“One more thing, Al. Those casualty lists we saw in Heidelberg show six crewmen killed because in defilade they spelled one another off. All six were crushed because the ground under the tank suddenly gave way under the weight. I don’t blame them. Underneath a tank’s as good a shelter as any. Besides, they’d just been shipped over — so didn’t expect it. Different geology than California. Still, their commander should have known better. We need every goddamn tank and man we can get. Now our G-2 tells us the Russians are stockpiling oil supplies in our own underground depots they’ve captured outside the pocket — safe from aerial attack. Meanwhile the bastards are pounding the shit out of our Atlantic oil and supply convoys. They keep getting clobbered, we could lose this thing for the want of a shell.”
Banks said nothing. As usual, the general was exaggerating — and as usual, he was right.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“Morning, Comrade General,” welcomed the captain of security.
Marchenko grunted and kept walking down the long, crimson corridor of the Kremlin’s Council of Ministers building to the first deputy prime minister’s office. The general was in no mood for pleasantries, and his lumbago was starting to act up again, a sure sign that winter was on its way. When he arrived in the waiting room outside the deputy minister’s office, the general informed the secretary he must see the minister at once.
“Is it pressing?” the immaculate major asked, his red shoulder boards vibrant in the pale shafts of sunlight.
Damn protocol, thought Marchenko. “It’s not pressing,” he retorted. “It’s critical.”
The major, unperturbed — it was always “critical”—put the ivory desk phone on “conference.” Often the minister could deal with it over the phone without wasting his time in the office. “General Marchenko here, sir,” the major informed the minister crisply. “He wishes to speak with you.”
There was a slight hesitation. “Very well,” said a voice resonant in the tinny-sounding speaker. Marchenko could see, through the beige-draped panel of the glass door, that the minister wasn’t coming to meet him, so that the general was required to walk the twenty meters down the long, rectangular office to where the deputy sat talking on one of the seven white phones to his left, waving Marchenko to a chair as a headmaster to a prefect. Marchenko bristled — after all, he was the senior adviser to Premier Suzlov, and yet the deputy minister wouldn’t meet him halfway. At the end of the row of chairs down the wooden-paneled wall to the minister’s right, a young, nervous executive type sat waiting apprehensively below the sepia-toned portrait of Marx.
“Comrade,” said the deputy minister. A small, squat man with a shock of graying hair, he pushed himself back from the semicircular cutaway in the elegant desk and rose, extending his hand. But Marchenko felt it was more protocol than heartfelt. The general envied the minister — he’d always wanted a desk like that, where documents were all around you, rather than where you could never reach them. “Comrade Deputy,” said Marchenko, simultaneously indicating the glum, nervous man sitting below Marx.
“It’s all right,” the deputy reassured him. “He is one of my advisers. We all need advisers, eh, Comrade?”
Marchenko was a recognized expert on military matters, but the nuances of superiors often bemused him. Was the deputy reminding him of the Kremlin’s pecking order with his comment or was he merely being polite?
“So — what’s critical, General?”
Marchenko gave him both barrels at once. “The Japanese fleet is in La Perouse Strait. Sailing north.”
The deputy said nothing, his face impassive.
“Between Japan and Sakhalin,” continued Marchenko.
“The Japanese call it Karafuto, you might recall.” Still the minister made no comment. Indeed, he seemed rather bored.
Containing his exasperation, Marchenko went on to explain, “They’re obviously strengthening their western flank. Northern Sakhalin is a perfect springboard for an invasion of Siberia.”
“Oil,” said the deputy.
Unconsciously Marchenko gave a sigh of relief. “Among other things, Comrade, yes. Oil and our Siberian bases, from which our bombers have been hitting their west coast.”
“You are sure it’s an invasion force? I thought you were the one who doubted Japan would escalate her involvement militarily.”
Marchenko looked straight at the deputy. “I was wrong. There are a dozen transports at least,” replied Marchenko. “A carrier, helicopter, ships as well, and a screen of fighters and surface vessels. Thirty vessels in all.”
“Can we stop them?”
“I don’t know,” said Marchenko. “If we were only fighting on one front, yes, of course.”
“But the Japanese defense force, I didn’t think was all that—”
“We could muster enough troops in Vladivostok and ferry them over, but we haven’t the time and there are only two divisions on all of Sakhalin. It’s as big as Japan’s north island. But our main concern, Comrade Deputy, and this is why I’ve come straight to you for your support in the Politburo, is that even if we repulse the Japanese landing — and this may be possible with our fighters out of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in south Sakhalin — so long as Japan continues to get oil from the Americans, she will be able to harass us along our eastern flank. We’ve got to stop the oil coming to her from Alaska. Even if their fleet is a feint to—”
“What about our submarines?” interjected the deputy. “We surely have enough of those out of Vladivostok?”
“So do the Americans, Comrade Deputy. And quite frankly, the U.S. hydrophone arrays — underwater microphones — are so good in the Pacific, they pick us up way ahead. At the moment, we can’t get near those tankers because of Shemya and Adak.”
The deputy glanced up at his wall map at the Aleutians arcing like a sickle toward Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, with only the two Soviet Komandorskiye Islands between Kamchatka’s ICBM sites 190 miles to the west, and the westernmost U.S. island of Attu 250 miles east of the Komandorskiyes.
“So we have to take out Shemya and Adak?” proffered the minister.
“Adak would do. It’s the U.S. submarine listening post and base.”
“No, no,” the general was quick to tell him. “Not by sea. By air. It’s the only way, given the time problem. Fighter attacks to soften the island base up — then paratroops.”
The deputy minister frowned. It was now evident why Marchenko was seeking his approval so urgently. He would need a majority of Politburo supporters on this one. “General — I am not as adroit as you in military matters, but I would doubt the Americans will fail to see you coming. An attack on the island by our fighters flying below enemy radar can be done. This I know. But when you take in paratroops, the radar will surely see them.”
“Not if our fighters knock out the American radar first.”
“And what if they don’t? As I remember from your reports on our air-to-ground rocket raids on England, radar installation masts can be notoriously difficult to knock out. Almost as difficult as bridges, I believe. But if I am correct, Shemya Island, as well as being one of the most heavily armed places on earth, is between Komandorskiyes and Adak?”
Marchenko nodded. “And if we wait, we could have the American Pacific Fleet to contend with. Elements of it are already heading up from the Sea of Japan, where they were providing carrier fighter cover for the U.S.-ROK counterattack in North Korea.”
“Then how do you propose dealing with the Adak submarine base?”
Marchenko walked to the wall map, extending his hand out from the Komandorskiyes. “We will fly due east two hundred miles north of Shemya — midair refueling for the MiG-29s. Then due south to Adak.”
