fighters, and their highly trained pilots, were a serious concern at Top Gun and Red Flag' fighter weapons schools.
TUPOLEV Tu-26 BACKFIRE BOMBER Col. Istvan I. Torgovnik nervously watched the American fighter plane off his left wing as he deftly used his flight controls to swing the Backfire bomber slowly toward the American Fleet.
Ah, Comrade Colonel, you appear tentative. We must remember our orders from Air Marshal Khatchadovrian. The small man with the large, scraggly mustache leaned closer to the pilot as he spoke.
Do not worry. The inept Americans will not interfere, boasted Maj.Fulvio Fedorovich Vladyka, the political officer assigned to this sensitive mission.
An assumption, Fulvio Fedorovich, replied the command pilot. We have never tested the Americans in this manner. We cannot guess their response.
Torgovnik watched the major out of the corner of his eye, testing his own convictions. The political officer did not respond.
This action. Comrade Major, is not within our defined operating
doctrine. In addition, continued Torgovnik, thinking a bout the
implications of his actions as reported by this insubordinate and
thoroughly disgusting zampolit, I have the responsibility for our six
aircraft and these superior aircrews to link
You will remember.
Comrade Colonel, it is I who have responsibility for the success of this mission. You will obey the orders to probe the American defensive reactions.
Torgovnik inwardly flinched, despising Vladyka for talking down to him in front of his crew. The offensive little political officer went on in his deriding manner.
Besides, Comrade Colonel, this operation, if successfully conducted, could see you achieve general officer status. Perhaps your own car and a dacha near your operational sector.
; Yes, Fulvio Fedorovich, I realize the significance of this risk, replied Torgovnik, thinking about the onerous situation that would develop if he was deemed responsible for botching the operation.
Besides, Torgovnik smiled, when I am a general officer, I will crush this impudent bastard.
Captain Linnemeyer rushed into CIC, slightly disheveled, and requested a cup of coffee.
What's the current status? the captain asked the distraught CIC officer.
The CAP has rendezvoused with the Soviet aircraft. They are approaching the one hundred-ten-mile mark, sir, responded Stevens.
The Ready Two CAP is airborne, closing on ... should be joining Cap One in two minutes, he added nervously. Also, sir, we have a tanker airborne and a spare Viking on the number one cat. Two more Fourteens are ready.
Stevens paused to look at his status boards. The escort ships are closing in, sir. No sub activity detected at this time.
Sounds good, Linnemeyer replied, sipping the scalding coffee, while he observed that all hands were at their respective battle stations.
The CO, a qualified naval aviator, had come up the hard way. A former enlisted man, Linnemeyer left the Navy after his initial hitch and returned to college. After graduating sumnu cum laude from Northwestern University, the short, wiry, twenty five-year-old placed his hard-earned business degree on the shelf and returned to the Navy.
Rear Adm. Donald S. G. Mckenna, the task force commander embarked aboard the Ike, had been awakened by the general quarters alarm and was now in Flag Plot. A steady stream of information was being digested by the carrier's skipper and Mckenna.
Ivan is setting a new precedent, Admiral Mckenna said to Captain Linnemeyer as a steward knocked quietly on the door, then entered the spacious staff cabin reserved for the battle group commander.
Greg, they are obviously trying to provoke us, test our defenses and reactions. I'll get off a Flash Message to the commander -in-chief of the Atlantic Fleet and the NATO commander.
We don't have a lot of time.
The admiral paused, waiting for a response.
You agree, Greg?
Yes, sir, replied the skipper of the Dee, but we'd better show some resolve if they break fifty
Sandra Mohr Jane Velez-Mitchell