Free Dragon Sim-13 by 1959- Bob Mayer Page B

at night almost as if it were daylight.
    Young was strapping down the pallet when several people climbed up into the aircraft through the front left crew door. Kent followed them up the short ladder that led into the cockpit.
     
    He introduced himself to the airplane commander. "I'm your new EW chief, Ed Kent."
    The pilot didn't seem too cheerful. "I'm Lieutenant Colonel Riggins. This is Major Bailey, the copilot. The navigator is still doing final flight planning over at base ops. You should meet Captain Bradley, the junior electronics warfare officer, in the back just before takeoff. You gentlemen might as well head on back and get comfortable. We've got a long flight on up to Korea."
    Yongsan, Seoul, Republic of Korea Friday, 2 June, 1700 Zulu Saturday, 3 June, 2:00 a.m. Local
    Riley had tracked down most of the team. He had them start loading out their gear into the two-and-a-half-ton truck that Sergeant Major Hooker had commandeered. Then he went in search of Colonel Hossey. He found the Old Man in his office.
    "You got everyone, Dave?"
    "No, sir. Comsky and Lalli are still missing, but I left Devito downtown looking for them. I think he'll find them unless they've already hooked up with a couple of bar girls and are spending the night somewhere."
    Hossey nodded. He handed over the message that had started the alert.
    Riley frowned as he read it. "What the hell is Typhoon 17 Alpha, sir?"
    Hossey pulled out a folder with Top Secret stamped on it. "Part of our war plan. It's a direct action mission into China."
    Riley considered that. "Is this for real?"
    "I don't know," Hossey shrugged. "The authorization code is real. The oplan is real. My best guess is that it's just a readiness exercise, but I don't want to take any chances. By the way, on this operation USSOCOM cuts Eighth Army and our army SOCOM out of the chain of command."
    Riley was confused. "Can they do that, sir?"
    "Yes. On strategic missions we're the regional reaction force. We work directly for the National Command Authority under those circumstances. You guys on the teams haven't been involved in it yet.
     
    It's just been me and the S-3 shop war-gaming and working out proposed missions like this one for various scenarios we've been sent by the USSOCOM's G-3 section." Hossey handed Riley the mission folder. "But you're going to be involved now.
    "I say you because, as you've already guessed, I've picked you to be team sergeant for this deal." Lieutenant Colonel Hossey peered closely at Riley to see if his announcement got any reaction.
    Riley had already figured that one out when he'd noticed that none of the other teams had been alerted. Riley had done many strange things in Special Forces (SF). He'd take this one step at a time. "And the rest of the team, sir? How do you want to work that?"
    The twelve-man Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha (ODA), or A Team, was the core of Special Forces. Colonel Hossey had five teams in DET-K to choose from. None of the teams was up to authorized strength with twelve bodies, so whenever a mission requiring a full team came down, they pulled members off other teams to fill up the deploying one. Riley knew that Hossey had a couple of options. He could cannibalize all the teams in DET-K to pick the twelve best soldiers, or he could simply fill out Riley's team with two more bodies.
    "Well, Dave, I thought I would humbly ask your opinion, seeing as you're the one who's going to have to live with it. I think you know my opinion on composite teams. I didn't like them in Vietnam and now that I'm in command, I'd prefer not to do that now. Plus, I don't have the time or the inclination to be pulling everyone in. I didn't want to alert the other teams because of security."
    Riley and Hossey had discussed the concept of composite teams several times in the past. Hossey felt that esprit and cohesiveness, buzzwords that he truly believed in, were more important than having twelve outstanding individuals. Riley agreed with