SALIM MUST DIE by Mukul Deva

happened to be on the borders that Iraq shares with Iran. Slowly but surely, the noose was beginning to tighten.

The Second Big Straw
    T HREE W EEKS L ATER . 2336 H OURS . H ATZERIM A IRBASE , N EGEV D ESERT , I SRAEL
    THE HIDEOUS SCREAM OF ENGINES DROWNED OUT ALL SOUND. A series of thunderclaps shattered the night as the afterburners kicked in. Four fighters slashed down the runway in pairs. Lifting off in meticulous unison, the 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 km. 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 fighters of the 69 Squadron were carrying a highly specialized weapons load. The 69 Squadron, also known as The Hammers, had seen more than its fair share of action since it was formed in 1948. Leading the four fighters tonight was their squadron commander, Ilan Yarkoni, a man with several combat sorties under his belt.
    Tonight was not the first time that a 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 sixty kilograms of Uranium-235 that had a blast equivalent of about thirteen kilotons of TNT) had been dropped over Hiroshima from a B-29 plane piloted by Colonel Paul Tibbets of the US-509 Composite Group. Ironically, the plane had been affectionately nicknamed Enola Gay after Tibbets’ mother. The bomb it dropped that day left many children motherless and many mothers childless.
    However, tonight was the first time since then that such weapons were being carried with a firm, committed resolve to put them to use.
    All four F-16s attained cruising height and levelled out. They were following a carefully plotted course. None of the men who rode in those metallic monsters had any doubts as to what awaited them as they sliced through the still, dark night. 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 .
    N INETEEN M INUTES L ATER
    ‘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. A few seconds later, the large, unsuspecting target appeared on their screens. With its strobe lights flashing majestically, the massive passenger aircraft was proceeding sedately along its 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 in position.
    ‘Sierra Tango, you are radar negative now. Hold steady.’
    Twenty-seven minutes later, the point of no return was crossed as the four Israeli aircraft entered enemy airspace. The strike had begun.
    LUFTHANSA FLIGHT LH-600 HAD TAKEN OFF FROM FRANKFURT airport at 1802 hours, two minutes behind schedule. The pilot hoped to make up the two minutes during the flight to ensure it reached Tehran at the stipulated time of 0125 hours. The flight was being managed with Teutonic efficiency and proceeding without incident. The Boeing 340 was cruising smoothly at an altitude of about 30,000 feet when it entered Iranian airspace a little after midnight.
    There were exactly one hundred and eighty-seven passengers on board, including eighty-three women and sixteen