Dragonfire

by Humphrey Hawksley

  Almost a thousand people worked at Pine Gap, near Alice Springs, intercepting telephone, radio and data links as well as satellite communications. The computer room alone was 5,600 square metres and there were more than twenty other service and support buildings. Yet when the Chinese satellite instruction made its debut in the massive Western listening station machine, there was nothing anyone could do to know what it meant. Only the senior Chinese army staff knew, together with the submarine commanders. Not even the communications officers who sent the message from the northern naval headquarters in Tsing Tao were aware of the significance of the signal.

  It was luck more than anything that submarine 0821 had to surface to pick up the twice-daily signal less than an hour after identifying the Delhi-class destroyer. It meant the Chinese could track the Indian warship for a minimum amount of time, lessening the risk of detection. The commander took the submarine just below the surface again, but within periscope depth. He verified the destroyer’s position on the sonar and headed for the kill. Because it was dark and visibility was low, he decided to confirm the target with Electronic Surveillance Measures. He surfaced again using the ESM mast to absorb the electronic spectrum of the ship, taking in the destroyer’s navigation radar, encrypted tactical communications and satellite communications. The data was cross-checked on the Kilo’s tactical weapons systems computer, giving the commander a near certain classification of the target. He verified that no unique signature had ever been taken of the Indian Delhi-class destroyers Bangalore and Mysore, deducing that his target must be one of those two ships.

  She was sailing south-west on a course towards the Andaman Islands, her speed just under 20 knots, probably slowed because of the unsettled weather. There would be about four hundred men on board the ship, which was part of the cream of India’s fleet. Unlike the Indian-designed and built Arjun battle tank or Light Combat indigenous fighter aircraft, the Delhi was considered a world-class warship and she sailed like a dream.

  When he was 440 metres from the target, the submarine commander opted to go for an ‘eyes only’ attack using the periscope. Unlike the Americans, the Indians’ skills at antisubmarine warfare were limited. The Kilo had been tracking the destroyer for more than an hour undetected. The two Westland Sea King helicopters remained strapped to the deck, indicating that the crew was not even suspecting an enemy presence.

  When the submarine was 30 degrees on the bow of the target, the torpedo doors were opened. He would create a classic gyro-angle shot with a spread of three torpedoes to counteract the target speeding up or suddenly turning away. He waited until he was 900 metres from the destroyer, then he released the first torpedo at a bearing of 90 degrees to the target course. The second torpedo was fired at 5 degrees ahead of the bearing, and the third at 10 degrees behind.

  As the 533mm torpedoes sped towards the target, the Indians had less than thirty seconds to react, which is why the commander had taken his vessel so dangerously close. The torpedoes did have a range of eight nautical miles and were wire-guided with active and passive homing at a speed of 40 knots. But the Kilo commander trusted little of that. He wanted to sight his target and fire.

  The first torpedo, with an impact fuse, struck the destroyer aft, cutting the engines almost immediately. The second, with a proximity fuse, blew a hole amidships, sending uncontrollable litres of water streaming into the ship. If the destroyer had not been slowed immediately by the explosions, the third torpedo would have missed. As it was it clipped the propeller casing, blowing another hole in the stern. This decided the Bangalore’s fate. Within minutes the ship was sinking. She was lost with all hands. The only distress signal received was sent out after the second impact. Then the radio went dead.

  In Zhongnanhai, President Tao was told of the success and hoped he had delivered China her victory with one strike, her yizhan ershang.

  Prime Minister’s Office, South Block, Delhi, India

  Local time: 0300 Tuesday 8 May 2007

  GMT: 2130 Monday 7 May 2007

  ‘If we continue our ceasefire and show restraint, China will be condemned by the international community in such a way that it will never recover,’ said the Foreign Minister Prabhu Purie.

  ‘Whatever it does, China will recover,’ said Hari Dixit, unable to contain his anger. ‘China gunned down civilians in Tiananmen Square and within a year the Western leaders were kissing the asses of the men who ordered it. Now China is sinking our ships in our ocean, occupying our land, killing Buddhists in Tibet. If you are suggesting India surrenders now, you can bloody well resign.’

  ‘No, Prime Minister,’ Purie said firmly. ‘I am merely saying that we should wait a few hours and get unequivocal international support. Then we can do whatever we damn well like.’

  Zhongnanhai, Beijing, China

  Local time: 0630 Tuesday 8 May 2007

  GMT: 2230 Monday 7 May 2007

  ‘He’s British,’ said Tang Siju. ‘He confessed after we gave him truth drugs. It is impossible for even the best-trained man to resist giving away his nationality.’

  ‘Is he a mercenary?’

  ‘He is a member of the Special Boat Squadron. I suspect he was following orders which would have had the approval of the British government.’

  ‘Comrade Song,’ said Tao, turning to his Foreign Minister, ‘what do you make of this?’

  ‘The only motivation I can see for it is to create a power balance against us in South-East Asia. The British commando probably came from HMS Ocean, which is in the Bay of Bengal on exercises under the Five Power Defence Agreement. Technically, the Cocos Islands belong to Myanmar. Our lease on them has not been officially declared.’

  ‘You’re waffling, Foreign Minister,’ said Tang. ‘Britain is an American ally and the United States is intent on containing the power of China. We must strike back immediately and effectively. We have a Song-class submarine which has been following the Ocean task force for two days now.’ Tang looked at his watch. ‘The satellite is passing overhead in fifteen minutes. I suggest we give the commander his orders.’

  Briefing

  Taiwan

  The island of Taiwan, 160 kilometres off the eastern Chinese coast, was governed by the Japanese from the 1890s and Taiwanese residents were given Japanese citizenship. For two years after the end of the Second World War it came under mainland Chinese control. Then, in 1949, when the government was overthrown by Mao Zedong’s Communist Party, Taiwan became a stronghold for the fleeing nationalist forces. Taiwan made a remarkable development into a modern society under a mixture of military rule and American benevolence. Taiwan received a jolt of reality in the 1970s when the United States began its rapprochement with China, eventually cutting relations with Taiwan in favour of the mainland. The island continued to thrive. Martial law was lifted in 1987, the first ever direct presidential election was held in 1996 and its foreign reserves became among the highest in the world. Links with the United States remained strong. Taiwan remained protected by the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act. The act was designed to ‘help maintain peace, security and stability in the Western Pacific’. It also maintained the ‘capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan’. It was deliberately woolly about America’s obligation to go to war with China over Taiwan, but it left the option open.

  Presidential Palace, Taipei, Taiwan

  Local time: 0700 Tuesday 8 May 2007

  GMT: 2300 Monday 7 May 2007

  President Lin Chung-ling of Taiwan was born in the United States while his father was the Ambassador there in the 1960s. He was given the best American education and even held a United States passport, which he had to give up when he entered politics. He considered himself as much American as Chinese and certainly was more at home in the corridors of the State Department and the White House than he would be in Zhongnanhai and the Great Hall of the People.

  The events of the past
few days had thrown up an opportunity which Lin was convinced he could not let pass. For sixty years Taiwan had struggled in isolation, risen to the challenges and created one of the most modern Asian societies. Even the poorest Taiwanese were generations ahead of the Chinese peasants and right now a vulnerable China posed an enormous opportunity for Taiwan.

  Lin had to strike while China was weak. It was pinned down in Tibet. The incursion into Arunachal Pradesh was as foolhardy as its invasion of Vietnam in 1979. International support had already been slipping from it. The decision to sink the Indian destroyer would bring condemnation from every quarter. Very rarely did such a succession of events come together in such a way.

  President Lin Chung-ling had been elected with a landslide majority after he said he would attempt to see himself a citizen of Taiwan as a recognized independent country within his lifetime. Never had he dreamt the opportunity would come so quickly. He desk-topped his personal secretary to bring in the BBC film crew which was waiting outside to interview him. He had decided to make his announcement of Taiwan’s independence on BBC rather than CNN to distance himself from his American benefactors. But it would be in the contemporary manner, announcing it to the world on live television.

  The Oval Office, The White House, Washington, DC

  Local time: 1830 Monday 7 May 2007

  GMT: 2330 Monday 7 May 2007

  ‘They’ve hit the British frigate Grafton,’ said Tom Bloodworth. ‘Two torpedoes. She’s still afloat. More than twenty men dead.’

  ‘What with?’ said John Hastings.

  ‘Song-class submarine, sir. She was damaged by depth charges and surfaced. The captain of HMS Ocean had to issue orders forbidding the men to open fire on the crew, they were so angry.’

  ‘Song-class. Any significance?’

  ‘It carries cruise missiles which it can fire from underwater – although the Grafton was hit with torpedoes. It’s a diesel-electric vessel and we doubt the missiles have nuclear warheads. The Song is Chinese, broadly with eighties technology. The main point, of course, is that the Chinese brought it way out of the usual theatre and used it effectively.’

  ‘So how many more submarines do they have over there?’

  ‘We don’t know, John,’ said Tom Bloodworth. ‘We just have no idea.’

  The President’s personal secretary interrupted on the intercom. ‘Joan Holden is on her way from State. She’s suggested you get Alvin Jebb in from across the river, and tune in the BBC World Service. I’m changing the channels for you now, sir.’

  Hastings moved away from his desk to the sofas in the middle of the room, just as the BBC interrupted its own breaking news report about HMS Grafton to go to its interview with President Lin of Taiwan. Because of the short notice given for the interview, the correspondent was only the local BBC stringer in Taipei. Unknown to the viewers he had already been told he had a maximum on-air time of two minutes thirty seconds. The editor of the day even questioned going to Taiwan for an unquantifiable announcement, believing the viewers wouldn’t understand the link with the China–India conflict. At one stage, when it was thought the BBC would also have a live interview with the emotional mother of one of the naval officers killed on Grafton, the live segment from Taipei was to be cancelled. But a senior editor stepped in curtly. ‘Our job is to inform and report breaking news. It is not to make people weep. Stick with Taipei.’

  BBC: President Lin, thank you for joining us. As time is short, could you firstly give us your reaction to the Chinese naval offensive in the Bay of Bengal? British and Indian naval ships have been sunk, and there are even unconfirmed reports that a Chinese nuclear-armed submarine is steaming towards the Indian coast.

  Lin: Yes. In the past few hours, China has forced me to make the most difficult decision of both my personal and political life. As the democratically elected President of Taiwan, I feel that we can no longer go on pulling the diplomatic wool over all our eyes. Unification with China, either under the mainland’s system of dictatorship or our own system of democracy, will never happen in the foreseeable future. A compromise reunion, such as has been tried in Hong Kong, would not work and, more importantly, the Taiwanese people would not tolerate it. The brutal repression of Chinese citizens in Tibet, be they Tibetan or Han Chinese, the invasion of India, a democratic neighbouring power, the exploitation of Myanmar or Burma for military means, upsetting the stability of South-East Asia, and the threatening naval offensive in the Bay of Bengal – these are not actions which the Taiwanese people can support. We abhor them.

  BBC: But surely you are powerless against China? All but the poorest Third World governments have diplomatic relations not with Taiwan, but with China.

  Lin: We have always been powerless, but we have become a leading light for both how the developing world should modernize and how it should handle the transition to democracy. So what I am saying is this. I have called an emergency session of both houses of Congress. They are ratifying a bill which will create the independent nation of Taiwan. At noon today, there will be nationwide celebrations to mark our transition. As from noon today, Taiwan will be an independent nation.

  BBC: But you are already as good as independent. You raise your own taxes, issue your own visas, have your own defence force. Why risk stability?

  Lin: The time has come for the international community to recognize that we are a nation in our own right. The policy of constructive engagement with a one-party state has merely strengthened China’s ability to do what she is doing now. What we will celebrate at noon will be a beacon of political morality to the world.

  Alvin Jebb and Joan Holden walked into the room together. ‘Switch to CNN,’ said Holden. ‘Reece Overhalt just called saying Jamie Song is live, in vision from Beijing.’

  Jebb was on his mobile to the Pentagon finding out the location of American naval forces in the Pacific. His expression indicated the news wasn’t good. Bloodworth made a call from the President’s Oval Office desk, took notes and moved extra satellite imagery over the eastern coast of China to watch troop and aircraft movements.

  ‘Why didn’t Lin tell us?’ said Hastings.

  ‘It would have been suicide for him and us,’ said Holden, sitting down and pouring herself a coffee into the empty cup used by Bloodworth. ‘Independence is about not consulting other powers. If he had, we would be accused of giving Lin permission.’

  ‘Song’s coming on,’ said Bloodworth, finishing his call. Jebb shut down his mobile. The Oval Office fell quiet.

  CNN: Within the past few minutes, Foreign Minister, Taiwan has announced its independence.

  Song: Yes, I heard that, too, Mike. It’s unfortunate.

  CNN: President Lin described his announcement as a beacon of political morality to the world.

  Song: Yes, I heard that, too, and his rather naive attempts to slur my government. The fact is, Mike, that India and China are in conflict right now over very complex issues regarding the sovereignty of both nations. It is not an immature conflict. It is the type of conflict which historically nations have fought, which you fought in your Civil War, your war in Vietnam, your conflict with Iraq and in Europe throughout much of the last century. Anyone who claims that the global economy, the Internet and all that are going to stop nations going to war against each other is naive in the extreme.

  CNN: But was it necessary to sink the Indian destroyer Bangalore and cripple the British frigate Grafton, with at least 450 people dead?

  Song: Let me try and answer that not in the emotional way in which you put the question but in the pragmatic way of geopolitics. We had intelligence information which we are making public on the Internet right now that the Bombay was under orders to sink a Chinese-flagged tanker heading for China with oil from the Middle East. We could not allow that to happen. It would be an infringement of all international shipping laws. We also have intelligence that this man – and I understand you have agreed to float the pictures over this interview – this man, Michael Hall, is a member of the British
Royal Marines. He was captured while on a sabotage mission at our naval base on Great Cocos Island. That Britain attempted to interfere in this conflict is abhorrent; that it decided to interfere on the side of India is a wound which will take a long time to heal. It was only right therefore that we defend our territory.

  CNN: Is it not Myanmar or Burmese territory?

  Song: We have a lease to use it as a military base. If we attacked American facilities at Okinawa, Japan, it would be seen as an attack on United States forces.

  CNN: All right, Foreign Minister. It seems that everyone is digging themselves deeper into the big holes. Pakistan is already finished. The UN calls it a non-functioning nation. You and India seem to be digging at the same speed, but both downwards. Taiwan has scooped its first shovelful of earth. How is China now going to dig itself out?

  Song: We need help, and that’s why I’m here, Mike. You’ve got a second video you’ve agreed to run. This was not shot by a Chinese television crew. We invited a neutral Russian crew to Lhasa. They picked their own interpreter and they were free to go anywhere.

  Song fell silent and didn’t speak throughout the first minute of the video. It showed a gang of Tibetan youths, brandishing modern weapons, moving in against a row of Chinese shops. They sprayed the shop-fronts with automatic weapons fire, shattering the windows, which fell out onto the pavement. Then they lit petrol bombs and threw them inside. The shop-owners mostly lived upstairs with their families and they came stumbling out, coughing, clutching their children and helping their elderly relations. As they emerged from the smoke, they were cut down in a hail of gunfire, women, children, the old, so fierce and unrelenting that those behind turned back and fled into their burning homes. One of the Tibetans moved forward, executing the wounded with a single gunshot to the head, until he ran out of bullets. Then he took out a machete, yanked up the body of a young woman by her hair. The camera unashamedly went close up on her face, her eyes danced around, between consciousness and shock. Her hands flailed out and the Tibetan began hacking at her neck with the machete to decapitate her. The crowd cheered and the CNN presenter came back into vision, looking utterly stunned.