Armageddon Mode c-3

by Keith Douglass

  Magruder tugged at his ear. “They’re not giving you many options.”

  The President looked up at the map across the room. “Well, there is one option.”

  “What’s that, sir?”

  “I had another visitor in here this morning. Crack of dawn. Anatoly Druzhinin, the Commonwealth representative. He made an interesting … offer.”

  “And a highly questionable one, sir,” Hall said, breaking his silence.

  The President gave his advisor a wan smile. “I know how you feel about it, George. You’ve told me. There doesn’t seem to be much choice, does there?”

  “The Navy staff has been champing at the bit on this one, Mr. President.

  Maybe they’re right. We don’t need the Russkies.”

  “”Don’t need … ‘” Magruder’s eyes widened. “You mean the Russians are offering to help, sir?”

  “They are indeed. Their Indian Ocean flotilla, SOVINDRON, is already enroute for Turban Station. They’ll be there late tomorrow afternoon, though their aircraft will be within range before that. The squadron is built around the Kreml, one of their two new nuclear-powered jobs.”

  Kreml … Russian for Kremlin. Magruder blinked. He’d followed the available intelligence on what had been the Soviet nuclear carrier program for years, of course, but so far the Russian flattops had not ventured far from their own waters. He remembered the red line on the map at his back and realized that it must mark SOVINDRON’s position.

  “Accompanying Kreml are six other warships of various types. An Oscar-class nuclear attack sub. A Kresta II cruiser. We think it’s the Marshal Timoshenko, but that hasn’t been confirmed yet. Two destroyers.

  Two frigates. They’re suggesting we form a combined task force with their squadron and CBG-14 for the express purpose of pressuring India and Pakistan to back off. It would effectively double our force in the area … and demonstrate to India and Pakistan that there is a united world consensus behind this, well before the UN could do anything about it. We hope this might shake the UN into speeding things up. God knows, they don’t have much time.”

  “Russians!” Magruder exploded. “Son of a bitch!”

  “Do you have a problem with that, Admiral?”

  Magruder was embarrassed. “Uh, no, sir. No problem. I’m just … surprised.”

  The President grinned. “It surprised the hell out of me, I’ll tell you.” He glanced at Hall, who was frowning. “I’ve been told that the Russians are more interested in reestablishing their global reach than in stopping that war.”

  “It’s possible, sir. They’ve lost a lot of prestige worldwide lately.”

  “You’re right. And I agree. This is probably the best chance Moscow has had since the Persian Gulf War to let the world know that the Commonwealth can be a world-class superpower.”

  “I also happen to believe they’d like to avoid a nuclear war that close to home,” the President continued. He leaned forward, his hands clasping in front of him. “You know, Tom, if this thing spreads, if it turns nuclear, South Asia could just fall apart. Never mind whether the war spreads to other countries or directly threatens our interests in the region. We’ll have vast areas of devastation from Afghanistan to central India. We’ll have people starving to death by the hundreds of millions! And hundreds of millions more will be on the move … looking for food, for clean water, for a place to escape the horror. Can you grasp numbers like that? I sure as hell can’t!

  “My feeling is that the Russians have enough trouble inside their own borders right now without having to deal with starving refugees by the millions … or Islamic warlords stepping into the power vacuum and calling for some damned religious crusade … or clouds of fallout drifting north across the border. Did you know Uzbekistan grows most of the Commonwealth’s cotton? That some of their best wheat and livestock-raising lands are in Kazakhstan? My God, a nuclear war just a few hundred miles from their border could be a catastrophe for the whole damned country! They’re having enough economic problems without nuclear devastation to add to it.”

  “And if things get worse in the Commonwealth,” Magruder began.

  “They’ll get bad for us too. We’re looking at a situation as dangerous as anything in the Cold War days. Maybe worse!”

  Admiral Magruder leaned forward in his chair. “I’m still not sure what a carrier task force could do out there, Mr. President. Even with two carriers on station.”

  “That’s why I called you in here, Tom. Maybe you can give us some thoughts on the situation. The one hard idea that’s surfaced in the NSC meetings so far calls for air strikes against Indian supply routes. The Indians have got to be gambling on a fast end to their war. If we could delay them, maybe things would bog down and we could get them talking to each other instead of shooting. Certainly, if the Indian advance stalls, the Pakistanis will feel less inclined to start tossing nukes around.”

  “Mr. President,” Hall said. “This is an incredibly dangerous move. It could also be a political disaster for-“

  “Fuck politics, George!” The President stood suddenly behind his desk.

  “We’re talking about trying to disarm two tough street kids before they burn down the block!”

  Hall looked stunned. “Yes, sir.”

  “Wait outside. I’ll buzz if I need you.”

  “Yes, Mr. President.” Hall left the room.

  “At the risk of getting kicked out on my tail, Mr. President,” Magruder said, “Mr. Hall’s right. If we step in, with or without the Russians, it could touch a match to the powder keg. And if the Indians already think we’re allied with Pakistan, what are they going to think when we send a couple of A-6s in to bomb their troop convoys?”

  “I know, Admiral. If you have a better idea, I’m certainly willing to listen.”

  “Do you really think the Indians and the Pakistanis will back down if you threaten them with a couple of aircraft carriers, sir?”

  “Pakistan will,” the President said. “I’ve been talking with their ambassador too. All they want is for the Indians to return to the borders. They insist they won’t do anything, ah, irrevocable, not until they’re up against the wall. After that …” He shrugged. “We have that long, anyway, to try. Right now, the big question mark is with our own people.” The President paused, then looked Magruder in the eye.

  “What do you think they’ll say on the Jefferson if I order them to join forces with the Russkies?”

  Magruder thought about it. “Can’t speak for Admiral Vaughn, Mr. President. I don’t really know him. Captain Fitzgerald might have a fit. But he’ll follow orders.”

  “Will the battle group be able to work with the Russians?”

  “Depends on a lot of things.” He thought about the question for a moment. The real unknown was the Russians. Moscow, he remembered, had openly supported the Indian-Sri Lankan Peace Zone proposal in the Indian Ocean, probably because they assumed that the idea would never work and it made a convenient point of Third-World-pleasing diplomatic opposition against the United States. Of course, a lot had changed in the world since Brezhnev’s day. “I guess it’s really up to the Russians,” he added. “Their willingness to exchange codes with us, stuff like that.

  But for our part … Yes, sir. Our people will make it work.”

  “Good.” The President nodded. “Good, because I’ve already told Druzhinin to put the plan in the works for his people. And I’ll have the Joint Chiefs draft orders for Admiral Vaughn this afternoon.”

  Magruder nodded. He felt suddenly very small, knowing that the decisions being made in this office were those that could save or destroy thousands — or millions — of lives within the next few days. Would India feel differently about the situation if both the United States and Russians made a stand against their ultimatum? Somehow, he doubted it, but perhaps it would make a difference for the men, those from the Commonwealth and America, who were out there south of Karachi.

  He studied the lines in the President’s face and knew aga
in the cost of command.

  CHAPTER 10

  0945 hours, 25 March

  Flight deck, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson

  Tombstone walked out onto the flight deck, accepting a helmet — a “cranial” in Navy parlance — from a sailor outside the mangler’s shack, where the deck handlers plotted each on-board movement of every aircraft in Air Wing 20. He was officially on duty in CATCC, but things were slow in Air Ops and he’d checked out for a stroll up on deck to get some fresh air.

  The cloud cover had thickened during the night, bringing rain and gale-force gusts of wind, together with towering waves that had crashed over Jefferson’s bows in the darkness with the fury of an avalanche.

  That morning the wind had abated to a steady fifteen knots, but the sky was still a dirty gray overcast anchored only a few feet above Jefferson’s highest radar mast. The ocean swells were running seven feet.

  The carrier had come about so that the wind was blowing down her angled deck from bow to stern. Jefferson was pitching enough in the heavy waves to make any trap a challenge, and the rolling seas had imparted an extra twist to her movements. Tombstone could feel the corkscrewing motion through his legs as he settled the helmet on his head and stepped onto the open deck.

  An E-2C Hawkeye had just completed its trap and was taxiing toward the ship’s starboard side, its wings already twisting sideways and folding back along its flanks in order to avoid the twenty-four-foot, frisbee-shaped rotodome above its back. A yellow-jerseyed deck director led the way, signaling come-ahead with his hands.

  Tombstone had been following the incoming air traffic down in CATCC and knew that the next aircraft due on board was a C-2A Greyhound. A long-range twin-engine prop plane used to deliver supplies, personnel, and mail to the battle group at sea, the Greyhound was called a COD, for Carrier On-board Delivery. Outwardly similar to the Hawkeye from which it was derived, the Greyhound had a larger fuselage than the E-2C and a rear-loading cargo ramp, and of course, it lacked the radar frisbee.

  Looking aft, he could make out the COD aircraft already in the slot a mile behind the carrier, a silvery speck swelling rapidly against the overcast as it dropped toward Jefferson’s roundoff. He watched as the pilot made a slight, last-second correction, adjusting for the changing pitch of the carrier’s flight deck. Then the Greyhound swept across the ramp and its landing gear slammed onto the roof, the lowered tail hook snagging the number-two wire and yanking the boxy aircraft to a halt.

  The propellers continued to describe brilliant silver arcs as the COD plane spit out the wire, then began creeping after the deck director toward the mid-deck directly opposite the island.

  Unlike the aircraft of CVW-20 that were based aboard the Jefferson, the COD Greyhound was not permanently a part of the carrier’s complement. It would be shot off the Number One Catapult as soon as its cargo and personnel were off-loaded, the bags of mail from Jefferson’s crew lugged aboard, and its tanks refueled.

  Tombstone was waiting as the COD’s rear ramp whined down and a line of men began climbing down onto the deck. All wore civilian clothes and life jackets, all were lean, hard, and young. One saw Tombstone and broke into a broad, lopsided grin.

  “Tombstone, you son of a bitch!”

  “Coyote!” Their hands clasped, then they embraced, pounding each other’s backs. “God damn, Coyote, welcome aboard!”

  Lieutenant Willis E. Grant, call sign “Coyote,” had been Tombstone’s very good friend since they’d first been stationed together at Miramar several years before. Both assigned to VF-95 out of CVW-20, they’d joined Jefferson before she left San Diego almost nine months earlier.

  Coyote had been Tombstone’s wingman until a Mig-21’s missile had knocked him out of the sky over the Sea of Japan six months before. Coyote had been captured by the North Koreans, escaped with the help of a Navy SEAL team reconning the camp where he was being held, and been wounded. He’d been medevaced to Japan and finally wound up at the Naval Regional Medical Center, Camp Pendleton.

  They walked toward the island. “So!” Tombstone said. “How’s the leg and arm?”

  “No problems.” Coyote flexed his arm, demonstrating. “I was out of the hospital inside of six weeks, but they had me humping in the RAG at Miramar until last week. Then they decided you guys needed me.”

  Tombstone grinned. “RAG,” for Reserve Air Group, was an obsolete term still used by Navy fliers for the Fleet Readiness Squadrons from which the carriers drew their replacements. “I don’t know, Lieutenant. We’ve been managing okay without you.”

  “Ah! Ah!” Coyote held up an admonishing finger. “Can that “Lieutenant’ crap, mister. I pulled another half stripe. Came through while I was in the hospital.”

  “Well! Congratulations! It’s about time. Lieutenant Commander, huh?”

  “On the road to fame and glory, son. My future career looks rosy as one of our Navy’s elite.”

  Coyote’s banter raised a small sting in the back of Tombstone’s mind. It was ironic. Here his friend had finally made it back to VF-95 … and Tombstone was going to be leaving for good in another few weeks.

  Well, that was Navy life. Good friends and good-byes.

  “Hell, what’s this elite garbage?” Tombstone said roughly, covering his feelings. “You look like a damned civilian to me.”

  Coyote looked down at his civvies. “Yeah. Didn’t have time to change.

  They routed that COD out of Masirah. We had a few hours in Dawwah, but they wouldn’t let us wear our uniforms. The locals are sensitive about American servicemen on their turf.”

  They entered the island and removed their helmets. A seaman took Coyote’s life jacket. “Well,” Coyote said. “I’d better get checked in.

  Hey, I hear your uncle’s not the Flag anymore. How’s the new guy?”

  Tombstone’s lips compressed, then he shrugged. “Still settling in. You hear about our dustup last night?”

  “No. What went down?”

  “I imagine they’ll fill you in. We had a run-in with the Indian air force.”

  “No shit?” Coyote whistled.

  “No shit. We knocked down three of theirs.”

  “So it’s gone to a shooting war!”

  “Just this side of one anyway.”

  “Were you in on it?” Coyote grinned. “You get yourself another kill?”

  The question bothered Tombstone. “Yeah. I got a kill.”

  “Then you can tell me about it. How about lunch?”

  “I’ve got the duty down in CATCC. I’ll see you tonight at chow.”

  “Roger that.” Coyote flashed a broad grin and was gone.

  Heading in a different direction, Tombstone clattered down a ship’s ladder to the 0–3 deck, then made his way past Combat toward CATCC once more. There was a lot more he’d wanted to tell Coyote. His being grounded, for one thing, and the doubts he’d felt the night before when he kept asking for clearance to fire, with no response. Fog of war was one thing, but Tombstone had the feeling that someone at a high level had not been snapping off the decisions in an efficient and military manner.

  True, the tactical situation always looked a lot different on the amber radar screens of CIC than it did in the cockpit of an F-14 on BARCAP, but the orders had been coming too little and too late during the evening’s engagement.

  Well, that was no longer Tombstone’s concern. He brushed past the curtains that excluded outside light and entered the red-lit semidarkness of CATCC.

  1000 hours, 25 March

  CVIC, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson

  CVIC was more than Jefferson’s briefing-room-cum-TV-studio. The acronym was also applied to the carrier’s entire intelligence department, which was the joint domain of the ship’s OS and OZ divisions. OS was made up of the cryptology technicians who encoded and decoded Jefferson’s communications. OZ — the two-letter designation led to the department’s inevitable nickname of “the Emerald City”—was responsible for providing intelligence data to Jefferson’s decision makers.
Divided into five interlocking work centers, including Mission Planning and Briefing (MP&B) and Multi-Sensor Interpretation (MSI), OZ was regarded by the rest of Jefferson’s people as a truly magical kingdom that provided the battle group with a day-to-day picture of what was going on around them.

  Of course, there was plenty of wry commentary when Intelligence was wrong, jokes about Naval Intelligence being a contradiction in terms, or how they used the Meteorological Division’s blindfold and dart board to come up with their predictions.

  The division head was the Carrier Group Intelligence Officer, Commander Richard Patrick Neil. Boston-born and educated, Neil had a slow manner of speech laced with the broad vowels of New England. He stood at the podium before row upon row of folding chairs, facing the senior battle group officers gathered in the room. A projection screen had been unfolded behind him, next to a map of India’s west coast.

  The morning’s briefing had been called for all of Jefferson’s division heads, as well as all senior personnel in Jefferson’s Operations Department. CAG Marusko and two of his staff officers were present representing the air wing, though individual squadron skippers were not.

  Also in attendance were a number of special guests, visitors from other ships of the battle group. Captain Cunningham of the Vicksburg and several officers from his CIC and tactical staff, were sitting near the front. If a major air or surface engagement with the Indians was in the offing, the squadron would be counting heavily on the Ticonderoga-class CG and her SPY-1B radar.

  “Attention on deck,” someone snapped from the back of the room. Admiral Vaughn entered, trailed by his senior staff. The officers in the room rose as a body.

  “As you were, as you were,” Vaughn said, making his way to the front-row seats reserved for his party. The others sat down as he did, with a loud rustle and squeaking of chairs. “Let’s get on with it, Neil.”

  “Admiral,” he said, nodding. “Gentlemen. Good morning.

  “By now, all of you have been informed that CBG-14 is being augmented this afternoon by the arrival of a Commonwealth naval squadron. I’ve been asked to brief all of you on the types and capabilities of the Russian ships, and on the opposing lineup we are likely to face if we’re forced to engage Indian naval forces. Lights, please.”