The Buccaneers had a four on four duel in the SEA last week, and I enjoyed it so much I was inspired to create the below story. It's part of a full-length novel I'm working on. Hope you enjoy it...Aces High ROCKS!
A Warrior's Tale
By
Rich "Sabre" Jernejcic
It began as a routine patrol; as routine as a wartime patrol over German occupied Europe could be, at any rate. Rob Jenkowski was leading a four-ship flight of P-47 Thunderbolts, scouting ahead of the bomber stream in order to bounce any Jerries trying to position themselves for an intercept. They had climbed to almost 33,000 feet when they entered a towering cloudbank. When Rob came out, Frank and Chuck were gone, and he and his wingman, Mike, were suddenly alone in the sullen sky.
"Alpha One, this is Two. I think my oxygen's not flowing right." Breaking radio silence was a big "no-no," except in extreme emergencies. A frozen O2 line at angels-three-three certainly qualified. Major Jenkowski looked out to his right and saw Mike fiddling with his hose and mask. There really wasn't any choice. At that altitude, Mike had only a couple minutes or so before he passed out.
Sighing, Rob replied, "Two, this is Lead. Roger. Follow me down to angels-ten." The flight leader backed up the radio call with visual signals, jabbing his left index finger in a downward direction where his wingman could see it. Mike responded with the "okay" sign.
No fighter pilot likes giving up altitude. Sky beneath you is like money in the bank. You hoarded it, and gave it up with all the enthusiasm of a miser in church with the collection basket in front of him. Nonetheless, the two Republic fighters, known affectionately as the "Jug" to there pilots, throttled back and dropped like stones to get down to the thicker air. The came down in a long, sweeping turn that would put them on a return vector to their fighter-base in England, just in case Mike couldn't get the O2 flowing again. Leveling out, Rob began to search the sky in earnest, hoping for signs of their missing element. Suddenly, the radio crackled to life.
"Alpha Lead, this is Alpha Three! Bandits, bandits! Four Messerschmitts, my 9 o'clock, slightly high." The anxiety was evident in Frank's voice, despite the interference.
"Three, this is Lead. I copy. What's your heading and altitude?" Rob had to figure out how to get his two elements back together. Alone, Alpha Three and Four would be outnumbered two to one and easy prey if they tried to engage the Luftwaffe planes alone.
Relief was evident in the other element leader's voice, as Frank replied with, " Roger, Lead. Heading is one-zero-five, angels-three-three, speed 280 IAS."
"Three, Lead. Turn one-eight-zero, and begin decent to angels-ten. Don't get too far ahead of them, Three. We want to give 'em a nice surprise. Watch out for compression in your dive." Compression was a phenomenon that affects all modern fighters, but the Jug more than most. At the rarified atmosphere they routinely operate at, it is very easy to put the nose down and find yourself pushing into the transonic region of flight. When this happens, shock waves form that clamp down on the aircraft control surfaces, immobilizing them as if they were set in concrete. Worse, in the transonic region aerodynamics gets turned on its head, causing the fighter caught in compressibility to go into a steeper and steeper dive. Under the right conditions, an experienced pilot can recover. The inexperienced pilot's aircraft inevitably becomes a giant lawn-dart.
Jenkowski and his wingman made a 180-degree turn and began a vigorous climb. Mike's oxygen supply had begun to flow again, melted by the higher temperatures found at their lower altitude. The younger officer spotted dots high in the distance, and called them out.
"Lead, this is Two. Bogeys, eleven o'clock high." A bogey is an unidentified aircraft, where as a bandit is a confirmed enemy aircraft. Rob quickly spotted them, then scanned the sky behind the first two bogeys. Sure enough, four tiny dots trailed behind in a finger-four formation.
"Roger, Two, I see em." he responded. "There are four more behind. Gotta be the bad guys." They were still too high for Rob and his wingman to engage, so they reversed once more and watched to see what the enemy would do. In the mean time, Rob ordered Mike to 'kick out,' i.e. to move his aircraft out and to the left and slightly in behind Rob's. Two of the bandits continued to chase Alpha Three and Four, but the other two dropped their noses and plummeted toward Alpha Lead and Two.
"Lead, this is Two. They're bouncing us, closing fast." Mike's voice had taken on a slightly higher pitch.
Rob struggled to remain calm, and mostly won. "Two, execute crossing S-turn on my mark…three, two, one, MARK!" Each of the two Republic fighters rolled ninety degrees toward the other and reefed into a hard turn. Both enemy fighters began to follow Rob's, leaving Alpha Two out of danger for the moment. After about 45 degrees of turn, Rob centered his stick for an instance, rolled 180 degrees to the right, the pulled hard again. Alpha Two mirrored the maneuver. The sudden move, known as a horizontal scissors, was designed to sucker the enemy into an overshoot; the hunter would suddenly become the hunted. One of the Messerschmitt pilots recognized the move for what it was. He continued the left-hand turn and separated, temporarily out of the fight. The other German pilot was more intent on what he thought would be an easy kill, and quickly reversed his own turn to follow Rob. He hoped to pull his nose around far enough to get a high deflection shot at the Yankee.
Rob repeated the maneuver, timing each roll and reversal to force the German to overshoot a little more each time. Realizing another turn or two would leave him out in front of his opponent, the enemy pilot pulled out and to one side, rather than follow Rob's next turn. For a few seconds, the two antagonists flew side by side, staring across the open sky between them. Then the moment was shattered, as the German machine staggered under a hail of 50-caliber slugs. A half-second later, it blew up.
Alpha Three and Four had by this time gained enough separation from their pursuers to pitch back in a chandelle turn. The four aircraft swirled around each other in descending spiral, each trying to get a shot at the other. Rob and Mike reformed on each other and turned to join the fray. Before they even got close, the other Messerschmitt that had separated from them during the scissors move came back in on their tails. Once again, Alpha Lead was the target, and Rob threw his Jug into successive break turns to try to stay alive long enough for Mike to "clear his six" again. Again, Alpha Two came barreling in, spraying tracers in the hopes of forcing the enemy to break off his attack on lead.
Seeing his imminent danger, the German pilot pulled up slightly, then rolled inverted and dove to the left for the farmlands below. The move caught Mike by surprise, but it was just what Rob was waiting for. He flipped over to the left and followed the enemy plane. For a few seconds, the German pilot gained some separation. However, the P-47 Thunderbolt was about the fastest fighter in the world in level flight, and the distance began to shrink. Realizing he couldn't outrun Rob, the German pilot zoomed into a climb, then rolled inverted and pulled toward the ground.
Rob fired a burst as the Me109 hung for a moment at the top of the zoom. A few rounds found their mark, but the distance was extreme and no serious damage was done. This guy's no slouch, Rob thought to himself. He hadn't fallen for the horizontal scissors, and hadn't panicked when the tables were suddenly turned. He was using the Me109's strength in vertical maneuvering to try to escape.
The Luftwaffe plane dove earthward as Rob Jenkowski rolled inverted to follow him. This left him going the opposite direction and set to pass beneath Alpha Lead. The American officer pulled the throttle back to idle and popped his combat flaps out. As the Messerschmitt passed under him, Rob was already pointed nearly straight down. He quickly pulled his nose ahead of the fleeing German, peppering him with long-range fire. Again the enemy plane attempted to zoom up then reverse direction with a split-S. This time, Jenkowski caught him with a full, on-target burst of machinegun fire. Smoke belched from his engine, and his propeller ground to a halt.
The enemy machine flipped end for end, and dropped toward the ground. At first Rob thought he had killed the Luftwaffe pilot, but then the German fighter rolled upright and flattened its dive. Major Jenkowski wrestled briefly with the dilemma of whether to let the enemy plane ditch. There were no other threats nearby; the other section of Alpha Flight had finished dispatching the other two Messerschmitts.
Had the German pilot simply bailed out, that would have been the end of it. Rob could never have fired at a helpless man hanging in a parachute. He knew a few Allied pilots that had no apparent qualms about it, and he knew also that some (though not all) German pilots would do likewise.
This guy's too good, Rob thought to himself. If the young Air Force major let him ditch successfully, he might have to face him again another today - another day that Jerry might have the upper hand. His decision made, Rob rolled over his left wing and rushed down on the mortally wounded Messerschmitt.
"Alpha Lead, in hot." The phrase told Mike that Rob was rolling into attack position, and to guard his six. Nearly out of airspeed and altitude, the German pilot had few options to evade. Skilled and determined to the end, he pushed his stick violently forward at the last moment in an attempt to throw off Rob's aim. He dipped so low the stopped propeller actually brushed the top of a short hedgerow. It didn't matter. Rob's thumb caressed the firing teat and walked the stream of bullets across the other plane with gentle taps on the rudder pedals. Debris shed off the enemy plane in gouts, and it plowed unceremoniously into the damp earth in a shower of muddy dirt clods.
"Hot damn, Alpha Lead! Nice shooting." exclaimed Alpha Two. A chorus of congratulatory remarks from the other American pilots briefly swamped the R/T circuit, but Rob cut it off.
"All right, knock it off you clowns." Rob cut in a bit too brusquely. He was elated to be alive, but also felt a bit depressed at having had to destroy the Luftwaffe pilot. Then he remembered the scenes of destruction in downtown London during the blitz. He remembered the faces of friends and fellow pilots lost during the dark days of the Battle of Britain. Finally, he recalled the images - burned into his memory - of the countless allied bombers raining down in pieces across the European continent. Saw again the German fighters relentlessly circling and attacking crippled Flying Fortresses and Liberators as they struggled to reach the English Channel and safety.
Images of his dream came to him again: his brother Rick's B-17, trailing long streamers of fire as enemy fighters closed in for the kill; Rob looking on helplessly, his guns jammed; cannon rounds walking across his brother's plane, ripping the wing off and sending it spiraling down to disappear into the clouds like a departing specter. An iron determination to prevent the dream's coming true gripped him. Again he felt the mantle of duty and responsibility drop across his emotions and smother the weak feelings of regret. Tomorrow would bring more such challenges and choices. Rob couldn't afford to dwell on it. He was alive and so were his wingmen. Anyway you looked at it; it was a pretty good day.
"Let's go home you apes." he said over the R/T. His voice had regained its usual good-natured quality. "First round's on me." The four Thunderbolts formed up and headed west towards jolly old England.
* * *
The young girl crept out of the tree line and walked tentatively towards the wrecked German fighter. The twisted aircraft's nose was buried in the mud, and more of it had fountained over the cockpit, obscuring the view inside. The young maid climbed up onto the wing and used her sleeve to wipe a clear spot and peer inside. She fully expected the man to be dead, but he stirred feebly. She gasped and took a step back, then stepped forward to stare at dazed and blood-covered figure inside. Despite the blood, it was a handsome face. She stood rooted in indecision.
She was a gypsy; one of those peoples Adolf Hitler had declared an enemy of the Third Reich. She and her family had been hiding out in the woods for several years now, living off a meager garden and a handful of farm animals. She had every reason to abandon the stricken Luftwaffe Leutnant, or even to pull the long knife from her boot and slit his throat. The young man - almost a boy, really - turned his head to look at her. One eye was dilated, but the other managed to focus on the maid with some difficulty.
"Help me…please….hel…" Then he lapsed into unconsciousness. She made up her mind. She wrestled the canopy up and began pulling the injured man from the cockpit. She wasn't sure why she was helping him, or what purpose it might serve. Perhaps they could get worthwhile information from him. Perhaps they could even exchange him for a ransom. Her papa would know. If they had to, they could always kill him…but a part of her hoped they wouldn't have to. She dragged him back into the tree line, to the two-wheeled pushcart she'd been using to collect firewood. She and her burden faded into the gloom beneath the trees.
The End
[This message has been edited by Rojo (edited 02-29-2000).]
