by Tom Clancy
“Very well.” The CO looked over at Admiral Dubro. “Care to lay any bets, sir?”
The best information, oddly enough, came from sonar. Two of the battle group’s escorts had their towed-array sonars, called “tails,” streamed, and their data, combined with that of two nuclear submarines to the formation’s starboard, indicated that the Indian formation was a good way off to the south. It was one of those odd instances, more common than one might expect, where sonar far outperformed radar, whose electronic waves were limited by the curve of the earth, while sound waves found their own deep channels. The Indian fleet was over a hundred fifty miles away, and though that was spitting distance for jet attack aircraft, the Indians were looking to their south, not the north, and it further appeared that Admiral Chandraskatta didn’t relish night-flight operations and the risks they entailed for his limited collection of Harriers. Well, both men thought, night landings on a carrier weren’t exactly fun.
“Better than even,” Admiral Dubro replied after a moment’s analysis.
“I think you’re right.”
The formation was blacked out, not an unusual circumstance for warships, all its radars turned off, and the only radios in use were line-of-sight units with burst-transmission capability, which broadcast for hundredths of seconds only. Even satellite sets generated side-lobes that could betray their position, and their covert passage south of Sri Lanka was essential.
“World War Two was like this,” the CO went on, giving voice to his nerves. They were depending on the most human of fundamentals. Extra lookouts had been posted, who used both regular binoculars and “night-eye” electronic devices to sweep the horizon for silhouettes and mast-tops, while others on lower decks looked closer in for the telltale “feather” of a submarine periscope. The Indians had two submarines out on which Dubro did not have even an approximate location. They were probably probing south, too, but if Chandraskatta was really as smart as he feared, he would have left one close in, just as insurance. Maybe. Dubro’s deception operation had been a skillful one.
“Admiral?” Dubro’s head turned. It was a signalman. “FLASH Traffic from CINCPAC.” The petty officer handed over the clipboard and held a red-covered flashlight over the dispatch so that the battle-group commander could read it.
“Did you acknowledge receipt?” the Admiral asked before he started reading.
“No, sir, you left orders to chimp everything down.”
“Very good, sailor.” Dubro started reading. In a second he was holding both the clipboard and the flashlight. “Son of a bitch!”
Special Agent Robberton would drive Cathy home, and with that notification, Ryan again became a government functionary rather than a human being with a wife and family. It was a short walk to Marine One, its rotor already turning. President and Mrs. Durling, JUMPER and JASMINE, had done the requisite smiles for the cameras and had used the opportunity of the long flight to beg off answering any questions. Ryan trailed behind like some sort of equerry.
“Take an hour to get caught up,” Durling said as the helicopter landed on the south lawn of the White House. “When is the Ambassador scheduled in?”
“Eleven-thirty,” Brett Hanson replied.
“I want you, Arnie, and Jack there for the meeting.”
“Yes, Mr. President,” the Secretary of State acknowledged.
The usual photographers were there, but most of the White House reporters whose shouted questions so annoyed everyone were still back at Andrews collecting their bags. Inside the ground-floor entrance was a larger contingent of Secret Service agents than normal. Ryan headed west and was in his office two minutes later, shedding his coat and sitting down at a desk already decorated with call slips. Those he ignored for the moment, as he lifted the phone and dialed CIA.
“DDO, welcome back, Jack,” Mary Pat Foley said. Ryan didn’t bother asking how she knew it was him. Not that many had her direct line.
“How bad?”
“Our embassy personnel are safe. The embassy has not as yet been entered, and we’re destroying everything.” Station Tokyo, as all CIA stations had become in the last ten years, was completely electronic now. Destroying files was a question of seconds and left no telltale smoke. “Ought to be done by now.” The procedure was straightforward. The various computer disks were erased, reformatted, erased again, then subjected to powerful hand-held magnets. The bad news was that some of the data was irreplaceable, though not so much so as the people who had generated it. There was now a total of three “illegals” in Tokyo, the net human-intelligence assets of the United States in what was—probably—an enemy country.
“What else?”
“They’re letting people travel back and forth to their homes, with escort. Actually they’re playing it pretty cool,” Mrs. Foley said, her surprise not showing. “It’s not like Teheran in ’79, anyway. For communications they’re letting us use satellite links so far, but those are being electronically monitored. The embassy has one STU-6 operating. The rest have been deactivated. We still have TAPDANCE capability, too,” she finished, mentioning the random-pad cipher that all embassies now used through the National Security Agency’s communications net.
“Other assets?” Ryan asked, hoping that his own secure line was not compromised, but using cover procedure even so.
“Without the legals they’re pretty much cut off.” The worry in her voice was clear with that answer, along with quite a bit of self-reproach. The Agency still had operations in quite a few countries that did not absolutely require embassy personnel as part of the loop. But Japan wasn’t one of them, and even Mary Pat couldn’t make hindsight retroactive.
“Do they even know what’s going on?” It was an astute question, the Deputy Director (Operations) thought, and another needle in her flesh.
“Unknown,” Mrs. Foley admitted. “They didn’t get any word to us. They either do not know or have been compromised.” Which was a nicer way of saying arrested.
“Other stations?”
“Jack, we got caught with our knickers down, and that’s a fact.” For all the grief that it had to cause her, Ryan heard, she was reporting facts like a surgeon on the OR. What a shame that Congress would grill her unmercifully for the intelligence lapse. “I have people in Seoul and Beijing shaking the bushes, but I don’t expect anything back from them for hours.”
Ryan was rummaging through his pink call sheets. “I have one here, an hour old, from Golovko ...”
“Hell, call the bastard,” Mary Pat said at once. “Let me know what he says.”
“Will do.” Jack shook his head, remembering what the two men had talked about. “Get down here fast. Bring Ed. I need a gut call on something but not over the phone.”
“Be there in thirty,” Mrs. Foley said.
Jack spread out several faxes on his desk, and scanned them quickly. The Pentagon’s operations people had been faster than the other agencies, but now DIA was checking in, quickly followed by State. The government was awake—nothing like gunfire to accomplish that, Jack thought wryly—but the data was mainly repetitive, different agencies learning the same thing at different times and reporting in as though it were new. He flipped through the call sheets again, and clearly the majority of them would say the same thing. His eyes came back to the one from the chairman of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. Jack lifted the phone and made the call, wondering which of the phones on Golovko’s desk would ring. He took out a scratch pad, noting the time. The Signals Office would take note of the call, of course, and tape it, but he wanted to keep his own notes.
“Hello, Jack.”
“Your private line, Sergey Nikolay’ch?”
“For an old friend, why not?” The Russian paused, ending the joviality for the day. “I presume you know.”
“Oh, yeah.” Ryan thought for a moment before going on. “We were caught by surprise,” he admitted. Jack heard a very Russian grunt of sympathy.
“So were we. Completely. Do you have any idea what th
e madmen are up to?” the RVS Chairman asked, his voice a mixture of anger and concern.
“No, I see nothing at the moment that makes any sense at all.” And perhaps that was the most worrying part of all.
“What plans do you have?”
“Right now? None,” Ryan said. “Their ambassador is due here in less than an hour.”
“Splendid timing on his part,” the Russian commented. “They’ve done this to you before, if memory serves.”
“And to you,” Ryan said, remembering how the Russo-Japanese War had begun. They do like their surprises.
“Yes, Ryan, and to us.” And that, Jack knew, was why Sergey had made the call, and why his voice showed genuine concern. Fear of the unknown wasn’t limited to children, after all, was it? “Can you tell me what sort of assets you have in place to deal with the crisis?”
“I’m not sure at the moment, Sergey,” Ryan lied. “If your Washington rezidentura is up to speed, you know I just got in. I need time to get caught up. Mary Pat is on her way down to my office now.”
“Ah,” Jack heard over the line. Well, it was an obvious lie he’d told, and Sergey was a wise old pro, wise enough to know. “You were very foolish not to have activated THISTLE sooner, my friend.”
“This is an open line, Sergey Nikolay’ch.” Which was partially true. The phone call was routed through the American Embassy in Moscow on a secure circuit, but from there on it was a standard commercial line, probably, and therefore subject to possible bugging.
“You need not be overly concerned, Ivan Emmetovich. Do you recall our conversation in my office?”
Oh, yeah. Maybe the Russians really did have the Japanese counterintelligence chief under their control. If so, he was in a position to know if the phone call was secure or not. And if so, there were some other cards in his hand. Nice ones. Was he offering Ryan a peek?
Think fast, Jack, Ryan commanded himself. Okay, the Russians have another network up and running ...
“Sergey, this is important: you did not have any warning?”
“Jack, on my honor as a spy”—Ryan could almost hear the twisted smile that must be framing the answer—“I just had to tell my President that I was caught with my fly unbuttoned, and the embarrassment to me is even greater than what—”
Jack didn’t bother listening to the embroidery. Okay. The Russians did have another spy network operating in Japan, but they had probably not received any warning either, had they? No, the danger from that sort of double-dealing was just too great. Next fact: their second network was inside the Japanese government itself; had to be if they had PSID penetrated. But THISTLE was mainly a commercial spy net—always had been—and Sergey had just told him that the U.S. had been foolish not to have activated it sooner. The novelty of what he knew distracted Jack from a more subtle implication surrounding the admission of fault from Moscow.
“Sergey Nikolay’ch, I’m short of time here. You are building to something. What is it?”
“I propose cooperation between us. I have the approval of President Grushavoy to make the offer.” He didn’t say full cooperation, Jack noted, but the offer was startling even so.
Never, not ever, not once except in bad movies had KGB and CIA really cooperated on anything important. Sure, the world had changed plenty, but KGB, even in its new incarnation, still worked to penetrate American institutions and remained good at it. That was why you didn’t let them in. But he’d just made the offer anyway. Why?
The Russians are scared. Of what?
“I will present that to my President after consulting with Mary Pat.” Ryan wasn’t yet sure how he would present it. Golovko, however, knew the value of what he’d just laid on the American’s desk. It would not require much insight to speculate on the probable reply.
Again, Ryan could hear the smile. “If Foleyeva does not agree, I will be most surprised. I will be in my office for a few more hours.”
“So will I. Thanks, Sergey.”
“Good day, Dr. Ryan.”
“Well, that sounded interesting,” Robby Jackson said in the doorway. “Looks like you had a long night, too.”
“In an airplane, yet. Coffee?” Jack asked.
The Admiral shook his head. “One more cup and I might shake apart.” He came in and sat down.
“Bad?”
“And getting worse. We’re still trying to tally how many uniformed people we have in Japan—there are some transients. An hour ago a C-141 landed at Yakota and promptly went off the air. The goddamned thing just headed right in,” Robby said. “Maybe a radio problem, more likely they didn’t have the gas to go anywhere else. Flight crew of four, maybe five—I forget. State is trying to run a tally for how many businessmen are there. It ought to generate an approximate number, but there are tourists to consider also.”
“Hostages.” Ryan frowned.
The Admiral nodded. “Figure the ten thousand as a floor figure.”
“The two subs?”
Jackson shook his head. “Dead, no survivors. Stennis has recovered her airplane and is heading for Pearl at about twelve knots. Enterprise is trying to make turns on one shaft, and is under tow, she’s making maybe six. Maybe none if the engine damage is as bad as the CO told us. They’ve sent a big salvage tug to help with that. We’ve sent some P-3s to Midway to do antisubmarine patrols. If I were the other side, I’d try to finish them off. Johnnie Reb ought to be okay, but Big-E is a hell of a ripe target. CINCPAC is worried about that. We’re out of the power-projection business, Jack.”
“Guam?”
“All the Marianas are off the air, except for one thing.” Jackson explained about Oreza. “All he tells us is how bad things are.”
“Recommendations?”
“I have people looking at some ideas, but for starters we need to know if the President wants us to try. Will he?” Robby asked.
“Their ambassador will be here soon.”
“Good of him. You didn’t answer my question, Dr. Ryan.”
“I don’t know the answer yet.”
“There’s a confidence-builder.”
For Captain Bud Sanchez the experience was unique. It was not quite a miracle that he’d recovered the S-3 Viking without incident. The “Hoover” was a docile aircraft floating in, and there had been a whole twenty knots of wind over the deck. Now his entire air wing was back aboard, and his aircraft carrier was running away.
Running away. Not heading into harm’s way, the creed of the United States Navy, but limping back to Pearl. The five squadrons of fighters and attack aircraft on the deck of John Stennis just sat there, lined up in neat rows on the flight deck, all ready for combat operations but except in a really dire emergency unable to take off. It was a question of wind and weight. Carriers turned into the wind to launch and recover aircraft, and needed the most powerful engines placed aboard ships to give the greatest possible airflow over the bow. The moving air added to the takeoff impulse generated by the steam catapults to give lift to the aircraft flung into the air. Their ability to take off was directly governed by that airflow, and more significantly from a tactical point of view, the magnitude of the airflow governed the weight they could carry aloft—which meant fuel and weapons. As it was, he could get airplanes off, but without the gas needed to stay aloft long or to hunt across the ocean for targets, and without the weapons needed to engage those targets. He judged that he had the ability to use fighters to defend the fleet against an air threat out to a radius of perhaps a hundred miles. But there was no air threat, and though they knew the position of the retiring Japanese formations, he did not have the ability to reach them with his attack birds. But then, he didn’t have orders to allow him to do it anyway.
Night at sea is supposed to be a beautiful thing, but it was not so this time. The stars and gibbous moon reflected off the calm surface of the ocean, making everyone nervous. There was easily enough light to spot the ships, blackout or not. The only really active aircraft of his wing were the antisubmarine helicopters whose
blinking anticollision lights sparkled mainly forward of the carriers, aided also by those of some of Johnnie Reb’s escorts. The only good news was that the slow fleet speed made for excellent performance by the sonar systems on the destroyers and frigates, whose large-aperture arrays were streamed out in their wakes. Not too many. The majority of the escorts had lingered behind with Enterprise, circling her in two layers like bodyguards for a chief of state, while one of their number, an Aegis cruiser, tried to help her along with a towing wire, increasing her speed of advance to a whole six and a half knots at the moment. Without a good storm over the bow, Big-E could not conduct flight operations at all.
Submarines, historically the greatest threat to carriers, might be out there. Pearl Harbor said that they had no contacts at all in the vicinity of the now-divided battle force, but that was an easy thing to say from a shore base. The sonar operators, urged by nervous officers to miss nothing, were instead finding things that weren’t there: eddies in the water, echoes of conversing fish, whatever. The nervous state of the formation was manifested by the way a frigate five miles out increased speed and turned sharply left, her sonar undoubtedly pinging away now, probably at nothing more than the excited imagination of a sonarman third-class who might or might not have heard a whale fart. Maybe two farts, Captain Sanchez thought. One of his own Seahawks was hovering low over the surface, dipping her sonar dome to do her own sniffing. One thousand three hundred miles back to Pearl Harbor, Sanchez thought. Twelve knots. That came to four and a half days. Every mile of it under the threat of submarine attack.
The other question was: what genius had thought that pulling back from the Western Pacific had been a good idea? Was the United States a global power or not? Projecting power around the world was important, wasn’t it? Certainly it had been, Sanchez thought, remembering his classes at the War College. Newport had been his last “tour” prior to undertaking the position of Commander, Air Wing. The U.S. Navy had been the balance of power over the entire world for two generations, able to intimidate merely by existing, merely by letting people see the pictures in their updated copies of Jane’s Fighting Ships. You could never know where those ships were. You could only count the empty berths in the great naval bases and wonder. Well, there wouldn’t be much wondering now. The two biggest graving docks at Pearl Harbor would be full for some time to come, and if the news of the Marianas was correct, America lacked the mobile firepower to take them back, even if Mike Dubro decided to act like Seventh Cavalry and race back home.