Impasse (The Red Gambit Series)

by Gee, Colin

  It worked.

  “Convenient, Comrade? Are you suggesting that the woman had some hand in this treachery?”

  Beria took his time in answering, forcing himself to return the glasses to their proper position.

  He looked through them, feigning reluctance both with his eyes and with his tone.

  “I’ve no evidence to that effect, Comrade General Secretary, but I do know she was very close to Pekunin. There’s talk of a relationship between them that went beyond professional limits.”

  That was true, in as much as Beria had started the talk.

  “Is this some criticism of my decision, Comrade?”

  Beria knew he was on dangerous ground.

  “Not at all, Comrade General Secretary. You promoted on competence... and we’ve all seen how efficient and competent the woman can seem. This is new information to which you could not have been privy and, in truth, it may yet prove to be nothing of concern for the State. We’ll know soon. Her report should give us indication of any issues, particularly if she omits anything that we already know.”

  Stalin nodded but once, signalling an end to the discussion and the opening of another.

  “So?”

  The word was not directed at Beria but at the other occupant of the room.

  Konev had been stood at attention, patiently waiting whilst the GRU lackey had delivered his reports, with nothing new presented; certainly nothing to change his mind from the course of action he had proposed that morning.

  “Comrade General Secretary, I see no reason to change my proposal. Given the weather conditions, the location of the Yugoslavian stocks, and the military situation I’ve inherited, it makes perfect sense and should yield good rewards for us, both militarily and politically.”

  That was no less true than it had been this morning.

  GRU’s briefing had confirmed the Italian position and some excellent successes against Allied supply and infrastructure by communist sabotage groups, particularly the volatile Italian groups who had been stirred up by rhetoric and promises delivered by recently arrived NKVD agents.

  “Very well, Comrade Marshal. You may commence Italian operations and the limited attacks as outlined in your Plan Red Two.”

  And with that simple statement, the pre-war planning was consigned to the bin and Konev’s new assault plan was set in motion.

  As Konev left, a dishevelled civilian stood and accepted the invitation of the still open door; a man the Marshal recognised but could not presently name.

  Two further men followed, one clad in the uniform of the NKVD, the other clearly a Red Navy Admiral, bearing all the hallmarks of an experienced submariner.

  The door closed on the trio and another audience commenced.

  It was not until he seated himself in his staff car, already well warmed for the journey to the airbase, that he recalled the name and, more importantly, the man’s purpose in life.

  “Ah, Comrade Kurchatov!”

  “Sorry, Comrade Marshal?”

  Konev had unwittingly spoken aloud.

  “Nothing, Comrade Driver, nothing at all. Shall we see what this fine Mercedes is capable of?”

  The woman needed no further inducements and the powerful beast surged ahead.

  ‘Comrade Kurchatov... Comrade Director Kurchatov of the Atomic weapons programme.’

  His eyes narrowed.

  ‘Atomic scientists, the NKVD and the Navy... all together... with no Army or Air Force presence.’

  His eyes closed.

  ‘What’s being hatched behind our backs, I wonde...’

  No sooner had the thought taken shape than it was expelled as sleep overtook him. The darkness did not relinquish its grip until he was shaken awake at Vnukovo.

  In the absence of orders, go find something and kill it.

  FeldMarschall Erwin Rommel.

  Chapter 105 - THE SUNDERLAND

  1005 hrs, Monday, 5th November 1945, airborne over the Western Approaches, approximately 45 miles north-west of St Kilda Island, the Atlantic.

  The Sunderland Mk V was a big aircraft, the four American Wasp engines giving her the power previously lacking in the Mk III.

  She was called the Flying Porcupine for very good reason, her hull bristled with defensive machine-guns, fourteen in total, manned by her eleven man crew. Such armament was required for a lumbering leviathan like the Short Sunderland, whose maximum speed, even with the Wasps, was a little over two hundred miles an hour.

  In the German War, encounters with enemy fighters had been mercifully rare and, in the main, enemy contacts were solely with the Sunderland’s standard fare; submarines.

  This Mk V also carried depth charges and radar pods, making her a deadly adversary in the never-ending game of hide and seek between aircraft and submersibles.

  NS-X was out on a mission, having flown off from the Castle Archdale base of the RAF’s 201 Squadron. The men had once been in 246 Squadron but, when that squadron was disbanded, the men of NS-X, all SAAF volunteers, had been one of two complete crews to be transferred to 201 Squadron.

  During World War Two, there had been a secret protocol between the British and Éire governments, which permitted flights over Irish territory though a narrow corridor. It ran westwards from Castle Archdale, Northern Ireland, across Irish sovereign territory and into the Atlantic, extending the operating range of Coastal Command considerably, and bringing more area under the protection of their Liberators, Catalinas, and Sunderlands.

  The agreement was still in force.

  NS-X had followed this route out into the ocean, turning and rounding the Irish mainland, before heading north, past Aran Island and onto its search area around St Kilda.

  Fig#73 – Éire, Great Britain, and the Atlantic 1945.

  A Soviet submarine had been attacked and damaged the previous day, somewhere roughly fifty miles west of Lewis, and the Admiralty were rightly jittery, given the importance of the convoy heading into the area in the next ten hours.

  There was little good news.

  The RCN corvette that had found and attacked the submarine was no longer answering; it was now feared lost with all hands. Other flying boats and craft were assigned to the dual mission, all hoping to rescue or recover, depending on how fate had dealt with the Canadian sailors, as well as attack and sink the enemy vessel.

  Flight Lieutenant Cox, an extremely experienced pilot, hummed loudly, as was his normal habit when concentrating.

  Having just had a course check and finding themselves a small distance off their search pattern, he eased the huge aircraft a few points to starboard, before settling back down to the extended boredom of searching for a scale model needle in a choice of haystacks.

  The Sunderland carried many comforts, including bunks, a toilet, and a galley, the latter of which yielded up fresh steaming coffee and a bacon sandwich, brought up from below by Flight Sergeant Crozier.

  “There you go, Skipper, get your laughing gear around that, man. I’ll take over for a moment.”

  South African Crozier wasn’t qualified to pilot the aircraft, but that didn’t trouble the old hands of NS-X. He flopped into the second seat and took a grip, permitting Cox to relinquish the column to the gunner.

  He let Cox start into the snack before airing his concerns.

  “Skipper, I think Dusty’s an ill man. He’s wracked up on a bunk, looking very green.”

  Dusty Miller was the second pilot, and he had disappeared off to sort out a stomach cramp, about an hour beforehand.

  “Too much flippin Jamesons last night, that’s what that is, Arsey”, the words came out despite having to work their way around large lumps of bread and bacon.

  Rafer Crozier didn’t much care for being called Arsey, but it didn’t pay to point that out, for obvious reasons.

  “Don’t think so, Skip. Dusty was the only one to have the goose, wasn’t he?”

  The local procurer of all things, Niall Flaherty, had slipped such a beast to the camp cooks for a small considerat
ion. In contravention of standing orders on aircrew’s meals, Miller had wangled a portion of the well-hung goose, prior to flight ops.

  “Maybe you’ve a point, Arsey. Best we keep quiet then, eh?”

  Another voice resonated through the intercom.

  “Contact, Skipper. Starboard 30. One thousand yards. Possible wreckage.”

  Flight Sergeant Peter Viljoen’s crisp and concise report interrupted the great Goose discussion, as Cox wiped his hands clean on his life preserver and took back command of the aircraft, releasing Crozier to crane his neck in the direction of the sighting.

  Viljoen’s voice came again.

  “Contact confirmed Skipper, Starboard 35, One thousand yards. Wreckage, and lots of it too.”

  Cox spoke to the crew.

  “Pilot to crew. OK fellahs, close up now, and keep your eyes peeled. Turning for a low level run over the site now. Sparks, get off a report to base right now. Magic, pass Sparks the position please.”

  Both radio operator and navigator keyed their mikes with an acknowledgement, as the port wing dipped to bring the lumbering seaplane around in a circle for a west-east run across the wreckage.

  Whilst some of the crew used binoculars to probe the floating evidence of recent combat, others remained with eyes firmly glued elsewhere, seeking out the tell-tale plume of a periscope, or the reflection of sun from the wing of an aircraft.

  Nose-gunner Viljoen was first up again, professionally and matter-of-factly, at least at first, then rising in pitch and excitement as his eyes worked out the details of what he was seeing.

  “Contact dead ahead, 500 yards. Dinghy in the water. Men onboard, Skipper, there’s men onboard! They’re waving!”

  “Roger, Dagga. How many?”

  “Hard to say, Skipper. Five, maybe more. Looks like a standard issue navy dinghy, and I’ll bet a pound to a pinch of pig shit that they’re navy uniforms, Skipper.”

  The reason behind Viljoen’s nickname was lost in time, but he was Dagga to everyone, including 201’s Commanding Officer, although, in fairness, that may have been because they were brothers.

  Sparks came back with a message, confirming the passing on of the location report, leaving Cox free to concentrate on his fly past.

  His first sweep had been at full speed but, with the absence of any adverse reports, Cox turned his aircraft round for a second pass and throttled back to permit closer examination.

  He saw the waving men in the dinghy himself, and believed he saw others in the water, whose only motion was caused by the shifting of the sea.

  ‘Poor bastards.’

  “What’s the latest on Dusty, please?”

  A slight delay, and the metallic voice of Rawson, one of the gunners, responded with negative news.

  The pilot did not welcome being single-handed for the entire flight.

  “Bollocks with an egg on top.”

  His favourite expletive and one that always puzzled those who heard it.

  “Arsey, I need a hand up here. Pass your guns onto someone will you.”

  “Roger, Skipper.”

  Crozier looked away from his waist guns, and saw Rawson moving forward.

  “All yours, Tiger,” and Crozier slapped the gunner on the shoulder as he headed towards the steps that rose up to the flight deck.

  Rawson had been nicknamed ‘Sid’ at a young age, for reasons best known to God and his friends in Mrs Oosterhuis’ class. That label survived until the first time that 246 Squadron’s Operations officer had placed his initials up on the crew roster.

  By the time those present had stopped laughing at G.R.R.R., ‘Sid’ was history and ‘Tiger’ was born.

  “Radar Contact, bearing 010, range approximately 95 miles, heading unknown, possibly south-south-west, Skipper.”

  Magic Malan’s report was delivered in his normal impersonal style. The type VIc Radar set was supposed to be capable up to 100 miles in the right circumstances, and Flight Sergeant Malan always seemed to coax the best out of the equipment.

  Cox thumbed his mike.

  “Witty, fit in with you at all?”

  After the slightest delay, the Navigator replied.

  “Position could tie in with the Stord, Skipper.”

  “Roger.”

  Stord was a destroyer of the Royal Norwegian Navy, one of the array of vessels converging on the area.

  Crozier slipped into the second seat, a place he often occupied. He had failed his pilot’s training, not on his ability behind the controls, but more on his inability with the required mathematics.

  Lining up on the wreckage, Cox throttled back as much as he dared.

  “Ok crew, slow pass. Keep your eyes skinned.”

  As the big flying boat did a leisurely flyover, Dagga and rear-gunner Van der Blumme confirmed the presence of naval personnel amongst the survivors, as well as many bodies floating on the surface.

  “Skipper, radar target has changed course, now confirmed at 90 miles, heading 190. She changed course after Sparks lit up the airwaves.”

  “Roger, Magic.”

  Standing orders no longer permitted the Flying Boat to touch down and recover the Canadians, but as the Norwegian Navy was coming to the rescue, it just meant a few more hours on the water for the survivors.

  “Dagga, use the Aldis. Let them know we can’t stop, but help is on its way. Witty, how long?”

  Navigator Jason Witt was already prepared for the question, so his answer was immediate.

  “Thanks, Witty. Four hours, Dagga. And wish them good luck. Sparks, send confirmed survivors at this location.”

  The Sunderland circled slowly, as the signal lamp blinked out the message to the men below.

  “Skipper, message sent.”

  “Roger Dagga. Right, now let’s find the bastards who did this.”

  Generally speaking, one bit of ocean looks much like another, but the piece of the Atlantic they had just flown over and now drew them back displayed something special.

  Fuel oil.

  On one of the southbound legs of their search pattern, Dagga’s sharp eyes had seen the long, thin, glistening streak on the surface below.

  Cox gave the matter some thought.

  “Pilot. Witty. Pop across to the palace will you.”

  Within seconds, Flight Sergeant Witt arrived from his navigating station behind the flight deck, or palace as it was known.

  “Witty, get a bearing on that slick and plot it in relative to the Canadian sinking will you. I’m going to deviate off our pattern and I want a bearing down which to fly ok?”

  The Navigator understood immediately and, with a modest acknowledgement, disappeared.

  NS-X was flying south-south-west on a course of 192 in search of whatever it was that was littering the ocean with fuel oil. Three more distinct glistening marks had been found, all on a heading of 192, vindicating Cox’s hunch.

  Whatever they were tracking was hurt.

  B-31 had been rushed to sea and that sort of haste never paid with submarines. However, the former Type XXI had easily manouevred into a killing position on the Canadian Corvette, without the surface vessel having the slightest idea that it was about to die. The XXI’s quality sonar systems had identified the approach of the warship, whereas the Canadian system was built for submarines less advanced than the XXI.

  As the computer-guided torpedoes had approached, the corvette’s captain got his men moving to action stations and fired off a hasty contact report before two warheads ripped the heart from the small craft.

  Forty men died in the twin explosions and the RCN London Pride was doomed, listing immediately.

  Off the starboard beam, the B-31 raised its periscope for a fleeting look at the sinking vessel.

  A single shot, hastily aimed, left the barrel of London Pride’s 4” main gun, thumping into the sea forty yards over target.

  The corvette turned turtle before a second shot could be fired, holding on the surface for a few seconds before surrendering herself to the inevitab
le and disappearing from view.

  B-31 dropped her periscope and proceeded at fifteen knots, moving swiftly away from the sinking, south-south-west on a heading of 192.

  The 4” shell had missed but there was sufficient water hammer from the explosion to seek out two items of faulty workmanship. The first effect was to shake loose an electrical coupling in the ‘Bali’ radar detector apparatus. The FuMB Ant3 Bali was used to detect incoming radar signals, and the B-31 had now lost the capability.

  The shockwave also slightly unseated one of the fuel intake valves, which intake also lacked a properly functioning non-return valve. All of which meant that the B-31 occasionally vented modest quantities of fuel oil into the ocean as she sought to evacuate the area.

  It was not until two hours had passed that the Engineering Officer noticed the fuel discrepancy and reported it to the submarine’s commander.

  The excellent sonar system showed no threat’s nearby, the Bali was clear, and so it was decided to quickly ascend to assess what was happening.

  B-31 blew her tanks and rose to the surface of the Eastern Atlantic at precisely 1303hrs.

  1304 hrs, Monday, 5th November 1945, Eastern Atlantic, 163 miles north of North-Western Éire.

  Dagga fired off an excited report.

  “Fuck a rat! Submarine dead ahead, Two thousand yards, just surfacing!”

  “Pilot to crew. Action stations. Action stations. Surfaced Submarine ahead.”

  Controlled pandemonium ensued as all the crew, except Miller, prepared for combat.

  “Identify it someone!”

  The pilot accompanied his request with a controlled turn, in order to not overfly the submarine.

  “Not seen one like that before, Skipper. Not on my list.”

  Dagga was referring to an illustrated list of submarine outlines that the crew used to identify types. It was not unheard of for aircraft to send friendly vessels to the bottom for lack of correct identification.