Barracuda 945 am-6

by Patrick Robinson

  He hit the telephone wire to a number in Damascus and instructed the answering voice to meet him in Bandar Abbas immediately. An Iranian Navy jet would pick him up at 7:00 a.m. from Damascus International. The Admiral informed General Rashood they would both then fly to Qingdao, in company with a lawyer to read and sign the contracts on behalf of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

  8 a.m., December 20, 2006

  National Security Agency

  Fort Meade, Maryland

  Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe scrolled down the list of coded messages the CIA had deciphered off the satellite of the People's Liberation Army/Navy. In fact, the signals were originally overheard by the eavesdroppers at the NSA itself, but the CIA then sorted them out, reading the routine Navy messages and forwarding them on with anything that looked mysterious, sinister, or unusual. Old Razormouth 600 was right up there with the unusual.

  It landed amidst twelve other pages of Naval and military signals, and it stopped Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe dead in his tracks. Old Razormouth 600! What in the name of Christ is that all about?

  Jimmy ran the word through his mind with alacrity, which came naturally to him, and total disdain for the confusing, which came even more naturally to him. Razor blade, razor wire, razor's edge, razorback — Arkansas. Beats the shit out of me. Might even be a misprint. Who the bloody hell's Old Razormouth?

  "Funny word, that," he muttered to himself. "Never even heard it before. Suppose it means sharp-tongued, kind of Waspish. Bloke with a quick turn of phrase. Probably some Chinese Captain taking the piss out of his boss. Hope for his sake Old Razormouth never reads the comms. The guy'd probably get fucking shot."

  At which point Jimmy Ramshawe consigned the signal to his private filing system on computer, just a little list he always kept of all things baffling yet interesting. "Get in there, Razormouth," he said, hitting the save button.

  January 20, 2007

  European North Russia

  The gray-painted Tupolev Tu-22, the multimission ASW Russian Bear, was making five hundred knots as it thundered through the freezing skies, fifty-five thousand feet above a stark white frozen landscape, toward the equally stark white frozen White Sea. The time was 1:40, which was essentially irrelevant, since the sun never makes it above the horizon up here, not during the "polar nights" between November and January.

  On the ground the temperature was minus six degrees, and there was still an hour's flying left of their 950-mile journey from Moscow, all of it due north, before landing at Severomorsk, Headquarters of Russia's Northern Fleet, 125 miles inside the Arctic Circle.

  It was almost impossible to distinguish land from ocean, so thoroughly icebound was this petrified corner of northwest Russia. The Bear was actually headed straight on over Murmansk, the most northerly city on this planet, to an airfield right on the shores of the Barents Sea, which does not freeze thanks to the Gulf Stream flowing around the North Cape. When the wheels of the Tupolev reached out for the last rock-hard runway on the Kola Pensinsula they would be positioned at sixty-nine degrees north, way closer to the Pole than Iceland, on a latitude identical to the shores of the Eastern Siberian Sea.

  "Looks a bit cold out there," said General Rashood, staring through the window into clear sunlit skies, above the White Sea. "You ever been this far north before?"

  "I've never even been cold, never mind this far north," said the Iranian Admiral, chuckling. "Are you sure this was absolutely necessary?"

  "Well, I need to meet the guys who will be driving the ship, and you better check up on that $200 million you just handed over."

  "I'm just joking," replied Mohammed Badr. "I'm looking forward to seeing Ben. He's been up here for almost two months now."

  They arrived at Severomorsk a little before two o'clock in the afternoon, stepping out of the plane into almost total darkness. All the runway lights were on, and the airport was lit up everywhere. A Russian Navy staff car awaited them on the runway, and the driver set off immediately across a light snow covering toward a wide road that plainly led down to the dockyards.

  It took only twenty minutes and they were escorted immediately to a waiting high-speed fast-attack Mirazh patrol boat, which made a little over forty knots up the flat-calm Kola River estuary, thirty minutes to the port of Polyarny. And from there they were driven up the small "Navy" road running behind the granite cliffs, which sweep down into the Barents Sea. It was about thirty miles to the top-secret Russian submarine base of Araguba, which lies in sinister seclusion at the head of a long steep-sided fiord.

  Admiral Badr thought it was touch and go whether he would be able to breathe the frigid air without his lungs caving in completely. He stood gasping, astounded at the temperature, as Commander Ben Badr came hurrying over to greet his father.

  He hugged the Admiral and shook hands with the General, though Ben was hardly recognizable in his coarse, heavy Russian Navy greatcoat, dark blue scarf, and thick fur hat that looked to contain the hides of an entire pack of grizzlies. Behind Ben, moored alongside, was the unmistakable shape of a 350-foot-long Russian-built nuclear attack submarine. To Admiral Badr it bore the hallmarks of the Sierra I, with a relatively short sail, tapered forward. But it looked somehow more expensive, more serious. It bore the white painted Hull number K-239. This was it, the jet black Russian nuclear hunter-killer: Barracuda Type 945.

  Right now she flew the Russian Navy ensign, pure white with a blue diagonal cross. It would be many months before she flew any other flag, if ever. Admiral Badr could see her Commanding Officer, Kapitan Gregor Vanislav, standing at the head of the gangway to greet them. A native of Murmansk, he wore no overcoat, just his uniform, the thick gold bar with one star on the sleeve denoting his seniority.

  He saluted in deference to the rank of the shivering Admiral Badr, and then said carefully, in English, "I am pleased to meet you, sir. You have fine son, Commander Ben, very, very fast learner."

  He welcomed, too, General Rashood and led the way into the submarine, Ben Badr's place of work since November. On board, awaiting them were four Iranian Naval engineers, trained in nuclear physics but currently acclimatizing themselves in the Barracuda's reactor room — they were Cmdr. Ali Akbar Mohtaj, Lt. Comdr. Abbas Shafii, and CPOs Ali Zahedi, and Ardeshir Tikku.

  They were all currently registered as personnel in the People's Liberation Army/Navy, and they were all wearing Chinese Naval uniforms, surrounded by ten officers, plainly Chinese, and crew executives. If the Russians had any suspicions, they never voiced them. Not a word or inquiry about either the trainees or the recently arrived guests, whom they obviously knew represented their valued clients, the Iranian Navy.

  They knew precisely who Admiral Badr was, and they had always known the identity of Commander Ben Badr. As for the rest, the Russians had obviously decided they were from central Asian Muslim States halfway between Russia and China — Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, or Godknowswhereistan. Either way, it was no one's business.

  Anyway, the Iranians had an office in the main dockyard in the Ukraine, right there in Sevastopol on the northern shores of the Black Sea. And the Ayatollahs are very important customers for all manner of Russian Naval hardware. Also, the Russians knew very well of the slightly unnerving and robust partnership between China and Iran in oil and arms deals. Six hundred million dollars had plainly helped to instill a keen sense of discretion among the former owners of the nuclear submarine. For Three Wise Monkeys, read Three Hundred Wise Russian Admirals.

  Two further local crewmen, both Petty Officers, joined the party and they moved through the Barracuda, informing the visitors of her excellence… She very fast, thirty-four knots dived, no trouble, very comfortable at that speed… good wide submarine… considerable standoff distance between hulls… makes big advantage for radiated noise reduction… also for damage resistance… all titanium hull… excellent… very, very quiet… made her expensive… maybe too expensive… they don't build no more… probably big mistake… she was our best… dives to
almost 2,500 feet… we all sorry Barracuda going… good ship… very, very good ship… keep you safe, eh?

  Admiral Badr nodded. He was getting the message. This had been an excellent buy. The Barracuda was almost twenty years old, but she was built in the outstanding shipyard at Nizhniy Novgorod, the former Gorky, in the opinion of many experts the home of Russia's finest marine craftsmen. They had floated her proudly up the Volga and all the way through the Belamorsk Canal all those years ago, on one of the great 600-foot-long Tolkach freight barges. Her weapons and reactor room were fitted out in the high-tech nuclear workshops in Severodvinsk on the White Sea, west of Archangel. Again, the home of some of Russia's best scientists and engineers.

  Her service record was impeccable. The first Barracuda, commissioned with such ceremony back in 1987, was built as pure frontline muscle for the Soviet Navy, and they had treated her like an Empress, refitting and replacing every part that showed stress or wear. She was probably as good today as she had ever been. Worth every ruble of the US $300 million the Chinese had paid.

  The Barracuda had lived in these cold northern waters all her life, through the end of the Cold War, and beyond. Now she was just too expensive to run, for a Navy that sometimes found it difficult to raise the cash for the dockyard lighting systems. General Rashood's original estimate of the Russian position had been accurate to a degree. The Russian Bear had indeed nearly taken Admiral Zhang's hand off when he made the offer for the massive cash sale.

  They broke for dinner at seven o'clock, the visiting Admiral and General from Iran being guests in the officers' mess. They were joined by Ben Badr, and dined with several high-ranking Russian officers, though none as high ranking as Mohammed Badr. It was as if this was strictly a lower level operation, just "working up" a recently sold submarine. Nothing like a flagrant breach of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, with a big attack nuclear boat possibly being sold to an Islamic Republic with major terrorist connections and many, many uses for the lethal U-235 uranium in an active nuclear reactor.

  They ate superb blinis, the delicious little Russian buckwheat pancakes served with caviar and sour cream. The former Major Kerman delighted his Russian hosts by telling them the allegedly true story of the visiting Texan and his family who dined at the Dorchester Hotel in London and had not tasted Russian caviar before.

  Just what is this stuff, worth a hundred bucks a shot? How could it cost that much?

  "Well, sir, it's something of a ritual," said the headwaiter. "We serve it with finely chopped egg, and onion, and small pancakes, plus a generous glass of the finest Smirnoff vodka, chilled, the favorite of the last Czar of Russia."

  Yeah, but what is caviar? What's it look like?

  "Sir, it's the eggs of the sturgeon."

  "That right? Beautiful. Lemme have two. Sunnyside up."

  This was greeted by roars of laughter, and glasses of vodka, since no one was likely to be going to sea for a couple of days.

  But then the conversation returned to the deadly serious nature of the visit. And two ex-Soviet nuclear Captains were detailed to supply notes on the differences and similarities in the ship, beyond the reactor room.

  You got a SAM missile system you're all going to recognize, the old SA-N 5/8, plus a Strela portable launcher… the SSM Novator Alfa SS-N-27 on the new Kilos is not much different from the A/S Novator 15 Starfish Tsakra on the Barracuda… 53 cm tubes, nuclear warhead or regular Type 40. Whatever. Anyway the big missile on this ship is the long-range RADUGA… the SS-N-21 Sampson Granat… that's a cruise… flies at 0.7 Mach, around 200 meters above the surface… 1,600 miles. It's just been in overhaul. Top of the range.

  Torpedoes. Hardly any difference. Mostly 21-inch tubes, 53 cm weapons.

  Countermeasures… some similarities. ESM, Rim Hat/Bald Head intercept with radar warning on this ship. You're probably more used to the Squid Head on the Kilos. But they're much the same.

  Radars: same… surface search Snoop Pair… back-to-back ESM aerials.

  Sonars: the Barracuda has regular Shark Gill hull-mounted passive/active search and attack, low to medium frequency… you're used to the more modern Shark Tooth and Shark Fin, the MGK-400 system. But there's not much difference… and we have the same Mouse Roar system… hull-mounted active attack, normal high frequency.

  You'll notice a V-shaped casing on the port side of the sail — that's to cover the releasable escape chambers… That bulbous casing on the after-end of the sail is for a towed communications buoy… very useful.

  They retired to bed at ten o'clock, and reconvened at five in the morning for a further tour of the ship. To the east, out into the Barents Sea, they could see a glow along the horizon, but there was no daylight and nor would there be daylight for another two weeks.

  Admiral Badr and General Rashood took time to inspect the second Barracuda they had purchased, hull number K-240. But it was in a floating covered dry dock, with several large plates currently being fitted into the underside of the hull. It would plainly be a few weeks before she was seaworthy, but the other one, Hull K-239, had already been in Sea Trials and would resume in late May when the new RADUGA missile system was complete.

  They left at noon, the same way they had arrived, car to Polyarny, patrol boat to Severomorsk, military aircraft south to Moscow. Commercial jet to Ankara, then change for Tehran, Navy jet to Bandar Abbas. General Rashood would not complete his 2,800-mile journey back to Damascus for four more days.

  But the news was excellent. The first Barracuda would clear Araguba by July 20, in time to make the summertime easterly route along the north coast of Siberia, south of the ice pack. She would be accompanied by an Udaloy Type 1 frigate, and the gigantic 23,500-ton ex-Soviet Arktika Class icebreaker Ural, a triple-shafted nuclear-powered monster with a reinforced steel bow, enabling her to ride up, and then bear down on ice, as much as eight feet thick, and smash it assunder.

  The waters ought not to be frozen at all in July, but there would be ice floes, and the Russians proposed to take no chances whatsoever with the safe delivery of the first Barracuda. Not with $200 million awaiting them in the port of Petropavlovsk. You can pay a lot of electricity bills with that.

  On the journey home, Admiral Badr could hardly contain his excitement about the new purchase. And he talked ceaselessly about her speed, her lethal missiles, and, above all, her ability to run endlessly in near silence through all of the world's oceans, without ever needing to surface, either for oxygen, water, or fuel.

  He was also aware that any missions mounted by the Barracuda would enjoy the clandestine protection of both the Russians and Chinese, both in the release of misinformation regarding their whereabouts, and in the case of China, a hiding place not yet revealed but one so secret, so unexpected, it was entirely possible they would never be located. Not in a thousand years.

  Even the somewhat taciturn, closemouthed Ravi thought that last part was pretty nifty. Though he was unsure whether the men from the Pentagon would accept defeat that lightly. He doubted it, but China was still one hell of an ally.

  And he looked forward to hot, peaceful spring and summer months with Shakira, interspersed by short planning visits to Bandar Abbas, before he returned to northern Russia to join the Barracuda on the long, working journey all along the icy waters of the northern coastline, and into the Bering Strait.

  Right there they would begin their deep-run down the Pacific, south along the barren wasteland of the Kamchatka Peninsula to Petropavlovsk, where they would put the finishing touches to the plan for a sophisticated attack on the United States that would never be forgotten.

  "Are you looking forward to our adventure?" asked Admiral Badr.

  "Yes, Mohammed. I am. And may Allah go with us."

  7

  General Ravi headed back to the cold north of Russia in the last week of July 2007 with no further price upon his head. The twin murders of Alf Rowan and Rupert Studley-Bryce were never solved in London, indeed the Brits never even admitted to the faintest suspic
ion that the Member of Parliament had been taken out by a professional. At least, they never admitted anything publicly. Neither, however, did they remove their constant surveillance and permanent phone-tapping at 86, The Bishop's Avenue.

  As Vice Admiral Arnold Morgan was often at pains to point out… the Brits talk funny, and because of their weird upbringing, they find it damn near impossible to speak plainly… but stupid they ain't. So don't underestimate 'em. Ever.

  In fact, MI5 had interviewed Richard and Naz Kerman on eight different occasions in the past twelve months, but the Iranian-born couple had revealed nothing, and flatly denied they had ever laid eyes on their only son, not since he was posted to Israel and then vanished in the Jerusalem Road, Hebron, more than three years ago. MI5 even tried telling the Kermans they knew, beyond any doubt, that Ray Kerman had attended Royal Ascot. Richard and Naz said if he did, they never saw him. For the record, MI5 did not believe them.

  There it remained, at a strange and frustrating standstill. Two SAS men murdered in Hebron, two gigantic bank robberies in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, the incredible liberation of every important political prisoner in Israel, and a brutal double murder in London: the same man suspected of committing each and every one of those crimes; the same man everyone knew, but no one knew.

  Lt. Jimmy Ramshawe had essentially blown the whistle six times, every time. And everyone believed him, at least everyone who mattered at the National Security Agency in Fort Meade believed him. And they had relayed their deductions to MI5, and MI5 believed him as well. MI5 was even on close speaking terms with his mom and dad.

  But no one even knew his name. Not now. And no one ever found him. No one ever even saw him, except for Alf Rowan. And no one really knew whether he was dead or alive, which country he was in, or which hemisphere. Nor what he might do next. The Mossad offered nothing. Jordan offered nothing. Neither did Iran, Libya, Saudi Arabia. But they wouldn't, would they? MI5 had even had the Queen's Ascot Representative search the offices in St. James's Palace for any badge application for a Major R. Kerman, and of course they drew a blank.