Fitter Engagement at the "Line of Death"
- Read - Mike Sasser provides some background
- Listen - the audio track of the engagement and the transcript.
- Understand - a glossary to help you understand what was said.
August 19, 1981
As told by Mike Sasser (LT, 1980-1981) former CIC Officer.
We left the shipyard in 1980 with a new crew. As I recall, the announcement over the 1MC was made on our way out the Delaware River that 30% of the crew had never been to sea and 50% had not been to sea on the Biddle. We had a bumper sticker distributed with our new motto “Don’t Fiddle with the Biddle”. A few weeks in Gitmo were all that was necessary to turn us into an efficient team. What we lacked in experience we made up in determination.
Our first assignment upon entering the Med was to demonstrate freedom of navigation by conducting a missile exercise inside the claimed territorial limits of Libya. Libya had claimed the entire Gulf of Sidra as their territory. This gave them a 200-mile territorial limit. If we did not challenge that claim, it would become international law. Our task force combined the USS Nimitz and the USS Forrestal task groups to conduct the exercise. Drones would be launched from a support ship within the missile test area and we were one of four missile ships that would be assigned to launch surface-to-air missiles loaded with telemetry instruments at the drones.
The first day of the exercise was August 18th and it was clear that the Libyans were going to do everything in their power to foil our plans. In addition, it seemed clear that the Libyan pilots were itching to find a U.S. carrier to attack. As the Libyans launched fighters from three airports, our task force would assign F-14s to cover them. Covering means to maintain a firing position on the contacts until they either shot at something or turned back to home. We had no authority to attack until we were fired upon. The F-14s were under the strict control of the E-2C (Hawkeyes) from the carrier. On board the Nimitz was the Sixth Fleet battle staff.
Needless to say the Libyans did not take kindly to having the pesky F-14s on their tail and so they would try to shake them with lots of high G-force air combat maneuvering techniques. Things were tense but no one lost their cool… at least not on day one of the missilex. The next day, on almost the first run of the day, two of the Libyan pilots decided to shoot at the lead pilot of a flight of two F-14s from VF-41.
- Bad idea #1 It was a head-on shot with a heat-seeking missile.
- Bad idea #2 It just happened to be the VF-41 Squadron Commander.
- Bad idea #3 This missile missed its mark but during the ensuing dog fight, AIM-9 missiles from the two F-14s downed both Libyan SU-22 Fitters.
Sukhoi 22 Fitter 
Grumman F-14 Tomcat No survivors were ever found. Immediately after the engagement, the F-14s were returning to the carrier and at that time received “Permission to defend yourselves” from the carrier.
From the time we were aware of the attack until its conclusion was about a minute. The Tactical Action Officer (TAO) in CIC was the Operations Officer LCDR Pilnick and I was the Ships Weapons Coordinator (SWC). After the engagement, the TAO leaned over to me and said, “I guess we should go to GQ.” So we did. It was an awesome thing to here general quarters without the “This is a drill” preamble. We struck the telemetry missiles below decks and loaded war shot birds on the rails. No more action took place. The Libyans continued to look for the carrier (this time with their fingers off the triggers). The F-14s continued to cover the Libyans (with no authority to shoot) and the missilex was successfully concluded. After the operation we detached from the task force and headed for the Black Sea. Return to Top of Page
