Parting Gifts

by gerald hall

Less than fifteen minutes later, the first pilots of the Alliance strike group saw the wakes of the incoming invasion fleet and called “Talley-ho.” Before diving down for the attack. No one had picked up any indications of fire control or missile guidance radars, so the expectation was that there would be little threat from mere merchant ships and amphibious warfare vessels, even though they had fired nearly one hundred cruise missiles. The first pilots saw that these were clearly not warships even from more than ten thousand feet in the air. While they thought that the jihadists might have some jury-rigged defenses, the Alliance pilots had no idea of what was actually waiting for them as they dove down for the attack.

  The Alliance pilots were prepared for the normal short-range defenses that the amphibious warfare vessels of the former European navies would have. But the Islamists had another surprise waiting on the Alliance aircrews.

  The first missiles fired by the air strike were targeted upon the dedicated amphibious warfare ships. Within a few minutes, most of these vessels were hit and quickly burning out of control or sinking. Then the air strike turned towards the merchant ships that were following.

  “What the hell?” an F-15E pilot called out over the radio as she saw dozens of corkscrewing contrails rushing up towards her from the decks of the closest merchant ships.

  “They’ve got MANPADS on those ships! A lot of them!” She announced as she turned sharply away and fired off decoy flares in an attempt to avoid the missiles racing towards her aircraft.

  Manportable Russian-built SA-14’s, 16’s and 18’s weren’t the only threat that the Alliance pilots had to face now. Several of the ships had containerized SA-15 and SA-22 surface-to-air missile units that had much longer range and lethality. Those weapons turned on their radars and began to engage the strike force too. Tarps were being pulled off of light anti-aircraft guns like ZU-23 and ZPU-4. Those light automatic weapons filled the skies with tracers at close range and added to the gauntlet that the Alliance aircraft had to race through.

  The Islamists had laid a trap of their own against the Alliance air arm in this dramatic invasion attempt. Pilots from the Alliance and their European refugee allies bravely bore in and delivered their deadly payloads even as the skies above the jihadist invasion fleet filled with soaring missiles and fiery tracers from automatic weapons. The British pilots were particularly willing to brave intense enemy fire to deliver their weapons, regardless of the price.

  Large, ugly black bursts of smoke appeared at the end of a missile contrail far too often, either leading to flaming wreckage falling to the sea or a crippled Alliance fighter trailing smoke and struggling to make its way back home to safety. The waves of missiles and curtains of shells coming from those enemy ships were ripping the Alliance fighter-bomber strike force apart.

  But still the pilots courageously pressed their attacks since they knew that if the invasion succeeded, their homes would be the next targets. Explosions began to shatter the large cargo ships as bombs pierced their hulls and detonated. The horizon was soon filled with towering columns of smoke from burning and sinking ships. After dropping their last bombs and firing their last missiles, many of the strike aircraft would dive down and use their internal cannons to strafe surviving ships to suppress the antiaircraft fire for their fellow pilots to make their own bomb runs. Such bravery often led to even more losses as the strafers were also hit by additional fire from the ships.

  Finally, low on fuel and munitions, the survivors of the air strike withdrew. The heroism and self-sacrifice of the aircrews were beyond measure. They had destroyed or crippled virtually every ship in the lead invasion fleet. But they paid a terrible cost in doing so because less than half of their aircraft survived to return back to their bases. They prayed that they had stopped the jihadist invasion.

  What they did not realize was that this was only the beginning.

  The defending Alliance fleet still stood defiantly out at sea, waiting to ensure that no enemy ships would reach the Alliance coastline. Their carriers began to turn into the wind to recover the survivors from the air strike. The escort ships stood vigil in the twilight in the event that a submarine or other enemy combatant would appear. It was while they waited that the next shoe began to drop.

  “I don’t know what the hell that the Islamists have done out there, but we are getting all kinds of incoming ballistic targets on our screen, Sir.” The chief radar systems officer for the nuclear powered strike cruiser USS Fort Pulaski reported.

  “What do you mean?” The warship’s captain Dawn Cordray asked.

  “Ma’am, our Aegis system has identified at least eight different known types of reentry vehicles. This is in addition to dozens more than we have been unable to determine if they are decoys or otherwise previously unknown warhead models. Several of the RV’s have also been observed conducting post-boost maneuvers. The computer indicates a high probability that they are Chinese design anti-ship ballistic missile warheads. Some of the other identified RV’s are definitely Russian strategic nuclear warhead models in any event.”

  “We don’t have a choice. Assign priority missile fires to the nukes, then to the identified ship-killers. Let’s just hope that there aren’t any more real nukes or other surprises hiding amongst the decoys. Otherwise, we are all in for a world of hurt.”

  The real invasion fleet was considerably motlier in nature than the group that had been attacked earlier by the Western defenders. Instead of purpose-built military amphibious warfare vessels, the Caliphate used commercial vessels of all types. There were even a score of former cruise liners that had impressed as troop carriers. These huge vessels each carried between six and twenty-five thousand mujahideen warriors in far less luxurious conditions than the liners had originally transported on grand vacations. Most of the lavish amenities that these floating hotels featured had been stripped out and looted before they set sail. The savage mutilation of these beautiful cruise liners allowed for them to carry far more people than they had been originally designed for, though in far less hospitable conditions than the previous passengers had enjoyed.

  On Fort Pulaski’s radar screens, these huge vessels stood out among the hundreds of impressed civilian vessels. But now, the warships defending the Eastern Alliance had very little heavy ordnance available to shoot at the invading fleet. It has all been expended upon the earlier waves of ships that had sailed towards the Alliance shoreline.

  Leaving only a skeleton force of escorts behind to guard the carriers, the Alliance fleet sent as many warships as possible eastward to engage this next wave of invaders. The Arleigh Burke Flight IIA class guided missile destroyer Oscar Austin led the formation of more than forty warships of all sizes moving forward to engage the jihadist invasion fleet. To the north, the nuclear powered strike cruiser USS Fort Pulaski held the flank against any ships that might attempt to go around the Alliance defenders. Her 155mm main gun would be deadly against any enemy ship that she encountered, though like most of the other ships, her missile launchers were now empty of any ship-killers.

  “We may not have any missiles left, but we still have our five-incher. A few rounds from our gun into each of their engine rooms will put an end to their little invasion. Close in on that nearest group of transports and prepare to engage.

  Sound ‘Battle Stations, Gun, Mister Reed.” Commander Kristopher Means, captain of the Oscar Austin, ordered.

  “Aye, aye, Sir.” The First Officer replied crisply.

  Aboard the 40,000 ton ro-ro container ship, Al Bashir, scores of personnel were running along the deck, yanking tarps off of the tops of vehicles that had been loaded on the container ship’s deck. Instead of hundreds of large steel shipping containers, Al Bashir’s deck had nearly a hundred military vehicles strapped down on her deck. This included T-72 tanks, 2S3 self-propelled artillery pieces, BMP infantry fighting vehicles as well as a variety of self-propelled and towed anti-aircraft guns.

  Once the tarps had been cleared, a pair of men leapt inside of each tank turret, a
gunner and vehicle commander.

  “How close are we to the nearest infidel warship?” Sargeant Tarique al Mansour asked his tank’s gunner, Corporal Ali Hassan.

  “We are within six kilometers of a Burke-class missile destroyer.”

  Our ship will be under the infidel’s warship in less than five minutes. What are your orders, Captain?”

  “Engage the enemy warship as soon as possible.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Within a couple of minutes, the booming sound of a 125mm tank gun being fired echoed through the ship. The ripple of half a dozen other heavy caliber guns also being fired from the Al Bashir’s deck quickly followed it.

  “What the hell is that?” One of the lookouts yelled as a pair of fountains of water erupted just behind the destroyer.

  “I’d say that someone was shooting at us.” a seaman next to him responded nonchalantly.

  A hollow ringing sound could be heard by many of the Austin’s crew. But few realized that they had even been hit.

  “Allah Ackbar. We just hit the infidel warship, brother.” The gunner inside one of the T-72 tanks gleefully exclaimed.

  “I saw no explosion. Are you sure that you hit her, Ahmad?” The tank commander asked after carefully looking at the target’s hull.

  “Yes, I am absolutely certain. I saw sparks fly off of the warship’s hull right where I had aimed.”

  “What ammunition did you fire, Ahmad?”

  “I fired the same kind of round that I usually fire at tanks. The infidels call it a sabot round.”

  “Fool. While you might have hit it, your shot probably went all the way through one side of the warship and out of the other side because it has no armor. Unless you were very lucky and hit a vital system, you did little damage. Load the high-explosive armor piercing rounds now. They will do much more damage when they explode, I assure you.”

  “Yes, brother.” The tank gunner quickly replied as he selected a HEAT round to be loaded by the tank’s automatic loader into the 125mm main gun’s breach. The tank commander rose out of his turret hatch for a moment to tell the other tanks to use the shaped charge rounds as well.

  “Fire, HEAT.” The tank commander ordered.

  The T-72’s gun fired, causing the jihadist tank to strain against its chains. A few seconds later, an explosion shook the Austin, followed by a second one about ten seconds after that.

  “They’ve got battle tanks strapped down on the decks of those cargo ships, Captain.” Another bridge lookout called out after a close observation of the nearest of the cargo ships, a large vehicle ferry. A couple of small clouds of light smoke could be seen drifting back behind the ferry. They were difficult to see against the grey hull of the ferry when the tank guns were first fired.

  “All guns, fire at that damned cargo ship.” The Austin’s captain immediately ordered.

  A few seconds later, the Austin’s 5 inch/62 caliber automatic naval rifle slewed around to starboard to point at the Al Bashir and opened fire. At the same time, the starboard 25mm Bushmaster automatic cannon and 20mm Phalanx CIWS mount also traversed to point at the large vehicle ferry. They immediately fired a fusillade of rounds at their target.

  The destroyer’s Mark 45 had a greater rate of fire. But there were at least four main battle tanks of various types firing back from the jihadists’ transports, plus the guns from a variety of lighter armored vehicles that had also been sited on deck for just such a purpose.

  But the Islamists aboard the Al Bashir had no idea what it would be like to be on the receiving end of a Burke’s guns. The vehicle ferry was soon on fire with dozens of dead or wounded personnel on her decks. But the men aboard Al Bashir refused to give up. The surviving vehicles on her decks just kept on firing.

  While the Arab Brotherhood’s invasion fleet continued to engage in a gun duel with the Austin and other warships of the combined fleet defending the Alliance’s eastern seaboard, there were other forces about to make their presence known also.

  The Virginia-class nuclear attack submarine USS Mississippi had spent the last two days slipping silently into position in the middle of the Arab Brotherhood invasion fleet. Captain Jacob Hammond had been particularly careful in his approach because of the presence of a pair of modern ex-NATO frigates. The Mississippi’s captain knew that these two warships had been equipped with very capable sonar sensors and could be a serious threat to his big ‘Humpback’ Virginia.”

  “Sir, we have firing solutions for multiple enemy ships. Sonar has been picking up the sounds of guns being fired by several ships of the enemy invasion fleet too. Our confidence is very high on positive identification of both friendly and enemy vessels.” The Mississippi’s weapons officer, Lieutenant Carla Powell announced.

  “OK, ladies and gentlemen. It is time for us to gut the enemy formation as thoroughly as possible with the weapons that we have available. Lieutenant Powell, I want you to select the four largest enemy ships and launch one ADCAP at each of them. Continue to reload with ADCAPs and focus on hitting enemy ships that had not been targeted previously.

  After the initial ADCAP shots are fired and our torpedo tubes are being reloaded, you are to select additional large enemy ships and fire one Tomahawk at each of them until all of our Tomahawks have been expended. I seriously doubt that any of those transports would be able to survive a hit from either an ADCAP or a Tomahawk. Those ships would be mission kills even in the unlikely event that they had halfway decent damage control teams aboard that are able to keep the ships from immediately sinking.”

  “Aye, Aye, Sir.” Carla quickly replied.

  “Helm, while we are doing all of this, I want you to keep the boat constantly moving. That includes keeping at least one of the enemy transports between us and those two enemy frigates at all times. We are going to hold off firing our SM-6’s for a little longer until we can find an appropriate billet for them.”

  “Will do, Sir”

  “You may begin your attack now, Mister Utley.” Captain Hammond told his first officer, who then passed orders down to his subordinates.

  The huge Virginia-class attack submarine shuddered four times as it emptied out its torpedo tubes at as many enemy ships. The Mississippi’s command center was a beehive of activity as the weapons officer called out information on each running torpedo. At the same time, the sonar operators were also pitching in with additional information on the targeted ships and other vessels in the area, both enemy and friendly. Less than a minute after the last torpedo had been fired, all four torpedo tubes had been reloaded and were, once again, ready to fire.

  The commercial container ship that had been exchanging fire with Austin had no idea that she had been targeted by the American nuclear attack submarine. Unlike a military transport, the container ship had no hydrophones to warn her of the approaching heavy anti-ship torpedo. Mississippi’s first ADCAP torpedo ran just under the massive container ship’s hull, just forward of Al Bashir’s deckhouse.

  The torpedo warhead’s magnetic explorer detonated under Al Bashir’s hull, lifting the ship out of the war briefly and snapping its keel. Tarique, Ali and the other jihadists manning the vehicles on the container ship’s deck were slammed against the interiors of their tanks by the shock.

  “What the hell just happened?” Tarique asked a few seconds later. He could hear alarms going off throughout this ship.

  “We’ve been hit by something.” Ali replied as he stuck his head out of the tank’s turret just in time to see a huge column of water erupt against the hull of another container ship in the invasion fleet. The T72’s crew could hear the tearing of metal from their own ship’s hull as she began to break up.”

  “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Ahmad screamed as he struggled to get out of the T-72’s turret.

  But as Ahmad and Ali tried to climb out of their tank, they suddenly found themselves being flung to the side as the entire ship lurched and twisted. Several vehicles snapped the chains holding them to the ship’s deck and slid sideways
into either other vehicles or over the side of the sinking container ship. Before the two jihadist tank crewmen could get out, the Al Bashir suddenly snapped in two, the bow briefly pointing skyward before plunging backwards into the ocean beneath.

  The rest of the doomed ship briefly righted itself, but the rolling motion shifted hundreds of tons of armored vehicles to one side of the ship. A few moments later, the Al Bashir suddenly rolled over to port and capsized. Most of her crew and passengers were trapped inside and perished as the massive ship sank beneath the waves.

  “If I am not mistaken, it looks like we just got some help from underneath. Captain Means commented as he watched the jihadist container ship sink. He quickly ordered his gunners to switch targets to the next closest jihadist ship. That ship was soon burning as the crew of the Oscar Austin saw three more giant fountains of water erupt next to enemy ships, signaling their doom as well.

  One after another, enemy ships were hit and either sunk or crippled and burning. A message from Austin’s CIC immediately got her captain attention as a yeoman gave it verbally to him.

  “We did it, Sir. The enemy ships are turning north.”

  “I would be much happier if they simply turned around and went back to where they came from. Do we have any idea as to where they might try to land now?”

  “CIC’s best guess is that they are heading for one of the Canadian ports.”

  “There will be no stopping them up there. The Canadians, what are left of them, don’t have nearly the ability to resist that kind of force.”

  “It still buys our people in the Alliance some more time to prepare, I hope. Are we going after them, Sir?”

  “I’m afraid not. The fleet has used up too many of its ammunition and needs to return back to port for resupply. Many some of the damaged enemy ships will sink before they can reach a Canadian port though. Every little bit will help, for sure.” The Austin’s captain noted before turning away and leaving the warship’s CIC.

  Chapter Twenty Four: