Dragon Fire (The Battle for the Falklands Book 2)

by Bleichert, Peter von

  From Hermes flight deck, yet another of Sheffield’s dead was tipped over the deck. He had perished, and was committed to the sea, in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection unto eternal life. Twenty-six more of Sheffield’s wounded suffered in the carrier’s sick ward with burns, shock, and smoke inhalation. Sub-Lieutenant Lawrence Fryatt was among them.

  Several decades later…

  1: NAVIS

  “Four hoarse blasts of a ship's whistle still raise the hair on my neck and set my feet to tapping.”—John Steinbeck

  The Norwegian Sea, a vast, black flatness, shivered in the cold, clear night. Pricks of bright light filled the sky and reflected in the calm water. These stars made it hard to tell where the heavens ended and the sea began. They seemed to be alive and spoke to one another with staccato flickers. A lone warship made way upon the sea, disturbing the black diamond-sprinkled tapestry, cleaving and pushing aside the reflected stars in a wave that undulated across the ocean’s surface.

  This warship was His Majesty’s Ship Dragon, the Royal Navy’s latest guided-missile destroyer. Of the Daring-class, otherwise known as the Type 45, Dragon was some 500 feet-long and crowned by a towering pyramidal mast topped by a radar dome. Like her namesake, Dragon had deadly sharp claws and teeth.

  A floating fortress, Dragon’s archers were missiles; her catapults: guns; and a Merlin lived in a cave at her stern. Dragon wore an invisibility cloak of sorts, with faceted sides that scattered enemy radar waves from her deceptive grey form. Every bit the agile slippery wyrm, or dragon, this proud ship could examine air, sea, and space in crystal screens, and when cornered or when in the mood, she could breathe very hot fire. Like most castles of old, just one man ruled this floating realm.

  Dragon’s bridge served as Captain Lawrence Fryatt’s throne room. Surrounded by loyal and obedient lieges, Fryatt exercised well-earned authority from a barely cushioned cold metal chair. Though his voice was often soft, sometimes even whispered, it thundered nonetheless. His voice brought immediate compliance, driving actions that were frequently a matter of life or death.

  Like most in the Royal Navy, Fryatt was a simple man; he believed in country, duty, monarch, and navy. He also believed that the Type 45s, with their Sea Viper primary anti-air missile system, stood alone as the world’s premiere anti-air warfare surface vessels. The Americans could keep their Aegis cruisers, Fryatt thought; the Chinese could parade their Type 054A frigates all they wanted; and, the Russians could stuff their Project 21956 destroyers. Fryatt was proud of Dragon, proud of those he commanded, and he possessed an unwavering commitment to defense of the realm. Captain Fryatt adjusted his collar and shifted in his chair.

  It’s too hot, Fryatt thought. Ever since fighting the blaze board Sheffield, ever since seeing the burned men, Fryatt had hated excessive heat. Even though the ship’s environmental system was doing its job of keeping the bridge and its company snug, the warm, dry breeze made Fryatt fidgety. He stood, drawing a concerned look from the officer-of-the-watch, a man who tried to anticipate his captain’s every need. Fryatt made his way to an exterior hatch. He swung open the heavy portal, and uttered a single word to whomever could hear: “Tea.” He stepped out to the bridge wing.

  Fryatt clanged the hatch shut. Although the steel door could ward off biological agents, chemicals, and radiation, he used it to keep his company at bay—to steal a moment in a place that otherwise did not allow much privacy. While he accepted the strong steaming mug of lemon-tinged Earl Grey that arrived within moments, Fryatt would tolerate no other disturbances. He went to the rail and leaned upon it. It propped up his tired body. The rail also transmitted the ship’s harmonic to Fryatt’s bones.

  Dragon’s bow gently rose and fell as she plowed through the sea, kicking up a spray that turned frosty and sparkled in the starlight. Fryatt drew a sharp, frigid breath that stung his lungs. He exhaled it as a cloud, watched it get caught in the breeze, and recalled his grandfather.

  Fryatt’s grandfather had sailed the Murmansk Run during the Second World War, the run that brought supplies to a choked Soviet Union. The man had sailed an old steam merchant over these very waters, had skirted U-boats and the feared convoy raider Tirpitz, as well as icebergs that calved from the jagged shores of Greenland and became caught up in the Eastern Icelandic current. Fryatt sipped his tea and pondered the throbbing stars blanketing the dark night.

  Fryatt had grown up in the west-end of London, a place where the night sky had for centuries been polluted with artificial light, light that subdued the glowing ribbon of the Milky Way, dulling its wonder. Tonight, however, far from the influence of man’s cityscapes, Earth and sky were beheld as they were meant to be: a vision that begged questions and forced fundamental things to be asked, private thoughts like: ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Why am I here?’ Despite such existential considerations, Fryatt knew why he, his comrades, and His Majesty’s warship were here, at the top of the world.

  Russia had reawakened; the bear roused by a leader longing for empire. This leader had turned back time and progress, back to when east and west stood eye-to-eye and toe-to-toe. Flush with oily cash, the Russian had claimed most of the Arctic, and, in support of these aspirations, the Russian Federation had built new attack subs and missile boats. These machines and their men stretched their legs and made the Greenland-Iceland-UK Gap come alive again. Furthermore, resurrected strategic bombers—Backfires and Bears—once again flew out of the Kola Peninsula to buzz the Finns, Swedes and Norwegians, and play chicken with the United Kingdom’s northern air defense identification zone.

  While the Royal Air Force gave its own unique brand of hell to such unwelcome visitors, Dragon and her sisters also reminded the Russian bombers that, like during the Cold War, they were not wanted in this part of the neighborhood. Intelligence, as well as over-the-horizon radar stations in Scotland, told the Royal Navy what was headed their way. This was how Fryatt knew he could expect airborne company tonight, in fact within the hour. In the meantime, however, he was content to cherish the star-lit Arctic night.

  Fryatt raised his dominant hand to the sky. It was the left one. He waved the square of his palm about, half-expecting the protuberances of his fingers to displace the stars, to push them along into streaks of lights, to wash them around like glitter that floated in black ink. Despite the grin on his face and this moment of suspended reality, Fryatt failed to influence the canvas of night, and in the end, remained as inconsequential as he had expected to be. However, when a sailor burst through the bridge hatch and announced that the ship’s Action Information Center had an airborne radar contact, Fryatt knew that, at the very least, he could affect terrestrial events. He could influence the behavior of his fellow humans. He took one last draw of the sharp air. It reminded him he was alive, and, it reminded him he wanted to stay that way.

  “Captain on the bridge,” was announced as Fryatt re-entered the warm enclosure. Fryatt always loved the sound of those four words. Just a lad from Hounslow, he still felt a rush as highly-qualified uniformed people acknowledged his presence, straightened their stance, and raised their chins. His thoughts turned to that of his charge—his ship.

  The vibration of Dragon’s bridge deck spoke to him. It said that the ship was slicing through the water at some 25 knots. Deep in the hull, Dragon’s twin gas turbines and diesel generators thumped away. Fryatt felt them provide power to the electric motors, which in turn sent 27,000 horsepower to the shafts. Two propellers translated this power to the water, cutting it, grabbing it, and pushing it away. Going to his chair, Fryatt ran his hands over the bridge control panel. He dragged each finger across the hard knobs and soft rubber-covered buttons. A ship is like a familiar lover, he pondered. As her tremble was felt, one adjusted touch to achieve harmonious vibration, to take her in the right direction, to bring her where she wanted, where she longed, to go. Fryatt sat down in his chair. It, too, vibrated. He smiled as Dragon hummed happily along.

  Lieutenant-Commander Nigel Williams—Dragon’s second
-in-command and one of 190 souls aboard—peered at a terminal. Bathed in its green glow, Williams’ eyes squinted, his jaw set. Then he turned to the captain.

  “Sir, the ship is at ‘air warning yellow,’” telling the captain that his men and women were ready for trouble.

  “Lovely night,” the captain responded, acknowledging the information while maintaining his façade of unflappability.

  “It is.”

  A bell rang. Williams spun around again to check another screen.

  “Flash. Op Room reports airborne contacts,” Williams announced.

  “Right,” the captain said with a glance to the clock. “Our Russian friends are right on time. Bring the ship to ‘air warning red.’ Maintain speed and course.”

  Williams acknowledged and brought the ship to action stations.

  Dragon’s dimly lit Op Room was cold. Despite the heaters, the icy Norwegian Sea reached through the hull and chilled the bones of the sailors manning rows of computer terminals and radar screens. One of these sailors energized the SAMPSON 3-D multifunction phased-array radar perched high atop Dragon’s forward mast. It fired beams through the atmosphere and found two low-altitude targets, populating the Op Room’s screens with blips and numbers.

  “Flag, AWO, probable targets. Two tracks inbound at two-seven-five degrees. Altitude: 3,000 feet. Speed: Mach zero-point-nine.” The numbers beside the radar blips changed. “Tracks have accelerated. Now at Mach one-point-one. They’ve gone supersonic. Flight profile suggests Russian Backfire bombers.”

  The Tu-22M Backfire was a swing-wing, long-range strategic and maritime strike bomber. Its two giant Kuznetsov NK-25 turbofans pushed the big bomber to Mach 1.88. When not on nuclear patrol, Backfires usually left base with a load of long-range anti-ship missiles; likely the older, though effective, AS-4 Kitchens; or worse for Dragon, newer SS-N-22 Sunburns.

  “Radar warning,” a sailor yelled out. The Backfires had energized their Down Beat missile targeting radar and painted Dragon with energy. Though Dragon’s sloped sides, faceted mast and radar-absorbent material inhibited the Backfire’s ability to lock on, the closer the airplanes got, the higher their chance of a successful missile launch. The Russian bombers drove in hard and fast.

  “Jam their signal,” Captain Fryatt ordered. Though he knew the Russians were unlikely to fire, he would play the game by the rules anyway and try to send them home with bruised egos. From the top of Dragon’s main mast, the integrated intercept and jammer suite’s antenna began to transmit at the same wavelength as the Backfires’ radar. If all went as advertised, an electronic fog had spread across the Backfire’s cockpit screen, temporarily concealing Dragon’s movements. Fryatt ordered a hard turn to port. The ship’s company braced against the lean of the deck. “Shoot them down,” Fryatt told Williams with a cheeky grin.

  Williams smiled back. As they had discussed previously, Dragon would use the intruders to conduct an exercise. Williams picked up the VUU—the ship’s Voice User Unit—and told the AIC to run an Aster missile drill. The ship’s phased-array radar fired a targeting beam into the face of the two Backfires. A Klaxon sounded aboard Dragon. It warned the ship’s company to stay away from the Sylver A-50 vertical launch system, an array of 48 missile cells sunk into the ship’s forward deck. Inside each cell hid a dart-shaped Aster surface-to-air missile.

  The Aster series could engage and take down aircraft, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. Right now, the Russian’s cockpit warning panels must be lit up like a Christmas tree, Fryatt thought. They know that the tables have been turned, that they had been detected, were being targeted, and should I so desire, supersonic missiles would soon be on the way to rip into their fuselage and wings. Fryatt stood, went to the windscreen, and peered out at Dragon’s forward deck.

  Had the captain authorized release of weapons, two Asters would have blasted open their frangible cell covers, erupted from the deck in a fountain of fire, and raced off to meet the Backfires. Op Room announced the radar contacts had climbed, slowed, and turned around.

  “Well, that was fun,” Fryatt said to the bridge crew. They all chuckled and nodded. “Bring us back to patrol course and reduce speed to 18 knots. Stand down from air warning red and revert to yellow.”

  Several minutes later Captain Fryatt was in his cabin reading and eating a sandwich. He heard a knock at the door.

  “Come,” Fryatt said. The wood-paneled door slid open. It was Lieutenant-Commander Williams, carrying a print-out. He asked forgiveness for the disturbance, handed his Captain the paper, and retreated again to the passageway. Fryatt rubbed his eyes, unfolded the decrypted message, and began to read:

  PROTECTIVELY MARKED INFORMATION

  ENCRYPTION KEY: ATD3GW

  FR: NAVY COMMAND HEADQUARTERS

  TO: HMS DRAGON

  REPUBLIC OF ARGENTINA (ROA) HAS INVADED/HOLDS SOUTH ATLANTIC OVERSEAS TERRITORY OF FALKLAND ISLANDS. STATE OF WAR EXISTS WITH ROA.

  ORDERS:

  RENDEVOUS WITH HMS IRON DUKE AT 8S 14W

  PROCEED IN UNISON AT BEST SPEED TO 51S 54W AND RENDEVOUS WITH HMS AMBUSH

  RULES OF ENGAGEMENT ULTRA—ENGAGE AND DESTROY ALL ENEMY CONTACTS. PROVIDE THEATRE–WIDE ANTI-AIR WARFARE UMBRELLA FOR FRIENDLY FORCES

  END TRANSMISSION

  Fryatt remembered having read that the Crown Prince had been headed to the Falklands for a tour. He thought of his old ship, Sheffield, and remembered the agonized groans of the badly burned man that had lain beside him in Hermes’ sick ward. He thought about the AM39 Exocet.

  During the 1982 Falklands War, other than sinking Sheffield, Exocet had damaged the merchant ship Atlantic Conveyor, and set the destroyer Glamorgan ablaze. Fryatt knew that Argentina now had over 200 Exocets in inventory, including the latest MM40 Block 3 version. While he knew that Dragon was far better equipped to handle this menace than Sheffield had been, he also knew that these weapons would be their greatest nightmare. What had not crossed his mind, however, was the fact of Argentina’s new submarines.

  2: ABISMO

  “They say the sea is cold, but the sea contains the hottest blood of all…”—D.H. Lawrence

  There were strange snaps, clicks, and haunting songs. The trio of sound was layered over a bass section of low-frequency groans. This orchestra of life belonged to the Atlantic Ocean, and, from the murk beneath the waves, another sound grew louder, rhythmic and unnatural. A shadow approached. It was blacker than the blackness.

  Argentine submarine ARA San Luis II was a Project 877EKM Paltus diesel-electric attack submarine, better known by the NATO designation of Kilo. Paltus meant Halibut, and, like the large bottom-dwelling flatfish, San Luis II could blend in, conceal herself, and lay in wait to snap up unwary prey. Built in Nizhniy Novgorod, Russia, like most things made there, the submarine had been sold like a drug in a dark alley. Cold cash had sealed the deal. Yes, to some on Argentina’s Cabinet of Ministers, a submarine was just a steel hole in the water that did not feed people, plow fields, sow seeds, nor provide shelter to the poor. But to others, San Luis II represented a means to an end, and existed, therefore, as a beautiful thing.

  San Luis II—called, simply, Numero Dos (Number Two) by her crew—featured a hemispheric bow that housed sonar and six big weapon tubes for mines, missiles, and torpedoes. She bore dive planes just forward of a large sail emblazoned with the big white pennant number ‘S-44.’ Antennae, two periscopes and a snorkel through which the diesels breathed, jutted from the sail’s top. The submarine’s fat and stubby, stretched teardrop-shaped, hull ended with a lower stabilizer fin/rudder and a single big six-bladed propeller. As to a blind man, sound was San Luis II’s eyes.

  She towed behind her a microphone-covered wire and, mounted hull-side, was the Rubikon passive sonar array. These ‘eyes’ collected sounds from the water, and allowed San Luis II to see in the dark. Her speed increased, and then she reeled in her towed array. Within the pressure hull, beyond the reach of the great crush of ocean, is where San Luis II’s human operators e
xisted. They dwelt in a tangled thicket of pipes and valves that lined a claustrophobes’ nightmare of artificial caves, grottoes, hatches, and tubular tunnels. The sonar station occupied a small space just off the main Control Room.

  This is where sounds were filtered and analyzed by computers and their sophisticated software. The computers then presented the sounds to technicians. A glowing screen, one of many, displayed graphical bars that cascaded like a waterfall. Each bar represented bearing, frequency, and the range of sonar contacts. The sonar technician pointed to one such bar and asked what he was listening to: “¿Que es eso?”

  “Whales screwing,” the senior sonar technician answered. The accent revealed a youth spent in the mountainous north-western Argentinian province of Catamarca.

  “And that background noise?” the subordinate added.

  “That, my friend, is from tectonic plates; the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The crackle you hear, just like your breakfast cereal?”

  “Yes.”

  “That is lava flash-cooling in seawater.”

  The tech nodded understanding, but his slackened jaw revealed lingering confusion coupled with fascination.

  The senior sonar technician pressed his headphones tighter to his ears and stated: “We are never going to hear anything at this speed.” San Luis II’s diesel generators continued throbbing away, masking the subtle sounds that could represent another submarine.

  San Luis II was on a north-easterly speed course, her depth now ten meters beneath the surface of the ocean, that undulating membrane between air and water. The sub’s diesels breathed through a snorkel that ripped the water like a shark’s fin, sucking vital oxygen that all Earth-bound creatures need, even those made of metal. The invasion of the Falklands—Operación Maza—was underway, and San Luis II would do her part. She arrived on station just 40 minutes behind schedule.