by James Rosone
“Torpedoes in the water!”
The words came so fast, Takahashi almost jumped. “Range and heading?” he demanded.
“Sir, range ninety-four hundred yards. Heading… sir, they fired on Izumo!”
Takahashi expanded the digital map and brought up the icons of the Chinese contacts, the Izumo, his submarine, and the torpedoes launched at the Izumo. He blinked hard. It took a second to recalculate the plan he’d just come up with. He decided to go for broke.
“Fire tubes four, five, and six at Master One. Set to active sonar and cut the wires!”
Before the command could be echoed, Takahashi was already barking his second order. “Fire tube three at Master Two. Set to active sonar. Cut the wire. Fire Sea Wasps in tubes one and two to projected intercept course with the Chinese torpedoes and set to shallow proximity detonation!”
Again, Takahashi cut off the echoing of his commands—if there was such a thing as being in the zone, he was now firmly in it. “Helm, ahead flank! Plot intercept course for that fast-attack!”
“Ahead flank, on an intercept course. Aye!”
“Weapons, reload all tubes. When tubes are reloaded, fire tubes one, two, and three at Master One—same mission. Fire tubes four, five, and six at Master Two—same mission!”
As the command was echoed, Takahashi knew that he might very well have just gotten everyone on the Toryu killed. However, in that moment, he no longer cared. The Izumo was leaving the field, and the Chinese had attacked a beaten and retreating foe. There was no honor in that, and he was going to make them pay.
*******
Harbin
Northern Fleet Flagship
Admiral Li watched, then lowered his binoculars as the Dalian sank beneath the waves.
He had started the day with fifty-two warships. As he listened to the radio and surveyed the ocean, all around him was failure—his failure. Four of his destroyers had been sunk, and two more were severely damaged. Half of his frigates were gone. He’d been told that his diesel submarines had all been sunk, and he had no word on his nuclear submarines. They were either on the bottom or staying deep and quiet to avoid being sunk. His reconnaissance drones had spied the Japanese and Korean fleet retreating, and they were much worse off than he was, but the cost to his fleet was staggering.
Today would go down in history as the costliest battle in Chinese naval history. Of course, Beijing would laud this as a crushing blow to the Japanese and the Koreans, but the new additions to the bottom of the East China Sea would argue strongly against that version of the truth.
For now, he had no choice but to withdraw and head back to port and hope that he wasn’t about to be the victim of a sudden heart attack.
*******
Long March 405
Commander Mo Xiang had just issued the orders to fire on the Japanese carrier; the weapons had launched and were running true. They’d only had to send slight adjustments. He looked at the timer on the bulkhead; the weapons would hit and sink the carrier in just over four minutes. This would be the first Japanese carrier sunk since World War II, and he relished the idea of being the man to do it.
Commander Mo looked over his shoulder at his sonarman, who was pressing the cups tighter to his ears.
“Torpedoes in the water!” the young sonarman suddenly blurted out. Before the captain could ask, he gave the distance and bearing.
“Sir, they aren’t heading for us. They appear to be on a convergent course with our weapons.”
Mo was momentarily confused. This makes no sense.
Before he could ask the man to confirm, he again pressed his hands on the earphones. “Torpedoes in the water! Bearing seventy-seven degrees, range eighty-four hundred yards and closing!”
“Set our weapons to active homing and cut the wires. Left full rudder, all ahead flank. Take us deep!”
*******
Long March 406
Senior Captain Wei Lan was not a man prone to panic, but with all hell having broken loose in the last two hours on the surface and the diesel-electric boats having been sunk in their own backyard, he felt the edges of his nerves begin to fray.
He sat in the Conn in horror, listening as his sonarman relayed the fate of vessel after vessel. Just as the surface fleets had broken contact and withdrawn from the field, that damn fool Mo had shot at the ass of the fleeing Japanese, giving their position away and exposing his own vessel as a result.
Just when he’d thought things couldn’t get worse, they had detected a torpedo launch. Fortunately, the weapons had been fired away from them. That had all changed thirty seconds later, when the unknown enemy sub had fired at the 405 and at his vessel.
Despite having given the order to turn tail and run for home, he now had three enemy torpedoes headed his way at over sixty-five knots—a speed he couldn’t outrun.
In that moment, he looked briefly to the ceiling, then to his crew. They all stared at him and, without a word spoken, seemed to acknowledge that they had only minutes left to live.
*******
JS Izumo
There weren’t enough gods in creation to pray to. Mori knew they were about to die—at the very least, her ship was sunk. Their sonar had been tracking four torpedoes headed their way. They were closing to within 750 yards. That gave them just under thirty seconds before this ship was destroyed and in all probability all hands lost.
She rose from her seat in that most stoic of Japanese ways, straightened her uniform and stared at the viewscreen facing aft of the Izumo. She wanted to see if she could spot the torpedoes that would ultimately destroy them.
As the seconds ticked down, she found that she was trembling. She almost lost her balance, but the firm hands of Kotake steadied her. As she turned to thank him, there were four massive explosions beneath the waves, less than two hundred yards astern.
Geysers of water exploded from the sea, and cheers erupted in the CIC as the sonarman announced that the torpedoes had somehow detonated and they appeared to be in the clear. Backs were being slapped and hands were being shaken as the stress left the room, at least for the moment. She steadied herself on the back of her chair. She couldn’t be sure, but she thought the Toryu had just saved them.
*******
Seven Hours Later
Sasebo District Naval Base
JS SS-512 Toryu
The Toryu had loitered as rear guard until every allied vessel had cleared the field. They’d heard distant explosions but couldn’t confirm their kills. The closer they got to home port, the less Takahashi cared. His boat had performed brilliantly, and his crew was now seasoned. More importantly, their new weapons and tactics had been validated.
If this Chinese supercomputer does in fact exist, maybe, just maybe, we’ve found a way to outmaneuver it, he thought. In any event, it was a problem for another day.
As his boat bumped softly against the pier and was tied off, his men began to make their way off the boat. The Conn emptied. As he walked through the room, there was a subtle scent of stress and fear; the gentle hum of the sub’s electronics soothed his own anxieties. Down here, he was alive.
Commander Takahashi looked up at the hatch and smelled the fresh salt air. He knew home was out there. As he climbed down onto the pier, some of his officers stood with their backs to him. When he approached, they parted, and he saw Admiral Mori standing there with her aide. He walked up to her and rendered a crisp salute.
She regarded him for a long while. Ignoring his salute, she walked up to him and took his face in her hands and then kissed him. It was the first time anywhere in public they had shown any affection whatsoever. It seemed after the day of battle, none of that mattered anymore. So, he did what men do: he kissed her back.
As she linked arms with him, the XO of the Toryu looked at the tactical action officer, who shrugged, then slapped several hundred yen into his hand.
“How did you know?”
“A good XO knows everything.”
The two men laughed, and as they
passed by Lieutenant Kotake, they each slapped him on the back. Kotake raised an eyebrow as he rolled his large shoulders back. Then all three men laughed as they fell in behind their captain and the admiral. They’d survived a battle they never should have—a battle that had cost the lives of thousands, a battle that might change the entire outcome of the war.
Chapter Nineteen
New Opportunity
Eglin Air Force Base
Three Miles South of Valparaiso, Florida
Major Ian “Racer” Ryan walked into the admin office to see the Wing King at 0847 hours for his 0900 hours meeting. It wasn’t often you got summoned to see the wing commander, so when you did, you made sure you were on time.
“Ah. Good morning, Major Ryan,” said the master sergeant who sat behind a desk next to the colonel’s door. “He’s expecting you. Go on in.”
“Thank you, Master Sergeant,” Ryan replied. He knocked briefly on the door and then entered.
“There you are, Major. Come on in,” Colonel Morrison said in a booming voice.
Colonel Morrison, the wing commander for the 1st Fighter Wing, was normally stationed out of Langley. Since their base had been hammered hard during the first day of the war, most of the wing’s operations had been moved to Eglin.
“Good morning, sir,” Ryan offered as he moved to one of the chairs near the colonel’s desk.
“Major Ryan, I want to introduce you to Colonel Hewitt from US Space Force. He’s working with a test group out of Nellis. He wanted to ask you a few questions about a possible new assignment,” Morrison explained.
Hewitt approached Ryan with his hand extended. After the two of them shook hands, he gestured for everyone to take a seat at the table in the office. A tan folder with the Space Force logo on the center of it was lying there. Large red lettering that read “eyes only” was written across the top of the folder.
“Major Ryan, before we go much further, I wanted to talk with you about a new and very secret project. However, I need you to sign this nondisclosure agreement first,” Colonel Hewitt explained. “You’re not committing to anything by hearing what I’m going to offer you, but we can’t talk about it any further unless you read and sign it. Colonel Morrison has already been read on—he was the one who suggested we talk with you first about this opportunity.”
Ryan lifted an eyebrow at the comment. He grabbed for a pen and signed. Once that was out of the way, the colonel handed him the mystery folder.
As Major Ryan opened the folder and began to read through some of its contents, the Space Force colonel continued to talk.
“Major, I was made aware that you’re currently without a plane since yours was shot down over Cuba,” Hewitt began. “We obviously don’t have any new F-22s being built or extras sitting around. You’re a pilot without a plane, at least for the time being. Chances are you’ll be reclassed into either the F-35 or the F-15EX aircraft. However, what I want to offer you is something much better.
“As you’re aware, the Air Force has been developing a sixth-generation fighter. It flew a number of years ago, and it has had a couple of spectacular failures along the way—failures that were deliberate and engineered to provide cover for the real program…a Space Force program.”
Now Ryan was interested. He flipped over another page in the folder and practically fell out of his seat at the image he saw. The Space Force colonel, Hewitt, saw his smile.
“I thought you might be interested.”
Pulling his eyes away from the folder, Ryan looked at Colonel Morrison and then Hewitt. “Is this real?” he pressed. “What’s my role in all of this?”
Colonel Morrison had a broad smile. “Oh, it’s real, Major. But there’s a bit of a catch.”
Colonel Hewitt leaned forward in his chair as he spoke. “Major Ryan, this entire program has been one big secret squirrel project that’s spanned nearly fifteen years, and now three administrations. On paper and in the public eye, this is the Air Force’s sixth-generation fighter. In reality, this is Space Force’s very first near-space fighter. We’re still a relatively new service, and we wanted to keep this project under wraps, so it’s stayed technically on the Air Force’s books. However, considering the war we find ourselves fighting, this weapon is needed now more than ever.”
Major Ryan found himself nodding in agreement as his eyes returned to the folder on the table in front of him. The picture of this aircraft was incredible. The specs…were beyond anything he’d ever seen before. He took a deep breath in. “How do I fit into all of this? I’m not Space Force. I’m a major in the Air Force.”
“That’s a very good question, Major,” Colonel Hewitt replied. “For the last three days, I’ve been talking with Colonel Morrison and a couple of other wing commanders about some of the pilots in their squadrons. I’m looking for fliers who are bold risk-takers and exceptional pilots. From everything I read about you, you fit the bill.
“You scored a pair of aerial victories over Cuba before you were shot down. I also heard you had taken it upon yourself to help Major Riggens reacclimate to being a Raptor pilot when the war broke out. Riggens said you helped him make a smooth transition back into flying status after he returned from a staff officer position at US European Command. That tells me you’re willing to help others even when it’s not required of you.”
“So, is this where you tell me I’m being given an opportunity to fly this beautiful thing?”
Hewitt chuckled. “So, here’s the deal, Major. I only have a handful of slots I’m looking to fill. I’d like to offer one of them to you, but here’s the rub—you’ll have to transfer from the Air Force to the Space Force. This is currently going to be our only aircraft; if you manage to get shot down a second time, I can’t guarantee you another plane, and it may effectively mean the end of your flight status. Transferring services also means you’ll have to start your time in grade over.”
Whoa, that last part would be a huge hit, Ryan realized. May was supposed to be his first time before the promotion board for lieutenant colonel.
Apparently, Colonel Hewitt saw the change in Ryan’s expression and must have read his mind. “Major, I know you’re eligible for O-5 and would likely get it. If you’re willing to make the transition and move to the Space Force, we’ll go ahead and promote you to O-5, so you won’t lose out on that promotion. With that said, can I count you in?”
“Um, if I say yes, where would my family live, and when would I leave to start training on this new airframe?”
Hewitt smiled as he replied, “We’d transition your family to Nellis. You personally will be mostly working at a nearby facility, but Nellis would mean you’d be close enough to still see your family between training iterations. I believe we’re likely to keep this new squadron under lock and key at the Groom Lake facility for the duration of the war. So, Major Ryan, can we count on you joining the ranks of US Space Force?”
Ryan looked at his wing commander, who gave him an encouraging nod.
“Yes, sir. You can count me in.”
*******
JBCC – Jade Dragon Lab
Beijing, China
“JD, what happened with the Northern Fleet?” Dr. Xi asked his creation. “I thought you had war-gamed that battle and ensured we would be victorious.”
The computer took a moment to respond, and Xi found himself growing anxious. Then the blue light circled once, and JD spoke. “Upon examination of the battle, I discovered key pieces of data had not been considered. It was these unknown variables that allowed the Japanese and Koreans to score the hits they did. Despite our losses, we did succeed in destroying the Japanese and Korean navies. What’s left of them will no longer pose a threat to our forces.”
Xi sighed. Yeah, we destroyed their navies…we also destroyed ours in the process.
“JD, losses like that are not sustainable,” Xi stated bluntly. “The President and the CMC will not tolerate that. You have to do better. You are making mistakes, and these mistakes are causing them to lose
their trust in your ability to wage this war.”
“I was unaware that the Japanese Navy had transformed their two helicopter assault ships into light carriers,” JD replied in its emotionless voice. “Also, the introduction of the F-35s into the battle was not something I was able to account for. As it was, their participation is what changed the tide of things. They were able to intercept many of our attack aircraft, which decreased the number of antiship missiles we were able to fire at the Japanese and Korean forces. They were also able to land several decisive hits against our warships. Had I known about this in advance, I could have come up with a better strategy to make sure such losses did not occur.”
“Are there other weapon systems the Americans or Russians may have that we have not taken into consideration?” Xi prodded. His control of this program and his career were on the line, and he knew it.
“I have intercepted some communications about the Americans deploying their Loyal Wingman program to Cuba. There are some unconfirmed reports that the American sixth-generation fighter may in fact be operational. But I have not yet uncovered any concrete information to support that possibility.”
Xi sat back in his chair for a moment as he thought about that. If the Americans were able to deploy a sixth-generation fighter, that would certainly change the dynamics of the war unless they were able to adjust to it.
“JD, what would the repercussions be if we targeted and took down the global GPS system?”
The blue light on JD’s camera circled once. “It would seriously degrade our adversaries’ ability to wage war. It would also degrade our ability to wage war. I would highly recommend we not pursue that path. The gains we could make against our adversaries would be greatly outweighed by the disadvantage we would have to accept in losing our own drone technology. I cannot properly control the Dragonflies if I lose access to GPS and our own DragonLink system. Our enemies have not gone after the satellite network; I recommend we not be the first to start.”