by James Rosone
Suddenly, he had an idea. “Release and cut the towed array, and release two countermeasures.”
Some of the crew looked at him quizzically, but they did as he ordered. Chen hoped cutting the towed array and dropping another noisemaker might buy them a few more seconds. Seconds equaled distance, and distance equaled life. They needed just a few seconds to get over the ridge and then dip down below it, allowing it to absorb the energy of the torpedoes.
“Distance to ridge?”
“Five hundred meters, Captain.”
“Distance to the closest torpedo?”
“Sir, closest torpedo has veered off course. It’s confused by the noisemakers!”
“Maneuvering, stay as close to the top of the ridge as possible. As soon as the bow has cleared it, I want a thirty-five-degree down angle on the planes, hard right rudder.”
As the man echoed the commands, the sonar pings from the closest torpedo faded considerably as it locked onto the detached sonar array, its systems confused by the two noisemakers.
“Sir, the bow is clearing the ridge.”
As it did, the sound of sonar pings thundered in the Conn. Another torpedo had locked on and begun its terminal run.
“Fifty-degree down angle on the planes!” Chen yelled.
The nose of the boat angled down sharply as the belly of the sub brushed against the rocks of the underwater mountain. At nearly thirty-two knots, it caused a loud scraping noise along their entire belly until they had cleared the ridge. They were now in a deep dive, rushing to get as far below it as possible.
Seconds later, two massive explosions rippled through the water. The torpedoes had impacted with the opposite side of the ridge.
The boat was rocked by the shock wave. Lights flickered out and electronic systems were overloaded for a moment. The boat seemed to list to port in what felt like an uncontrolled roll. The automated systems activated and righted the boat as emergency power kicked on. The lights in the Conn flickered back on.
“All stop. Rig for ultra-quiet!”
“All stop. Rig boat for ultra-quiet. Yes, Captain.”
They’d managed to evade two of the most advanced torpedoes in the NATO arsenal. More than that, they’d survived. For the moment, Chen was going to assess the damage to his sub and play dead until it was safe to slip away to lick their wounds.
*******
German Sub, U-39
Mouth of the Red Sea
Captain Lassen had maneuvered his boat at a perpendicular angle between the destroyer and its sole remaining frigate. He had clear shots to both as the frigate had pushed ahead of the destroyer. They were off his port bow at 325 and 348 degrees, respectively.
One of the other boats had destroyed a corvette and put the merchant on the bottom. His sonar operator had reported the sounds of underwater explosions consistent with a submarine being hit. He didn’t have time to worry about all that right now. If he survived the day, he’d know soon enough who all had survived and who hadn’t.
“Prepare to fire tubes one and two along generated bearings.”
“Tubes one and two ready to fire along generated bearings, aye.”
Lassen waited a beat as he tried to picture the ships on the surface some four thousand meters away. He’d gone ultra-quiet and allowed his boat to drift in the current, barely moving along at seven knots. The Chinese ASW helicopters were to the northwest, and the sonobuoys they’d dropped had lost the U-39 to the decoys he’d launched as the boat had dived to 175 meters, placing them ten meters above the seabed.
Lassen took his cap off and ran his fingers through his sweat-soaked hair. He wondered if this was what it had felt like for his great-uncle during the battle of the Atlantic. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to be hunted by the American and British navies.
Putting his cap back on, Lassen steeled himself for what he hoped was the last part of the day’s action.
“Fire!”
The sound of the torpedoes leaving the tubes echoed briefly in the Conn. Watching the digital timer, Lassen noted it would be two minutes and thirty seconds until the torpedoes hit their targets.
“Set fish to active homing and cut the wires.”
“Active homing set. Wires cut, Captain.”
“Set tubes three and four to wake-homing and fire.”
“Torpedoes set and away, Captain.”
Lassen’s intent was for the torpedoes in active homing to force the ships to take radical evasive maneuvers to avoid the incoming fish, churning up the ocean so that the wake-homing fish could lock on and track to their targets. When the wake-homing weapons hit their terminal runs, the boats would try in vain to outrun them. In doing so, they would allow the weapons that were in active homing to lock on, and the combination of the two salvos would double his chances of finishing this fight in the next two minutes.
*******
Chinese Destroyer Chengdu
Zheng thought he’d survived the worst of the torpedo attacks. They’d had two close calls, but their ship-launched heavyweight torpedoes had put one of the enemy submarines on the bottom. It had given them breathing and maneuvering room. That all changed in an instant.
“Captain, torpedoes in the water, bearing one-three-two degrees!”
Zheng was about to issue orders to fire countermeasures when a second warning came in of torpedoes approaching from 284 degrees. His last remaining corvette, the Fushun, would need to deal with them.
“Captain, two more torpedoes in the water, bearing one-four-zero degrees!”
Panic was starting to set in on the bridge. The crew was sensing that they had outlived their nine lives in this battle. Zheng needed to restore their confidence.
“Helm, evasive maneuvers! Launch countermeasures!”
“Countermeasures away, Captain.”
“Distance and speed of contacts?”
“Sir, the contacts bearing one-three-two degrees are thirty-four hundred meters away, speed forty-seven knots and accelerating.”
Damn! he thought. They had less than two and a half minutes.
He heard the rotors of his modified Harbin Z-20 ASW helicopter as it raced overhead. The pilot radioed that he was headed down the bearing of the estimated launch point of the torpedoes and he would fire his remaining sonobuoys and torpedo in an attempt to sink the sub.
He scoffed to himself. That won’t do us any good.
*******
German Sub, U-39
“Captain, wake-homing torpedoes have acquired target. They are actively homing.”
“Cut the wires.”
“Explosions in the water, bearing three-two-zero degrees.”
Lassen looked at the timer; it was too early to be his fish finding the destroyer or the corvette. He smiled, knowing that whichever U-boat had survived was still in the fight and they’d just all but ensured that the destroyer was less than a minute from being put on the bottom.
*******
Chinese Destroyer Chengdu
Once again, the night sky turned bright orange as a massive fireball erupted to their port bow. The remaining corvette, the Fushun, had been struck in her aft quarter. The back of the boat bent at an unnatural angle as the torpedo detonated beneath her. As her drive shafts were lifted from the water, she slowed to a stop.
When she’d finally become stationary, the Fushun was hit again by a second torpedo. This time, the force of the explosion ripped the ship in half.
Zheng resigned himself to his fate. Despite his best efforts, his first real command and flotilla had never stood a chance of reaching their destination. His last thought before his ship was hit by three torpedoes was that he wished he could have seen one more sunrise.
*******
German Sub, U-39
“Sir, she’s hit! Three impacts. The ship is breaking apart.”
There were cheers on the Conn before his first officer quieted them down. Walking over, he extended his hand to Lassen.
“Congratulations, Captain.”
“Thank you, XO.” Releasing his hand, Lassen took off his cap and looked at the laminated picture inside of his great-uncle—not in his Kriegsmarine uniform from World War II, but of him as an old man, with a young Johann Lassen sitting on his lap that summer long ago in Spain.
“XO, in one hour, bring the ship to periscope depth. Those ASW helicopters won’t be around much longer with no place to land. We need to report this engagement to headquarters.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Lassen walked aft to his tiny room. He planned to lie on his bunk for the next forty-five minutes and pray to whatever gods were out there, thanking them for seeing him and the U-39 through this day of days.
Chapter Sixteen
Viva Cuba
White House, Situation Room
Washington, D.C.
December 23, 2024
Blain Wilson rubbed his temples. He was starting to get one of those crushing headaches he’d get from time to time when either he had physically exerted himself too much or he was under far too much stress, like he was right now. He grabbed the Excedrin Migraine he kept in his pocket for moments like this and washed them down with some coffee.
“As you can see, Mr. President, the 101st Air Assault Division, along with the Florida Army National Guard’s 53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, have finally captured this last remaining stronghold, south of Havana,” explained General Kilbourne, the Army Chief of Staff. “With this last obstacle removed, our forces are now able to finish off the remaining Cuban and PLA forces that haven’t surrendered on the main island. All we have left is the forces they have on Isla de la Juventud, and frankly, now that we’ve eliminated the air threat on that island, we can bypass it entirely—starve ’em into submission.”
“Has the Cuban government officially surrendered yet? Do we even know who’s in charge anymore?” asked the President. He looked at his Secretaries of State and Defense for this answer.
Secretary Riley shook her head. “Not yet, Mr. President. We’re still working to figure out who’s in charge down there. It appears our decapitation strike at the outset of the war did succeed, and we took out the senior leadership of the country. From what we’ve been able to gather, one of the Cuban generals, a man who appears to be in tight with the Chinese, has assumed power. We’ve tried to reach out to him, to no avail.”
Looking at Peter Morris, the President asked, “OK, Pete, then how should we proceed? We’ve captured most of the country. Do we go ahead and try and appoint some locals to take over or keep this a full-on military occupation for the time being?”
The Secretary of Defense thought about that question for a minute before answering. “I think until we can identify who we want to ultimately take over the country, we should assume control of it, just like we did in Iraq. We can establish a Cuban provisional authority. Once we’ve finished securing the place and things have calmed down, then we can look to figure out what kind of people want to lead their nation. Obviously, we aren’t going to let them go back to communist dictatorship, but we should give them some time to figure things out while we work on stabilizing the country and bringing in much-needed humanitarian support.”
The President nodded at the suggestion. He looked exhausted. Blain wasn’t sure how the man had managed to stick around as long as he had, given his condition. If he’d resigned earlier due to his battle with ALS, there was a high likelihood his Vice President would have won the presidency. As it was, it had been a tough election, and she’d lost.
“General Kilbourne, how long until you have the rest of the main island occupied and under our control?” President Alton asked next.
“We have two more strongholds to root out: one in the south, which the Marines are handling, and one further west on the island,” explained the Army Chief of Staff. “Now that we can shuttle in attack helicopters and additional close-air support, taking these next strongholds should be a lot easier. The Air Force just introduced their Loyal Wingman drones to the fight in some serious numbers. They’re making a huge difference in going after those enemy SAM sites.”
“Good,” the President responded. “We transition power to the next administration in less than thirty days. I suspect those in uniform will be sticking around, but the rest of us will likely not be here. Let’s do our best to leave them in as good a position as we can.”
Blain felt he should ask a question. “Um, sir, what should we do about the southern Caribbean and Venezuela? The Chinese and Venezuelans have already captured several Dutch, French, and British territories down there.”
The generals all nodded as they looked to Alton to see what he’d like them to do. There had been a lot of talk the last couple of weeks about this very topic. The Venezuelans and the Chinese were making all sorts of problems down in their neck of the woods. Something did have to be done about it—the question was what.
“I want to get Cuba settled up first. I also need to talk with the President-elect privately,” Alton replied. “I need to find out what she’d like to do. It’ll be her call in less than thirty days. Now, let’s wrap up Cuba and get ready to take the fight down south.”
Then the President stood up, effectively ending the meeting.
*******
White House, Oval Office
Washington, D.C.
Blain walked into the Oval Office, unsure of what the President wanted. He still wasn’t sure who his official counterpart was yet. The President-elect hadn’t named her National Security Advisor, which was making his office’s transition a lot tougher to figure out.
“Ah, Blain. Sorry for summoning you right before you were about to head out the door,” said President Alton. “I needed to talk with you about something.” He motioned for the two of them to take a seat on the couches.
Blain took a seat, a serious look on his face. “Is everything OK? Something I should be concerned about?”
Alton smiled disarmingly. “No, nothing like that, Blain. You’ve done a hell of a job as my NSA—better than my previous one, but don’t tell anyone else that.” The President chuckled. “I called you in here to ask you something. How well do you know President-elect Maria Delgado?”
“I’d say I know her pretty well, but we aren’t close if that’s what you’re asking,” Blain responded. “I’ve spoken with her only a few times in the last few years and then only during the required briefings during the run-up to the election and post-election. I knew her best in the early 2000s. She was a captain in the Army back then. When I was tapped to become a battalion commander with 5th Group, she was my public affairs officer. She was with me when our Humvee got blown up by an IED.” He stared off into the distance.
“Sorry if that brought up some bad memories, Blain,” the President said in a soft tone. “I was just curious what kind of woman she was—what kind of mettle she’s made of.”
“When our Humvee got blown up, several of my toes and my left leg got mangled pretty bad. I had also taken some shrapnel to the left side of my left face and lost my eye. I was in bad shape. Maria pulled me from the burning wreck. All I remember was when the vehicle got hit, it was like the dust and dirt inside the vehicle magically floated in the air for a moment, only to be replaced by smoke and fire. Then I saw her face as she was trying to tend to one of my wounds. I saw her grab for her pistol and fire several shots as she protected me. She yelled out orders to some of my soldiers to engage the enemy while our team medic ran over to help her treat me. My driver was unfortunately killed. Our turret gunner had lost both of his legs, but the medic had gotten tourniquets tied off in time to keep him alive.”
Blain paused for a second as he relived the worst day of his life. “I can tell you this, Mr. President: I don’t know I’d be alive if she hadn’t acted swiftly and without fear like she did. When I was recovering at Walter Reed, I made it a point to put her in for a Silver Star. I ran that all the way up to the head of Special Operations Command to make sure she got it, too. Since that day, we’ve kept in contact as friends and fell
ow soldiers, though not as much the last six or seven years. We seldom talked politics when we did talk.”
President Alton nodded. He’d obviously known already that she’d earned a Silver Star and a Purple Heart during the war. It was a huge selling point for her politically—a female war hero turned congresswoman, now turned President.
“Blain, I called you here to tell you I spoke with her a few hours ago. I told her about our coming decision on Venezuela and that I needed her to tell me what she’d like done in the next few days. I also told her we desperately needed to know who her NSA was going to be. That’s when she asked me if I thought you might be willing to stay on in the position, at least until we got through this conflict and her new administration was able to get settled in. I told her I’d ask. When you meet with her tomorrow morning, she’s probably going to ask you, so I wanted you to know in advance.”
Blain sat back in the couch. In all honesty, he was seriously conflicted. On the one hand, it had been a really long and rough eighteen months. He’d missed a lot with his family. He desperately wanted to go back to a normal life. But the soldier still inside him wanted to stay on and help defeat an enemy that had violently attacked his country and killed millions of his people.
“What are your thoughts, Mr. President? Should I stay if I’m asked?” Blain punted the question back to Alton.
The President blew some air out of his lips. “Blain, I’m a dying man. You know, it’s the reason I didn’t run for reelection. What little time I have left, I want to spend with my family.” He shifted in his seat. “What I do know is you are hands-down one of the sharpest people I know. Our country is in a very tough position right now. It needs a wartime president. You know Maria better than I do; she’s been to war, and she’s made the tough calls just as you have. You also know the history that’s led to this war and you have a good idea of how we defeat this super-AI we appear to be fighting. I know this is going to come at a tremendous personal cost to you and your family, but I’d stay on if she asks you to. The country needs you to. I need you to.”