China Attacks

by Chuck DeVore

  700 yards away to the north the crew of the USS Dubuque heard the sonic booms and fired a round of chaff. This was fortunate as six missiles were homing in on the ship. The extra 2.5 seconds of reaction time added another 88 feet of distance between the chaff cloud and the ship. The Mk 36 chaff system claimed two missiles. Within three seconds the other four missiles dove into the ship from 100 feet up, each impacting just ten to 20 feet above the water line, then detonating deep within the ship. The blasts tore through the hull. Water poured into the wounded port side. The ship was listing 35 degrees within a half-minute.

  The Dubuque was mortally wounded. Her captain, Commander Peggy Brown, lay dying in her CIC—the first American female ship captain to die in combat. Her last, desperate thoughts were of her two sons who would now grow up without their mother.

  The USS Belleau Wood presented the largest and most lucrative target for the missiles. Eight missiles streaked towards the 820-foot ship. They dove to just under 100 feet above the ocean and began their active radar sweep. The Mk 36 chaff system’s wiring had been burnt through and wasn’t repaired yet. Both Phalanx systems were still off line.

  Some 600 yards to the north of the Belleau Wood, the USS Curtis Wilbur’s crew had helplessly watched as one of ships it was to protect was struck, then two. The repair crew on the aft CIWS replaced the last burnt out black box and restored power. On automatic search mode, the CIWS scanned the skies for the fast Doppler shift of an incoming missile. It found its first target—brrrrapp, brrrapp—hundreds of 20mm rounds cracked down range to intercept the missiles. The CIWS is an excellent defense of last resort for a ship under attack, especially if the missile is coming directly at the ship. However, for an oblique defense, the system is less than optimal. The CIWS downed two of the eight missiles heading for the Belleau Wood, then the system picked up two missiles bound for the Curtis Wilbur itself and turned to face the new threats.

  Six C-301s began their final dive on the Belleau Wood from 100 feet. The first two struck center mass amidships, burrowing their way through 20 feet of hull and decking before exploding. Colonel Flint was on the flight deck preparing to board his UH-1N flying command post. The concussions of the twin explosions knocked him off his feet.

  The third missile struck the bridge, instantly killing the PHIBRON 11 Commodore, Captain Bright and the captain in command of the Belleau Wood.

  The fourth missile found the gaping hole created by the first two and traveled 30 feet within the ship before striking enough metal to trigger the penetrating warhead’s timer. The warhead traveled another 20 feet before detonating against the keel. Water began rushing in through a 15-foot hole in the bottom of the ship.

  The fifth missile tore through the flight deck aft and wrecked the well deck’s water barrier.

  Colonel Flint picked himself up and boarded his Huey chopper. Several staff officers were also on board. He saw another UH-1N airborne too. He hoped Rez and the XO made it. The skids of the helicopter lifted off the flight deck.

  The last missile doomed the crippled ship. Flying through the same hole traveled and enlarged by three previous missiles, it reached two-thirds of the way through the beam of the ship before exploding, breaking the ship’s back. The front half of the ship lifted up and away from the still underway stern. Thousands of tons of water slammed against the exposed leading edge of the stern at 20 miles per hour, crushing bulkheads and flinging aside watertight hatches. The sudden deceleration swept a Harrier off the flight deck and into the sea. Within ten seconds only 20 feet of the now stopped stern was visible above the waves, its twin propellers pointing uselessly at the gray sky. More than 100 male and female sailors were dead or soon destined to be.

  The last two of the first wave of 30 missiles descended on the USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG-54). The CIWS’ wall of super-dense tungsten bolts downed one. The other pushed on, decoyed slightly to the stern by the chaff. The missile struck aft, destroying the engine room and killing 26 sailors and wounding another ten.

  In less than 90 seconds, the four ships of PHIBRON 11 were badly hit. The flagship was torn in two and sinking, the USS Dubuque would soon capsize, the USS Germantown sustained serious damage but still had power, and the USS Curtis Wilbur was on fire and dead in the water. The human cost was dramatic by modern American standards: 580 dead or missing, and 322 wounded. It could have been worse.

  Due to Colonel Flint’s foresight and aggressive actions all but three of 31st MEU’s aircraft were in flight while every operational LCAC and assault amphibian was in the water. In all, he had 18 Sea Knights, nine Super Stallions, four Super Cobras, two Hueys, and five Harriers carrying 781 Marines, including crew, safe in the air—for the moment. In addition, he had another 65 Marines and seamen aboard five LCACs and 264 Marines inside 11 Assault Amphibians. Colonel Flint had half of his 2,200 Marines on the move, one step ahead of disaster. With hard work and Providence, he’d make landfall quickly and return to rescue as many Marines and sailors as possible.

  * * *

  Donna Klein was burning to speak with Jack Benson all day. He was either avoiding her or engaged in meetings. She couldn’t stand it anymore—she had time critical information and analysis to discuss.

  She decided to risk a call to her old boss Mr. Scott—her boss’ boss. “No, Ms. Klein,” Mr. Scott’s secretary droned, “Mr. Scott is not available, he is in a meeting right now.” And, so it went for the remainder of the afternoon—What a Friday.

  Finally, at 7:10 PM, she decided to personally visit Mr. Scott. Donna again called Mr. Scott’s office. Surprisingly, the secretary was still at her post. Donna had no patience for this. “Is Mr. Scott in his office?” she inquired, barely keeping a diplomatic tone.

  “Yes, Ms. Klein. . .” Donna hung up and raced upstairs to the Office of the Director of Asian Pacific and Latin American Affairs.

  The secretary looked alarmed to see her and moved to stop her. Donna swerved to avoid the woman’s intercept, knocked twice and threw open the door without waiting for an invitation. She was surprised to see her boss, Jack Benson, the China section chief.

  “Donna. . .” Mr. Scott began.

  “Look, I’m sorry to do this, but I’m certain. . .” Mr. Scott’s secretary was on the phone behind the open door.

  Mr. Scott spoke, “Ms. Kesler, it’s okay,” he said to his secretary. “Donna, please close the door behind you.”

  “Sir, I have to talk to you about China. I’m convinced they are preparing to invade Taiwan, probably within the next day or two!” Donna was flushed and still short of breath from her bolt up the stairs.

  Benson broke in, sounding calm and reassured, “That’s why I’m here, I was just telling my boss that I believe China will try to take Quemoy in an attempt to force the issue of reunification, focus domestic attention away from the growing list of problems there, and challenge the U.S. to back away from its vague defense commitments to Taiwan. You know the Chinese just announced a temporary naval exclusion zone to block international traffic through the Taiwan Strait. We even have indications that they have shipped large quantities of fuel, food and equipment to North Korea, probably to distract us from their true objective.”

  “No! That’s not it at all!” Donna paused, gathered her herself and fixed her gaze solidly at Mr. Scott, “The PRC is going to invade Taiwan proper. They’re going to do it within 48 hours, and they’re going to do it with enough force to crush resistance within days. They intend to present us with a fait accompli—there’ll be no way we can intervene in time. We’ll be faced with the choice of accepting Chinese aggression or mounting a costly assault on a prepared defense on a small island against a nation with four times as many people and the world’s second largest economy! This isn’t Serbia or Indonesia we’re talking about here. China can defeat us if she sets her mind to do so!”

  Jack Benson looked angry and embarrassed. Donna had committed the ultimate sin: she went over his head to his boss with a harebrained, lunatic fringe story and tried to pass it off as rea
l intelligence, “I’m sorry for this outburst Mr. Scott. You know the pressure Donna’s been under recently. Donna, see me in my office immediately!” Benson started to get up.

  Mr. Scott said firmly, “Donna, stay right here. Jack, remember what it was like during the Cold War? Remember when the Chinese invaded Vietnam in 1979 and you were the only analyst to call it? Remember how everyone ignored you until it was already underway? Well, damn it Jack, let your analyst have her day. Donna may be politically incorrect in her suspicions of Chinese motives, but has she yet been wrong on anything important?”

  Scott’s STU-IX secure phone rang. He picked it up, “Scott here.” His whole countenance dropped as he fell back into his chair. “Yes, I understand. . . Benson’s here right now. . . Klein? Of course she’s available. . . Yes, I understand.”

  Mr. Scott hung up and buried his face in his hands. He inhaled deeply, gathered his strength and faced Donna, all but forgetting Jack Benson. “Donna, that was our desk at NORAD, the PRC just detonated at least one nuclear device over Taiwan. We’re getting indications that a couple of civilian satellites in LEO (Low Earth Orbit) over the Asia-Pacific region have been damaged or destroyed. Probably a low Earth orbit EMP attack. By the way, the Pentagon wants you down at the NMCC (the National Military Command Center) ASAP. The Joint Chiefs’ office asked for you by name. They want someone with a solid handle on the Chinese to provide immediate on-the-spot crisis management assistance.”

  Donna looked devastated, “I’m sorry I failed sir. I didn’t provide enough warning. I. . .”

  Mr. Scott put up his hand and said, “Donna, Donna! Don’t beat yourself up! You’re the only one in the building who called it. You can’t help it we were so blinded by the official policy of engagement, appeasement, whatever, that we didn’t want to see it coming.” He looked at Benson. His tone shifted to gentle encouragement, “Besides, you’ve got a job to do and you’re obviously better suited for it than anyone else around here. I’ll call for a car. Donna looked up, she had started to cry but was recovering quickly. She had a job to do and the future of her nation was in the balance.

  22

  Blocking the Eagle

  The Panama Canal had been a key part of American defense plans for an entire century. All U.S. fighting ships were designed to be just thin enough to transit the canal. Aside from its obvious economic benefits, the canal provided the U.S. Navy with crucial strategic mobility. Without the canal, shifting naval power from the Atlantic to the Pacific and vice versa would take two added weeks as the ships had to head south to transit the Drake Passage.

  It had been many years since the Canal Zone was American territory. Now, it was no longer home to American troops either. In fact, a Hong Kong-based Chinese company had purchased key commercial concessions in the former Canal Zone—in effect, China now ran the canal that the United States had dug almost 100 years before.

  Regardless of the canal’s status, it was very vulnerable to sabotage. On Friday evening, only an hour after China’s attack on Taiwan, a large, but aging ship from China’s COSCO line weighed anchor and entered the Miraflores Locks just outside of Panama City.

  A Panamanian official inspected the ship. But a $2,000 cash bribe kept him from being too curious.

  The freighter was carrying ammonium nitrate. Tens of thousands of gallons of diesel fuel from the ship’s fuel bunkers had been sprayed into the cargo hold two days before. A PLA special operations demolition team placed thousands of pounds of explosives on top of the now 25,000-ton fertilizer bomb. They then covered the explosives with drums of sand to direct the blast downward.

  Once in the locks the demolition team set the timers on the explosives. The first device to detonate was an incendiary bomb in the engine room. Its flames quickly engulfed the compartment, trapping three crewmembers. This “accident” was to provide the barest of cover to throw the Americans off and conceal the enormous magnitude of the coordination involved in the Chinese attack.

  With the fire out of control, the demolition team spread panic and warned the crew to abandon ship. Climbing down ropes, 29 merchant crewmen and demolition team members escaped from the doomed ship. The sailors stayed on the concrete casing of the lock, close to their vessel. The ten-member demolition team ran hundreds of meters away to the top of a small tree-covered hill. Panamanian security thought it odd but simply marked it up to fear—the smoking ship gave them bigger and more immediate concerns to deal with.

  The explosives detonated with perfect timing. The shock wave heated and compressed the mixture of fertilizer and diesel. This action allowed the rapid release of the stored chemical energy in the mixture. In less than a second, almost 10,000 tons of explosive fuel had released its fury, unharnessing the equivalent of a two-kiloton nuclear bomb.

  The lock the ship rested in was the first casualty. The lock’s towering but hollow steel doors, with their internal piping and valves, blew out like pieces of aluminum foil. This itself would not have presented a huge problem as the Canal Authority had spare lock doors as well as a second lock channel for opposing traffic just 60 feet away. Unfortunately, the massive fertilizer bomb had a more ambitious purpose than simply cutting the Panama Canal’s traffic in half for a few days. The true target of the assault was the lock’s concrete casing. The explosion shattered the casing, rupturing the water lines that power the canal’s hydraulics. It also destroyed the rails upon which the diesel train engines worked as tugs to pull the ships along the lock system. The huge shock wave continued to propagate through the concrete and earth, seeking voids and weak spots. When the wave reached the empty lock for Pacific-bound traffic it collapsed the concrete wall into the lock. The Panama Canal would be shut down for many, many months.

  With the exception of the demolition team members, every witness to the “accident” died in the explosion. The demolition team, deaf and bleeding at the nose and ears from the concussive overpressure, straggled into the outskirts of Panama City. They soon found their safe house. They cleaned up and changed their clothes. Within an hour they transferred to another safe house. They were prepared to remain out of sight for a very long time.

  23

  Build-up

  Fu Zemin loved irony. Here he was, a Communist Party official, flying in as a conqueror to an airport named after a man who dedicated his career to fighting Communists. Chiang Kai-Shek International Airport was an hour away from Zhangzhou by way of the twin turboprop Y-7 he was aboard. Fu knew the ROC air force had to be substantially destroyed before someone of his stature would be allowed to make the flight over, but that still didn’t make him feel entirely comfortable flying in a small, slow airplane.

  Just prior to leaving, a liaison from PLA Military Intelligence boarded the aircraft. The officer presented his papers to Fu. “Comrade Fu, I am Major General Wei. My job is to keep you current on the strategic and operational situation. The Party leadership believes your assessments will be of greater utility to them if you are kept informed.”

  Fu felt the surge of pride and power well up within him. He had his own general of intelligence to brief him—now that was prestige. “Please, General Wei, be seated and tell me what you know about our efforts.”

  “Sir, my information is only,” the general glanced at his watch, “15 minutes old.” It was 10:30 AM. “Sir, I understand you read the briefing packet that gave you a detailed understanding of the strategic situation?”

  “Yes.”

  “So then, I will concentrate on the recent operational details.” The general was obviously used to briefing VIPs. He was completely at ease.

  “Comrade Fu, first, the enemy overview. Prior to our electro-magnetic attack, the ROC ground forces were estimated to be at 50 percent effective manning levels due to the genetically engineered flu virus we introduced on the island 11 days ago. The electro-magnetic attack should result in a further erosion of their military effectiveness through degraded command, control and communications ability. We destroyed 40 to 60% of the ROC Air Force. And we est
imate ROC Navy losses to be in excess of 60%.”

  “What about the American flotilla at the south end of the Straits?” Fu demanded.

  “We have no word on them. We warned them not to enter the Taiwan Strait. We currently have no specific information on them, their location or their condition.”

  “The moment you hear anything about the Americans, I want to know.”

  “Yes sir. Now, if you please, I will brief you on the friendly situation. Using deceptive measures we have landed strong forces on Taiwan by unconventional means. Friendly casualties have been remarkably light. We have 10,000 soldiers of the 37th Infantry Division Keelung only 15 miles northeast of Taipei. We have reinforced regiments of about 4,000 men each in all three of the major west coast ports: Taichung, Tainan, and Kaohsiung.

  We have air dropped a regiment of the 2nd Airborne Division on Shalu to help secure Taichung’s harbor for follow-on forces. We have also air dropped the remainder of the 2nd Airborne Division on Highway 1, nine kilometer southeast of CKS Airport. Lastly, we have airlanded a battalion of commandos at CKS and secured the airport. Other airborne and airlanding operations are in progress.

  “Beginning one hour after we captured the airport we have been landing aircraft every five minutes at CKS. By now we ought to have an entire regiment of the 87th Infantry Division in place with one regiment arriving every hour. Using commercial shipping and civilian ferries, reinforcements will arrive by sea in less than eight hours at every port facility we have seized. We have pressed into service every ocean-capable ferry in China from Guangzhou to Shanghai as well as most of our nearby merchant fleet. Our conventional amphibious forces will concentrate on landing troops and armor at Keelung and on the beaches near CKS.