1992 Mission Foreshadows bin Laden

By Chester Campbell

My wife is a sporadic daytime TV watcher. She switches it on and off frequently. Most of the time it's to check the Dow or see what's new in the news. For the past couple of days, there's been little in the news besides the Osama bin Laden demise. It will probably continue to dominate the talking heads for another week, or until some other significant event occurs.

Air Force MH-53J Pave Low III

For mystery/thriller writers, what happened in a small town in faraway Pakistan is the sort of thing that makes us salivate. A helicopter-borne special ops mission into a hostile environment makes great reading. It takes me back to a book I wrote in the early nineties, after the Cold War ended. This was the third book in a trilogy about a former FBI agent who takes on an assignment with a CIA spin-off. One of the main characters, however, was a former Air Force special operations helicopter pilot whose mission was tragically terminated through a general's miscue.

The story took place shortly after Desert Storm. It involved flying an MH-53J Pave Low III special operations helicopter from Kuwait up the mountainous spine of Iran to a small village in the Zagros Mountains. Using its terrain-following and terrain-avoidance radar, the chopper could be flown almost at tree-top level at night without being detected. The mission called for transporting an Army Delta Force team that would pick up a man and his family at a landing area marked by CIA operatives.

The President was under intense pressure to get some American hostages out of Lebanon, and the helicopter's key passenger would be Iran's chief liaison with the Lebanese terrorists. With his brother marked for execution by a hardline mullah, he had made contact with the CIA to arrange his defection. The operation had been carefully planned and rehearsed like the bin Laden mission, and it had been given presidential approval.

This was twenty years ago, before all the technological wizardry that allowed the White House Situation Room to monitor the bin Laden operation in real time. The chopper in my operation would maintain strict radio silence. The only communication with it would be a secure signal via a FLTSATCOM (U.S. Navy Fleet Satellite Communications System) satellite on a national command authority channel that would alert the Pave Low commander to any change in plans. However, after the mission was under way, a problem developed with the alternate channel and it was shifted to a different satellite. Because of an onerous personal problem, the Air Force Chief of Staff neglected to pass on that information to the helicopter crew. When the situation room received information that the mission had been compromised, it failed to reach the aircrew.

There's much more to the book, titled Overture to Disaster, which follows the Pave Low pilot after his recovery from the crash and court martial. In fact, there was so much more that I had to make a lot of cuts before its acceptance by a literary agency. Unfortunately, the agency left it on the shelf for a long time. When they finally sent it out, a Tor Forge editor liked it but said it was too dated.

Now that post Cold War novels are back in vogue, I think I'll put it on Amazon for the Kindle and Smashwords for everything else. Joe Konrath and Rob Walker have had great success going this route. With the bin Laden venture fresh on everyone's mind, it could be a timely move.

The Simpler Life

By Mark W. Danielson

The best thing about my flying job is being able to drop in on distant friends. I was recently able to visit my best buddy during a short LA layover. Dan and I grew up together, have known each other for fifty-four years, and every visit feels like old times. We did everything imaginable growing up, riding our bikes up and down the East SF Bay hills delivering The Richmond Independent, and when we finished, would race through Wildcat Canyon on what we called the “Inter-Canyon 500” to Tilden Park and other regional parks. My paper route had a particularly steep hill near its end that frequently had a radar cop parked near the bottom. My goal was to get stopped for speeding, but in spite of my many efforts at exceeding forty miles per hour in a twenty-five zone, it never happened.

In our early teens, Dan and I were either kayaking, sailing, or piloting sailplanes or airplanes. Steve Canyon was our hero, and Twelve O’Clock High was our favorite TV show. Dan soloed a glider at age 14, and we both soloed airplanes on our sixteenth birthdays. Dan’s dad was my flight instructor, doctor, and mentor. He bought a J-3 Cub so that Dan could build flying time, and I was fortunate to be included in that, too. Being two years older than Dan, I earned my license first, and the two of us flew a plane around Northern California, sleeping under the wing. Neither of us took anything for granted, and we worked hard for what we achieved. Although Dan had hoped to be a test pilot, his vision declined during college. Instead, he has had a remarkable thirty-three year career with Northrop Aviation, has designed nine civilian aerobatic airplanes as a side-line, was an aerobatic champion, and is a third degree black belt. I’ve had an equally successful thirty-nine year piloting career with the Air Force, Navy, and numerous civilian aviation positions. We are who we are because we had supportive parents and a thirst to achieve our dreams.

(Dan and his J-3 Cub. Me and our under-wing tent.)

A lot has changed since we were kids, though. Cell phones and personal computers keep inescapable pressure on kids and under-develop their minds. Instead of jumping off a fence with a pretend parachute, or building models as we did, they play video games, or chat electronically, all the while gaining weight from their lack of exercise. The President’s Physical Fitness program faded along with daily gym class. Kidnappings and random shootings have become far too common. One day, meaningful conversation between two people may even become extinct. But while today’s kids may not have the same opportunities as Dan and I, nothing says they can’t have dreams and work to achieve them.

Our Schwinn bikes riding gave Dan and I our independence. Not only did they get us around, they also taught us coordination, energy management, and geometry. To me, there is nothing better than seeing young kids riding bicycles. Two boys in my neighborhood are just like Dan and me, but they are the exception. It’s easy for me to make a value judgment, but instead, I’ll chock this up as the new reality.

Looking back, life was simpler when Dan and I were growing up. All we had to worry about was the Cold War, and remember to “duck and cover” when out teachers told us to. Perhaps because most moms stayed at home to raise their kids, we respected adults, and identified them as “Mr.” and Mrs.” Another difference is we were happy living with one TV, one phone, one family car, and ate meals at home.

Children today face many more challenges, and the pressure to be perfect is outlandish. The media portrays unrealistic lifestyles, and kids are bombarded with technological interference. While I view these changes wishing their lives could be simpler, I must realize that they aren’t complaining because their perspective is different from mine. In that regard, I suspect they will one day look back, and like me, wouldn’t change a thing about how they grew up.