Читаем War with Russia полностью

War with Russia

Another check of his instruments. Everything was doing what it was meant to do, but there was still nothing. And they were closing fast on Kaliningrad.

Then the radio in his helmet burst into life.

“Apollo, this is Giant Killer, are you receiving me?”

“Affirmative, Giant Killer,” Bertinetti replied—thinking, what does ground control want?

“Apollo, we’re receiving reports that lead SEAD sortie is on target and has received no incoming, repeat no contact. They’ve had a clear run onto target and have taken out multiple SAM systems.”

“Roger, Giant Killer. Guess they’re keeping it for us then.” Bertinetti tried to make light of this surprising news.

“Apollo, on the contrary, we’re getting multiple reports that enemy C2 is totally scrambled. All their systems appear to be down.”

Bertinetti was dumbfounded. That could only mean one thing: something massive must have been initiated to coincide with the air attack. How else would the feared Russian integrated air-defense system crash?

But this was no time to be complacent. It was time to prepare for their own run in to the target and to pray that the gods of war were looking after them as well.

An hour later, Bertinetti knew that something extraordinary had taken place. As they had prepared for the mission, the 510 Fighter Squadron pilots had all assumed their attack on the Pionersky radar station would require them to penetrate the most sophisticated, integrated air-defense system on the planet. It would probably be a suicide mission. But something unaccountable had plunged the Russian command and control systems into chaos, for there had been no incoming SAMs.

True, the vehicle-mounted, four-barreled, ZSU-23-4 anti-aircraft guns had put up a fair amount of 23-millimeter flak, but a hit from one of those now-elderly anti-aircraft systems, while deadly, would have seemed more like bad luck than anything else, given the other modern weapon systems arrayed against them. But no SAM missiles were fired at them and the few uncoordinated attacks by Russian air defense MiG-29 Fulcrums and MiG-31 Foxhounds had been easily seen off by teams of roving F-15 Eagles providing top cover above the F-16s.

In fact, the raid had started like a night training-run in the Nevada desert. Led by Bertinetti, they’d gone down to very low level shortly after entering the 400-kilometer S-400 range and, guided by their LANTIRN infrared navigation and targeting systems, they’d approached the target at no more than 100 feet, streaking across the tree tops with the ground flashing by in the darkness below. Seventy kilometers from the target they had linked up with the eight F-15 Eagles above them. They carried advanced, counter-electronic warfare jammers to neutralize the radar systems of the SAM-6 batteries and ZSU-23-4 anti-aircraft guns guarding the Pionersky radar station.

As they closed with the target, Bertinetti led the sortie in a gradual climb to 5,000 feet. A few individual ZSU-23-4s started to put up a massive barrage of manually aimed flak. So, just short of the target and conscious of the streams of Russian tracer flashing past his canopy, he had overcome his natural instinct to turn and dive to make for a more difficult target and had, instead, gritted his teeth and held his course and height before releasing his two GBU-31, Mark 84 bombs. Guided by the JDAM kits, they hit the radar station in the center of the roof with a massive explosion. Pulling left and climbing aggressively to escape the flak and join the circling F-15s, he had seen the building erupt as the two bombs buried themselves deep inside—only to be followed by the other seven F-16s, also achieving perfect hits.

Extraordinary, thought Bertinetti. Although they had not said as much, HQ had sent out his eight F-16s in the hope that one or two might get through. And one direct hit would probably have been enough to knock out the radar. Instead they had all survived and all had scored. What was really going on down there in Kaliningrad, he wondered. Because someone had been, and was still being, very clever indeed.

“Giant Killer, this is Apollo. Mission accomplished.” Bertinetti spoke coolly into his radio to ground control. “Now heading to link up with tankers before getting back on CAP.”

“Apollo, copy that. Tally ho and good hunting.”