by Tom Clancy
“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.”
&nb
sp; 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.
“Now. Ten degrees rise on the planes and come right twenty degrees rudder.”
“Yes, sir!”
The hull thundered with the news that their fish had found their target. Everyone jumped or cringed—they had their own problems chasing after them. Chicago’s maneuver left a massive knuckle in the water that the executive officer punctuated with four noisemakers. The small gas canisters filled the disturbance with bubbles that made excellent sonar targets while Chicago sped north. She raced right under a sonobuoy, but the Russians could not put another torpedo down for fear of interfering with those already running.
“Bearing is changing on all contacts, sir,” sonar reported.
McCafferty started to breathe again. “Ahead one-third.”
The helmsman dialed the annunciator handle. The engineers responded at once, and again Chicago slowed.
“We’ll try to disappear again. They probably aren’t sure yet who killed who. We’ll use that time to get back down to the bottom and crawl northeast. Well done, people, that was sorta hairy.”
The helmsman looked up. “Skipper, the south side of Chicago ain’t the baddest part of town anymore!”
Sure as hell is the tiredest, though, the captain thought. They can’t keep coming at us this way. They have to back off and rethink, don’t they? He had the chart memorized. Another hundred fifty miles to the icepack.
39
The Shores of Stykkisholmur
HUNZEN, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
They’d finally defeated the counterattack. No, Alekseyev told himself, we didn’t defeat it, we drove it off. The Germans had withdrawn of their own accord after blunting half of the Russian attack. There was more to victory than being in possession of the battlefield.
It only got harder. Beregovoy had been right when he’d said that coordinating a large battle on the move was much harder than doing it from a fixed command post. Just the effort of getting the right map opened inside a cramped command vehicle was a battle against time and space, and eighty kilometers of front made for too many tactical maps. The counterattack had forced the generals to move one of their precious A reserve formations north, just in time to watch the Germans withdraw after savaging the rear areas of three B motor-rifle divisions, and spreading panic throughout the thousands of reservists who were trying to cope with old equipment and barely remembered training.
“Why did they pull back?” Sergetov asked his general.
Alekseyev did not respond. There was a fine question that he had already asked half a dozen times. There were probably two reasons, he told himself. First, they’d lacked the strength to pursue the effort and had had to settle for a spoiling attack to unbalance our operation. Second, the central axis of our attack was on the verge of reaching the Weser, and they might have been called back to deal with this possible crisis. The Army group intelligence officer approached.
“Comrade General, we have a disturbing report from one of our reconnaissance aircraft.” The officer related the sketchy radio message from a low-flying recce aircraft. NATO’s control of the air had brought particularly grim losses to those all-important units. The pilot of this MiG-21 had seen and reported a massive column of allied armor on the E8 highway south of Osnabrück before disappearing. The General immediately lifted the radiophone to Stendal.
“Why were we not informed of this as soon as you received it?” Alekseyev demanded of his superior.
“It is an unconfirmed report,” CINC-West replied.
“Dammit, we know the Americans landed reinforcements at Le Havre!”
“And they can’t be at the front for at least another day. How soon will you have a bridgehead on the Weser?”
“We have units on the river now at Rühle—”
“Then move your bridging units there and get them across!”
“Comrade, my right flank is still in disarray, and now we have this report of a possible enemy division forming up there!”
“You worry about crossing the Weser and let me worry about this phantom division! That’s an order, Pavel Leonidovich!”
Alekseyev set the phone back in its place. He has a better overall picture of what’s going on, Pasha told himself. After we bridge the Weser, we have no really serious obstacle in front of us for over a hundred kilometers. After the river Weser, we can race into the Ruhr, Germany’s industrial heart. If we destroy that, or even threaten it, then perhaps the Germans will seek their political solution and the war is won. That is what he is telling me.
The General looked at his maps. Soon the lead regiment would try to force men across the river at Rühle. A bridging regiment was already en route. And he had his orders.
“Start moving the OMG troops.”
“But our right flank!” Beregovoy protested.
“Will have to look after itself.”
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM
SACEUR was still worried about his supplies. He’d also been forced to gamble in giving highest transport priority to the armored division now approaching Springe. The container ships loaded with munitions, spare parts, and the millions of other specialty items were just now sending their cargoes to the front. His largest reserve formation, the tank force, was about to team up with two German brigades, and what was left of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, once a brigade in all but name, now only two battalions of weary men.
His supply situation was still tenuous. Many of his line units were down to four days of consumable stores, and the resupply effort would take two days, even if things went perfectly: a thin margin that in a pre-war exercise might have seemed equitable enough, but not now, when men and nations were at stake. Yet what choice did he have?
“General, we have a report here of a regiment-sized attack on the Weser. It looks like Ivan’s trying to put troops on the left bank.”
“What do we have there?”
“One battalion of Landwehr, and they’re pretty beat up. There are two companies of tanks on the way, ought to be there in a little over an hour. There are preliminary indications that Soviet reinforcements are heading that way. This might be the main axis of their attack, at least it seems that they’re orienting in that direction.”
SACEUR rocked back in his chair, looking up at the map display. He had one reserve regiment within three hours of Rühle. The General was a man who loved to gamble. He was never happier than when sitting at a table with a deck of cards and a few hundred dollars’ worth of chips. He usually won. If he attacked south from Springe and failed . . . the Russians would put two or three divisions across the Weser, and he had precisely one regiment in reserve to stand in their way. If he moved his new tank division there, and by some miracle they got there in time, he would have frittered away his best chance for a counterattack by reacting to a Soviet move again. No, he couldn’t just react anymore. He pointed to Springe.
“How long before they’re ready to move?”
“The whole division—six hours at best. We can divert the units still on the road south to—”
“No.”
“Then we go south from Springe with what’s ready now?”
“No.” SACEUR shook his head and outlined his plan . . .
ICELAND
“I see one,” Garcia called. Edwards and Nichols were beside him in a moment.
“Hello, Ivan,” Nichols said quietly.
Even with binoculars, the distance was still a little over three miles. Edwards saw a tiny figure walking along the crest of the mountaintop. He carried a rifle and appeared to be wearing a soft hat—perhaps a beret—instead of a helmet. The figure stopped and brought his hands up to his face. He had binoculars, too, Edward
s saw. He looked north, slightly downward, training his field glasses left to right and back again. Then he turned and looked off in the direction of Keflavik.
Another man appeared, approaching the first. Perhaps they were talking, but it was impossible to tell at this distance. The one with binoculars pointed at something to the south.
“What do you suppose this is all about?” Edwards asked.
“Talking about the weather, girls, sports, food—who knows?” Nichols replied. “Another one!”
The third figure appeared, and the trio of Russian paratroopers stood together doing whatever it was that they were doing. One had to be an officer, Edwards decided. He said something, and the others moved off quickly, dropping out of sight below the crest. What order did you just give?
Presently a group of men appeared. The light was bad, and they shuffled around too much to get an accurate count, but there had to be at least ten. About half of them were carrying their personal weapons, and these started moving downhill. To the west.
“Right, he’s a smart soldier,” Nichols announced. “He’s sending out a patrol to make certain the area’s secure.”
“What do we do about it?” Edwards asked.
“What do you think, Leftenant?”
“Our orders are to sit tight. So we sit tight and hope they don’t see us.”
“Not likely they will, you know. I shouldn’t think they’d climb down—must be eight hundred feet—then cross that rock yard, then climb up here just to see if any Yanks are about. Remember, the only reason we know they’re there is that we saw their helicopter.”
Otherwise we might have walked right into them, and that would have been that, Edwards reminded himself. I won’t be safe until I’m back home in Maine. “Is that more of them?”
“Must be at least a platoon over there. That is rather clever of our friends, isn’t it?”
Edwards got on the radio to report this development to Doghouse while the Marines kept track of the Russians.
“A platoon?”