Stephen Coonts - Combat

“Only if I want to keep my job.” He sighed. “Let’s just say that the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command won’t be giving me its endorsement. Admiral Carson almost had me thrown in the brig.”

She laughed, half at his joke and also to cheer him up. “You’re joking.” He could hear the smile in her voice.

“He’s siccing the IG on me, to see if I’ve wasted any Navy time on this quote half-baked fantasy unquote.”

“That’s not good.” She paused, then asked, “So, you’ve gone all the way up your chain of command with no success?”

“I’d call that an understatement,” he replied.

“Well, then it’s time to try another chain,” she said forcefully. “Let me make some calls.”

“What?” McConnell was horrified. “Jenny! I’m poison. Please, just ditch anything you have with my name on it. Defender ’s all over the Web. We’ll just have to hope someone picks it up and uses it.”

“No, Ray. We’re not going to just sit. Defender ’s a good idea, and I’m going to do everything I can for it.” She paused again, and her tone softened, almost calming. “Let me call some of my friends on the NAVAIR staff. Admiral Schultz is a pilot and an ‘operator,’ not some bureaucrat. I’ve met him, and I think he’ll give you a chance.”

Ray didn’t know what to say except, “Thanks, Jenny. I hope this doesn’t backfire on you.”

“Anything worthwhile is worth a risk, Ray. I’ll call you this evening and tell you what I find out.”

“I am not going to go into the Joint Chiefs of Staff and propose that we adopt some crackpot design that came off the Internet!” Admiral John Kramer was so agitated he was pacing, quickly marching back and forth as he protested.

Admiral William Schultz, Commander in Chief, Naval Aviation, sat quietly in his chair. He’d expected this reaction, and waited for Kramer to calm down a little. Schultz was calm, sure of himself and his mission.

“I’ve checked out this design, John, and the engineer. Both are OK. There are some technical questions, but nothing he’s done here is science fiction. The man who designed it, Ray McConnell, had a lot of help. It may be unofficial”—Schultz leaned forward for emphasis—“but it’s good work.”

He sat back, straightening his spine. “It’s also the only decent idea I’ve heard in almost two weeks.”

Kramer and Schultz were both pilots, and had served together several times in their Navy careers, but where Kramer was tall, and almost recruiting-poster handsome, Schultz was only of middle height, and stockier. And his looks would never get him any movie deals. His thinning sandy hair was mussed whenever he put his navy cap on, while he was sure Kramer kept his in place with mousse. Kramer was a good pilot, but he’d also been the staff type, the “people person.” Or so he thought.

Used to the convoluted, time-consuming methods of the Pentagon, the CNO continued to object. “Even if we did propose it, and even if it was accepted, where would we get the money?”

“Somewhere, John, just like we’ve done before. The money’s there. We just have to decide what’s the most important thing to spend it on.”

Schultz continued, mentally assigning himself three Our Fathers and three Hail Marys. “Look, I’ve heard the Air Force is buying into Defender in a big way. They think it can work, and as far as they’re concerned, if it’s got wings, it belongs to them.”

Kramer looked grim. The Air Force was shameless when they talked about “aerospace power.” He nodded agreement.

“Let them get their hands on any armed spacecraft, and the next thing you know, we’ll lose SPAWAR. Remember the time they tried to convince Congress that we should scrap our carriers and buy bombers with our money?” Kramer frowned, listening.

Schultz pressed his point. “Do we have any viable alternative for stopping the Chinese, sir?”

Kramer shook his head. “The launch site is out of Tomahawk range, and the President has already said that he won’t authorize the use of a ballistic missile, even with a conventional warhead. And you’d need lots of missiles. The way that site is hardened, I’m not certain a nuke would do it.”

“Air Force B-2s could reach it,” Schultz said quietly.

“But they can’t be sure they’d get out alive. The defenses are incredibly thick, and they’re expecting us to use bombers. And it would take several aircraft to destroy the gun. We might have to commit as many as ten and expect to lose half.”

“This is better, John. Look, McConnell’s flying in here tomorrow. You can meet him yourself. I’ve listened to him, and I’m convinced.”

“Then that’s what we’ll try to sell,” Kramer decided.

General Michael Warner was an unusual Chief of Staff. He flew bombers, not fighters. In an Air Force that gave fighter pilots most of the stars, it was a sign of his ability, not only as an officer, but as a politician. Looking more like a banker than a bomber pilot, he had an almost legendary memory, which he used for details: of budgets, people, and events.

Pilots lived and died because of details. They won and lost battles because of them. And the general kept looking for some small detail that his deputy, General Clifton Ames, had missed. The three-star general had put the target analysis together personally.

Ames had nothing but bad news. An overhead image of the Gongga Shan launch site filled the wall screen. “I’ve confirmed there’s no way the Navy can stretch the range of their Tomahawk missiles. They’ve got smaller warheads than our air-launched cruise missiles anyway. And even if we could adapt a ballistic missile with a conventional warhead, they aren’t accurate enough for this target.”

His data pad linked to the screen, Ames indicated various features of the site as he talked. “The Chinese built this installation expecting it to be attacked by cruise missiles. It has heavy SAM and AAA defenses. They’ve mounted radar on elevated towers to give them additional warning time of an attack. They’ve even constructed tall open framework barriers across the approach routes a cruise missile might use.” He pointed to the large girder structures, easily visible in the photograph.

“The barrel and all vital facilities are hardened, and there’s the matter of the gun itself. Given its three-meter bore, intelligence says the barrel thickness is at least a foot. Damaging that will require precision at a distance — precisely the capability we’re now lacking.”

“To get an eighty percent chance of success would take twelve B-2s, each carrying eight weapons.” Ames knew he was talking to a bomber pilot, and watched for Warner’s reaction. The chief just nodded glumly, and Ames continued.

“And the worst part is that the Chinese would have the gun back in operation again within a few months, possibly a few weeks. We’re certain the barrel is constructed in sections, like the Iraqi gun. If a section is damaged, you remove it and replace it with a spare section. We’ve even identified in the imagery where they probably keep the spares.

“We estimate follow-up strikes would be needed every two weeks — indefinitely.”

Even as he said it, Ames knew that wasn’t an option. Airpower provided shock and speed, but it had to be followed up by something besides more air strikes.

“What about losses?” Warner asked.

“Using the standard loss rates,” Ames replied, “there’s a good chance we’ll lose several bombers in the first few raids. And part of the flight path is over Chinese territory.” The implications for search and rescue were not good.