Post by James G on Apr 11, 2019 19:07:08 GMT
Air Force One Is Down – August 2024
Three years ago, the United States was at the forefront of an international coalition which invaded Saudi Arabia and deposed the regime there of the House of Saud. In its place, the Republic of Arabia was established: freedom and democracy were brought to the renamed country, the Coalition claimed, and there was a bright future ahead for this land at the centre of the Middle East.
The ‘Saudi War’ was a brutal affair. The invasion and then the occupation were costly in terms of destruction caused and lives lost. It was a conflict which rocked the world with its affects felt seemingly everywhere across the globe. The insurgency inside the Republic of Arabia was one fought by Saudis as well as volunteers from across the Arab World: terrorists, the Coalition called them. American forces did the bulk of the fighting yet they had allies in this fight including several Muslim nations who provided troops for the war, especially for occupation duties around Mecca and Medina. Regardless of that specific of the occupation, there were ‘infidels in the Holy Land’ and this drew out the war where those who hated the deposed former regime came to the country to fight to establish something different from Saudi Arabia and the Republic of Arabia too: they wanted to see an expansive, theocratic nation develop. It would have been another Islamic State as seen in years gone past if they had their way. They didn’t get what they wanted. The United States threw everything it had at winning.
Victory had been declared earlier today by the American president when he visited Riyadh. The insurgency was beaten and a ‘big, beautiful democracy’ had risen. His legacy was complete. When he left office in January next year, the president was certain that this would define his administration for decades to come. The Saudi War really would.
Air Force One left Riyadh International Airport (formerly King Khalid International) ten minutes after two in the afternoon. It got airborne and started flying northwards. Baghdad was the destination where the president would visit his counterpart there: the Iraqi leader had been instrumental in aiding the fight to defeat the insurgency and also had provided the majority of those troops for the Mecca and Medina mission. There had been a huge security effort on the ground and that continued in the sky. Flying from bases in both the Republic of Arabia and also from Bahrain – the latter country had seen Saudi activities which had been the casus belli for the war –, there were escorting fighters. The US Air Force had F-22A Raptors in close escort while also flying distant patrols too: all to keep Air Force One and the president safe.
It was one of those F-22s which shot Air Force One out of the sky.
The pilot was a long-serving officer with the US Air Force. Despite claims to the contrary made afterwards, he wasn’t a radical secret Muslim convert. He hadn’t planned this at all. Chance came to Lieutenant-Colonel Alan Mitchell… and it was a chance he took. Mitchell’s only son had been killed during the Saudi War. It was a conflict which had taken over seven thousand American lives, all of them acts of murder in his eyes. Long having blamed his president personally for his son’s death, until today Mitchell had never considered taking his vengeance. How could he have done so? Then he was told he was flying escort for his son’s murderer.
There was a second F-22 in the sky close to Air Force One. Mitchell was off the converted passenger jet’s port wing, his wingman was off the starboard side. He didn’t do anything to alert his fellow pilot what he was doing. Alone in his aircraft’s cockpit, Mitchell armed his carried air-to-air missiles and then planned his manoeuvre. It was rushed, hasty and dangerous. That was not what he was trained to do but what he could do.
Mitchell activated his airbrakes. His F-22 slowed down suddenly and he fell behind the two other aircraft in the sky. Those aboard neither of them noticed this occurring yet. A distant AWACS aircraft did. A fighter controller aboard alerted his superior officer to the sudden change in Mitchell’s position. A query was made, an urgent one at that. Mitchell ignored the radio call from the AWACS though. His wingman also came on the airwaves, asking what was going on too after hearing that attempt to contact Mitchell. Once more, that call went unanswered.
Two AIM-9X Sidewinders were fired.
Mitchell had a firm lock-on with each in the seconds before he launched them. They blazed away from his aircraft and bore-in towards the engines of Air Force One. The wait for impact was short: Mitchell was less than three miles back. One engine on each side was hit with explosions knocking out engines #2 and #3. The two other engines didn’t escape damage though with the both of them ingesting fragments of the others. Turbine blades were torn and fires started in each. There was other damage elsewhere across Air Force One too due to the blasts under each wing throwing debris about with wanton abandon.
Mitchell contacted Air Force One on the radio in the seconds after his Sidewinders slammed home.
“Tell the president to go f**k himself… and that’s from me and my boy!” With more thought put into it, Mitchell would have said something far more profound for history’s sake. Alas, these were to be his last words on this earth and they would have to do.
Air Force One had fires in two engines and two more of them utterly destroyed. Part of the starboard wing had been sheared off and wreckage had ripped into the port tailplane plus the vertical stabiliser. The aircraft was doomed. It started falling from the sky, spinning as it did.
The desert was below.
Mitchell chased after the doomed aircraft. He opened fire with his F-22’s cannon. None of the 20mm shells struck home no matter how hard he tried to hit it. Air Force One was out of control. It spun in a counter-clockwise direction though also flipped over as well onto its side and then its back. Sirens wailed in Mitchell’s cockpit: his aircraft was locked-on by his wingman’s fighter. From the distant AWACS, the fighter controller had ordered that Mitchell be shot down. There was a belief that Air Force One might be saved and he continued to fire on it as it fell out of the sky.
A lone Sidewinder exploded right behind Mitchell’s diving fighter. His F-22 was now just as doomed as Air Force One as both headed for the desert. It didn’t take long for the two aircraft, one after another, to reach the ground. Each smeared itself and those aboard them into the sovereign soil of the Republic of Arabia.
Mitchell hadn’t killed just his president. He knew that there were others aboard that aircraft. His didn’t think of them though. Ninety-two others were slain alongside the man who he blamed for his son’s death. Even in his own last moments, it was all about the murderer of his child and not those also aboard that aircraft.
"Air Force One is down," further radio messages went out, "and the president was aboard".
Like the Saudi War, this act would be felt worldwide with tremendous consequences for all.
Three years ago, the United States was at the forefront of an international coalition which invaded Saudi Arabia and deposed the regime there of the House of Saud. In its place, the Republic of Arabia was established: freedom and democracy were brought to the renamed country, the Coalition claimed, and there was a bright future ahead for this land at the centre of the Middle East.
The ‘Saudi War’ was a brutal affair. The invasion and then the occupation were costly in terms of destruction caused and lives lost. It was a conflict which rocked the world with its affects felt seemingly everywhere across the globe. The insurgency inside the Republic of Arabia was one fought by Saudis as well as volunteers from across the Arab World: terrorists, the Coalition called them. American forces did the bulk of the fighting yet they had allies in this fight including several Muslim nations who provided troops for the war, especially for occupation duties around Mecca and Medina. Regardless of that specific of the occupation, there were ‘infidels in the Holy Land’ and this drew out the war where those who hated the deposed former regime came to the country to fight to establish something different from Saudi Arabia and the Republic of Arabia too: they wanted to see an expansive, theocratic nation develop. It would have been another Islamic State as seen in years gone past if they had their way. They didn’t get what they wanted. The United States threw everything it had at winning.
Victory had been declared earlier today by the American president when he visited Riyadh. The insurgency was beaten and a ‘big, beautiful democracy’ had risen. His legacy was complete. When he left office in January next year, the president was certain that this would define his administration for decades to come. The Saudi War really would.
Air Force One left Riyadh International Airport (formerly King Khalid International) ten minutes after two in the afternoon. It got airborne and started flying northwards. Baghdad was the destination where the president would visit his counterpart there: the Iraqi leader had been instrumental in aiding the fight to defeat the insurgency and also had provided the majority of those troops for the Mecca and Medina mission. There had been a huge security effort on the ground and that continued in the sky. Flying from bases in both the Republic of Arabia and also from Bahrain – the latter country had seen Saudi activities which had been the casus belli for the war –, there were escorting fighters. The US Air Force had F-22A Raptors in close escort while also flying distant patrols too: all to keep Air Force One and the president safe.
It was one of those F-22s which shot Air Force One out of the sky.
The pilot was a long-serving officer with the US Air Force. Despite claims to the contrary made afterwards, he wasn’t a radical secret Muslim convert. He hadn’t planned this at all. Chance came to Lieutenant-Colonel Alan Mitchell… and it was a chance he took. Mitchell’s only son had been killed during the Saudi War. It was a conflict which had taken over seven thousand American lives, all of them acts of murder in his eyes. Long having blamed his president personally for his son’s death, until today Mitchell had never considered taking his vengeance. How could he have done so? Then he was told he was flying escort for his son’s murderer.
There was a second F-22 in the sky close to Air Force One. Mitchell was off the converted passenger jet’s port wing, his wingman was off the starboard side. He didn’t do anything to alert his fellow pilot what he was doing. Alone in his aircraft’s cockpit, Mitchell armed his carried air-to-air missiles and then planned his manoeuvre. It was rushed, hasty and dangerous. That was not what he was trained to do but what he could do.
Mitchell activated his airbrakes. His F-22 slowed down suddenly and he fell behind the two other aircraft in the sky. Those aboard neither of them noticed this occurring yet. A distant AWACS aircraft did. A fighter controller aboard alerted his superior officer to the sudden change in Mitchell’s position. A query was made, an urgent one at that. Mitchell ignored the radio call from the AWACS though. His wingman also came on the airwaves, asking what was going on too after hearing that attempt to contact Mitchell. Once more, that call went unanswered.
Two AIM-9X Sidewinders were fired.
Mitchell had a firm lock-on with each in the seconds before he launched them. They blazed away from his aircraft and bore-in towards the engines of Air Force One. The wait for impact was short: Mitchell was less than three miles back. One engine on each side was hit with explosions knocking out engines #2 and #3. The two other engines didn’t escape damage though with the both of them ingesting fragments of the others. Turbine blades were torn and fires started in each. There was other damage elsewhere across Air Force One too due to the blasts under each wing throwing debris about with wanton abandon.
Mitchell contacted Air Force One on the radio in the seconds after his Sidewinders slammed home.
“Tell the president to go f**k himself… and that’s from me and my boy!” With more thought put into it, Mitchell would have said something far more profound for history’s sake. Alas, these were to be his last words on this earth and they would have to do.
Air Force One had fires in two engines and two more of them utterly destroyed. Part of the starboard wing had been sheared off and wreckage had ripped into the port tailplane plus the vertical stabiliser. The aircraft was doomed. It started falling from the sky, spinning as it did.
The desert was below.
Mitchell chased after the doomed aircraft. He opened fire with his F-22’s cannon. None of the 20mm shells struck home no matter how hard he tried to hit it. Air Force One was out of control. It spun in a counter-clockwise direction though also flipped over as well onto its side and then its back. Sirens wailed in Mitchell’s cockpit: his aircraft was locked-on by his wingman’s fighter. From the distant AWACS, the fighter controller had ordered that Mitchell be shot down. There was a belief that Air Force One might be saved and he continued to fire on it as it fell out of the sky.
A lone Sidewinder exploded right behind Mitchell’s diving fighter. His F-22 was now just as doomed as Air Force One as both headed for the desert. It didn’t take long for the two aircraft, one after another, to reach the ground. Each smeared itself and those aboard them into the sovereign soil of the Republic of Arabia.
Mitchell hadn’t killed just his president. He knew that there were others aboard that aircraft. His didn’t think of them though. Ninety-two others were slain alongside the man who he blamed for his son’s death. Even in his own last moments, it was all about the murderer of his child and not those also aboard that aircraft.
"Air Force One is down," further radio messages went out, "and the president was aboard".
Like the Saudi War, this act would be felt worldwide with tremendous consequences for all.
I think a lot of people who knew him and also a lot in the US government will want the truth to come out. Otherwise their given a big victory to Islamic extremists. Not to mention if that theory is pushed the military is going to be hit, because of the concerns about the possibility of other such 'converts' being hidden somewhere.