A Tan Beret Goes to Nellis
Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2023 5:57 am
Author's Note: This is the beginning of a revised version of The Briefing, modified to take some needed changes into account.
9 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
0827 Hours Central War Time
Chief Warrant Officer 2 Sophia Henrix read the hand-written CONOPS carefully.
Twice.
She then sat back and considered the map on the wall. Different-colored lines connected various cities; there was an ugly break stretching from the Lower Sabine River in East Texas all the way to southeastern New Mexico, roughly corresponding to the FEBA.
She then turned to Brigadier General O’Neil, 23rd Air Force’s ops chief. “Sir, did you ever work with Major Wiser?”
“No, I’m afraid I haven’t. Different swim lanes. But I’ve worked with General Tanner before, and General Tanner has full confidence in Major Wiser. That’s enough for me, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“I’m not, sir. He’s already impressed me. This CONOPS is still pretty rough, but he has a good eye for what he really needs versus he’d like to have. Just wondering if there’s anything I’m missing between the lines, that’s all.”
“I doubt it. It’s pretty straightforward. I’m just not sure it’s even possible.”
Henrix looked at the map again. “Sir, with all due respect, you keep thinking old-school--infiltrate the enemy’s command center, that sort of thing. Our big screwup with the initial missions was that we didn’t fully understand our own capabilities. If I have a good enough phone line, I’m in. The real problem with this op is that there’s too many good phone lines; we need to get the enemy to put his traffic onto the lines I can be certain of reaching.”
O’Neil raised his eyebrows. “Do tell.”
“It’s similar to Euler’s Seven Bridges of Koenigsberg problem. Right now, there’s too many nodes and they’re in the wrong relationship, so the network topology doesn’t exactly work for us--”
O’Neil winked and said, in his stuffiest tone, “I was told that there wouldn’t be any math in this job.”
“And you probably believed the stripper when said she loved you, sir. All right, the bottom line is that if we bomb a selected set of telephone switches, the Combloc forces will HAVE to use certain network paths to pass the data to the necessary recipients--they need trunk lines that have enough capacity AND connect these locations. If we do it right, the switchover--”
Sophie blinked.
O'Neil rolled his eyes. “Oh, ****. I know that look.”
“What look, sir?”
“The ‘I love it when a plan comes together’ look. Hilarity Ensues after that look. Last time you did this, we ended up retasking two fighter wings to supporting a hot extract.”
“Sir, it also resulted in 13th Army getting their pasty white rumps kicked from Albuquerque to Truth or Consequences. That said . . . “
Sophie hauled out a cigar and a wooden match, and struck the match on her BDU jacket. She puffed the cigar to life.
“Sir, I love it when a plan comes together.”
* * *
19 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
1040 Hours Central War Time
“Warrant Officer Henrix, while you’re working the problem I handed you a couple weeks ago, I need you to have a glance at another problem.”
“Of course, sir.”
O’Neil said, “It’s the Mainstays again.”
Sophie muttered a scatological reference under her breath.
O'Neil nodded. “That's what I said. You can try to play it off all you want, that was an extremely hairy extract. Like Sasquatch hairy. Ivan replaced their losses from HUNTER DAWN—we think he staged them through India at night, officially covered as Aeroflot. And higher is thinking that since we were able to send some ninjas to take them out the first time, maybe we can do so again.”
“Sir, they’re probably in a bastion this time.”
The Air Force had cheerfully stolen that term from from the Navy: the swabbies referred to the White Sea, Kara Sea, and the Sea of Okhtosk as “bastions” for the Soviet Navy’s ballistic missile submarines—isolated positions surrounded by minefields and antisubmarine forces. Aerospace bastions were used to protect high-value targets from AFSOC, TAC, and SAC.
O'Neil nodded. “Got it in one.”
Sophie looked at the big topo map again.
And saw flight paths, launch points, transit times, all dancing across the map from New Mexico to the Gulf, flowing neatly, like a fluid origami trick, into a series of time-on-targets.
She grabbed a legal pad and started scribbling numbers.
O’Neil sighed. “Did your mutant math ability just kick over again?”
“Yes, sir. Got me a neat little idea.”
* * *
23 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
O’Neil muttered, “Got me a neat little idea, she said.”
Sophie said, “Calm down, sir, the plan is solid.”
“Oh, it’s solid, all right. Solidly aligned with get our sorry a$$es sent to Alaska.”
The door to the conference room opened, and a full bird colonel in ironed and starched BDUs said, “General Gorton’s ready for you.”
“Knock ‘em dead, Warrant Officer Henrix.”
The colonel blinked. “Sir?”
“This was her idea, not mine.”
Sophie stood to attention and marched into the conference room and marched to the podium. General O’Neil said, “Chief Warrant Officer Henrix will brief her concept for what she’s dubbed Operation EIGHTH CARD.”
Sophie took her cue. “Ladies and gentlemen, as Colonel O’Neil said, I am Chief Warrant Officer Sophia Henrix, and this briefing is intended to lay out the concept of operations for Operation EIGHTH CARD. The intent of this operation is to eliminate the major Soviet aerospace threats from the North American theater of operations, specifically their airborne warning and control and theater strike capabilities.”
The audience stirred.
Ignore the elephant in the room. “Lights, please.”
The room lights dimmed.
Sophie clicked the remote, and the slide projector threw a map of North America onto the screen. The front was a slash across New Mexico, Texas, and Louisiana.
“Situation: at present, we are in a state of strategic pause as we consolidate our gains from OPERATION PRAIRIE FIRE. The Soviets are using this pause to regroup, and in all likelihood to prepare some kind of counteroffensive.”
Another stirring in the audience.
General Gorton asked, “What makes you say that, Chief?”
“Sir, they’re going to try to regain the initiative, and the only way to gain the initiative is to take the offensive, to force us to react.”
Gorton looked at her for a moment, then nodded. “Well reasoned, Chief, and that’s my considered opinion, as well—do NOT repeat that to anyone. Go on.”
Sophie changed the slide, and the view shifted to one centered on Houston and extending to Lake Charles, Louisiana in the east, and San Antonio in the west. SAM, AAA, and fighter silhouettes were thick around San Antonio, Houston, and Lake Charles.
“RED has stationed his critical assets—Mainstays and Fencers—in aerospace bastions located at Randolph AFB, Hobby International, and Lake Charles Airport. EIGHTH CARD is aimed at sweeping out the bastions. Option 1 is a limited effort focused mostly on the Fencers and has several preconditions that must be met.”
Sophie then outlined Option 1 across eight slides, calling attention to the preconditions—that sufficient damage be done covertly to the telephone landline switches in south-central Texas that, when the final push came, hitting five switches would cause certain high-volume circuits out of Randolph to switch to microwave repeaters—which could be intercepted by NSA SIGINT satellites in GEO. This would give indicators and warnings of Fencers moving forward to staging bases, allowing Tenth Air Force strike assets to destroy the Fencers before they could execute a strike mission. Meanwhile, the Navy would strike the Mainstay facility at Hobby International using Tomahawk missiles from the Gulf, mostly as a diversion.
"Any Mainstays we bag would be gravy. However, sir, getting to the preconditions required for Option 1 will be complex and
carries some risk of exposure, which may compromise the operation. Option 2 avoids this risk, at the cost of considerably more resource allocation and some increase in operational complexity. This could be generated from a standing start if we successfully disguise the preparatory moves as presaging a renewal of offensive ground operations.”
She clicked to the next slide. This showed South-Central Texas to Louisiana in the north, down to Campeche in the south.
There was an audible gasp at the scale of deployment.
Gorton was staring at her.
“First, yes, this is definitely a case of ‘go big or go home.’ However, I believe that the destruction of the infrastructure supporting Mainstay and Fencer operations in North America will bring a significant return on investment.” She tapped a point on the map in Western Texas. “I’ve taken the liberty of calling this the Marfa Gap. RED has located early warning radars and SAM sites on the heights to either side of the gap, but not within the gap itself—the Gap is too narrow to require additional coverage, assets are scarce, and the Marfa Gap doesn’t appear to lead anywhere in Mexico—which is TVD Amerika’s prime worry. The Marfa Gap is key to this plan’s scheme of aerospace maneuver within Texas.”
She continued speaking, clicking through slides as they flowed through the mission.
“The opening move in Option 2 is a diversionary strike at H minus two against targets in the Yucatan and Veracruz by three Navy carrier battlegroups in order to draw RED first-line fighter assets to the south, apparently presaging an amphibious raid or assault. The intent is to get RED’s look-down/shoot-down capable assets—Flankers and Fulcrums—out of Texas long enough for this prank to work. Once we have definite indications that fourth-generation fighters are sortieing to counter the carrier raid--”
Sophie tapped the Marfa Gap.
“--Tenth Air Force will conduct Iron Hand and Wild Weasel missions hit SAM sites and early warning radars on the heights to either side of the gap, but will spend most of their effort on RED assets well east of the gap, pulling the PVO’s attention away from the Marfa Gap itself. Ninth and Tenth Air Forces will conduct a maximum effort offensive fighter sweep across the entire FEBA to keep everyone's attention on the high altitude bands. All of this will be timed to allow passage of ALCM and GLCMs through the gap until they are through the main SAM belt, whereupon they will be evasively routed eastward to the Randolph bastion. The missiles will converge from multiple points of the compass with as close to a simultaneous time-on-target as possible. Targets in the bastion proper will include 16th Air Army headquarters, the Fencer ramps and hangars, workshops, and maintainer barracks.
“Coincident with this, a major effort will be made against the Lake Charles bastion, again targeting command and control, maintenance infrastructure, and critical-skills personnel. This will be executed by Eighth and Twelfth Air Force assets controlled
from Barksdale, with the intent of a time-on-target consistent with the strike on Randolph.
“The final piece of the puzzle is a multiple-SSN Tomahawk strike on Hobby International, aimed, again, at critical assets and supporting infrastructure.”
She clicked the slide. “The end state of EIGHTH CARD will significantly shift the net assessment in our favor, with key RED strike and AWACS assets destroyed or significantly degraded. Given the present state of play in the war at sea, reconstitution of those capabilities is likely to be extremely difficult, especially with Strategic Air Command accelerating operations over the RED homeland. This concludes my presentation. Are there any questions?”
Gorton said, “Not at this time, Chief. Good brief.”
Sophie took her cue and left the room.
* * *
General Gorton looked at his staff.
“I hope nobody takes this question the wrong way. Where the hell did we find her?”
Gorton’s deputy chief of staff for personnel said, “Sir, I looked her up with the head of AFPC. She was attending MIT on a full-ride scholarship, ditched it all to enlist on Day One. Apparently caught the attention of General Lodge over at DIA, he recruited her for SCREAMING FIST. And she’s been on some hairy ops—VERMONT CEDAR, OMAHA THUNDER, HUNTER DAWN. She's even got two Air Force Crosses with classified citations—and they may never get declassified. She’s the real deal, sir.”
Gorton looked around the room and said, “All right. Any thoughts on the proposed operation?”
Gorton’s ops chief, Major General Ron Dealey, said, “If we could get the resources for Option 2, it’d be one legendary op, sir.” He paused, then said, “The plan is audacious—but conceptually simple. It’s just throwing a lot of firepower at just a few targets. The deception moves are likewise conceptually simple, but they’re designed to play to Ivan’s prejudices, and it’s always easier to deceive someone if you show them what they already want to believe. There’s a lot of meat that needs to get put on those bones before it’s ready to execute—no surprise considering it’s one person’s initial idea—but the basic concept is sound, sir.”
* * *
Sophie and O’Neil stood to attention as the 23rd Air Force Staff stepped into the hallway.
The colonel who’d ushered them in was standing by the door. “Chief Henrix? General Gorton would like a moment of your time, please.”
“Of course, sir.”
She turned to O’Neil. “By your leave, sir.”
“Granted.”
Sophie stepped into the conference room and saw Gorton working with dividers on a set of Operational Navigation Charts.
The door closed behind her.
Gorton straightened up. Sophie stood to attention and saluted.
“Sir, Chief Warrant Officer Henrix reports!”
“At ease, Chief. Come on over here, let’s look at this again.”
She looked at the charts; she’d used identical ones to plan EIGHTH CARD.
They discussed specific aspects of the plan, and it became obvious to Sophie that Gorton was quietly impressed with the answers she worked out to his detailed questions.
“Chief, this is a pretty sound preliminary plan . . . with the exception of the massive resources required.”
“Well, sir, if you want to win the big pot, sometimes you have to go all in.”
Gorton chuckled, then asked, “You gamble at all, Chief?”
Sophie smiled. “Yes, sir. Mostly with other tan berets. If the Air Force ever fields a bridge or poker team, it’ll be 100% Special Recon Operators. The normies—” Sophie cleared her throat. “Excuse me, sir, I meant the regular Air Force—well, everyone runs in terror when they see someone in a tan beret shuffling cards.”
Gorton laughed. “Are all tan berets like . . . you?”
“We’re all computer experts, sir. That said, sir, I’m a mutant, even by our standards. I have this crazy math ability—my mother tells me she knew I was different when I was four years old.”
Gorton made a “go on” gesture.
“Sir, the way Mom tells it, we were watching the news, and Walter Cronkite was giving the results of some nationwide Gallup poll, so many percent want this, so many percent want that, et cetera. I guess they rounded up the percentages, because right after he got done, I blurted out, ‘Mama, that’s more than a hundred.’ I apparently understood percentages and could do addition in my head.”
Gorton let out a low whistle. “Damn. How’d that affect your life?”
“That? Not much. Mom & Dad did their best to give me a normal, healthy upbringing. Being a mousy, nerdy wallflower? That affected me a whole bunch more, sir.”
Gorton looked at her silently for a moment.
“Sir, I’m not that mousy, nerdy wallflower any more. Mostly.”
Gorton nodded. “The last thing I’d ever view you as is any sort of wallflower, Chief. Proposing this op took guts.” He looked at the charts. “What were you thinking when you developed Option 2?”
Sophie was quiet for a moment, then said, “Sir, I want RED to know that if they lay anything on the table in North America, they’re going to lose it. I want RED to turtle up, I want him unsure of what comes next, I want to seize the initiative and hold it permanently. That's how we win decisively enough to allow ourselves to focus on rebuilding America, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “I notice you keep saying ‘RED.’ Why not the Soviets, or Communist bloc forces?”
Sophie said, “Trying to keep things on a detached, professional level, sir.”
Gorton asked, “As opposed to very personal. Ivan kill your boyfriend?”
“My boyfriend is a Combat Controller in General Lodge’s other brilliant idea, doing a different secret squirrel gig.” She sighed. “Sir, when I arrived at MIT in 1983, I went from being the biggest fish in a small pond to just another face in the crowd. One of the people who helped me make a healthy transition was my roommate it McCormick Hall, Mary Goren. We became close friends. Well, she graduated in ’85 and went to Columbia for her Master’s.” She paused again. Finally, she said, “I’m sure Comrade Chebrikov would say that it wasn’t anything personal, but it kind of feels personal, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “I understand, Chief. I really do. It’s all right to feel that way, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Just make sure you use anger and don’t let it use you.”
“Yes, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “All right, then. Chief, the bad news is we can't afford to do Option 2, it just takes more assets than the theater commander and Joint Chiefs are going to be willing to commit to this tasking. Which is a damn shame, it really is a beautiful concept."
"I understand, sir."
"Good. I'm cutting orders to attach you to Tenth Air Force for the duration, and I'm sending them a copy of Option 1. You're going to help work that into a solid, executable plan. You're going to be working with Marine Air Group 11, the 335th Tactical Fighter Squadron, my headquarters, and 10th Air Force to build this into a sound operation. Consider this part of your professional development—the Air Force needs snake-eaters, true enough, but we also need leaders and planners. And this segues into the last bit I wanted to talk to you about. Chief, this war’s going to end someday. And I want you to consider maintaining a career in the Air Force—at least in the Reserves, if not Regular—when that happens. You have outstanding operational planning instincts—EIGHTH CARD is every bit as good a concept as the stuff I’ve gotten out of the Air War College, RAND, or Johns Hopkins. You seem to have a good head on your shoulders, and a good heart as well—and those are what we need in our future leaders, the ability to think, plan, and execute, and the ability to care for your airmen.”
Sophie blinked, then turned the idea over in her head.
Finally, she said, “Sir, I haven’t given that any thought. Not even about the war ending.”
“Please do. And not just on staying in Big Blue, but also what kind of life you want to build for yourself—who you want in it, and what you want to do with it. One of Sun Tzu's aphorisms says, 'Compel others, do not be compelled.' Either you plan for your future, or the future makes its plans for you. So, please, give that some serious thought.”
“I will, sir.”
“All I can ask. Now, one more thing: you haven't taken any leave in a year. I'm routing you through Salt Lake so you can visit your parents before you report in. I want you rested and ready to contribute when you get to Nellis.”
"Understood, sir."
"Very well. Dismissed."
9 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
0827 Hours Central War Time
Chief Warrant Officer 2 Sophia Henrix read the hand-written CONOPS carefully.
Twice.
She then sat back and considered the map on the wall. Different-colored lines connected various cities; there was an ugly break stretching from the Lower Sabine River in East Texas all the way to southeastern New Mexico, roughly corresponding to the FEBA.
She then turned to Brigadier General O’Neil, 23rd Air Force’s ops chief. “Sir, did you ever work with Major Wiser?”
“No, I’m afraid I haven’t. Different swim lanes. But I’ve worked with General Tanner before, and General Tanner has full confidence in Major Wiser. That’s enough for me, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“I’m not, sir. He’s already impressed me. This CONOPS is still pretty rough, but he has a good eye for what he really needs versus he’d like to have. Just wondering if there’s anything I’m missing between the lines, that’s all.”
“I doubt it. It’s pretty straightforward. I’m just not sure it’s even possible.”
Henrix looked at the map again. “Sir, with all due respect, you keep thinking old-school--infiltrate the enemy’s command center, that sort of thing. Our big screwup with the initial missions was that we didn’t fully understand our own capabilities. If I have a good enough phone line, I’m in. The real problem with this op is that there’s too many good phone lines; we need to get the enemy to put his traffic onto the lines I can be certain of reaching.”
O’Neil raised his eyebrows. “Do tell.”
“It’s similar to Euler’s Seven Bridges of Koenigsberg problem. Right now, there’s too many nodes and they’re in the wrong relationship, so the network topology doesn’t exactly work for us--”
O’Neil winked and said, in his stuffiest tone, “I was told that there wouldn’t be any math in this job.”
“And you probably believed the stripper when said she loved you, sir. All right, the bottom line is that if we bomb a selected set of telephone switches, the Combloc forces will HAVE to use certain network paths to pass the data to the necessary recipients--they need trunk lines that have enough capacity AND connect these locations. If we do it right, the switchover--”
Sophie blinked.
O'Neil rolled his eyes. “Oh, ****. I know that look.”
“What look, sir?”
“The ‘I love it when a plan comes together’ look. Hilarity Ensues after that look. Last time you did this, we ended up retasking two fighter wings to supporting a hot extract.”
“Sir, it also resulted in 13th Army getting their pasty white rumps kicked from Albuquerque to Truth or Consequences. That said . . . “
Sophie hauled out a cigar and a wooden match, and struck the match on her BDU jacket. She puffed the cigar to life.
“Sir, I love it when a plan comes together.”
* * *
19 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
1040 Hours Central War Time
“Warrant Officer Henrix, while you’re working the problem I handed you a couple weeks ago, I need you to have a glance at another problem.”
“Of course, sir.”
O’Neil said, “It’s the Mainstays again.”
Sophie muttered a scatological reference under her breath.
O'Neil nodded. “That's what I said. You can try to play it off all you want, that was an extremely hairy extract. Like Sasquatch hairy. Ivan replaced their losses from HUNTER DAWN—we think he staged them through India at night, officially covered as Aeroflot. And higher is thinking that since we were able to send some ninjas to take them out the first time, maybe we can do so again.”
“Sir, they’re probably in a bastion this time.”
The Air Force had cheerfully stolen that term from from the Navy: the swabbies referred to the White Sea, Kara Sea, and the Sea of Okhtosk as “bastions” for the Soviet Navy’s ballistic missile submarines—isolated positions surrounded by minefields and antisubmarine forces. Aerospace bastions were used to protect high-value targets from AFSOC, TAC, and SAC.
O'Neil nodded. “Got it in one.”
Sophie looked at the big topo map again.
And saw flight paths, launch points, transit times, all dancing across the map from New Mexico to the Gulf, flowing neatly, like a fluid origami trick, into a series of time-on-targets.
She grabbed a legal pad and started scribbling numbers.
O’Neil sighed. “Did your mutant math ability just kick over again?”
“Yes, sir. Got me a neat little idea.”
* * *
23 November 1987
23rd Air Force Headquarters (Forward)
Oklahoma City, OK
O’Neil muttered, “Got me a neat little idea, she said.”
Sophie said, “Calm down, sir, the plan is solid.”
“Oh, it’s solid, all right. Solidly aligned with get our sorry a$$es sent to Alaska.”
The door to the conference room opened, and a full bird colonel in ironed and starched BDUs said, “General Gorton’s ready for you.”
“Knock ‘em dead, Warrant Officer Henrix.”
The colonel blinked. “Sir?”
“This was her idea, not mine.”
Sophie stood to attention and marched into the conference room and marched to the podium. General O’Neil said, “Chief Warrant Officer Henrix will brief her concept for what she’s dubbed Operation EIGHTH CARD.”
Sophie took her cue. “Ladies and gentlemen, as Colonel O’Neil said, I am Chief Warrant Officer Sophia Henrix, and this briefing is intended to lay out the concept of operations for Operation EIGHTH CARD. The intent of this operation is to eliminate the major Soviet aerospace threats from the North American theater of operations, specifically their airborne warning and control and theater strike capabilities.”
The audience stirred.
Ignore the elephant in the room. “Lights, please.”
The room lights dimmed.
Sophie clicked the remote, and the slide projector threw a map of North America onto the screen. The front was a slash across New Mexico, Texas, and Louisiana.
“Situation: at present, we are in a state of strategic pause as we consolidate our gains from OPERATION PRAIRIE FIRE. The Soviets are using this pause to regroup, and in all likelihood to prepare some kind of counteroffensive.”
Another stirring in the audience.
General Gorton asked, “What makes you say that, Chief?”
“Sir, they’re going to try to regain the initiative, and the only way to gain the initiative is to take the offensive, to force us to react.”
Gorton looked at her for a moment, then nodded. “Well reasoned, Chief, and that’s my considered opinion, as well—do NOT repeat that to anyone. Go on.”
Sophie changed the slide, and the view shifted to one centered on Houston and extending to Lake Charles, Louisiana in the east, and San Antonio in the west. SAM, AAA, and fighter silhouettes were thick around San Antonio, Houston, and Lake Charles.
“RED has stationed his critical assets—Mainstays and Fencers—in aerospace bastions located at Randolph AFB, Hobby International, and Lake Charles Airport. EIGHTH CARD is aimed at sweeping out the bastions. Option 1 is a limited effort focused mostly on the Fencers and has several preconditions that must be met.”
Sophie then outlined Option 1 across eight slides, calling attention to the preconditions—that sufficient damage be done covertly to the telephone landline switches in south-central Texas that, when the final push came, hitting five switches would cause certain high-volume circuits out of Randolph to switch to microwave repeaters—which could be intercepted by NSA SIGINT satellites in GEO. This would give indicators and warnings of Fencers moving forward to staging bases, allowing Tenth Air Force strike assets to destroy the Fencers before they could execute a strike mission. Meanwhile, the Navy would strike the Mainstay facility at Hobby International using Tomahawk missiles from the Gulf, mostly as a diversion.
"Any Mainstays we bag would be gravy. However, sir, getting to the preconditions required for Option 1 will be complex and
carries some risk of exposure, which may compromise the operation. Option 2 avoids this risk, at the cost of considerably more resource allocation and some increase in operational complexity. This could be generated from a standing start if we successfully disguise the preparatory moves as presaging a renewal of offensive ground operations.”
She clicked to the next slide. This showed South-Central Texas to Louisiana in the north, down to Campeche in the south.
There was an audible gasp at the scale of deployment.
Gorton was staring at her.
“First, yes, this is definitely a case of ‘go big or go home.’ However, I believe that the destruction of the infrastructure supporting Mainstay and Fencer operations in North America will bring a significant return on investment.” She tapped a point on the map in Western Texas. “I’ve taken the liberty of calling this the Marfa Gap. RED has located early warning radars and SAM sites on the heights to either side of the gap, but not within the gap itself—the Gap is too narrow to require additional coverage, assets are scarce, and the Marfa Gap doesn’t appear to lead anywhere in Mexico—which is TVD Amerika’s prime worry. The Marfa Gap is key to this plan’s scheme of aerospace maneuver within Texas.”
She continued speaking, clicking through slides as they flowed through the mission.
“The opening move in Option 2 is a diversionary strike at H minus two against targets in the Yucatan and Veracruz by three Navy carrier battlegroups in order to draw RED first-line fighter assets to the south, apparently presaging an amphibious raid or assault. The intent is to get RED’s look-down/shoot-down capable assets—Flankers and Fulcrums—out of Texas long enough for this prank to work. Once we have definite indications that fourth-generation fighters are sortieing to counter the carrier raid--”
Sophie tapped the Marfa Gap.
“--Tenth Air Force will conduct Iron Hand and Wild Weasel missions hit SAM sites and early warning radars on the heights to either side of the gap, but will spend most of their effort on RED assets well east of the gap, pulling the PVO’s attention away from the Marfa Gap itself. Ninth and Tenth Air Forces will conduct a maximum effort offensive fighter sweep across the entire FEBA to keep everyone's attention on the high altitude bands. All of this will be timed to allow passage of ALCM and GLCMs through the gap until they are through the main SAM belt, whereupon they will be evasively routed eastward to the Randolph bastion. The missiles will converge from multiple points of the compass with as close to a simultaneous time-on-target as possible. Targets in the bastion proper will include 16th Air Army headquarters, the Fencer ramps and hangars, workshops, and maintainer barracks.
“Coincident with this, a major effort will be made against the Lake Charles bastion, again targeting command and control, maintenance infrastructure, and critical-skills personnel. This will be executed by Eighth and Twelfth Air Force assets controlled
from Barksdale, with the intent of a time-on-target consistent with the strike on Randolph.
“The final piece of the puzzle is a multiple-SSN Tomahawk strike on Hobby International, aimed, again, at critical assets and supporting infrastructure.”
She clicked the slide. “The end state of EIGHTH CARD will significantly shift the net assessment in our favor, with key RED strike and AWACS assets destroyed or significantly degraded. Given the present state of play in the war at sea, reconstitution of those capabilities is likely to be extremely difficult, especially with Strategic Air Command accelerating operations over the RED homeland. This concludes my presentation. Are there any questions?”
Gorton said, “Not at this time, Chief. Good brief.”
Sophie took her cue and left the room.
* * *
General Gorton looked at his staff.
“I hope nobody takes this question the wrong way. Where the hell did we find her?”
Gorton’s deputy chief of staff for personnel said, “Sir, I looked her up with the head of AFPC. She was attending MIT on a full-ride scholarship, ditched it all to enlist on Day One. Apparently caught the attention of General Lodge over at DIA, he recruited her for SCREAMING FIST. And she’s been on some hairy ops—VERMONT CEDAR, OMAHA THUNDER, HUNTER DAWN. She's even got two Air Force Crosses with classified citations—and they may never get declassified. She’s the real deal, sir.”
Gorton looked around the room and said, “All right. Any thoughts on the proposed operation?”
Gorton’s ops chief, Major General Ron Dealey, said, “If we could get the resources for Option 2, it’d be one legendary op, sir.” He paused, then said, “The plan is audacious—but conceptually simple. It’s just throwing a lot of firepower at just a few targets. The deception moves are likewise conceptually simple, but they’re designed to play to Ivan’s prejudices, and it’s always easier to deceive someone if you show them what they already want to believe. There’s a lot of meat that needs to get put on those bones before it’s ready to execute—no surprise considering it’s one person’s initial idea—but the basic concept is sound, sir.”
* * *
Sophie and O’Neil stood to attention as the 23rd Air Force Staff stepped into the hallway.
The colonel who’d ushered them in was standing by the door. “Chief Henrix? General Gorton would like a moment of your time, please.”
“Of course, sir.”
She turned to O’Neil. “By your leave, sir.”
“Granted.”
Sophie stepped into the conference room and saw Gorton working with dividers on a set of Operational Navigation Charts.
The door closed behind her.
Gorton straightened up. Sophie stood to attention and saluted.
“Sir, Chief Warrant Officer Henrix reports!”
“At ease, Chief. Come on over here, let’s look at this again.”
She looked at the charts; she’d used identical ones to plan EIGHTH CARD.
They discussed specific aspects of the plan, and it became obvious to Sophie that Gorton was quietly impressed with the answers she worked out to his detailed questions.
“Chief, this is a pretty sound preliminary plan . . . with the exception of the massive resources required.”
“Well, sir, if you want to win the big pot, sometimes you have to go all in.”
Gorton chuckled, then asked, “You gamble at all, Chief?”
Sophie smiled. “Yes, sir. Mostly with other tan berets. If the Air Force ever fields a bridge or poker team, it’ll be 100% Special Recon Operators. The normies—” Sophie cleared her throat. “Excuse me, sir, I meant the regular Air Force—well, everyone runs in terror when they see someone in a tan beret shuffling cards.”
Gorton laughed. “Are all tan berets like . . . you?”
“We’re all computer experts, sir. That said, sir, I’m a mutant, even by our standards. I have this crazy math ability—my mother tells me she knew I was different when I was four years old.”
Gorton made a “go on” gesture.
“Sir, the way Mom tells it, we were watching the news, and Walter Cronkite was giving the results of some nationwide Gallup poll, so many percent want this, so many percent want that, et cetera. I guess they rounded up the percentages, because right after he got done, I blurted out, ‘Mama, that’s more than a hundred.’ I apparently understood percentages and could do addition in my head.”
Gorton let out a low whistle. “Damn. How’d that affect your life?”
“That? Not much. Mom & Dad did their best to give me a normal, healthy upbringing. Being a mousy, nerdy wallflower? That affected me a whole bunch more, sir.”
Gorton looked at her silently for a moment.
“Sir, I’m not that mousy, nerdy wallflower any more. Mostly.”
Gorton nodded. “The last thing I’d ever view you as is any sort of wallflower, Chief. Proposing this op took guts.” He looked at the charts. “What were you thinking when you developed Option 2?”
Sophie was quiet for a moment, then said, “Sir, I want RED to know that if they lay anything on the table in North America, they’re going to lose it. I want RED to turtle up, I want him unsure of what comes next, I want to seize the initiative and hold it permanently. That's how we win decisively enough to allow ourselves to focus on rebuilding America, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “I notice you keep saying ‘RED.’ Why not the Soviets, or Communist bloc forces?”
Sophie said, “Trying to keep things on a detached, professional level, sir.”
Gorton asked, “As opposed to very personal. Ivan kill your boyfriend?”
“My boyfriend is a Combat Controller in General Lodge’s other brilliant idea, doing a different secret squirrel gig.” She sighed. “Sir, when I arrived at MIT in 1983, I went from being the biggest fish in a small pond to just another face in the crowd. One of the people who helped me make a healthy transition was my roommate it McCormick Hall, Mary Goren. We became close friends. Well, she graduated in ’85 and went to Columbia for her Master’s.” She paused again. Finally, she said, “I’m sure Comrade Chebrikov would say that it wasn’t anything personal, but it kind of feels personal, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “I understand, Chief. I really do. It’s all right to feel that way, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Just make sure you use anger and don’t let it use you.”
“Yes, sir.”
Gorton nodded. “All right, then. Chief, the bad news is we can't afford to do Option 2, it just takes more assets than the theater commander and Joint Chiefs are going to be willing to commit to this tasking. Which is a damn shame, it really is a beautiful concept."
"I understand, sir."
"Good. I'm cutting orders to attach you to Tenth Air Force for the duration, and I'm sending them a copy of Option 1. You're going to help work that into a solid, executable plan. You're going to be working with Marine Air Group 11, the 335th Tactical Fighter Squadron, my headquarters, and 10th Air Force to build this into a sound operation. Consider this part of your professional development—the Air Force needs snake-eaters, true enough, but we also need leaders and planners. And this segues into the last bit I wanted to talk to you about. Chief, this war’s going to end someday. And I want you to consider maintaining a career in the Air Force—at least in the Reserves, if not Regular—when that happens. You have outstanding operational planning instincts—EIGHTH CARD is every bit as good a concept as the stuff I’ve gotten out of the Air War College, RAND, or Johns Hopkins. You seem to have a good head on your shoulders, and a good heart as well—and those are what we need in our future leaders, the ability to think, plan, and execute, and the ability to care for your airmen.”
Sophie blinked, then turned the idea over in her head.
Finally, she said, “Sir, I haven’t given that any thought. Not even about the war ending.”
“Please do. And not just on staying in Big Blue, but also what kind of life you want to build for yourself—who you want in it, and what you want to do with it. One of Sun Tzu's aphorisms says, 'Compel others, do not be compelled.' Either you plan for your future, or the future makes its plans for you. So, please, give that some serious thought.”
“I will, sir.”
“All I can ask. Now, one more thing: you haven't taken any leave in a year. I'm routing you through Salt Lake so you can visit your parents before you report in. I want you rested and ready to contribute when you get to Nellis.”
"Understood, sir."
"Very well. Dismissed."