.

“Thank god for small mercies, eh?” the pilot noted dryly.

There had already been blue-on-blue attacks in this war. In the most egregious case, not twelve hours ago, a Jaguar from the Tuskers had lit up a couple of friendly BMP-IIs at the Pangong-Tso shores amidst a chaotic running firefight between Indian and Chinese light-armor units. These things happened, but it didn’t make it any more acceptable.

“Roger that, sir,” the WSO said. “Okay, I have an enemy tank in its revetment north of our guys. Suggest we go for a drop!”

“Roger. Drop on your go,” the pilot replied.

The WSO switched on the targeting laser and had a positive reflection from the metallic turret of the T-99 below.

“Target is lit! Drop in three, two, one. Dropped!”

The aircraft gained a few dozen feet of altitude as soon as the heavy weapon fell off its pylons. The pilot looked to his left and right and saw other aircraft releasing weapons as well. Three laser-guided-bombs were on the way down with split-second delays and fourth one with a ten second delay…

“Steady on the marker!” the pilot cautioned.

“I have it! Steady and holding. Impact in three… two… one…”

The thermal view flared white following by an inverted black cone of mud and soot that flew upwards from the impact point.

Three targeted tanks were destroyed.

There was no explosion from the fourth bomb, which malfunctioned.

“Boom!” the WSO exclaimed. The pilot chuckled.

“Roger that. Damage assessment?”

“Boss, I probably dropped it through the tank commander’s hatch!”

“Point taken!” the pilot said. “Okay, find me a new target. We still have one more hanging.”

“Copy. Beginning acquisition…”