Kirov Saga: Armageddon (Kirov Series) (24 page)

“Con. Sonar. Reporting undersea contact. Possible submarine
bearing 265, range approximately 22,000 meters; speed unknown.”

The sonic energy from those active pings had radiated out through
the deep sound channel in a distinct pattern, the sound waves overlapping until
they encountered that shadow in the sea. It had caused the slightest ripple in
the pattern, and the barest return of that energy that indicated there was
something more there than the empty ocean.

Captain James Donahue turned to his sonar man, Ensign Eugene
Campanella. “What’s up, Campy? Speed unknown? I can’t get a firing solution
with that.”

“Sorry sir,” said Campanella. “Give me a moment.”

“That’s about all I have to spare. Those pings are radiating our
way as well. If the Russians have good ears they just might hear something
too.”

The Captain did not think that likely yet, but he put a little
fire to the feet of his sonar man just the same. “Battle stations. Load tubes
one thru four,” he said quietly.

“Load tubes one through four,” came the echo from his XO
Lieutenant Commander Chambers. “The boat will come to battle stations, aye,
aye.”

“Rig for silent running.”

Silence was the order of the day now, and the Captain turned to
his communications station and raised a finger, waving it in a tiny circle to
indicate the desired action. Orders had been given to use ultra low frequency
sound to indicate he had achieved a possible contact and to signal all other
units close at hand with the approximate location. It was not something he
would have done if not for those orders.
Mississippi
liked to play the
game solo, as any submarine would.

Four minutes later a whisper came back.

“Captain…” Donahue went to the signal station, reading the
incoming message on screen. It showed the approximate coordinates of the suspected
contact as refined by the
Seahawks
, and asked for a concerted attack at
18:30 hours, five minutes away. Every asset in the region was going to put
torpedoes in the water to see what they could flush out. If anything got close,
the enemy might have to use countermeasures, which would surely give their exact
position away and allow a follow on attack to have a high probability of a
kill.

The Captain looked at his sonar man. “Give it to me, Campy. You’ve
got some help from those
Seahawks
now.”

Campanella bit his lip. “I make it eighteen knots, sir. Twenty at
best.”

“Run with it and get me a firing solution now.”

Computers would take that input, the suspected location and
bearing, and calculate the best initial heading for the torpedoes. He was going
to put two in the water, to join one from each
Seahawk
and two from each
Japanese submarine out there somewhere. They had just heard the music, and now
they were going to make the Russians dance. Eight torpedoes in the water,
reasonably well aimed, were going to be a real nightmare for Gromyko in about eighteen
minutes. That was the time it would take for the Mark 48 ADCAP torpedoes from
Mississippi
to cross the 22 kilometer gulf to the suspected target. Other weapons closer to
the target would get there first, but the Mark 48s were the best in the
business on the US side of the fence, and they would deliver the coup de grace.

One Japanese boat was closer, firing from a range of about 11,000
meters, and the helos were in that same radius as well. They would fire,
listen, and then move to the source of the contact before firing again. If these
assets were anywhere close to the mark with their shots, the Russians would
have to go defensive with countermeasures, and then the other torpedoes could
vector in for the kill. It was a good and well coordinated plan…

*
* *

“Con
, Sonar. I have torpedoes in the water! Two…three… no sir, many
more. It looks like eight separate contacts!”

“Eight? My God.” Gromyko was quickly at his sonar man’s side.

“I have two close contacts, most likely fired by the helicopters
that have been searching for us. One bearing 260, range 12,500 meters
approximate; another bearing 178 at about 9,500 meters. Those would be Mark 46
torpedoes, sir, and that first one is firing at maximum range.”

“The enemy is very eager today,” said Gromyko, seemingly
unconcerned. “What is the speed of those torpedoes?”

“I make it 40 knots, sir—that’s 74KPH.”

“I see they are in no hurry. This is a fishing expedition.”

“Then I have two more, medium range at 11,000 meters approximate
and bearing 315 degrees. They sound like Type 89s from the profile data match,
sir.”

“Then we have another Japanese submarine to our south on that
heading. Note it as Tokyo-One and place it on the tactical board, Mister Belanov.”

“Aye, sir. Designating Tokyo-One.”

“Four more contacts at longer range, Captain: two bearing 240, range
19,000 meters; two more bearing 272, range 18,000 meters.”

Gromyko nodded his head. “Type 89s, Chernov?”

“No sir, not all of them. I think the two fish bearing 272 are
Type 48s, sir. The others sound like Type 89s.”

“Then we have an American boat on the 272 heading, and another
Japanese boat on the 242 heading. Very interesting. Someone has convened a
meeting here today. Designate the second Japanese boat Tokyo-Two, and the
contact at 272 as
Orlan.”

“So designated, sir,” came Belanov’s deep voice. The
Starpom
was busy setting up the battle on the tactical Plexiglas screen.

“Very well,” said Gromyko. “Weapon’s officer.”

“Sir!”

“Ready on tubes five and six. Set weapons to manual control.”

That caused the barest moment of hesitation but the Weapon’s
Officer, Lieutenant Sergei Leonov, soon echoed the order, his eyes heavily on
the Captain now as everyone on the bridge waited.

“Eject ordnance in tubes five and six. Do
not
, engage
motors. Understood?”

“Aye sir. Firing now….Weapons free in the water. System on full
manual control. Motors not engaged.”

Kazan
had just ejected two big 650mm torpedoes, with no firing solution
plotted, and the weapons had been manually prevented from starting their
motors. Leonov was watching the Captain closely, now, waiting on his next order
and wondering what he was doing.

Gromyko had but one question on his mind, now: how good was the
enemy firing solution? What did they really know? We have been creeping along
but they obviously heard something, he thought, possibly that damn bad bearing
again, or this infernal maintenance procedure being run in the reactor room. I
just gave them another whisper with that weapons ejection. Now here we are with
no more than twenty knots available and a whole lot of trouble heading our way.
Time to dance.

“Helm, right full rudder. Come to 270 true,” he said calmly.

“Helm answering, right full rudder and coming around to 270
degrees west sir, aye.”

“Where is the thermocline boundary, Chernov?”

“About 160 meters, sir.”

“Helm, make your depth one-five-zero.”

Kazan
had been at 200 meters, and was now climbing slightly as they
turned, aiming to pierce the thermocline and alter the sonic conditions surrounding
the boat. The maneuver was also putting more vertical distance between the
submarine and the two heavy wire guided torpedoes it had just ejected, which
were now slowly sinking deeper into the sea, waiting for orders.

Volsky and Fedorov were still on the bridge, tensely watching the
situation, eyes on the Captain. Gromyko folded his arms, leaning Volsky’s way
as he spoke in a quiet voice.

“I turned to starboard to put as much room between the boat and
those last four torpedo contacts as possible. That is their endgame, those Mark
48’s off the American boat will have the best sonar for tracking us. Those are
their kill weapons, but they will have a very long ride before we have anything
to worry about. We’re moving west now at 20 knots. They are heading our way,
probably at 40 knots. That means their effective speed is only 20 knots, or
about 37KPH. It will take them at least thirty minutes to catch up with us, and
if I had full power on the reactors they would never catch up with us at all.”

“But what about all those other torpedoes?” said Volsky, obviously
worried. “They are much closer.”

“True, but I don’t think they had a good fix on our location. The
close in contacts are trying to flush us out of the bush. No doubt they heard those
torpedoes eject, and they should now be vectoring on our approximate firing
point. In a moment I will keep them running true to that location for a while.”

The Matador had swirled his cape and stepped to his right,
taunting his adversary, but the bull was charging, and its horns were very
sharp.

 “Listen to the closer contacts, Chernov,” Gromyko said quietly.
“Any bearing change?”

“No sir. They seem to be running true on their initial bearings”

“Good. Now let us keep them busy, shall we?”

The Captain was looking at his watch. “Time on target remaining for
the closest torpedo?”

“Sir, about six minutes thirty-five seconds.”

“Very well.” Gromyko waited, inclining his head to the Admiral.
“In a minute we start the wild goose chase, Admiral. Any idea how much more
time this procedure on the reactors will take?”

Volsky looked to Fedorov to answer that.

“There is no way to tell exactly,” said Fedorov. “Sometimes the
effects have been almost immediate, but other times it has taken many hours
before the displacement happened. Then again…we have never used this control
rod in a submarine reactor. The equipment is cooled by self-circulating water,
not by pumps. It sounds different, which has me worried somewhat. I hope Chief
Dobrynin can control the shift.”

“That’s an understatement,” said Gromyko, still looking at his
watch. “Weapon’s Control. Activate torpedo motors at lowest speed setting.
Guide them on a heading of 80 degrees. No active search—understood?”

“Aye, sir. Activating motors, steering zero-eight-zero with
passive sonar.”

Gromyko waited briefly before he turned to his sonar man again.
“Any heading change on the close in contacts?”

“Yes, sir! The Alpha One torpedo has turned to starboard. It is
tracking our torpedoes!”

“Excellent. Let our two big fish swim for a while. They will soon
realize what they are tracking and start looking elsewhere, but I think we may
have put them off our scent without having to resort to noisemakers.”

They waited as the seconds ticked off. The Mark 46 torpedo fired
from
Seahawk 2
was now no more than three minutes away. Then Chernov
looked the Captain’s way, a warning in his eyes.

“The Alpha One contact is starting to circle, Captain. It has
switched to active sonar.”

“Weapon’s Officer, ready on tube number nine please.”

“
Shkval
system active on tubes nine and ten, sir.”

The Matador was getting ready to swat the enemy lance aside with
another flourish of his cape as the bull made its first mad rush. But the
bullfight had only just begun.

Chapter 20

Kazan
was lavishly armed, with ten torpedo tubes,
five on either side of the boat. Two tubes held smaller 533mm torpedoes, six
housed the bigger 650mm fish that Gromyko had put in the water, and the last
two had been armed with the deadly high speed underwater rocket known as the
Shkval
,
the VA-111
Squall.
It was a supercavitating torpedo that was actually a
liquid fueled rocket that generated a gas bubble around it as it moved through
the water, allowing it to reach a dizzying speed of over 200 knots. The smaller
210kg warhead was designed to find and kill enemy torpedoes, and the weapon
could range out to 15,000 meters.

“Let me know the instant you believe that torpedo has found us,
Chernov.”

“It’s still searching, sir…Active sonar, but I don’t think it has
found us. They are circling near our firing position.”

In the time since
Kazan
turned, the boat had already moved
some 3000 meters on its new heading. The nearest enemy torpedo would soon be
that close when it reached the point where they turned, but still minutes away
as it circled, trying to find its elusive quarry on active sonar.

“Will it acquire us?” asked Volsky, sweat dotting his brow. He was
not accustomed to the more confined space of the submarine, or at all well
versed in undersea warfare. An enemy weapon that close was cause for alarm,
which is why Gromyko had the
Shkval
ready if necessary.

“Their sonar is looking for us, Admiral, but
Kazan
is a
very slippery fish too. Even at this speed we make no more sound than typical
ocean background noise. It might not acquire us at all. It’s those American
Mark 48s I’m more worried about. They have good passive sonar, and they are
listening to everything happening out there, and sending all that noise back
along their control wire to a very good sonar man. If he’s smart, he will
realize what we have just done, using those two big Type 65s to lure in the
weapons fired by their helicopters. They’ve seen through that ruse already, but
seeing is one thing—finding us is quite another. We still have some time, but I
wonder what is happening in the reactor room?”