Chapter 8: The Magnificent Bombing

  As the huge fireball erupted in the sky ahead, Lt. Col. Iftach Spector and Capt. Ilan Ramon were flying their F-16 at the back of the entire formation.

  When he heard Nahumi's urgent voice coming from the headphones: "There is an enemy anti-aircraft position ahead, climb immediately, climb immediately!" Yiftach was still several thousand meters away from Nahumi.

  It wasn't that Yevtushenko deliberately fell behind, but he had to occasionally wipe his large, Jewish nose with his hand. In order to keep his brain clear, he hadn't taken any cold medicine, and now, after a long flight, he finally couldn't hold out anymore, the stuff in his nose started flowing out uncontrollably, and he had to use his hand to help.

  This way, he couldn't maintain a tight formation, and yet he couldn't break radio silence either. So, he opened up some distance with the lead plane, Nachumi.

  Raymond had already discovered that this ace pilot was in poor condition today, so he didn't overtake Yiftach but followed behind him.

  The F-16 is not a car, there are no rearview mirrors, and the AWACS plane's information transmission cannot be obtained. "Chisel" squadron leader Nachumi did not notice that two of the four planes in his formation had dropped out.

  Fortunately, they had opened up some distance, so when the planes in front of them fell into the ambush, Yiftach and Raymond did not choose to follow suit, but instead turned right ahead of time, flying towards their designated attack point.

  Climbing wasn't the best option, it's just that the planes in front flew too close, they had no choice. The two lagging planes were on guard, they didn't fly over each other's high anti-aircraft positions, but instead turned ahead of time and headed straight for the designated reactor.

  Dropping this unguided ordnance requires exceptional bombing skills, with precise standards for when to dive and release the bomb. This is also why the squadron chose a lake as the starting point of their attack route, flying for ten minutes to reach an altitude of one thousand meters, then diving from high altitude at a predetermined angle before releasing the bomb.

  Things seen from the sky are different from those on the ground, and at different angles, they are also different. Therefore, choosing a different angle can easily cause you to fly over your target without dropping bombs in time.

  However, there is no other way now, these two planes are the last hope!

  Yevgeny gazed calmly at the F-15 fighter jets descending in anger. What if they could eliminate all of their anti-aircraft artillery with cannon fire? The mistake had already been made, and their best choice was to provide more cover for themselves to prevent being attacked by enemy fighters. The previous anti-aircraft position indicated that the enemy probably already knew about this operation.

  Ivanchuk flew the fighter, looking for landmarks, ready to drop bombs over the speeding nuclear reactors at any moment. It was just snot, still occasionally wanting to come out.

  Raymond's eyes were a little red, last night they were still discussing together, saying that if they were attacked, he would be the easiest to become a martyr, unexpectedly, those pilots in front had already taken a step ahead of him.

  Revenge, revenge! Raymond buckled the oxygen mask to his face. Although it was not necessary to breathe in oxygen at an altitude of less than 3,000 meters, in order to calm down and focus, Raymond started inhaling the oxygen from the mask.

  A distance of twenty kilometers, for high-speed flying fighter jets, is just over a minute. Two fighter jets approached the Osirak reactor in tens of seconds and also rose to an altitude of one thousand meters.

  Blocked balloon! The two looked up at the sky in front of them, their eyebrows slightly furrowed.

  Colorful balloons, densely packed, with dozens of them, filled the air hundreds of meters high in front, wanting to fly over from above is possible, but diving and bombing would be very difficult.

  An aircraft flying at high speed will absolutely explode in an instant if it collides with a steel cable tied to a barrage balloon.

  "Original plan unchanged, dive bombing." Yiftach said. The bomber squadron was left with only the two of them, Yiftach was a colonel and Raymond was a captain, so naturally he had to listen to Yiftach's orders.

  "Yes!" Raymond replied over the wireless, his voice tinged with a sense of tragic heroism, flying into the densely packed barrage balloons was virtually suicidal.

  If not diving, then it can only be level bombing, the plane flies horizontally and drops bombs. This kind of bombing is very inaccurate, unless it's B-52 carpet bombing, which is slightly better.

  But there's no other way, the current arsenal only has this MK84 bomb with the greatest power, which can deal with the thick concrete wall of the opponent's nuclear reactor.

  In an instant, it entered its final stage.

  Iftach was originally going to switch the electrical gates to bomb mode, but as he dove, he suddenly switched to machine guns.

  In the gaps between several blocking balloons, that tall circular concrete structure with a horseshoe-shaped earthwork beside it is Iraq's "Tammuz-1" nuclear reactor.

  Yevtyatych pushed the control column forward, and the plane dived down rapidly, gaining speed, with the outline of the earth becoming clearer.

  "Blockade balloons are just children's toys!" Yiftach bellowed, pressing the button in his hand.

  The M61A1 "Vulcan" 20mm six-barreled Gatling cannon under the belly of the aircraft, the barrel was spinning non-stop, spitting out tongues of fire, and several balloons next to it were shot down one after another.

  Alright, switching to bombs! Yiftach's hands moved deftly over the electrical switches, switching to bomb operations.

  The firing button is singular and located on the control stick, while controlling multiple weapons requires switching between them electronically.

  On the glass in front of the cockpit, a parallax-free image has already been projected. Just need to put that round concrete building on the aiming star, lower it to 200 meters, press the button, and then pull it up again.

  At this time, he had already forgotten to look at the instruments in the cockpit, and Yiftach's two eyes stared straight at the increasingly larger target on the glass.

  The anti-aircraft artillery position below, facing the diving aircraft, started a burst of fire, but this outdated anti-aircraft gun could not capture the trajectory of the opponent's falling plane at all, and after a random shot, the opponent's plane was still diving.

  Raymond followed Yiftach and dived down.

  Witnessing Yiftach's swift dive and cannon fire in front of him, Raymond was deeply impressed. No wonder the other party is an ace pilot. It's this move that he can't do himself. This requires a sharp reaction speed, and it's done with two heavy bombs loaded.

  Raymond didn't know that at this moment, Yiftach's vision had already begun to blur, a massive overload causing him to have tunnel vision.

  Normally, an overload of less than five wouldn't be a problem for him, but today he wasn't feeling well. His blood circulation was already poor to begin with, and the intense maneuvering caused his blood to fail to deliver oxygen to his brain in time. Finally, his vision began to blur and everything went black before his eyes.

  Having done all he could, Yevtushenko pressed the button with a sense of hopelessness.

  Under the wing, two huge bombs skillfully detached from the wing rack, drawing a beautiful arc in the air, falling down.

  Yevtya felt the plane suddenly lighten, he used all his strength to pull the control stick back, or else it would have crashed.

  Just a moment ago, Raymond was still admiring the ace pilot's skills, but in this instant, he widened his eyes: those two bombs had not flown towards the reactor at all, but instead fell towards the front steam turbine plant.

  The nuclear reactor only provides heat, which is transferred to water to produce high-pressure steam, driving a turbine to rotate and drive an electric generator or output power.

  Damn it! The bombing run was off, entering the dive too late and at too shallow an angle. At this rate, they'd miss the reactor. Raymond's mind seethed with frustration.

  Pull up, once more into the fray? Raymond gazed at the rapidly approaching outline of the land, gritted his teeth, and continued to push the control stick down.

  Increase dive angle! Change to a ninety-degree vertical dive, and I don't believe it won't hit the reactor. Raymond made up his mind.

  The nose of the plane slowly dropped down, finally almost facing the ground. The bright red circle had already been superimposed on the circular building. Raymond opened the safety lock of his weapon and prepared to drop the bomb.

  This dive requires great courage, the speed is so fast that if it's 0.1 seconds late, it will be a fatal crash. And if the bomb is released too early, it may fall into empty space.

  Raymond glanced at the altimeter with his peripheral vision, and it was spinning rapidly. Soon, the altitude would be close to 200 meters.

  Raymond's right hand was already on the firing button of the control stick, the most exciting moment had arrived. Release the bomb and then pull up quickly, if a little slower, he would passionately kiss the ground with himself, becoming a pancake, eaten by Saddam without adding oil or vinegar.

  Suddenly, Raymond felt the aircraft shaking violently, and suddenly, the scenery in front of him began to spin rapidly.

  Oh no, entered tailspin!

  A spin is a condition where an aircraft rotates in a steep spiral descent path, with the nose of the aircraft pointing towards the center of the spiral. The F-16's onboard computer has restrictions to prevent entering a spin under normal circumstances, but during special maneuvers, pilots may choose to disengage these restrictions to increase the aircraft's maneuverability, allowing it to perform actions that could potentially lead to an accident.

  In this low altitude, there is no ability to pull out of a spin, the only choice is to eject and escape.

  Raymond didn't hesitate, he had no choice, he pulled down the ejection handle under his seat, "Boom" four explosive bolts fired simultaneously, blasting out four holes in the glass canopy, then the rocket of the ejection seat ignited, propelling the seat upwards, bursting open the cockpit cover and sending Raymond flying out.

  In the next second, the plane crashed into the ground and exploded with a loud noise.