Early 1991: The Brief Before the Sun.
A kneeboard of handwritten cards, a plan that changes on the route, and a debrief before anyone sleeps.
The Creator's Journey · Chapter VII, Execution Under Fire
Operation Desert Storm was underway, and I was a young Lieutenant. The intelligence officer walked us through what was known and, just as carefully, what was not. Then the part every good brief includes and every bad one skips: what we will do when the plan stops working.
Somewhere along the route, the plan changes. It always does. I say out loud what has changed and what I recommend. Fear is there, quiet and patient. But it is not in charge. I have a job to do every few seconds.
I flew eighteen of those missions. I remember very few of them as heroic. I remember them as disciplined.