My first time in combat was one of my significant life experiences, as it has been for most military professionals. Our OAF stories show just how strange some of those combat experiences were. We had a close view of OAF combat, a closer one than some of our support teammates and fellow strikers who employed precision-guided munitions from relatively high altitudes. Their combat duties often kept them focused on interpreting their sensors and radarscopes, but we Hog drivers (and other FACs) watched with revulsion as Serbian atrocities unfolded before us. We spent most of our time putting eyeballs and ordnance directly on enemy troops whose identity we confirmed firsthand with our gyrostabilized binos.
The war was very real for our maintainers, who worked in shifts and hustled 24 hours a day to launch, recover, and reload our jets—and to repair the two combat-damaged Hogs. Some of our noncombat experiences, on the other hand, seemed unreal. Even when we were flying over the KEZ and working 12-hour days, we still slept in nice hotels, ate in restaurants, and sunbathed at the hotel pool.
Most of our pilots and maintainers had no previous combat experience. That included both colonels and both squadron commanders at Gioia del Colle, who received their baptism of fire over Kosovo. I will never forget Dirt Fluhr’s radio call on 7 April: “Hey, they’re shooting at us!” as we checked out a convoy of civilian and military vehicles northwest of Prizren. Our reaction that day was similar to many battlefield responses recorded in history—a warrior’s training takes over, and he acts aggressively and dispassionately to eliminate the threat immediately.
Many of our first combat experiences included shouldering the mission’s heavy responsibility and acquiring the “I’d better not blow this!” syndrome. Maintainers understood and internalized the importance of preparing the aircraft, building up and loading the weapons, installing and setting the self-protection countermeasures pod, and loading and setting the chaff and flares—all of these systems had to work. Pilots experienced similar character-building pressures when they led young wingmen in combat, squeezed the trigger near a civilian village, and decided what got shot and what didn’t in a highly politicized conflict.
AFACs knew that the responsibility to find and accurately identify enemy forces was all theirs. They also knew that incoming fighters trusted them implicitly; they expected to be talked-on to only valid targets. Likewise, the fighters knew that their obligation was to hit valid targets only. Due to the unpredictable nature of locating and identifying the enemy, strikers would normally have to wait at their contact point until the AFAC could find a target. The strikers would often consume most of their available fuel and become anxious to unload their ordnance by the time the AFAC was ready to direct their attack on a target. Attacking quickly required that the strikers have complete trust in the AFAC. Not once did any striker question the validity of any target during the dozens of attacks I directed.
“Okay, Two, big eyes out!” came the flight lead’s simple yet meaningful order. I was flying on Capt Jim “Meegs” Meger’s wing, and we were about five seconds from crossing the Kosovo-Albania border. This would be my first-ever combat mission. I had been flying the A-10 for only 10 months; not only was this my first combat mission, but it was also my first flight without a grade sheet. Less than two weeks earlier, I finished my mission-qualification training, kissed my wife good-bye, and boarded a plane with Lt Glib Gibson, another new wingman. We were excited because we would finally join the rest of the squadron in Italy. We had heard many stories of the great time to be had in Aviano and expected to experience unbounded fun between flying peacekeeping missions over Bosnia-Herzegovina. Instead, as we quickly learned, we were going to war.
At first the A-10 was tasked for nothing more than covering CSAR alert and a little CAS alert. Since I was not a qualified Sandy, I was told that I would probably not be needed. Capt Buster Cherrey had pulled me aside prior to the first bombs falling and had given me the choice of staying in Aviano or going back to Germany, where I could get some flying, at least. I initially thought that I should go home, fly, and spend more time with Cheryl, my wife of only seven months. However, I finally decided to stay and help if I could. By the time I got back to Buster to tell him my decision, he had already decided to keep me there. Since the A-10 did fight, I was very happy with that decision.
So there I was—flying into Kosovo to find and kill a real enemy who was, most likely, trying to find and kill us. I remember thinking to myself, “What am I doing here so soon?” That thought quickly gave way to the realization that I really needed to have “big eyes.” I spent nearly all of my time scanning the ground for AAA and SAMs while we were on the other side of the fence, a term we used to describe the boundary between friendly and enemy territory. Although we did not find anything to destroy, I was excited to join the brotherhood of combat pilots, and I knew there would be more missions.
More missions came. Except for often being tired, I found myself quickly getting used to the combat-ops tempo. I flew mostly early morning sorties; I went to bed at about 1930 hours and got as much sleep as I could before my 0200 wake up. Each time I flew, I felt—and rightly so—that it was my responsibility to keep my flight lead and myself alive. However, as fatigue built up and challenged my discipline, I was tempted to stop clearing and slip into the more exciting task of looking for targets. I often had to remind myself that it was my job to be looking for threats and that the AFAC would find the targets.
On several occasions the AFAC did find targets. I was flying with Maj Lester Less on an AFAC mission and instead of looking in Kosovo, we began our search in Serbian proper—in the Kumanovo Valley. As we approached the town of Vranje from the south, Lester found an area he wanted to search more thoroughly. A few moments later he keyed the radio and excitedly half-yelled, “Okay! Okay! We’ve got military vehicles down there!” We both felt an immediate surge of adrenalin. Neither of us had ever fired weapons in combat, and Lester decided to use a Maverick missile to kill one vehicle and have it serve as a mark for me. His missile was a direct hit, allowing me to verify that the vehicles I saw were the same ones he meant for us to attack. He told me to drop two bombs on a row of four trucks in the same area. As I positioned myself to roll in for my Mk-82 delivery, I thought about how much I did not want to miss those targets. This was for real. I wanted to know that I could do it right, but even more importantly, I wanted to contribute to the effort. After completing my diving delivery and safe-escape maneuver, I looked back at the target area to see where my bombs had hit. About 15 seconds later, I got my answer as all four trucks disappeared under two huge fireballs. My first time to employ weapons in combat had been a success.
Not all of my missions were on an AFAC’s wing. In fact, my most successful mission occurred when I was flying on Capt Nate “Foghorn” Brauner’s wing in a two-ship of strikers. Our primary job was to kill the targets that our AFAC might find and assign to us in western Kosovo. However, if a striker flight lead was AFAC qualified, as Foghorn was, he was often allowed to search for targets while waiting. If he found any enemy forces, he would call the designated AFAC to take a look. On this day as we waited, Foghorn searched the area of Dakovica. He saw something and talked my eyes onto a small area on the southern edge of town, asking what I saw there. By this time in the air campaign, the Serbs had learned to hide nearly every piece of equipment they had. I could not believe it; here were two-dozen trucks and APCs parked in an open area! I told Foghorn what I saw, and he quickly responded, “Yeah, that’s what I see, too.” The AFAC, Capt JD McDonough, also had trouble believing our target description—it seemed too good to be true. He took a look and cleared us to kill it. We each dropped four Mk-82s, launched one Maverick, and fired hundreds of rounds of 30 mm—my first time to use the gun in combat. By the time we departed, nearly every vehicle was burning. On later missions, I would steal a quick glance when I flew in that area to see if the vehicles’ hulks were still there. We must have destroyed or damaged them all beyond repair because they remained there even after the air campaign ended. Although many fellow pilots teased Foghorn about inflating his BDA, I knew he was right on at least this occasion—we had British imagery to prove it.
I had flown a total of 30 combat missions by the end of the conflict. Not all of them were successful because on various days we had bad weather, could not find targets, or experienced aircraft malfunctions that forced an early RTB. And on some days we became the targets of Serb SAMs and AAA. Even though the Serbs did not often shoot at me, I retained a healthy degree of unease each time I flew. On every sortie it was important to me to be a good wingman; I wanted my flight leads to be confident that they could count on me to add to, rather than diminish, our flights’ combat capability. After all, Glib and I had been brand-new wingmen when the air war started, and we had to prove ourselves. My biggest fear, therefore, was not being shot down—but failing my flight lead.
I felt a surge of excitement as I departed our squadron’s makeshift ops center for the jet parked on Gioia’s ramp. I hadn’t flown in three days and was stepping for my sixth combat sortie. However, I felt excited today because I would lead a flight into combat for the first time. I climbed into the aircrew minivan, got comfortable, and began to reflect on the series of events that had occurred during the past six months—the events that began with my arrival at Spangdahlem and brought me here, sitting in the crew van en route to a combat-loaded aircraft.
I hadn’t been flying much. I had arrived at Spangdahlem as a new pilot in early March, just three weeks before the campaign started and while the squadron was still engaged in “split ops.” For the past six months the Panthers had maintained a near-constant presence at Aviano with half the squadron, keeping the other half at home in Germany. It was a tough situation for everyone in the 81st. The delicate peace negotiations seemed to drag on for years; however, they now seemed close to breaking down, as they had on several occasions. The Panthers had been sent to Aviano in anticipation of the need for air strikes should the negotiations fail. They had been sent to provide CSAR support in case one of our planes got shot down, not to conduct air strikes.
When I arrived at Spangdahlem, the squadron showed the long-term effects of its split ops. Several bachelors even considered Aviano more “home” than they did Spangdahlem. The deployed Panthers had been staying at a mountain chalet just north of Aviano—affectionately known as “Mr. C’s.” Its owner was a former pilot and an aviation enthusiast—to say he was hospitable to his American guests would have been a gross understatement. The Panthers were comfortable there despite the married pilots’ families being several hundred miles away. They were quite happy to enjoy the Italian food and wine, and receive the American per diem to pay for it all. The women were striking, the scenery was equally luscious, and the flying was good. It was as close to a fighter pilot’s dream as was possible in post–Cold War Europe. The constant deployment was seemingly never going to end, and the squadron had established a well-defined routine. When I met Kimos, the Panther squadron commander, he assured me that I would get well acquainted with life in northern Italy and that I would also be a candidate to go with the squadron when it deployed to the Air Warrior CAS exercise at Nellis AFB in early April. He said, “It is going to be a very busy spring, so don’t get too comfortable relaxing in Germany.” He couldn’t have been more correct. I would be on the road quite a bit, but the real reason was one that even our most experienced pilots did not foresee at the time.
The deployments were an exciting prospect, but I still had several hurdles to jump before I could participate. I hadn’t flown the A-10 since mid-December, thanks to a mountainbike accident while I was at home on leave. A clavicle fracture and resulting surgery had kept me out of the cockpit, and it would be the end of March before I could fly again. It was a bad position to be in; I hoped that I would be healed enough to start flying and make our April deployment to Nellis. I wanted to be on that trip—and all others like it.
My heart sank on 15 March when all of our planes and combat-ready pilots were directed to deploy immediately to Aviano. I had been out of flying for three months, and when our squadron’s time came, I wasn’t qualified to go. It grated on me like nothing I had ever known. I have been entranced by listening to war stories ever since I was a doolie at the academy. I wondered how I would I react when it was my turn. Would I carry away the same perceptions and learn the same lessons that others had? I had no doubt about my training. And now—when the call came—I had to carry water while the rest of the team took to the field. It wasn’t a good feeling. I was convinced that there must be some way to join the fight, but how to do so eluded me.
As I continued to heal and wait for my opportunity to join the effort, I prepared for my recurrency flights by studying “the threat” in the classified tactics manuals we kept in our squadron vault. I also listened to the first reports that came back from Aviano—invariably through the wives’ network—of Panthers sitting CSAR alert as the first interdiction strikes were launched. On 27 March, I was home eating a late dinner and enjoying my recently installed satellite TV, when CNN broke in with the news of the first allied plane to be shot down. I was riveted by the news accounts of the crash and didn’t sleep more than an hour or two that whole night. The task to rescue the pilot would fall to our 81st pilots. Because of the locations of the targets the F-117s were tasked to attack, I knew the wreckage must be deep inside Serb territory, which would make the rescue difficult. Nevertheless, it was all over six hours later. Once again, the pilots of the A-10s had risen to the occasion and performed their duty in an exceptional manner. Unlike a previous F-16 shoot down several years earlier, there were no press conferences, no smiling for the cameras, and no million-dollar book deals. The pilots involved were serious about this conflict and did not want any attention or publicity to distract them from their primary job—flying combat missions. I felt a surge of pride at being counted as one of them, and that only served to strengthen my resolve to join them as soon as possible.
The two flights I needed to regain all of my currencies happened in rapid succession the following week. My instructor was Lt Col Snoopy Schulze, the Panthers’ previous commander. Snoopy was an old hat at flying in Germany and quickly got me up to speed after months of inactivity. I was now ready and chomping at the bit to go.
Finally my call came—not to join the squadron at Aviano but to be the squadron’s rep at the CAOC in Vicenza, Italy. Going to the CAOC was kind of like paying my dues. It was imperative that we had an A-10 rep there—an experienced flyer who understood our mission and could help with planning the details of the air war. It was a thankless but important job that most units pawned off on their lieutenants. The rep often felt like a small cat that had been dropped into a pen of hungry dogs. We looked at it as a sanity check on the whole process, and most of our captains had already served there for at least a week. It was time for me to pay my dues, and I was ecstatic just to get a chance to play a role—any role. I could contribute to the cause from my new position and, with some luck, join the squadron in about a week.
The CAOC was a loose collection of prefab metal buildings. The arrangement of the successive additions appeared haphazard, and their orientation suggested an accelerated growth to satisfy the CAOC’s expanding missions. New areas had been added in any space available—immediate needs clearly outweighed any desire for aesthetic beauty. I arrived on 10 April—still early in the war. Inside, officers frantically worked to align the scarce in-theater resources to support an increased air presence in the skies over the Balkans. It was obvious that our initial in-theater assets were not sufficient after President Milosevic refused to concede his position following the first few nights of allied raids. One of my first tasks was to help define the new and expanded role A-10s could play in the KEZ. More often than not, I was merely a conduit—passing information and ideas between the squadron leadership at Aviano (and later at Gioia) and the appropriate people at the CAOC. I had become the voice of the squadron.
Being the squadron voice could be a good thing or a very bad thing, depending on the day’s events and who was sitting in the big chair. The man running the air war was Lt Gen Mike Short, whom we called Senior. He had flown the A-10 in the 81st during a previous assignment and had a son, whom we called Junior, in our squadron. Although it wasn’t obvious, he had a special affinity for Hog drivers and paid close attention to any news of our operations. Senior was tough as nails, much like a high school football coach who was busy directing the game of his life. No one in the CAOC ever took Senior lightly. His questions (or orders) were always direct and spot-on. He knew the game better than anyone else in the room and was familiar with most, if not all, of the details. He had subordinate experts tackle the details that he didn’t personally have time to address. None of us ever lost sight of the fact that Senior knew his stuff and would call us on the carpet if we failed him. He was always deadly serious. We took our breaks and killed time in the unit rep’s room by cracking jokes, surfing the net, or trading stories; but we knew when we came up front and Senior was in the big chair, there would be no latitude for levity. I couldn’t imagine anyone pulling the wool over Senior’s eyes. It seemed that he generally knew the answer before he asked the question and just wanted to keep people on their toes.
I remember on one occasion being called into the CAOC’s main room to answer to Senior. It seemed that someone had told him that A-10s were going to bomb through the weather—release our bombs on coordinates without being able to visually identify the target. There is no way that we would have done that. Our navigational systems were not accurate enough, and even if they were, we had not trained that way. I couldn’t imagine any Hog driver who would have been willing to drop his weapons blindly without knowing what he might hit. It just wasn’t in our thought process. Senior sent for me; when I arrived he gave me a hard look and said, “What’s this I hear about A-10s wanting to bomb through the weather on coordinates?” I must have looked fairly shocked and assured him that with all the civilians on the ground, we had no desire or inclination to start fighting this war that way. With a short grunt and a terse, “That’s the right answer,” Senior turned back to work. He had known the answer all along—he just wanted to make sure I knew it.
Senior’s aptitude and extensive knowledge was shared by most, but not all, of the senior officers in the CAOC. Men like Lt Col Paul C. “Sticky” Strickland, Maj James “Dibbs” Dibble, and Lt Col Walrus Heise, to name a few, kept the place functioning. They dealt with daily issues as trivial as how to get gas to the rental cars and as critical as reorganizing the war’s SEAD support. They kept the big picture and sidelined those who didn’t.
There were a few others whose priorities, war-planning abilities, or aptitude for leading men was disappointing. We had one officer in the CAOC who focused his efforts on ensuring that people didn’t pop microwave popcorn anywhere in the building, because he didn’t want to smell burnt popcorn. We had a war on and he’s worrying about people popping popcorn. On one occasion he called me to the floor after some of our jets had been shot at and returned fire. “Why are your guys getting shot at?… Don’t they know that they aren’t supposed to be looking for targets in these areas?” He blurted this out as he waved at a wide area hashed out on a 1:500-scale map.
His wave depicted an area, inside Kosovo along the Macedonian border, where we were prohibited from actively looking for targets. The restriction had been put into place for several reasons, including a desire to keep NATO ground troops inside Macedonia, but close to the Macedonia-Yugoslav border, from being drawn into the conflict. The Serbs had discovered our selfimposed no-attack zone and were using our ROEs against us. The restriction had an unintended consequence of turning the entire area into a “safe haven” for the Serbs. They roamed freely through that zone, and often we were powerless to stop them.
I explained to him that the A-10s had to transit the restricted zone using the ingress routes planned by his CAOC airspace experts to get into their assigned areas. It was during their transit that, while they weren’t searching for targets, they had noticed the AAA. “Well, I don’t want them hanging out in there. Tell them not to fly over there any more. That’s too close to Macedonia!” He was excited, and his gestures only served to amplify his emotional outburst. A German colonel, who was standing behind him, smiled knowingly. He had observed this exchange and had probably overheard 10 more diatribes that night on as many subjects—par for the course when this particular officer was in charge. So I gave him the best “Yes, sir” I could manage and was dismissed from the main room.
Most nights were uneventful. Our pilots flew the scheduled missions, reported their BDA, and the war went on. I will never forget, however, the contrast in leadership I witnessed in the main room of the CAOC. There were times when it seemed that the war was being run by people who had been there before, had the big picture, and were doing their best to make this operation run the way it should. At other times other people were in charge who did just the opposite. Many of us felt much aggravation and irritation when these types were in charge. I learned later that my frustration, from having to personally answer their questions in the CAOC, paled compared to that felt by the people flying operational missions over Kosovo when an officer of this type was in charge.
I had been lost in my thoughts for some time when TSgt Damien Fortunato stepped lightly on the brakes—forcing me back to the present—and brought the aircrew minivan to a stop near my aircraft. Damien was one of our life-support NCOs. We had served together in the same squadron at Pope, and he was now part of the 74th FS contingent that had come over to supplement us at Gioia. It was nice to have some familiar faces in both squadrons. “Here you go, sir,” Damien said. It was time to start thinking about the mission at hand. I thanked him, stepped out of the van, and walked towards tail number 80-984.
The weapons troops were busy putting the finishing touches on the CBU-87s slung underneath the aircraft. One of the ammo troops had written some personalized messages to the Serbs on the CBU canisters. I was sure that if I got the opportunity to drop them, the soldiers on the ground would have no question as to their meaning. We were all focused on the task at hand, and it was evident that everyone on the flight line took great pride in his or her work. This was the first shooting war for many of us. Morale was high, and so was our efficiency. The jets rarely broke, but when they did, they were fixed in a fraction of the time that we had come to expect back home. That accomplishment was due, in great part, to the great enthusiasm we had for our jobs and to the fact that we rarely, if ever, wanted for necessary parts. It was a great feeling to be part of that team.
Amn Joe Ulshafer was busy annotating the aircraft forms to document the maintenance work that had been done on the jet since it had returned from the first go that morning. Joe was a young first-term airman on his first assignment with the 81st FS. In recent times, shooting wars have been scarce (thankfully), so I couldn’t help thinking that the experience he was gaining from this war would serve him well for the rest of his time in the Air Force. He looked up as I came around the jet.
Joe flashed me a sharp salute and a smile. Salutes out here were a lot sharper than back home—probably a reflection of the excitement. He asked if I was ready to give the Serbs a dose of their own medicine. “They don’t stand a chance,” I replied. Continuing, I asked, “How did the jet come down?”
We settled into some friendly banter about the jet. I always thought it was good to know how the jet, which I was getting ready to strap on, had been flying recently so I would know what to look for. I didn’t expect any problems. We were both part of the same team, and it was important to let the crew chiefs know what we were doing. I showed Joe on my map where we were going to start off—north of Pristina near Podujevo—and that we’d be looking for some tanks and APCs at the location where they had been located by imagery. They knew they were part of the team and liked seeing us take off with bombs and come home clean; he now had an idea of what we were going after, and that made a big difference.
The mission that I briefed to Joe wasn’t going to be as easy as it appears in Hollywood movies. Imagery was suspect; our needs were not high on the CAOC’s targeting and intelligence-support priority list. Satellite reconnaissance was well suited to support interdiction strikes against fixed targets, but most of our targets were mobile forces. Those forces would be photographed at 1400 on the day prior, and the information was accurate at the time it was taken. However, unlike fixed targets, they had 18 hours to move before we would be in the predicted area. Out of necessity, Lt Stephen “Al” Smith, our intelligence officer, and his enlisted troops did their best to get us the most current pictures from all sources. Al and the others spent all night sifting through image databases, which were sorted only by basic encyclopedia (BE) numbers that had no correlation to the target type, date of the imagery, or its location. It was a laborious and dull task, repeated every night to find the right combination of target type, location, and date of image. Without the hard work of Al and his team, we would have had far less success at finding targets. Their pictures told us where the enemy forces had been and when they had been there; they also provided us with a starting point for our searches. Although our confidence in the target’s current location was not as good as we would have liked, it was far better than nothing. With people like Al and Joe on our team, we were optimistic.
Ground ops were pretty standard. It had been a beautiful day so far and a stark contrast to the previous foggy mornings. The light from a brilliant sun, filtered by high cirrus clouds, fell onto red poppy fields dancing in a gentle, wind-driven rhythm just outside the base perimeter. Looking at that beauty, I found it surreal to imagine that we would launch in 40 minutes—take off to wage war and wreak havoc and destruction on the Serb army.
As I led Capt Rip Woodard airborne, I felt another surge of excitement.
This was it! I was in the lead of Taco flight, making the decisions. I was the one who would do the target search, ID the target, and dictate the tactics. I had been excited on my first six sorties, but this was different. This time I was responsible for the flight, which was both exhilarating and sobering. It reminded me of the first time, after I had received my driver’s license, that my parents had let me take the car out by myself on the interstate. I had approached that with a nervous excitement—excited about the new opportunity and praying, “Please God, don’t let me screw this up.” This was no different.
Rip joined on me and we flew east over the Adriatic, performed our systems checks, and looked over each other’s jets. We continued east across Albania and into southern Macedonia, where we rendezvoused with our tanker—a KC-135 that would refuel most of the A-10s going into the KEZ during our vul period. The actual air refueling was a relatively simple task. Because of the distances, almost every aircraft required aerial refueling to complete its mission. That demand made the management of aircraft schedules, flow patterns, and gas offloads critical. I had witnessed firsthand the CAOC’s complex planning process which ensured that it all flowed smoothly during execution. Their planners developed tanker, SEAD, and ABCCC schedules, put together airspace-control plans, and integrated the resources and the requirements of the 700-plus aircraft armada. Even the A-10, which consumed relatively little fuel, still required refueling if it was to stay airborne in the target area from three to six hours at a time. Tankers seemed to be everywhere, but unless they were well managed, there would never be enough gas when and where it was needed. So while hitting the tanker (our term for the actual refueling) was a relatively simple task, it required a great deal of coordination and effort to make it work.
We flowed on and off the tanker during our planned refueling time and headed for the eastern side of Kosovo. The AFAC today was one of the augmenting Pope pilots—Capt Larry Card, a young 74th FS weapons officer. I was glad to be working with Larry, whom I had known since we were in the same squadron at the academy. He had been a sharp, introspective cadet then, and he had since become an excellent fighter pilot. I checked in with him just prior to crossing the Kosovo border. He was busy FACing a pair of British Harriers and sent us north to check on sites near Podujevo. I put Rip in a wedge formation position—about 45 degrees back on the left side—where he could comfortably maneuver and clear for threats as we flew north.
Over the radio we could hear Larry working the flight of Harriers on his target. It sounded like they were missing short. The Harriers were normally great to work because they had actually been trained for CAS, which meant they were proficient at looking outside the cockpit to visually acquire targets. Even though we weren’t flying CAS missions in Kosovo, what we were doing required many of the same strengths and skills. We saw a big difference between pilots who trained to acquire targets visually and those who trained to bomb coordinates. It was much easier to talk the first group onto targets. The Harrier pilots could be expected to find the target visually, but their BLU-755s hit short almost every time because of a software glitch in their aiming and delivery system. I couldn’t help thinking how frustrating that was for both the Harrier pilots and the AFAC as I continued leading my flight north.
In the midst of the communication between Larry and his Harriers, we heard a standard call from NAEW: “Aircraft, Derringer 060/80, say call sign.” Most of these calls reflected the dynamic environment and the difficulty NAEW had in keeping track of many maneuvering aircraft. NAEW would occasionally lose track of someone, locate a return, and then query him or her to make sure the controller had the correct call signs. “Derringer” was a geographical point from which to describe a radial direction and distance in nautical miles. Derringer was colocated with Slatina, the Pristina airport. The NAEW had asked the aircraft located on the 060 radial (east, northeast) from Slatina at a distance of 80 NM to identify itself. We were about 10 minutes north of the border when I heard an NAEW transmission on strike frequency that I had not yet heard during OAF: “Outlaw, spades, Derringer 070 for 75, southwest bound!”
What did those brevity terms mean? It had been a little while since I had reviewed all the terms in our manuals. Nevertheless, I knew “outlaw” meant that an aircraft met the bad-guy point-of-origin criteria, and “spades” said that it wasn’t squawking the right IFF transponder codes—that wasn’t good. Usually I would hear those calls right before an unknown aircraft was declared a bandit (enemy aircraft), and that wasn’t good either. I quickly pulled out my 1:250 chart to plot the position. The plot came out right near the Bulgarian border, inside Serbia. And it was heading this way.
Another, older voice came over the radio: “Aircraft, Derringer 070 for 75, tracking 230, this is Magic on Guard; identify yourself immediately!” This wasn’t supposed to happen. The F-16CJs, who had been in an orbit overhead providing SEAD support for us, called NAEW and departed their orbit to intercept the intruder. I could hear their fangs sticking through the floorboards over the radio. Blood was in the air, and they could smell it.
Looking back at my map, I tried to get a rough estimate of the distance between us and the contact the NAEW had identified. It was about 45 miles. Time for us to pull back a bit. We both still had all of our ordnance on board. I had two cans of CBU-87 and Rip had four Mk-82s, along with our Mavericks. I didn’t feel like getting into an air-to-air engagement with all of that on board, but I sure didn’t want to get rid of it and give the outlaw a mission kill. “Taco, let’s hook left. Line reference steer-point five.” I had given Rip a copy of my lineup card when we briefed the sortie; today, steer-point five was Skopje, Macedonia—nominally friendly airspace.
Rip maneuvered into a good defensive line-abreast position, about a mile and a half off my right side. NAEW transmitted on Guard again, directing the unknown aircraft at Derringer 080 for 65 to identify itself. There was no response. I looked down at my map—30 miles to Skopje. He was obviously going a lot faster than we were. Thirty seconds passed as I increased my scan outside the cockpit, looking across the formation and behind us. I knew that Rip was doing the same thing in his cockpit.
“Mink Three-One, Bandit, Derringer 080 for 60, southwest bound, hot!” NAEW called out to the F-16CGs. “All aircraft in NBA, this is Magic. Chariot directs retrograde.” NBA was the code word that we were using for eastern Kosovo.
Great. NAEW was now declaring the contact of a bandit—an enemy aircraft heading towards friendly aircraft. Time to make sure that both of us had our switches ready for an air-to-air fight. “Taco, check AIM-9 in Select, master arm to arm, gun rate high. Let’s push it over. No lower than 160,” I said as I traded altitude for airspeed, but still stayed above 16,000 feet.
“Two,” came Rip’s immediate response to indicate he understood and would comply with my instructions. I expected that he would have had his switches set, but I had to be sure. In the background, almost drowned out by the excitement of the moment, I could hear the low growl of the AIM-9 seeker head looking for a target.
“Bandit, Derringer, 090 for 56, southwest bound, descending, hot!” I checked the distance—about 25 miles. Suddenly, despite all the coalition aircraft out there, I felt very alone. Time to get some information from NAEW.
“Magic, Taco One, say BRAA to Bandit,” I transmitted as I asked the NAEW for the bandit’s bearing, range, altitude, and aspect.
Pause. “Taco, Magic, unable, stand by,” came the reply.
Stand by??!!! You can’t be serious! NAEW controllers had never shown stellar performance getting us information when we had trained together in the past, but at least they had given us some close control when we were at medium altitude. Now, when it really mattered—and we weren’t at Red Flag over the Nellis ranges—all they could do is say “stand by.” I wanted to reach out and wring their necks. They probably didn’t even know what my position was—let alone how close the bandit was to any of us. I increased the amount of time that I was checking six—the airspace behind our aircraft.
“Bandit, Derringer, 090 for 52, heading 240, hot!”
I looked down and checked my chaff and flare settings. We were quickly approaching the point where I was going to have to turn the formation to be ready to fight. Two green ready lights stared up at me from the panel. Everything was set. I hacked the clock and started mentally calculating the range.
“Magic, Mink Three-One. Contact target, closing for VID (visual identification),” a charged but steady voice came over the radio. It was the same voice that I had heard earlier when the F-16s had departed their holding point to intercept the Bandit. There was a very pregnant pause. I checked six again. The next call sent a shiver down my spine.
“Magic, Mink Three-One. Target is an EA-6. Turning south now.”
I was relieved, upset, and mad—most of all I couldn’t believe my ears. We had almost shot one of our own aircraft—an EA-6B—because he wasn’t in his planned orbit, and the NAEW didn’t know who or what he was. I could have been taking part in an impromptu CSAR had it not been for the professionalism of Mink 31 and his ability to visually identify an EA-6B. I had a flashback to when that had not happened—when two friendly Black Hawk helicopters had been misidentified and shot down by friendly fighters, taking the lives of Lt Laura Piper and 25 other people flying low over northern Iraq. I was also mad because we had lost about 10 minutes of our available time over Kosovo; it was time to get back to our mission.
We deselected our AIM-9s and turned north. Rip floated back to a good wedge position, and I could see him pick up the gentle rhythm of checking our six and providing cover against AAA and SAM threats. Irregularly, his jet would move—slight changes in heading and pitch angles—just enough to give him a better view of the ground beneath us and to remain unpredictable. In front, I was doing the same thing. I picked out visual landmarks that would help orient and guide me into the target area. It gave us something to do while the adrenaline worked its way out of our system.
We arrived near Podujevo after taking an easterly and slightly circuitous 20-minute route, about the same time the adrenaline wore off. Podujevo lay in the middle of a long valley that pointed south towards Pristina and terminated in the north at the Serbian border. Like most of Kosovo, this was an agricultural area, and the fields were full of the spring crops.
We didn’t see many farmers operating heavy farm equipment these days. With the oil embargo in full effect, there probably wasn’t any gas to spare, and most of the work was likely being done by hand. We rarely saw any traffic on the roads. The Serbs either had learned their lesson or had figured out our ROEs. They knew that civilian vehicles were safe (at least from A-10s); therefore, civilian vehicles were the only type we would see on the roads.
Today there was little movement on the ground, and the few vehicles I did see on city streets were definitely civilian. I checked along the tree lines and in other areas that our imagery from the past two days had indicated as likely locations for Serb equipment. There was nothing. If the Serb army was in the vicinity of Podujevo, it was well hidden.
In the background, I could overhear the communication between other fighters and AFACs. I called Larry and told him that there wasn’t anything to be found around Podujevo, and asked, “Do you have anything else for us?” “Taco, check with Stew Two-One. He’s working over near G-Town,” Larry said. We sometimes referred to the major cities in Kosovo by their first initial. It kept the chatter down and gave the Serbs who were listening something else to figure out. He quickly passed me coordinates and pushed me to the backup frequency. I sent Rip to the assigned frequency for the eastern half of Kosovo, checked him in, and was almost immediately contacted by Stew 21.
“Taco, Stew Two-One, good voice; say ordnance and playtime.” I recognized the voice of Maj Bumpy Feldhausen, one of the boys from Pope. I replied, “Stew, Taco, One’s got two by CBU-87, Maverick, and the gun. Number Two has four by Mk-82s. We’ve got another 20 minutes of playtime.” “Roger,” Bumpy said, “we’ve got some arty positions in the tree line in our target area. We’re halfway between G-Town and Vranje. Confirm you have the coordinates.”
I looked at the INS. “Another five minutes away,” I told him.
“Copy all. I want you guys in at 200 and below. We’ll hold over you, 210 and above, and we can provide your cover. When you get into the target area, I’ll give you a talk-on.”
“Taco Zero-One,” I replied. Switching frequencies, I compared fuels with Rip. We’d have enough for about 15 minutes in the target area. I plotted the position of the target on one of my 1:50 maps. It was within a kilometer of the corner of the map, halfway up the side of a hill on the eastern side of a fairly nondescript small valley. It wasn’t going to be easy finding it—especially without being able to reference the map features to the immediate south and west of the target. To see all of that, I would have to juggle two other 1:50 maps in the cockpit along with the one I already had out and the 1:250 that I was using for navigation. It wasn’t an easy thing to do.
We were almost there—only three miles away. I looked out and saw Stew 21 circling over the valley to the south, slightly higher than us and about four miles away. “Stew, Taco’s visual, ready for the talk-on,” I announced.
“Right beneath you, there’s a fairly long town in the middle of the valley, oriented north-south. Call contact.”
I looked down into the valley. There were a lot of towns. I came back inside, checked my map, checked the compass, back outside. Yep, there was the town that he was talking about, and it was pretty much north-south. “Contact,” I replied and then added, “Confirm that there is a hardball road leading through the length of the town.”
“Affirmative,” came the answer. “Let’s call the length of that town one unit. Now look on the eastern side of that town. There’s a dirtball road leading southeast up into the hills. Call contact.”
I looked down. There were a lot of dirtball roads, some more prominent than others. “I see a lot of dirtball roads,” I said.
“Right, this one is the most prominent one. It leads out in a straight line to the southeast and hits a tree line in the hills about two to three units away from the town.”
I looked down. None of the roads that led out the town to the southeast ran into a tree line. I checked my orientation. OK, I was looking to the southeast of the town. No trees. My frustration started to build.
“Stew, Taco’s not contact with that tree line,” I admitted.
“It’s right underneath me now. I’ll put down a mark to show you.”
I looked up to watch him. He wasn’t over the town. Where was he? I looked off to the south. Searching, searching… I had lost him while I was looking for the target. One potato, two… wait a minute—there he was—only he was a lot further south than he should be. How was he going to mark this target area from so far away? Then it dawned on me—I was looking at the wrong hillside. I swore to myself. How could I be so stupid? I had been looking at the wrong area. My INS pointed to the area that I was looking in, but it must have drifted. I looked about three miles south, underneath the area where Bumpy was circling. There was another elongated town in the valley, with a hardball road leading through it. “Stupid idiot!” I cursed at myself for a novice mistake!
I called Rip on FM to say that we had been orbiting too far to the north and were shifting south. Rip acknowledged, and we started south just in time to watch Bumpy roll in and put down two Willy Pete rockets on the side of the hills. One landed near but on the north side of a dirtball road; the other Willy Pete landed about 200 meters north of that.
“Stew, Taco’s contact with your smokes. We were looking in the wrong area,” I admitted, somewhat sheepishly. I still felt stupid.
“Roger that,” he replied. “There are four revetments in the field just on the south side of the road, south of my southern mark. I’d like you to lay down your CBUs right on the tree line—I think that they may have some of their stuff hidden in the trees. The two closest revetments to the tree line have something in them.”
“Copy all,” I replied. Then to Rip, “Shooter-cover, bombs, gun. Winds are out of the west at 60 knots.” That meant that I would be coming in with a tailwind to make this work. Even though each one of these bombs weighed about 1,000 lbs 60 knots of wind would definitely affect it as it fell for about 12,000 feet. Rip acknowledged my plan and shifted his orbit to the west, so he could look through me to the target area.
I checked all of my switches. All the lights were green, and I was at the right altitude—everything was ready. “Taco One can be ‘in’ in 10 seconds,” I said.
“Continue.”
“One’s in hot!” I rolled to the left, slicing down out of the sky. Down, steeper and steeper, my nose pointed at the earth—green and brown earth replaced the blue sky in my windscreen. In the background, I heard Bumpy’s clearance. I rolled out, straightened my wings, and waited a few moments for the low altitude safety and target enhancement (LASTE) bombing solution to stabilize and indicate that I had lined up just right of the target. I had misjudged the winds slightly and had to compensate by adding about five degrees of bank. I clicked forward on the trim to reduce stick forces and attempted to relax—I tried not to jerk the stick or make any sudden inputs that might throw the LASTE solution and the CBU-87 canisters off target. Slowly, in seconds that were like minutes, the pipper approached the target. As it got closer, it seemed to accelerate. I resisted the urge to push forward on the stick to slow the pipper’s movement and make the weapons-release point easier to judge. If I had done that, I would have “bunted” the aircraft, fooled the computer, and caused the canisters to impact long of the target. Temporal distortion is normal during a diving delivery—it just seemed much more intense now that I was doing the job for real. I waited until the pipper was superimposed on the target, pressed the pickle button, and felt the two clunks as the two canisters left the jet and started their ballistic fall.
I pulled back on the stick, felt the Gs build up as I brought the nose up to 35 degrees of pitch, and then rolled into a slight bank to the right. I looked down and could see some of the flares I had expended trailing behind my jet; my left index finger persisted in hammering away at the flare button. I continued my right-hand climbing turn towards the sun while looking back at the target area. It seemed to take an eternity, and then I saw two small puffs when the canisters opened. Half a second later, the whole area along the tree line erupted in a beautiful shower of silver and white sparkles as the bomblets detonated. It reminded me of one of my chemistry labs when we had set fire to magnesium shavings. Only this was on a much larger scale. I looked away and scanned the ground for threats.
“Good hits, Taco,” came Bumpy. “Have your wingman drop his Mk-82s north of your hits. We’re going to clear you off on this target and look for some more targets.”
“Copy all,” I said. “Two, I want you in out of the west in one minute. One’s climbing for energy,” I directed on FM. I continued my climb, slowly ascending out of danger, and reached the relative safety of altitude. About a minute later, I was happy with my position. “One’s cover,” I announced.
“Roger, Two will be ‘in’ in 10,” Rip replied.
“Continue.” I replied and offset myself to the southwest, where I would be in a good position to monitor his attack.
“Two’s in hot,” Rip called, as he rolled in towards the target.
I scanned the area beneath him. He was clear, and his nose was pointing at the area that was still smoking from my attack. “Cleared hot, Two.”
Four seconds later, Rip was pulling back skyward, arching away from the ground. “Two’s off, switch error,” he said. “I was in singles.”
Great—neither one of us was at our peak today. It was a simple error, but because of it, Rip had released only one of his four bombs. He was going to have to make another pass. I looked down. His lone bomb impacted on the northern revetment, throwing dust high into the air. Neither one of us had gotten secondaries, although there was some black smoke coming from the southern revetment, which had fallen under my CBU pattern. Something was burning in there.
I checked the fuel. We would have enough for another pass and still have about 10 minutes to spare; no problem.
I looked at Rip, who was climbing, and then I saw something really neat. There were little white clouds underneath him that I hadn’t noticed before. They were small, like little cumulus bits of popcorn. Something wasn’t right—time slowed way down. Some of the clouds looked like they had little silver centers; then they’d disappear. Now more clouds were around him. Hairs stood up on the back of my neck—they were shooting at Rip! Instantly, it seemed time was speeding up again—just like the pipper was approaching the target. Only this was much more real, and yet—surreal. What do I say? I urgently fumbled for words as I pressed the mike switch.
“Taco Two, keep the jet moving. Climb! Triple-A beneath you.” I could now see that it was all bursting beneath him by a good 4,000–5,000 feet, so I was less worried. Rip started moving his jet a little more. The little clouds started to disappear.
“Say location.” Rip’s voice sounded controlled but worried.
“It’s stopped now. Let’s egress north. Keep climbing.” I responded.
The AAA had appeared beneath Rip when he was about a mile or two southwest of the target. As we moved away, I looked back over my shoulder and tried to get a good look at the area, but couldn’t acquire any AAA pits or military positions.
“Taco, Stew, say location of triple-A. Do you need assistance?”
Bumpy asked over the common frequency.
“Stew, stand by.” I needed a second. Get away from the threat. Pull out the 1:50. Find it on the map. Plot the position. My attempt to determine the AAA coordinates was frustrated by its location just off the southwest corner of the target map.
We circled north of the target and climbed a bit higher. If the airbursts were limited to the places where I had seen them, we should be safe. They had used only medium-caliber AAA, but if they had MANPADS it would be more of a threat. I told Bumpy and Rip what I had seen and that my plan was to climb up above 200, look down with my stabilized binoculars, and see what I could make out while Rip maintained cover.
“Roger. Let me know if you need us down there.” This was an important target for us. People had shot at us, and now we were going to finish our attack. Bumpy had every right to be interested, but, for now, it was my game.
We circled around to the south, and I scanned the area with my eyes. A road snaked away to the southwest through a pass and then continued south towards Gnjilane. On the southwest side of the road, the terrain climbed into the hills, which were dotted with trees. On the northwest side, there was a small hill with a plateau on top, and beyond that the terrain climbed into another range of hills. The hill with the plateau must have something on it—if I were a Serb, I would want to hold that ground.
Calling, “One is ‘heads down,’” I raised the binoculars and looked at the hill. It appeared no different than the surrounding landscape, which consisted of three fields of a yellow crop that was probably wheat, two solitary large trees, and what appeared to be a farmhouse in the northern corner. No tracks, no unusual shadows, no revetments. Nothing.
I scanned the fields around the hill. Still nothing. I widened my scan, moving up towards the hills in the west and a reservoir that was tucked neatly away. Nothing. After about three to four minutes of this, I passed the lead to Rip to let him take a look. He found nothing.
I checked our fuel—we had another seven or eight minutes, tops. I made up my mind. “Two, let’s go back to the original target and drop the rest of your Mk-82s there. I’ll stay in a high cover to the south and watch for any more triple-A. I want to take out the rest of those revetments, but if anymore triple-A comes up, we still have the gun and Stew flight.”
Rip agreed. We moved our orbit back to the original target, and I called cover. Within 30 seconds, Rip rolled in from the west, dropping a string of three bombs across the middle of the remaining revetments. He pulled off to the south, puking out flares and turning towards me.
About 10 seconds into his climb out, the AAA started again, and I was ready for it. I called for Rip to keep his jet moving and quickly scanned the ground. Where was it coming from? Out the corner of my eye, I could see Rip’s jet maneuvering and remaining unpredictable. But there was nothing on the ground. The AAA stopped about five seconds after it appeared. Short, controlled bursts, I thought. These guys are regular army, not just a bunch of thugs who got their hands on some military hardware. They’re disciplined, and they’re smart.
We moved north while Rip climbed back to altitude. Once he regained his energy, we moved back in to look for the AAA. I told Rip to stay high in cover, and I descended to take a better look. I dropped down to about 15,000 feet and started taking a closer look at the area around the hill and the rising terrain to the west. Nothing.
“One, come hard right and climb; they’re shooting again.”
Rip’s voice broke through my concentration. I had already been moving the jet, but now I pulled back on the stick and started a climb. My left index finger quickly started hitting the flare button. I saw some of the small popcorn clouds with the silver centers about 3,000–4,000 feet underneath me. Then they were gone. I scanned the ground, but they weren’t firing anymore. Nothing to see. I looked at our gas. Three minutes, tops. Time to call Bumpy. “Stew, Taco.”
“Go ahead,” Bumpy replied.
I said, “We just got shot at again by some of the triple-A. We’re looking for it, but no luck. We have to bingo out in about three minutes. Any chance I can give you a handoff?”
It was like asking a child if he wanted ice cream. Bumpy was on his way over before I could finish the request. I described what I had seen and when it had happened. All the time, I was looking out, trying to find some last-minute clues that would alert me to the AAA position. The three minutes came and passed with no new revelations, so I passed the target to Bumpy and left.
During the flight home we made the normal in-flight reports to ABCCC and looked each other over as we accomplished our battle-damage checks for any unexpected problems. I felt like I had come off an emotional roller coaster. It had been my first time to lead a formation in combat, and everything had happened. We had to defend against a possible air threat; we searched for, found, and attacked targets; and we had been shot at by AAA. What a mission! However, the people who had shot at us were still alive back there, and that really angered me. I still had some nagging questions: What else did I miss? How lucky did I get? I later found that these questions persisted—no matter how successful the sortie was.
Bumpy joined us after he landed and debriefed. We met at the Truck Stop—a favorite eating place on the road back to the hotel. He had not been able to find the source of the AAA either, and we had a good laugh about it over a glass of wine. That had been my first combat flight lead mission, and I couldn’t wait to do it again.
I couldn’t sleep during the night before my first sortie. In spite of the air conditioner, my room was stagnant. It was too hot to wear anything. I could taste the lemons in the orchard outside my second-floor window. The warm Italian breeze also carried in mosquitoes that buzzed in my ears throughout the night. I turned the television on and off repeatedly. My mind was racing. I was still awake when the alarm clock went off at three A.M. on 11 May 1999.
I showered and headed out, driving to the base with Lt Col Surgeon Dahl, my flight lead. Today would be his fini-flight with the 81st FS from Spangdahlem. He flew with the Flying Tigers during the Gulf War and, after today’s mission, would head back to Pope to become their operations officer. So today, I was getting to fly my first combat sortie with my soon-to-be ops officer.
In the squadron building we were briefed by intel, and then Surgeon briefed me on our sortie. We walked to life support and put on our gear—no wallets, no patches, no rings. We carried dog tags and a 9 mm Berretta. I chambered the first round before holstering it in my vest.
I experienced a special feeling walking to my jet at sunrise. My harness, G suit, and survival vest (with all its buckles, straps, and zippers) were as comfortable as Hugh Hefner’s smoking robe and silk pajamas. The sun began to trim the clouds with pink as the gray sky gave way to Mediterranean blue. I wanted to be airborne.
My jet was lightly loaded. I was carrying two cans of CBU-87 cluster bombs, which weighed 1,000 lbs each; two AGM-65D Maverick missiles; two AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles; an ECM pod; and 1,000 rounds of 30 mm depleted-uranium bullets. I strapped into the jet and started the engines. Before I taxied, a maintenance van pulled up in front of my jet. SSgt “Chunk” Barth, a maintenance specialist in my squadron, ran over and climbed up the side of my jet to wish me luck on my first sortie. He shook my hand and yelled, “Go get ’em, sir.”
I finished my preflight checks and started to taxi. I returned my crew chief’s salute as I pulled out of the chocks. He then jumped up to pat his jet one last time for good luck. The guys in the maintenance van were pumping their fists in the air. These young airmen and NCOs are the heart and soul of the military—they are the heroes.
After takeoff, Surgeon and I refueled over the Adriatic Sea, and then flew south of Montenegro into Albania. The rugged terrain reminded me of the Rocky Mountains in early spring, when the peaks are still dusted with snow. Looking down onto Albania and Macedonia, I could see the orange terra-cotta tiles that cover the roofs of the local houses and other buildings. As we flew closer, Surgeon pointed out the numerous refugee camps scattered along the border of Macedonia and Kosovo. After seeing these camps from the air, I realized that no one can get an accurate feeling of how many people fled Kosovo by watching CNN—even on a 32-inch Zenith.
“Fence-in,” Surgeon called to me. I set my switches to arm my weapons and self-protection systems.
“Gunhog One-One, SA-6 at Derringer is active.” That call was made by the NAEW controller as we moved into Kosovo to warn us of the active SAM site.
Surgeon replied that he copied the information about the SA-6 site near the city of Pristina being active and pointed out artillery sites that had already been bombed. The scorched craters looked like black stars painted on the ground. The countryside was breathtaking in its beauty and ruin. I could not find one house with an intact roof.
We started searching for targets in an area that intel had said the Serbs were using as a vehicle-refueling point. Surgeon put me in a high-cover position as he scanned the area for the refueling point. My job was to keep an eye out for AAA or SAMs fired at our formation. I continually rolled up to check beneath our jets and change my heading. While I was in a right-hand turn looking out the right side of my cockpit, I saw something flash on the ground. I was in the perfect location to catch the morning sun’s reflected glint off the windshields of two westfacing parked trucks.
I called Surgeon on our FM radio and told him what I saw. He asked that I give him a talk-on, so I described the area around the trucks. He could not break out the vehicles and wanted to make sure we were both looking at the same place before we dropped our CBUs. He told me that he was going to roll in with the gun, and I realized that this game was real.
Surgeon squeezed off a healthy burst of 30 mm bullets that hit just to the west of the trucks. As he pulled off target I focused on the ground, ready to call break to Surgeon should the Serbs start firing. Surgeon pumped out four self-protection flares when he pulled off, and the bright red flares contrasted with the muted greens and browns of the background.
I told Surgeon where his bullets hit compared to where I had seen the trucks. He told me that he was going to roll in with his CBU. He entered a 45-degree dive-bomb pass, pickled, and pulled off; his bomblets also hit just west of the trucks. He climbed back to altitude and told me to set up for a rip-2 pass with my CBU-87.
I checked and rechecked my switches. My fuzing was set, and I had green ready lights. I checked my bomb-pass parameters one more time and then committed myself to the attack. “Two’s in,” I called and then started my roll in, accelerating towards the ground.
“Two, come off dry to the south,” Surgeon called me off. I broke off my pass, pulled out of my dive, started my climb to the south, and began punching out flares. My heart was racing. What did I do wrong?
Surgeon told me that he wanted me to roll in from the southwest to avoid the SA-6 that was active to our northwest. When I reached altitude, I checked my switches one last time. Now I was nervous. This would be the fourth pass on the same target. Everything that I’d read and heard from experienced guys said to never hang around a target too long. How long was too long?
I cracked my wings and rolled down the chute. I was completely focused on those two trucks. The lime green pipper slowly tracked up my HUD; I pickled and felt the thumps of the munitions leaving my jet. G forces pushed me heavily into my seat as I pulled hard on the stick during my safe-escape maneuver. I climbed, pumped out flares, and changed my heading so that I could look back over my shoulder to watch for my impacts. The bomblets covered an area as big as a football field, and in the middle of all the sparkles I saw a large, orange flash.
“Did you see that Two?”
“Affirm.”
“Those are secondaries.”
“Two copies.”
Surgeon set up for another attack while I held in a highcover position. He rolled in and dropped his second CBU on the target. A thick, black column of smoke started to form. We moved on to western Kosovo.
Surgeon called the FAC covering the west side of the KEZ to see if he had any targets for us. Surgeon stressed that we had four Maverick missiles left. He really wanted to shoot a Maverick on his last combat sortie here. But the FAC did’t have any targets and we were low on gas, so we headed home.
As we left Kosovo, Surgeon told me to look back at the target area we had worked. I rolled my wings and pulled the nose of my jet around to get a better view. From 20 miles away I could see the dark column of smoke reaching up to the sky. No one could have survived all that.
That was the first of my 18 sorties in Kosovo and typical of what it took to find and kill two fuel trucks. I became a flight lead a few rides later and flew most of my sorties as an AFAC. As such, I had to follow the ROEs closely, a requirement that continued to frustrate us throughout the campaign. We had to call Italy for CAOC approval to attack targets if they were within so many miles of the border of Albania or Macedonia. The ROEs put most vehicles off limits, and only those painted army green were considered valid targets. When those two ROEs were established, ABCCC repeatedly broadcast the detailed restrictions in the clear over an unsecure radio. Afterwards, we saw hundreds of white and yellow vehicles driving throughout Kosovo every day. The Serbs had to have been laughing at us while they shook those cans of spray paint.
We routinely located valid military targets, and called the CAOC for permission to hit them, only to be denied by a director sitting in Italy. I still do not understand why we had to get that clearance to drop on a target in Kosovo. A brigadier general and former CAOC director during OAF tried to explain it to me once in the Officers’ Club bar at Nellis. He had served as a colonel during OAF and been promoted six months after the conflict.
I had asked him, “Sir, did you guys plot the target coordinates we passed on 1:50 or 1:250 maps?” I used this question to try to understand how he, in Italy, developed his judgment on those targets. The 1:50 scale maps that AFACs carried in Kosovo were extremely detailed. Plus, I had a beautiful view of the target from my cockpit. He said that they had used 1:250s, maps that I knew showed much less detail.
I continued, “So, sir, why did you guys deny us clearance to hit some of those targets?”
He responded, “Well you need to understand the politics of the war. Do you really think striking that one target would have mattered in the overall campaign?” Then the recently promoted general added, “It really would not have mattered.”
I stared into my drink in astonishment. So he knew it didn’t matter. Great, I thought, soon he’ll get promoted again and will be one of the leaders for the next war.
“Sir, the next time we send our boys into combat to get shot at, we better make sure that it matters.” I refused to stand there and listen to his doublespeak. I walked away and ordered another drink.
I began Operation Allied Force as an experienced wingman—I finished it as an inexperienced two-ship flight lead. I had developed a complete and utter confidence in the capabilities of the A-10 during the one and one-half years I had flown the Hog. However, I often thought that we were not very realistic with our expectations for the airframe during peacetime training. My OAF experience opened my eyes and provided insights that increased my love for, and confidence in, the Hog.
The OAF conflict was not what I expected. I had previously flown medium-altitude sorties over war-torn Bosnia, so it came as no surprise when we employed under many of the same constraints. Those constraints, such as having to AFAC and employ weapons from medium altitude, led to the predictable difficulty in identifying and destroying tactical-sized targets. What I did not expect was that the ROEs would change on a daily basis and that tactical decision making would be taken out of the cockpit and given to someone in the CAOC—hundreds of miles from the AOR. The cumulative effect was that these constraints frustrated our ability to kill enemy targets that we badly wanted to destroy. In retrospect, our operations seemed to reflect more political than military considerations. That was frustrating for everyone involved—because we were capable of so much more.
For me, the war began in earnest after our departure from Aviano AB. In the beginning, our flying was constrained by the A-10’s limited mission taskings and bad weather. My last mission at Aviano was typical of our frustration. I flew over 10 hours, tanked four or five times, and brought home all my bombs because of bad weather in the AOR. After the decision was made to move our A-10s to Gioia del Colle in southern Italy, a quick look at the map made me smile. It would take only half an hour to fly from Gioia, across the Adriatic, and into the AOR. Finally, we could spend the lion’s share of our time finding targets and not droning back and forth to Aviano.
I arrived in advance of the main party, only to find a bare base with an old dormitory that would serve as our operations section. All we were able to accomplish during the 24 hours prior to the arrival of the squadron was to break down all the bunk beds to make room for furniture and equipment—items that weren’t there and that we didn’t own. In spite of that, the 81st was flying combat sorties within 48 hours of deploying to southern Italy. Our experiences were often surreal. We would fly, attack targets, and get shot at. Then only hours later, we would be at the Truck Stop, drinking vino and eating pasta. On “English night” we would even watch a movie at the local theater. Every once and awhile, you’d stop and think about the weird and incongruous aspects of our lives.
A war was being fought. Nevertheless, the peacetime administrative routine continued—much to my surprise. I flew my mission-qual check ride over Kosovo with Lt Col Kimos Haave, our squadron commander. I flew as his wingman and remembered going into the brief thinking, “Cool, don’t get shot down, Stu, and you should pass this ride.” I realized that Kimos was going to apply peacetime check ride criteria about halfway through the brief. Therefore he would need to see me drop bombs or shoot something—and I might have to hit the target using CBU-87s for the first time. In retrospect, I think it made sense. I also realized that I might not complete the check because on more than one occasion I had returned with all my ordnance due to a lack of viable targets or bad weather. Finding targets in the AOR seemed to be either feast or famine. On some days, we’d drop all our bombs, shoot the gun, and, if the right target came along, launch a Maverick. Other times, we’d fly back with all our ordnance since A-10s rarely ever hit “dump” targets. I felt better bringing back my ordnance knowing that, on a later date, I could drop it on the skull of some town-burning Serb.
I signed out at the ops desk and learned that I’d be flying aircraft 992; that jet had my name painted on the nose, and I was immensely proud of her. I thought she was the best in the fleet—a status due mostly to the efforts of her crew chief, SSgt Donny Trostle. Don wasn’t there when I arrived at the jet, but no matter; she had been code-one for the past 15 sorties. I knew that she could safely carry me through harm’s way. Preflight, taxi, and takeoff were normal, but I remember thinking how sluggish the controls seemed as we lumbered into the warm morning air. The two CBUs were roughly the same weight as four Mk-82s, a load I was familiar with; however, the CBUs had the aerodynamics of two barn doors, produced considerable drag, and significantly degraded the aircraft’s flying characteristics.
Once we entered the KEZ, the search for targets began. Kimos was given a target area that included a factory complex constructed of red brick in southeastern Serbia between Presevo and Vranje. Using his binos, he spotted three tanks lined up in the factory’s parking lot and rolled in for a medium-altitude Maverick attack. Unlike a real tank, this target disintegrated when the Maverick hit it. Kimos concluded that the tank was a decoy and that the factory complex was likely producing decoys. He then directed me to set up for a CBU attack on the western end of the factory complex, which also contained mortar positions and lighter vehicles. I knew from studying CBU ballistics that I could get a HUD solution only if I bombed with a tailwind. The winds were strong out of the west, so I set up and rolled down the chute from west-northwest. I say “rolled down the chute,” but at our gross weights and altitudes we did not have the thrust or aerodynamic authority to do much more than smoothly coax the jet to fall to the correct dive angle. With my pipper on the target and at the desired combination of altitude, dive angle, and airspeed, I hammered down on the pickle button and felt the familiar clunk of ordnance being released. However, something wasn’t right—I felt only one clunk. Sure enough, only one can of CBU came off, and my other station was still showing a “green ready.” Since my thumb was still on the pickle button, I knew it had to be an aircraft malfunction. I initiated my safe-escape maneuver and began the climb back to altitude. Much to my chagrin, the CBU hit well short of the target. I discussed the problem with Kimos, and we decided that I should check all of my switches and try to deliver it one more time. I rolled down the chute and pickled on the target, but nothing came off the jet. With the end of our vul time approaching, Kimos decided to attack the target with his CBUs. Those, unfortunately, also hit extremely short of the target. We then departed the KEZ for home.
I had a “hung” CBU, and, depending on the circumstances, I would either land with it or attempt to jettison it over the Adriatic. The weather for the approach and landing was good. The CBU appeared secure on an inboard station and did not pose a problem for landing. We decided that I would land with it. I flew a straight-in approach with Kimos flying chase to monitor the CBU and warn me of any problems he might detect. The landing was uneventful, but Kimos later told me that he was relieved when I touched down and the CBU didn’t fall off. A subsequent inspection reveled that the ejection carts had correctly fired when I had attempted to release the CBUs. However, during much recent use, some cart-generated carbon had been deposited on the mechanical linkage and ejector orifices. Those carts’ hot gas would normally be used to overcome the forces required to open the two mechanical suspension hooks and release the CBUs. When I had hammered down on the pickle button, a firing pulse had been generated; the ejection carts had fired, but the generated gas pressure had been insufficient to open the hooks and release the CBU. Nonetheless, Don Trostle never forgave me for “breaking” our jet and ruining 992’s streak of flawless performances.
During the debrief Kimos voiced his disappointment with our bombing. However, he admitted he couldn’t very well downgrade me on my bombing accuracy when both of our CBUs had hit short. We reviewed the tape, and everything appeared normal with both of us pickling on the target. I discussed the problem with Maj Goldie Haun, our weapons officer. He stated that anomalies in our bombing computer’s algorithms often cause CBUs to hit short when bombing with a strong tailwind—we had 70 knots at altitude.
Capt Scott R. “Hummer” Cerone, a member of the 74th FS out of Pope AFB, and I were paired up for a mission. Hummer and I had gone through our initial introduction to fighter fundamentals and the A-10 replacement training unit courses together. In addition, we both recently had pinned on captain rank and passed our flight-lead check rides on the same day, 31 May 1999. Hummer was an AFAC, so according to the rules, he was the only one in our flight qualified to pick out and direct strikes on targets. We decided that I would be the flight lead for the sortie. I would give him the tactical lead in the KEZ so that he could find targets and comply with the ATO. We were young flight leads and flew that day with our “fangs out”—happy to be flying on our own and not with some older, more staid member of the squadron.
Hummer and I got a handoff from an excited Foghorn who had apparently located 12 APCs in a field. Foghorn talked louder than ever over the radios and was hair-on-fire as he departed for gas. When Hummer and I arrived, we looked for something other than bales of hay. We used binos and our Mavericks but finally asked an F-14 AFAC to recce the area with his pod—all with no luck. Hummer and I gave up on those targets and proceeded to an area north of D-Town. We dropped our Mk-82s on some small revets before I spotted a large revet, which I was convinced contained an arty piece. I talked Hummer’s eyes onto it and got clearance from him to launch one of my Mavericks. I hammered down, and the Maverick hit the target less than 30 seconds later. Hummer, unfortunately, lost the missile at burnout, from his viewing angle he thought the Maverick had “gone stupid” and had flown towards the west. I guess he was trying to see if it hit northern Pristina, probably thinking, “How are we gonna explain this one!” I got his eyes back into the target area, but for a few minutes I was unsure whether he had actually cleared me to hit that target. We talked about a possible miscommunication during our debrief but, with some map study, became convinced that we had been looking at the same target. Later that year, after I had been reassigned to the 74th FS, I ran into Hummer at Pope. He kiddingly said, “We both had hit ‘bags of dirty diapers’ that day.”
Hummer and I were paired again. After checking in with all the appropriate agencies, we entered the KEZ and proceeded to an area north of D-Town. We got a handoff from an F-14 AFAC who was trying to talk a flight of Hogs (Corvette 71) onto several APCs that he had located with his targeting pod. We called contact on the targets, and the F-14 departed. Hummer told me he was going to use his binoculars to visually ID these targets. With Corvette 71 flight orbiting to the north, Hummer took a couple of laps around the field. After a minute of silence, he came over the radio and told me he’d cover me while I got a visual: “Tell me what you see down there.”
In a less than a minute it became obvious to me that the APCs were actually a red car and a white pickup truck. I told Hummer what I saw, and he agreed. Hummer then did a lower pass, confirmed that the targets were invalid, and sent the other Hogs home.
During the rest of the sortie, JSTARS personnel had us on a wild-goose chase, trying to talk us onto a convoy they believed to be in a creek bed south of Pec. For 20 minutes, we unsuccessfully tried to find the vehicles corresponding to the radar contacts that an increasingly frustrated controller so clearly saw on his scope. As we exited the AOR, I pointed out to Hummer that Pec was burning. We learned later from the news that the peace talks had stalled and that the Serbs were buying time as they withdrew. A few of this mission’s remarkable events have now become some of my most enduring memories.