Fortunes of War

by Stephen Coonts

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  The michman wearing a sound-powered telephone headset spoke up: “Captain, Sonar reports two destroyers at ten thousand meters, closing quickly.”

  Saratov smacked Martos on the arm. “Hurry.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Martos pulled his mask over his face and scurried up the ladder into the lock. As the torpedomen sealed the hatch closed, Saratov headed for the control room. White faces watched him every step of the way. He tried to keep his gait under control, but the sailors must have thought he was galloping. “Two destroyers,” the sonarman reported. “About ninety-five hundred meters. And two more helicopters.”

  “Are they echo-ranging?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Askold had been wearing the extra sonar headset, and now he passed it to the captain without a word. He looked very tired.

  As he waited inside the dark lock while the cold water rushed in, Martos felt the dogged-down hatch above his head. Esenin had closed the hatch once he was outside the ship. Had he left the hatch open, no one else could have used the air lock. Was closing the hatch a tactical error, or was Esenin waiting for someone to come out through the lock?

  Locked in this steel cylinder as the water rose past his shoulders, Martos recalled that Esenin and one of his men had gone out first, then the third man. That third man must have closed the hatch behind him. The cold water shot into the lock under pressure. This small, totally dark steel chamber with cold seawater flooding in was no place for a person suffering from claustrophobia. Martos had conquered his fear of the lock long ago. The water was over his head now. Breathing pure oxygen from the tank on his shoulders, Martos waited until the sound of water coming in had stopped completely. He could just hear the pinging of the Japanese sonars probing the dark waters. Saratov was right: they were running out of time. Martos reached above his head and grasped the wheel on the outer hatch. He applied pressure. The wheel resisted. Martos braced himself and grunted into his mask as he twisted with all his strength. The wheel turned ninety degrees, and he pushed on the hatch. It opened outward. Martos flippered up and out. The light was dim, visibility in the murky, dark water was very restricted. He could see, at the most, ten feet. He had his knife out now, in his right hand, ready. He cast a quick glance in all directions, including upward. Keeping his chest just inches off the steel deck plating, Martos swam aft. The first two containers loomed into view. They appeared to be closed, with the metal bands that encircled them still attached. As he got closer, he could see someone between the containers, someone in a semierect position, facing aft. The other two men must be beyond this guy. Martos’s adrenaline level went off the chart. He was ready. He flippered up and over the left container, which was about four feet high, so that he came at the man he could see from behind his left shoulder. As he closed he saw the other two, their heads bent. They had the container behind this one open and were bent over, working on whatever it contained. A light source near what they were working on silhouetted them in the murky water. Martos took in the scene at a glance as he closed swiftly on the nearest man, still motionless. The head of the man across from him jerked up just as he stabbed with the knife, burying it to the hilt in the side of the nearest man’s neck. With a ripping, twisting motion, he jerked the knife free as dark blood spouted like ink. Martos used his left hand to slam the victim away. His momentum carried him toward the man who had jerked his head up. He slashed with the knife, but the man kicked backward, so the knife missed its target. As he went by the third man, Martos slammed an elbow into his mouthpiece, causing it to spill out.

  Scissoring hard with his legs, the Spetsnaz fighter shot toward the second man and slashed again with the blade. This time, the knife clanked into a wrench the man had in his hand. The man dropped the wrench. The human shark that had attacked him bored in relentlessly. Another slash with the blade at his oxygen line bit deep into his shoulder. The panicked man got a hand on Martos’s goggles and snatched them away. This time, Martos drove the blade deep into the man’s abdomen and ripped it free with one continuous motion, then pushed the dying man away and spun to face his last opponent.

  “Eight thousand meters, Captain. They were making at least thirty knots. Now one of them is slowing. The other is charging toward us.” Ping/t damned noise. “The helos? Where are they?”

  “One is overhead, sir. I think he has dipped a sonar pod.”

  Saratov could hear the steady whop-whopping beat of a helicopter in his earphones. It did sound as if the chopper was in a hover. Ping!

  “How long has Martos been out?”

  “About a minute, sir.”

  Everyone in the control room was looking at him, waiting for him to hatch a miracle, pull a rabbit from the hat. Pavel Saratov made a show of reaching into Askold’s shirt pocket for a cigarette, lighting it, and taking a deep, slow drag.

  Esenin was no amateur. He fought like a trained professional, without wasted effort, making every move count. He kept his eyes on Martos’s abdomen, not his face. He had his knife in his right hand. And the bastard was grinning! Martos saw the flash of white teeth just before Esenin placed the scuba mouthpiece back in his mouth. For the first time, Martos felt fear. Was the general grinning because he was going to kill Martos with a knife, or was he grinning because this damned bomb he had been working on was now set to explode?

  Esenin slashed with the knife and Martos countered, but in slow motion, because all their movements were slowed by the water. At first blush, avoiding a slow-motion attack seemed easy, until you realized that your movements were inhibited to the same degree. Then underwater hand-to-hand combat became a horrible, twisted nightmare. Martos got his left hand on Esenin’s right wrist and gripped it fiercely. Before Martos could deliver a killing thrust with his right, Esenin seized his wrist. Locked together, they struggled. Martos was the stronger of the two. He could feel Esenin yielding, and at that moment, Esenin got his feet up and kicked. The two men flew apart. Martos had to look at the bomb. There was a panel with glowing numbers. Esenin launched himself off the front of the submarine’s sail. Martos flippered hard to avoid him and slashed with his knife as Esenin went under him. He felt the blade bite flesh. Esenin whirled to face him. The shoulder of his wet suit was leaking dark black blood, or perhaps Martos only imagined it. In the dim murk it was hard to tell. This time as Esenin came forward, he held the knife low, ready to slash upward. Martos used his hands to move himself backward, waiting for his moment. Something rammed itself into his left shoulder. Stunned by pain and shock, Martos looked down at his shoulder. Protruding from the wet suit was the tip of a knife blade, gleaming in the watery twilight.

  24

  They were waiting when Atsuko Abe entered the war room in the basement of the defense ministry. The foreign minister, Cho, was there with four other ministers and half a dozen senior politicians from the Diet. The chief of staff of the Japanese Self-Defense Force, General Yamashita, stood in their midst. “What are you doing here?” Abe demanded of the group as they bowed. Without waiting for an answer, he walked around them. He went to the prime minister’s raised chair and climbed into it. “A Russian submarine is in Sagami Bay, just outside the mouth of Tokyo Bay,” Abe said. “I suppose you’ve heard. Come, let us see about it.”

  They turned to face him. The raised chair resembled a throne, Cho thought, annoyed that such a thought should intrude at a time like this. “The submarine can wait, Mr. Prime Minister,” Cho replied. “We have come about a more serious matter.”

  Abe looked from face to face, scrutinizing each. “My conscience forced me to violate the security laws,” Cho continued. “I told these gentlemen of your plans to use nuclear weapons to destroy the American air base at Chita. My colleagues decided that verification must be obtained before any decision was possible on a matter this serious. General Yamashita agreed to meet with us. He confirmed that you ordered this attack.”

  Abe’s eyes flashed angrily. “Without air superiority, gentlemen, our pos
ition in Siberia is untenable. We cannot resupply our forces through the winter. Does anyone dispute that?”

  No one spoke. Abe bored in. “General Yamashita? Do you concur with my assessment?” Yamashita gave a tiny affirmative bow. “We must eliminate the American F-22’s or lose the war. If we lose the war, this government will fall. If this government falls, Japan will lose its last, best hope for greatness. Surely you see our dilemma. Des perate situations call for extreme remedies — I have the courage to do what must be done.”

  “Mr. Prime Minister,” Cho said, “sometimes defeat is impossible to avoid. The wise man submits to the inevitable with grace.”

  “Defeat is never inevitable. Our resolve must be as great as the crisis.”

  “To struggle against the inevitable is to dishonor oneself.”

  Abe flared at that shot. “How dare you speak to me of honor!” he roared. Cho gave not an inch, which surprised Abe. He didn’t think the old man had it in him. “I speak of our honor, ours collectively, yours and mine, the honor of the people in this room, and the honor of Japan. We must choose a course worthy of ourselves and our nation.”

  “And that is?” Abe whispered. “We must withdraw from Siberia. Nuclear weapons are abhorrent to the Japanese people. To have them as a deterrent is one thing, but to use them on a foe when the life of the nation is not at stake is quite another.”

  “The life of Japan ix at stake.” Abe looked again at every face, trying to read what was written there. “We are a small, poor island in a vast ocean bordered by great nations. We are caught between China and the United States. With Siberia, Japan can also be great. Without it …”

  His voice trailed off. “Your failing, Mr. Prime Minister,” Cho said slowly, “is that you have never been able to admit the possibility of visions other than your own. But the time for discussion is past. The decision has been made. The Japanese government will not betray the ideals of the Japanese people.”

  Abe seemed to shrink in his large chair. General Yamashita stepped forward and presented a piece of paper. “Please sign this, Mr. Prime Minister, canceling preparations for the nuclear strike.”

  Abe made the smallest of gestures, motioning the paper away. “I cannot,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “The strike was launched a half hour ago.”

  “Call it back,” one of the senior politicians said harshly. Atsuko Abe smiled grimly. “The possibility always existed that weak men might lose their resolve. The pilots were ordered to ignore any recall orders.”

  The politicians stood in stunned silence, trying to comprehend the enormity of the step taken by Abe.

  Cho was one of the first to find his tongue. “Come with me,” he said to General Yamashita. “We will call the American president.”

  David Herbert Hood was still on the telephone with Marshal Stolypin when the call from the Japanese defense ministry came in. Hood listened in silence to the translation of the words of Foreign Minister Cho. When he realized that Cho was saying the nuclear strike against Chita had been airborne from Vladivostok for forty-two minutes, Hood pushed the button on the telephone that allowed everyone in the room to hear the translator, and in the background, the voice of Cho talking rapidly in Japanese. Hood was horrified. The news that a nuclear strike couldn’t be recalled struck him as complete insanity. The Russians had done the very same thing. “Mr. Cho,” Hood replied, trying to keep control of his voice. “I just got off the telephone with the Russian chief of staff. Are you aware that Russia launched a nuclear strike via aerial bombers against Tokyo and the missile-launch facilities on the Tateyama Peninsula two hours ago?”

  The translator fired ten seconds of Japanese at Cho, who asked in horror, “Tokyo?”

  “Tokyo,” thundered David Hood. “And the crazy sons of bitches sent planes without any way to recall them.” Cho said something to try to get the message straight. In a moment, Hood continued: “Yes, sir. The Russians did do that. They are doing it now. Six Mig-25 bombers, three for each target, with Sukhoi-27’s for escort.”

  He handed the telephone to Jack Innes. “Tell them where the Russian strike is. They may be able to intercept it.”

  While Innes talked, Hood scanned the giant display that covered most of the wall in front of him. It was a presentation of raw data from the satellites, massaged by the best computer programs yet devised. What Hood focused upon were the symbols marking unknown airborne targets in eastern Siberia. There were several. One of the formations the Americans were watching was undoubtedly the nuclear strike, probably that one a hundred miles north of Khabarovsk. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Stanford Tuck, was standing beside him. “Nukes,” Hood told him. “The bastards are trying to nuke each other.”

  “What are the targets?”

  “The Russians are sending two strikes, one against Tokyo, one against the missile-launch facilities on the Tateyama Peninsula. Mean while, the Japanese are trying to nuke the F-22 base at Chita.”

  Tuck was horrified. “Tokyo …”

  “The F-22 squadron,” Hood said, pursing his lips. “There are hotheads in Congress who will want Japanese blood if they use a nuke to kill Americans.”

  “How did we get to the edge of the abyss?” Stanford Tuck asked. “How do we keep from falling in?” Hood countered. He pointed to the computer presentation on the wall. “The Russians are too far east to be intercepted by the F-22’s. It would be a futile tail chase. The Japanese are going to have to take care of themselves. Our only option is to scramble the F-22’s to intercept the Japanese strike headed their way.”

  “The planes near Khabarovsk must be the Japanese,” Tuck said. He grabbed a satellite telephone.

  Stunned by the agony of the knife that had been rammed through his left shoulder from behind, michman Martos almost lost his scuba mouthpiece. His instinct and years of training saved him. Without conscious thought, he turned and grabbed his assailant’s throat with his left hand and buried his knife in the man’s stomach again. Continuing the same movement, he then spun the man toward Esenin and flippered as hard as he could.

  The agony in his shoulder was extraordinary, so bad that he could barely stay focused.

  Esenin tried to push the dying naval infantryman out of the way so that he could get at Martos, but while he was using his hands for this, Martos pulled his knife from the human shield and stabbed Esenin under his left armpit.

  Esenin twisted away before Martos could withdraw his weapon. He floated away, looking down at his left side, reaching with his right hand. Martos turned back toward the bomb.

  Lights … numbers … Where was the on-off switch?

  As he looked for it, the sheer volume of the pinging noises got his attention. And a noise like a train. Martos looked up, toward the surface a hundred feet above.

  He saw the destroyer speeding over, and splashes. Out to either side of the racing ship’s hull, splashes.

  Depth charges! The Japanese destroyer was dropping depth charges!

  “Depth charges in the water, Captain.”

  “All hands into life jackets. Let’s pray these charges are set too shallow. If we survive them, we’ll blow the tanks, surface the boat, and abandon it. Pass the word.”

  Every man in the boat was talking to someone, reaching for something, bracing himself.

  “Close all watertight fittings.”

  Saratov heard the hatches clanging shut. He reached for a life jacket and pulled it on, fumbling with the straps.

  He was still at it when the first depth charge exploded.

  The detonation rocked the sub, causing circuit breakers to pop and emergency lighting to come on.

  Another blast, like Thor pounding on the boat with his mighty hammer.

  Then the worst of all, three stupendous concussions in close succession.

  Silence. “Damage reports?” Saratov shouted the question into the blackness. Even the emergency lights were out.

  The reports came back over the sound-powered telephone. The boat was still intact.
/>   “Emergency surface. Blow the tanks. All hands stand by to abandon ship.”

  Martos had only a few seconds, so he looked again at the panel on the bomb still sitting in its cradle on the transport container. Esenin and his helpers had merely opened the container by releasing the two steel bands that held it together. Surely these damned fools weren’t arming the thing before they got it off the submarine?

  But it was armed.

  Martos tried to remember — as he knifed the first man, Esenin had been on his left, and doing something to this panel. What?

  Which is the power switch?

  Running out of time … Which one is it?

  He heard a powerful click, and instinctively he slammed his knees into the fetal position and hugged them. The concussion smashed into his left side like a speeding truck. For a second or two, he lost consciousness. Another blast, and another. These blasts were above him and to his right, farther away than the first, which had almost opened him up like a ripe tomato. Martos concentrated on staying conscious and keeping his mouthpiece in place as the shock waves from the explosions hammered at him. The knife buried in his shoulder helped. The pain was a fire that burned and burned, and his mind couldn’t shut it out. Then the explosions were over. Amazingly, he was still alive. And deaf. He could hear nothing. His eardrums must have burst. He tried to find the warheads, the containers, but couldn’t. The water was opaque. The rising submarine hit him, carried him upward on an expanding tower of bubbles, a universe of rising bubbles. Instinctively, Martos used both hands to grasp the slippery tiles of the deck, which was pushing him up, up, toward the light. He was going upward too fast. He was going to get the bends. He could feel his abdomen swelling. Oh, sweet Christ!