Kevin Miller - Declared Hostile

Wilson could see the kids up forward were excited, excited to be involved in a real world operation, ready to make history, ready to be tested . He, on the other hand, was apprehensive, not about his ability to lead them or about how to deal with the Venezuelan threat, but about the manufactured sense of urgency from Davies and, apparently, Washington. He soon became lost in his thoughts as he stared at the outline of Saint-Martin twenty or so miles away.

In two days, Wilson was scheduled to lead a deck-load strike to San Ramón. Looking around the flight deck, he was reminded of what that looked like. Almost every aircraft he saw, some forty aircraft, would be launched. It would take about an hour. The join up south of the ship, then finding and tanking from four KC-10s, would take another hour. They would then push out in a tactical formation, check in with the AWACS, and bump up the airspeed at the IP. They would avoid “neutral” Trinidad and enter Venezuela with a hail of defense suppression, and, if the FAV sent up fighters, a hail of missiles would knock them down. He didn’t expect the FAV would fly at night, and if they did, they would be nearly blind compared to the Americans with Data Link and NVGs and FLIRs to augment their powerful radars. Wilson guessed by the time one of their rusty F-16 pilots got a lock, he would already be targeted by Wilson with a radar missile, only a trigger squeeze away. Ducks in a barrel. Wilson hoped, for their own sakes, they didn’t come up.

He strode aft past the island and wondered, What’s the rush? Why not wait until Theodore Roosevelt gets here? And the Marine Expeditionary Unit and all the Air Force tac air? The bombers in South Dakota and the paratroops in Kentucky and North Carolina could be kept on alert . Wilson knew it would take less than two weeks to raise a credible American hammer over Venezuela that would likely diffuse the situation. A diplomat? All this over a diplomat? Wilson thought.

And the tasking! Cut the runways? It was as if they were being ordered to punch with brass knuckles but land nothing more than a soft jab. Wilson had a recurring thought that made him uneasy: that the United States was again going to pull its punch — by design — while he and his pilots were facing real AAA and SAMs fired by an angry and determined enemy. Once the runways were cut, the Venezuelans could fill the craters in days, a week at most. It was a recoverable injury that made no sense when factored in with Annie’s mining strike, which would shut down Río Salta. Mining a harbor was a serious military objective that took months to recover from, even if the Americans — knowing where the mines were dropped — helped sweep the area later.

Wilson tried to guess at the U.S. objective. Punish the Venezuelans for the drug trade run from their country? Remind them who’s boss in the Western Hemisphere? Discourage their nascent relationship with Iran? Up the cost of their cozy relationship with Russia? Maybe it’s more. Maybe they have something we don’t know about.

He figured that had to be it. Why else attack a country that wasn’t on their radar five days ago? Faith. True faith and allegiance. He and the Firebirds were going to man their jets and fly hundreds of miles to strike a sovereign nation on faith. Those before him had done it. Ours is but to do and die .

The JOs on the bow, far from unthinking automatons, would nevertheless launch and fly into the enemy defenses like generations before them because Wilson, their CO, ordered them to do so. Like Matson ordered him, and Devil Davies ordered Matson. No, Wilson and the other aviators each sensed the mixture of anticipation and dread in themselves and each other. Washington might turn this off, but we’ve gotta be ready if they don’t. Deep down, Wilson knew he was excited, too, and that soon turned into a personal indictment of guilt.

Wilson navigated the tie-down chains between two Rhinos and stood at the flight deck round-down. For several moments, he watched the boiling, frothy wake generated by Coral Sea ’s four giant screws. Nearly a football field wide, the wake extended all the way to the horizon, the red sun sinking into it as the wake met the sky. Wilson figured they were making at least 25 knots. On the other side of the Super Hornet, he noted a brown-shirted plane captain taking a picture of the sunset. He figured the girl to be a teenager, excited to see the beautiful scene, wanting to record a memory of it. Although Wilson had witnessed such sunsets many times before on other ships on other oceans, he was grateful to see this one tonight. Despite the wind whipping at his flight suit legs, he wanted to stay and enjoy it, but he had duties below, and, as a senior officer, couldn’t be seen wasting too much time in reflection. He turned and headed to the island.

What new thing did the Venezuelans have? Was it a threat? Would he be leading his pilots into some unknown danger?

Wilson sensed the increase in the ship’s roll when he awoke at 0620. He switched on the TV monitor and selected the inertial navigation screen that displayed numeric data on the ship’s lat/long, course and speed: 17 41 North, 59 54 West, heading southeast at ten knots. In the Atlantic about 100 miles off St. Kitts. Wilson figured the ship would transit at an easy pace down the Antilles chain with some day and night cycles thrown in to keep jets and pilots sharp before the main event tomorrow night. His day would be spent in CVIC flight planning with Stretch and Coach. One of his nugget pilots, LT Conner Davis, “Irish,” had been hovering about the planning team and helping with the suppression package. Wilson knew he wanted to go on this one. He would schedule Irish as one of the HARM shooters. Wilson looked at the PLAT to “see” outside. From the image on the screen it was sunny. A good day was in the offing. The rolling of the 100,000-ton carrier wasn’t out of limits for his pilots.

On the eve of battle, Wilson wanted to give his squadron a talk, to inspire them, to calm them. He wanted them to focus on the reason it was important they were there. He was still troubled at how fast all this was happening. Coral Sea was featured in network newscasts with video of the ship transiting north of St. Croix yesterday. Just the way Devil wanted it. The military situation in the Caribbean was 24/7 on the cable networks, and Wilson was surprised the powers-that-be hadn’t shut down the satellite link that provided it — and the email connectivity to home.

What should I say to them? Wilson thought. Nuggets like Irish and Macho were chomping at the bit to go, to prove themselves in combat. All Wilson had to do was point and Irish and the rest of the nuggets — even veterans like Stretch and Olive — would run to their jets, drop themselves in the cockpit, fire up the engines, and go. Annie, Steady-As-She-Goes Annie , would man her jet in a less excited manner, taking everything in stride as usual, and she would launch and fly to any target assigned and deliver any weapon assigned. In three days, she was going to lead a strike, a big one, to mine Río Salta. Wilson drew water in the sink to shave.

Venezuela had oil money and drug money. Would the Venezuelans risk an American attack that was going to shut down both lucrative sources of income? Why invite it by jailing the diplomat and why accept it? Wilson thought. Broadcast video of Venezuelan mobs protesting the impending American action resembled mobs in any number of Middle Eastern population centers, the difference being that, in Caracas, women protested alongside their men and showed more skin.