Fedorov nodded. Then to Volsky he asked: “Do you want me to destroy this submarine, sir?”
The Admiral looked at him from beneath his heavy brows, then slurped another spoonful of his soup. He realized that the young captain was asking him to shoulder the burden of this next kill, to give him the order so that he would not have to pull the trigger himself, but he considered it best to leave this matter alone, and said as much.
“You are presently acting Captain of this ship, Mister Fedorov. The decision is yours. Protect the ship, that is all I ask, and also, I think when you are done with this submarine business it would be wise to recover all the sonobuoys before we depart this area. Leave nothing in the water that might be found and raise a lot of questions, yes?”
“Very Good, Sir… Will you be returning to duty soon?”
“Ask Zolkin here,” Volsky inclined his head to his friend.
“Ask Zolkin, ask Zolkin. Everyone is always asking the doctor for advice. Well in this case, I think the Admiral is recovering nicely and should be back on his feet in little time. You may go chase your submarine, Mister Fedorov, but don’t get too close. A few less explosions would help the Admiral sleep a bit better.”
“Don’t worry about me, Fedorov,” said Volsky. “I’ll be fine.”
Fedorov left the sick bay, encouraged by the thought that the Admiral might soon recover to take the burden of command from him. He headed for the bridge, thinking what to do about this submarine. They had lost four men. He knew that the U-boat was still out there, and probably intent on stalking them further if they lingered here, yet he believed he knew what to do about it now. Moments later he stepped onto the bridge resumed command from Rodenko, sending him below for some rest.
Karpov had already gone below a few hours earlier, and would relieve him at dawn. Now he was ready to consider the matter of this submarine. The KA-40 was still up, though low on fuel, but he decided to follow his hunch and have a closer look at Fornells Bay. He had Nikolin radio the helo and ordered the pilot to overfly the inlet and use infrared cameras and sensors to have a look. Sure enough, when the telemetry was fed back to the ship he could see the knife like presence of a submerged submarine hovering in the shallow waters of the bay, very near the entrance. It was probably trying to sneak out at this very moment, he thought!
Returning to his navigation station he called up the reference to U-73 once more and clicked on the link to the boat’s captain, Helmut Rosenbaum. There was Germany’s newest recipient of the Knight’s cross for the sinking of HMS Eagle, he thought. So there you are, you crafty little bandit. He looked at the first photo of Rosenbaum, smiling amiably beneath his captain’s hat, a younger man in a better day. There was another photo of him arriving back at La Spezia after this very same patrol, a bouquet of flowers before him and his head turned left to the camera with a gritty smile, his beard unshaven and a jaunty look of pride in his eyes. He read the final notation on the man’s fate:
“He left U-73 in October 1942 and became the commander of the 30th flotilla, which fought in the Black Sea. Helmut Rosenbaum was killed in an air crash on 10 May 1944.”
As Fedorov stared at the photo he felt a strange connection to the man, and an eerie sensation in knowing his future like this. It was a heady, almost God-like feeling, and something that no man should ever have in his grasp, he thought.
“KA-40 reports it can put a weapon on the target at any time sir,” said Nikolin, looking at Fedorov.
Roused from his muse, Fedorov looked at him for a moment and blinked. He could order the U-Boat destroyed in a heartbeat, snuffing out the lives of every man aboard as easily as he might blow out a match. In that event he suddenly realized the photo he was looking at would never even be taken!
Something in him revolted at that that. It was no longer a cold calculation of war or survival in the balance. Kirov was well off shore and safe from any harm this U-Boat might still wish upon them. It was his intention to sail west as soon as the helo was recovered, and even running at only twenty knots the ship would quickly leave Rosenbaum and his intrepid U-73 behind. He looked again at the photo, saw the pride in the man’s eyes as he accepted his laurels, and then he made up his mind. Rosenbaum would die in that plane crash on 10 May, 1944. The man was living out the last brief years of his life, and Fedorov would give them to him, come what may.
He remembered what Doctor Zolkin had said just a few minutes earlier, and he knew he had chosen correctly: “…choosing life is better than death, even if it means you do not win the day or avenge a fallen foe.”
“Mister Nikolin,” he said. “Order the KA-40 to secure all weapons and return to the ship immediately. They are to recover all sonobuoys as well. Leave nothing in the water, is that clear? We are heading west at once.”
Nikolin raised an eyebrow. “Very well, sir,” he said, and he passed the orders on. When Karpov returned to the bridge an hour later Kirov had sailed and was off the western edge of Menorca. Heading into the channel between that island and the largest landform in the Balearic chain, Majorca. He gave a heading of 270 degrees due west, intending to move north of that larger island and then down through the wider channel to its west. There would be plenty of sea room there and the ship could stay well off shore and safe from prying eyes. He would use that channel to head due south before plotting his course for the Alboran Sea, the last great bottleneck that would lead them to the cork—Gibraltar.
Fedorov communicated his intentions to Karpov and made ready to leave the bridge. “I stand relieved, Mister Karpov.”
“Aye, sir. Rest well.”
Once alone Karpov inquired about the submarine with Tasarov just as he was about to hand over his shift to Velichko. “Any sign of that devil?”
“We spotted it in that inlet a little over an hour ago. The Captain had the KA-40 right on top of it, but he did not fire, and ordered the helo back to the ship.”
Karpov’s face registered real surprise. He started to say something, then stopped himself, thinking. Fedorov had the U-boat in his crosshairs and let the damn thing live! He never said a word to me about it when I came up to relieve him. He had half a mind to refuel the helicopter and send it back out to avenge its dastardly attack on his ship, and avenge the lives of the men that had died, but another voice spoke to him from within. “He who seeks vengeance must dig two graves: one for his enemy and one for himself.” It was his headstrong obsession with righting perceived wrongs that had cause this trouble for them in the first place. He would let Fedorov’s decision stand.
“Very well,” he said at length, tapping Tasarov on the shoulder. “Get some sleep and wash the wax from those ears, Tasarov. We’ll need you back in your chair when we sail for Gibraltar.”
He let the matter go and turned to the helmsman: “Steady on two seven zero.”
U-73 slipped quietly through the narrow mouth of the bay and out into the wide sea beyond that rocky shore. Rosenbaum immediately raised his periscope for a look in case his enemy was still nearby. He saw no ship, but spied a strange craft in the air, heading northwest, its running lights winking as it went.
A strange feeling came over him, and an involuntary shudder shook his frame as he watched the aircraft vanish in the grey dawn. It was as if the hand of death had been poised above his head, and stayed itself. He felt strangely alive, a vibrant sense of the moment keening up his senses as he scanned the horizon. It was empty, and the sun was casting its first golden rays on the rocky crest of Cape Caballería off to the northwest. He knew he could never catch up with that British ship again, and something told him that it would not be wise to try. So he decided to take his boat quietly out to sea and then turn northeast for La Spezia. He would not get his number seven kill on this patrol, and he would have to put aside the attack he had planned to avenge the loss of U-563 and Klaus Bargsten. Enough was enough, he thought.
He smiled, lowering his periscope and thinking of home. His patrol was over. He would go back to La Spezia and collect his medal, an
d then off to a new assignment in the Black Sea—commander of a new flotilla of six Type II boats!
Life was good.
Part VIII
The Best Laid Plans
“The best laid schemes of mice and men
Go often awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy.”
~ Robert Burns
“I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea.”
~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground
Chapter 22
Word came to Syfret in a brief respite in the middle of a very hard day on the 12th of August. It was marked highest priority, direct from the Admiralty, and he was to respond and confirm these new orders at once. It was more than he needed just then, as the Germans and Italians had been throwing everything they had at him. There was a relatively small attack that morning at 08:00 hours, easily beaten off with the substantial flak his escorts could put up. At noon, however, a stronger attack came, some seventy aircraft. It was just as the intelligence had indicated after intercepting and decoding orders sent to the Italian 77th Wing at Elmas, Sardinia. Yet there was also some odd chaff in that message about an engagement farther north, at Bonifacio Strait. What was that about? It was the only bright spot in his day, as it indicated that the Italian Naval units that had been gathering like a flock of black crows in the Tyrrhenian Sea had suddenly turned north, and were now well away from the planned convoy route.
It was clear from the intelligence that the whole operation was being taken in deadly earnest by the enemy. There were opinions expressed that the Germans now believed there was a direct threat to Benghazi, Tripoli or even to Crete, with the threat of Allied troop landings prompting them to reinforce all these areas with any available air and ground units.
Lord, he was having enough trouble simply trying to protect fourteen merchant vessels carrying supplies to Malta, let alone the notion of mounting an amphibious operation behind Rommel’s back. He knew that was coming, but for the moment those plans were still hush, hush. Now he looked at his new orders, curious as to what might be so urgent in them.
‘IMPERATIVE YOU WITHDRAW FORCE Z AT EARLIEST OPPORTUNITY - RETURN TO GIBRALTAR AT BEST SPEED – REPEAT – WITHDRAW IMMEDIATELY - ACKNOWLEDGE – END’
He frowned, noting how “at his earliest opportunity” had been duly strengthened by the addition “withdraw immediately.” Here the Germans and Italians were doing everything possible to impede his progress—high level bombers, dive bombers, low level torpedo planes, submarines, minefields, some twist on a new aerial torpedo dropped from planes that would circle in the midst of the convoy to seek out targets. The Italians would call them ‘motobombas.’ He had even heard they had packed a seaplane full of high explosives and planned to fly it by radio control and crash it into one of his carriers. Thankfully the plane could not be controlled and flew harmlessly across the Mediterranean Sea to crash in the desert, leaving a large crater where it exploded but doing no other harm. The Italians, he thought, shaking his head.
Now the Admiralty simply wanted him to turn about with the heart of the surface escort fleet, and run off home to Gibraltar. For what? He knew he would have to turn back in any case, as they were very near the Skerki Bank now, and the channel narrowed there to make a transit by his battleships an unwise operation in these circumstances. It had always been planned that Force Z would turn back at this point. The question was merely how long to hold with the convoy before he turned it over to Admiral Burrough and Force X with his cruisers and destroyers.
They would have the worst of what was yet to come, he knew. He was taking the carriers, and both Rodney and Nelson home with him, and Burrows was left with whatever they could spare him.
“Rodney reports she’s having difficulties with her steering, sir,” said a watch stander. The ship had been having trouble that way for the last month, Syfret knew, and now it was all she could do to make just fifteen knots. If the Admiralty wanted them home directly, he had little choice in the matter. He had to turn back now.
“Very well,” he said with a heavy heart, and gave an order to the midshipman at his side. “Signal Admiral Burrough Godspeed, and we’ll turn about at once and head east for Gibraltar.” He looked at his watch. It was 16:00 hours, some three hours before he was planning to make this turn.
So it was that the carrier Indomitable, which might have sailed on into the teeth of the enemy air attacks for another three hours, did not receive three critical bomb hits when the Axis air forces mounted a large and well coordinated attack with JU-88s, JU-87s, and Italian Cant 1007 torpedo bombers. Rodney was also spared three near misses and the crash of an Italian aircraft on her bow. The order from the Admiralty had changed the history—Kirov had changed the history by her very presence in this region, and by prompting those urgent orders.
Now Syfret sailed east chasing the setting sun, even as Kirov was beginning to put her first divers into the water north of Menorca Island. While Rosenbaum’s U-73 was taking that long torpedo shot and prompting Karpov to churn up the sea with his ASW rockets and initiate his search with the KA-40, Syfret was receiving bad news over his shoulder and burdened with considerable regret. Burrough was under attack, and his cruisers Nigeria and Cairo had both taken torpedoes, along with the one ship he had dearly hoped to protect, the American oil tanker Ohio. He was inclined to split his force and send Rodney on home to satisfy this order from the Admiralty, while taking Nelson back east to cover the eventual withdrawal of Burrough’s Force X. Yet he received further orders clarifying his options in no uncertain terms. He was to return to Gibraltar at his best speed, and with as much force as he could spare. At the very least he felt obliged to detach some of his escorts and send help to Force X, come what may. So he gave orders that cruiser Charybdis and destroyers Eskimo and Somali should be signaled by lantern to break off and return to the fray. It would end up doing little good.
In the next twenty-four hours the British would see two more cruisers torpedoed, Kenya and Manchester, and of the 14 ships they had mustered all this naval power to protect, only five would make it through the terrible gauntlet of fire and reach Malta. The Ohio was saved by a handful of dispossessed crewman who manned her AA guns while they watched the ship sink so low in the water that the waves were right at the height of the deck. Two British destroyers lashed themselves to either side of the beleaguered tanker and literally dragged her to port.
Five ships…only five made it through, but it was enough to keep the garrison and population of Malta from starvation, and the vital oil and fuel in Ohio’s holds was pumped out in the nick of time before she finally settled on the bottom at her berth, a ruined wreck. She would never sail again.
As the haggard Royal Navy ships fell back on Gibraltar, Force Z would limp home with the two big battleships, carriers Indomitable and Victorious, two light cruisers and twelve more destroyers. The carrier Furious would be their rear guard with five more destroyers in escort. The weary crews would get little respite.
To his great surprise, Admiral Syfret soon learned that they were to prepare for a make or break defense of Gibraltar itself! He was to make immediate plans to close those straits to any and all ship traffic.
What in the world can have the Admiralty all rousted up like this, he thought? He was not one of the select few that had been briefed on the details of the engagements of a year past. Yes, rumors flew throughout the whole of the fleet of this new German raider with its wonder weapons and the terrible end it brought to the Americans there. And yes, he had seen the damage to Prince of Wales and King George V himself when they had returned to Scapa Flow, and knew that the venerable battlecruiser Repulse had not come home with them. But that was a year ago, and this enemy ship had been sunk, or so the official line had been put out. He knew nothing of the Admiralty’s continued interest and preoccupation with the incident, and nothing of the code word “Geronimo” that had set these events in motion.
So
what was all this bother about? Had the plans for Operation Torch been moved up? It was the only thing he could think of that made any sense, and so he made his plans for the fleet to refuel so his destroyers would to be ready to move out again on patrol in the straits of Gibraltar as soon as they reached that location. Perhaps he should invite Admiral Fraser over from Rodney and have a little chat. Maybe he knew something more and could explain matters to him.
Even as Syfret gave that reluctant order to turn about on the afternoon of August 12, Admiral Tovey was already aboard the cruiser Norfolk and well out to sea where he would soon transfer to the flagship, King George V.
While the KA-40 was searching in vain for U-73 on the night of August 12-13, Home Fleet had been pounding it sway south at twenty-four knots. While Fedorov had his last visit with the Admiral and Doctor, Tovey’s battleships were already off the coast of Brest. There German reconnaissance planes spotted the fleet, and telephones were soon jangling as the Germans tried to surmise what this big fleet movement was all about. They had already been spooked by Operation Pedestal, with strong opinions that the British were planning an imminent amphibious operation on the coast of North Africa. These ships must be mustering for that operation, they now believed, and began to strengthen their defenses all along that coast.
Kirov lingered well north of Menorca while U-73 slipped quietly away to the northeast, heading home. At one point they saw the U-boat on their powerful surface radar sets, and Karpov had a second chance to think about killing it with a missile. He decided the boat was not worth the expense, and let Rosenbaum go. In his mind, however, there was no calculus of what may or may not happen at some future date, nor was there any musing over life and death. It was simply a matter of economics at that point. Kirov needed her anti-ship missiles for what lay ahead of them now, not what lay behind.
Kirov II: Cauldron Of Fire (Kirov Series) Page 22
