CARRIER 3: ARMAGEDDON MODE

As a good atheist, Kurasov could not call the appearance of the tanker a godsend. But he was damned glad to see it approach. “Red Soldier, this is Tower,” he said, using the call sign and frequency given him by the new Soviet air control officer on board the Marshal Timoshenko.

“Tower, Red Soldier. We heard you boys were thirsty. Perhaps you would like a small drink, comrades?”

Kurasov grinned. The old communist honorific “comrade” had fallen into disfavor of late among die people of die Commonwealth. Somehow, it had managed to take on an entirely new meaning among those who served in Russia’s armed forces. Comrade. Breaker.

“Indeed we would. Red Soldier. Ten baby birds with mouths open wide!”

‘ One by one, die MiGs approached die Russian tanker in onler of tireir fuel needs. Each would take only five hundred liters, enough to remain airborne long enough for all of mem to slake dieir durst in turn. Then tbey would go through die list again, drinking their fill.

“Tower Leader, diis is Tower Three,” thepilotof oneof the other MiGs said.

“Go ahead. Tower Three.” •

‘Tower Leader, we have a message from die American radar plane.”

“Read it” Tower Three, a young pilot named Lavrov, was me only one of die ten pilots still in die air who spoke passable English. He’d been designated as die go-between with American traffic control.

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“They say, ‘Estimated ten to twelve Indian aircraft approaching from one-six-zero degrees, range eight-five kilometers. Believed to be Sea Harriers from INS Viraat. Intercept and destroy.'”

‘”Intercept and destroy,’ eh?” He chuckled. “I never thought I would be flying air cover for an American aircraft carrier!”

“Da, Comrade Captain. But their defeat is ours as well.”

That, at least, had been the reasoning used by Fitzgerald, the American carrier Captain. Fitzgerald had been unable to promise the MiGs a place to land if they ran out of fuel . . . but he had, rather eloquently, convinced the Russian aviators that to lose the Jefferson would doom their own ship. If the Indians broke through, they would find the scarred and battered Kreml a tempting target indeed.

It all would have been a moot point if the tanker had not arrived, of course. Sometimes, the fate of whole nations hung upon the unlikely, the incredible.

Like the decision by the SNA staff at Dushanbe to dispatch the Tupolev.

Or by a Russian squadron commander to defend an American nuclear carrier.

“Agreed, Lieutenant Lavrov. Reply: ‘Will redeploy when fueling is complete.’ They cannot expect us to attack Indian fighters when willpower alone keeps us aloft!*’

Ahead, Tower Five began maneuvering toward the refueling boom suspended from the gigantic, swept-wing Tupolev. Kurasov’s orders were to cover the American ships during the strike against India. In a sense, though, he was fighting less for the Americans than for the others of the squadron, if Jefferson was burning, there would be few helicopters to spare for fishing wet Russians from the sea!

He hoped that there would be time.

0150 hours, EST (1220 hours, fcxfla time), 2$ torch Situation Room, the White House

For Admiral Magruder, the evening had dragged fay with unmerciful deliberation. It had been four hours since the first report that Jefferson had been struck by a missile. An hour later

ARMAGEDDON MODE

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Ibe communications net had gone down, and for ten suspense-fifled minutes, no one in the White House or the Pentagon had known what was going on half a globe away.

Then communications had been reestablished with Jefferson, jand Washington learned that Vicksburg and Kreml had both been badly hit

The President had come close to ordering Mongoose aborted. Magruder knew that, had seen it in the President’s tlace. When Captain Fitzgerald had come on the line, however, alarming the President and the Joint Chiefs that Mongoose ‘was still on, the admiral had watched some measure of tension ease from the President’s face. “I have mis problem with my field commanders,” he’d said, grinning at Magruder. “They always tell their Commander in Chief what to do.” “A piratical lot, Mr. President”

‘”Indeed.” The President and picked up a mug filled with i steaming coffee, a potent brew concocted in the Secret Service •office outside for just such occasions as this. “What do you mink, Tom? Can they pull it off?” ; ‘”There’s a chance, sir. A good one.”

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