“Why is he on a submarine under the ice? How can he monitor this exercise from there?”
Dretzski swallowed. If he said Novskoyy would surface and use Kaliningrad’s antennae, it would look too much like he had a command-and-control flagship, determining the destinies of his fleet. But if he lied and said Novskoyy couldn’t receive radio messages. Admiral Barisov would know it. A morsel of truth was needed.
“Again, sir,” Dretzski said, “Admiral Novskoyy felt that it would be best to get an unbiased opinion from an intelligence community that had no political obligations to him, someone completely impartial. That is why Naval Intelligence was not called in. The admiral wants the hard, cold truth, not a subordinate’s possible sugar-coating. He is intent on finding out any operational flaws in the fleet. He deliberately left it to keep his own opinions and biases out of the exercise evaluation and execution. He is looking for the negatives, and the KGB will help him find them.”
“Very well. Colonel,” Yulenski said. Dretzski suppressed a sigh of relief. Yulenski, it seemed, had bought the story, and with Yulenski went the others. Yulenski stood, suddenly in a hurry, the meat of the briefing over. He left the room, aides coming in to collect his briefing papers from the presentation.
As the members filed out Dretzski felt confident — until Admiral Mikhail Barisov materialized in front of him. Barisov, the Supreme Commander of the Pacific Fleet, was young for his job although he did not look it — thin to the point of gauntness, deep lines showing in his face, hair completely gray. Barisov had spent his youth in the submarine force, arriving for duty fresh out of the Marshal Grechko Higher Naval School of Underwater Navigation the same year that Yuri Gagarin had been launched into orbit. After twenty years in the submarine fleet, having commanded the VICTOR III submarine Volgograd, Barisov had cross-decked to the surface fleet and had commanded a destroyer, a cruiser and a helicopter/VTOL aircraft carrier. What followed were several dull years in the Moscow Defense Ministry, mostly spent fighting office politics, until Admiral Gorshkov had promoted him and given him command of the Pacific Fleet. Barisov stared into the eyes of this weaselly KGB officer, wondering why he was covering for Novskoyy.
“Dretzski, what’s the real story on this deployment?” Dretzski tried to look confused. Barisov began asking questions, a prosecutor doing a cross-examination. Dretzski tried to handle them calmly, all the while thinking that something might have to be done about Barisov. An aircraft accident on the way back to Vladivostok…?
ARCTIC OCEAN
POLYNYA SURFACE
F.S. KALININGRAD
Admiral Novskoyy heard a knock at his door, looked up from his decryption of the last incoming message marked PERSONAL FOR FLEET COMMANDER. Quickly he stowed the message and the attack-profile chart, then let Captain Vlasenko into the stateroom. Novskoyy turned his back on the captain and returned to the table. Vlasenko sat in front of it.
“Yes, Captain?”
“Admiral, we have been at the polynya now for two days. Isn’t it time we went forward with the sea-trial agenda?”
Novskoyy stared at Vlasenko a moment. “The sea-trial agenda is postponed. Something urgent has come up. Fleet business. We may be here another week.”
Vlasenko’s insides turned over. “Then, sir, we should shut down the turbine room. There is no sense in keeping the engines warm if we are going to sit here—”
“No, I want to be able to move quickly, I need flexibility. There is no predicting when the ice around the polynya may shift and threaten to crush us. We need to be able to run if we have to.”
Vlasenko hesitated. He could not confront Novskoyy with what he had found out. That would land him in a locked storage compartment. He reached for an alterative course. He could sabotage the radio-transmission gear at the base of the radio multifrequency antenna. Racking out perhaps five drawers and severing connections, perhaps pocketing some key components and destroying the spares. Of course, with Novskoyy on the control-compartment communications console, the tampering would be detected before he would be able to damage the gear beyond repair. There might be no way he could prevent the admiral from transmitting his message to the fleet. At least, Vlasenko was convinced, the operation was not on automatic. No one would actually launch unless Novskoyy transmitted his go-code. Otherwise, why would they be surfaced here? The ship was being used as a flagship. Which meant the only way to stop the time-on-target strike or threat of a strike… was to sequester Novskoyy. If necessary… kill him.
Vlasenko stood, turned and left. Novskoyy returned to his message from Colonel Dretzski in Moscow:
1. KREMLIN IS SUSPICIOUS.
2. TODAY I BRIEFED THE KREMLIN AND DEFENSE MINISTRY PERSONNEL, INCLUDING PACIFIC FLEET COMMANDER ADMIRAL MIKHAIL BARISOV.
3. ALL EXCEPT BARISOV SATISFIED FOR THE MOMENT THAT YOU ARE CONDUCTING AN EXERCISE. TIME OF THE ESSENCE. ADVISE YOU COMPLETE OPERATION SOON OR THEY WILL WONDER WHY PIERS STILL EMPTY.
4. BARISOV VERY INTERESTED IN FLEET DEPLOYMENT. ASKED QUESTIONS, WANTED SPECIFICS. MENTIONED POSSIBILITY OF EMULATING OPERATION TO SEE HOW WELL HIS SUBMARINES COULD SCRAMBLE TO SEA. I TOLD HIM IT HAD TAKEN MONTHS OF PREPARATIONS, GREAT COST. THAT MAY HAVE PUT HIM OFF OR MADE HIM MORE SUSPICIOUS OF YOUR MOTIVES. HE SAID NOTHING.
5. BARISOV REMAINS IN MOSCOW. MEANWHILE PACIFIC FLEET HEADQUARTERS IN VLADIVOSTOK BUSY. BARISOV MAY BE PLANNING SOMETHING. MORE REASON TO CONCLUDE OPERATION
6. NEW INTELLIGENCE — U.S. ATLANTIC FLEET ATTACK SUBMARINES SCRAMBLED TO WEST ATLANTIC. OVER 60 VESSELS. SUGGEST RETHINK OPERATION IF THEY ARE ABLE TO TRAIL OUR SUBMARINES. THEY MUST BE PRESUMED TO CARRY JAVELIN CRUISE MISSILES. PROVOCATION COULD BRING DANGEROUS CONSEQUENCES.
7. MORE INTELLIGENCE — A U.S. ATTACK SUBMARINE, PIRANHA CLASS, IS ENROUTE NORTH ATLANTIC, POSSIBLY TO ICECAP.
8. U.N. CREW WITNESSED DESTRUCTION OF 120 “WARSHOT” SSN-X-27 CRUISE MISSILES TODAY. WORLD BELIEVES WE NOW HAVE NONE.
9. FISHHOOK, AS ORDERED, TRYING TO CONVINCE U.S. LEADERSHIP THAT NORTHERN FLEET DEPLOYMENT IS EXERCISE.
10. RAPID REPEAT RAPID CONCLUSION OF THIS OPERATION VITAL. GOOD LUCK.
Novskoyy read the message again, then shredded it in Vlasenko’s shredding machine. He consulted his calendar. With a decent speed-of-advance, his fleet should be off the coast of the U.S. in two days — by the 20th of December. What remained was for Agent Fishhook, General Tyler, to hold off the U.S. submarine force long enough for his ships to get in position.
CHAPTER 14
SATURDAY, 18 DECEMBER
NORTH ATLANTIC
The periscope video-repeater showed the dark water, the ridge of ice ahead and the low arctic sun shining coldly in the local morning. This far north, in the marginal ice zone, where the sun lingered low on the horizon most of the days, the MIZ was a dangerous area of icebergs and drift-ice, the transition between open water and the cover of the polar icecap. Submarines usually avoided going to periscope depth in the MIZ. The risk of collision was great, and the hull could easily be torn open by an iceberg. But Pacino had insisted on one last look and for twenty minutes had trained the scope around in slow circles. What Pacino saw looked like snow-covered, mountainous terrain on the horizon. Cold, deserted, desolate, dead.
Still, at least it was the surface, complete with the sun and the sea and the ice. And fresh clean air not filtered by charcoal, not scrubbed of carbon dioxide by an amine bed, not fed through carbon-monoxide burners, not electrified by the precipitators. Not the dry coppery artificial air generated by the “Bomb,” the oxygen generator that split water into hydrogen and oxygen, storing the oxygen and discarding the hydrogen, the mixture of gases dangerous enough to breach the hull in a violent explosion should it fail, and giving the machine its nickname.
Christman’s voice, edged with uncertainty, interrupted Pacino’s thoughts.
“Captain, range to the ice raft ahead is nineteen-hundred yards by SHARKTOOTH sonar.”
Lieutenant Commander Christman, Officer of the Deck, stood at the underice sonar, the SHARK
TOOTH, a console with a joystick and a vertical video readout. At the top panel was a stripchart used to record the depth of the ice overhead. The display on the center panel looked very much like a radar, was generated by a hydrophone on the forward edge of the sail that transmitted a faint high pitched tone in a pattern like a police siren. If the sound pitch was plotted against time on a graph, the waveforms looked like shark teeth. With the changing transmission frequency, it could transmit and interpret the echo simultaneously, giving continuous ranges and bearings to ice-shapes ahead, which now formed a solid bank less than a mile away.
For a moment Pacino had a sense that this might be the last time he would see the surface and the sky and the sun… not an unheard of thought among submariners… and quickly censored the thought as he snapped the periscope grips up and rotated the hydraulic control ring. As the scope optic-module descended into the well the stainless steel pole felt extremely cold brushing Pacino’s arm.
“Take her deep,” he said without looking at Christman, then moved forward on the periscope stand to the pole of the number-one periscope, the World War II relic used only for surface navigation, and stared at the Conn sonar console on the port side. The TV screen was red to keep the OOD’s eyes night-adjusted. The display was a waterfall cascading downward. The horizontal axis was bearing — north on the left, south in the center and north-northwest on the right. The vertical axis was time — the top now, the older data lower. All the data fell downward on the screen like a “waterfall.” Like the moon “following” a moving car, a distant contact would show up as a vertical trace on the display, its bearing constant, but a close contact would have a slanted slope, showing it moving from one true bearing to another. At the moment the displays were only filled with static. Then a definite sloping trace appeared on the short-duration display. High-bearing rate, a close contact. Pacino reached for the microphone.
“Sonar, Captain, report the contact at zero four zero.”
“CONN, SONAR, AYE, CONTACT NOW BEARING ZERO SIX TWO IS BIOLOGICS.”
Pacino frowned. A whale or a school of fish.
“Sonar, Captain, select the narrowband beam on the trace’s bearing and integrate on narrowband time-freq.”
“CONN, SONAR, AYE.”
Pacino pressed a selector-pad button below the display. The waterfalls disappeared, replaced by six graphs, each a plot of intensity on the vertical axis versus sound frequency on the horizontal axis. Fed by the towed array, the narrowband processors listened for specific frequencies known to be emitted by most Russian submarine classes, from such as their turbine-generator resonance, a 300-cycle-per-sec- and sound. One of the graphs was centered on the anticipated 300-hertz tonal. If the contact was a Russian there was a high probability it would get a narrow vertical spike centered near 300 hertz. The time-frequency data took about five minutes to come up with a meaningful display. Like the camera taking an evening-time exposure photograph, the sonar system “integrated” the sound data over a long-time period to make sure tonals weren’t just background noises. For a full five minutes Pacino stared at the 300-hertz graph, not aware of Christman staring at him. The graph was flat. No spike anywhere near 300 hertz. Pacino shook his head, pushed a button on the selector pad and the broadband waterfall display returned.
“Sonar, Captain, return to your search.” The trace had definitely been biologies.
“CONN, SONAR, AYE.”
The short-duration display began to fill with traces. Noise from rafts of ice shifting and grating against each other. Soon it would be audible to the naked ear.
Pacino moved through the gap between the port Conn console and the aft telephone-communications bulkhead, squeezing past the radar console, which was shut down and useless when submerged. On the other side of the radar was the SHARKTOOTH underice sonar. Pacino looked down at the forward scan screen. The ridge of ice was now astern, and ahead were some more ridges, stalactites of ice hanging down from the ice canopy overhead. Just gentle ridges now, but soon they would stab down deeply enough to smash into them if the OOD made a mistake. Dimly Pacino heard Christman giving slight rudder adjustments to avoid the ridges. For the rest of their time under ice the OOD or his assistant, the Junior Officer of the Deck, would stand here at the underice sonar steering the ship. The JOOD would also help with underice navigation or man the fire-control computer, ensuring a weapon was programmed and ready. In case.
“Offsa’deck, clear baffles,” Pacino ordered. “And don’t go more than two hours without a baffle clear. I don’t want to be surprised out here.”
“Clear baffles, Offsa’deck, aye. Helm, right five degrees rudder, steady course one three zero.” Christman picked up a microphone at the underice sonar console. “Sonar, Conn, clearing baffles to the right.”
“CONN, SONAR, AYE.”
Pacino climbed back up to the periscope stand and stared at the short-duration waterfall display, thinking of the Russian that came out of the Stingray’s baffles decades before.
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA
COMSUBLANT HEADQUARTERS IN FLAG PLOT
Admiral Donchez stared up at 120 flashing red X’s. The sons of bitches had arrived, he thought. The subs were lining up from off the coast of Maine down to the Carolinas. The southernmost portions of the coast were still clear, the last Russians still on the way to these more distant stations. His attack submarines were in force off the coast, but 67 boats against 120 … not good odds for a face-off, if it came to that. His message to his submarines had been carefully worded to be as vague as possible yet still give their commanders some leeway to engage… if necessary.
1. RUSSIAN SUBMARINE ATTACK UNITS EXPECTED TO TAKE STATION OFF U.S. EAST COAST IN WESTLANT BY 182000ZDEC.
2. ALL UNITS SHALL DO UTMOST REPEAT UTMOST TO GET IN TRAIL OF RUSSIAN UNITS. ESTABLISH TRAIL WITH MAXIMUM TRAIL RANGE FIVE THOUSAND (5000) YARDS. MINIMUM TRAIL RANGE AT DISCRETION OF INDIVIDUAL COMMANDING OFFICER, WITH MISSION DIRECTIVE TO REMAIN UNDETECTED IF POSSIBLE.
3. RUSSIAN INTENT UNKNOWN.
4. COMMANDERS SHALL USE BEST JUDGMENT. SUBLANT RULES OF ENGAGEMENT APPLY, BUT SHALL BE INTERPRETED SO AS TO MAXIMIZE SAFETY OF U.S. AND U.S. INTERESTS.
5. ON DETECTION OF ANY HOSTILE FIRE, UNITS ARE AUTHORIZED TO ATTACK TARGETS.
6. ADM.R.DONCHEZ SENDS.
It was the best he could do. No one could shoot unless one of the Russian attack boats shot first. But why would they be deploying? To test American nerves?
Donchez walked to the elevator to go to his office and watch the construction on the Stingray monument. For all the good he was doing in Flag Plot, he might as well walk out to the site and help them pour concrete. As he left Flag Plot he looked at the charts and promised himself he would not come back to the room until the Russians turned around and abandoned their game of chicken, or war of nerves, or whatever the hell they thought it was.
ARCTIC OCEAN
POLYNYA SURFACE
Admiral Alexi Novskoyy sat at the communications console in the control compartment and watched the laser printer reel off page after page of papers from the computer’s storage memory. Only five minutes after the hour Novskoyy had appointed for the boats to be onstation, he had 120 messages from his submarines. He picked up the ream of messages and took them to the ladder to the upper level of the second compartment below, nodded to the Deck Officer, Captain-Lieutenant Ivanov, the only other occupant of the space.
“Good night, Ivanov.”
“Good night, sir.”
Novskoyy continued down the ladder and through the passageway to his stateroom, where he turned on a small stereo and sat down at the desk. It took over an hour to decrypt the messages, but when he was done he stared down at the checklist with satisfaction. Each of the 120 attack submarines was in position along the coast of the U.S., and none had encountered any harassment. The Americans seemed to be giving them a wide berth. He leaned back in his chair and let his eyes unfocus. He had expected at least a dozen reports of bumps and collisions with the U.S. attack subma
rines in the Atlantic, perhaps lines of frigates and destroyers filling the water with sonar pings, aircraft doing low flyovers and dropping sonobuoys, squadrons of helicopters chopping over the waves dipping sonar receivers on long cables. But nothing. The Atlantic was deserted. Not even a sniff of the American attack submarines Dretzski had reported. Something had to be wrong. It was too perfect. Novskoyy took off his reading glasses and shut his eyes. It had to be Agent Fishhook coming through. That and the U.N. inspection. The plan had worked.
He sat back to listen to the sounds of the symphony music washing over him, but the nagging thought kept intruding… why had the fleet achieved positions without opposition?
WESTERN ATLANTIC OCEAN
The USS Billfish cruised slowly northeast at four knots, bare steerage way, at a depth of 658 feet. The ship was rigged for ultraquiet. All offwatch personnel were ordered to their bunks. Lights throughout the ship were off or switched to a dim red setting. The P.A. Circuit One speakers were disabled, an announcement on them might be detected outside the hull. In each space men stood with headphones and boom microphones, linked on a single ship wide phone circuit, ready to pass urgent orders by voice. Every running pump or piece of equipment in the ship had redundancy; the equipment selected to be running was the one in a set that was the quietest. All maintenance activity was halted. Non-essential gear such as galley equipment was turned off — the crew would eat cold meals for the duration of ultraquiet. Hard-soled shoes were prohibited, the crew had switched to sneakers and slippers. Stereos, radios, televisions were turned off. The spare gyro was shut down, as well as the Bomb, the oxygen generator. Reactor main coolant pumps were in slow speed. The ship was dead quiet. In the torpedo room all four tubes had signs on the inner doors reading WARSHOT LOADED. Tubes three and four were flooded, sea pressure equalized to the outside pressure, outer doors open and weapons powered up, their gyros spinning rapidly, their computers activated, ready for a fire-control solution. In the control room only the whine of the gyro and the humming of the fire-control computer were audible. The watchsection fire-control team was ready to track and, on orders, shoot any contact.
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