Assault on Zanzibar

by E. C. Williams

  Sam passed the word for Dave Schofield. When he appeared, clearly exhausted from the day's work, during which he alternated serving in the tower and flying a plane himself, Sam said, “What about it, Dave – are your boys ready for combat?”

  “Well, sir, they've gotten good – damned good – but one more day would be helpful to polish up their skills.”

  “Sorry, Dave, we can't afford another day's training. For one thing, we've burned so much fuel during this evolution that we can't spare any more without leaving us dangerously short for actual operations. As it is, Charlie will have to suck Emma almost dry to replace what we’ve used.

  “For another, comms has reported a significant increase in enemy radio chatter, apparently from multiple stations, a sign that a large enemy force has put to sea. They're probably on the hunt for us, and we can't disappoint 'em. I'm not asking you if the squadron is perfectly ready – are they good enough?”

  “Yessir. We're good enough to take on the enemy.”

  “Then we'll get under way this evening. Be ready to start flying scout missions at dawn.”

  “Aye aye, sir. Another thing – Mister Patel has asked permission to use deck lights tonight, to get the machines ready after all the flying we've done the last couple of days.” Patel, a warrant officer, was the Réunionnais volunteer personally trained by Rao, designer of the Petrel, to take charge of the maintenance and repair of the flying boats, and the training of men to do it.

  Merde, Sam thought to himself. With her deck illuminated, Charlemagne would be a beacon for the enemy all through the night.

  “Permission granted, but in that case, I'll delay sailing until early tomorrow.” Sam dismissed Schofield, who hurried back toward the Air Shack – he had a great deal to do and oversee before the morning.

  Sam then looked around and caught the eye of a harassed-looking Lieutenant Cameron.

  “Todd, we'll get underway at first light tomorrow. Check the almanac for the exact time, and pass the prep order to the task force.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “How's Eloy shaping up?”

  “Pretty well, sir. I've briefed him on comms procedures and keeping the flag log, and we've worked up a draft of the standing orders for your review.”

  “Okay. I'll look at them over supper. My compliments to Captain Murphy, and I'd welcome a word with him.”

  Murphy appeared promptly, and Sam said “Ben, we'll be getting underway first thing tomorrow. And we may be in action before sunset, so be sure your crew and ship are ready.”

  “We're ready, Commodore. Charlie won't let you down.”

  “I'm sure she won't, Ben.”

  While it was still dark, early the next morning, the task force began heaving up. With admirable timing, the anchors came home just as the brief morning twilight began. At dawn, the vessels were motoring northwards and setting sail. Sam was up and on deck well before this – he had spent a restless night. The sun rose in a cloudless sky, over a nearly-calm sea. It promised to be another beautiful tropical morning.

  The first scout Petrel was launched, and flew off to the northward. It was unarmed, for maximum endurance, with neither bombs nor ammo for its one-inch cannon. A few hours later it returned, having been relieved on-station by another plane. The task force fell into a routine of launching and recovering scout planes while motor-sailing northward on a broad reach. At fixed intervals, the scout aloft would check in by radio, always with the same signal: “Nothing to report.”

  An hour after the last plane of the day had taken off, however, those on deck were electrified when the speaker crackled into life with “Charlie, this is Mauler: have sighted four three-masted and four two-masted gun dhows in company, sailing on a southerly course, location sector eleven, I say again sector one one, over.”

  Sam turned to Mr. Eloy, standing at his elbow, and snapped, “How far away is that? And who's 'Mauler'?”

  Eloy consulted a clipboard and replied, “Search sector eleven is about one hundred miles dead ahead of the task force, sir. And 'Mauler' is Lieutenant Maury.”

  Sam did some quick mental calculations. The enemy squadron would be beating into the moderate east-south-easterly breeze, and therefore not making best speed – perhaps three knots. A closing rate of, say, seven or eight knots, then. This would put the two forces within sight of one another at just about sunrise, which would be perfect; he didn't want a night action, which would rule out use of his one big advantage, the Petrels. And, with a new moon, there was the danger that the two forces would sail right by one another in the darkness without making contact.

  But what if the dhows were now fitted with engines, and thus capable of greater speed? There was no intelligence to this effect, but the Pirates had in the past always been quick to copy Kerguelenian technological advances, their diesel-powered small craft just the most recent example. Sam turned over in his mind the possibility of making sure of a daylight encounter by turning and beating south through the night, coming back to a northerly course at sunrise. But he hated the thought of giving the Zanzibaris even more time to prepare for his attack. As he thought about this, a sudden question formed in his mind.

  He turned to the signals petty officer and said: “Transmit to Mauler: 'Interrogative: is enemy under sail?'”

  Almost at once the reply came: “Affirmative enemy squadron under full sail, over.” Sam heaved a sigh of relief. If the Pirates had been motoring into the wind, they would not have had sails aloft; sail would only have retarded their forward progress, not added to it. Of course, the possibility remained that they were equipped with engines, and proceeding under sail alone to conserve fuel. But, given their urgent operational necessity of contacting the RKN force as far south as possible, he didn't think they would do that. He was willing to gamble, anyway.

  “Make to squadron: 'double lookouts after sunset',” he ordered the SPO.

  The last plane touched down as the sun reached the western horizon, the recovery operation completed just at the end of the short tropical twilight. Sam passed the word to Charlemagne's watch: “Be prepared to launch aircraft at dawn.” Almost at once, Sam's phone talker said: “Mister Patel requests permission to use deck lights to work on aircraft.” Sam considered this, and his first thought was to refuse. But he reflected that the planes had racked up hours of flying time that day, and decided that it was far more important to ensure that they were fully ready for combat than to worry about being spotted now. “Reply: 'Permission granted',” he said.

  It occurred to Sam that he was very hungry. Dinner had, once again, been a hasty bite grabbed on deck. He summoned the staff messenger and said, “Compliments to Captain Murphy, and would he care to join me for supper.” The sailor came back quickly with an acceptance, followed closely by Ben Murphy himself.

  “Ben, let's talk about tomorrow over a drink and a bite.” But they found little to say about the coming battle – all was as ready as possible. So they chatted about home and family while drinking and eating, each hiding his apprehension about the coming dawn.

  When Murphy had taken his leave, Sam left word to be called with the morning watch, and spent a restless night. It was not, or not only, the prospect of a battle in the morning that disturbed his rest, but growing doubt about the wisdom of pressing on with the planned attack now that surprise was lost. He could not now count on a psychological shock to the enemy, of coming under aerial attack for the first time and unexpectedly. In fact, the Pirates had quickly improvised a moderately effective defense in the form of anti-aircraft artillery. Was he justified in sending his tiny air arm in to the attack, in the teeth of a storm of ground fire? He finally decided, as he had every time before he had conducted this internal debate, that the answer had to be “yes”. The Indian Ocean settlements simply could not endure the steady attrition of shipping and trade. With that thought, he finally fell asleep.

  Up at 0330, he went topsides, where he found the carrier dark and quiet except for the brief bustle of watch change. The sq
uadron's mechanics had completed their maintenance chores on the planes and were grabbing a few hours of much-needed sleep. He walked forward to the vicinity of the Air Shack, the domain of the aviators, where the Petrels crouched silently on their cradles.

  Then there was a flicker of hand-lights, and shadowy figures filed up onto the deck. Some fanned out to prep the planes for flight; another group huddled aft of the Air Shack for a briefing. Sam could hear Schofield's voice. He approached, and waited on the fringes of the group until Dave noticed him.

  “Good morning, Commodore,” Schofield said, and saluted. The others, now recognizable as the pilots, encumbered with parachutes, also saluted, after a fashion: the RKN wasn't noted for military smartness, the aviators least of all. All of them were sweating already. Under their coveralls, they wore thick wool sweaters and long underwear, because the air cooled rapidly with altitude. At twelve thousand feet, the operational ceiling (due only to the danger of apoxia to the pilots – the Stirling engines seemed to work more efficiently the higher they were), the temperature dropped to below freezing.

  “Sorry to interrupt your briefing, Dave. I just wanted to say good luck, and associate these new call signs with faces.”

  “Certainly sir.” Schofield then went around the group, reciting names and call signs. Mallery – “Loverboy”; Kai – “Dragon”; Yates – “Rowdy”.

  “Why 'Rowdy', Mister Yates?” Sam asked.

  “Dunno, sir. Only Dave – Commander Schofield – said he'd read that it was an ancient naval aviation tradition that any pilot named Yates had to be nicknamed 'Rowdy'”.

  Schofield continued down the roster: Ellis – “Swordsman”; Maury – “Mauler”; Ballinger – “Poet”. Sam gazed into Ballinger's face. He was a burly, cheerful young man who looked like he'd played football as a youngster – most un-poet-like.

  “I thought pilot call signs had to be macho and virile-sounding, Mister Ballinger? How'd you get tagged as 'Poet'?”

  The young man grinned sheepishly. “Well, I scribble a bit of verse, sir, sort of a hobby, like. Soon as my mates caught me at it, I was tagged and couldn't shake it off.” Everyone laughed.

  As he went around the group, shaking the hand of each pilot, Sam had stared hard into their young faces, wanting to associate each with his call sign. When he heard their voices over the loud speaker, he wanted to be able to summon up a mental image of each.

  “I broke into your briefing, Dave. Please, continue.”

  “Just finishing, sir. To sum up, we'll send out a pair of two-ship attack flights: Loverboy and Dragon are Red flight; Swordsman and Poet are Green flight. I'll fly high cover, and direct the attack. Rowdy and Mauler drew the short straws – they'll be in flight ops, here on board.” There followed an awkward silence. Sam knew that this was the time for the traditional spirit-lifting oration from the leader, words that would send these kids into battle full of fight. For the life of him, Sam just couldn't come up with those words. Finally, he said simply, “Good luck, lads.”

  Strangely, that seemed satisfactory. The young man shuffled their feet and muttered “Thank you sir”, or “Thanks, Commodore”. Sam then turned and walked back aft to flag country.

  Sam now fretted about when to order the task force to battle stations. He wanted to do it immediately, to be ready in case he had miscalculated the rate of closure of the two formations, but he also knew that all hands needed as much rest as possible in advance of what was sure to be a long, busy – and probably bloody – day. He also wanted them to have time for breakfast, almost certainly the last hot food they would get for most of the day. He finally split the difference, and ordered a signal for early reveille at 0430, and battle stations at 0520. He glanced upwards in time to see Charlemagne's mizzen-top signal light stutter into life, flashing the word to Taffy One. He decided to follow his own advice and went below for breakfast.

  After a quick bite, he had started back topside, a mug of coffee in hand, where he heard the familiar sounds of a Petrel being launched. As he reached flag country, the airplane was taxiing off to windward, visible only by the white rooster-tail of her wake in the half-light as a tropical dawn was beginning to illuminate the sea. The plane became airborne, then banked around toward the north, climbing, and quickly disappeared.

  The brief morning twilight turned into full day with the usual tropical abruptness, and the loud speaker on the Air Shack crackled into life. “Charlie, this is Poet. Enemy formation in sector one, more than four dhows visible.” Sam smiled grimly to himself; search sector one was dead ahead and just over the horizon. His timing for meeting the enemy had been perfect.

  Immediately, the deck of the Charlemagne became a scene of frantic activity as the other four operational Petrels were readied for launch. There was a rattle of lines in blocks as sail was doused throughout the task force; now that every vessel was motorized – even Emma Lee, at the Navy’s expense, of course -- it was doctrine that all canvas be struck below at the prospect of battle, to reduce the threat of fire topsides. At the same time, the general alarm bells clanged and bosuns' calls twittered the pipe to action stations. Albatros and Joan of Arc forged ahead to take up their battle stations in the van, while Roland assumed plane guard a half mile astern of the carrier.

  “Make to task force: Engage enemy when within range,” Sam said to his phone talker; the flag hoist soared up the mizzen signal halyards, and the signal was simultaneously sent by flashing light.

  Dave Schofield climbed to ten thousand feet, and surveyed the sea ahead. He spotted the enemy force at once. They were lowering their own sails – did this mean they had engines, too? Then he saw, ahead of each of the dhows, a small craft emitting puffs of black smoke. Motor boats were towing the enemy warships.

  “Herd, this is Bull. We'll take on the big three-masters first. Red flight, take the easternmost one, Green the westernmost. Bonne chance, lads.”

  “Red Flight, roger.”

  “Green, roger.”

  Dave watched from above as the two attack flights turned eastward and climbed, then turned again to fly out of the sun toward their targets. The Pirate vessels lit up with muzzle flashes as anti-aircraft guns opened fire, well before the aircraft were within range. Even the towing boats appeared to have one small AA gun apiece. The tactic appeared to be to fill the air with lead and hope for a lucky hit.

  The dhows all turned inward, toward the center of the formation, closing the gaps between vessels. To Dave this did not appear to be spontaneous, an instinctive huddling together against a threat, but a deliberate tactic. He decided that they intended to concentrate the AA fire of the squadron. He smiled to himself at the thought; this would likely be effective against dive bombing, but almost totally counter-productive against skip-bombing, since it would effectively mask the fire of all but the vessel being attacked.

  Both pairs of airplanes dived right down onto the deck almost simultaneously, flying so low they must have had spray in their faces. Dave saw each of the machines flying top cover open with suppressive fire from its one-inch automatic nose gun while its mate lined up for a bombing run. Red flight's attack plane, piloted by Poet, dropped first and the two banked sharply left and right and climbed away. Green flight's attacker, Dragon, dropped a pair right after.

  Dave's headphones came alive with excited chatter. Both flights were reporting direct hits. But Dave wasn't so sure; from his vantage point it looked like three near-misses, with one possible direct hit by Dragon. But the two towers of water alongside each dhow looked very close, close enough to do some damage to each target.

  The two flights joined up again for another attack, first flying eastward and climbing, then turning to put the sun at their backs. The volume of AA fire from the enemy ships increased, but, as before, their own vessels masked much of it as soon as the attacking airplane dropped right down on the surface of the sea. The second attack wasn't as successful as the first; both flights dropped late, over-correcting, and missing entirely.

  Since each pla
ne had four bombs in her racks – the maximum load – each flight could make four attacks, alternating position as bomber and top cover. As the planes went around to line up for a third bombing run, Dave said into his headset, “Herd, this is Bull. Switch targets. Say again, switch targets.” He feared that the two dhows previously attacked were getting too good at low-level AA fire. Both flights acknowledged, and selected the other two three-masters for attention. The first attacks resulted in four misses, but two of them may have been near enough to do damage. Dave then noticed a worrisome development. Apparently on a signal, the enemy squadron was fanning out, opening the distance between vessels. The enemy commander had figured out that huddling together only masked the fire of most of his vessels.

  “Herd, Bull. Be advised: enemy is fanning out to unmask AA fire. Watch out.”

  “Green flight, roger.” “Red, roger.”

  Kai – 'Dragon' – wanted badly to get a hit on this, his last bombing run before he would have to return to Mother for re-arming. He dropped right down to within twenty feet of the sea and opened his throttle, watching the target dhow approach rapidly. Just as he was about to release, an AA round from the dhow, a solid shot, hit the port side of his plane, came through the cockpit, and smashed his left leg. He went into shock at once, but somehow managed to hold the plane's nose on the target. It crashed into the side of the dhow, disintegrating, its ruptured fuel tanks spraying aviation spirit over the vessel. The bombs went off seconds later and the dhow was instantly aflame from stem to stern.

  Dave Schofield watched in horror. He knew that Kai could not possibly have survived.

  Sam paced the Charlemagne's quarterdeck, frustrated by his inability to build a mental picture of the battle going on miles to the north. The fragmentary transmissions of the pilots told him nothing. Then, shockingly, he heard, “Dragon's hit – repeat, Dragon's down!” It was Dave's voice, but so distorted by shock that it was barely recognizable. He pictured Petty Officer Kai's merry, boyish face at the morning briefing, and felt a spasm of intense grief. He started at the voice of his phone talker, at his elbow, who said “Lookout reports a column of black smoke on the horizon dead ahead.”