USS
INDEPENDENCE
Toland stood in the Combat Information Center, watching the displays. Submarines concerned him the most. Eight allied subs were in the Denmark Strait, west of Iceland, forming a barrier that few submarines would be able to pass. They were supported by Navy Orions operating out of Sondrestrom, Greenland, something impossible until the Russian fighters at Keflavik had been whittled down. That closed off one possible avenue of access to Strike Fleet Atlantic. More submarines formed a line parallel to the fleet’s line of advance, and those were supported by the carrier-borne S-3A Vikings that operated continuously off the flight decks.
The Pentagon had leaked to the press that this Marine division was en route to Germany, where the battle hung in the balance. In fact, the tight formation of amphibs was twenty miles from his carrier on a course of zero-three-nine, four hundred miles from its real objective.
USS
REUBEN JAMES
“We’re not heading north any longer,” Calloway said. Dinner was being served in the wardroom. The officers were plowing through the last fresh lettuce aboard.
“I believe you’re right,” O’Malley agreed. “I think we’re heading west now.”
“You might as well tell me what the devil we’re up to. I’ve been shut off from your satellite transmitters.”
“We’re screening the
Nimitz
battle group, except that when you’re motoring along at twenty-five knots, it’s not all that easy.” O’Malley didn’t like this. They were running a risk. It was part of war, but the pilot didn’t like any part of war. Especially risks.
They pay me to do it, not to like it.
“The escort is mostly British, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, so?”
“That’s a story I can use to tell the people at home how important—”
“Look, Mr. Calloway, let’s say you file your story, and it got published in the local papers. Then let’s say a Soviet agent reads the story and passes it along to—”
“How would he do that? The government has undoubtedly put severe restrictions on all forms of communication.”
“Ivan has lots of communications satellites, same as us. We have two satellite transmitters on this dinky little frigate. You’ve seen ’em. How expensive do they look? Think maybe you could have one in your backyard, inside a bush maybe? Besides, the whole group is blacked out. Total EMCON. Nobody is transmitting anything at the moment.”
Morris arrived and took his seat at the head of the table.
“Captain, where are we going?” Calloway asked.
“I just found out. Sorry I can’t tell you.
Battleaxe
and we will continue to work together for a while as stem guard for the
Nimitz
group. We are now designated ‘Mike Force.’ ”
“We getting any more help?” O’Malley asked.
“Bunker Hill
is heading this way. She had to reload her magazines and join up with HMS
Illustrious.
They’ll operate in close when they catch up. We’re going to outside picket again. We start doing real ASW work in another four hours. Still going to be a bastard trying to keep up with the carrier, though.”
USS
CHICAGO
There were three contacts. All arrived within ten minutes. Two were ahead of
Chicago,
left and right of her bow. The third was on her port beam. Somehow, McCafferty realized, the Russians knew of the submarines they had killed. Probably some sort of radio buoy, he was sure. That meant all that his tactical successes had really accomplished was to draw more dangers in on the trio of American submarines.
“Conn, sonar. We have some sonobuoy signals at two-six-six. Count three buoys—four, make it four.”
More Bears?
McCafferty wondered.
A cooperative hunt?
“Skipper, you better come forward,” the sonar chief called.
“What’s happening?” The waterfall display screen was suddenly crowded.
“Sir, we have three lines on sonobuoys forming up right now. Gotta be at least three aircraft up there. This one’s fairly close, looks like it’ll extend aft of us, maybe right on our friends.”
McCafferty watched the new signal lines appear at the rate of one per minute. Each was a Russian sonobuoy, and the line marched east as two others grew on different azimuths.
“They’re trying to box us in, Chief.”
“Looks that way, sir.”
Every time we destroyed a Russian ship we gave them a location reference. They’ve confirmed our course and speed of advance many times over.
McCafferty had gotten his submarine back to the Svyataya Anna Trough. His path to the icepack was a hundred miles wide and three hundred fathoms deep. But how many Russian subs were there? The sonar crew continued to call off bearings to the submarine contacts while the captain watched the buoy lines extend.
“I think this is
Providence,
sir. She just increased speed—yeah, look at the noise now, she’s really increased speed. This buoy must be right near her. Still can’t find Boston, though.”
Bearing was constant to the two forward submarine contacts. He couldn’t develop a range figure unless he or they maneuvered. If he turned left, he’d then close on a third contact, which might not be a good idea. If he turned right, he’d run away from the submarine that might then close on
Providence.
If he did nothing, he’d accomplish nothing, but McCafferty didn’t know what to do.
“There’s another buoy, sir.” The new one was between the bearings of two existing contacts. They were trying to localize
Providence.
“There’s Boston. She’s—yeah, she’s running past a buoy.” A new contact line appeared suddenly bright where nothing had been before.
Todd just increased power and he’s going to allow himself to be picked up,
McCafferty thought.
Then he’ll dive deep to evade.
Look at it from the Russian side,
the captain told himself.
They don’t really know what they’re up against, do they? They probably figure they’re up against more than one, but how many more? They can’t know that. So they’ll want to flush the game before they shoot, just to see what’s here.
“Torpedo in the water, bearing one-nine-three!”
A Russian Bear had dropped on
Boston.
McCafferty watched the sonar display as Simms took his boat deep with the torpedo in pursuit. He’d change depth and make a few radical changes in course and speed, trying to evade the fish. The bright line of a noisemaker appeared, holding a constant bearing as
Boston
maneuvered further. The torpedo chased the noisemaker, running another three minutes before it ran out of fuel.
The screen was relatively clear again. The sonobuoy signals remained.
Boston
and
Providence
had reduced power and disappeared—but so had the Russian sub signals.
What are they doing? What is their plan?
the captain asked himself.
What submarines are out there?
Tangos, has to be Tangos. They cut their electric motors back, slowed to steerageway, and that’s why they disappeared off the scopes. Okay, they’re not coming in after us anymore. They stopped moving when the aircraft detected Providence and
Boston.
They’re coordinating with the Bears! That means they have to be at shallow depth, and their sonar performance is down because they’re close to the surface.
“Chief, assume that these two contacts you had were Tangos doing about ten knots. The figure of merit gives us a detection range of what?”
“These water conditions . . . ten to twelve miles. I’d be real careful using that number, sir.”
Three more sonobuoy lines began to appear north of Chicago. McCafferty went aft to see how they were plotted out. They assumed about a two-mile spacing on the sonobuoy lines, and that gave them range figures.
“Not being very subtle, are they?” the exec observed.
“Why bother when you don’t have to? Let’s see if we can pick our way through the buoys.”
“What are our friends doing?”
“They’d better be coming north, too. I don’t want to think about what other assets they have moving in on us. Let’s head right through here.”
The executive officer gave the orders.
Chicago
began to move forward again. Now they’d really find out if the rubber tiles on the hull absorbed sonar waves or not. The last bearings to the Russian submarines were plotted also. McCafferty knew that they too could be moving behind that wall of noise. When he detected them again it would be at perilously close range. They went deep. The submarine dove to a thousand feet and cruised toward the precise midpoint between a pair of pinging buoys.
Another torpedo appeared in the water aft, and McCafferty maneuvered quickly to evade, only to realize that it was aimed at someone else, or nothing at all. They listened to it run for several minutes, then fade out.
A perfect way to break a man’s concentration,
McCafferty thought, bringing his sub back to a northerly course.
Bearings to the sonobuoys changed as they got closer. They were almost exactly two miles apart, a mile on either beam, as
Chicago
went through the first line, crawling just above the bottom. They were set on a frequency that could be heard clearly through the
hull. Just like the movies,
the captain thought, as the crewmen not directly involved in navigating the boat looked up and outward at the hull as though it were being caressed by the noise. Some caress. The second line was three miles beyond the first.
Chicago
turned slightly left to head for another gap.
Speed was down to four knots now. Sonar called out a possible contact to the north that immediately faded away. Maybe a Tango, maybe nothing. It was plotted anyway, as the submarine took nearly an hour to reach the second line of pinging buoys.
“Torpedo in the water, port side!” sonar screamed out.
“Right full rudder, all ahead flank!”
Chicago’
s propeller thrashed at the water, creating a bonanza of noise for the Russian aircraft who’d dropped a fish on a possible contact. They ran for three minutes while waiting for additional data on the torpedo.
“Where’s the torpedo?”
“It’s pinging, sir—but it’s pinging the other way, bearing changing south, left to right, and weakening.”
“All ahead one-third, rudder amidships,” McCafferty ordered.
“Another one—torpedo in the water bearing zero-four-six.”
“Right full rudder, all ahead flank,” McCafferty ordered yet again. He turned to the exec. “You know what they just did? They dropped a fish to spook us into moving!
Damn!” Beautiful tactic, whoever you are. You know we can’t afford to ignore a torpedo.
“But how’d they know we were here?”
“Maybe they just guessed well, maybe they got a twitch. Then we gave ’em the contact.”
“Torpedo bearing zero-four-one. The torpedo is pinging at us, don’t know if it has us, sir. Captain, I got a new contact bearing zero-nine-five. Sounds like machinery noises—possible submarine.”
“Now what?” McCafferty whispered. He put the Russian torpedo on his stem and hugged the bottom. Sonar performance dropped to zero as
Chicago
accelerated past twenty knots. Their instruments could still hear the ultrasonic pings of the torpedo, however, and McCafferty maneuvered to keep the weapon behind him as it dove down after the American sub.
“Bring her up! Make your depth one hundred feet. Shoot off a noisemaker.”
“Full rise on the planes!” The diving officer ordered a short blow on the forward trim tanks to effect the maneuver. Along with the noisemaker, it created an enormous disturbance in the water. The torpedo raced in after it, missing below
Chicago.
A good maneuver, it was also a desperate one. The submarine rose quickly, her elastic hull popping as the pressure on the steel diminished. There was an enemy sub out there, and he now had all sorts of noise from
Chicago.
All McCafferty could do was run. He was confident that the other sub would chase after him with a homing torpedo circling below, but didn’t understand why the other sub was there at all. He slowed
Chicago
to five knots and turned as the torpedo ran out of fuel below him. Next problem: there was a Soviet submarine close by.
“He’s gotta know about where we are, skipper.”
“You got that one right, XO. Sonar, Conn, Yankee-search!” Both sides could use unusual tactics. “Fire-control party, stand by, this one’s going to be a snapshot.”
The powerful but seldom-used active sonar installed in Chicago’s bow blasted the water with low-frequency energy.
“Contact, bearing zero-eight-six, range four six hundred!”
“Set it up!”
Chicago’s
steel hull reverberated three seconds later with Soviet sonar waves.
“Set! Ready for tubes three and two.”
“Match bearings and shoot!” The torpedoes were fired within seconds of one another. “Cut the wires. Take her down! Make your depth one thousand feet, all ahead flank, left full rudder, come to new course two-six-five!” The submarine wheeled and sped west as her torpedoes raced toward their target.
“Transients—torpedoes in the water aft, bearing zero-eight-five.”
“Patience,” McCafferty said.
You didn’t expect us to do that, did you?
“Nice job, fire-control! We got our shots off a minute faster than the other guy. Speed?”
“Twenty-four knots and increasing, sir,” the helmsman answered. “Passing four hundred feet, sir.”
“Sonar, how many fish we got chasing us?”
“At least three, sir. Sir, our units are pinging. I believe they have the target.”
“XO, in a few seconds we’re going to turn and change depth. When we do, I want you to fire off four noisemakers at fifteen-second intervals.”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
McCafferty went over to stand behind the helmsman. He’d just turned twenty the day before. The rudder indicator was amidships, with ten degrees of down angle on the planes, and the submarine was just passing through five hundred feet and hurtling down. The speed log now showed thirty knots. The rate of acceleration slowed as
Chicago
neared her maximum speed. He patted the boy on the shoulder.