Nudged by tugs, Ronald Reagan had already put to sea beneath the twinkling stars, and departed San Diego Harbor early that morning. With her decks bare and cavernous hangar empty, ‘The Gipper,’ as Ronald Reagan was affectionately called, would meet her air wing and escorts south of San Clemente Island. Once formed-up in southern California waters, the Ronald Reagan carrier strike group was to head west toward the continental shelf.
Pelletier’s taxi arrived at the outer gate of North Island Naval Air Station. Her identification checked by the sailor on duty, she handed in her sea-bag. The cabbie, who clutched his lower back as he mumbled, fell back into his car. Pelletier strolled a promenade where a gauntlet of palm trees rustled, and headed for one of the naval station’s old buildings. She returned salutes from those she passed and smiled all the while.
Squeezing into her flight suit, Pelletier checked her flight plan and strode out to North Island’s ramp and the warplane that awaited her. She went about her pre-flight routine and watched two fat carrier cargo aircraft take off from the base’s main runway. Propeller-driven and heavy with spare parts, mail, supplies, and Pelletier’s sea-bag, the cargo planes required the most time to catch up with Ronald Reagan, and were, therefore, first to depart. As she watched them struggle into the air, Pelletier began her own airplane’s start up sequence.
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The American nuclear supercarrier George Washington was engaged in an exercise with the Royal Australian Navy south of Palau. She was the closest to Taiwan, so her strike group got orders to steam northwest at full speed, and entered an area of the Philippine Sea called the ‘Dragon’s Triangle.’ George Washington was super in all respects. She towered some 20 stories over the water and reached four more beneath it. The 1,096-foot hull—as long as the Chrysler Building was tall—got pushed at over 30 knots by twin nuclear reactors that powered four giant bronze propellers. With a four-and-a-half acre flight deck and an air wing larger than most national air forces, George Washington was twice the weight of Titanic, and some 97,000 tons of American diplomacy.
Plying the waves off George Washington’s port bow was the guided-missile cruiser Lake Champlain, a sleek vessel and, at about half the size of the carrier, the largest of George Washington’s escorts. Although five-inch deck guns were her only apparent armament, Lake Champlain hid anti-air, anti-ship, and land-attack missiles below her spray-soaked decks. At the ship’s prow, snapping in the headwind proudly flew a red-striped flag with a yellow snake that menacingly declared ‘Don’t Tread on Me.’ A single black anchor hung beneath it, and, below the waterline, a bulbous sonar stem protruded. With helicopters and torpedoes, Lake Champlain was an enemy submariner’s worst nightmare. On the cruiser’s superstructure, below the bridge’s band of windows, hexagonal radar arrays scanned the sky for threats. Arrayed around the ship were dishes, domes, and antenna masts that talked to satellites. They also linked Lake Champlain to the group’s other ships, and to command at Pearl Harbor. With sensors and weapons controlled by a sophisticated computerized combat system, Lake Champlain projected a protective bubble high into space and deep below the sea. All by her lonesome, Lake Champlain constituted an armada.
On Lake Champlain’s bridge, US Navy Captain Anthony Ferlatto stood between the quartermaster and lookout, his legs spread wide to brace against the roll of the ship. With squinted beady black eyes, Captain Ferlatto studied digital charts and chewed an unlit cigar. “If I ain’t chewing on this, I’ll be chewing on you,” he told those who questioned the nasty habit. The soaked cheroot occupied his mouth, and his sharp hooked nose whistled as he breathed. Ferlatto scanned the ship’s helm console and looked to the officer-of-the-deck, who gave a curt nod. The OOD knew the captain hated minced words—what he called ‘noise’—especially when a simple gesture would suffice. Ferlatto walked forward and rested a hand on the ship’s steel wall. He determined from its vibration that the cruiser’s gas turbines were at the correct power setting, and running good and healthy. He grunted with satisfaction. Ferlatto was always happy at sea. He squinted through the armored, tinted windows and looked to the other ships spread around the supercarrier.
A bit smaller than the cruiser at just over 500 feet, two guided-missile destroyers—Mahan and Paul Hamilton—steamed with George Washington and Lake Champlain. Bringing up the rear and rounding out the posse was the smallest ship of the group, the guided-missile frigate Rodney M. Davis. Ten miles ahead of this main body of ships, the nuclear attack submarine California ran 200 feet beneath the choppy surface leading the charge.
California was a 377-foot high-tensile steel shark. Although she looked like most submarines, with a hemispheric bow, dive planes, a tall sail, and a long black cylindrical hull that tapered at the stern, California went beyond common appearances to represent the cutting edge of American submarine technology. Like other boats of the new Virginia class, California sported a wide array of advanced sensors and weaponry. She could dominate shallow green and deep blue water against any submerged foe, conduct covert surveillance, deliver special forces, or pummel land and sea surface targets with cruise missiles and torpedoes. With the alignment of complex factors like availability, personal desire, rotation, and shipyard experience, Commander Max Wolff had the good fortune of being California’s very first skipper.
Commander Wolff came from a long line of submariners… German ones. His great-great-grandfather was a U-boat captain for von Tirpitz during the Great War, and his grandfather manned one for Dӧnitz. Max was born in Philadelphia a few years after his father left the rubble of Germany for the ‘Land of Opportunity.’ He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1985, attended submarine school in Groton, Connecticut, was assigned to a Permit-class boat and, a year later, received the coveted gold dolphins, pinned on his uniform. Several boats and decades later, Wolff distinguished himself with a first command on a Los Angeles. Possessing recognized proficiency in nuclear propulsion and an instinct for submarine tactics, the stars came together for Commander Wolff, and he took command of California. With the big white hull number on her sail and her new skipper’s ethnicity, California was informally referred to as ‘Unterseeboot-781’, or, simply, ‘U-781.’ When Wolff was informed of the boat’s new nickname, it was the only time his crew had seen him smile. Used to his expressionless face and frosty steel eyes, they knew full well that behind this façade lived a deeply caring man and a consummate submariner who would give anything for those who served with him. As California sailed into dangerous waters, Commander Wolff’s inherent stoicism became amplified, leaving greetings unanswered as he finished lunch in the submarine’s wardroom.
Wolff’s tense jaw flexed and churned the soft sandwich. His crew-cut of blonde hair was spiked back to attention with a backward sweep of his hand. Wolff punched the air to look at his watch. It’s time, he thought, and stood. A pillar of a man, he headed for California’s control center. He passed and respectfully brushed with his fingertips, a brass plaque stating California’s motto: Silentium Est Aureum—‘Silence Is Golden.’ Although quiet at most speeds, California was racing at 32 knots with the rest of the carrier strike group. She was making plenty of noise and her ability to collect sounds from the water was degraded. Wolff entered the submarine’s control center. He announced his presence with an order to reduce speed and deploy the towed sonar array.
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Chiayi Air Base sat on Taiwan’s northwestern coastal plain, one of the many Taiwanese military complexes that lived under the gun. Home to the 455th Tactical Fighter Wing, 4th Group, Chiayi was well within range of Chinese missiles. Like the rest of Taiwan’s air bases, Chiayi practiced alerts and scramble take-offs so its aircraft could not be caught on the ground. Since the Fourth Crisis had begun, all Taiwanese air bases had been on ground alert. On Chiayi’s flight line, Major Han Ken waited in the seat of his F-16 Fighting Falcon.
The Fighting Falcon’s look was classic: dart-tip nose, crisp and sharp edges, distinctive bubble canopy, tricycle landing gear, and an ov
oid engine inlet nestled between slender wings. Like tail feathers, the notched empennage had, beneath it, a big, silver nozzle that marked the end of the engine tunnel. Although built in the 1990s, the Americans had kept Taiwan’s Fighting Falcons upgraded, making the jets practically new under the skin. Major Han proudly served as flight leader of Chiayi’s 21st Squadron; ‘The Gamblers.’ Freshly painted on the side of the warplanes the squadron’s insignia was displayed: two playing cards, the ace-of-hearts crossed by the king-of-spades. Upon the vertical tail was a blue roundel with the white sun of Taiwan with ‘455-4’s painted beneath it. Parked with Han on the tarmac were the squadron’s nine other fighter-bombers, all outfitted with external fuel tanks and air-to-air missiles. The sweating pilots suffered, strapped into their reclined seats. Beside those of ‘The Gamblers,’ the wing had 40 more Fighting Falcons ready to go, with six others getting armed and fueled within Chiayi’s shaded shelters. . Even with the canopy wide open, the pilots enjoyed no breeze, and cockpit temperatures climbed.
Han tugged at his flight suit, itching through the thick fabric at the tickle of streaming sweat. A welcome air conditioning cart pulled up, and an airman snaked a flexible yellow duct into his cockpit. Cool, dry air blew over him. Relieved, Han tried to relax. Unlike the other men in his wing, he had no photos of family to stare at longingly, to pass the minutes. However, he did have Erica, Playboy’s ‘Miss August, her picture taped to his cockpit console. She accelerated time like no other. Han sighed; her ample bosom made the uncomfortable wait pass faster. The cool air seeped into his suit. Han shifted in the ejection seat and tried to stretch.
Like other young Taiwanese men, Han had been conscripted. His academic records in math and other sciences, however, allowed him to apply for a place at the Air Force Academy at Kangshan. He was accepted and, soon enough, it became clear that Han had an innate ability to fly. Shunted to fixed-wing aircraft and then jets, Han smoked anyone who tried to down him. After he had ‘shot down’ countless hotdogs in mock combat, and showed his absolute control in flight after flight, it was realized Han was an artist who worked in the medium of airspace; his brush: precise proximity flying and aerial combat maneuvers. Han, ever the doubtful prodigy, stood sweating in his flight suit as he was ordered to be the youngest pilot ever to join the air force’s ‘Thunder Tiger’ air demonstration team. After wowing air shows and dignitaries for years, all while training Taiwan’s greatest aviators, Han now had a wing of warplanes under his command.
Han checked his watch. It was two hours since the siren had summoned the men to their aircraft. In another four, backup aircrews would relieve them all. In hopes of a nap, Han closed his eyes.
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A sharp, jagged horizon in the ocean, Taipei was a human beehive. ‘Taipei 101’—a graceful skyscraper shaped like a bamboo frond—punctuated the city’s skyline. Taiwan’s capital since being so declared in 1949 by the leader of the Chinese Nationalists, Chang Kai Shek, Taipei was an effervescent city of festivals, towers, shopping districts, and dazzling light. It was also contrasted by shadows, with narrow alleys where smoke and grease, sucked from sizzling woks, discharged around laundry flapping on poles. Arcades jutted from colonial and Chinese style storefronts, and sheltered pedestrians from the hard rain as they strolled along the red tile sidewalks and beside endless rows of parked motorbikes. Taipei, kissed by warm sea breezes and the hot sun, and with, nearly seven million people crammed in, it comprised the economic, cultural, industrial, and political heart of the Taiwanese nation.
Taipei’s metropolitan area sat at the northern tip of the island, blooming on the Danshui River between the Keelung and Xindian river valleys. Land was scarce, so every inch of the cityscape had been utilized, with neighborhoods that sprawled in a jumble of lanes and backstreets. Crisscrossed by high-speed rail and highways, the city was served by an international airport—Taoyuan/Chiang Kai Shek—as well as one that handled domestic and trans-Strait traffic: Taipei Songshan. Southeast of downtown and across the Danshui River sprawled the Jhongjheng District, the capital’s civic soul. Surrounding the city, scattered among its fields and on its hilltops, a ring of air defense sites stood guard. A road climbed a hill on the eastern side of Taipei. It switched back and forth through a dense and steep stand of trees, and then emerged at the gate and electrical fencing of Songshan-East Air Defense Site #2.
This air defense site, known as ‘Hill 112’ for its altitude in meters, guarded Songshan Airport and the eastern part of the capital from aerial attack. Hill 112 comprised a cruciform reinforced concrete platform and a massive bunker built into the hill. Atop the platform stood a rotating radar antenna, three anti-aircraft guns, and a single surface-to-air missile battery. A parking lot doubled as a helicopter landing pad, and camouflage netting draped over an observation tower precariously perched on the hill’s slope. Two airmen occupied a machinegun position guarding the main gate. In command of Hill 112 was Republic of China Air Force Senior Master Sergeant Li Rong Kai.
Senior Master Sergeant Li left the command bunker to get some fresh air. He was young, tall, and thin, but with hard, intelligent eyes. He took a deep draw of the wet, warm summer air. It would be a beautiful day if not for the unfolding events, a day when he and his family might have driven to a mountain park for a picnic. Li drew the delicate fragrance of plum blossoms into his nose and tasted its sweetness on his tongue. He brought binoculars up to his face and focused on the cityscape.
The usual buzz of the capital—its heartbeat—was clearly subdued. People had skipped work to hoard supplies and huddle around televisions. Li panned away from the hazy view of skyscrapers and fixed his magnified gaze on the building where he lived with his wife, young daughter, and mother. Li hoped his family had left by now for their farm on the eastern side of the island. Traffic had clogged the highways for hours to days, so the journey was sure to be long. Li prayed it would end with them safe. Although he had left them just yesterday, it felt like days. Buses roamed the city to collect Taiwan’s airmen, marines, sailors, and soldiers. They packed into the sweltering coaches that drove them to marshaling areas and waiting trains. Li’s bus had met another that then dropped him at a junior high school parking lot where a Humvee and driver waited. During the short drive to Hill 112, they passed one of Li’s favorite restaurants, an Italian eatery where he and the wife would steal away for a romantic dinner. Li wondered if he would ever dine there again. He continued his stroll around Hill 112.
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A lone Chinese J-15 Flying Shark banked over the golden Bohai Sea. Off the warplane’s right wing menaced the massive Chinese mainland, and, to its right was the Korean Peninsula. A menacing twin-engine heavy fighter, the Flying Shark sported dark-blue tiger stripes across its grey skin, and a distinctive drooped nose, large forward canards, and a candy-striped tailhook tucked under its pointed tail, Chinese naval aviator Senior Lieutenant Peng Jingwei at the stick. One of China’s best pilots, Senior Lieutenant Peng was counted among the few qualified to land an airplane on the corkscrewing deck of an aircraft carrier. Peng turned the jet over Liaodong Bay and toward the coastal city of Huludao.
In the distance, just outside Huludao’s urban expanse, and among neatly rowed crops, a long, single runway stretched. Beside the strip sat a squat, concrete building shaped like an aircraft carrier hull. Topped by a steel flight deck and superstructure, it served as China’s carrier flight school, known simply to the rank and file as ‘91-065 Troop.’ The faux ship hull housed student pilots and the Russian and Ukrainian advisors who trained them on flight simulators and in classrooms. On the ‘dry ships’ flight deck, sailors worked with mock-ups of aircraft and helicopters, practicing arming, fueling, moving, and repairing these aircraft. After Peng had been transferred from the People’s Liberation Army Air Force to the Army Navy Air Force, this school was where Peng learned carrier operations, and graduated to lead China’s first naval aviation squadron known as ‘The Garpikes.’ Peng lined up his Flying Shark with the runway, deplo
ying flaps and dropping the landing gear.
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People’s Liberation Army Navy Captain Kun Guan served the Party from deep beneath the sea. Despite a natural aptitude for nuclear propulsion and subsurface tactics, Captain Kun had never felt comfortable in submarines. ‘Unnatural contraptions,’ he called them, and he cringed with every creak from the metal constructs. Despite hailing from China’s political class, Kun’s rapid rise through the ranks of the People’s Liberation Army Navy was self-accomplished. When the Party sought to expand Chinese subsurface power, Kun—in command of a destroyer at the time, and a surface warfare man at heart—had been shunted to submarine school at Qingdao Naval Base.
Kun’s new career track under the sea began on a Romeo-class boat. He was chief officer on the obsolete Soviet diesel-electric that occasionally flared a nasty habit of choking the crew with engine fumes. After several patrols and some high-profile encounters with the American navy, Kun, promoted took command of Changzheng 6, one of China’s new Shang-class nuclear attack submarines. This one is better, Kun thought of Changzheng 6, although he still did not like being hatched into the steel tube.
Kun leaned against the cold steel of Changzheng 6’s attack center bulkhead. Kun’s was the sixth hull of the brand-new Shangs, all of which were named ‘Changzheng’ after the year-long 8,000 mile Long March of the Red Army retreat from Chiang Kai Shek’s Nationalists. Designed and constructed with Russian assistance, Shang-class nuclear attack submarines compared roughly to early flights of 1970s American Los Angeles- or Russian Victor III-classes. They were generally quiet and heavily armed with tube-launched torpedoes and missiles. Captain Kun stood straight again and tugged the wrinkles from his uniform. Used to old analog dials and gauges, Kun admired the colorful glow of the attack center’s new-fangled digital screens. With a well-padded roundish frame, Kun seemed built for the confines of a submarine. It was his brain, however, that revolted
Fourth Crisis: The Battle for Taiwan Page 3