Kilo Class (1998)

by Patrick Robinson

Today the tourist boats do not enter here. And the military keeps a watchful eye on the canal to make sure that it is running efficiently. But just as the submarines looked so alien, so outlandish, on the lovely waters of the lake, their jet black hulls look at home in the waters of the Belomorski—because they are ultimately instruments of death, and the canal is a place of remembered death. The shades of sadness will never leave here.

  THE RUSSIAN WATERWAY. The Russian Navy’s two-thousand-mile-long inland submarine route along rivers, lakes, and canals—the great private waterway that joins the Black Sea and the White Sea.

  The slow eight-hundred-mile journey from Volgograd to Nizhny through often congested industrial waters would be a long one for the empty Tolkach barges. Admiral George Morris looked at the pictures taken off the Volgograd waterfront, and then at those of the three Kilos. There was little doubt in his mind. The Russian diesel-electrics were nearing completion, and the two gigantic transporters were on their way to pick them up. The Admiral assessed they would average sixty miles each day, which would put them off the Red Sormovo yard in about two weeks.

  He went to a computerized screen and pulled up a map of central Russia. It was hard to assess the speed of the Tolkachs when loaded, but they’d probably average five knots and make a steady 120 miles a day. That would put them at the entrance to the canal a week after their departure. George Morris thought the loading time in Red Sormovo might take anything between two and four weeks, given last-minute corrections and repairs. He guessed, correctly, that the Chinese would have their top technicians at the shipyard, signing off on everything before China would pay the next installments on the $900 million price of the three Kilos.

  On reflection he decided four weeks loading time might be closer to the mark than two, and he began to assume that the submarines would be out of Nizhny and on their way north some time around the first week in June. The ex-Carrier Battle Group Commander frowned and wondered whether the Chinese and the Russians had yet decided that the loss of K-4 and K-5 was no accident, and that the culprits were probably operating under the flag of the United States.

  He noted the almost 750-mile distance between Nizhny and the White Sea, and he deliberated about the strength of the Chinese escort. He wondered whether the submarines would travel under their own power, as the last Kilos from the North had done. Or whether they would make the journey on freighters, like China’s first three. One thing, however, was certain: there was no way the USA was going to allow the submarines to arrive in China.

  George Morris was uncertain about the best course of action for the USA. As far as he could guess, if the Kilos were to make the transit under their own power, they would be given a strong Russian escort force. They would be fully armed, and there was no way a covert US operation could remove all three. Not that he could see. Not without a sizable support force. And George Morris knew SUBLANT would be reluctant to employ its Los Angeles Class boats in any other capacity than that of the lone hunter-killer.

  To destroy the three Kilos traveling under heavy Russian escort…well, as far as George could see, you’d be talking about a US Navy Task Group stalking three brand-new Russian submarines, plus another couple of ex-Soviet hunter-killers, not to mention several frigates…“Jesus Christ!” he muttered. “This is beginning to sound like the Battle of Midway. We can’t do anything like that. I guess it’s Arnold’s problem.”

  The Admiral walked over to his desk. It was 0515. His duty was clear. Admiral Morgan had insisted he be informed the instant there was any development with the Kilos currently under construction. He picked up the telephone and dialed Admiral Morgan’s home number in Montpelier. The ex-Intelligence chief had been awake for fifteen minutes and picked up the phone immediately, answering in the refined manner that had endeared him to so many high-ranking politicians and officers.

  “Morgan. Speak.”

  “Good morning, Admiral. George Morris. Sorry about the time.”

  “If I was, or ever had been, worried about the goddamned time, George,” growled Morgan, “the world would doubtless be a more dangerous place. Shoot.”

  “Your three friends, Admiral. I have some pictures I know you’ll want to see right away. Your place or mine.”

  “I’ll be with you in fifteen,” snapped Morgan, and he slammed down the phone, leaving Admiral Morris standing awkwardly in a roomful of people, with the phone still to his ear.

  The Admiral did what many other people had done in similar situations with his irascible predecessor, who rarely if ever hung around for telephonic etiquette once he had heard what he wanted to hear and hung up.

  “Yes, okay then, Admiral,” he said, speaking into the dead phone. “See you then. ’Bye.”

  By which time Arnold Morgan was burning rubber on his own driveway, driving himself from home directly to Fort Meade. He arrived at the National Security Agency in near-record time. His steely presence galvanized the night staff into action, and a two-man escort accompanied him to Admiral Morris’s office, where the resident Director had already ordered coffee for them both. “Black with buckshot” for the Big Man, which at least alerted the entire building as to the forthcoming arrival of their former boss. George Morris vacated his desk for Arnold Morgan, who now sat quietly studying the picture taken from space. “Yup,” he said. “Yup, George. You got it. These babies are on their way, real soon.”

  Admiral Morris explained his fears about a serious confrontation in the Atlantic, with a small flotilla of American ships effectively doing battle with the Russians.

  Morgan waited. He did not wish to betray the fact that his plans had been in place for several weeks. Nor did he wish to tell anyone about them. “Don’t worry about the details, George,” Morgan said. “I’ve had this in hand since the day we found out the Russians had put the Chinese right at the front of the Kilo build-stream.”

  He turned and stared at the Fort Meade Director and said grimly, “I want to thank you and your team for your vigilance in this matter. Right now there’s no need for you to know more. Just keep me posted every inch of the way.”

  Then he lightened, just a shade. “George, old buddy, as you well know, we each have to sit in our own chairs in this game. You in yours and I in mine.” The fact that Arnold Morgan was actually sitting in George’s chair at George’s desk, at that precise moment, was regarded by both men as irrelevant.

  The bells of the watch tolled for 0800 on the Director’s maritime clock as the Admiral left Fort Meade. He decided not to stop at home but to press on for the White House. He arrived at 0930, turned the engine off, and told someone to take care of his car, and to tell Charlie, his chauffeur, to call him on the telephone.

  He arrived at his office in the West Wing just as the chauffeur was put through from the garage. “Charlie,” he said, “go get my car from wherever the hell it’s parked, and get it back to my home in Montpelier. Then return here with the office car and be on parade by 1230. I could be moving in a lot of directions.”

  “Yessir. But sir, how do I get back here from your house in Montpelier?”

  “Charlie.” Admiral Morgan spoke kindly and patiently. “Right now I’m tackling two or three very minor matters at once—I’m trying to ensure the northwestern area of the Pacific stays safe and secure for world shipping; I’m trying to retain our dominance over the Taiwan Strait; and I may have to kick a few Chinese butts…Just get my car down here, now!

  “Charlie…Charlie…I know your problems are many…BUT WOULD YOU JUST GET MY FUCKING CAR TO MONTPELIER? AND THEN GET YOUR ASS BACK HERE ON THE DOUBLE, BEARING IN MIND THAT I DO NOT GIVE A FLYING FUCK IF YOU NEED TO HIRE THE SPACE SHUTTLE IN ORDER TO ACHIEVE IT.”

  Charlie was about to drop the phone in terror when the Admiral softened again. “Try your best, Charlie,” he said as he hung up the phone. “It is only because of these immense problems that men such as yourself are hired.”

  He replaced the phone, grinning at a new degree of wit that he found himself increasingly utilizing. Life a
t the White House was smoothing away the rougher edges of his choleric personality. Nearly.

  He picked up the phone again and asked the operator to connect him to the Director’s office at Fort Meade. He was told that Admiral Morris had left for the Pentagon and would not be back before lunch. He could be located with Admiral Joe Mulligan. Not wanting to alert the entire Navy about the developing Kilo situation, Arnold Morgan elected not to interrupt the meeting in the office of the CNO, even though the Admiral himself would not have hesitated to interrupt a conversation between God and the Pope if he believed that it fell within the military interests of his beloved United States.

  He glanced at his watch. It was now 0945, which meant it was 0645 in California. No good. Admiral John Bergstrom would not yet be at his desk. “Lazy prick,” snarled Morgan impatiently. “Have to give him another hour.”

  He gazed at his map, absentmindedly picking up a jade-handled magnifying glass. He found himself looking closely at the waters of Russia’s enormous Lake Onega, the 120-mile stretch through which the Kilos would have to travel on their way to the Belomorski Canal. He had asked Fort Meade to run through their records, through all of their recorded photographic evidence, to try to find a pattern in the outlandish inland waterway journeys of the Russian submarines.

  “There must be something,” he murmured. “Someplace where they stop, refuel, or change guard…someplace where they might be vulnerable.” He stared at the map, noted the position of the island of Kizhi, and then considered the largest port on the lake, Petrozavodsk. Arnold knew the name meant Peter’s Factory. He also knew that Peter the Great had converted the entire place into a cannon foundry, ransacking the town and nearby areas of all of their metal in order to melt it down for artillery hardware in the early eighteenth century.

  The result was, of course, that Peter had forced the Swedes into submission in the Great Northern War of 1700-1712. “If I can just get this situation in order, I’ll give ’em some more scrap metal to fuck around with,” he growled. “I just need someone to get some kind of pattern on those submarine internal delivery voyages.”

  It was hard to decide whom he was more irritated with—Admiral Morris, Admiral Bergstrom, or “the goddamned Soviets.” On reflection he decided it was probably a dead heat—with Charlie the chauffeur right in there behind ’em.

  He informed a secretary that he was deeply depressed by the current absence of coffee. When it finally arrived, he slurped it in solitude, leaning back from his desk, trying to ensure his own thoughts, so that the immediate future of the Kilos would be the product of solid, well-reasoned military logic.

  “You have to start with one fact,” he declared to himself. “These three little bastards ain’t never gonna get to the South China Sea. Not to that ocean, nor to any other.

  “And that gives us three military options, and only three…Option (A): we arrange an air strike and blow them to pieces, right there in the shipyard where the satellites have been watching their progress for almost two years. This would of course instantly start World War III.

  “Or, we could go to Option (B). Wait for the Russians to load them, and then obliterate the barges and their cargo with a missile strike. This would also detonate World War III.

  “Option (C) is even simpler. Another air strike to blow up a section of the 125-mile-long Belomorski Canal, which would end the northern journey of the submarines, and for that matter the northern journeys of everyone else. You might need a nuclear device for this, but you might not, if you could launch a big enough bomb or missile. Either way, here comes World War III—which essentially renders options A, B, and C out of the question. Therefore, it remains as I have thought from the beginning. It’s gotta be Special Forces. And it’s not gonna be easy.”

  He returned to the table and looked at the canal. “The trick is,” he said to himself, “to confuse the life out of the goddamned Russians. Maybe get ’em to blame someone else. We are going to have to get stealthy. Our big problem is technology and organization. I just wonder what the hell time Bergstrom elects to get out of the sack. And what time Morris intends to terminate his banquet at the Pentagon.”

  He was suddenly preoccupied with Admiral Bergstrom. The head of SPECWARCOM had endured a late night and would not be at his desk before 0800, which was 1100 Morgan time. And Morris? The President’s NSA had underestimated him.

  As soon as he arrived at the CNO’s outer office, George Morris had called Fort Meade and told them to give Admiral Morgan the latest update on the submarine journeys. Lieutenant John Harrison was now on the line to the White House, being put through to the office of the National Security Adviser.

  “Morgan. Speak.”

  “Er, Admiral…Lieutenant Harrison, Fort Meade. The line’s secure. I’m calling for Admiral Morris, who thought you would like to be updated on our search for a journey pattern on the Russian boats.”

  “He was right. Shoot.”

  “Sir. Well, as you know, we’ve gone back around twenty-five years, studying all of the submarine journeys out of Gorky up to the White Sea. Naturally we do not have data on them all, but we have a lot, around fifty…and there is just one thing we think stands out—they all seem to stop at a certain point on Lake Onega, right up in the way north, on the left, beyond Petrozavodsk. It was difficult to find a reason, but in the end we came up with something very simple. Each time they stopped, there was a buildup of traffic astern of the barges. We think they pulled over to free up the north waterway, take a break, and get some sleep. Our notes suggest they stopped at around 2100, then set off again at around 0500.”

  “Interesting. And very helpful, Lieutenant. I’m grateful. Have you finished writing it up?”

  “Almost, sir. Say one hour from now.”

  “Okay, Lieutenant. I’ll send an officer down to collect it, usual high security…manacled briefcase…Mark the envelope for limited distribution—Top Secret, US Eyes Only.

  “My own White House chauffeur will drive him…Charlie…tall, gray-haired guy around fifty. He ain’t that swift of thought, so call him by name or he might get bewildered.”

  The Lieutenant laughed. But he had no time to start wondering why such an apparently minor point should have earned the dreaded Admiral Morgan’s gratitude because the phone was dropped back on its hook with a resounding clunk, and young John Harrison was holding a dead phone to his ear just as his boss had earlier in the day.

  Arnold Morgan poured himself more coffee and instructed a secretary to locate a detailed map of Lake Onega. It was almost 1100 and he also told her to get Admiral Bergstrom on the line. As it happened, he wasn’t in yet, but the call came bouncing back from US Navy SEAL headquarters by 0815 Pacific Daylight Time.

  By then, the Admiral had commandeered a finely detailed map of the lake, and he gruffly asked Bergstrom if he wanted him, Morgan, to do all of his work while the SEAL boss slumbered in the West Coast sun, or whether he was proposing to pull his act together.

  “If you had been on the receiving end of my luck last night, Arnie, you would not begrudge me my few moments of pleasure,” Admiral Bergstrom told him.

  Admiral Morgan chuckled. “How are you, John?” he said. “Sorry I’ve been out of touch, but I wanted to wait until I had something definite to tell you, and now I have.”

  “Are we looking at a basic plan similar to what we discussed?”

  “Exactly that. We should meet soonest.”

  “You want me to come to Washington, or will you come out here?”

  “The latter. Two days from now. As you know the Chief’s coming to LA for the day. I can get a ride—they’ll drop me off in San Diego.”

  “Jesus. You sure you can use that aircraft like a taxi?”

  “No problem. I’ll be in San Diego around 0900. Get someone to meet me, John. I’ll need a lift back to the airport around 1600—we want to be home by midnight if possible.”

  “Right. I’ll start to get this revved up. What’s our priority?”

  “Timing and
recce.”

  “Okay. You want me to alert the guys. You know they’re all in place?”

  “Yeah. We better get three of ’em moving within three days. Right after you and I finish.”

  “Okay, Arnie. I’ll start it up. Look forward to seeing you before 1000 day after tomorrow.”

  Air Force One touched down at San Diego’s Lindbergh Field at precisely 0900 and headed for the seclusion of an outer runway. The airway steps were down for exactly forty-five seconds, and Admiral Morgan was out and gone, ensconced in the backseat of a US Navy staff car. By the time he reached the airport freeway exit, Air Force One was off the ground and heading north for LA.

  The Navy driver swung onto the Pacific Highway

  heading south, and the road began to climb the spectacular curved bridge that crosses San Diego Bay on towering concrete stilts, like a mammoth centipede, 140 feet above the water. From its high point, the bridge curves steeply down to the island of Coronado, headquarters of the US Navy SEALs. Surrounded by heavy-duty wire, and patrolled by armed devils disguised as men, the SEAL base is not a place that invites intruders.