The Su-20s were organized into two Flying Groups, each with three Squadrons of four aircraft—already the absolute limit Basra Air Base could muster.
The mission profile was high-altitude ingress, low-level attack, then high-altitude egress; that still gave them a twenty-minute on-station time over the target—enough to hammer the Iranian armored division—after which the Mi-24 Hinds would take over.
Once the MiG-21s arrived overhead they too began circling above the marshes, warily scanning the sky, though their confidence was thin; the moment they picked up the powerful AN/AWG-9 pulse-Doppler signal of the F-14, their best bet was to dump the sluggish Su-20s and run for their lives.
Spotting the armored columns far below, the Su-20s jettisoned their Drop Tanks and rolled in to set up for the strike.
Even with the whole sky to roam, bombing ground targets is never a casual affair.
Per training, they had to descend to 800 m as they closed on the enemy, switch on the simple RSD-5M Ranging Radar and IR scanner, arm the Rocket Pods, and stay ready to fire.
Over the target they dropped to 500 m, pitched over into a dive, placed the optical gunsight's pipper on the enemy armor, squeezed the trigger, then pulled up and away.
Because the Su-20 is a single-seat attacker, the pilot's workload was brutal—flicking switches again and again.
Every aviator was wound tight; in the sky a moment's hesitation meant overshooting by several kilometres and having to wheel back for another pass.
The two groups, by Squadron, came out of the clouds in four-ship flights.
"Attention—air attack!" crackled a frightened voice over the radio.
At that cue every vehicle-mounted anti-air gun opened up.
The Chieftain's cupola mounted an L37A1 that could be fired from inside, and each M113 had a 12.7 mm Browning M2HB on the commander's hatch with 360° traverse and −21° to +53° elevation—but against low, fast attackers those machine-guns were practically useless.
The only real threat came from a handful of M163 Vulcans; their six-barrel 20 mm cannons were spitting streams of tracer, desperately trying to break up the strike.
This otherwise well-equipped Iranian division had no Stinger missiles; had it possessed any, it might have clung on a little longer.
As it was, the battle was almost one-sided.
Each time an attacker dipped its nose, fire lanced from beneath the wings and the ground erupted in blasts; the 240 mm rockets were devastating—one hit on a Chieftain could punch through the turret roof, and even a non-penetrating strike on the thickest frontal plate set the interior ablaze, roasting the crew alive.
One sharp-eyed flight spotted the heaviest flak concentration—about a dozen M163s scattered among the M113s.
The flight leader ordered an immediate dive on that spot.
Four Su-20s rolled straight into the teeth of the Vulcan fire.
The self-propelled AA battery realized it had been singled out, but there was no escape; even at full throttle the Vulcans could only crawl a few dozen metres in the scant seconds before the jets' rockets arrived.
There was only one option: toe-to-toe.
The six-barrel 20 mm kept hammering the predicted flight path—if they could kill the attacker before it fired, they would live.
Yet this time the Su-20s did not dive; instead a tongue of flame flashed under the wing—out came the Black Bull Air-to-Surface Missiles!
To smash this surprise armored thrust, Basra command had scraped together every ace, including the precious Black Bulls.
The Black Bull was already obsolete—the first compact Soviet air-to-ground import—range a mere twenty kilometres, guided by manual radio command; still, it beat unguided rockets.
Seeing the missiles streaking from the Su-20s, the Vulcans blazed again, but now they aimed at the incoming rockets, not the planes.
With a fast gun, shooting down a missile is possible—everything depends on the fire-control system's reflexes.
Tracer streams clipped several missiles, detonating them mid-air and saving the battery—for the moment.
But the remaining Black Bulls slammed into the M163s, turning them into burning wrecks.
Before the AA crews could recover, the jets followed with a salvo of rockets.
Caught off-guard: the six-barrel guns had overheated during the missile duel and had to pause; in that lull the rockets arrived.
In the fine points of tactics, some Iraqi air commanders still showed ingenuity.
Fewer than five Vulcans were left intact.
That morning would be etched into Rajavi's memory forever: minutes earlier he had been directing his Self-propelled Howitzers to blast a path through the Iraqi tank brigade blocking the road to the Karun River.
But fortune had spun its wheel; moments ago he had been the attacker, now he was the prey.
The sky above belonged almost entirely to Iraq, and his division was being annihilated from the air.
The 35th Armored Brigade could only sit back and watch; to advance now risked fratricide—those pilots might not distinguish friend from foe at close range.
Once the Muslim Brothers upstairs finished their work, the 35th could move in and scoop up the spoils at leisure.
The Air Force merely struck; it couldn't secure the ground. That bounty would fall to the 35th—only fair after yesterday's mauling.
Every man is flesh and blood, prey to fear; under the relentless pounding from above, Iranian morale finally collapsed.
Further attack was pointless; some soldiers broke and ran.
On the perimeter, several APCs wheeled about and fled the way they had come.
"Cowards! Attack—attack is the only way to live! You think you can outrun their planes?" Rajavi roared over the radio, ordering the advance to continue.
It was useless; some men had already lost their minds—war breeds madness.
At last the strike birds departed: the Su-20s and MiG-21s, low on fuel, turned for home, leaving only a pair of MiG-25s still on station.
"Brothers—our turn!" Muhammad shouted.
Crews clambered aboard their tanks and APCs, ready to attack—not the suicidal charge of yesterday, but a victorious sweep to take prisoners.
Then the thud of rotor blades filled the air—the Hinds were stepping onto the stage.
The total rout of the Iranian armored division was at hand.