"Nightwing, come heading east."
"Copy, turning east."
While the OMDF were best known for their strategy of using aircraft carriers to deny airspace and launch raids into territory behind enemy lines, they weren't the only navy on Earth to practice the doctrine. Yuktobania had fifteen aircraft carriers, ten of which were stationed with the Yuktobanian Navy's Western Fleet. One of these ten carriers was the Admiral Anray.
"Anray, Ofnir Lead, maintaining eastern heading at thirty thousand feet." Su-35K pilot and squadron leader Captain Second Rank Michael Heimeroth reported to his carrier's flight operations commander.
"Copy Ofnir."
12 OCT 2010
"Hey Bitcher." Nightwing Squadron leader and Su-35KP pilot Frejya Litwin checked in with Heimeroth. "Still got money on the races?"
"When do I not?" Heimeroth heartily replied, earning a chuckle from his supporting squad leader. Both Heimeroth and Litwin spoke in accented Yuktobanian. Neither were Yuktobanian natives.
"In retrospect, stupid question." Litwin stated.
At the end of the Belkan War, Osea recruited veteran Belkan aviators to help train the next generations of Osean pilots in exchange for amnesty from the Osean government. While Osea had gotten the largest cut of aviators under Operation Paperclip, Yuktobania had run a similar program with the same premise. Heimeroth, Litwin and the members of their respective squadrons were some of the Belkans who went to Yuktobania. However, while Osea used their Paperclip veterans primarily as instructors and as aggressors, Yuktobania took a more hands on approach with their cut of the crop, using veteran squadrons as force multipliers in operations.
Heimeroth sometimes wondered how his counterparts in Osea that he didn't remain in contact with were doing. What they were up to. Bitcher, as his callsign went, certainly was still in touch with some of his counterparts across the ocean. He knew that at least one OADF-associated squadron, led by colleague and good friend Ashley Bernitz, was operational in play. But that was one squadron out of a dozen or more who went to Osea.
However, the actions of the pilots who he used to fly with didn't matter in the short term. They had a mission to fly.
After the invasion of Osea's premiere forward air base had failed a week prior, Osea had taken to the offensive and had been launching missile and bombing raids on depots, bunkers, ports and command centres in Yuktobania. Ofnir and Nightwing Squadron's mission as the sunshine hours waned was to give Osea a taste of their own medicine by striking an early warning radar array in northern Osea.
As they approached the Osean coast, Heimeroth expected to see Eagles or god forbid Raptors intercept them. Much to his surprise, the path all the way to the Osean mainland was clear. No sign of warships, ground radars, fighters or AWACS aircraft. Maintaining radio silence between them and the carrier as they crossed from feet wet to feet dry, Ofnir and Nightwing dramatically dropped their altitude from thirty thousand feet to five hundred feet, terrain masking themselves against the backdrop of the mountain ranges that dotted the northern section of the country.
"What are the chances that array spotted us?" Heimeroth's immediate wingman, Ofnir 3, pondered.
"They're meant to see things in orbit, not below the horizon. We're fine." Heimeroth replied. He noticed that much of the landscape was covered in a thin layer of snow. It wasn't even winter and things were already freezing over. Finally, some weather that he was familiar with. They powered on through. The target was a considerable distance inland and they weren't even a quarter of the way there. Slung under Heimeroth's wings were six S-25O large diameter rockets. Fitted with a fragmentation warhead, the rockets were the perfect weapon to target the large unarmoured radar arrays they were targeting. The rest of Ofnir were carrying similar weapons. Both they and Heimeroth also had a handful of R-73 and R-77 missiles for defense against opposing fighters.
As they came up on the target after fifteen minutes of low altitude flight, the two squadrons came up over a lake. Contrasting against the lake was a ring of mountains. On the ridgelines of this ring of mountains were two of the four target radar arrays.
"Tally arrays one and two." Ofnir 2 called out the obvious. At this point, the formation split into three distinct groups. Heimeroth and Ofnir 3 in group one who would strike arrays three and four further up the lake, Ofnir 2 and 4 who would be attacking arrays one and two in group three, and Nightwing Squadron who were about to pop up and begin jamming any radar emitters in the area.
"Ofnir 1, in." Heimeroth had his target set.
"Ofnir 2, in." Ofnir 2 and 4 lined up for the first two radar arrays.
"Nightwing, popping!" The electronic warfare aircraft nosed up and shot up in altitude. Heimeroth and his buddy moved across the lake and banked around the mountains. Their targets were on the ridgeline of another row of hills facing westwards. Heimeroth pressed a button under his HUD. The HUD went from navigation mode to ground attack mode with his rockets selected. Once he entered firing range, Heimeroth pitched up slightly, put the predicted impact marker over the radar dish and dump fired all six rockets.
"Ofnir 1, weapons away." Heimeroth announced as he banked away from the radar array.
"Ofnir 2, weapons away."
"Ofnir 4, weaps away."
"Ofnir 3, weapons away."
As Heimeroth turned away, he witnessed his specific target go up in a cloud of powdered snow, smoke and dirt. At least one of his rockets had hit its mark. Flying back over the lake, Heimeroth saw more rising smoke. His wingmen had hit their targets too.
"Good effect on target." Heimeroth reported. "Ofnir is withdrawing."
"Right behind you, Bitcher." Litwin replied. As Ofnir withdrew from the lake and disappeared into the mountains, Nightwing hopped off their perch and followed the fighters out. Their egress from the area was the same route they had used to ingress towards the target.
"Andrey, Andrey, Ofnir 1, good effect on target." Heimeroth broke radio silence to inform the carrier of their mission progress. "We are RTB at this time. Out."
"I hope nobody heard that." Litwin cautioned.
"Bah." Heimeroth dismissed Litwin's concerns. "By the time they triangulate that, we'll be safely home."
Heimeroth's statement would come to bite him up the ass. South of their position, two Osean-flagged Su-30s had been alerted to a raid and were on alert. Michael Krafte, the senior of the two, had no idea where to start looking until he had received a brief datalink spike north-east of their formation. He and his wingman lit their burners and turned north-east. Sure enough, the IRST systems of their Su-30OAs detected an eight-ship flight of Su-35s retreating west using the valleys and hills as cover. Krafte and his wingman slotted in behind the Yuktobanian fighters. None of them knew they were slotted in close to their six. Krafte slaved the seeker heads of his wingtip mounted AIM-9Xs to his IRST, locked up the two most rear fighters and fired.
"Corvid 1, fox 2."
"Corvid 3, fox 2."
At such close range and with no room to maneuver, the four rear fighters were easy pickings for the all-seeing Sidewinders. Boom, boom, boom, boom. All four members of Nightwing Squadron were blown out of the air without as much as a chance to react.
"Bitcher, behind-" Litwin managed to warn the Ofnir guys before her radio transmission was cut short by the impact of a Sidewinder up her Flanker's tailpipe. Heimeroth cranked his head back. He saw the four burning wrecks of Nightwing, and two Flankers rapidly pushing their rear through the smoke. Heimeroth drew back the throttle and flicked the stick back out of pure reflex. He was pulling a Cobra maneuver. Much to his own surprise, he wasn't immediately cut in half by a burst of cannon fire. The two Su-30s passed by Heimeroth. Ofnirs 2, 3 and 4 made an effort to evade by climbing out of the valley and gaining altitude to maneuver in. Litwin's final words had bought Ofnir enough warning to get them out of the line of death. Everyone except Ofnir 4.
"Mop, jink, jink!" Heimeroth yelled at the most junior member of the squad to evade incoming cannon fire. He didn't stand a chance with the distance between him and one of the Su-30OAs. One single concentrated burst lanced through Ofnir 4's aircraft from engine bay to cockpit, tearing through the pilot in the process. The burning aircraft fell out of the skies, its pilot little more than red paste.
"Fox 2, fox 2!" In retaliation, Heimeroth put an R-73 right up the ass of the guy who had shot out Ofnir 4. Much like how all of Nightwing Squadron had been obliterated by close range IR guided missiles, the first of the two offending Su-30s had no chance of evading at point blank range. Heimeroth's first R-73 blew the offending Osean apart. Rolling over so that the cockpit was facing the valleys below, Heimeroth looked over for the second Osean Flanker, gained a lock and fired a second Fox 2. The second Osean was too occupied attempting to put his nose over Ofnir 2 to notice the R-73 beaming right for him. Boom.
"Ofnir 1, splash two!" Heimeroth yelled. His heart was racing a mile a minute.
"Boss, I've got no eyes on chutes from Nightwing." Ofnir 3 informed Heimeroth of the fate of their escorting jammer buddies.
"Nothing we could do for them anyway." Heimeroth surmised. "Ofnir, drop alt, RTB."