Steel Reign (Kirov Series Book 23)

by John Schettler

  “An excellent plan,” said Fukada. “But I have the icing for the cake. If we have them inside 50 klicks at that time, then we should use the deck gun as well. If not, then we should definitely use the rail gun.”

  “The rail gun? It was meant for missile and aircraft threats.”

  “True enough, but it can also lob that projectile out 200 Kilometers at Mach 7—and they can’t stop it. If we get a hit, it might be the equivalent of a 90mm gun for the damage it could do. There’s no explosive power, but it will damn well ruin any system it might hit on that Russian ship.”

  “Very well, I’ll consider that. Anyone else? Mister Honjo, you’ve got the CIC. Any thoughts?”

  “Just give me a target, sir. But I agree with what the XO says. If we go offensive, then we throw anything we have that might put damage on that ship.”

  “Alright. Where do we want Kurita in all of this?” The Captain waited, but as expected, Fukada was first to answer.

  “He’ll want to be aggressive once cut loose from that convoy escort. Those troops should be ashore by tomorrow morning. He’ll come looking for trouble after that.”

  “Think we can dissuade him?”

  “Why should we?”

  “You want to expose those ships to a Moskit II barrage?”

  “The more targets Kirov has to worry about, the better. I’d say we should let him sortie up the east coast as a fast surface action threat. Let Kirov take their shots, and then we can go after his SSMs—assuming they survive what we just discussed when we bushwhack them.”

  “And the carriers?”

  “They shouldn’t be anywhere near the action. I’d make a strong request that they operate from the lower Tatar Strait. Sakhalin Island will shield them from possible detection, but when they launch, those strike waves should fly due east, then turn northeast to overfly our position. They’ll have plenty of range. If they fly direct to the target, they’ll give away their bearing.”

  “I agree, and I’ll see if I can make it so. Let’s just hope the Japanese cooperate. They can have a mind of their own, and as far as they are concerned, we’re just an auxiliary screening unit attached to Kurita’s group.”

  “Well we need to get a handle on this. The way you have it planned, we might have a good chance to saturate Kirov’s defense. Maybe at least one of our missiles will get through. This is going to be interesting.”

  “It’s going to be dangerous. Don’t anyone forget that. This is no drill, because if they get one missile through….” He didn’t have to finish.

  * * *

  Rodenko was the first to go to Karpov with the oddities discovered by Nikolin. The Admiral had been very pleased with operations now underway in North Sakhalin. He had dealt with that pesky Japanese destroyer, and his brother self concluded the seizure of the ferry site at Lazarus. Now he had the choke point on the Tatar Strait, and could position shore batteries there to prevent any further incursion by Japanese surface ships in the waters north of that point. This was important, because the next division he planned to sealift would go directly to the Amur River delta, where he would begin a buildup of forces there to secure that region and prepare for the drive that might eventually take him to Vladivostok.

  On Sakhalin itself, he secured Okha, and then his tough Siberian troops quickly pushed south towards the oil fields. A battalion of the 25th Karafuto Brigade had been holding out there, with engineers trying to set charges. The fast moving Siberians stormed into the region, pushing swiftly through their resistance and securing the fields. Some sustained damage, but that did not matter. The oil was there, and it could not be destroyed. Karpov had what he wanted, and by May 22nd he had control of the top third of Sakhalin Island, as far south as Lazarev.

  For their part, Kurita’s first objective in getting troops from the 7th Division from Sapporo to the lowermost Ezu Province on Karafuto had gone off unchallenged. Karpov, with limited sealift, deemed it essential that Kirov stand off Okha Harbor and protect those landings. If that meant he would permit the Japanese to reinforce from the south, so be it. His real intention at this stage was securing that valuable terrain, for there were airfields there that he could trade with the Americans like pearls for supplies and equipment.

  The Admiral had been warned by Fedorov that the Japanese would have to respond to his incursions, but Karpov felt he could deal with them easily enough. “If they attempt to interfere with my landings, they will regret it,” he said. “At the moment, there isn’t even a whisper of protest from the Japanese Navy. Perhaps they’ve learned to fear and respect me, as they should.”

  “Sir,” said Rodenko, “speaking of whispers. Nikolin and I have been trying to run down the source of some odd signals activity down south.”

  “Explain.”

  “Well sir, Nikolin thought he was hearing some high speed frequency hopping. That would be the kind of thing we might do in sending signals to friendly units with our equipment. But he thinks he located that traffic well south, so it wasn’t any activity from our sets in the airship fleet.”

  “South… How far south. Mister Nikolin?”

  “Sir, I first got a whiff of it two days ago. Rodenko was trying to help me by routing in a top mast antenna for better reception. Since we know where the enemy might be, I focused my search to the south, and set up a fingerprinting profile to look for anything suspicious in the traffic analysis. It’s been very intermittent, but a couple signals got my attention. They were in high frequency bands that would not normally be used in the 1940s, and they were hopping like mad. Someone didn’t want us to have a listen sir, and they had the means of protecting those transmissions with some very modern signals techniques.”

  “Modern techniques. We are the only systems that could be called modern out here.”

  “But they weren’t ours, sir. I’m certain.”

  That got Fedorov’s attention. He looked over his shoulder listening carefully as Nikolin continued explaining what he had done, and then stepped into the conversation. “This is something we should pay attention to,” he said. “How frequent were these transmissions?”

  “I’ve only heard three,” said Nikolin, “and nothing in the last twelve hours.”

  “And the others?”

  “All within this 24 hour period.” He handed Fedorov his SIGINT chart.

  “That would be the time we suspected landing operations from Hokkaido were underway,” he said, looking to Karpov.

  “Most likely communications related to that,” said the Admiral. “Well, we already know they’ve sent at least two regiments. It’s not a concern at this point.”

  “No sir, it’s not the traffic, but the method of transmission here. Look at the frequency bands noted on Nikolin’s chart. Nobody uses those channels, and look at this data on the frequency hopping. That could only be accomplished by computer controlled electronics. It just isn’t the sort of thing vacuum tube equipment can do here.”

  “You’re saying these signals were sent by modern day equipment?”

  “Correct, and the fact that we can’t read them is even more of a red flag. Nobody in the Pacific should have anything even approaching that capability for signals encryption.”

  Karpov’s eyes narrowed. “I see…”

  “Sir,” Fedorov lowered his voice. “There are some matters I think we should discuss privately.”

  “Alright. Walk with me, Mister Fedorov. I need some air.”

  Out on the weather deck, Fedorov cleared his throat and set sail. “Sir, there are a few things you may not be aware of. While you were focused on building up your position here in Siberia, remember that Volsky and I had Kirov in the Atlantic.”

  “How could I forget,” said Karpov, his voice laden with a tone that revealed some displeasure, though he did not take it any further than that.

  “Yes… well you already know that Kirov was not the only vessel from our Russian navy to visit here. In the Atlantic and the Med, we encountered a few other… situations.”

 
; “That has an ominous ring to it. What do you mean?”

  “It’s a fairly long story, but seen as though you are an Allied head of state now, you may as well know it. There is another modern day ship at sea in the Atlantic, a British ship.”

  “What? You mean a modern British ship of war?”

  “Not exactly, but yes. This was a private ship, though it was purchased from the Royal Navy, a Daring Class Destroyer that was then heavily upgraded and modified to be a corporate security vessel for a small oil conveyor, a company called Fairchild Enterprises.”

  “It’s here? Now?”

  “That it is.”

  “But how is that possible? We had Rod 25—that’s what moved both Kirov and then Kazan around, yes?”

  “That and something more. Did you initiate a rod replacement cycle during your engagement with the 7th Fleet? No. It was in the Primorskiy Engineering Center, sending me on my little train ride to look for Orlov.”

  “That was a very fateful ride,” said Karpov.

  “It was, but the point I am making is that Kirov moved, and on that occasion there was no nuclear event involved either.”

  “That Demon Volcano,” said Karpov, remembering it all now. One moment they were sailing in the massive ash fall shadow of a VEI Level 7 Ultra-Plinian Super-Colossal volcanic eruption, with tsunami driven seas and ashen skies that blotted out the sun itself, sending them into a limbo of brimstone and pumice—then they were suddenly cruising on quiet seas, with a strange tinge of green fire in the ocean, and pristine white cumulus clouds in an azure blue sky. The distant silhouette of the Kuriles was calm and undisturbed. There was no sign of the eruption at all….

  “So large explosive events can cause time displacement,” said Fedorov, “and that volcano was one hell of an explosion. Your proximity to the volcano may have been the reason you fell through.”

  “Yes,” said Karpov, “to 1945, and with Orlan and Admiral Golovko with me as well.”

  “No magic control rods involved on any of those ships.”

  “Alright Fedorov, you’ve made your point. What are you getting at with all this?”

  “This ship we encountered in the Med came through somehow. I later learned that one cause could have been a missile strike aimed at its location in 2021. That aside, it was there, right in the middle of a rollicking fight with the Germans and Italian navies, and it’s still operating in the Atlantic today.”

  “How very interesting,” said Karpov. “Then that could not be the ship responsible for these signals intercepts, could it.”

  “Most unlikely.”

  “And you were not secretly receiving a transmission from someone else using modern day equipment, eh?”

  “Sir? Me?”

  “Don’t look so surprised, Fedorov. You know that would be something I would have to consider. Volsky may be gone now, but you and the British became a nice little cadre there for a while—comrades all.”

  “Well you can discard that notion,” said Fedorov. “I’m not secretly sending and receiving signals.”

  “Could anyone else be doing so aboard ship?”

  “Who? I doubt that very much, sir.”

  “Then these signals Nikolin reported are coming from another source. Do you have any theories?”

  “Well… There was just another major VEI 7 eruption at Krakatoa. Ships in the vicinity may have been affected.”

  “Blown to hell, or elsewhere,” said Karpov with a grim smile.

  “What I’m suggesting, sir, is that when there is a big event like that, the integrity of the continuum is profoundly disturbed. You fell through, along with Orlan and Admiral Golovko, and other ships could have fallen through during that event as well. But the key thing I’m trying to convey is this—if there’s a hole opening in time, things can go both ways….”

  “You mean… things could fall into that hole from the future? How so? The explosive event occurred here, in 1942. I could see how it might blow away a nearby ship, but how could anything get here from some future time?”

  “Well, if there was an explosion below decks, and it was powerful enough, it could rupture this deck—and you and I could fall through the hole. Understand? Krakatoa was a massive eruption. We have no way of knowing how far into the continuum its effects propagated. If it reached into modern times, our day….”

  “I get the picture. What you are saying is that we could be looking at the possibility of uninvited guests.”

  “We just may, sir. Something is out there on the VHF band sending signals they don’t want anyone else to hear, and using a method that requires modern electronics. We’d best be careful here until we know more.”

  Karpov nodded. “Thank you, Mister Fedorov. Kindly send the order in to have the ship go to condition one alert. I think we’ll have a better have look around.”

  Chapter 36

  Sea of Okhotsk, 20 May, 1942 ~ 08:00

  That was now what was on the mind of Admiral Kurita—get up north and have a look around. With the ice retreating, the Sea of Okhotsk was now open, and it was his charge to give challenge to the enemy by taking his task force north. Lieutenant Kobayashi reported to the bridge of the battleship Hiraga with the latest message from Takami. It was asking him to do exactly what he had in mind. Captain Harada was taking up a position in Taraika Bay up near the port of Shikuka, old Poronaysk under the Siberians. He had requested that Kutaka’s carriers move well west into the Tatar Strait and await a signal to then launch a strike wave and fly east to his position before being vectored north. Now Kurita was being asked to move north, up the east coast of Karafuto, towards the ongoing ground battle there.

  Admiral Yamamoto asked me to cooperate with this Captain, thought Kurita, and as his mind and my own are in accord here, I will accommodate this request. Our troops up north will undoubtedly appreciate the sight of my battleships and cruisers off the coast.

  For all his bravado, Kurita did not really have any idea what he was now going to be up against. The fledgling radar set that had been installed on Hiraga was incapable of ranging out to find the enemy ahead of him, or ever really effectively tracking its missiles. Kurita’s squadron was, in effect, like a group of near blind men with shotguns, huddled together and needing to get within close visual range of a target to fire at it. That was all they could represent, a possible close range threat against a modern ship like Kirov. They would not even know that ship was there, unless Takami fed updated position and ranging information in via that secure radio set.

  Kurita had no conception of this. In his mind, he was aboard one of the finest battleships in the world, and the verbal admonitions of Yamamoto could not convey the danger he was now sailing towards. The inspection of the damage on Mutsu, however, had been quite sobering. He spoke with crewmen and officers from that ship, who told him of the lightning fast rockets Yamamoto had warned him about.

  “You will see them easily enough,” said one man. “They claw the sky like Raiju, more terrible than the sky demon Itsumade. Yes, you will see them when they come, but there will be nothing you can do to stop them. Look how the fires consumed our ship!”

  “Did you fire back at them?”

  The man smiled. “There was nothing to shoot at. We never saw the enemy ship—only these terrible rockets.”

  That gave Kurita pause, but he steeled himself. “Then they are cowards if they refuse to face you in battle.”

  “That may be,” said the officer, “but here sits Mutsu, a burned wreck, and the enemy still commands the northern sea.”

  “We shall see about that.” Kurita put on an outward face of bravado, but even the smell of the charred metal on old Mutsu haunted him for some time.

  So now he sailed north, his watchmen straining to see through the misty dawn, his men ready for anything that might come. Yet he and his entire task force were merely bait, meat being thrown to the wolf. The officers of Takami were trying to get the attention of their adversary, and had asked Kurita to pose a threat, and then to withdraw up
on their signal.

  But that is not what would happen…

  Taraika Bay, 20 May, 1942 ~ 10:40

  At the moment, Takami was sitting with its SPY-1D in silent mode. The system was unmatched insofar as radiation control in that stealthy listening mode. Those sensitive ears could detect and to some extent track contacts by receiving the target’s own RF emissions and also by receiving echoes from other third party sources that would reflect off the target. This was why Captain Harada had asked all the conventional strike elements to be very free with radio communications on their approach to Kirov’s suspected location, for even simple FM band radio could bounce off a target and be detected by passive radars listening for such a signal.

  For much more precise tracking of a contact, the system would have to actively radiate its own radar pulses to illuminate the threat, but in doing so it would also give its own position away. Yet once clearly fixed on a target, the lightning fast chain of electronic reflexes would quickly pass information to the ship’s Command Decision System, (CDS), which evaluated threats and sent the data directly to the Weapons Control System, (WCS), all in a heartbeat. There was no handover to a separate targeting fire control radar, which made AEGIS so quick and reliable on defense. The system was extremely robust, as technology injections had kept it right on the leading edge of what was possible, and the Japanese had upgraded to the AN/SPY-1/D(V) incorporating improvements in eliminating ground and background clutter.

  “Kurita looks to be in position,” said Harada. “They should spot him before noon.”

  “Should we get the helicopters up?” asked Fukada. “We’re not going to see anything over the horizon like this. All we’ll get is a general location on the target, and we already know that much now.”