The Tanith Gambit

by Dietmar Wehr

  Bargham took note of the fact that the incoming ships had now passed the invisible line that represented the point where those ships no longer had the option of breaking back out beyond the no-jump zone if they tried, before being intercepted. He checked the status of all of the ships still on the ground. All ships were listed as ready for immediate liftoff. Tired of waiting, he looked at the screen that was connected with Admiral Shefter at Space Defense Command.

  “Admiral, the enemy has lost the ability to avoid combat and I’ll be ordering our grounded ships to liftoff in about another minute. Any last minute orders?” The response was immediate.

  “No Sam. Good luck.”

  “Thank you, Sir.”Bargham paused just long enough to take a deep breath and then said in a slightly louder voice.

  “Bargham to all ships. We will lift off and maintain a 2G acceleration until further notice commencing 10 seconds after my mark….Mark!”Ten seconds later all of the ships took off. Bargham was pleased to note that the Royal Marduk Navy ships left the ground at exactly the same second while the two Tanith ships lagged behind by a second or two. He leaned back in his command chair and forced his body to relax. At 2G acceleration, it would take his ships almost three minutes to leave Marduk’s atmosphere. The hostile ships, which had been constantly bombarding the planet with microwave detection beams, would pick up the rising fleet in about 2 minutes if their crews were paying attention to their equipment. How those ships reacted would determine how this battle would play out. The two minutes want by fast and then another minute went by without any apparent reaction by the enemy ships. Just as Bargham was about to query the tactical computer for advice on the best way to intercept an enemy that WASN’T in full retreat, the main tactical display pinged to signal a change by the hostile formation. Bargham looked at the changing display and smiled. This was going even better than he had any right to expect.

  Shefter noticed the change in status and looked over at the Prince-Protector, who was half-heartedly eating the breakfast, that Shefter had ordered for him.

  “They’ve noticed Admiral Bargham’s Force, Your Majesty!” Simon looked and after a few seconds turned to Shefter and said.

  “What kind of a reaction is that?” Shefter smiled and replied.

  “The best kind, Your Majesty. An uncoordinated one. They’re all reacting individually, instead of as a disciplined unit. Whoever’s in command of that bunch either doesn’t know what to do or hasn’t got the authority to make his commands stick. Not all of them have started to decelerate yet and the rest are decelerating at different rates, which means that by the time Bargham’s Force gets within missile range, that collection of ships will be so scattered that they’ll have trouble massing their return fire. Our ships, on the other hand, will stay in tight formation and fire coordinated barrages that should be able to overwhelm individual enemy ships.” Simon nodded and then frowned.

  “It looks as though two of those ships are continuing to accelerate but on a diverging course away from the planet. They’re obviously trying to break past our defending ships. Can they avoid battle altogether, Admiral?”

  “Unknown at this point, Your Majesty. I’ll confer with Admiral Bargham and see what his tactical options are.” Turning back to the screen connected with Dreadnought’s Flag Bridge, Shefter said.

  “Sam, can your Force still intercept those two ships that are veering off?” Bargham didn’t answer right away and Shefter understood why. Bargham was clearly busy asking his tactical computer to calculate all of the outcomes of various strategies that the defending Force might attempt to engage not only the two ships that were attempting to break away in opposite directions but also meet and defeat the rest of the ships that were still on course for Marduk. Finally Bargham turned back to Shefter’s screen and replied.

  “The answer is ‘yes but’. Even with the panic reaction of the main body, the tactical computer is still recommending that I intercept them with a minimum of 12 ships. That means that I can only spare two ships to try to take out those two veering ships and that means that if I order a one-on-one engagement, the outcomes will be dangerously risky. If my two ships gang up on one of the loners, the other one will get away.” Shefter knew what he wanted Bargham to do but he also remembered his promise not to be a back seat driver. Bargham was the man on the spot and it was his call.

  “Understood. Your call, Sam.” Bargham nodded and said.

  “Thank you, Sir. Excuse me while I give the necessary orders.” Switching his attention to the other screens, Bargham said.

  “Captain Valkanhayn, I want Star Knight and Red Thunder to intercept one of those two loners, that are trying to veer off in opposite directions. Pick one of them and proceed as you see fit. Capture it if you can but don’t let it get away. Any questions?” Boake’s response as immediate.

  “No questions, Admiral. We’ll catch that son of a damnthing!”

  “Very good, Captain. Good hunting.” Bargham turned away and Boake switched his comm. screen to Red Thunder’s Captain Karffard.

  “Did you catch all that, Captain?”

  “I did! Which one are we going after?” Boake looked at the small version of the tactical display, in front of him and picked up his light pen. On impulse, he touched the light pen to one of the two veering ships and transmitted the data to Red Thunder’s computer.

  “I’ve decided that we’re going after this one.” Alvyn nodded.

  “I got it. Okay, I happen to have an intercept course already computed. I queried the tactical computer while you were talking with the Admiral. I’ll transmit it to you and you decide if it looks good or not.”Seconds later, Boake was looking at Karffard’s projected course and smiled. It looked good assuming that the target continued on its course but there was enough time and distance between them that the target could complicate things by shifting to a whole new vector although that was true regardless of what Boake’s two ships did. They would just have to adjust their vectors accordingly if the target ship started to maneuver differently.

  “It looks good to me. Execute the course change now!”

  Admiral Bargham took note of the fact that Valkanhayn’s two ships were maneuvering away from the rest of the fleet. His tactical display projected their probable vector and Bargham was pleased to see it eventually merge with the projected path of one of the two loners. He envied them their task, which in terms of interception, was much simpler than his task. By the time Valkanhayn’s ships got to within missile range, his two ships would be moving more or less in the same direction as their target as all three ships would end up moving sideways from their initial vectors. Bargham’s targets on the other hand, were still doing the worst possible thing, from their perspective, which was to decelerate directly on course for Marduk. That meant that their chances of escaping combat was zero BUT the key to victory for Bargham and his ships, was to maximize the amount of time that his ships were within combat range of the enemy. If they passed by each other too quickly, not only would the enemy likely survive the passing engagement but they would then be between his ships and Marduk and his ships would be moving further away while the enemy ships could continue on to attack Marduk. The trick was to get within missile range after the enemy ships had managed to decelerate to a dead stop and started accelerating away from Marduk. Then both groups of ships would be moving in the same direction and Bargham’s force could catch up to them from astern. That scenario was doable as long as the enemy kept on decelerating. But if they should suddenly get smart, they would realize that the very best thing they could do now would be to resume acceleration TOWARDS Marduk in order to break past Bargham’s force as quickly as possible. With the defending fleet now out of Marduk’s atmosphere, Bargham ordered his ships to go to maximum acceleration.So far, so good. It was almost ten minutes later that things got a lot more complicated.

  Both Simon and Shefter looked up upon hearing the ping indicating a status change. Shefter reacted first.

  “Oh God! They’ve resum
ed accelerating towards the planet…AND they’ve changed course too! If they stay on this course, they’ll fly past Marduk at a distance that will permit them to fire missiles at the surface!” Simon, whose knowledge of tactical space combat wasn’t as good as Shefter’s, asked.

  “Can Bargham still stop them?” Shefter shrugged in frustration.

  “There’s no way to know at this point. That enemy commander’s obviously not as unsophisticated as we thought. He might just be shrewd enough to realize that he can complicate Admiral Bargham’s interception efforts by continually switching from acceleration to deceleration and back again. If he does that and for long enough, Bargham will run out of time and distance and will lose the ideal interception configuration.” Simon looked closely at the Status Board. The enemy ships were now about a fifth of the way towards Marduk with a velocity of just over 36 miles per sec. Bargham’s force was still only up to less than 15 miles per second and hadn’t even reached 5,000 miles distance from Marduk yet.

  “If only…” Shefter didn’t finish the sentence.

  “If only what, Admiral?” Shefter looked at the Prince-Protector and shrugged.

  “Just wishful thinking on my part, Your Majesty. Our missiles can accelerate at 55Gs for about 80 seconds, giving them a powered range of just over 1,000 miles. After that, they lose the ability to maneuver and coast on a straight line course that a target can maneuver to avoid. But if we had missiles with ten times the range, then it would simplify Admiral Bargham’s interception problem immensely.” Simon understood and nodded.

  “When we get thru this current situation, I want your staff to come up with a plan to develop longer range missiles. Maybe we’ll have them ready next time we get uninvited visitors.”

  “I’ll see to it, Your Majesty.” Both men fell silent again.

  Bargham reviewed the missile firing plan developed by his Tactical Officer and used his light pen to approve the plan. All ships immediately received their copies and signaled their readiness. The plan was simple in concept but required split second timing that only the ships’ computers could handle. Bargham’s ships were now in line abreast formation. The enemy ships were still accelerating while Bargham’s ships had already decelerated to zero and were now accelerating back towards Marduk. The enemy ships were moving much faster and were now catching up to them. When the enemy ships were 5,000 miles away, Bargham’s ships would fire a missile barrage that targeted just two enemy ships. Since the enemy ships were in a very loose haphazard formation, it would be difficult for the other 6 ships to use their counter-missile fire to help defend the two targeted ships. The concentration of missiles from six Marduk ships on each enemy ship should in theory overwhelm the target’s own counter-missile fire with enough atomic missiles getting thru to at least severely damage the target, if not outright destroy it. Since the enemy ships still had a hefty 50+ miles per second closing velocity by that time, they would have travelled roughly 4,000 miles during the 80 seconds of powered acceleration of the first barrage missiles, thereby entering effective missile range at the last possible moment. But that was just the beginning. Fifteen seconds after the launch of the first barrage, the Marduk ships would launch a second barrage aimed at a different pair of targets and fifteen seconds after that, a third barrage followed fifteen seconds later by a fourth. With all four barrages fired prior to the first barrage hitting anything, Bargham would have a mere 15-20 seconds to evaluate the effectiveness of the first barrage and decide if another barrage was warranted and if so, against which targets, before the range between opposing ships dropped to zero. If there were any enemy ships still capable of maneuvering at that point, they would pass Bargham’s ships and his force would then be in a stern chase with only a very small window of opportunity to continue firing before the enemy ship(s) were beyond effective missile range again. The first four barrages had to be effective which is why he chose to concentrate so much missile fire against so few targets in each barrage.

  The seconds remaining until the computer controlled firing point was reached, seemed to pass very quickly. Bargham made sure that he was strapped down as tightly as possible. Any hits on Dreadnought by atomic warheads would be savagely jarring even if the collapsium armor prevented penetration of the hull. Bargham had time for one last quick look at the situation on the Tactical Display with Valkanhayn’s two ships and the loner they were trying to bring to battle, before his Tac Officer yelled out.

  “First barrage is away!” Almost immediately followed by, “Enemy missile fire!” Bargham looked back at his own tactical situation and grinned. One enemy ship was firing back and the computers were projecting that its missiles would exhaust themselves before Bargham’s ships were within range. That ship had fired too soon, probably as a impulsive reaction to the first barrage. But it wasn’t long before all of the enemy ships were firing missiles and now they were close enough to reach Dreadnought and the other ships.

  “Second barrage is away. Eighty…eight zero enemy missiles inbound! They appear to be evenly allocated among our ships! Counter-missile fire has commenced….third barrage is away…fourth barrage is away! First barrage impact in….ten seconds!” Bargham was watching the Tactical Display closely now. The range was so small that the display was showing each friendly and enemy ship as a separate icon. Two clusters of white dots , representing the first barrage, reached their targets. One enemy icon disappeared altogether indicating that the target had been blown apart. The other target icon changed from a solid red to a flashing orange. The color indicated that the target was no longer changing velocity but was now just coasting on a ballistic trajectory. The flashing indicated massive venting of atmosphere. Bargham held his breath. If that damaged ship could still fire anti-ship missiles, it would need another strike but when no missile fire, counter or anti-ship, emerged, Bargham was ready to declare that ship a harmless cripple. He almost missed seeing the second barrage hit. Both of its targets disappeared. He actually did miss seeing the third barrage hit because he was watching to see how many enemy missiles got thru his force’s counter-missile fire. Spreading their first volley among all his ships was the kind of mistake a first year academy cadet made. He shouldn’t be surprised by it because Space Vikings didn’t attend naval academies and weren’t versed in the nuances of fleet combat tactics. The second enemy volley surprised him again. It was now concentrated on only two of his ships. That enemy commander learned fast! The third barrage had only damaged both targets and while one had gone ballistic, the other was still maneuvering and still firing. Bargham quickly allocated half of the fifth barrage to that target and ordered immediate firing. By now range between opposing forces was down to several hundred miles. The fourth barrage hit and destroyed one target. The other was still able to maneuver and fire.

  Bargham was in the process of designating it as the target for the remaining missiles of the fifth barrage when Dreadnought took a hit by an atomic missile that somehow got thru the coordinated counter-missile fire of all 12 Marduk ships. The armor did its job but the energy of the explosion exerted enough force to push the ship sideways hard enough that the Flag Bridge Command Station was crushed by a consol torn loose from its housing.

  “Dreadnought’s been hit!” yelled Shefter. Simon heard someone swear then realized the he was the one swearing. “One ship got thru! Why aren’t they firing on it? It’s about to fly right past them and it’ll be out of missile range in seconds!” Simon suddenly knew the answer.

  “They’re not firing because Bargham is either injured, dead or his Flag Bridge has lost its tactical link to the other ships and his second in command hasn’t realized it yet!” Both men watched as the one remaining enemy ship, that was still able to maneuver, flew past the Marduk ships. Shefter must have seen something that Simon missed because he slammed his fist down on the conference room table and shouted.

  “One of ours launched its missiles! Let’s hope it was in time!” As the seconds slipped by, both men watched the huge Status Board in silence. The
Board showed a circle around the point where the Marduk ship had fired its missiles, apparently on the Captain’s own authority. The circle represented the effective range of those missiles. Just as the remaining enemy ship was about the cross that boundary, the icon representing it, disappeared. Simon looked at Shefter and said.

  “That volley got thru their counter-missile defenses?” Shefter nodded.

  “That ship was probably damaged and either didn’t see the incoming missiles or couldn’t fire enough counter-missiles to stop them all. The main battle is over. Now it’s just the loner being pursued by the two Tanith ships.”