Israeli Army. They’d suffer disproportionate losses, torn between defense over land and at sea, torn further between conflicting roles of air superiority and antiship or ground attack. With the Luftwaffe so powerful, and the ekranoplans giving them all the initiative theater wide, the Israelis had almost no chance to win.
And none of it would be necessary if Ohio hadn’t been sunk.
The final run to Israel took Challenger southeast. The slope up onto the continental shelf was gradual but relentless. Before, in deep water, if fired on, Challenger could outdive conventional torpedoes, which had crush depths of 3,000 feet or less. Now, with the shallower bottom, that option was forfeited when Jeffrey and his ship might need it most.
The SEALs, with Salih, Meltzer, and Klaus Mohr, got ready to depart in the minisub. Jeffrey went to battle stations; Bell sat next to him. Challenger used the established shipping lane that led toward Haifa harbor, which presented many perils but helped avoid naval mines. He ordered two off-board probes to be deployed, to scout ahead for uncharted mines or wrecks, bottom sensors, and prowling ocean rovers. When the bottom reached 600 feet — miles into Israel-owned waters — he and his probes turned south, on the inner edge of the corridor for coastal traffic. He wasn’t surprised there were so few cargo vessels in the area. Rumors, of a German offensive that would be soon, must have spread far and wide. Merchant mariners would’ve noticed changed military behavior, and civilian anxiety and dread, in any port of call — including Haifa.
A probe’s feed suddenly went dead. Lieutenant Torelli said the fiber-optic line was good, but the probe had broken down. Without its motor working, there was no way to retrieve the 3,000 pound unit, and no time to improvise a retrieval. Jeffrey ordered the line cut. He had no more probes as replacements. Challenger needed to go on, half blind, leaving dead-certain proof that an American submarine had been through here. The probe’s malfunction might indicate Israeli interference; the loss of its feed could be the prelude to an assault on the mother ship. Everyone braced for the worst, staying quiet, barely moving.
Nothing happened. Then Jeffrey remembered that Challenger might have gotten this far because of unwanted aid: Some of the Kampfschwimmer attack teams, with sets of Klaus Mohr’s gear, would be doing the same sort of infiltration, in U-boats. They might be diverting Israeli forces that otherwise would be denser in Challenger’s area — but their presence could also alert Israel to search with the greatest care for more subs sneaking toward the coast. And nothing says we won’t bump into one of those U-boats. Then there are the Kampfschwimmer, whose movements might warn Israel to watch out on land… and who might even cross paths with my SEALs. Things could get ugly.
Challenger opened her hangar doors to release the minisub. Jeffrey timed it between passes of Israeli aircraft and patrol boats. He held his breath; there was no incoming fire, yet. The minisub moved inshore; Challenger withdrew to deeper water. The patrol boats had no sonars or antisubmarine weapons. They bristled with.50-caliber heavy machine guns and larger automatic cannon. Their crews’ job was to spot intruders using small craft, rubber boats, or scuba. From years of fighting terrorists, they tended to shoot first and ask questions later. They could chew Felix and his men to pieces, in the water or on the beach. Jeffrey hoped Felix’s audacious plan would prevent this.
Egon Schneider and Manfred Knipp sat at the command console in Doenitz’s control room. Schneider was still displeased by being relegated to a side show: Lurking for Los Angeles- or Virginia-class American submarines around the Arabian Gulf, plus maybe an aircraft carrier or two.
His flank-speed dash northward through water five thousand meters deep — so fast yet so invisible — had been exciting. Then he waited, but nothing interesting occurred.
“It seems we’ve beaten the Americans by too wide a margin. We’re simply too fast.”
“Sir?” Knipp asked.
“Nothing but merchant shipping passing above us. No enemy cargo ship is a target worth revealing our presence and true nationality for.”
“Jawohl.”
Schneider sulked and studied the large-scale nautical chart. Doenitz was in the Gulf of Aden, where the bottom in many places was 900 to 12,000 meters deep. Twelve hundred meters was his crush depth. Now he hugged ooze-covered terrain at almost one thousand meters, moving at only four knots — for quieting, and to assure the best sensitivity for his on-hull passive sonars searching upward.
The Gulf of Aden was an inlet off of the Arabian Sea that pointed toward Africa. At the gulf’s western end, the water suddenly narrowed to the Strait of Bab el Mandeb. Through this strait lay the Red Sea. All shipping for Israel and Egypt, to or from the Indian Ocean and the Pacific, had to pass through this one strait, less than sixteen sea miles wide, much of that blocked by islands and shoals, jagged coral reefs, and wrecks.
“Verdammt,” Schneider cursed. “This is getting us nowhere. The Gulf of Aden is too wide for us to be sure of catching good targets, and the Bab el Mandeb is too narrow to lurk there. I don’t like this setup.” One side of the Bab el Mandeb Strait was controlled by neutral Yemen, and the other by the Allies’ Central African pocket.
“Your intentions, sir?”
Schneider leaned toward Knipp’s main console screen, until his large belly pressed against the edge of the console. “We penetrate the Bab el Mandeb, move to the northern end of the Red Sea, and work here, at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula. Once inside the Red Sea we get water that’s nice and deep again. Off the Sinai, by Sharm al-Sheik, we’ll be astride the Jubal Strait, the start of the Gulf of Suez leading to Egypt and the canal to the north-northwest, and also right outside the Tiran Strait, at the start of the Gulf of Aqaba, leading north-northeast to the harbor and naval base at Eilat in southernmost Israel, here.”
“Understood,” Knipp said, as obsequious and yet martinetlike as ever.
“That puts us at the center of the Y intersection. The Red Sea is the Y’s base, the Gulf of Suez is its left upper arm, and the Gulf of Aqaba is its right upper arm. This gives us several advantages compared to where we’re positioned now. Do you see them?”
Schneider knew he didn’t have to especially like Knipp to harness him as a good einzvo. My career advancement depends on bringing up key subordinates, grooming them for eventual independent command, regardless of what I think of their personalities…. As far as I’m concerned, proper military leadership is altruistic only superficially. The true political goal is always selfish — to build good-looking paper credentials, thus earning, no, demanding my own next promotion.
Knipp continued studying his screens and thinking.
“I see one thing, sir. The deep water there is up to eighty miles wide. That gives us more options than staying close to the Bab el Mandeb.”
“That’s tactical. Think big picture.”
“Oh. By blocking the central intersection of that Y, we dominate any naval cooperation between Israel and Egypt along their southern flanks, before and during the Afrika Korps’ offensive.”
“Good. What else?”
“There’s more, Captain?”
“Yes. Much more.”
Knipp thought about the chart again. “I believe I see another factor now.”
“Speak.”
“We know Allied fast-attacks need to enter the Red Sea for their cruise missiles to reach useful targets in North Africa.”
“Go on.” This much is obvious from the chart.
“If we run stealthily to the north end of the Red Sea, we can then sweep southward again, and sink the Allied
