West German Airspace
July 23, 1985
Major Simon Donavan, call sign Juggernaut, yawned. He had done this run a hundred times before, and he knew he'd do it a hundred times again. This time was a little different, what with the nuke he had loaded in the bomb bay, and the fact his wingman had just returned to base with an equipment malfunction. Everything else about this nap-of-the-earth flight was routine. They hugged the deck as the mighty engines of the FB-111F fighter bomber, unofficially but affectionately nicknamed the Aardvark, strained, eager to reach the battlefield its crew hoped they would never see.
He pulled up on the stick slightly as a thatch of tall trees neared, his fun meter momentarily pegged as he recalled the report of the Canadian F104 Starfighter pilot that flew his single engine jet home last month after a bird strike. Unfortunately the bird was in its nest and the pilot had the branch in his intake to prove it. Pilots across NATO had assigned him a new call sign—Treehugger. He wasn’t amused.
“If only the peace-niks knew what we were doing!”
Juggernaut smiled at his Weapons Systems Officer. Captain Mike Trotter, call sign Minkey, had been his WSO for the past two years and, like him, knew the routine like the back of his hand. This was one of their assigned runs, the actual run decided when and if hostilities broke out. And if it were this run, this was the exact route they'd take. No exceptions, no deviations. Rush the border at treetop level, cross into enemy territory and deliver your nukes. This was NATO's answer to the Warsaw Pact's overwhelming numbers. If the enemy reaches the Rhine, we go nuclear-Europe would not be lost.
“I'm hugging the deck so hard if this plane had balls, they’d be shaved. If those pinkos knew, they'd probably try to shoot us down themselves!”
“Yeah, the morons. Don't they realize that nukes are the only things that keep those damned Rooskies out of their backyard?”
“Yeah, and Ivan would love a little pay back on the Germans.”
Minkey snorted and in his best Russian accent said, “Allo, Siegfried, my name Ivan. Pay back is ah beetch!”
Juggernaut's laugh was cutoff as he entered some heavy low lying clouds. His TACAN indicated he was twenty nautical miles from the border but it didn't jive with his knowledge of the terrain. “Hey, Mike, check our position, will ya?”
“Roger.” Minkey examined some readings. “TAC says we're sixteen miles but Inertial says one. That can't be right. We'd be in the Buffer Zone.”
“Inertial's been off before. Contact GCI just to make sure.”
Before Minkey could make contact with Ground Control Intercept, their comm squawked.
“Brass Monkey! Brass Monkey! Brass Monkey!”
Juggernaut's heart leapt.
“Is that us?” yelled Minkey.
“I don't know, but let's get the hell out of here.” Juggernaut jerked his stick to the left, banking the lumbering Aardvark in a one-eighty he had done innumerable times before, but never in a Brass Monkey situation where he was this close to the East German border.
A flashing indicator on his cockpit followed by an alarm momentarily distracted him. “We've got a threat alarm!” exclaimed Minkey. “I'm showing a SAM launch!”
“Castle-Rock, this is Foxtrot two-ten. We are under attack, say again, we are under attack. TAC shows us in friendly airspace, am deploying flares.” Minkey was already launching flares and chaff to try and confuse the missile. Juggernaut knew if they had indeed strayed into enemy airspace, it was probably due to the Soviets spoofing their TACAN.
“Foxtrot two-ten, this is Castle-Rock. We show you two nautical miles outside the green zone, over.”
“Damn!” Juggernaut had the engines maxed but he knew this beast wasn’t going to make two miles before the SAM hit. “Status on inbound!”
“Flares had no effect, still on target. Estimate impact in ten seconds. We’ve got to eject!”
“Not with this goddamned cargo!”
If he could just get them back across the border, they might have to jettison the missile on bailout, but at least it would be in friendly hands. He pushed the engines even harder as he flattened from his turn and glanced out his canopy at the contrail rapidly approaching. In a last ditch effort he pushed the stick hard forward, sending the aircraft into a rapid dive. He thought of his wife and son as the plane’s tail jerked from the missile contact.
East Germany, Mobile SAM Site
Major Grigori Andreievich Trubitsin stared through his binoculars, his face revealing none of the elation he felt inside. For years he had spoofed the NATO TACAN using a hobbled together system based upon plans obtained from a French contact. He always laughed at the fact NATO continued to let France sit at the same table when they refused to commit to NATO. Capitalist pigs. Your arrogance will be your undoing. He watched as the SA-8b Surface to Air Missile he had ordered launched moments before sped toward its prey. In less than a minute it was all over. A cacophony of shrapnel from the airframe, burning jet fuel and exploding ordinance was all that was left of the FB-111A that had strayed illegally into their airspace.