Foxbat (31 page)

One of the problems with a heavy, very fast missile like the Acrid is that it’s not
particularly agile, but in most cases this doesn’t matter because no aircraft currently flying can outrun its Mach 4.5 maximum speed, and few can manoeuvre fast enough to get out of its
path. But the Harrier could.

Long waited until he heard Richter’s call. Then he rotated the nozzles fully forwards,
almost stopping the aircraft dead in mid-air, and chopped the throttle back, a virtual repeat of Richter’s manoeuvre just minutes before. The Harrier dropped like a stone and the Acrid
punched a hole through the air where the GR9 had been three-tenths of a second earlier.

Richter’s Harrier was a thousand feet below the Foxbat when the broken circle in the
HUD solidified, showing that the ‘winder had locked on. He didn’t hesitate, and immediately fired the missile. The solid-fuel rocket motor ignited and boosted the Sidewinder to
two and a half times the speed of sound in a matter of seconds.

Richter watched critically as it curved away from his Harrier and angled towards the Foxbat,
already travelling close to Mach 2. Then he turned his aircraft away, heading back towards Chiha-ri, where Dick Long should also be heading. If the missile killed the ‘bat, they might
just get away unscathed. If it missed, they were in deep trouble.

Gennadi Malakov wasn’t entirely sure he believed his eyes. The grey Harrier had
apparently stopped dead in mid-air, then dropped straight down into a valley as his R-40T had been about to impact it. Now he’d either have to reacquire it and use another missile, or
simply forget about it and catch up with the American Hornet.

But before he had a chance to make a decision, Richter’s Sidewinder smashed into his
starboard engine exhaust at a relative speed of about three hundred miles per hour and the twenty-pound warhead exploded.

When they designed the MiG-25, the Mikoyan-Gurevich team had included a firewall between the two
engines, but this was intended to protect against an engine failure, not the impact of a missile, and offered little resistance to the high-explosive detonation.

For the briefest of moments, Malakov thought his aircraft might have suffered some kind of
mechanical problem, then he realized what must have happened. The Foxbat lurched sideways and the cockpit came alive as fire-warning klaxons sounded and engine instruments began showing the
extent of the damage. If it had just been the starboard engine that the missile destroyed, he might have been able to save the
aircraft, but the warhead’s detonation
had also blown lumps of steel through the firewall and into the combustion chamber of the port engine, which almost immediately caught fire.

With both engines destroyed, the MiG-25 was going nowhere but down, and Malakov had no intention
of staying with it, so he did what any prudent pilot would have done – he ejected.

Fifteen seconds later, the burning Foxbat crashed into a hill eight miles east of Chiha-ri. And,
ninety seconds after that, Gennadi Malakov landed hard, but unhurt, two miles away. An army patrol found him four hours later and automatically shot him as a deserter.

‘Now can we go home?’ Long asked, as he pulled his Harrier up to join
Richter.

‘Yes,’ Richter said, with a final glance back towards the burning wreckage of the
MiG-25. ‘Now we can go home.’

Ten minutes later the two aircraft crossed the DMZ into South Korean airspace and turned
west. They knew they wouldn’t make it back to the ship with what they had in their tanks, so instead landed at Seoul to refuel.

The airport was in a state of chaos, to put it mildly. The nuclear weapon in the Seersucker
had detonated twenty miles away at around nineteen thousand feet, and the EMP had done considerable damage. Radars and radios weren’t working properly and, before they approached, the
two Harriers had been forced to use Guard frequency, which someone in the Control Tower was monitoring on a standby radio. Fortunately, the pumps on the fuel bowsers were simple electrical
devices, and so had been unaffected by the blast.

Just over four hours after they’d taken off from the
Illustrious
, the two aircraft landed back on board.

When Kim Yong-Su had explained the reality of the situation to the ‘Dear Leader’,
he’d received the most explicit instructions.

Clearly they couldn’t proceed with the invasion. They’d utilized almost all the
plutonium in their vaults and, as two of the three EMP weapons had been destroyed, the ability of the South Korean forces to repel them was only slightly affected. To proceed would have
virtually guaranteed that the Americans would land troops in South Korea, because obviously the Taep’o-dong bluff hadn’t worked. Within minutes
of the attack
starting, US Navy aircraft had entered North Korean airspace and destroyed fourteen of their MiG-25s and badly damaged three others, for the loss of just two of the Super Hornets.

With his plans in ruins, the ‘Dear Leader’ was looking for someone to blame, and he
didn’t have to look very far. The plan had been suggested and conceived by Pak Je-San, and so its failure was clearly his fault. Which explained why Kim Yong-Su had just landed at
T’ae’tan with a squad of soldiers in two Mil Mi-8 transport helicopters.

Twenty minutes after it touched down, one of the helicopters was airborne again, heading north
with one extra passenger on board, the man lying bound, gagged and blindfolded on the floor. Fifteen minutes after that, the second aircraft took off and followed the first, a woman and two
young children lashed together and secured to one of the fuselage side strakes.

‘We paid a very high price, gentlemen,’ Captain Alexander Davidson said,
‘but, thanks to the two of you, I think the end result was better than we had any reason to expect in the circumstances.’ He was standing in the Main Briefing Room, with Roger
Black beside him. Dick Long and Richter were slumped in the front row of seats, both looking exhausted.

‘We’ve had confirmation from Seoul,’ Black said. ‘Their patrols found
the wreckage of both Harriers on the ground below the site of the airburst. The bodies of Charlie Forbes and Roger Whittard were still strapped in. The initial medical evidence suggests they
were killed instantly by the blast when the weapon detonated.

‘According to the latest signals from CINCFLEET, based on American technical intelligence,
North Korea’s now abandoned the invasion attempt. They’ve started withdrawing their additional troops from the area close to the DMZ, and their forces appear to be reverting to
normal readiness. Despite the detonation of the North Korean nuclear weapon, it looks as if both sides are going to maintain the status quo. It’s possible that the cruise missiles they
fired contained their entire supply of
plutonium and, without the destructive effects of the EMP to cripple the South Korean forces, they weren’t going to risk
proceeding.’

Black glanced at his watch. ‘The bar’s opened already, because of what happened to
Charlie and Roger. You should both go down there. The rest of the squadron will want to talk to you about the mission, but be careful how much you tell them. Officially, neither of you ever
crossed the DMZ, and all the action took place over South Korea. Sign the bar chits with “Viper”, as it’ll make accounting easier.’

An old Royal Naval tradition is that on the day an officer dies, the entire wardroom drinks on
his mess bill, which is then written off.

‘Why not?’ Richter murmured, and stood up.

‘It looks like they’ve given up,’ Muldoon said. ‘The latest pictures
show the extra troops dispersing, and there’s noticeably less activity at most of the North Korean bases.’

‘I’ve just got back from the White House, and the President’s decided
we’re not going to embark on a military response,’ Hicks replied. ‘Pyongyang has sent an apology for the nuke that detonated over Seoul. They’re claiming that the
release was an unauthorized act by a disaffected officer, and officially we’re buying that. They’ve already offered financial reparations for the damage caused, and that includes
the two British Harriers that were lost trying to take out the Seersucker.’

‘They’re buying their way out? But North Korea’s virtually
bankrupt.’

‘I know, so I guess they’ll just increase their production of hard drugs for a few
years to cover the cost. The problem we have is that if we did decide to eliminate that psychopathic dwarf in Pyongyang, we’d either have to use nukes ourselves or get dug in for
another Vietnam, and neither option’s politically acceptable in the present climate.’

‘So we wait for the next brilliant plan the little shit comes up with?’

‘I guess so,’ Hicks said, ‘but maybe next time we’ll be better placed to
take him down.’

North Korea isn’t a particularly big country, and the flight took only just over an
hour. Both helicopters landed a few minutes apart on the square that lies between the armoury and the office of the Camp Director.

Once the rotors had stopped, the prisoners were hustled into the torture and detention centre on
the west side of the square. Preparations had been made for their reception, and the order of their arrival had been specified. Pak Je-San was already gagged and strapped to a chair bolted to
the floor in front of the clear glass wall of the gas chamber when his wife and two children were led towards the killing room.

The moment he saw them he began pulling at his bonds, but the soldiers who had secured him knew
their trade, and his struggles were completely ineffective.

Kim Yong-Su smiled pleasantly at the woman, who was clearly terrified, her hands clutching at
her children’s shoulders, and opened the airtight door to usher her inside the chamber. He looked, bizarrely, like a doorman at a good hotel welcoming a favoured guest, and within
moments the three of them – Pak Je-San’s wife and his two sons, aged ten and eight – had stepped inside. There was, after all, no other option for them.

The door was sealed and the internal pressure checked. Pak moaned in anguish as his wife
stared helplessly at him through the armoured glass, and his eyes filled with tears.

Kim Yong-Su ordered the cameras to start recording – although it was an execution, useful
data could still be obtained – then walked across and took the chair beside him. He settled himself comfortably, then nodded to the chief scientist, who started a stopwatch and opened
the valve that allowed the gas to flow down the injection tube and into the chamber.

‘We’re using soman,’ Kim remarked in a conversational tone to Pak,
who’d closed his eyes and bowed his head as he heard the rush of the injected gas. ‘It shouldn’t take long.’

The gas chamber wasn’t soundproofed, but the thick glass wall served to muffle any sounds
from the inside.

When his wife screamed, Pak looked up and stared at her for what he knew would be the last
time. His sons had already collapsed, their slight frames twitching involuntarily as the agent wreaked havoc on their nervous systems. Urine and faeces stained their clothes and the grubby
metal plates that formed the floor. Then his wife fell backwards and Pak closed his eyes again. That he couldn’t bear to watch.

Four minutes later the gas flow was switched off and the pumps began purging the chamber. Pak
looked up again, at the three pathetic bundles that had once been his family, as strong hands began releasing the straps that held him in the chair. Anger burned inside him, but he knew
resistance was completely futile.

Three prisoners wearing grey overalls and gas masks opened the door of the chamber and dragged
out the bodies. A sharp command brought Pak to his feet, and he shuffled round to the chamber entrance, Kim walking beside him.

‘For you, we’re going to use tabun,’ he explained. ‘It’s not quite
as fast-acting as soman, so you’ll have a little more time to suffer.’

Pak Je-San stepped into the chamber and waited for the door to be closed. He’d resolved to
simply sit down close to the injection pipe and inhale as deeply as he could, to finish his life quickly.

Behind him he heard a sudden commotion, and looked round in surprise. The door had slammed shut,
but Kim Yong-Su was
inside
the chamber. The government official was yelling and banging on the door, but the smiles on the faces of
the men outside told their own story.

And despite himself, Pak began to laugh.

The mood in the Wardroom was subdued. Most officers who weren’t on duty were there,
standing or sitting in small groups as they discussed the events of the last few hours. Richter was sitting in one corner, half a cup of coffee on the table in front of him, and still wearing
flying overalls, a technical breach of etiquette that no one appeared too concerned about. He was wondering if he could be bothered to change before lunch. Or even to eat lunch. All he really
wanted to do was sleep.

When the communications rating appeared in the doorway, Richter knew almost instinctively that
he was the addressee on the signal the man was holding. He got up, walked over towards him, signed the Classified Documents Register, and ripped open the envelope. The message was short and
to the point, and Richter knew immediately that he wasn’t going to be getting much sleep in the near future. Or, at least, not on this ship.

RICHTER, ILLUSTRIOUS. RETURN LONDON IMMEDIATE. OVERRIDE PRIORITY
FRANTIC
. SIMPSON, FOE.

Thirty minutes later Richter was escorted onto the flight deck by the duty SE rating. They
stopped just abeam the Merlin’s cargo door and waited for the pilot, Craig Howe, to give permission for him to board the aircraft. The moment the marshaller waved him forward, he walked
across, ducking as he moved under the rotor disk.

As he strapped himself into the seat, about to lift off for Seoul, Richter wondered just what
the hell Simpson had got them involved in now. He’d only heard the ‘FRANTIC’ priority code-word used once since he’d been at FOE, and had hoped he’d never hear
it again. But, he reflected, leaning back and finally closing his eyes, he supposed he’d find out soon enough.