Editing Mercenaries and planes (section)

====Recap====

Ok, so here's how it started. Before we started, Steve told us all what the range to the target was. I suggested buddy tanking (Thanks Guys!) and he told us this was probably the smartest idea. We agreed to minimize the use of the tanker, the Flanker took a belly tank, so wouldn't require any tanking for the entire mission. My F-4 took two Ferry tanks two rocket pods, 4 AIM-9s, and four [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GBU-12 GBU-12s], the F-111 took four tanks, with the buddy system, as well as two [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GBU-15 GBU-15s] and a bunch of GBU-12s. The other F-4 took the same loadout as me. The mirage had two BLG-66EC cluster bombs, and four GBU-12s, 2x [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADEN_cannon Aden gun] pods but no tanks. I also bought an upgraded IR detector, so with luck I wouldn't get toasted by a stupid heat seeker.

We decided against any satellite intelligence, or other sources. Our plan was to stay high, out of the way of ground fire, and then come in at ridiculous speed when called by the FFL. At my suggestion we asked and were told that the FFL would communicate with us via secure UHF, and would enter the area when required. The plan was that the flanker would investigate air threats, while one of the F-4s did full power long range scans in a racetrack, looking for enemies, and directing the flanker nose cold to them. Ground attack would be the mirage first, the F-4s if needed, and the F-111 if absolutely necessary. The F-111 was to stay out of combat, because it was the lifeline back to the base.

We took off uneventfully, no one used burner, and with some of us being pretty heavy, we had to make a few skill rolls to make sure we didn't fly into some low level trees. Luckily we all made it out ok, and settled into a high altitude cruise. The Mirage tanked once, and the Phantoms were fine all the way to the target. We went in nose cold except for a single F-4, which detected nothing other than standard airliner traffic. We had one close call initially, an the Flanker peeled off to investigate, about 20 miles out he called tally ho and told us we'd panicked over a South African A340. We talked and said that we wouldn't investigate radar returns unless they were above a certain speed and/or on an intercept course. With that in mind, we had no problems. When we got there, we hit a small snag. We hadn't asked for a weather briefing, and it was cloudy. Two cloudy in fact to use our original high altitude bombing plan. However, we talked to Steve, and suggested that since the GBU-15s were tv guided, and we knew where the bridges were.

The F-111 flew a pattern, and released the bombs in the 'basket' as Steve put it, and then became very focused on making sure the things nailed the targets. The clouds were at 3000' [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Above_ground_level AGL] and that meant the Aardvark operator would have very little time to make course corrections when they went through the cloud ceiling. Our backup plan had the mirage circle low, and prepare to make a run at the bridges should the Aardvark miss. We were really tense, because it would really suck to miss now, we'd be short on ammo for the assault portion, and we weren't sure if 500lbs could take out a bridge. Turned out we were worried over nothing. The bridges were wood and metal rickety things. The first GBU-15 punched right through the first bridge, detonating just underneath it. The second GBU-15 missed by about 28 ft, and hit the river. The good thing though, is that missing by a few feet with a 2000lb bomb doesn't make much of a difference. The Mirage confirmed this as it completed its pass, both bridges were now mostly smoldering toothpicks, with pieces of them still raining down from the sky.

Now, shit started to hit the fan. We called the FFL, who said they were inbound, and gave us some coordinates. Since I was in the radiating Phantom, I flew with the Flanker towards the Antonov. The flanker hugged close, we were hoping to make the Phantoms radar return block out the Flanker's. We asked steve, and he said this was pretty smart, and told us that the Phantom [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_cross_section RCS] is almost 8x bigger than a Flankers. Anyway, we found the AN-12 on Radar below the cloud cover but the weird thing was it was orbiting. We told them again the bridges were down, and they acknowledged, but kept orbiting. At this point, we thought things were going well, until the Mirage pilot decided to dive down for another look. He flew another pass, and called up to us saying there were more than two dozen boats crossing the river with men aboard, “Like some sort of ghetto third-world D-Day”, and there were small explosions from the village (we found out later this was mortar strikes). He was about to strafe the boats when the other Phantom pilot shouted about the ROE and he held off, and climbed out.

We relayed this new info to the FFL, and they asked us to take another look, but not to fire unless fired at. The F-4 decided to take a look, and began a descent. Now we had plotted the area beforehand and were flying a safe track relative to elevation, that gave us the shortest route but with the most visibility to the target area. We all thought that this was a really smart idea. The bad thing is that we forgot we'd already flown the path twice with the Mirage, and didn't realize how dangerous this is. The F-4 got down below the clouds and began making his run. Then, without much warning, his own IR detector went nuts, and the treetops below him exploded and a flurry of SAMs blasted out of the undergrowth on trails of acrid smoke like Medusa having a bad hair day. There were also tracer rounds blasting around everywhere, as a few Bofors opened up on the flight path. The pilot threw the f-4 into a hard climbing right (no burners, was relying on momentum) and his backseater was probably breaking the flare dispense switch. This stopped a lot of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-to-Air_Missile SAMs] (the guy was reading the missile book Steve gave him and found that if you can see the smoke trails in front of you, they probably don't have a lock, especially SA-7s and Redeyes. There were no [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIM-92_Stinger Stingers] though, because he got away clean from the missiles. He did take a few Bofors hits, but nothing seemed affected as he made his way out of the area. He was fucking pissed though, because he hadn't had a chance to shoot back.

Other than confirming there was some serious anti-air down low on the south side of the river, we realized that we had no clue what the village or river looked like now. We told the FFL, and they finally turned to head towards the village, although a one-legged turtle on diazepam would have been faster than the POS Russian trash hauler they were in. They really did seem like they were taking their time. The other strike aircraft were staying high, and keeping an eye out for any missiles, but none appeared. As we approached, I began picking up a target, but it was very faint, very slow, and very low. I told the Flanker pilot, and he descended to check it out. Based on the position though, I figured it was setting up an orbit over the town, and the Flanker pilot agreed to keep his distance, since we knew there were man carried anti air in the area. The Flanker approached to about 10 miles, and then called out that it was a single engine plane, and had tracer rounds coming from it, firing into the village. The FFL was told, and they simply told us to kill it. The flanker pilot figured he wouldn't need to waste a missile, so went to guns, high power, and blasted towards the target, intending on a quick kill and speedy overflight. The first part went well, the plane never saw what hit it, and according to Steve, the Flanker's internal gun ripped the little thing in half like a buzzsaw. The Flanker flashed past the village, dumping a few flares pre-emptively. Without a IR warning, we don't know if anything shot at him, but Steve said there were no tracer rounds. By this time, I was low, circling the slow moving Cub, and had just come back in line with the village, when two new targets popped up on my radar, about 3 miles behind the flanker! I was 14 miles away, and I didn't think, I just hit my burners and switched to sidewinders.

The targets firmed up, and I eased off the Burners, since I was still carrying a/g ordnance, and Steve told me going supersonic would be tough, and rough on the ordnance. I got tone just as I saw a flash from one of the targets, which I could now see was some sort of helicopter. I told the Flanker and he dumped more flares, and climbed hard. The missile followed the flare, and I got to use the phrase “Missile trashed”. My own sidewinder scored a direct hit, and the helicopter blasted to pieces. I got off a snapshot with my cannon at the other helicopter but I don't know if I connected, since I blew by too quickly. The backseater though called out that I had “Splashed” another one, and there were some impressive secondaries coming out of the jungle as we climbed out. We then all received a call from the FFL that they were landing and debarking, and to stand by for support missions. They had laser designators (we had asked earlier, but forgot about clouds) so are GBUs wouldn't be completely useless. The other F-4 had done a systems check in the meantime, and apparently, despite a smallish hole in his wing, there were no problems. Things were looking better, the bridges were down, we'd taken out what little air support these guys seemed to have, and with varied attack runs, the Bofors weren't posing much of a threat. Are flare supplies were another issue, since we did not know how long we would be needed to stay.

We began an orbit above the cloud layer about ten miles outside the village area, and the Flanker climbed and lit off its radar, since it was the most potent, and decided it would simply scare off anyone who came for a look by targeting them with Fire control instead of basic search. The F-111 continued it's slow orbit at altitude. That was when we got our first fire mission call. There was a large mass of troops heading towards the Antonov and the FFL who were still getting organized. We were told to suppress them and the few technicals. The gave us a grid reference, and we found the street. The Mirage maneuvered, then dove for the deck, in a high speed pass. He roared in, heading down the street, and dropped one of his cluster bombs. The result was devastatingly glorious, as the submunitions ripped apart a good percentage of a village block. The FFL called in that the strike was successful, and the Mirage guy was ecstatic, because he was already climbing out, no hits taken. But this was short lived, since a call came in for another mission almost immediately. The FFL was advancing now, clearing pockets of resistance, but one set of insurgents had become nested in a building. The couldn't designate the target yet, but they told us to call 60 seconds out from the village and they would mark the target with smoke. I rolled in, with the other Phantom following 30 seconds behind.

We came in from the west, since the FFL were to the north, and we figured this way any strays would probably not hit them. We called, and then Steve put the smoke marker on the map, and I was able to make my turn towards it. I rippled off 2 GBUs in dumb fire mode, and a small part of me was thinking about the price of the laser systems. Still, I hit with one of them, the other hit too early and took out something (I found out what in the after action report). Just before passing over the building, I noticed it was white, and had a red cross on it. I don't know why, but I winced when Steve told me this, but there was nothing I could do. The other Phantom reported the hits, and then followed it up with a rocket attack on the structure. The village and area was in chaos, with tracers and fire in the streets everywhere. Lots of people and vehicles moving, but at our attack speeds, nothing we could really identify with certainty. We didn't get the warning of an IR, but Steve told us there were some straight smoke trails. RPGs he said, but you'd know in a jet, that it was pretty much an empty threat, and indicative of how poorly trained the OPFOR was. We peeled out dropping a flare every so often just in case, escaping back to the relative safety of the cloud cover.

The FFL called in, saying our strike was a success, and that they were pushing the enemy back, and had identified two temporary chokepoints, and a staging area. The would designate the chokepoints, and mark the staging area with smoke. We decided that putting one aircraft down below the cloud cover just focused the fire, and the Mirage, myself and the Phantom circled around for another low pass. We broke out of the cloud cover at speed, coming in low over the burning village and hellish firefight like avenging angels transporting the sword of Damocles. Both myself and the Phantom dumped two more GBU-15s at the chokepoint barricades/firebases, while the Mirage turned hard to line up with the smoke. The last second turn affected his aim, and while our GBUs nailed their targets, the cluster bomb went a bit wide. It took out part of the staging area, but from the resulting fireball, probably a gas station on a corner and a few shops/buildings around it. The French still called all three strikes a success. On our way out, the Phantom beside me couldn't evade yet another SA-7, and took a proximity hit. I called out that he was smoking quite badly, and he climbed out preparing to shut down the engine. As he climbed, Steve told him his ailerons were not very responsive, and that a lot of control surface was gone from one wing. We all climbed and told him to tank, and go home. The aardvark came down, and gave him a drink, before he turned for home. Then the FFL made another call, saying that the insurgents were being forced across the river, and that anything in the river was now a target. We lined back up, and prepared for a quick run, we knew that now the Bofors would be a threat again, along with the SAMs.

We dropped below the darkening clouds, on what we expected would be our last run. The scene greeting us was awesome. Half the village appeared to be on fire, with thick black smoke roiling upwards. The river was again full of boats, but heading south, to the other shore. I switched to the rocket pods and just held down the trigger, sending rockets rippling out in a sustained salvo of destruction. Plumes of water, mud, wood and metal arced into the air as the rockets played their way up the river. I saw some tracers begin to make their way up, and felt a few bumps. I angled towards the largest stream headed towards me and dumped my remaining bomb payload before spewing flares and staying low, heading out of the area at speed. The Mirage simply flew down the river, gun pods blazing away and tearing through anything that got in the way. He evaded a few last SAMs and began a slow climb. Steve reported that my plane was fine, but that the mirage had lost it's air to air radar capability. The Flanker joined up wth us as we climbed, calling out visual damage reports. One of my engines was smoking more than usual, but not severely. We both had substantial cosmetic damage to the undersides of our craft, but other than that, nothing horrible. The FFL called in, saying that they could deal with the stragglers, and that we were cleared out of the area. I bit back a 'fuck you assholes' since I figured I'd save that until after I got my check. The remainder of the mission was uneventful, we all landed safely, the most severely wounded aircraft being the other Phantom.