by David Poyer
Fortunately, the patch kit was intact.
For the first day, after he’d wrestled Hwang’s computer away and thrown it overboard, they’d tried to paddle northeast, along the vector Wilker said he’d been flying to Hampton Roads. The breeze made it hard. Each time he lifted the paddle for a rest, it blew the raft’s blunt nose off course. And he tired all too quickly. Whether it was from lack of sleep, the shock of the crash, or whatever, he couldn’t seem to muster much energy, though he was still alert.
He just wondered how long he could stay that way.
* * *
NOT far into the second afternoon, Hwang had gasped out, “Submarine.”
Dan had stopped paddling after a spell that had left him so woozy he’d almost lost the paddle. He stared where the Korean was pointing. “I don’t see anything.”
“Wait until we rise.”
The slow Pacific swell lifted them, and he saw it. A low black shape was cutting their way. He frowned, shading his eyes. But submarines didn’t transit on the surface. Not in this century. And it didn’t seem as large as it ought to be. Also, the shape was wrong—
“It’s a hunter,” he said. “One of ours. I think.”
The autonomous semisubmersible glided silently on. Its course would lead it past, he saw, not directly to them. But there was a bare possibility.…
The others saw this too. Bending, they began prying and scooping at the sea with the plastic oars, with bare hands. The raft spun under their uncoordinated efforts, then straightened as they dug in together. It didn’t exactly speed over the waves, but they were making way. Dan paddled as hard as he could, aiming by seaman’s eye for a point where they might intercept the hunter. Assuming the thing didn’t change course. Which, since it was probably headed back to a preset rendezvous, didn’t seem likely.
They paddled like demons, until their lungs burned and their hands bled. The slanted side of the conning tower, or whatever you called it on a robot vehicle, barely broke the water. The deck itself was awash. The prow peeled up only the slightest wave, though it had to be doing six or seven knots. He couldn’t remember what powered these semisubmersibles, fuel cells or batteries, but it was absolutely silent.
“We’re only gonna have one shot at this,” he panted. “Hwang, grab that line. Make it up in a bowline.”
“A bow—?”
“In a loop. A circle.” He eyed the swiftly nearing craft, searching for protrusions. Hitting at any speed, it would just bounce the inflatable aside. Their only chance was to lasso some mooring point or sensor stub, then scramble aboard as the raft was towed along. Once on board, they could probably find some way to get below. The things must have accesses for repair and rearming, and surely there was some way to steer them from inside. This could be their ticket home.
If they could get aboard … “Harder,” he gasped, paddling with all he could muster. “Almost there.”
Hwang held up a loop of line. “I see a place to put it.”
A vertical jut, halfway back from the bow. Either a sonar receiver or some sort of digital transmission head. “Go for it, Min Su. But don’t miss.”
Beside him, paddling with one hand, Wilker groaned encouragement.
They covered the last yards with a rush, and now he could hear it, a low hum as the thing powered through the water. A rotating optical sensor atop the pyramidal black fin stopped revolving, swung back, and locked on them.
“Stop,” Dan shouted, knowing it was probably silly, that the thing wouldn’t respond to voice commands. But he couldn’t help it. The others cried out too, waving, shouting.
The unwinking eye of the optical seeker tracked them. He felt a thrill of hope. It had noticed. Whatever intelligence guided it had registered their existence. It would have to take action of some kind. It couldn’t just pass them by.
The oculus stayed on them, even as the black craft neared. Suddenly a chill ran up his spine. Something about its unwavering yet passionless gaze implied both recognition, and an inhuman, pitiless dismissal.…
“What the fuck,” Dan breathed. “No.”
The black silhouette was altering.
The stern swung toward them. The chuckle of water increased. It was speeding up, too.
“Avoidance subroutine,” Wilker croaked though his shattered mouth.
In a few minutes it was a speck, shrinking away.
* * *
SINCE then they’d drifted with the wind. Searching the sky for aircraft, seeing only the distant traceries of high contrails. But none swerved their way. They squinted into the reflected glare until their eyes teared and dazzle played inside their skulls. But never saw a ship.
It was strange no one had vectored a search-and-rescue helo to the crash site. Well, maybe they had more pressing issues.
Now Dan pried crusted, sticky lids open once again, peering at a bank of clouds. The raft jostled uneasily. Thank God they hadn’t had to ride this thing, patched and overloaded as it was, through any storms. So far, anyway. That would finish them for sure.
Instead they would die slowly from dehydration. There’d been only two cans of emergency water in the raft, and the desalinization kit hadn’t worked beyond a drop or two.
The gull was back, circling lower, evaluating him with head cocked. Hoping to feast on his eyes, no doubt. Hadn’t someone in another life raft, another castaway, caught a curious gull, wrung its head off, drunk its blood? He half closed his lids and lay totally still, hand concealed but ready to grab. But the bird just kept circling, and uttering its harsh reproachful cries. Actually, he could understand what it was saying now. It was quite plain. “Die. Die.”
“Yeah, soon enough,” he muttered through cracked lips. Squinting between salt-swollen lids, he examined a paler patch of sky.
Then hoisted himself, shading his stinging eyes.
A white sky. Which often signaled surf ahead.
He shook the others back into consciousness. They stirred, murmuring, groaning. Then stilled as he pointed to the east.
Over the next hour, as the steady wind scudded them, it came into view. A low island, maybe half a mile long. Ringed by white surf as long swells built, toppled, and broke. They watched silently as a dark mass pushed up out of the sea, becoming beach, palms. Eventually they could make out individual trees.
Dan reached over the side to scoop up water. He grunted as the salt seared into scabbed eyes, burned skin, bleeding lips.
There would be coral under that surf. Sharp-toothed, razor-edged reefs. A hundred to one the raft would capsize going through those breakers, and they’d be torn into sharkbait. Who knew what island this was, or who held it. The three men stared hungrily. None of them spoke.
Shuddering as the surf-line crept nearer, they gripped one another’s hands.
The voyages of USS Savo Island and Task Force 76, and the story of the war with China, will continue in David Poyer’s Deep War.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
EX nihilo nihil fit. For this novel, I began with the advantage of notes accumulated for previous books about Navy and joint operations, as well as my own experiences at sea and in Central Asia and the Pacific. The following new sources were also helpful.
For details on Apra Harbor: Globalsecurity.org and Tim Gorman of Joint Region Marianas. Procedures for exiting dry dock: Interview with John Vitzthum, Naval Engineers Journal, Sept. 2015.
For Marine Corps passages: Specs on M240 are from DM 3-22-68 (italicized material is quotes) and “M240B Machine Gun,” USMC website. Mike Pasquini of the Crimson Lion in Wilkes-Barre read the hookah scene. Ramos’s equipment description began with “The Modern Warrior’s Combat Load: Dismounted Operations in Afghanistan April–May 2003,” Task Force Devil, Coalition Task Force 82, Coalition Joint Task Force 180, US Army Center for Lessons Learned, combined with USMC input. Info on Itbayat coastline from Pub. 162, Sailing Directions (Enroute) Philippine Islands, National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, 2010. USMC structure: MCRP 5-12D, Organization of Marine Corps Forces. These chap
ters were read and commented on by Katie Davis and Peter Gibbons-Neff; many thanks to them and to Drew Davis for introducing us.
About China’s “lost territories”: Barbara Tuchman, Stilwell and the American Experience in China 1911–1945, (New York: Macmillan, 1971), p. 250.
My portrayal of the fictional USS Hornet was aided by bull sessions with crew and officers aboard USS Wasp (LHD-1), with subsequent availability for specific questions as they arose. Interlocutors included William Tonacchio, Dane Lathroum, Kurt Kastner, Toy Andrews, Mack Nolen, Joe Towles, Andy Smith, and Todd Lewis. A deep bow to all for unfailing hospitality!
Discussion of Expeditionary Strike Group makeup: Michael Moran, Modern Military Forces Structures, Council on Foreign Relations, 2006.
USAF Rapid Capabilities Office: Lara Seligman et al., “As Industry Awaits Bomber Contract, New Details Emerge,” Defense News, Sept. 5, 2015.
The following sources were valuable as background for tactics, mind-sets, and strategic decisions:
James D. Hornfischer, Neptune’s Inferno: The U.S. Navy at Guadalcanal, (New York: Bantam Books, 2012).
Lisle A. Rose, The Ship That Held the Line, (Annapolis: Naval Insitute Press, 1995).
Joseph H. Alexander, Storm Landings: Epic Amphibious Battles in the Central Pacific (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1997).
Wayne P. Hughes, Fleet Tactics: Theory and Practice (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1986).
Contending with China issue, Armed Forces Journal, Apr. 2008.
Joint Operation Planning, Joint Publication 5-0, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2011.
David Sears, The Last Epic Naval Battle: Voices from Leyte Gulf (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2005).
Dale C. Reilage, “The Imperative to Engage,” US Naval Institute Proceedings, Apr. 2015.
Hunter Stiles, “1941 Asiatic Fleet Offers Strategic Lessons,” US Naval Institute Proceedings, Aug. 2016.
The Future Surface Fleet issue, Naval Institute Proceedings, Jan. 2014.
David C. Gompert et al., “War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable” (Santa Monica: RAND, 2016).
For autonomous ships: IHS Engineering 360’s “Unmanned Anti-Submarine Vessel Ready to Set Sail,” Feb. 29, 2016.
The discussion of deterrence is from Joint Publication 3-12, “Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations” (unclassified).
The discussion of BMD was backgrounded by Jonathan Masters, “Your Pocket Guide to How U.S. Missile Defense Works,” Council on Foreign Relations, Aug. 18, 2014. The discussion of the ground-based deterrent is from Robert Spalding and Adam Lowther, “Rethinking the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent,” Breaking Defense, Dec. 29, 2014; also, Amy F. Woolf, U.S. Strategic Nuclear Forces: Background, Developments, and Issues, Congressional Research Service, March 10, 2016. Also, from an unpublished thesis I did at George Washington University. On the DF-41: “DF-41 (CSS-X-10),” George C. Marshall and Claremont Institutes, Missile Threat, Mar. 22, 2016.
For Chinese empoyment of hackers: Katie Williams, “Chinese National Pleads Guilty to DOD Hacking Conspiracy,” The Hill, Mar. 23, 2016.
For the Army point of view on joint operations: Dennis Steele, “The Hooah Guide to Pacific Land Power,” Army Magazine, Apr. 2013. Also Nicholson and Trevithick, “The Army’s New Role in the Pacific Pivot,” Naval Institute Proceedings, Oct. 2015.
For Oberg’s story, sources about Uighur resistance included Igor Rotar, “The Growing Problem of Uighur Separatism,” China Brief, vol. 4, issue 8, Jamestown Foundation, accessed Nov. 23, 2015. Also Matthew Oresman and Daniel Steingart, “Radical Islamization in Xinjiang—Lessons from Chechnya?” CACI Analyst, July 30, 2003.
For background on helicopter crashes and survival thereof: Mike Hixenbaugh, “Training Gives Helicopter Crews a Shot at Survival,” Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, Aug. 11, 2014. Also NATO RTO AG-341, “Specification d’un respirateur de sauvetage pour aeronefs a voilure fixe et a voilure tournante en mission de survol maritime,” May 2001. For trauma procedures: Dr. Frances Anagnost Williams. For Battle of Lake Erie: “We Have Met the Enemy,” Shipmate, May–June 2012.
For overall help, recognition is due to Charle Ricci and Stacia Childers of the Eastern Shore Public Library; Matthew Stroup and Corey Barker of the Navy Office of Information, East; Mike Hatfield of Expeditionary Strike Group Three; and James DiAngio, Commander, Naval Surface Forces Atlantic. Deep bows to Mark “Dusty” Durstewitz, James W. Neuman, Bill Doughty, John T. Fusselman, and others (they know who they are), both retired and still on active duty, who put in many hours adding additional perspective. If I inadvertently left anyone out who wanted to be named, apologies!
Let me reemphasize that these sources were consulted for the purposes of fiction. The specifics of personalities, tactics, units, and locales are employed as the materials of story, not reportage. Some details have been altered to protect classified capabilities and procedures.
My deepest gratitude goes to George Witte, editor and friend of over three decades, without whom this series would not exist. And Sally Richardson, Ken Silver, Sara Thwaite, Young Jin Lim, Adam Goldberger, Naia Poyer, and Anya Lichtenstein at St. Martin’s/Macmillan. And finally to Lenore Hart, kindest critic, best friend, anchor on lee shores, and my North Star when skies are clear.
As always, all errors and deficiencies are my own.
PREVIOUS BOOKS BY DAVID POYER
Tales of the Modern Navy
Onslaught
Tipping Point
The Cruiser
The Towers
The Crisis
The Weapon
Korea Strait
The Threat
The Command
Black Storm
China Sea
Tomahawk
The Passage
The Circle
The Gulf
The Med
Tiller Galloway
Down to a Sunless Sea
Louisiana Blue
Bahamas Blue
Hatteras Blue
The Civil War at Sea
That Anvil of Our Souls
A Country of Our Own
Fire on the Waters
Hemlock County
Thunder on the Mountain
As the Wolf Loves Winter
Winter in the Heart
The Dead of Winter
Other Books
On War and Politics (with Arnold L. Punaro)
The Whiteness of the Whale
Happier Than This Day and Time
Ghosting
The Return of Philo T. McGiffin
The Only Thing to Fear
Stepfather Bank
Star Seed
The Shiloh Project
White Continen
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DAVID POYER’s sea career included service in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, Caribbean, Pacific, Middle East, and the Pentagon. Hunter Killer is the seventeenth in his widely popular series featuring Captain Dan Lenson. Poyer’s work has been required reading in the Literature of the Sea course at the U.S. Naval Academy, along with that of Joseph Conrad and Herman Melville. He teaches at Wilkes University, and lives on the Eastern Shore of Virginia.
Visit www.poyer.com, or sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Epigraph
I. War
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
II. The Hunt
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
&nb
sp; Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
III. The Whetting of the Sword
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
IV. Operation Recoil
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
The Afterimage
Acknowledgments
Previous Books by David Poyer
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
HUNTER KILLER. Copyright © 2017 by David Poyer. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Young Jin Lim
Cover illustration by Steve Gardner/Pixelworks Studios, Inc
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-09795-8 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-09796-5 (ebook)
e-ISBN 9781250097965
Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at [email protected].
First Edition: November 2017
