An Excerpt from – SALIM MUST DIE - by Mukul Deva

2336 HOURS. HATZERIM AIRBASE, NEGEV DESERT, ISRAEL.

The hideous scream of engines drowned out everything. All vestiges of silence were destroyed as the crescendo of sound mounted to an earthshaking roar. A series of thunderclaps shattered the night as afterburners kicked in. The flight of four fighters slashed down the runaway in pairs. Lifting off the runaway in meticulous unison the four F-16Is clawed their way into the coal black night. Silence returned with equal suddenness as they receded into the darkness.

Codenamed Sufa (Storm) by the Israeli Air Force, the heavily modified F-16I with massive conformal fuel tanks has a combat radius of approximately 2100 kilometres. The highly versatile aircraft is a deadly fighting machine capable of functioning in the most intensive warfare scenarios. It carries on board an amazing array of weapons that can wreak mind numbing destruction. That particular evening the four aircraft of the 69th Squadron of the Israeli Air Force was carrying a highly specialized weapons load. The squadron also known as The Hammers had seen more than its fair share of action since it was formed in 1948. Leading the fighters tonight was their squadron commander, Ilan Yarkoni, a man with more than a few combat sorties under his belt.

Tonight was definitely not the first time that military aircraft had taken to the skies with nuclear weapons since that fateful day in August 1945 when the nuclear bomb named Little Boy (a gun-type fission weapon with 60 kilograms of Uranium-235 that had a blast equivalent of about 13 kilotons of TNT) was dropped over Hiroshima from a B-29 plane piloted by Colonel Paul Tibbets of the American 509 Composite Group. Ironically enough this plane had been nicknamed Enola Gay after Tibbets’ mother. The bomb it dropped that day would leave many children motherless and many mothers childless.

However tonight was the first time since those horrendous days that these weapons were again being carried with a firm, committed resolve to put them to use.
All four F-16s attained cruising height and leveled out. They were following a carefully and skillfully plotted course. None of the men who rode in those metallic monsters of destruction had any doubts about what awaited them as they sliced through the still, dark night. Standing between them and their destination was a deadly cordon of metal and fire. If any of them had been the betting kind they would not have put any money on their chances of returning home alive.
I just hope we are able to complete the mission. Ilan shrugged away the thought as he settled deeper into the seat. We have to… failure is not an option. Not once did it strike him that this thought was as futile as the act he was going to commit. But then one could not really blame the man. After all he had been conditioned by the hundred of years of persecution that Jews have faced; which automatically lent a kill-or-be-killed tint to everything that they encountered or embarked upon. Not once did it strike them, or him, that they too could be wrong.
Nineteen minutes later.

‘Sierra Tango (Strike Team), you’re now approaching merger point. Four minutes and closing.’ The coded transmission from the unknown controller hundreds of miles away crackled into the headphones of the four flying fighters. None of them bothered to reply. Strict radio silence was in place. Senses sharpened and eyes homed in on their instrument panels. Sure enough, a few seconds later the large, unsuspecting target appeared on their screens. A bit later it hove into view. With its strobe lights flashing majestically, the massive passenger aircraft was proceeding sedately along the expected path.

The four fighters closed ranks and came together in a tight, diamond formation. As one they angled sharply up and towards the right. Four minutes later they were perfectly in position.
‘Sierra Tango you are radar negative now. Hold steady.’

Another twenty-seven minutes later the point of no return was crossed and the four Israeli aircrafts had entered enemy airspace. The strike had begun.
The dice had now been irrevocably cast. Once again the spectre of nuclear weapons had returned to haunt humanity.

Lufthansa Flight LH-600 had taken off from Frankfurt Airport at 1802 hours, just two minutes behind schedule. The pilot hoped to make up the two minutes during the flight to ensure it reached at the stipulated time of 0125 hours. The flight was executed with Teutonic efficiency and proceeding without incident. The Boeing 340 was cruising smoothly at an altitude of about 30000 feet.

There were exactly 187 passengers on board. This included eighty-three women and sixteen children. Keeping in view the late hour and the fact that the dinner had lived up to Lufthansa’s exemplary culinary standards most of them were fast asleep though a few flirted with the in-flight movies. In any case it is very certain that none of them were aware of the four Israeli F-16’s, which were now flying in the shadow of the huge jet. All four Israeli fighters were flying in a dense pack immediately below the jetliner. This ensured that their radar profiles 

merged with that of the Lufthansa jetliner.
Eighteen minutes into enemy airspace.
‘Sierra Tango, time to hit the deck.’ The unseen controller rapped out the command.

There was just an infinitesimal pause. Then, as one, the jet pack broke cover. Falling away from the jetliner the four fighters fell into a steep dive angling away to the right. A huge whack of adrenaline slithered into their systems, jolting the men flying those deadly tubes of destruction.
Their journey into the jaws of death had begun.

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