Fifty miles southwest of the island of Crete, the attack submarine Baton Rouge was in her drift mode on a heading of two-six-five, submerged at three hundred feet beneath the surface. Far to the north, in the Aegean, her sister boat the USS Phoenix was keeping close tabs on the approaches to the Dardanelles. They had been taking part in OPERATION LOOKUP with the CVN Nimitz when they had received orders to search for the Indianapolis. At all costs, their orders had specified, the Indianapolis was not to be allowed anywhere near the Dardanelles. “Top priority is communications. If the Indianapolis does not respond, and if she continues to make an attempt to reach the Black Sea, she is to be considered hostile, and is to be killed” commander Richard Keyser had surfaced his boat for clarification, and when it had come his orders had seemed no less incredible than before.
He knew JD. Webb. They were friends. If JD. was attempting to steal his boat, there was a gun pointed at his head. Or he was dead. Keyser would have bet anything on it.
A few minutes earlier their sonar had picked up what very Possibly was a submarine far off to their south. They had run at high speed for five minutes, and then had shut down to drift again.
“Conn, sonar” the comms speaker blared. “Conn, aye” Keyser said. “I have a definite fix on that target. Range eight thousand meters, bearing thin-six-zero. It’s changing left to right. I I The other submarine was directly ahead of them and was moving almost due south. “Is it the Indianapolis, Randy” The comms was silent for a beat. “Yes, Skipper, I’d be willing to bet anything on it, unless there is another Los Angeles-class boat in the area. “NO” Keyser said. “No chance it’s Russian”
“Not a chance, Skipper. She’s definitely an LA. class”
“What’s she doing”
“That’s the part that threw me at first. She’s not making more than ten knots, but she’s diving, on a constant angle. “How deep”
“Sir, a thousand feet … belay that. She’s passing eleven hundred feet now, and the angle of her dive has increased. I I Keyser looked at his exec at the chart table across the control room. “What’s it look like, Dean? Are they heading for the bottom”
“Just about ten thousand feet here, Skipper. But they’ve probably picked us up; they may be trying to duck under a diermocline”
“Then we’re going after her. Give me turns for full speed” Keyser turned back to the comms. “Sonar, keep a sharp watch, I want to know when she levels out”
“She’s still going down, Skipper”
“She’ll level off. She has to” The Baton Rouge accelerated smoothly, the angle on her planes down five degrees as she turned on an intercept course. The Los Angeles-class boats had a service depth of around fifteen hundred feet, though they were considered reasonably safe a few hundred feet deeper than that. It had always been one of their problems whenever they came up against the Russian Alfa-class boats that were constructed of welded titanium. The Alfas were not only faster, they could dive to nearly three thousand feet. Keyser hit the comms switch three minutes later as the Baton Rouge began to level off at one thousand feet. “Sonar, conn. I I “Sonar, aye. “What’s she doing”
“Skipper, she’s passed eighteen hundred feet and her angle hasn’t changed. I’m starting to pick up hull compression noises”
“Christ” Keyser swore. “Go active, ping him once, Randy, let him know we’re, here”
“Aye” Chief Petty Officer Randy Sparkman replied. Monts later they all heard the single pong. MAnything” Keyser radioed. “Negative. I’m getting more hull compression noises. Skipper, she’s just passed two thousand feet. I think … wait Keyser turned on his heel and hurried aft to the sonar control center. Sparkman looked up and shook his head.
“She’s breaking up, Skipper” Keyser donned a set of headphones. It took him a moment or two to sort out just what it was he was hearing. But it was there. The Indianapolis was definitely breaking up. “Give me another range and bearing” Sparkman hit the active sonar, the pong reverberating throughout the boat. “It’s a scattered target, Skipper.
She’@ losing all her air. Same range and bearing, but she’s going down now. Straight down”
“Oh, Christ” Keyser swore again, ripping the headphone! off. He hit the comms switch. “Dean, surface the boat. Emergency practices”
“Aye, Skipper.
A billion points of light sparkled on the deep blue of the Mediterranean as the Motor Vessel Stephos raced east into the rising sun. She was a French-built hydrofoil, and when she rose up out of the water on full plane she was a sight to see. Capable of speeds approaching fifty knots, at this moment she was doing nearly that, leaving behind a creamy but curiously flat wakeshe was beautiful, her lines sleek, her hull and superstructure all white except for the huge red crosses on her port and starboard sides. Her expansive forward deck, however, was cluttered with what appeared to be big crates, all marked LEBANESE RELIEF ORGANIZATION. In actuality, the crates were a sham; they served to hide the Tomahawk missile securely cradled to her hastily assembled launching rack.
“Within ten minutes” Kurshin had been assured by KGB Captain Ivan Akhminovich Grechko, who skippered the Stephos. “We can have the crates stripped away, the missile raised and fired”
“You have done a fine job” Kurshin said. Kurshin, Grechko, and Makayev had gone below to the captain’s cabin where they sat around a low coffee table on which was spread a chart depicting the entire eastern Mediterranean from Greece to Israel. Grechko stabbed a blunt finger on the chart at a point fifty miles north of Crete. They were just passing the eastern end of the island.
“We’ll make the Carpathos Strait just south of Rhodes within the next ninety minutes. Puts us out in the open Med for the run to the north side of Cyprus” Kurshin had been intently studying the chart. He looked up. Grechko and Makayev were watching him. “What time”
“We should be around the island Cape Andreas late this afternoon, and in position off the Syrian coast before nightfall”
Kurshin thought about it a moment. “We’ll reduce speed later today, perhaps around noon” he said. “But I’ll leave that up to you. The point is I don’t want to close with the coast before nightfall”
“That makes sense” Grechko nodded his agreement. “And then what, Comrade Colonel” Makayev asked. “We launch the missile, scuttle this boat, and take the auxiliary to the coast just north of Jeble where we’ll be picked up and flown immediately to Tbilisi”
“Why Georgia” Grechko asked.
“There isn’t much there except for peasants, factory workers, and old women. “Because we’re going to have to be hidden”
“For how long”
“I don’t know. Perhaps for a long time” “Because of the target” Makayev asked. “Yes, Niki, because of the target”
“Where” Kurshin sat back. He decided that it was going to be a pleasure killing this bastard. “What if I said Tel Aviv” The color drained from Makayev’s face, but Grechko was grinning. “That would teach those Jews a lesson” the KGB captain grunted. He was a roughshod man, with absolutely no class. He was ex-navy, though, and knew what he was doing here. “But you can’t be serious, Comrade Colonel” Kurshin had kept his eyes on Makayev. He shook his head. “We are not going to hit a civilian target”
He sat forward again and drew the chart a little closer.
“Here” he said, pointing. “En Gedi”
“What is there” Makayev asked.
“Israel’s stockpile of nuclear weapons.
Their only nuclear weapons” Makayev licked his lips. “They’d be deep underground. Beyond the damaging power of that missile, I think”
“You’re correct. But the nuclear blast will contaminate the surface for a lot of years to come, rendering their weapons inaccessible. Grechko was grinning again, his face like a death’s head. “Destroyed by an American weapon. That is rich” “But there’s more, isn’t there” Makayev said. “What do you mean” Kurshin asked. “There are some politics involved “
“You are a naval officer, Captain Makayev. Let’s just keep it at that, shall we”
“I don’t like this”
