MiG for the last two years, growing increasingly efficient in
pinpointing each other’s weaknesses and exploiting the high
maneuverability and low wing loading factor of the MiG, they’d had no
real adversary aircraft to train against. Not like the Americans, who
since World War II had made it a practice to carefully maintain
adversary air for the credibly trained force.
Had he actually gone up against the Hornet one-on-one, he would have
known that the wing loading factors he’d read about in Aviation Weekly
were illusory. With the fuselage providing a good deal of lift, the
Hornet was considerably more nimble than its specs would warrant. As
with the Tomcat, the lack of credible intelligence on the performance
capabilities of these two aircraft flown at the edge of their envelope
by pilots who knew them like their family car was astounding.
And meaningless. If the missiles didn’t launch . . .
Santana peeled away from the furball and put out the call over
tactical. RTB return to base. If there was anything left to protect,
that was their place now, not holding off this force so far away.
0719 Local (+5 GMT) USS Jefferson “What the hell are they doing?”
Batman grumbled. “Just when we’re winning, they want to turn tail and
run.” He switched his gaze back over to the far left-hand side of the
screen, where the small blip representing Tomcat 202 was just going
feet wet. “At least Stoney’s out of the area.”
But maybe he’d spoken too fast. As he watched, the gaggle of remaining
Cuban fighters turned toward the southern boundary of the air base.
The American fighters milled about in the air uncertainly for a few
moments, awaiting direction from the carrier. Taking on Cuban fighters
in the air was one thing chasing them back down to their home base over
Cuba was another. Absent orders, they’d remain where they were.
Batman snatched up the microphone. “Get on them!”
Within moments, the small blue blips turned to follow the MiGs back
toward Cuba. “It’s what you want to do anyway,” he muttered. He
glanced at Tombstone’s aircraft symbol. The tanker was only thirty
miles away, patiently circling with an anxious fighter aircraft. If he
had any sense of how his shipmate flew, Stoney would be sucking fumes
in another twenty minutes. Batman always did like the afterburner.
“Stoney, you’ve got a load of Cuban MiGs inbound on your nine
o’clock.
They’re at altitude, and the rest of the wing’s giving chase. You
might want to vector to avoid them until you can tank.” Batman knew
how much Tombstone would hate doing that, but it was the only sensible
thing to do under the circumstances.
0720 Local (+5 GMT) Tomcat 202
“Nothing to come home to, boys,” Tombstone said to the incoming MiGs.
“Nothing at all. You might as well park those puppies on the tarmac
for all the good they’re gonna do from here on out.”
‘Tombstone, there’s one out in front of that pack,” Tomboy’s worried
voice reported. “He’s got a big lead on the Hornets and Tomcats Stoney,
he’s gonna be here before they are.”
Tombstone glanced down at his fuel gauge. It was dropping perilously
low, far out of the acceptable range for beginning a dogfight. And the
tanker with its fighter escorts was too far ahead to provide cover for
them. He sighed it was always like this. Just when you thought it was
over, the fat lady failed to sing.
“Been a while since our last dogfight, my love.” He slewed the Tomcat
violently back toward the incoming raid and grabbed for altitude.
“Let’s get up where we can get a good look at what’s going on.” And
where I’ll have some reserve altitude when this bird runs out of fuel,
he added silently. Altitude was safety, safety and reserve airspeed
and maneuverability. With it, he might have a chance. But without it,
the starving Tomcat was no match for a MiG.
0723 Local (+5 GMT) Fulcrum 101
Santana tweaked his radar, looking in vain for the flight of attack
aircraft he’d been so certain were outbound from his home base.
Regardless of his delicate twiddling of the knobs, the radar insisted