by Nigel Seed
The merchant navy captain was on his bridge and wide awake after the attacks on the two navy vessels. To save his ship he ordered her turned toward the Brooklyn shore. With huge torrents of water pouring into his ship his only chance to prevent a complete loss was to beach her as soon as possible. It takes a long time to turn a ship of this size, but as she settled down into the water he managed to find an open area of shoreline and drove his ship onto it.
He had been lucky. The design of his ship put most of his crew above the waterline and the torpedoes had hit away from the engine room. He had lost no people, but the massive containers floating awash in the harbor could cause serious problems to other shipping until they were recovered.
Chapter 21
Captain Ahmad, skipper of V4-2, lost interest in the container ship once his weapons had impacted her. He scanned for further targets. He could hardly believe what he was seeing when through the mist he spotted the greatest prize of all, an aircraft carrier, moored and vulnerable. He swung his boat around to bring his stern tubes to bear and sent his few torpedo men racing aft through the boat to get ready to fire. As soon as his firing solution was confirmed the two aft torpedoes were fired. They ran true and struck the massive ship in the stern ripping, off a propeller and tearing open the hull.
The USS Intrepid has been a floating museum in New York for years and the river has filled the dock she sits in with silt so that, as the ship settled, she only sank four feet before coming to rest. The ship was empty of tourists and staff who had already fled the chemical attack. Still unaware of his mistake, the skipper swung his boat around to bring his single loaded forward torpedo tube to bear and fired again at the retired carrier. Again he scored a hit, but since the ship was already on the bottom he could sink her no further.
In the excitement and confusion of the wasted attack the understrength crew had lost control of the buoyancy of the U-Boat and before the skipper realized the error, she had partially surfaced and was wallowing in the dirty river water.
HMS Huntingdon, a frigate of the Royal Navy, had been on a goodwill visit to New York as part of Fleet Week and, having stayed on for a few extra days, had been leaving harbor as the attack began. She was now returning to render whatever assistance she could to the most important ally Britain has. She cruised up the river with all hands at battle stations following the torpedo attacks on the US Navy vessels. The ship’s company was keyed up and ready for anything. The port bridge lookout was the first to see the attacking submarine wallowing in the water. A Royal Navy officer is not trained to hesitate and Nick Evans, the commander, seized his golden opportunity with both hands and started issuing rapid orders.
Within seconds the semi-automatic 4.5 inch naval gun on the foredeck had slewed round and aimed at the conning tower. Checking that there was no chance of overshooting and damaging New York even further, the captain gave the order to open fire. With a firing rate of twenty-five rounds per minute and a reputation for accuracy the modern 4.5 inch naval gun is a formidable weapon, particularly at close range. The first two rounds missed, but the third smashed into the conning tower and the fourth and fifth struck the pressure hull below it.
Inside the submarine’s control room the crew were unaware of the British warship until the first round penetrated the conning tower above them and exploded. Whether they had time to wonder what it was in the two and a half seconds before the next round crashed in amongst them was doubtful. Most of them were slaughtered by the flying shrapnel of the exploding shell and the submarines own casing. Those that were wounded had only to suffer for a further two and a half seconds before the next round entered the compartment and snuffed out their lives.
The U-Boat was finished as an effective weapon from that instant on, but the captain of the Huntingdon was taking no chances and a further four rounds struck the submarine along her aft casing. The Chiefs’ Mess was pulverized, the engine room penetrated and the huge diesel engines dismounted. The final round smashed into the aft torpedo room and ripped a massive hole in the stern. The crew in the forward sections may have survived for a few seconds or minutes, but the boat sank fast with such damage and nobody got out.
By this time the US Navy had realized they were dealing with two attacking boats loose in the river. One was now no longer a threat, but the other must be found before more lives were lost. The US Navy had suffered badly in the attacks that had cost them two ships within minutes of each other, but the crews of her warships are highly trained and accomplished professionals. They would mourn later, but first an enemy had to be dealt with. It had been a mistake to initiate the attack as Fleet Week ended with so many warships available close by.
An underwater search in such enclosed and shallow waters with so many obstructions was difficult and the number of false echoes from debris and numerous sunken ships on the bottom of the river was confusing. As long as the last submarine sat silent on the bottom it would be difficult to find and destroy.
The Captain of V4-1 was in no hurry to conclude his attack. His crew were still engaged in the slow and awkward process of reloading the forward tubes. Once that was complete he would have six torpedoes left to strike at the Americans, four in the forward tubes and two aft. His sound man was reporting large numbers of high speed screws passing up and down the river. The sounds were becoming more regular, so the enemy was probably settling into a search pattern. They had heard the multiple rapid explosions through the water as the shells had ripped their brothers to pieces and they had heard the structure of the other U-Boat cracking and tearing as she sank.
They were now the last element of the attack and the captain had to make sure that it was effective. If he succeeded this was to be a day the Americans would never forget. It would make the attack on the World Trade Center pale by comparison.
He checked his watch. The night would be coming on now. The short days at this time of year would work to his advantage. He could surface in the night and make his attack; he might even be able to make an escape if he was lucky. His first officer came to him and calmly reported that the forward tubes were loaded and ready for use. He was tired, the loading had not been easy in the reduced space available for the task in this boat.
It was too risky to make the attack now with the Americans scouring the river. He would wait. Maybe they would think that Ahmad had been alone? Perhaps they would think that this boat had already escaped to the open sea? He left a skeleton watch in the control room and ordered the rest of the crew to their bunks. They deserved rest and soon they would need their energy to continue striking at the Americans. He went to his small cabin. The extra privacy was welcome now that Romanov had left. A strange man, that Romanov, he never said why he had set up this attack at such expense to himself. Perhaps he, too, had a grudge against the Americans? Whatever the Russian’s reasons, the money he had paid would compensate their families well.
Chapter 22
Unaware of the greater tragedy unfolding in the city Jim lay quietly in the rubber dinghy with Tatiana in his arms. She was awake and in pain, but the sound of his voice seemed to help a little.
He told her where he was going to take her when they made it back to shore. He described the misty wetlands of the Fens of East Anglia and made them sound mysterious and welcoming. He described the English pubs scattered alongside the waterways, where they would call in to get warm during their walks together.
She spoke very little and never complained about the pain. She looked into his eyes and searched his face as she gripped his hand weakly. Jim felt the despair of being unable to help this lovely, brave woman.
He promised that help was coming and that everything would be alright. She smiled weakly and then her eyes closed as she drifted away again. Ivan and Jim kept her lying down between them to try and give her some of their body warmth. Jim whispered to her whenever her eyes opened and she looked around.
It was early morning when Ivan spoke. “It’s over, boss. She’s gone.”
Jim looked up at him i
n disbelief then gently pressed her neck to feel for the pulse that was no longer there.
“But I was just talking to her. She can’t be gone.”
“And the last thing she heard was the sound of your voice. That will have been a comfort to her. We have to let her go now.”
Andrei said a short prayer in Russian and crossed himself in the fashion of the Orthodox Church before they gently eased her limp body back into the water.
As they watched in silence she slipped below the surface and vanished from view. As Tatiana slowly sank, Jim felt the gratitude for her survival leave him, to be replaced by a cold hard ball in his stomach. The need for revenge. He made himself a promise, somewhere, somehow Romanov would answer for that girl.
Chapter 23
Captain Ibrahim slept well. Above him the search went on, but his silent, unmoving craft avoided detection. After four hours the sound man could hear through his headset that the search was running down. The US Navy had scoured the river intensively. They had investigated anomalous readings and found small wrecks from New York’s turbulent history. They had even found a steam locomotive lying on its side in the mud. How that had got there was anybody’s guess and would be worth investigating on a more peaceful day.
The Navy had sent divers down to V4-2 and despite the poor visibility they had identified it as a World War Two U-Boat, of a type never seen before. They had even managed to retrieve the bodies of two of the crew from the engine room. Torn and battered as they were, there was enough left of them and their uniforms to allow them to be identified as Arabic. One even had a small Quran in the pocket over his heart.
The bodies lay on the cold, steel floor plates of the deck hangar on a Navy destroyer; the helicopter it usually housed was flying a pattern search, looking for any trace of another attacker. Investigators examined the bodies to try and give them an identity or a nation of origin. Their uniforms were not of a type known to be used by any navy, but the label left in one of the suits of coveralls was in Russian. That didn’t help much; the Russians had supplied many Middle Eastern governments with equipment for their armed forces.
Across the world, US forces had gone to a heightened alert status. They had a justifiable anger, that could unleash awesome military power as soon as the target was identified.
The sweeping of the river area was wound down and the focus of the search moved toward the open sea where it was assumed the second boat would be heading. Already ships were converging on the area and the sea was saturated with sonar searches. If fish and whales were affected by such sonar searches they would be having a miserable time. The river became quieter as the navy moved downstream. The sound operator in V4-1 listened carefully before reporting to his captain; if he was right this was the time to return to their task. He walked the few steps to the captain’s small cabin area. He pulled the curtain back gently. The captain lay on his back with the framed picture of his wife and children on his chest.
The picture was famous among the crew. The captain’s family had been wiped out when a US Air Force practice bomb had gone astray and hit their house. They had no terrorist connections and lived in a quiet village away from the trouble spots. All they had wanted was to bring up their children in peace until an American bomb had slaughtered them. It was an accident of course and as a military man he had accepted that in training for war such things happen. He grieved for his family, but did not blame the pilot for an equipment malfunction. But then he had seen a photograph of the aircraft that had dropped the bomb. Someone had painted a little house and three small people on the nose of the aircraft to indicate a kill. For a while the Captain had gone a little insane with grief and anger. He was no longer fit to command a submarine and had been discharged from his navy. Now it was time to complete his personal revenge.
The sound man touched his captain’s shoulder. He was instantly awake. He looked at his sound man who nodded, “It is time.”
The captain placed his photograph carefully on the shelf above his bunk and swung his legs to the floor.
“Pass the word to the cook to make strong coffee for everyone, then wake the crew.”
The captain paused to organize his thoughts. Then he walked back through the boat talking to the crew as they stirred back to life. He picked up his coffee from the galley and went back into the control room. He stood sipping the thick, black, aromatic liquid, trying to ignore the faint tinge of diesel oil while staring at the detailed chart of New York harbor. He knew exactly where he was and where the currents ran. If he kept the boat quiet he could let the current take him to a new area where he could surprise his enemy once again.
The men of the control room took their places. The torpedo men went through to their positions cradling their coffee. Nobody spoke, they were all prepared to die for their mission but, no matter what the reason, contemplating one’s own death is a sobering thought for all men. The captain drained his cup and carefully set it down at the back of the navigator’s table. He looked around the control room. They were all looking at him expectantly.
“Are we ready?” They all nodded, some smiled.
“Very well. Up periscope and then slowly raise the boat. I want the periscope to break the surface slowly so it is not seen.”
The scope rose silently and he stepped to it. The wheels were spun and valves opened, the boat slowly and quietly rose out of the clinging river mud and started for the surface. There was a loud thump and a heavy grinding noise from above them as the boat shook along its length. The periscope wrenched violently in the skipper’s hands and water gushed in under pressure as the periscope distorted.
“Take her down! Quickly! Quickly!”
The boat sank back to the bottom of the river. Although only just submerged, in this shallow part of the river, the flow of cold, dirty water into the control room was intense. In minutes it would start to affect the electrics and they would be in real trouble. If the batteries in the lower compartments were submerged it would create the deadly chlorine gas that would kill them all. The Captain considered for a second. No time for clever solutions, he needed to act now.
“Surface! Surface!”
The crew responded rapidly and the boat rose again from the bottom. He watched the depth gauge drop until he knew the conning tower was breaking the surface. He climbed the ladder, followed by his bridge crew, opened the hatch and climbed out onto the bridge deck of the conning tower. The wreckage of the periscope hung across their heads.
The lookouts took station and one called, “Captain!”
He looked where the man was pointing. Wallowing alongside them was one of the containers from the cargo ship that had been torpedoed earlier. They had tried to surface under it and destroyed the periscope. Foul luck, but an attack on the surface should present no problems in the misty, moonless night.
The four men on the conning tower bridge scanned the harbor. They had not been seen and the oily water was calm and silky. There were still ships in the area though none close to them.
The captain called down the hatchway “Electric Motors only.” The deck officer looked at him quizzically. “It is quiet. We do not want anyone to hear those diesels start and then look this way.”
The officer nodded and spoke into the voice pipe to relay the order, then returned to scanning ahead through his binoculars.
“Slow ahead. Come right ten degrees.”
The long sleek boat slid forward in the night, parting the water to either side of its sharp bow. With hardly any bow wave and little or no wake behind them they moved slowly down river, heading toward the sea. The illuminated figure of the Statue of Liberty came into view.
The officer of the deck said, “A shame the Germans did not fit deck guns to this boat. We could have made quite a mess of the green lady.”
The Captain snorted, “A useless gesture. I am here to take revenge not make political statements. Find me a meaningful target for the rest of our torpedoes.”
Even so, all four of the men on the deck looked u
p as the imposing statue came closer to them. Illuminated by the floodlights and rising out of the river mist it was an impressive sight.
The US Coast Guard cutter rapidly overtaking them went undetected as the U-Boat crew looked forward and sideways. The skeleton crew meant that the bridge deck was not fully manned. The submarine had appeared on the cutter’s radar as soon as it surfaced and the night vision systems had identified it as soon as it started to move. The cutter crew could hardly believe the situation. The enemy was in front of them and they had yet to be seen. This submarine could not be allowed to escape. The crew had been warned to be ready for a collision as soon as the U-Boat had been seen. No loudspeaker announcements were made and no klaxons were sounded. The U-Boat was not to be given any extra chance to spot them.
Down below in the U-Boat, the exhausted sound man returned to his station, sipping his coffee He put on his headset. For two, then three, then four seconds his tired mind refused to process what he was hearing. Then it made sense. He leapt from his seat, knocking the coffee over the plotting table, the old fashioned headphones wrenched from his ears jerking his head back. He ran into the control room, pushing startled men out of the way. Reaching the conning tower ladder he started to climb rapidly.
“Behind us! Behind us!”
The bridge crew spun round to look behind. They did not need binoculars. As he reached the deck the sound man looked back and saw to his horror the creamy white bow wave of a ship at speed and above it the bow of the cutter with the familiar red and blue hull markings of the Coast Guard. There was no time for anything and no point in screaming. They stood paralyzed and watched their end unfold.
The cutter was slightly out to one side and approaching fast. They saw it heel outwards in the turn. A few seconds more and the bow sliced into the pressure hull behind the conning tower. The casing of the U-Boat was strong, but it had been built for pressure and not this sort of impact. The metal tore as the bow of the cutter penetrated the pressure hull. The momentum of the Coast Guard ship continued, the U-Boat was forced sideways and started to roll. As the cutter mounted the aft end of the submarine the conning tower rolled down into the polluted water. The hatch was still open and the cold water cascaded in as the weight of the cutter pressed the U-Boat down. With such a rush of water there was no chance for anyone to climb the ladder and escape. The control room flooded, smashing men against the bulkheads and controls. With the pressure hull ruptured the integrity of the boat was gone and the compartments aft of the conning tower filled. The air in the sealed forward torpedo room held the bow above water for a short time, but then the weight of the water in the rest of the boat dragged her back down into the dark river mud.
