Cobra

by David E. Meadows

  The USS Spruance, named for the World War II Navy admiral and hero of the battle of Midway, Admiral Raymond Spruance, was the oldest destroyer on active duty in the United States Navy. USS Spruance was commissioned on August 12, 1975. Her engine plants, electrical systems, and crew quarters showed the forty-plus years of action. The number of empty bunks revealed the number of missing sailors. The designers of this ship were ahead of their time. They had the forethought to realize the ship would outlast its 1980s weapons systems and technology, so they built empty compartments along with electrical conduits to accommodate whatever new warfare developments occurred.

  This engineering forethought proved invaluable when Congress cut funding to build new ships, and the Navy was forced to keep aging warships on active duty. Technology provided the capability for the Spruance to continue a primary AS W mission while now possessing the capability to fight antiair warfare actions. The loss of the USS John Rodgers a month ago, when its commanding officer sacrificed the ship to save the USS Stennis from four enemy torpedoes, had reduced the Navy inventory of Spruance-class destroyers to six, all of which possessed technologically enhanced war fighting capabilities.

  The Strait of Sicily separated Europe from the Tunisian coast by eighty-three choppy miles, a choke point in the center of the Mediterranean capable of severing the sea into two nearly equal halves.

  On a clear day, no ship sailed through the Strait without being visually logged from military observation points located on the high mountains on both sides of the Strait. The two-ship surface action group, with the Hue City leading two nautical miles ahead and to the south of the USS Spruance, had entered this Mediterranean bottleneck thirty minutes ago.

  The SAG sailed under the direction of the commanding officer of the USS Hue City, a four-striper by the name of Horatio Jurgen Mcteak, who hid the mouthful Horatio and Jurgen under the nickname Buc-Buc. Not that he wasn’t proud of his folks or didn’t love them, but a name like Horatio had its own cross to bear in a Navy community, and no one ever pronounced or wrote Jurgen — it was pronounced joor-gan — correctly. The Jurgen name was a Mcteak legacy passed down through the firstborn of his family for four generations. Buc-Buc received a lot of badgering from his father when he failed to stick the Jurgen brand on his name, but when the second son was born and became known as Jurgen Thomas Mcteak, his father, Thomas Jurgen Mcteak, lovingly accepted the compromise. The Navy had not been a Mcteak legacy. The original Jurgen Mcteak had fought with the Union Army in the Civil War. Another one had been in Black Jack’s expeditionary force in World War I, and his father had served in World War II and Korea as a colonel in the infantry. Buc-Buc was the first Jurgen Mcteak to earn an officer’s commission in the Navy. The Mcteak family were proud of their Navy son.

  It was a family joke that if he had gone to a real college instead of the Naval Academy, he could have had a real degree.

  His father and two elderly uncles enjoyed poking fun. The three of them, Army veterans, made the annual Army-Navy football game an exciting event in the Mcteak household with beer, pretzels, grilled hot dogs and shifting insults flowing between the grill outside and the large-screen television inside. The game had become as much a Mcteak family get-together as Thanksgiving.

  Buc-Buc earned the nickname early in his childhood, unlike most military veterans who are honorably dubbed by their shipmates. It occurred during a grammar school incident with two bullies in his class.

  The two, terrorizing the eighth grade, decided it was Mcteak’s turn to provide them with spending money. When he realized he was going to be unable to avoid a confrontation, he lowered his head and, like a battering ram, knocked the breath out of the bigger of the two. Then he turned and, before the other one could run, rammed his head into the boy’s stomach, sending both scrambling away, crying. The incident was bigger in Buc-Buc’s mind than in the school history. He received numerous invitations to speak at alumni reunions or schools he attended, places where a Navy captain was considered prime speaker material. One of those many places had been his old grammar school, and when he casually mentioned the incident, no one seemed to remember it, so he dropped the subject to never raise it again.

  The principal remembered it. He remembered it with glee, for the two boys Mcteak punished had been a growing problem. They seemed to teeter on the edge of misbehavior, always around the corner out of sight from authority. He had slapped his leg and said, “Gosh, darn,” which was the strongest language Mr. Alonzo Aberaathy ever used, causing his secretary to rush in to see if he was all right. After a moment of satisfaction, Mr. Abernathy recalled that rules were rules, and the rules for fighting called for suspension. He searched for a couple of days for an acceptable alternative before the three sets of parents at tended a counseling session with him about the unfortunate incident. After allowing the three sets of parents to argue “My child is innocent,” he let go a deep sigh and offered an alternative that they all reluctantly accepted rather than have their young angels suspended. The three boys spent two weeks in after-school detention. Two weeks in which the reformed bullies fawned over the new grammar school hero, who spent his two weeks ignoring them.

  Mr. Alonzo Abernathy stuck him with Buc-Buc after overhearing a teacher say to a fellow teacher, “Sure, they started it. But we can’t have this.

  Violence begets violence. What if every time we felt threatened, we lowered our heads and buc-bucked them. We’d have chaos everywhere.” The nickname spread through his classmates, and no one called him Horatio again. Buc-Buc was the first of many accolades and awards Captain Horatio Jurgen Mcteak would receive in the years ahead.

  * * *

  Buc-Buc paced over to the port bridge wing for the third time in fifteen minutes and hoisted the heavy Navy binoculars hanging around his neck. A couple of twists of the eyepieces, and the profile of the USS Spruance steaming three thousand yards — one and a half nautical miles — off his port side leaped into view. The thirty-two knots they used to zoom ahead of the battle group ruined any ASW capability for both ships, but the primary threat to them was air. Sixth Fleet had cleared the seas of hostile submarines with the lone remaining Algerian Kilo safely in port in Malaga. The lone remaining Libyan Foxtrot diesel submarine lacked the legs to reach this far north.

  “Officer of the Deck,” Buc-Buc said, sticking his balding head back inside the bridge.

  “Yes, sir, Captain.”

  “Relay to the tactical action officer to slow the SAG to eighteen knots.

  And give me an updated estimate to our MODLOC.” MODLOC: another Navy acronym seldom understood by even the officers and sailors who used it.

  MODLOC stood for miscellaneous operational details, local operations. It was a term to describe an assigned area of the sea where a ship or battle group, or in this instance the surface action group — the SAG — was to operate. They could burn holes in the sea, do exercises, race from one end of the box to the other, but the assigned area was the MODLOC, and they were expected to remain within it. The center of the MODLOC for the Hue City and Spruance was a hundred nautical miles southeast of Lampedusa just north of the one hundred-mile mark from Tripoli. Their mission was to take out any military threat airborne out of Tunisia or Libya. They were not to cross the thirty fifth parallel.

  “Skipper, TAO says thirty minutes at eighteen knots to the north boundary of the MODLOC.”

  “Very well. Keep me apprised.” Buc-Buc looked at his watch. He loved this Omega, but had no illusions he was anything like James Bond. He had bought the expensive chronometer purchased in Norfolk from an antique dealer who specialized in Mariner paraphernalia. Chronometer was just another name for a watch, only it cost more. The stars overhead were beginning to fade with the emerging sunlight. The Stennis and its escorts would still be in darkness for another hour.

  The sound of the reveille bugle at six o’clock marked the start of another workday. There was always someone near the light switch, eager to flood a sleeping compartment with harsh fluorescent lig
ht to arouse the occupants. The sound and fog of the morning showers caused moisture to settle on the tile floors as sailors rushed to dress and head toward the mess decks. The clanging of metal trays against the slide rails of the serving bar mixed with the morning chatter as mess specialists dished out breakfast. Like a sleeping bear, reveille brought the ship from its nightly hibernation to its full war fighting strength.

  The thought of breakfast caused his stomach to growl. He could step into his at-sea cabin behind the bridge and order up his earlier. Of course, if he did that, the crews would know within minutes that the Old Man had used a privilege. It was amazing when he thought about it how, here he was in charge of one of the most powerful ships in the world, and morale could be affected by the little things he did in running it. What were the days of Rock and Shoals like? he wondered briefly for the thousandth time, referring to the laws that governed Navy captains during the period of sail and before the Uniform Code of Military Justice was passed after World War II. He grinned. Probably too rough for me.

  He watched the gray silhouette of USS Spruance ease back until she was off his port stern. Good. This cleared their weapons from mutual interference so they could better fight a 360-degree war.

  “Bridge, TAO; captain still up there?”

  “Captain, TAO for you, sir.”

  Buc-Buc stepped into the bridge near the 12MC speaker box and flipped the switch. With all the technology shoved onto this ship, the Navy still depended on a sound-powered communications system as the primary means for instant communications between war fighting stations.

  Sound-powered communications depended only on voice for power, thereby removing battle damage to the electrical system as a threat to internal communications. “Go ahead, TAO.”

  “Captain, we have two blips airborne out of eastern Libya. Computer assesses them as ballistic missiles — designated targets zero zero one and zero zero two.”

  “Officer of the Deck, sound general quarters. TAO, Sixth Fleet notified?”

  “In process of doing so, sir.”

  “You have flight path yet?”

  “Yes, sir. Target zero zero one launched zero six oh one hours from coordinates—”

  “Don’t give me coordinates, Commander. I never have time to figure them out. Give me geographical locations or names.”

  “Yes, sir. Target zero zero one launched from west of Tripoli near the Libyan-Tunisian border. Direction of travel is north by northwest.”

  Buc-Buc moved over to the navigation table, where the chart displayed the coast of Libya, Tunisia, the Strait of Sicily, Sicily, along with the southern boot of Italy and then farther west to encompass most of the Algerian coast. “Possible targets, TAO?” “Intelligence officer says based on estimated range of the Al-Fatah III missile, the target could be Algiers.”

  “Or?”

  “Or eastern coast of Spain.”

  “Why Algiers?”

  “U. S. Marines are there, sir. Plus Algiers was identified by Sixth Fleet as a primary ballistic-missile target.”

  “I’m coming down, TAO.” Buc-Buc stepped behind the helm and swung open the watertight door to the stairwell leading between the Combat Information Center and the bridge.

  “Captain off the bridge!” shouted the boatswain mate of the watch as Buc-Buc stepped over the transom. The BMOW stepped over and closed the hatch behind the captain. The bongs of general quarters filled the approaching dawn skies. From across the water, the GQ bongs of the USS Spruance echoed through the bridge. Great way to greet the morning, thought the young lieutenant officer of the deck as he lifted his binoculars to scan the horizon for approaching traffic. The two ships were approaching center of MODLOC at eighteen knots and going to battle stations against hostile theater ballistic missiles. Complicating this was the fact they were in one of the most heavily traveled areas of the Med for maritime traffic.

  “How many ships we have on scope?” the lieutenant asked as he lowered his binoculars. He took the life vest and helmet the BMOW held out to him and quickly put them on, holding the helmet momentarily as the navigator gave the range, bearing, course, and speed of the four contacts reflected on the AN/SPS-55 surface-search radar. The OOD’s job was to maneuver the ship in tandem with the USS Spruance through the morning traffic maze of ships waiting for full daylight to transit the narrow Strait of Sicily.

  * * *

  Buc-Buc stepped through the open door into the Combat Information Center. The quiet professionalism in the blue-lighted compartment gave him satisfaction. A lesson he learned from an old mustang captain during his first duty as an Ensign on a now-decommissioned destroyer was that a quietly functioning CIC was the sign of a well-trained war fighting machine. He refused to allow any shouting in his CIC.

  “Captain in Combat,” came from a voice from the shadows, probably the CIC watch supervisor, who moved continuously among the sailors, ensuring they were doing their jobs effectively and exchanging information rapidly.

  “What you got?”

  The TAO pushed the buttons on the holograph display and with his laser pointer highlighted the two small missile symbols airborne. The two missiles were still climbing. The operator, sitting nearby, hit the keyboard. Behind the two missile symbols, red flickering contrails appeared. Ahead of the missiles, a green line leaped from their noses and curved off into the horizon, showing the projected flight path.

  “Zoom out a little,” Buc-Buc ordered, leaning over the display to get a better view.

  The TAO nodded to the operator, and in a second, the HD flickered briefly before returning. The missile symbols were smaller, but the green line from target zero zero one shot through Algiers, while the projected path of target zero zero two traveled southeast of their MODLOC over Sicily and through Naples and eventually disappeared into the Balkans near the Italian-Croatian border.

  “Give me the red phone. TAO, you have targeting solutions on the missiles?”

  “Sir, we have a brief window in four minutes for target zero zero one.

  Target zero zero two, we can take out in two minutes, but we will be in range for twenty minutes. Target zero zero one is the hard one. Skipper.

  She is traveling opposite direction from us at an awkward tangent. We have a three-minute window,” he glanced at the clock. “And only three minutes in which to fire.”

  The assistant TAO. a young lieutenant, handed the secure phone to Captain Mcteak. “Sixth Fleet, this is Charlie Oscar Hue City; come in, please.” Charlie Oscar was the NATO phonetic for CO — commanding officer.

  “Hue City, Sixth Fleet; go ahead.”

  “Sixth Fleet, this is Charlie Oscar Hue City speaking. Unless otherwise directed, I intend to engage two ballistic missiles launched from the Libyan landmass. Data transmission on Global Information Grid should show you same picture we have here. Request advice if other course of action desired. We have a two-minute window remaining for target zero zero one.” Without waiting for an answer, he hung up the phone. Naval action was always based on an unless-otherwise-directed concept. Unless higher authority directed him to do something different, Buc-Buc would fight the Hue City as he saw fit. Buc-Buc knew that if Sixth Fleet did not want him to launch against the missiles, they would tell him in the next two minutes. Two minutes was a lot of time in combat.

  Around Buc-Buc, the movement of arms and rushing sailors hurried through their portion of the theater ballistic missile defense — TBMD — plan. No one ran — another golden rule of Buc-Buc’s on what made an effective CIC.

  “Hue City, do you have projected targets yet?” came from the overhead speaker connected to Sixth Fleet.

  A sailor handed a sheet of paper to the TAO, who quickly read the data, whispered a quick question, and received an equally quick reply. The TAO grabbed a blank sheet and wrote hurriedly on it. “Sixth Fleet, data being transmitted via Global Information Grid even as we speak. Initial indications are one missile inbound Algiers and second heading toward Sicily or Naples.”

  The TAO held
up a sheet of paper for the captain to read.

  “Sixth Fleet, probability of SAM success is only sixty percent for the missile heading toward Algiers. We have an eighty plus percent probability of taking out the northbound missile.”

  “Hue City, keep us advised. Good shooting. We are moving fighter aircraft between Algiers and inbound target zero zero one, but they will be out of range of your SAMs. You have free fire zone, sir. Admiral Devlin sends his compliments.”

  “Roger, out.” He handed the handset back to the sailor standing beside him.

  “TAO, how soon you ready?”

  “We’ve been ready. Skipper. You just say when.”

  “Well, tell me how you intend to handle this dual problem. Commander,” Buc-Buc said to the young lieutenant commander. Buc-Buc turned and crawled up into his chair, fighting the urge to shout, “Fire!” The captain’s chair in Combat, like the one on the bridge, sat up high, allowing the skipper to see everything and everyone as they fought the ship. Conceivably, from the chair, the captain could fight and drive the ship during combat. Buc-Buc had fought computer-simulated sea battles before in a lot tighter situations than this. The only way future warriors learned their craft was to experience it. His major challenge was to remain calm, regardless of how fast his heart was beating and his blood was racing right now. A sailor slipped a cup of coffee into the cup holder on the right side of the chair before handing Buc-Buc a helmet. Buc-Buc looked at the coffee but was afraid his hand might shake if he tried to lift it. He glanced up at the TAO as he put the helmet on. Time to discover how well this officer performed in a real-life situation. Time to discover how well he performed, also.

  “Captain, for target zero zero one, I recommend two two missile firings; extended-range Standard Missiles with each of the pair fired at five-second intervals. Second pair to be fired ten seconds after first pair.”

  Buc-Buc nodded. “Okay, Commander.” He glanced at the clock on the wall.

  They still had one minute until their weapons systems would be within range of the launched missiles. “Whatever happened to fire two, wait, watch, and then fire two more?”