Scorpion in the Sea

by P. T. Deutermann

  “Yes.”

  “Sir, the contact has slowed to 20 rpm; she’s closing still, but very slowly now. Bearing still 100.”

  “Very well. Protect your ears at midnight.”

  “Yes, Sir. We are ready.”

  “Tell the watch officer that I will address the crew at midnight, if this is the one.”

  “It will be done.”

  He looked again at his watch. 2320. Forty minutes more or less. He lay back in the bunk. Their transit out to the rendezvous had been uneventful. They had spent the time making an inventory of small repairs needed, pumps, motors, valves—the usual laundry list. The tanker had been fitted out with a machine shop for this mission. She also had food, diesel fuel and fresh water for them, which was very fortunate because one of their evaporators had broken down. Submarines, like surface ships, had to make all their potable water from seawater, using distillation plants called evaporators. A submarine had small water reserves to begin with; the loss of even one evaporator was serious.

  If the weather held, they would be able to get the men off the sub and onto the tanker for a few hours, for hot showers and a good meal. He wondered if there would be women. The Russian advisors had told him that their support ships were crewed almost entirely with women; full service support ships, they would say with a leer. He had seen some of the Russian women, and wondered how one told the difference between them and the machinery. He had never married and had no particular interest in having a permanent relationship with a woman. They satisfied sexual needs, but were nothing but trouble for anything else.

  He had to control himself from going to the Control Room. He sensed that the mission was at midpoint. there were still times he could not believe that they were doing what they were doing, that he, of all the submarine Captains, had been chosen for this mission of all missions. He had come a long way indeed.

  His parents had been servants in the mansion house of a British businessman in Tripoli. He had grown up with four other children in a one room hut built into the back wall of the mansion’s compound. His “duties” as a child were limited to helping the groundskeepers; none of the children had ever once been allowed inside the main house. He had grown up knowing only what his father would tell him of the many rooms, the fine furnishings, and the incredible amounts of food. His mother had taught all of them to read and write Arabic, but he had never set foot in a school until the Revolution had upended the colonial order of things and changed everyone’s world dramatically.

  He had joined the Army as soon as he was old enough, and had flourished, applying his native intelligence in a manner that quickly caught the attention of superiors who were desperately looking for indigenous officer material. He had been assigned to the artillery, where he was schooled by grim-faced Soviet advisors in the lethal mathematics of ballistics and the intricacies of surveying. Because his tribal origins were the same as the fledgling nation’s leader, he was promoted somewhat faster than many of his fellow officers.

  His political education paralleled his technical training. He learned that the entire world, led by the United States and its allies, had turned against his country for the sin of throwing off the yoke of colonialism, and that they were now attempting to isolate his country to the desert sands of North Africa. Only the Soviets had been their steadfast friends on the world scene, providing armaments, training, advisors, and a market for the precious oil when the Arab world executed its first oil embargo. He had learned Russian through a combination of association with the advisors and formal schooling.

  Ten years into his career, the Soviets had provided six submarines, and a call had gone out through the Army and the Air Force for volunteers to become submariners as the leader added a new and deadly dimension to the country’s armed forces. He had been encouraged by his Commanding Officer, a Colonel of his own tribal group, to volunteer on the basis of political reliability, mainly to extend the family’s influence into this new and exciting facet of the country’s armed forces. With his grasp of the Russian language and innate technical ability, he had been accepted easily, and then had come the intensely alien experience of living and going to submarine school in the Soviet Union. Upon completion of the year’s training, he had been put in command of a Foxtrot class Russian submarine, and had been its Captain ever since.

  Mechanically, his submarine was no easier to keep running than the other five, but he had patiently assembled a capable crew and reliable officers over the years, many of them volunteers from different Arab countries or nationalities. More importantly, they remained with the submarine permanently, as his country did not subscribe to the policies of rotation that other navies used. As the international climate grew increasingly hostile to his country, the submarines were given more and more resources against the day when they might have to go out into the Mediterranean to defend the country against the growing power of the imperialists, or to strike a blow against the hated Zionists. The Al Akrab achieved a reputation for readiness that made her the natural candidate for this incredible mission to restore his country’s honor after the American sneak attack.

  The phone buzzed again.

  “Yes.”

  “Sir, the contact has stopped engines.”

  “Very well; turn off axis to 010; begin a passive plot on him for the next thirty minutes, and estimate the range.”

  “It will be done.”

  He climbed out of his rack and found his sea boots. A thirty minute passive plot was a waste of time, but it would give them something to do while waiting. This had to be the support ship. He needed to tell the whole crew what was going on. But he would have to wait for the signal, to be sure. He went aft to the control room.

  Arriving there he found the tactical team hovering over the plotting board. Every three minutes the sonar operator would call the bearing to the contact, derived by listening to its engine noise, to the table plotters, while the submarine travelled north, perpendicular to the initial bearing, at a steady speed of five knots. After thirty minutes, the bearings would begin to converge, and a very rough range could be measured. If the contact was also moving, the procedure was more elaborate, and took much more time. But for a stopped or almost stopped target, one leg would do it for a very rough estimate. It was good practice for the watch officers; the submarine could determine the all-important range to the target without making a sound or revealing a periscope. He looked at his watch. Ten more minutes. He sat down on his steel stool by the periscope, and waited.

  At midnight, he asked for the estimated range.

  “Three thousand, five hundred meters,” replied the watch officer. The quartermaster logged the number in the contact log. They waited.

  “Turn back to 110,” ordered the Captain. He would begin closing the ship.

  At five minutes past midnight, three evenly spaced, metallic clanks were heard throughout the boat. The Captain smiled.

  “Prepare to surface,” he ordered.

  Five minutes later, the Deputy announced that the boat was ready to surface. The Captain acknowledged, and picked up the ship’s announcing system microphone.

  “Be silent,” he began, using the traditional admonishment which preceded any important announcements. “In the name of Allah, the Merciful: in a few minutes, we will surface to make rendezvous with our mother ship, the Ibrahim Abdullah, a national tanker. She has been sent by our Leader with fresh provisions, fuel and water. For the fortunate, she may also have mail.

  “Our plan is to remain alongside for twenty-four hours. This depends on the weather remaining calm, and no other contacts coming near. Everyone will be allowed to go aboard the mother ship, to bathe and to enjoy some fresh air, and perhaps other things. All clothing and bedding will be cleaned. But first there is work to be done. We must take on a full load of fuel and water and food before anyone goes anywhere. That way, if we are forced to dive, we will have done the essential things.

  “We have completed the first half of the mission. We have journeyed to the ene
my’s coast, we have learned his patterns of operations there, and we have scouted the bottom in preparation for the second phase. This rendezvous is the vital intermission point: from here, we go back to the patrol area, and await the American carrier.

  “Remember, our mission is still a secret. The crew of the Ibrahim knows only that we have been dispatched to America to carry out an important mission of reprisal. They do not know the target, nor the timing. Keep silent about the final objective. If they wish to speculate, smile with them, let their imaginations run, but do not confirm our mission. A failure of surprise will mean the death of every one of us. Surprise is our only protection from the American Navy.

  “Now, surface. Allah be with us. That is all.”

  Fifteen minutes later, the boat was nosing into position alongside the tanker, her diesels rumbling, filling the diminishing space between the tanker’s high, slab sides and the submarine with their noise. The tanker was an old Greek multi-product carrier, bought in Piraeus three years ago for the specialty fuels run along the north African coast, and modified for this mother ship mission six months ago by the military shipyard at Benghazi. She looked like any other medium sized tanker in the world, with a superstructure and funnel aft, a long, flat deck running forward, where another superstructure containing the bridge and the cabins rose close to the bow. She was of 25,000 dead weight tons displacement. Nothing in her outward appearance would have revealed any special capabilities.

  She lay to now, a dark silhouette in the light of a full moon, as the submarine maneuvered alongside. There were special fenders already deployed along the tanker’s side, and they creaked and groaned as the sub slid alongside and backed down. Heavy ropes snaked down to the sub’s deck, and the crew then pulled down wire mooring hawsers to make her fast. The submarine kept one main engine on the line, charging batteries and maintaining readiness to cut away quickly if they were discovered.

  Once alongside, the tanker deck crew passed down a fuel hose and a water hose, and the vital replenishment began. There was some back and forth shouted conversation between the tanker crew on deck up above and the submariners, but the essential transfers were the main order of business. A steam winch blew clouds of exhaust steam over the side as it hoisted pallets of food and spare parts down to the submarine’s deck. The crews worked until 0330 before the fueling and watering was completed, and most of the stores had been brought onboard. Then, with the weather still flat calm, everyone secured until later in the morning. If the submarine had to be cast off in an emergency, the main replenishment was completed.

  At 0900 that morning, the tanker crew dropped an accommodation ladder down over the side, and one half of the submarine’s crew went topside for the first time in five weeks. They were a smelly, scruffy lot, carrying their accumulated dirty laundry and bedding up to the mother ship. Once onboard, they were delighted to find out that there were women onboard, along with unlimited quantities of hot water for baths, and a special meal available in the dining room all day long.

  The remaining half of the crew stayed aboard the boat to keep watch, and to stow the fresh provisions. They also passed up the items for repair, taking care to disable no system entirely in case they were scared off the mothership. The rendezvous position had been picked to avoid shipping lanes, so the chance of another ship coming along was very remote. The position, as best their intelligence services could ascertain from their Russian friends, was also off the track of surveillance satellites.

  The Captain went up the ladder at 1000, following the first increment of his crew. He was greeted by the master of the tanker, who introduced the political officer, a Lieutenant Colonel in the security service. The Captain recognized him as the officer accompanying the Colonel on the landing the night they had left. The political officer was several years older than the Captain. He indicated that the Captain should come with him to his cabin. He instructed the master to keep a vigilant watch while the two military officers conferred. By his manner, he was clearly in charge of the entire replenishment operation.

  They went up to the forward superstructure, climbing a set of ladders to the third level above the tanker pipe deck. It was a bright, sunny day, with almost no wind. The submarine was hidden in the shadow of the Ibrahim created by the easterly sun. They made their way to the Lieutenant Colonel’s cabin, which was a spacious affair, especially when compared to the Captain’s tiny quarters aboard the submarine. There was a sitting room with conventional furniture, and a bedroom and bath off to one side.

  The Lieutenant Colonel politely offered tea, and inquired after the Captain’s health and personal well-being in the traditional manner. He was a swarthy, powerfully built man, who looked more like a Turk than a Bedou, which he was. He had been a Major General until the last coup attempt had provoked Khadafi to reduce all ranks to something below full Colonel. He was of Khadafi’s tribe, and therefore to be trusted. He smoked noxious French cigarettes continuously.

  The Captain reviewed the events of the transit across the Atlantic, and the first few weeks off the Florida coast. He did not at first describe the broaching incident, but he did give full details of the sinking of the fishing boat. The Colonel’s eyes grew narrow.

  “What was the enemy’s reaction to this incident?”

  “Nothing that we could tell. We heard a destroyer operating in the area later the next day, but there were no indications of a real search. They must have concluded that it was an accident. I am convinced that they have no idea we are there.”

  “And there were no survivors, correct? You took care that no one was left in the water to tell the tale?”

  The Captain swallowed, and sipped some tea to hide his discomfiture. He had still not quite come to terms with what they had done. It offended many precepts of the desert code. In a sense, the sea was not much different from the desert. Even your enemy was given succor if he was helpless on the sands. Later you might kill him, but always the fundamental courtesy of rescue would be extended. To shoot the men in the water had been inescapably necessary, but very much against his instincts.

  “Yes, Effendi. There were two survivors, and we machine-gunned them in the water. The sharks took them as we watched.”

  “You are confident then that you have not been actually sighted?”

  The Captain thought quickly. It was likely that the Colonel would interview the Al Akrab’s political officer when he was done with him. That worthy would surely reveal the broaching incident.

  “Yes, we may have been sighted. It was on the second day in the patrol area. The watch officer lost depth control briefly, and we broke the surface momentarily. It is called broaching. There were fishing boats nearby, but it was dark; morning twilight. I doubt that any of them saw us.”

  “Was there any Navy reaction?”

  “By coincidence there was a destroyer that came out and pinged around the area that day, but they do that all the time. This is their training area. Destroyers, frigates, they are always out there pinging, practicing ASW. We watched him from the shelter of the Gulf Stream, and he went away after a while, going into port that Friday morning as they always do. They are very predictable, these Americans. They come out Monday, they go back Friday by midday. They must be very religious.”

  The Colonel, who had been an Attaché in America many years ago, snorted. The Captain obviously had no concept of the American weekend.

  “Did you discipline the watch officer who exposed you?”

  “I issued a decree that the next such mistake would be punished by death.”

  The Lieutenant Colonel’s eyebrows went up. This young officer had steel in him. Killing the surviving witnesses, and now this threat to his own crew. The Colonel had chosen well.

  “And there were no more such mistakes?”

  “Not until I made the one which resulted in snagging the fishing boat,” he said evenly. Might as well tell the truth, he thought. The older man might actually respect it.

  The Lieutenant Colonel looked out the
porthole for a long moment. Then he got up and went over to his desk. He retrieved a thin envelope, and handed it over to the Captain.

  “This contains the latest intelligence estimate of when the carrier will return to its base. And a new part of the plan.”

  “A new part?”

  “Yes; we have some additional weapons for you. This is most secret. It is described there, in the instructions. Why don’t you just read them. I will have some food sent in when we are through.”

  The Captain opened the envelope and scanned the operations order. He looked up. “Mines?” he asked, incredulously.

  The Lieutenant Colonel sat back and smiled at him. “Yes, mines. We are going to take two shots at this carrier. The first will be when you attack him on the approach to the base. The second will come when he actually enters the harbor.”

  The Captain’s face flushed. “You mean, if we fail.”

  The Lieutenant Colonel looked at him for a long moment. Then he stood up, and began walking around the cabin. The sunlight streamed through the portholes now. The Captain, after weeks in the dim light of the submarine, found the light to be almost unbearably bright. The Lieutenant Colonel stopped his pacing and faced him.

  “Captain, this is an audacious plan. An outrageous mission. To strike back at the American Navy for the crimes they committed against the Jamahiriya,. If it comes to nothing, for whatever reason—they catch you before the carrier comes back, or during your attack—we will have expended a great effort only to be embarrassed again.”