by Don Brown
"We'll piggyback under the freighter through the Sea of Marmara to the entrance of the Bosphorus. If we slip though, they cut us loose about twenty miles into the Black Sea, and we go hunting." Frank looked at Pete. "Skipper?"
Pete rose as Frank returned to his seat. "Gentlemen, we have several complicating factors. First, we're in a race against time. Alexander Popovich could get out of the Black Sea before we get in. Now one advantage we have is speed. We're three times faster than the freighter.
"Also, intel now believes that this freighter is scheduled to make a port visit to Odessa in Ukraine before leaving the Black Sea. If that's true, that could be our lucky break. This means that if we clear the Bosphorus, we'll sail due north and set our patrol area off the Ukrainian coast, in the waters off Odessa. Hopefully, we'll spot her and sink her before she ever makes that port visit.
"Now if we miss her, then the USS Charlotte is on submerged patrol in the northeastern sector of the Aegean Sea. Charlotte is Honolulu's backup, just in case. If she gets that plutonium past both subs, we've lost this game."
A new round of concerned glances.
"Any questions?"
There were none.
"Be ready. Be on your toes. And pray that God's will be done. I'll be in my stateroom for about thirty minutes. Until then, the XO has the conn."
Vandenberg Air Force Base Near Lompoc, California
Kent Pendleton brought the binoculars to his eyes and adjusted the focus into full view. The vertical tower sitting atop the launch pad was two miles downrange from the observation platform, but the powerful binoculars brought the sight into full focus.
White steam spewed from the base and sides of the illuminated Delta II rocket, as the countdown echoed from loudspeakers blaring in the observation area and flight control rooms.
"Ten… nine… eight… seven… six… Ignition sequence started…"
The rocket shook on the pad under the igniting combustion of its boosters.
"… four… three… two… one… We have ignition!"
Orange fire and white smoke mushroomed from the base of the launch tower.
"We have liftoff!"
The Delta II lifted into the sky… first slowly, as if a giant, invisible hand was gently raising it off the ground, and then rapidly gaining speed, shooting through the sky like a blazing rock shot from a slingshot.
Streaking a ghastly white mark across the heavenly twilight, it turned on a trajectory headed into the southern sky, growing smaller, smaller, and finally disappearing behind its wispy jet stream.
Five minutes later, a second Delta II burst into the sky, blazing across the heavens to the south, seemingly in pursuit of its predecessor.
Kent checked his watch. Good. Ahead of schedule.
His job here was done. Sure, it was a long shot, but a long shot was better than no shot. Barring computer or mechanical malfunctions, Redwoods I and II, the satellites sitting atop the Delta rockets, would reach their destinations before he got back to Washington. Now, if the cameras on board those satellites could just get a lucky shot at the Alexander Popovich.
The USS Honolulu The Aegean Sea
The captain's stateroom on board a Los Angeles – class nuclear submarine was not much larger than a walk-in closet. Even so, considering the sardine-can berthing arrangements available to the rest of the crew, the captain's quarters was a haven of luxury.
Once the Honolulu rendezvoused with the freighter Volga River, there would be no time for sleep. From that point on, the skipper would need to be as well rested as possible.
In drill after drill throughout the years, Pete had learned the importance of sleeping when one could. Clarity of thinking would be required for dozens of decisions with dangerous implications that could mean the difference between success and failure or life and death. Of course, in the Cold War and the uneasy peace that followed, Pete's naval career was a series of drills and high-stakes war games.
But this mission was no game. Torpedoes would be fired in defense from a larger threat. Real people would die. His boat would become the most hunted warship in the world.
For the benefit of his crew, to insure that their captain was fresh, Pete Miranda positioned the pillow under his head, flipped off the small lamp, and lay faceup on his rack.
Darkness was never complete on a submarine. Light streamed under the hatch separating his stateroom from the passageway. Sounds of sailors passing by outside, though muffled, constantly reminded him of his surroundings.
Pete flipped the lamp back on, then reached down into the locker under his rack and felt the blue photo album that he always kept there. Other than his U.S. Navy uniforms, the album was about the only thing he'd gotten to keep following the divorce.
His daughter Hannah had taken gold, glittery paint and written the word Memories on the outside. Inside, she had arranged a panorama of photographs that told the colorful story of his life with Sally and the kids in the years before the divorce.
The first photo, an eight-by-ten image of Pete as a slim, young lieutenant j.g., in his summer dress whites, showed him holding Hannah in his arms in front of the pink and green bougainvillea vine in their front yard at their home in California. She first came home from the hospital that day, and the photo taken on that August morning revealed the head of black hair.
The commander drank in the sight of his baby girl. She was the most beautiful little baby ever born. And she was his little girl.
Until the divorce.
The blare of the 1MC shocked him out of his daydream.
"Alert one! Alert one! Incoming emergency action message! Alert one! Alert one! Incoming EAM!"
Pete dropped the album on the rack and swung his feet onto the deck.
"Captain Miranda, report to the conn, please!"
Pete picked up the phone line connecting to the control room. "CO here. On my way."
He scrambled out the hatch, turned right, and sprinted along the steel grated floors. Sailors stood back, clearing a pathway for their commander.
Pete stomped up a short aluminum stairway to the second deck, and then stormed into the control room, where Frank Pippen stood in the middle of the room, under the periscope mount. He was holding a white sheet of paper and barking orders to the officers and enlisted men.
"Attention on deck!" the chief of the boat shouted.
"At ease! I have the conn!" Pete said. "What is it, Frank?"
"New EAM, Captain." The XO handed the message to Pete. "Looks like Turkey's heating up, sir."
Pete whipped his reading glasses out of his front shirt pocket, then looked down.
EMERGENCY ACTION MESSAGE
FROM: NATIONAL MILITARY COMMAND CENTER – WASHINGTON, D.C.
TO: ALL U.S. SHIPS AT SEA AND U.S. NAVAL SHORE FACILITIES
SUBJECT: ACTION MESSAGE – TURKISH – GEORGIAN MILITARY
SITUATION
REMARKS:
President of Turkish Republic has requested NATO ground and air forces reinforcement in NW Turkey in response to massive Russian military buildup in Caucasus region.
President of Republic of Georgia has requested NATO military aircraft overflights in response to same.
U.S. National Command Authority has endorsed Turkish and Georgian request to NATO Secretary General under codename Operation Fortify.
British government has concurred in endorsement.
Elements of 82nd and 101st Airborne Divs ordered deployed effective immediately to NW Turkey.
Set DEFCON 3 by order of National Command Authority.
Pete crumbled the message in his hands. "Great. Just great."
"What do you make of it, Skipper?"
Pete held his hand out, signifying later. "Mr. COB, " he said to the chief of the boat. "On the 1MC."
"The 1MC, aye, Captain." The COB flipped a switch on an overhead control panel and passed the microphone to Pete.
"This is the captain speaking." Pete's words echoed into every section of the submarine. "We've just received another
emergency action message from Washington. Due to the Russian military buildup in the Caucasus region, the Turkish and the Georgian governments have requested NATO support.
"Turkey, gentlemen, is a member of NATO. Georgia is a former Soviet republic with strained ties to Russia. Georgia has applied for NATO membership. Our government has endorsed that application, and the Russians don't like it because they want to keep Georgia in their sphere of influence.
"Our commander-in-chief has also endorsed the request for NATO buildup in northwestern Turkey and for military flights over Georgia. The 82nd and 101st Airbornes are on their way to Turkey.
"Gentlemen, United States military forces have been elevated to DEFCON 3."
Pete paused and looked around the control room. The eyes of every man were glued on him.
"The last time U.S. forces were at DEFCON 3 was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
"Needless to say, all this complicates our mission. Not only is this dangerous enough, but now we may be sailing into a war zone. There's a powderkeg burning in the region, gentlemen. And they've called on us to go there. One slipup and NATO's in a shooting war with Russia. None of this makes our job any easier. With Turkey on eggshells, you can bet they'll be watching everything moving through the Bosphorus with an eagle eye.
"Be on your toes. The safety of your shipmates and the security of the free world depends on us.
"Be alert. Be professional. You are Americans. That is all."
CHAPTER 9
The Alexander Popovich
The Black Sea
Captain Batsakov stormed up the outside ladder on the portside of his ship and into his bridge. His first officer, Joseph Radin, was standing on the starboard wing side of the bridge with several officers and deckhands. They were taking turns squinting through a telescope and were pointing out to the horizon and chatting excitedly.
"What is it, Joseph?" Batsakov's voice boomed across the tile floor of the bridge, pulling the officers' attention away from whatever they were looking at.
"An Egyptian freighter, Kapitan!" He turned and pointed off to the starboard. "Out there. He seems to have stopped in the water!"
Batsakov rushed across the bridge and squinted into the telescope. The freighter was about five hundred yards off the starboard, and appeared to be dead still in the water. He adjusted the scope to the ship's stern and zeroed in. The sea breeze blowing from the west was stretching the ship's ensign out over the water behind the stern.
The three horizontal stripes of the flag, from bottom to top, were black, white, and red. In the very center of the flag, a small gold war eagle could be seen.
The flag of the Arab Egyptian Republic!
"Right full rudder. Steady course zero-two-zero!" Captain Batsakov ordered.
Masha felt the ship tilting to the right. The aluminum chair that she was sitting in slid across the floor. Her heart pounded as she grabbed the captain's desk to stop the slide. "Lord, protect my children. Do not let any of them fall into the sea!"
Talk poured out of the intercom into Batsakov's cabin.
"Have we achieved radio contact?" Batsakov's voice asked.
"Negative, Captain."
"Open VHF-FM channels 13 and 16, " Batsakov said.
"Opening channels 13 and 16, " a voice said. "You have the microphone, Kapitan."
"This is the captain of the Russian freighter Alexander Popovich. To the captain of the Egyptian freighter. Please identify yourselves."
There was nothing.
"Maybe they are waiting for us to give them the call signal, Kapitan."
"No, they were supposed to send us the call signal, " Batsakov said. "I have Abramakov's letter right here spelling it out."
"Perhaps they have their signals mixed up, " another voice said.
"Perhaps we should go ahead and bring the cargo up to the deck just in case."
"But what about all those runt children playing hide-and-seek down on the deck?" someone said.
"Throw the runts overboard!" another voice suggested.
What? Masha's hands went to her mouth in disbelief.
"Silence!" Batsakov barked. "Joseph, what do you think?"
There was a pause.
"Kapitan, we have an Egyptian freighter out here in the sea lanes near our certain course from Sochi to Odessa. We are not yet at the rendezvous point. That is true. But this is a perfect interception point in the sea. It is as if they have stopped in the water and are waiting for us. My guess is that they are waiting for us to signal first. I think we should. There is too much money on the line to pass this opportunity. If we are wrong, the signal will be unintelligible gibberish. Leave the crates below until later.
"But kill the girl now. We cannot afford to have her as a witness. Kapitan, there is too much money on the line."
Dear Jesus! Masha prayed. What is happening?
"I've decided to kill the girl later. We will need her to contain the little piglets roaming on the deck until just before we turn them over to the president of Ukraine. It doesn't matter what she witnesses. She can't tell anybody right now about it anyway."
"But, Kapitan…"
"The decision is made. I will kill her later. But I agree with you on the rest. I will send the code now and we shall see what happens."
Masha wanted to run.
But where?
Was the outside of Batsakov's stateroom guarded? He had left in a hurry. Maybe he had not posted a guard outside or bothered to give any instructions. Could she hide with her children somewhere in the bowels of the ship and escape when they reached land?
Batsakov's voice over the intercom interrupted her thoughts. "This is the captain of the Alexander Popovich. Now hear this. Peter the Great! Again I say, Peter the Great!"
Office of the president of the Russian Republic Staraya Square, Moscow
Comrade President, the defense minister is here, sir. He says it is urgent that he see you."
President Evtimov leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms, and exchanged irritated glances with his foreign minister and his chief of staff.
Despite the words of support that each had given him in favor of the defense minister, Evtimov wanted to strangle Giorgy Alexeevich Pop-kov. Popkov's excuse-making was pathetic. The Army lost the nuclear fuel, and Popkov was in charge of the Army. Procedures and safeguards should have been in place to prevent this, especially near Chechnya. The fact that the Americans were also sloppy wasn't good enough.
"Send him in, " Evtimov growled at his secretary.
The defense minister, a short man in his late fifties, in a charcoal-grey suit with silver hair and jet-black eyebrows, stormed into the president's office flailing his hands. "I am afraid I have disturbing news."
"What, Giorgy Alexeevich? The Chechens have already made a bomb with our plutonium?"
"NATO is deploying forces to northeastern Turkey, Comrade President."
"What?" Evtimov felt as if he had been punched in the face. "What's behind all this?"
"The Turkish president has made this request. He apparently believes that our buildup in Chechnya is not defensive in nature, and that we may be planning to cross into Georgia and then Turkey."
"Americans, " Evtimov snorted.
"You think the Americans are behind this request?" the foreign affairs minister asked.
"Of course, " the president retorted. "Who else would engineer such paranoia for the sake of finding an excuse for a military buildup? Just like Vietnam, Korea, Panama, Grenada, and Iraq, and every other country where they've tried to station their military ever since the Great War. Mack Williams is like all American presidents – a power-hungry cowboy."
The defense minister nodded, as if relieved to find a topic of common ground with the president. "As a matter of fact, Comrade President, the Americans did endorse the Turkish request to NATO."
"Of course they endorsed it." Evtimov made quotation marks with his fingers. "They endorsed it after they concocted the idea behind the scenes. Typical Yankee f
oreign policy. I know the Americans well, Giorgy Alexeevich."
"And the British have signed onto it as well, " Defense Minister Pop-kov added this almost as an insignificant afterthought.
"Obsequious sycophants, " Evtimov said.
The defense minister sat up a bit straighter, smirking with a tad more satisfaction. "The president of Georgia has also contacted NATO to request air support."
"Air support?" Evtimov unleashed a profanity-laced tirade. Nothing infuriated the Russian president more than the West flirting with nations of the former Soviet Union. "And I suppose the Americans have endorsed this request also."
"Comrade President, American F-16s and British Tornados are already flying close air support over northern Georgia. They are twenty miles from our forces, even as we speak. Our tanks are within range of their Sidewinder missiles."
"Bloodthirsty capitalists, " Evtimov fumed.
"Not only that, " the defense minister added, "but two Delta II rockets were launched from their base in California. Probably satellites for additional command-and-control of military operations."
Vitaly Evtimov's Slavic blood expanded the veins in his neck and temples.
"Comrade President, " the foreign affairs minister spoke up.
"Not now, Alexander Alexeyvich!" Evtimov waved his foreign affairs minister off, stood again, and, turning from the small group of advisors, gazed out through the windows behind his desk overlooking 4 Staraya Square.
Pedestrians crossed the streets and sidewalks; businessmen carried suitcases. Some women were in business suits and others carried children on their backs like papooses.
From this vantage point, Moscow gave the appearance of vibrancy. And if one didn't know better, the grand city in many ways resembled the way she looked when she was the capital of the greatest nation on earth.