VIRULENT WINDS Flying advanced MiG-41s from a forgotten airfield a covert strike team of hotshot US and Russian pilots wreak havoc throughout the Middle East. With Islamic unity broken and the region gearing up for war, the Russians have one last surprise, a stolen SS-20 nuclear warhead in Sandori hands. The team must fly one last mission to destroy this warhead before it can be moved, but a lone US intelligence officer accidentally discovers the awful truth and the Russians' terrible secret.

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JIM CLONTS

Born in St Louis, Missouri in 1966, Jim Clonts graduated from the University of Missouri with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and received his commission in the U.S. Air Force in 1988. As a B-52G Stratofortress navigator-bombardier, he flew ten combat missions in Operation DESERT STORM. During his nearly ten years of active duty service he amassed over 2,500 flying hours in the B-52G and H bombers, including 130 combat hours, and was awarded the Air Medal, the Air Force Commendation Medal, the Air Force Achievement Medal, Southwest Asia Service Medal, Kuwait and Kuwaiti Liberation Medals, Outstanding Unit Award with Valor, and the National Defense Service Medal. Jim left the service in 1998 and is currently working in the field of engineering. He is a Civil Air Patrol pilot and enjoys building experimental aircraft when he is not writing.

The B-52 is an eight-engined, intercontinental, strategic bomber. It has a crew of six, an aircraft commander(pilot), a copilot, a navigator, a radar navigator (bombardier), an electronic warfare officer, and a gunner. (The G model had four radar guided .50 caliber machine guns on the tail of the plane.) The B-52 was designed in the early 1950's and became operational with the Air Force in 1955. The only model used in DESERT STORM was the B-52G (The B-52H model sat nuclear alert during DESERT STORM and all other preceding models have been retired from service. The aircraft weighs 185,000 lbs empty and has a maximum weight (with fuel and bombs) of over 500,000 lbs. At high altitude the B-52 can fly at 530 Knots or about 630 miles an hour (which is .91 mach). The service ceiling of the B-52 is 50,000 feet, but heavily loaded in combat we never went that high. The B-52 is also capable of penetrating enemy airspace at low altitude ( as low as 200 feet) The terrain avoidance radar and advance infra-red sensors allow us to fly that low safely through mountainous terrain, day or night in all weather conditions. At low altitude our maximum speed is 390 knots, about 450 miles an hour.

The B-52 can carry nearly any bomb in the US inventory. Although today we can carry laser- guided bombs and GPS guided bombs, back in DESERT STORM we only employed 500 lb, 750 lb and 2000 lb iron bombs and an assortment of cluster bombs. We could carry up to fifty one bombs per aircraft, twenty four on the wing pylons and twenty seven in the bomb bay). We could also carry twenty 2000 lb bombs, crowd pleasers. The B-52 is also capable of carrying large quantities of cluster bombs, land mines or sea mines. The aircraft can also carry up 20 AGM-86B and C ALCMs (air-launched cruise missiles). Other types of missiles the B-52 can carry include 8 AGM-84 Harpoon anti-shipping missiles and 4 AGM- 42 Raptor TV-guided missiles. The B-52 is just beginning to employ JDAMs (Joint Direct Attack Munition), a GPS guided bomb.

A typical mission during DESERT STORM lasted about 17 hours from take-off to landing. We would take off from a small island called Diego Garcia, located in the Indian Ocean. Our formation of three B-52s would fly northwest toward the Persian Gulf, topping off our tanks from Diego tankers about an hour after take-off. Four hours later hours we would meet up with six KC-135 tankers from Oman or Bahrain. We would air refuel for another hour, topping off our tanks again before we flew into battle. We would take two hours to cross Saudi Arabia and get to Iraq or Kuwait. Once we got close to the border we would call our AWACS plane on the radio and check in with our strike controller. He or she would tell us what the tactical situation was, what threats were in the area (like fighters or surface to air missiles) and would pass any target changes to us. Most of the time we would get a new target when we checked in. The targets were usually things like ammunition dumps, rail road yards, airbases, armored and mechanized infantry divisions (tanks), etc. Sometimes the targets were "troops in the field", basically large concentrations of Republican Guard soldiers. Usually the targets were real easy to find on radar. They tended to be in the middle of nowhere (in the desert).

Some of the threats we encountered surface to air missiles and anti-aircraft artillery. Enemy fighters were driven off by our own fighters, which were near us most of the time. Our electronic warfare officer could jam many of of the Iraqi radars, but we also had F-4G Wild Weasels with us carrying AGM-88 anti-radiation missiles. If a missile radar turned on they could shoot a missile at it. A few B-52s got hit by enemy missiles and anti-aircraft artillery(AAA), but they all managed to return to base safely.

We would usually spend anywhere from fifteen minutes to forty-five minutes over Iraqi territory. We would fly our bomb run, drop our bombs and turn around to go home. We had a target timing window in which our bombs had to hit within a certain time period. You see when all our bombs go off shrapnel fills the air up to 2000 feet high, 2000 feet wide and a half mile long. Any plane flying through that would be shot down so we had to drop our bombs on time, less we kill a friendly plane flying through the area. That was my job as navigator, get the plane to the target and air refuelings on time. There were a few times we had to change course to get out of range of some missile that was aimed at us and we did get AAA shot at us, but we never got hit. A buddy of mine did come back with a hole in the nose of his plane. They found a piece of shrapnel inside the nose.

After we crossed back into Saudi Arabia, we'd fly another two hours and refuel again for the trip home. We'd land five hours later and spend the next three hours debriefing the mission.

The B-52s in DESERT STORM dropped 30% of all the bombs dropped in that war and forty percent of the unguided bombs dropped. The B-52 force, located at four different bases, would average about 100 missions a day. That was about 5000 bombs dropped on Iraq every day. One mission that was a little different launched from my home base at Barksdale AFB, LA. Seven B-52s launched from Louisiana flew non-stop to the Persian Gulf, launched 35 cruise missiles and flew back to Louisiana. They flew 34 hours and air-refueled 5 times, making it the longest combat mission in history and the first mission launched in DESERT STORM. These missiles were the AGM-86C. They have a range of several hundred miles, fly over 500 miles an hour and are extremely accurate. We used these missiles against communications relays, power plants, command and control radio stations, military headquarters, etc. All of those targetswere very important and therefore highly defended. We didn't want to lose men taking them out so we sent in the cruise missiles and they hit their targets as planned.

In the last few years the B-52G has been retired, but the B-52H has been used several times to launch cruise missiles against Iraq and they both launched missiles and dropped bombs in the Kosovo conflict in 1999. The B-52H looks like the G except for it's engines, which are larger and more powerful. The B-52H also had its tail guns removed in 1994. The plane, although 40 years old, is an outstanding missile launch platform with a very long range and is planned to be retired from service in the year 2030. By the time they are retired they will be about 70 years old. The planes do go through depot maintenance every four years. They basically tear them apart, replace the bad parts with new parts, slap on some paint and the darn things look new from the outside. There is very little on the plane that is actually 40 years old anymore. The planes themselves only have about 15,000-16,000 hours of flying on them. The average airliner you might fly on would have as much as 30,0000-50,000 hours. (By the way the wrinkles on the skin of the plane are suppose to be there. They were there when the planes were brand new.) I also just read that the B-52 will be going through its Avionics Mid-life Upgrade (AMU) very soon. Mid-life at 40 years old. Wow.

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