The Hot Pilots (40 page)

“Colonel Steven Gold, may I present Captain Rivka Yakkov,” Benny said as both he and Steve stood up.

“Shalom, Colonel Gold,” Rivka said in thickly accented English. She offered Steve her hand. Her fingers only brushed his palm
before fluttering off like a bird thinking twice about landing. “I am pleased that we will be working together.”

“The pleasure’s mine, Captain.”

“Please, call me Rivka. I feel like I know you already, Colonel.” She nodded, setting her shoulder-length hair billowing in
chestnut waves that framed her heart-shaped face. “As Benny’s administrative assistant I have done much research concerning
your impressive career…”

“Research on me?” Steve smiled. “I’m flattered. Maybe you and I ought to go somewhere private for a one-on-one interview—?”

“Not necessary, Colonel,” she said evenly. “We will have ample time to talk while working together.”

“You’re going to be working with me?” Steve asked her, and then glanced at Benny.

“I’ll be in and out of Israel during your stay,” Benny explained. “I’ve got a life and a family to deal with back in America,
after all, so I’ve arranged for Rivka to be assigned as your assistant. Turn to her for anything you might need.”

“Hear that, Rivka?” Steve winked. “Your boss says anything I need …”

“I will certainly do my best, Colonel—” she replied, her wide-spaced, almond-shaped brown eyes revealing no sign that she
was aware he’d been flirting.

“Well, you can start by calling me Steve. Next on the agenda would be a set of wheels.”

“Pardon?” She looked questioningly at Benny, who machine-gunned some Hebrew her way.

“Oh yes! Of course! A car! I’m aware that your time will be spent here at the base, and at Air Force headquarters in Tel Aviv.
For that reason I found you housing—a flat—close to headquarters, and I have already arranged for a car.”

“Very efficient,” Steve complimented her. “But I hope the car you got me is something a little more sporty than Dov’s Mercedes
… Tell me, Rivka, do
you
like sports cars?”

She merely smiled politely, and then her eyes fell on Steve’s flight jacket draped over the back of his chair. She studied
the shield design. “Please? What is the significance of the vees—?”

“It stands for Vigilant Virgins,” Benny told her. “It was the nickname they gave our fighter squadron during World War Two.”

“But why in the world would they call you virgins?” she asked. Her eyes were large with amused curiosity, and this time a
genuine smile was playing at the corners of her pink rosebud mouth.

“It’s a long story,” Steve said. “I think I should tell it to you over dinner …”

Her smile broadened. “I think that I would do well with a jacket such as this,” she murmured, fixing Steve with her penetrating
stare, the pupils of her eyes grown so large that her gaze seemed almost black. “It would save a
lot
of men a lot of pointless effort.”

“Rat-tat-tat …” Benny chuckled softly.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me,” Rivka said. “I have work waiting.”

Steve watched her walk away, her rump working sleekly beneath the snug khaki. He waited until she was out of earshot, and
then asked, “Do you think she really is?”

“Is what?”

“A virgin.”

“I really couldn’t tell you,” Benny said, startled.

“I figured you Mossad guys knew everything.”

“There are some places even the Mossad doesn’t stick its nose.”

“Good idea, leave that to me.”

“You are a hound.” Benny laughed, shaking his head.

“Me?” Steve protested. “What about
you?
Don’t try to tell me you made her your assistant because she’s a great typist—”

“She’s no secretary. It so happens that Rivka received her degree in aeronautical engineering from the Israel Institute of
Technology. She’s my assistant because my main area of concern these days is Israel’s project to develop a homegrown jet fighter
largely based on the French Tyran II, but incorporating whatever international aviation technology is worthwhile.”

“Then that’s why she’s here?” Steve asked. “To see if there’s anything worthwhile copying from the MIG-21?”

“Yes, but as I said, she’s also here to assist you. She will be your liaison—and when necessary your interpreter—with the
rest of the Israeli air defense establishment. The two of you together should make an excellent MIG-21 evaluation team.”

“So there’s nothing between the two of you?”

“Have you been listening to a word I’ve been saying?” Benny frowned sternly.

“Sure, so she isn’t your mistress, or anything like that?” Steve persisted.

“In the first place, Amy knows Rivka,” Benny declared. “Not that I would cheat on my wife in the second place—”

“Okay!” Steve said, beaming. “Your loss is my gain.”

“I think the laugh is going to be on you.” Benny smiled.

“Wanna bet?”

Benny gestured toward Steve’s jacket still draped on the chair. “Rivka meant it when she said she ought to have a jacket like
this to ward off would-be Romeos. That young lady has shot down more guys than your old man’s wartime buddy the Red Baron.”

Steve flipped the MIG-21 over into a high G barrel roll, feeling the joyful push of the turbojet as he went to after-burn.
The altimeter read fifty thousand feet. Below him, Tel Aviv looked like a jumble of children’s building blocks scattered along
the sand-banded, blue curve of sea, while the land to the east was a tapestry of crimson and gold, flecked with green.

Well away from Steve, orbiting warily, were a pair of armed IAF Tyran IIs. The Mossad had warned that the loss of the MIG
had so infuriated the Russians and humiliated the Arabs that a surprise Arab air strike to destroy the airplane could not
be ruled out. The dun-colored Tyran Us were assigned to baby-sit Steve. They would hold the fort in case the Arabs somehow
managed to come in undetected by the Israelis’ extensive early warning system, and before the main force of Tyran IIs waiting
on deck could scramble.

Steve came out of the barrel roll at 55,000 feet, which was close to the MIG’s ceiling, and put the nimble little Russian
bird into a low-speed yo-yo, a steep dive that took the MIG to the limit by trading altitude for speed. As he watched his
altimeter unwind he felt the MIG rocketing earthward as solidly steady as a locomotive on a downhill stretch of track.

This was Steve’s forty-second flight in the MIG. During the weeks since he’d first made the proud Russian war bird’s acquaintance
he’d taken his time in wooing her. Patiently, carefully, he’d become only a little more forward on each flight, so that now
he felt that he knew all of her eccentricities; what liberties he could take and remain unscathed; what insults would earn
him a slap in the face … Or worse.

Now Steve felt he knew the MIG’s pure, simple pleasures. Due to her uncomplicated instrument panel, her lack of a HUD Head-Up-Display
beyond a weapons sight, or any sophisticated avionics at all, she was in many ways a throwback to an earlier, simpler time
in jet-propelled warfare.

That was not to say that this Russian artistocrat was perfect. He’d never quite gotten used to the MIG’s poor visibility in
air-to-ground mode due to her strange snout, and the almost total lack of rearward sight lines thanks to that flush-mounted
canopy…

He pulled out of his dive, moving the stick back between his legs and cobbing the throttle. The MIG climbed like a squirrel
up a tree. At 45,000 feet he leveled off, feeling a mix of exhilaration and sadness. This passionate affair between an American
fighter jock and a Russian war bird was fast coming to a close—

Very simply, the MIG had nothing left to tell him. All of her secrets had been revealed, as he and the Israelis now knew.

Last week Benny Detkin had returned to Israel from the United States. Just now Benny was waiting for Steve back at the base.
Benny had mentioned something about dinner in Tel Aviv this evening with some Israeli Air Force bigshots. Steve guessed that
this was going to be the Israelis’ way of letting him know that he’d overstayed his welcome; that it was time for him to go
home. Steve was sorry to see his visit here coming to an end. He loved to fly, and on this assignment he’d spent almost the
entire time in the air.

He had Rivka Yakkov to thank for that. As Benny had predicted, Rivka had been an outstanding assistant. Her engineering and
design savvy had nicely dovetailed with Steve’s hands-on experience. Together they’d created a thick folder of valuable MIG
specification/evaluation reports that had been regularly sent back to the Air Force.

Benny had been right about what a great team Steve and Rivka would make, and, sadly, Benny had been right about one other
thing, as well: No matter how hard Steve had tried, he hadn’t been able to get to first base with the beautiful Israeli …

Steve pushed his lewd fantasies about the girl out of his mind and tried to get his thoughts together about the MIG. Chances
were that at tonight’s farewell dinner the IAF brass would expect him to say a few words about what he’d learned.

The bottom line was that the MIG was an agile sports car of a fighter, but her lack of avionics put her at a distinct disadvantage
to the Tyran II. Like the MIG, the Israelis’ French-built Tyran II was delta-winged, small, and maneuverable, and the Tyran
IIs had also been just as limited by their lack of electronics—until GAT had come through with the Vector-A radar ranging
system. The Vector-A was the ace in the hole the vastly outnumbered IAF needed to have a shot at taking control of the sky
during a war.

Could the U.S. fighters currently rolling off the production line compete with the MIG-21?
This was the question that the USAAF would soon be asking him, and it wasn’t nearly as easy to answer, Steve thought as he
brought the Russian airplane around in a gentle banking turn toward the air base.

The American aviation establishment’s majority thesis was that one elaborately equipped state-of-the-art fighter could wax
any number of smaller, cheaper, less sophisticated enemy war birds. Steve wasn’t so sure about that. There was no question
that in a hypothetical, one-on-one duel with equally capable pilots in both cockpits, the MIG couldn’t touch anything currently
in the U.S. Air Force’s stable. The problem was that air wars weren’t decided by a single, gladiator-type duel. Wars were
won by getting lots of airplanes into the fray, and that required machine reliability.

Steve knew that you couldn’t judge a production line’s entire output by only one sample. For what it was worth, however, this
particular MIG had proven supremely reliable
despite
the punishment that Steve had unwittingly inflicted upon her by putting her through her paces without the benefit of flight
manuals or instructors. He couldn’t help comparing the MIG’s rock-solid reliability to that of the Thuds he’d flown in Vietnam.
The Thuds were always suffering downtime, or going negative on this or that piece of black box black magic just when it was
most needed, despite preventive maintenance …

Yeah, what it all came down to in a war was the ability to get your airplanes flying, and the caliber of the men in the cockpits
…

Steve glanced out at the pair of Tyran IIs flying escort.
Speaking of the caliber of men in the cockpits, since this is likely going to be my last time out with the MIG, why not have
a little fun?
he thought.

The Israelis had forbidden any mock dogfights between the MIG and Tyran IIs. They felt that their MIG was irreplaceable, which
was true, but Steve thought they were wrong about not wanting to take the rather unlikely risk of the MIG being damaged or
destroyed participating in the rough-and-tumble of a mock furball. The bottom line was the MIG was only as valuable as the
amount of knowledge concerning Soviet aircraft capabilities that could be wrung out of her. Steve could execute solo high-speed
maneuvers from now until doomsday, but it wouldn’t tell him as much as would a single dogfight up against some capable opponents.

Thinking about capable opponents, Steve reminded himself that the Tyran II drivers baby-sitting him were supposed to be as
good as the IAF’s. Steve guessed it was time to find out just
how good
. Chances were that they were going to have to prove themselves for
real
, sooner or later.

In the past few weeks there had been a gradual but steady increase in the number of border incidents between Israel and its
Arab neighbors. Even more ominous, IAF fighters defending the integrity of Israel’s airspace had on several occasions played
a tense game of chicken with Syrian and Egyptian jets. So far no shots had been fired in the sky, but Steve knew that it was
just a matter of time before one side or the other made a mistake, and the shooting did start. From his conversations with
Israelis Steve knew that most in this country were resigned to the fact that war was inevitable.

Steve had made some friends here. He wanted to know for his own peace of mind that the IAF jet rockets had what it took, but
there was another, more practical reason for his defying the Israeli Air Force authorities by using the MIG to engage in a
mock attack upon his Tyran II escorts. When Steve got back to the States he knew that the CIA and the Air Force would debrief
him on what he’d learned about the Israelis’ air combat capabilities. When that time came, Steve wanted to have the answers.

He brought the MIG up and around to gain some altitude, and get behind the unsuspecting Tyrans. He couldn’t warn the Israeli
pilots about what he was about to do. The MIG had been equipped with IAF communications gear, but Steve wasn’t allowed to
use it except in a dire emergency because he couldn’t speak Hebrew. The Israelis knew that the Arabs had Soviet personnel
operating high-tech/long-range surveillance equipment. If the Russians were to monitor Steve’s obviously American transmissions
coming from the MIG, international diplomatic hell would break loose.