One Perfect Op by Dennis Chalker

Author:Dennis Chalker
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780061751295
Publisher: HarperCollins

CHAPTER 17

A LONG DAY AND A NIGHT

The Navy was making air strikes on Fort Frederick to knock out the antiaircraft guns that were making the skies so dangerous and helping to prevent the helicopters from picking us up. Our sniper with the .50 caliber spotted someone up at Fort Frederick, either an officer or maybe a spotter who was helping direct their guns. Either way, the sniper figured he could nail the guy with the big .50. Duke recommended against taking the shot. Rules of engagement and all.

But one shot with even a big .50 wouldn’t have made much of a difference a few moments later. Navy A-7 Corsairs showed up and made several gun runs, strafing the fort with their 20mm cannons. Then their bombing runs, when they dropped 250-pound bombs into Fort Frederick, caused a bunch of secondary explosions. There was a grim satisfaction for us in seeing the explosions. The Fort Frederick guns had brought down the Cobra gunships earlier.

The only communications we had were through our Motorola MX-360s. Captain Gormly and his team had gone into the airport that the Rangers had taken and set up a SEAL command post. Now our radios were starting to go dead and the communications were getting weak. But we did manage to call in our own air support, relaying the request through Captain Gormly’s team and on to whatever air assets were available. Gormly’s radio operator, after talking to us, called out to a ship on his SATCOM, which directed the aircraft. Not the most efficient way of getting commo, but it worked.

The strike we wanted was on the mansion near us, from which we had been taking fire off and on all day. Several of us were told to go up to a higher window and spot for the air strike, directing their fire onto the targets we wanted hit. Originally we were going to go up to the roof, but the occasional RPGs still bouncing around made that option a poor one. Instead we watched from a high window and called in strike effects over our radios.

In the room there was a can of Coke that looked mighty tempting. We shared it and watched the aircraft come in. That Coke made a big difference to the taste in my mouth. It was considerably better than canteen water and dried tobacco.

The air strikes leveled the house. But the troops inside must have had bunkers. Later we saw them running away from the rubble like ants from a big footprint.

Night started to fall by 1730 hours, and we got word from one of the gunships overhead that about thirty people were penetrating the area around the house. My shooting partner and I were told to move to a forward position. We got down low in front of a big tree. The M60s were behind us. If we saw the enemy coming we were supposed to open up on full automatic and stay low. The M60s would be firing right over our heads.

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