“So what’s the deal?” Tombstone asked, as he propped his feet up on his desk. “Is it time to save the world?”
“A small part of it, maybe,” his uncle said. He came over to Tombstone’s desk, and tossed a couple of photographic surveillance photos in front of him. “Take a gander at these.”
Tombstone studied them, pretending to puzzle out whatever it was he was supposed to notice. But in truth, he as well as his uncle depended on the enlisted intelligence staff who were experts at this sort of work. Interpreting satellite images was still more of an art than a science, and it took years of looking at seemingly random collections of light and dark before the brain started making sense of what the eyes reported.
Once he made the obligatory show of studying them, Tombstone held out his hand. “Okay, care. Where’s the report?”
His uncle handed him two sheets of paper.
Tombstone scanned them quickly, sparing a fleeting moment to appreciate the terse style in which they had been written. The terrain was just north of the Kurile Islands, and those specks of white on the infrared shots were troops. Lots of troops. Just off the coast were Russian landing vessels. The analyst concluded that there were at least two regiments and ships to carry them waiting to deploy to the Kuriles.
“The Russians making a grab for them, are they?” he asked.
His uncle nodded. “Yep. No indications from other sources yet, but we’ve got some feelers out.”
“Well, you got to have troops to hold land, that’s for sure. And it looks like they’ve got enough of them.”
“Take a look at the last paragraph again.”
Tombstone looked again. According to the analyst, there was no indication that there were antiair defenses in place, and no indication that they would be installed. He looked up at his uncle in amazement. “Pretty stupid. The Japanese are more than capable of taking them out.”
“The Japanese aren’t. We are.”
“What!?” Tombstones bolted upright in his chair.
His uncle stuck out his hand. “You heard me. Congratulations, you’re a plankowner.”
Tombstone clasped his uncle’s hand in both of his own. “We’re actually going to take them out?”
His uncle nodded. “The Pentagon figures that one good bombing run could disable all three ships and decimate about half of the ground troops. They’ll know who’s responsible, don’t doubt that. But they won’t be able to say a thing. Because just as we’re not going to be there, they’re not there right now. Everybody’s cover stories will fit together neatly.”
One bombing run — yes, that could do it. Tombstone studied the satellite photographs again, now that he knew what they represented, and saw it was entirely possible. Two antiship rounds, maybe three — the rest Rockeyes or some other antipersonnel weapon. He called up a picture of the region in his mind, and verified that there was one serious problem with the plan. “How am I supposed to get there?”
“The Aleutians. Your last stop will be Adak. You’ll refuel there, and then make one hell of a long-assed haul down to the Russian position. You’ll be met enroute by KC-135 tanking support.”
“Tanking from the Air Force? That’s going to compromise our mission, isn’t it?”
His uncle shook his head. “Son, there’s a hell of a lot you don’t know about the way the world works. The Air Force has been providing this sort of service for ages. They don’t ask, we don’t tell. After all, they get paid the same whether they’re refueling satellites or aircraft.”
Tombstone looked stunned. “Satellites? You’re kidding; they do that?”
His uncle’s face was dead serious. “Yes. Of course I’m kidding.” Then his face cracked into a broad smile and he laughed aloud again. “Don’t be silly, Tombstone. Refueling a satellite… come on, it was a joke.”
“I knew that.”
“Right. So. You up for this? Remember, I told you that you could refuse any mission you didn’t want to carry out.”
“Are you kidding?” Tombstone said. “Of course I’m up for it.”
“Remember, there are going to be risks,” his uncle said somberly. “For most of the transit, you’ll be a long way from land. You’re going to get the best aircraft that money can buy, but there’s always the unexpected. And it’s possible the Russians will move air defenses in place between now and then.”
“When is then?” Tombstone asked.
“Tomorrow. Unless you need more time.”
“Tomorrow! You’re not kidding when you say things move fast.” Tombstone shook his head admiringly, thinking of the things he could’ve done while on active duty if the Navy establishment had been so flexible. So much trouble could’ve been prevented, nipped in the bud, by a force capable of doing just what his uncle was proposing.
But then, did he really know for sure that there hadn’t been a predecessor to Advance Solutions?
He started to ask, and saw his uncle shake his head. “I know what you’re thinking. Don’t even ask. I can’t tell you, even if I knew.”
“Well. I just wish…” Tombstone’s voice broke off.
His uncle laid a reassuring hand on his nephew’s shoulder. “I miss her, too. She was good for you.”
His last, shattering memories of Tomboy came flooding back. Her face, the feel of her skin next to his, the way she had of continually challenging him, making him better than he’d ever thought he could be. God, but he missed her. And to be denied even the cold comfort of burying her — well, it didn’t bear thinking about. Nothing could change what had happened.
“So tomorrow,” Tombstone said at last. “I better get some sleep, then.” Another question occurred him. “Who’s my backseater?”
“Some good news, there,” his uncle said. “The aircraft you’re taking was originally configured as a trainer, so you’ll have dual flight controls. You can have a pilot instead of an RIO, if that’s what you want.”
“I’ll take Jason,” Tombstone said promptly.
Jason Greene was the newest addition to their team, a hotshot young F-14 pilot who had leaped at the opportunity to join up. He had already foreseen the way his career would go, that eventually responsibilities and duties would take him further and further away from the cockpit. All Jason wanted to do was fly — he didn’t care about additional responsibility, about command, or any of the other things that a good naval officer should care about. That made him perfect for Advance Solutions.
“Jason’s a good choice,” his uncle said approvingly. “I don’t think you’ll have any difficulty convincing him.”
“Difficulty? Hell, I’d have to shoot him to take off without him.”
FOURTEEN
Marshall P’eng
Saturday, September 20
0800 local (GMT +8)
Captain Chang gazed out over the relatively placid Yellow Sea. He knew this body of water like he knew his own house, its moods, the peculiarities of its sound velocity profile, and had developed an almost instinctive feel for how sonar propagation curves would look. He glanced up at the sky and took a careful look at the horizon. Everything he saw agreed with his gut feeling. There would be no storms today, none of the sudden squalls that could lash the sea into unbelievable chaos. And a good thing, too. While a storm might not bother the massive aircraft carrier off its port now, the crew of the small frigate would definitely feel the effects. Even worse, increased sea state would definitely degrade their USW capabilities.
But even a body of water he knew well could hold surprises. Somewhere over the horizon, the Chinese surface task force was supposedly conducting a training exercise. Their intentions worried Chang, but not as much now as they had earlier. Within a few hours, the aircraft carrier would be within range to deliver antisurface missiles, should the need arise, and Chang found the prospect of a snowstorm of Harpoon missiles immensely reassuring.
What bothered him more than the surface ships was what might be below the surface. The latest intelligence reports showed that one Chinese die
sel submarine was missing from its berth in port. Yes, Chang had held them, tracked them, even simulated killing them. But who was to know just how much of that was realistic? It would not be beyond a Chinese to feign incompetence in order to induce a false sense of confidence in the Taiwanese.
Oh, he knew them too well. They had ancestors in common stretching back over time on a scale that these Americans could not even contemplate. These Americans — the new toys, their advanced electronics, the brash, abrasive way they had of dealing with each other. Such a young nation, with officers like children — it could be, at its very best, simply annoying. At worst, the differences in their culture led to serious misunderstandings that took much patience and tolerance to work through.
Chang walked back onto his bridge, noted that all was going well, and then proceeded aft to Combat. The quiet murmurs inside there fell silent as he walked in, a mark of respect. His watch officer, a young man from a good family, stood and bowed politely.
“All is well?” Chang asked.
“Yes, Captain. We maintain our station, and have been transmitting reports regularly on our contacts.” The lieutenant hesitated, as though deciding whether to speak further.
For just a moment, Chang felt nostalgic for the days when it had been just the Lake Champlain and the Marshall P’eng in this part of the world. The arrival of the aircraft carrier USS United States had complicated life by a factor of ten, not the least by the micromanagement of his own USW patrol area.
Oh, Chang understood the reason behind the sudden rudder orders and the polite requests that Marshall P’eng be somewhere other than where she was headed. The carrier usually pleaded pending flight operations or replenishment evolutions with the USS Jefferson. After all, it wasn’t like they could order him out of certain areas of his own sea, but he could tell that that was just what they’d like to do.
There was an American sub somewhere around, there had to be. There was a sub in his water, and no one wanted to tell him about it. Nor did they want him accidentally stumbling across their sub and prosecuting her.
Chang conducted a few careful maneuvering evolutions to determine exactly when and where the Americans got nervous. By careful observation, he had a pretty good idea what the boundaries of their sub’s operating area was, and he confirmed his suspicion by noting that no American ships ventured into that particular square of water.
But the American submarine was not his only problem. Even with the aircraft carrier’s escorts a few days out, the tension had already started to affect his crew in more subtle ways. No longer were they the premier warship in the water, a pretense they’d been able to maintain with only the Lake Champlain around. The massive bulk of the aircraft carrier, the sheer volume of radio traffic and aircraft and everything else that she threw into the air brought home to each Marshall P’eng sailor just how powerful the other ship was.
That was the down side, as the American’s said. The up side was that the Chinese task force seemed to have stopped dead in the water. They remained approximately two hundred miles off their own coast, ostensibly conducting training operations, perhaps to draw attention and resources toward the surface ships and mask covert maneuvers by their submarine. Chang felt a flash of pity for the ground troops sweltering in the close confines of the troop transport ships.
“And?” Chang prompted gently, waiting for the watch officer to continue.
“I am not sure they listen to our reports, sir. Oh, they are quite polite on the circuit — sometimes I must repeat numbers and names, but eventually they understand. But look at the display,” he turned to point at the newly installed tactical data system.
Unfortunately, it was a one-way system on their ship. They received an integrated tactical picture from the battle group, but could not manually input their own contacts. “Why have they a need of our reports when they have all this?” the watch officer asked.
Chang had wondered the same thing himself, but the decision had been made at higher levels. “It is to develop coordination,” he explained, hoping to sound like he meant it. “We will get used to working together, now, when there is time. There may not be time later.”
“Yes, Captain.” His watch officer said nothing further, but his eyes mirrored a shadow of doubt.
USS United States
TFCC
0810 local (GMT +8)
Lieutenant Commander “Bird Dog” Robinson clicked down on his mouse again, this time punching it harder. Nothing happened. His JTIDS, or joint tactical information display system screen remained infuriatingly locked on what the sailors called “the eagle prompt,” meaning that the giant American Eagle logo was displayed. A nice logo it was, indeed, with the eagle well drawn and suitably fierce, but no substitute for the array of tactical data that should have been there.
Bird Dog glanced over at the watch supervisor’s console, the small one mounted directly under the racks of computer gear. It showed a complete tactical data picture.
“Why the hell has he got it and I don’t?” Bird Dog demanded. He glanced over at the lieutenant sitting at his side, his watch officer. “It’s just not fair.”
“I don’t know, sir.” The watch officer paused for a moment, as though wondering whether to proceed. “Were you adjusting the background color displays again? Or the geographical features?”
“Maybe. What’s that got to do with it?”
“It’s just that if you overload the computer with high-density graphics, sometimes it drops offline.”
Behind Bird Dog, Taiwanese Major Ho Kung-Sun walked into the compartment silently, and stood at the back to study the screen. Even in his few days on board, he knew what the eagle prompt was.
That American officer, abusing his computer again. Ho Kung-Sun had listened to the technicians and other officers explain to him time and time again what would drop it offline, yet the lieutenant commander never seemed to understand. If he did, he certainly didn’t modify his behavior. Instead, he insisted on experimenting with different color mixes, changing the range displayed continuously, tracking contacts and putting up graphics, all of which quickly overloaded the system.
“Well, call the geeks and tell them to get up here,” he heard the brash lieutenant commander say.
Ho Kung-sun stiffened. That word — how dare he! Long exposure to American culture, as well as a careful reading of the documents provided to the American officers, had made it clear to him that the term “geek” was an old, offensive word, a racial slur applied to many Asian races. And to use it here, in front him — well, no matter how they protested about their desire to work together in harmony with the Taiwanese Navy, this made their feelings clear. Had there been any real desire to work together as equal partners, no American would have even thought — much less spoken out loud — the racial slur.
Ho Kung-Sun turned and stalked out of the room, infuriated beyond measure. This would be reported, it would indeed, and the American officer would rue the day he dared to use such language.
The watch officer turned as he heard heels staccato on tile, and caught a glimpse of Ho Kung-Sun leaving the room. Bird Dog swiveled around as well to follow the man’s gaze. “Wonder what he wanted?” the watch officer asked.
Bird Dog shrugged. “Who knows? He seems like a nice enough guy and pretty sharp. That little boy of theirs, he’s a hell of a good station keeper, isn’t he?” He concluded in an admiring way. “They’ve got that Helen Keller sonar on board, but once they’ve got something, it’s not getting away. And aggressive?” He pointed at the watch officer’s log. “They’ve called in more detailed contact information in the last hour than our lookouts report in two weeks.”
“Yes, I know what you mean. It’s a shame that there’s a language barrier — I bet he’s a hell of a nice guy when you can get him to loosen up.”
“Oh, his English is pretty good. He just has problems with a couple of the vowels, that’s all.”
The watch officer turned to stare at the door, an odd thought crossing his mi
nd. No, it couldn’t be — of course not. He dismissed the thought. And it wasn’t until much later, when the situation had deteriorated considerably, that the watch officer first voiced his hesitant thought. “He has a problem with vowels.”
USS United States
CVIC
0815 local (GMT +8)
The senior submarine officer on board copied down the coordinates then plotted them quickly against his detailed area chart. Certain areas of the ocean were exclusively for the submarine’s use, at given depths and at given times. The United States would not launch sonobuoys or deploy other assets against the submarine operating in its own area.
The submarine officer laid down his two-point dividers and said, “Admiral, the Marshall P’eng is on the very edge of the sub’s keep-out zone. And he hasn’t said anything, but I think that frigate captain knows what’s going on. He’s no dummy, sir.” He shook his head, a frown deepening on his face. “I don’t like it a bit, sir. No telling what can go wrong. You know it’s an absolute, that we never share water space with anyone else.”
Coyote sighed. Yet another problem, another one arising out of incomplete information exchange between the two forces. It was bad enough that the LINK was not a full duplex operation, although it certainly made safeguarding classified information easier. But in times such as this, when Captain Chang inadvertently stumbled into areas of waters they didn’t want him in, it could be hard to explain. Nevertheless, the Marshall P’eng was under Coyote’s operational command, and he’d already seen that the Taiwanese frigate was eager to be a part of his battle force.
Coyote turned to his TAO. “We can’t tell Captain Chang why, but he’ll figure it out. He’s a smart man — the second we start moving him out of some operating areas, he’s going to get suspicious — and, based on what he’s already seen, if there’s a problem with our submarine, he’ll know it. So tell him I’m setting a restrictive EMCON condition and he is to use only passive sensors. That’s at least got some basis in reality, and I won’t have to change his station to keep him out of the way. Plus, his chances of detecting our submarine by passive means alone are pretty darn low.” He glanced over at the submarine officer. “Aren’t they?”
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