Читать книгу Hostile Odds - Don Pendleton - Страница 8

Klamath Falls, Oregon

The two F-15E Eagle fighter jets streaked into the air with the thunderclap of sonic speed, their aluminum skins glinting silvery-blue with the twilight of dusk. Suddenly they lost altitude and crashed several hundred yards outside the perimeter fence of Kingsley Airfield.

The tower crew could only discern what looked like engine flameouts, and then the explosions of impact a heartbeat later, each red-orange fireball fed by twenty thousand liters of jet fuel. As one controller began to scream out the call signs of the two trainer fighters, the tower chief contacted the command duty officer at the USAF headquarters building. The CDO ordered an immediate lockdown of the base and surrounding area even as the tower dispatched emergency services to the crash site.

The tower crew would later testify they hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary, even swore the flashes of light just prior to the accident could only have been reflections of the engine flameouts. What they didn’t know—couldn’t possibly have known at that time and what the government wouldn’t tell them—were that those flashes marked the points where surface-to-air rockets had struck the pair of trainer fighters.

Rockets fired from portable launchers in proximity to the airfield.

“Which meant is wasn’t an accident at all,” the chief investigator told the CDO and Colonel Harlan Winnetka, the wing commander, a week later.

“Any ideas who the hell might be responsible for these attacks?” Winnetka asked.

“I can’t be certain of anything right now, sir,” the investigator replied. “To be perfectly honest, there isn’t enough evidence to draw a definitive conclusion. The only thing we know for sure is that these craft were brought down by shoulder-fired weapons. The perpetrators were diligent to cover their tracks in the confusion, because we were too busy working this initially as an accident, maybe a midair collision. After all, these were trainers with students at the stick. We thought one of the students lost control and ran into the other, bringing down both birds in the process.”

“Except that those fighters were also attended by highly experienced pilots,” Winnetka said. “And with the evidence of antiaircraft weapons, we know different. Could this be the work of terrorists?”

Major Leonard Swope, the CDO on duty at the time of the incident, expressed incredulity. “You think these were…terrorists? If that gets out to the press, sir—”

“Well, then we just make damned sure it doesn’t get out, Major!” Winnetka’s face reddened. He jabbed a finger at the investigator and his eyes flashed. “And I don’t even have the details of this incident off to Washington yet, so you have to promise you’ll keep quiet about this until I can make a full report to the Chief of Staff. Is that understood, Captain?”

The investigator nodded. “Yes, sir, of course. But I must submit my written report within forty-eight hours.”

“I’m aware of the regulations, mister,” Winnetka said. “I have no desire to make this sound like a cover-up. I just don’t want a media circus. If either of you are approached by anyone about this, you simply advise them it’s still under investigation. In fact, better to just refer them to me.”

After he swore both officers to secrecy and warned of the consequences should they disobey his direct orders, Winnetka dismissed them. He spun in his leather office chair and looked absently out the window.

Winnetka had put out feelers and gotten just the response he expected—the shock of suggesting a terrorist group might be responsible for another attack on American soil had practically sent his two subordinates into a fit. What they didn’t know, either because they were too blind or too afraid to admit it, was that domestic terrorist activities across the Northwest had increased in recent months. Winnetka didn’t know exactly who or what, but he couldn’t ignore the signs. The Pentagon would call him paranoid, maybe even suggest he take some leave to reconsider his assertions without hard evidence, but at least he could prove this had been a wanton attack against the United States Air Force and not just a training accident. Either way, he needed help on this—a specialized kind of help.

And he had no idea where to find it.