What a fun mission this was! Managed to do a full manual start and get airborne. I was a little slow though.
== SPOILERS ==
They called out 'mortars!' and I was thinking, oh.. it'll be a few little explosions here or there. Then I heard an explosion from my right as I was trying to setup waypoint on my Abris. I glanced over and (I had labels on) there was a wall of blue... their mortars will blot out the moon! They started landing around me, streaking past my windscreen, demolishing everything. I paniced and shot almost straight up, somehow managing to weave (totally unintentionally) through all the raining shells.
I gave up on the plot and just flew north. Eventually my wingman (who I must sadly admit, I'd totally forgotten about) says he's in position on my left. I switch to external camera and wow.. he got wasted! But the good ol' boy was with me flying strong. Here's what he looked like (any splotchiness is Photoshop enhancing, not bad graphics):
I guess he didn't take off quite as quick as I did!