Episode 44

Antonio B. Won Pat International Airport

United States Territory of Guam

The runways and taxiways of Guam’s only international airport looked more like an aircraft carrier than an airport. Planes were stacked in random corners, along taxiways, wherever they could fit. Planes constantly roared down 6L which was the only operational runway. 6R had been turned into a long skinny parking lot for tactical aircraft. A full squadron of F-22’s were lined up along with two squadrons of F-16’s. At all times a full squadron of F-16’s flew BARCAP over the largest (and least mobile) carrier in the pacific. Nothing like a couple of horses getting loose to ensure the barn door was fully closed and locked.

Civilian reaction to the attack had been polarized between “hold to the last man” and “get the fuck out of dodge.” Since all commercial flights had been immediately cancelled, the military had taken over transportation into and out of Guam. A line of chartered civilian aircraft were evacuating any civilians who wanted to leave to Hawaii under the careful supervision of the Guam National Guard (GU ARNG). They were in a foul mood after having their homeland attacked with no real way to defend themselves or strike back. Nobody wanted to mess with the grim eyed soldiers so the process was peaceful, if not terribly quick. With a population of 164,000 people, even a small percentage wanting to evacuate would strain the available air lift. Even a 747 could only accommodate about 400 people. A ten percent evacuation meant 16,000 people or over 40 747 flights.

This large scale civilian evacuation was going on at the same time as the USAF was attempting to urgently resupply the aircraft trapped on Guam with no real support. Andersen was off the air with most of the structures there including the critical refueling infrastructure down hard after the attack. The ammunition bunkers along with the nuclear weapons stocks were secure, but there was enough damage to the site that there was no way the big aircraft like the P-8’s and E-3’s would get in there. The one thing that Won Pat had which the military desperately needed was fuel. Millions of gallons of Jet A-1 were sitting there in the tank farm, ready to go. It was similar enough to JP-8 that they could just gas up and go.

Captain Travers kept a nervous eye on the civilians currently refueling her bird. While she was sure they had refueled thousands of 737’s in the past, she was pretty sure none of them had Harpoon missiles hanging off the wings like hers did at the moment. With no ground support, she had no easy way to remove them or fix any fittings which might be broken during refueling. With who knows what going on in the Pacific, she really didn’t want to take any weapons off her plane anyway.

“Ping Pong? Is that you?”

An Air Force Major was walking towards her, waving. “Tex? What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were in Virginia with the first?”

Ewing walked over and gave her a distinctly non-military hug. “Good to see you Ping Pong. We went TDY as soon as this nonsense started. We’ve been in Japan, but got called down here just before all hell broke loose. Painted a couple of cruise missiles on the old girl.” Ever the fighter pilot, Ewing knew exactly how many air to air kills he had.

Travers smiled and silently pointed to the large silhouette of a submarine that her crew chief and hastily painted on the nose of the Poseidon. She had no idea where the paint had come from, but she didn’t even attempt to stop him or ask where it had come from. Some things had to be done.

“Damn Ping Pong! Is that the first kill for a P-8? Not bad for a flying squid!”

“Back off Tex, I can still take you one on one.”

Ewing held up a placating hand in mock surrender. Many of their fellow students at the Defense Language Institute in Monterrey had learned the hard way not to challenge Travers on the Judo mat. Ewing among them. “Down girl. I’m happy for you. I’ve just been given a forced stand down order. No flying for twenty four hours. I’m planing to find out how much scotch they have at this airport.”

Travers shook her head. “Yeah, I got the same order. Two P-8’s just arrived from Whidbey and we are dark for twenty four hours minimum. I am already way over my flight limit.”

“Then, come with me.”

“I was planning to stay with my bird, make sure we are ready to go, just in case.”

Ewing gently took her by the upper arm and guided her away from her enlisted crew. “Ping Pong, this is a marathon, not a sprint. Take your downtime, get drunk, get laid, whatever it is you need to do. Otherwise, the stress will eat you alive. Don’t do it just for yourself, set an example for your crew. Fight hard, play hard, it’s the only way they will stay sane long term. Take some advice from an old man.”

“Old man? What are you, thirty five?”

“It’s not the years, it’s the miles, sister.”

Travers had to laugh at that one. She turned back to the CPO overseeing the refeuling. “Chief, finish up here and make sure the crew gets some down time. Keep two back to watch the plane, but make sure everyone gets time off.”

“Will do Captain. Same for you, I hope.”

“Yes, standing down now.” She walked back to were Ewing was waiting for her. “OK Tex, lead on.”

Guam Air National Guard 254th REDHORSE Squadron

United States Territory of Guam

“Any word from the 554th?”

“No Major. Andersen is off the air. Only SAR is answering.”

Major Aguan scowled. His REDHORSE (Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineers) squadron was supposed to mate up with the 554th active duty squadron when called up. While the governor had already declared martial law and all the guard and reserve units on Guam had already been called up, Aguan hadn’t received any orders yet. A Chamorro (a member of the indigenous people of the Mariana Islands including Guam) he had been born and raised on Guam, Aguan had joined the reserves after getting his Civil Engineering degree at CalTech Pomona. His normal day job was building roads and bridges. Well, one thing was for sure, Andersen needed rebuilding and his team could to that.

“Get the squadron mounted up. I want to be on site in one hour.”

Ironically, Guam was the only place in the Pacific with an active REDHORSE squadron. For this reason, the Air National Guard unit here had also been converted over to REDHORSE in 2008. This gave them a local ability to build and repair airfields that didn’t exist for any other Pacific Island, not even Hawaii. Usually, their training revolved around being air dropped onto remote islands to build up temporary infrastructure. He didn’t expect to be driving to his first combat assignment.

As the collection of trucks, graders and other equipment formed up, they quickly started rolling down Highway 16 towards Andersen. Local traffic melted away for the passing motor vehicles like the tide going out. Luckily, the civilian areas of Guam had been largely spared in the attack. His entire squadron had reported in within sixty minutes.

They didn’t see much destruction until they turned right onto Andersen’s main drive off of Highway 1. They could see columns of smoke and some craters from near misses. As they rolled onto the base, a squad of Airmen clutching M-4’s guarded the main gate which they had blockaded with Hummers.

“Out of the way son, REDHORSE is here.”

The Sergeant leading the airmen stood to attention and snapped off a fairly respectable salute. “Sir, glad to see you. The base CO is dead. Comms are down to just handhelds, no phones or sat comms. Captain Peters has a forward CP just before the flight line, you’ll see the Hesco barriers there. Most of the fires are out at this point, but nobody knows when we can resume air ops.”

“Thank you Sergeant. We’ll see about that shortly.”

As the convoy rolled through the gates, the first thing Aguan noticed was the temporary morgue. Rows of body bags had been lined up, ready for identification and rendition to the USA. It was something that he had to expect given all the damage to the base, but something he hadn’t allowed himself to think about. It took a firm act of will for Aguan to take his eyes off that awful sight. The only way you can help them now is to get their airfield back in business. Get to it!