Ghosts of Bungo Suido (2013)

by Deutermann, P. T

  Gar sat back in his chair. “Yes, sir,” I said. “I understand that. But Bungo Suido—”

  Nimitz held up his hand. “Bungo Suido is a technical problem, Captain,” he said. “If you truly think it’s beyond your capabilities, I will get someone else. There is no lack of submariners waiting for command, as I’m sure you know. That would, however, be quite disruptive a day before your scheduled departure.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You have a fine boat and crew, and you personally have done very well in damaging the Japanese war effort. But above and beyond that, you need to understand that there are forces at work in this war that dwarf the Dragonfish and all its efforts. You may, in time, understand what I’m talking about, if you survive this mission. But for now, this is all I’m going to tell you: Your orders are not the result of whimsy.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I want you to sail tomorrow morning. Take the Japanese Hashimoto with you. He will get you through Bungo Suido and, more importantly, to your objective. What happens after that will be up to you and your crew. Am I making myself clear, Captain?”

  Gar knew when he’d been outmatched. “We’ll do our best, Admiral.”

  “We’re counting on that, Captain. More than you could ever imagine.” He paused for a moment and gave Gar another dose of that icy stare. “Do not ever challenge me again, young man.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  Gar became aware that Admiral Lockwood and Captain Forrester were watching from across the dining room. Everyone else in the dining room had sat back down and was pretending not to watch. Nimitz stood up, wished Gar good luck, and then left to rejoin Admiral Lockwood, who gave Gar a wry smile and a sympathetic shake of his head over his shoulder as he followed his boss out of the hotel.

  Well, I showed him, didn’t I, Gar thought as he tried to avoid the puzzled looks from the rest of the diners. Six yes-sirs and an aye-aye. He took some small comfort in the fact that he wasn’t the first naval officer to be steamrollered by Chester W. Nimitz. The Japs didn’t stand a chance.

  We don’t, either, he thought.

  His coffee had gone cold, much like the pit in his stomach. He wondered if Sharon DeVeers would have been impressed.

  Probably not, he thought, but then she’d just order another Scotch and make bogeymen like Chester Nimitz go away. He saw the waiter and raised a finger for a refill. As the waiter approached, he changed his mind. Recalling the previous evening, he decided to at least pretend he was still in control of his fate, but as he remembered the image of Sharon poised above him on the bed he had to smile. His life was becoming one interesting ride after another.

  SEVEN

  The northern Philippine Sea

  Gar studied the sharp, bare pinnacle of granite shimmering in his periscope. “Lot’s Wife, bearing two niner five,” he reported. “Down scope.”

  “That’s a pretty good match with our estimated position, Captain. A range would help.”

  Gar told the exec he could calibrate the surface-search radar on Lot’s Wife, a 300-foot-high volcanic crag sticking up out of the ocean, using the attack periscope. They knew its precise height above the sea, and thus could focus the radar’s range gate using the periscope’s stadimeter. The pinnacle’s Japanese name was Sofu Gan, and it lay 400 miles south of Tokyo, at the very northern extremes of the Philippine Sea. American subs entering empire patrol areas always used it as a navigational reference point, as did, apparently, Japanese warships headed south into their ever-shrinking Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. Or at least they used to, before SubPac saturated the area with submarines. “When finished, make your depth two hundred fifty feet, then put us on a course to our rendezvous point at five knots. We’ll surface after dark to get back on planned track.”

  “Three three five looks good.”

  “Okay. I want all department heads in the wardroom once you’re confident in the track. We’ll need the Bungo Suido charts and Hashimoto-san’s chart.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  Gar went down the ladder into the control room and then forward to his cabin. It was two hours until full dark. They were twelve hours behind their projected track due to some bad weather out of Guam. Gar wanted to make up some of that time to avoid spending an entire day submerged at the entrance to Bungo Suido. He planned to surface an hour after dark if the area was clear and run on the diesels toward their objective.

  He flopped down on his rack, automatically checked the course and depth indicators by his feet, and then closed his eyes. So far, so good. They’d left Pearl on time with everyone on board, including the elderly Japanese gentleman. That novelty had made for some interesting reactions among the crew, but the exec had done a good job of prebriefing everybody, emphasizing that Hashimoto-san hated the Japanese military for seizing his livelihood and drawing Japan into a war with the Americans. Lieutenant Commander Tanaka had come down to the pier to say good-bye to the old man. Standing there in his navy uniform, he’d lent some credence to what the exec had been telling them. He’d brought a departure gift for the old man, a cylindrical box wrapped tightly in tissue paper. Hashimoto-san was berthed in the chiefs’ quarters, and, after three weeks of transit across the North Pacific, he seemed to have been accepted pretty well by the denizens of the goat locker.

  He’d proved his worth when No. 2 main engine tripped off the line. The motor mechs had been climbing over the Fairbanks Morse engine, trying to find the problem, when Hashimoto-san showed up. He’d watched the snipes for a few minutes and then, with a combination of Hawaiian pidgin and sign language, asked if they needed help. It turned out that the old man was a wizard with diesel engines, and in no time flat he was tearing into the fuel pump assembly, finally identifying a broken linkage as the root of the problem. After that, he was welcomed in both engine rooms and kept himself busy tweaking and peaking all sorts of machinery. He’d taught the boat’s mechanics some lessons about the Japanese way with machinery, which took “fastidious” to extreme limits. Every nut, washer, bolt, and gasket—anything that came out of or off a machine—was carefully cleaned, oiled, measured, and then reinstalled with a calibrated torque wrench, as opposed to the old-navy “give it a two-fart twist and send it home” technique. Some of the pumps ran so smoothly once Hashimoto-san got hold of them that the chief engineer had to put his hand on them to make sure they were running.

  Dragonfish had been escorted all the way to Guam by a destroyer, which allowed them to run on the surface the entire time except for daily training dives. The threat from Pearl to Guam hadn’t been Japanese but trigger-happy American planes, which tended to bomb any submarine on the surface and then ask questions later. One army air force B-29 had made a low pass two days out from Guam, but they’d been mostly rubbernecking. The tin can had fired off some flares as the lumbering bomber approached, just in case. They’d also got some valuable training with their captive destroyer, making submerged approaches from all angles. The destroyer’s sonarmen had kept themselves up to date by using Dragonfish for some sonar training in return. They’d refueled in Guam, detached their escort, and headed for empire waters, a mere 1,600 miles distant.

  Gar had opened the sealed orders pouch upon departure from Guam as instructed. Inside he found three things: another sealed envelope; a two-page operations order, signed by Admiral Rennsalear, the deputy chief of staff for operations at the Pacific Fleet headquarters; and a single black-and-white picture of the mysterious supercarrier. Unlike many operations orders, this one was quite succinct:

  Open the second envelope once inside the Inland Sea, but not before. Otherwise, Dragonfish is to penetrate the straits of Bungo Suido, proceed submerged to the vicinity of the Kure Arsenal, and attack an unnamed aircraft carrier. Attack no other shipping en route to or once within the Inland Sea. Your sole objective is the aircraft carrier, either fitting out at the Kure naval arsenal, or wherever encountered. Upon completion of the attack, escape back to sea and report, but otherwise, maintain radio silence
until clear of the Inland Sea.

  Then one interesting technical note: Set torpedo running depth for 10 feet when attacking this carrier.

  That made no sense at all to Gar. An aircraft carrier drew between 30 and 40 feet of water. If he’d ever encountered the Wounded Bear, IJN Shokaku, he’d have set his fish for 25 feet running depth. Ten feet? Somebody knew more than he was telling about this mysterious ship.

  The picture wasn’t particularly good as a recognition photo because it was an overhead shot. Fine for dive-bombers, but their view of this ship, assuming they found her, would be from about a foot above the water. The good news was that if they succeeded in bagging this big guy, they’d accomplish in one attack a tonnage score to equal even the most famous of the PacFleet sub skippers.

  Big if, though.

  The sole attachment to the operations order, besides the picture, was a map of the known minefields in the Inland Sea approaches, with the clear inference that there were probably unknown minefields.

  That was it. No mention of the old man, although Gar had had his orders on that score from Nimitz himself. The second envelope looked like nothing more than a letter, but it was heavily taped and labeled For Commanding Officer’s Eyes Only, upon arrival inside the Inland Sea.

  He sighed and looked at his watch again. They were supposed to rendezvous later tonight with the Archer-fish, through whose patrol area they were going to transit. The skipper of that boat, a seasoned veteran named Joe Enright, would brief them on what they’d been seeing in the op area and give them any recent information on Jap patrols, radar usage, and aircraft surveillance. Archer-fish would have already made an intrusion into the approaches to Bungo Suido to confirm water and sonar conditions so that Dragonfish could optimize the setup of her new sonar before they got there. While they were surfaced for the Archer-fish join-up, Gar’s guys would be rigging the defensive cables that would shoulder away any mine mooring chains they happened to scrape up against. Gar made a mental note to remind the XO to get evening stars; an accurate fix was vital for a submarine rendezvous.

  He’d met several times with his tactical team after reading the sealed orders. Everyone was interested in the carrier, and Gar had even expected some amplifying information from SubPac while they’d been making the transit. They’d heard nothing. In fact, there had not been a single message addressed to Dragonfish since they’d left. This whole patrol was one big mystery, Gar decided. Or they’d already been written off.

  He’d also spent a lot of time with the exec and Hashimoto-san, whose English was better than he had first let on. They worked on making a composite of the U.S. Navy charts for Bungo Suido and the Inland Sea and the old man’s personal charts. Everything on his charts was annotated in kanji characters, and they’d labored mightily to translate depth and obstruction marks into characters that both of them could recognize. Hashimoto-san had, of course, no knowledge of minefields, but he did show them interesting hydrographic features that would make the placement of mines almost impossible. They’d slowly managed to develop a plan of attack for the penetration of Bungo Suido, and that was going to be the subject of the department head meeting this evening.

  ComSubPac Headquarters, Pearl Harbor

  “And, last but hardly least,” Captain Forrester said, “Guam reports Dragonfish has departed for empire waters. No mechanical problems, traded in one sick fish, one emergency leave case, but otherwise she’s off to the races.”

  “The original reluctant dragon,” Admiral Lockwood said, and Forrester grunted his agreement.

  “That night Chester Nimitz went down to ‘share his thinking’ with Gar Hammond, I would have given a lot to hear what he said.”

  “I’ll bet it didn’t take very long,” Forrester said.

  Lockwood smiled. “A half-dozen yes-sirs is what it looked like. Maybe ninety seconds. Everybody in the dining room pretending not to notice. Wonderful.”

  “Hammond has his moments,” Forrester said. “And a disrespectful tongue, too.”

  “The real killers are that way, Mike. He’s never been married, been at sea for almost his entire career, and goes for the throat when he finds Japs. It’s just too bad he didn’t come to our attention until now.”

  “If a guy like that had been out there in ’42, he probably wouldn’t still be with us,” Forrester said. “Mush Morton, Sam Dealey, they were hotshots, too, but they never gave me the impression that they were out of control like Hammond sometimes does.”

  “And where are they, now, Mike, hmm?” Lockwood asked, knowing all too well the answer. “I wouldn’t want Gar Hammond for a staff officer, but for this harebrained mission, he’s perfect.”

  “He asked me why we didn’t just go in and bomb the damned carrier, especially if she’s still in dry dock. I deflected him, but it seemed like a reasonable question.”

  “Nimitz has his reasons, and, as I witnessed personally, one does not go asking Himself to explain why he wants something done. Anything else? I need a drink.”

  “No, sir, other than to remind you that we won’t hear from Dragonfish until she gets in and back out of the Inland Sea.”

  “If she gets back,” Lockwood said.

  “Don’t go jinxing it, now, Admiral. They’ll get back.”

  * * *

  The rendezvous with Archer-fish was scheduled for 0130, and Dragonfish, courtesy of an 1830 four-line star fix, was in position at the appointed time. Gar took a long look around with the night scope. They were lying surfaced and motionless in a flat, calm sea on what appeared to be a clear, starlit night. He’d kept her at what they called radar depth, the boat’s decks awash in order to make as small a radar target as possible should any Jap planes be patrolling. Gar had their own radars in standby, and he was hesitant to put either one into radiate. They were a good 60 miles from the Japanese coast, but a radar signal could be intercepted farther than the radar itself could see. There was no one topside in case an emergency dive had to be made, and they were back to running on the battery, in deference to any prowling Jap subs.

  “Like two scorpions looking for each other in the dark,” he muttered, continuing to train the periscope in a slow, continuous circle.

  “Especially if one of ’em is a Jap I-boat,” the exec said. “Who makes the first move?”

  “We’re the ones passing through Archer-fish’s patrol area,” Gar said. “We came to the rendezvous point on the surface and on the diesels, and then we went quiet. If he was anywhere around, he’d have heard us on the diesels, and should be looking at us right now.”

  “Asking the same questions we’re asking?”

  “Yeah, probably. Radar, put the SJ on short time constant, radiate for one revolution.”

  “Radar, aye,” said the operator at the other end of the conning tower. “One rev, STC on. Stand by.”

  They waited.

  “One contact, very small, one five zero at two thousand yards.”

  Should be him, Gar thought, as he spun the periscope to 150. He couldn’t see anything, so he keyed the signal light embedded in the periscope head three times in accordance with this day’s recognition code sheet. If the radar had caught Archer-fish’s shears or periscope, he should answer with two flashes.

  “Got him,” Gar announced. “What’s the second signal?”

  “The letter Dog. Then the letter Tare. He should answer with the letter Fox.”

  Gar keyed the light: long, short, short. Pause. One long. DT.

  The reply was immediate: two short, one long, one short. F. This should be Archer-fish. Since he had initiated the light sequence, Gar now spelled out a course and speed to Archer-fish and ordered Control to trim the boat up to the normal surfaced depth.

  “Station the bridge watch,” he ordered. “Four lookouts. Come to course three three zero, switch to main engines, speed ten.” He turned to Russ. “XO, stay on the scope. Once he gets alongside we’ll need a light-line party forward to get a sound-powered phone circuit up. Do a one-sweep air-search radar trans
mission every six minutes, and a ten-mile surface search sweep every other ten minutes.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” the exec said and handed Gar his jacket and binoculars. It was November in the North Pacific, and the tropical heat of the Luzon Strait was a distant memory.

  Fifteen minutes later the two subs were running alongside each other at a distance of 75 feet, and Gar was on the sound-powered bridge-to-bridge phone line with Commander Enright.

  “How’s the hunting?” he asked.

  “Not worth a shit,” Enright said. “We’ve been out here a month, had a couple of scares, but zero worthwhile targets. Where you guys going that you need my BT logs?”

  “Big secret,” Gar said. “But I’ll give you a hint: From here it’s three four zero.”

  “You do that, you’ll run right into the minefields at Bungo Suido.”

  “Fancy that,” Gar said.

  “You out of your gourd?” Enright asked.

  “Somebody is,” Gar said. “From our perspective, though, it looks a lot like a direct order.”

  “The Inland Sea? Can’t be done, Gar. Hell, from twenty miles out you’re looking at pretty much constant air cover, and when they take somebody through, we’ve seen as many as a dozen escorts.”

  “So there is a channel through the minefields?”

  “Must be,” Enright said. “Their big ships come through there from time to time. But where the channel is, where it starts, and how far offshore? Only the Japs know that. You got one of those new FM sonars?”

  Gar told him about the upgraded mine-hunting sonar. Enright said he hoped it worked.

  “Do you have some BT logs for me?” Gar asked.

  “That’s affirm. Last thirty days, inshore waters, or as close as we could get without somebody jumping our asses. Water’s getting colder, layer’s getting thicker, but there won’t be any layers in Bungo Suido—the tides are too big and the currents too fast.”

  “That’s what we were told, too. You need any spare parts?”