0907 Monday 11 July 1994
Kadena Air Base
Okinawa, Japan
You must always be able to predict what’s next and then have the flexibility to evolve.
—MARC BENIOFF, AMERICAN ENTREPRENEUR AND PHILANTHROPIST
Air power is indivisible. If you split it up into compartments, you merely pull it to pieces and destroy its greatest asset, its flexibility.
—BERNARD MONTGOMERY, BRITISH FIELD MARSHAL AND VISCOUNT OF ALAMEIN
Gentlemen, when the enemy is committed to a mistake we must not interrupt him too soon.
—VISCOUNT HORATIO NELSON, COMMANDER OF THE ENGLISH FLEET
The first week of July 1994 was hot and humid on the island, just like every summer in the tropics. Young Tiger Tankers continued flying strategic, operational, and tactical missions throughout the Pacific Rim. All of us looked forward to the Fourth of July after a short workweek, with Kadena shutting down for the annual airshow. An 18 Wing Intel troop walked into our Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF), the bank vault–like area we worked in Friday afternoon, Pacific Air Forces or PACAF message in hand. North Korean state radio and TV had announced that the nation’s Dear Leader of fifty years had passed away in the middle of the night. North Korea’s only television station showed Kim Il-sung’s body lying in state. All of us knew his son Kim Jong-il, whom we called “the Chonger,” was his designated successor because his dad had announced it over a year earlier. During one of the broadcasts from Pyongyang, the Chonger announced his father’s funeral plans. In one of his typical rants, the Chonger stated that his father’s funeral would be in Seoul. The only problem was that Kim Jong-il didn’t own Seoul.
None of us knew what the Chonger meant by saying he would bury his dad in Seoul, South Korea. The second question all of us asked was what to prepare for in case he tried. All of us in Weapons and Tactics or DOT were extremely familiar with the war plans in case North Korea invaded South Korea. But what if Kim Jong-il slowly ratcheted up the pressure over time? We didn’t know what to prepare for that Friday afternoon. I had been looking forward to a weekend at Kadena Marina, a local beach, with my wife, Val, and my children, Rachel, Ryan, and eight-month-old Jeffrey. But I knew a phone call might be coming, along the lines of “Time to make the doughnuts!”
It did not take long to find out what the North Koreans meant. There was a checklist of indications and warnings leaders in Hawaii used as a baseline for gauging North Korean intentions. Intelligence analysts told us North Korean military warnings increased every couple of hours. The North Korean military was gearing up for something big. The one item grabbing everyone’s attention was the North Korean Special Operation Force dispersing.
Sometime Saturday morning, PACAF headquarters issued their warning order to prepare for operations. The order tasked the USS Independence battle group to begin sailing to the South Korean peninsula. Indy’s CAG 5 required Young Tiger tankers for support. Increasing our situational awareness, RC-135 Rivet Joint and U-2 reconnaissance aircraft missions rose. Included in this warning order was a statement instructing the 18th Wing to prepare for defensive counter air missions over South Korea. Defensive Counter-Air, or DCA, patrols over South Korea meant lots of tankers. To maintain a twenty-four-hour F-15 CAP requires eighteen KC-135R sorties. If the Eagles engaged, tanker missions would increase to twenty-two to twenty-four sorties in a twenty-four-hour period. If an F-15 engaged enemy aircraft, the first things coming off the Eagle jets would be the external fuel tanks. The ability to carry four thousand more pounds of fuel would immediately leave the airplane at the start of any air-to-air engagements. PACAF’s order stated that F-15s and their support must be ready by 9:00 a.m. on Monday 11 July. My DOT boss T-Mac’s phone call Saturday at lunchtime was my invitation to join the DOT planning party in the Vault. He could not tell me what was happening over the phone, but I already knew. By that afternoon we still didn’t know what F-15 support would look like, so we started with an assumption of twelve-ship packages of Eagles in three CAP stations near the DMZ.
On Sunday morning Val left for church with the kids, and I walked out the door in a flight suit bound for the Vault. The solution we came up with was to fly the twelve-ship formation of F-15s with two airborne spares to the Korean peninsula, taking off at 0900 and 1600 Monday. Spitter, our DOT weapons controller, would leave in the AWACS forty-five minutes before the Eagles, and the RC-135 Rivet Joint would go thirty minutes prior. AWACS and Rivet Joint need refueling every five hours, using up four KC-135s. We devised a communications-out launch plan for all seventeen airplanes to silently leave Kadena. Everyone would take off when the control tower shined a green light at us. Four of us calculated the rejoin time, hinging on the third tanker’s takeoff and climb out. Boom operators would immediately drop their booms to test all fourteen Eagles’ refueling systems. Any Eagle not capable of taking on gas would return to base, and one of the airborne spares filled the hole. Intelligence reported a Russian fishing trawler or spy ship sailing north of Okinawa. We knew the Russian trawler would send any indication of activity at Kadena straight to the Chonger in Pyongyang.
The next three-ship of Young Tiger tankers would relieve the first cell as it passed Cheju-Do Island. Eagles maintain a three-hour vulnerable time, meaning tank-fight-tank-fight-tank-fight and then come home with another three-ship cell of tankers meeting over central South Korea. Fourteen Dirty Dozen Eagles would accomplish the same sequence beginning at 1600 Monday afternoon, arriving in South Korea after sunset. Every aircraft movement had a definite time, so none of us had to talk on the radio. PACAF’s order stated that Shogun Wing’s air superiority packages would defend South Korea twice a day every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, with no end date given. Nine tankers a day, three times a week for the foreseeable future would run the Young Tiger squadron out of annual flying hours.
PACAF ordered F-117 stealth fighters to deploy from the US at the same time. F-15E Strike Eagles and A-10 Warthogs based in Alaska would arrive in South Korea on Monday. Doug, my counterpart in Wing Scheduling, had the task of creating an air bridge from the States to the South Korean bases. Doug sent three KC-135s to Misawa, leaving the squadron with only twelve jets at home. Marine Air Group F/A-18 Hornets would move forward to the Korean peninsula also. All of these movements were to happen in the next seventy-two hours. PACAF’s mini air campaign to keep Kim Jong-il from doing something stupid shaped up nicely through Sunday afternoon. Before leaving, Doug scheduled me on the first tanker out on Monday morning as a passenger, not a flier. The 67th Fighting Cocks were tagged with the first Monday-morning missions. The 12th Dirty Dozen Eagle Squadron filled the afternoon go at 1600. Even though I was a passenger on the first tanker, regulations require twelve hours of crew rest. I walked in the door just before 1900 Sunday night.
Monday morning’s pre-mission mass brief emphasized the rules of engagement. Twenty-millimeter training rounds filled the guns, and that was all the Eagles were taking. The large Eagle fighter package was a show of force, not an in-your-face MiG sweep. WeeBee led the Eagle mission brief, and Spitter finished up on command and controlling the force. Fourteen Eagles made up the BLOWN flight: BLOWN 21 through 24, BLOWN 31 through 34, and BLOWN 41 through 44, with two additional air spares. The BLOWN call sign came right out of the Pentagon call sign book. All of us wished there were a sexier or more manly name for the event, but DoD call signs wouldn’t allow it. At least it wasn’t something embarrassing, like FLOWER. My good buddy Tazz was BLOWN 23, WeeBee’s second element leader. Bigs, the ops group commander, had a few words to end the mass brief. His message to the force was: “Don’t do anything stupid—let the Chonger do that. We don’t want this to escalate.”
Twenty minutes before 0900, Alan, the pilot for my flight, pushed the throttles up and we taxied out of our parking stub. As we turned right onto the taxiway, our crew could see across both runways. Fourteen F-15s taxied down the opposite taxiway toward runway 5 right, each one loaded with three external fuel tanks. To accomplish end-of-runway checks, seven Eagles taxied across the runway into another arming area. At three minutes to 0900, WeeBee taxied his four F-15s onto the runway, the second four-ship right behind them. The third four-ship waited between the runways as the two air spares moved closer to runway 5 right.
At exactly 0900 on Monday 11 July 1994, WeeBee observed a green light from Kadena Tower. I was surprised how bright the light was from over a mile away. WeeBee’s exhaust nozzles opened wide as each engine went into full afterburner. The F-15s began their takeoff rolls every twelve seconds. The sights and sounds of fourteen F-15s taking off in afterburner are something you never forget. The last departing F-15 air spare brought his gear and flaps up and made an aggressive left turn out of traffic right in front of us while we sat on runway 5 left. Alan had taxied onto the runway when WeeBee blasted off. Looking northwest out Alan’s window, we could see all the F-15s formed up into three groups.
And we waited.
My Wing Tactics F-15 counterpart Redeye calculated that the Eagles took approximately seven minutes to get the four-ship airborne, fly around the radar traffic pattern, and reach the five-mile initial point. As the cockpit FMS clock showed 00:07:00 Zulu time, Alan’s crew began looking for the tower’s green light. The light gun signal was clearly visible from the cockpit. Alan pushed the throttles up and released the brakes at 0907 on the clock. The jet strained in the heat to get 322,000 pounds airborne. On runway heading at 2,300 feet and three miles from the Kadena TACAN, I looked out the window behind Alan’s seat. Tazz and his wingman were just pulling into position on the left wing. Crawling over to the right window behind Alan’s copilot, I saw WeeBee and his wingman tucked in under the right wing. Alan’s boom lay in the boom pod for takeoff—normally a regulation no-no, but escorting fourteen Eagles was not a Stateside training mission. I captured one Eagle refueling low over Okinawa with my camera, and the Pacific Ocean did not disappoint; it was a gorgeous turquois blue around the island. Each F-15 cycled through, receiving about two thousand pounds before getting a pressure disconnect as we passed over the smaller Ryukyu Islands north of Kadena. All four of WeeBee’s F-15s plus an airborne spare checked good for refueling systems. At the predetermined point north of the island, the two airborne spare Eagles peeled off and returned to Kadena.
And Naha Air Traffic Control made a strange radio call.
“KOBE 51 flight, how many in your formation?”
Bigs had been adamant in the mass brief that none of us say how many jets were in formation. If anyone asked KOBE 51 flight how many aircraft were in our formation, the reply should be “As filed.”
The copilot radioed, “Naha, KOBE 51 flight as filed.”
The Japanese controller did not like the answer. Being close to the island, he must have seen more aircraft than just three tankers. He probably saw the F-15s do a lap around the radar pattern, and the fourteen F-15 radar blips merge with our tankers during climb out.
“KOBE 51 flight, Naha—say how many in formation?”
He probably thought the Americans were being sneaky again.
“Naha, KOBE 51 flight, as filed.”
The copilot looked over at me. “What do you want me to do if he asks again?”
I told him what our instructions were. “You tell him KOBE 51 is as filed, and if he asks you again, stop answering.”
I told them it would be okay—let the ops group figure it out after we landed. Bigs would take care of us. We had to hide from the Russian spy trawler north of the island.
Leveling off at twenty-eight thousand feet, all four F-15s remained close to our wings until we were out of Naha’s radar coverage. As soon as we passed that point, all the Eagles spread out into tactical formation.
Every fighter pilot thinks tankers purposefully fly formations through clouds. Tazz has always chided me that there could be a single cloud out in front of the tankers, and we would turn to take the formation right through it. Of course, this wasn’t true; I may have skirted the cloud to see if Tazz was paying attention, though. But Tazz sure gave me a hard time about it from his cockpit perch under our wing. North of the island, some high cirrus clouds stretched across our route. Alan made no attempt to alter course. I looked out the window to see Tazz and his wingman slide in close. I knew Tazz would have some words for me because he held up his left hand and wagged his index finger back and forth at me.
The boom operators left their booms down and ready to refuel all the way to Korea, and the F-15s randomly plugged in as we pressed north. Approaching the South Korean peninsula, the Eagles moved in tight again to appear as one big blob on North Korea’s long-range early warning radar. As we arrived at the drop-off point, Tazz and his wingman seemed to be underneath the wings, right next to the outboard engines. WeeBee briefed us that all Eagles would explode off the tanker wings into their CAP stations when crossing a certain point in central South Korea. As we passed over the point, WeeBee made BLOWN flight’s first radio call: “BLOWNS, PUSH BLACK ONE NOW!”
All twelve Eagles fanned out from under the tankers’ wings and rose to their CAP locations south of the Korean DMZ. Kneeling down behind Alan’s seat, I watched Tazz and his wingman select afterburner and climb to their CAP stations above the tankers. Farther behind us, two more Eagles appeared off KOBE 52, and then two more off KOBE 53, all in burner and climbing. Later, during the debrief, we learned that when all the Eagles came off our wings, every radar in southern North Korea turned on and illuminated the formation. Tazz’s afterburner departure off KOBE 51’s wing was the predetermined action point for all three KC-135s to return home. Right on schedule over Cheju-Do Island, our relief tankers in the KOBE 61 flight passed two thousand feet to our right and below us. The refueling plan I had created for WeeBee and his BLOWN flight of Eagles was executed perfectly. At 1235 Monday afternoon, KOBE 51’s main wheels touched down on runway 5 left.
My day wasn’t finished, as another air superiority package would depart at 1600. Habu Hill offers a direct line of sight to Kadena’s control tower and the green light to both ends of runway 5. The afternoon launch went off just like the morning’s—perfect. Even the timing was dead nuts on. Watching fourteen F-15 Eagles take off in afterburner is spectacular and deafening in the waning sunlight of the afternoon. As the F-15s turned five miles from the end of the runway, all three KC-135s launched thirty seconds apart. A lot of Eagle drivers, tanker aircrews, and weapons controllers had parked on Habu Hill to watch the afternoon go. There were a few minor things Weapons and Tactics had to refine in some of the refueling plans, but all tanker crews reported that everything went off just as planned.
The Shogun Wing flew the same schedule on Wednesday 13 July. The 44th Fighter Squadron Vampires flew the morning go, Stump leading the fourteen Eagles down from the upper fighter ramp. The Dirty Dozen flew the nighttime vulnerable period again, Jay Ray leading the formation. The Dirty Dozen had the most experience in the newly upgraded Eagles, so Skeet’s squadron would always fly the night missions. After Friday’s launches, Wing Scheduling noticed a problem. Kim CAPs were soaking up a lot of tanker sorties and flying hours. Nine tankers supported one three-hour vulnerable period. Three KC-135s dragged the Eagle twelve-ship to Korea, three others kept them in their CAPs, and three more tankers dragged them home from the Korean peninsula. The fuel bill was the same for the afternoon go. Each day the Shoguns flew the Kim CAP missions, eighteen KC-135s consumed 3.2 million pounds of gas a day escorting twenty-four Eagles back and forth to South Korea. BRIGHAM AWACS and the Rivet Joint required three more KC-135 sorties. F-16 Vipers from Osan and Kunsan Air Bases also needed gas on some missions. If this operational tempo continued, the 909th would exhaust its annual flying hours before August, two months short of the end of the DOD fiscal year. PACAF ordered us to keep going.
The three tankers supporting the air bridge of fighters from the States also stayed busy. F-15E Strike Eagles from Elmendorf outside Anchorage and A-10s from Eielson near Fairbanks deployed to South Korea on Wednesday 13 July. Stealth fighters arrived at Kunsan Air Base a day later. F-117 Black Jets showing up in the region sent a very clear and powerful message to Kim Jong-il: the low observable aircraft are here and flying. The Black Jets operated only after 2100. Two tankers flying in cell formation supported the F-117s by orbiting in the training areas over the Yellow Sea. The Black Jets showed back up about thirty to thirty-five minutes later for a mid-mission refueling. The Rivet Joint kept up its busy schedule, flying other high-priority missions throughout the Pacific Rim, which 909th KC-135s had to support with two aircraft, a primary and a manned spare. This mini air campaign continued for two weeks.
The Young Tigers were exhausted, running out of flight hours and then aircraft to cover the schedule. At the same time, we were doing what we all loved. Toward the end of the second week, Kim Jong-il made the decision that burying his dad, and making any other funeral arrangements, in Seoul had too high a cost. I’m sure the US government used other diplomatic, informational, and possibly economic sanctions against the North Korean government, but I think it was seeing walls of Eagles twice a day every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday over South Korea that gave Kim Jong-il reason to rethink his father’s funeral plans.
PACAF headquarters sent a message bringing the Kim CAPs to an end on 25 July, two weeks after we had started the show-of-force exercise. Strike Eagles, Warthogs, and stealth fighters returned to the States behind KC-10s refilled in the air by KC-135s. Events in Korea, plus other real-world missions, ran the 909th out of annual flying hours at the end of July. 18 Wing Commander General Cliver sent a message to PACAF headquarters stating that he would lock the tanker squadron’s doors on 31 July. PACAF reluctantly gave General Cliver additional flying hours to cover the added sorties. Doug took a computer product to PACAF headquarters with refueling taskings the 909th was ordered to fly without additional flight time. Taking the computer paper by the top edges, Doug tossed it across the floor. A six-foot-long exposé on over 220 additional taskings unfolded. PACAF found additional flying hours out of some bucket, but the 909th almost ran out of those before October, the end of the fiscal year. The flying tempo just did not let up that summer.
Visiting San Antonio recently for a baby christening, Doug, Shadow (a 909th boom operator), and I had breakfast at a diner near the airport. All three of us talked about how exhausted we had been at the end of those two weeks: Doug running the air bridge delivering fighters and attack aircraft, and Shadow lying in the boom pod and reaching out and touching BRIGHAM AWACS, F-15s, F-16s, F-117s, and Carrier Air Wing 5 Tomcats and Hornets. Redeye and I refined tactics and procedures used by the Shogun Wing to hide operations and coordinate mission timing, and we read all the intelligence reports generated by Eagles CAPing so close to the DMZ.
Even though all of us were tired, involvement in these critical missions gave us tremendous job satisfaction. US airpower kept a deranged enemy and his forces from invading South Korea without firing a shot. Months later, the Chonger implemented a different method to intimidate the Pacific Rim by firing ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan. One test missile flew over Misawa Air Base, which concerned us. Additional contingency plans were created to monitor the Chonger’s missile ambitions, including shooting them down if they were headed in the wrong direction. All plans required Young Tiger tanker support, exacerbating our flying-hour problem. But I was introduced to some of the Navy’s capabilities, which assured me that my family would remain safe in Okinawa.
The events of July 1994 illustrated the flexibility and dominance airpower had on an adversary. 18th Wing AWACS, fighters, and tankers went from zero to five hundred knots at the speed of a newscast. Using regional plans as our baseline, T-Mac’s Weapons and Tactics shop created a flexible defensive counter air plan to defend South Korea from invasion. Within a few hours of notification, Doug coordinated the construction of an air bridge with AMC’s Tanker Airlift Control Center to deliver A-10s, F-15Es, and F-117 stealth fighters from the States across the planet’s largest ocean. Airpower’s inherent flexibility gave national and military leaders options, which we’re seeing used now in the news as North Korea launches more ballistic missiles. Flexible deterrent options and our show of force kept North Korean leaders from continuing with their funeral plans and averted a catastrophic war. Kim Jong-il would just have to bury his father somewhere closer to home.
The key to airpower is its flexibility. It gives national and military leaders options to choose from as a situation develops. Recent news broadcasts have illustrated the volatility of financial markets around the world. In the business world, leaders create business and financial plans with the flexibility to adapt to changing environments. The military has a term for these flexible plans; we call them branches and sequels. Business plans developed with branches and sequels reduce risk, because leaders have flexible options for when the market takes off in different directions.