Straits of Power

Decryptions of what was received could be passed from Challenger’s own radio room up into this special compartment. The compartment had its own receivers and decryption gear, for redundancy — in case something on Challenger failed or the connections into the hold broke down or snapped. Display screens here would let Jeffrey observe the theater-wide military situation around him, courtesy of uploads to the satellites from Norfolk or the Pentagon.

The Bunga Azul’s antennas also fed raw intercepts to Challenger’s electronic support-measures room. Computer interpretations came back for Jeffrey to see and listen to — various radars and radio stations in range of the Bunga Azul, with icons that identified the transmitter types and whether they were military, civilian government, or private commercial. The compartment also contained equipment to maintain these feeds if something went wrong on Challenger. In this soundproof space, Jeffrey had an intercom to talk to Bell and others in his control room, and one to hear from Master Pribadi on the Bunga Azul’s bridge. Instrument readings from the bridge were fed to other displays in the room. These included inertial navigation fixes against a chart of the canal, the Bunga Azul’s course and speed, plus copies of readouts from her navigation radar, and forward-looking obstacle-avoidance sonar.

Having a canal pilot on the bridge forced Jeffrey to avoid that area of the ship as much as possible. The pilot was Egyptian, an employee of the Suez Canal Authority, whose presence was required by the authority; he was not in the know about the Bunga Azul’s true nature. But in an emergency, from this compartment, Jeffrey could be on the bridge in moments.

This space is like my combat information center, normally buried deep in the bowels of a warship — the position from which a captain fights a naval battle. The only problem is that for all the hours she’s cooped up in the hold, Challenger can’t fire a single weapon. No torpedoes, no land-attack or antiship or antiaircraft missiles, no countermeasures, nothing…. And the Bunga Azul is defenseless but for a handful of machine guns meant to fight off modern pirates striking near Java or Malaysia.

Jeffrey felt sudden movement and vibrations through the deck, confirmed by the ship’s speed and other data he did have. The master had said that because the Bunga Azul was fast, maneuverable, and in good condition, she was third in line — one of the very first ships in the convoy of almost fifty. The convoy formed up promptly and headed into the canal.

More displays came alive. Jeffrey began to integrate the images and numbers into a three-dimensional picture within his mind. Ahead and underwater, he could see the sides and bottom of the channel on the Bunga Azul’s simple sonar. He knew unarmed Egyptian minesweepers went through the canal far out in front of every convoy, just in case, but was glad he had a mine-avoidance display. Challenger’s arrays were of no use enclosed in the secret submarine hold.

Over the years, the bottom had been deepened to more than seventy feet. The canal was six hundred feet wide here, but safety required that the ships stick to the middle and keep a rigid separation distance between each and the next; this was the job of the pilots. The wartime speed limit for canal convoys was twelve knots.

We’ll meet Monday’s 0500 northbound convoy in the Bitter Lakes, after the halfway point of the canal at Ismailia. We anchor while they keep going, to avoid any chance of a head-on collision.

“Like coffee, Mr. Captain, sir?” The radioman offered Jeffrey a thermos bottle.

“Thanks.” Jeffrey needed it. He wouldn’t let himself sleep until they went out the other side of the canal, crossed through the 160-mile-long, narrow and shallow Gulf of Suez, then dived from inside the Bunga Azul when they reached the Red Sea itself.

Despite the cup of coffee, Jeffrey yawned.

“Why not to go on deck small while? Stretch legs and get fresh air. Once sun up, very hot and you be obvious…. Go near stern so pilot not be seeing you.”

Jeffrey thought it over, then nodded.

Jeffrey stood on deck near the stern. The deck vibrated beneath his feet more strongly here. The air was humid but cool — the desert on either side of the canal got cold at night. He could see glare from the searchlight, fitted to the bow of the supertanker immediately astern, shining toward him and illuminating the landscape to port and starboard. The Bunga Azul had a similar searchlight aimed ahead from her bow. The equipment was provided by the canal authority, and served as just what they seemed to be: giant headlights. Each ship in the convoy had one, by law.

Jeffrey kept to the shadows beside the base of a loading crane. Gazing up, once his eyes adjusted to the dark, he could see countless stars. Except for directly overhead, where the Bunga Azul’s exhaust fumes and heat distorted the view of the heavens, the desert stars were breathtakingly brilliant and perfectly sharp.

Jeffrey looked around, trying to relax his mind as well as his body. He felt on pins and needles, knowing what he knew about the strategic situation. Yet for a while he was forced into a totally passive role, and he hated it. The Bunga Azul and the other ships continued moving south.

Immediately to port he saw big, reddish-brown weathered berms of earth and sand, at least thirty feet tall, with intermittent gaps between and sometimes roads paved up them. On that bank, Jeffrey also saw occasional shacks and patches of scrub brush. This was the west edge of the Sinai Peninsula.

Along the opposite bank, the African side, the narrow strip of land lit by the supertanker’s headlight was mostly flat. Sand dunes and more scrub stretched beyond an asphalt road. Along the edges of the canal, where water lapped and splashed from the wakes of the passing ships, Jeffrey could make out the tips of concrete walls that lined the canal to keep the sand and loose soil from caving in.

Jeffrey returned to the secret radio room while it was still night outside. He did feel somewhat refreshed, and had another cup of hot coffee to stay energized. He glanced at a clock: 0430 local time.

As expected from reading his egress orders, a theater-wide operational plot began to be broadcast from the U.S. via satellite — not just for Jeffrey but for all Allied forces in Egypt and Israel and the Central African pocket. The egress orders had said that a spy satellite would be diverted to watch the sailing of the 0100 Monday southbound convoy. Since the Bunga Azul’s master had been instructed not to take the canal unless Challenger was securely inside, her movement was the signal that Jeffrey was leaving the Med.

He realized that, because of his continued radio silence, his superiors probably had no idea what had happened with his mission. Although the Bunga Azul possessed the equipment to send a message burst to Norfolk, doing so now, with Axis electronic warfare surveillance at its peak, might too readily give the host ship and its passenger sub away. That would make them a valid military target to the Axis, and could draw immediate lethal fire while trapped inside the canal.

No, there’s nothing useful I have to say to anyone, or to ask them.

The data download did tell Jeffrey several things. German forces of all types were massing in Libya, at what seemed like logical jumping-off points for an assault to the east in North Africa — targeting Alexandria and Cairo, then the Sinai, and then Israel. Other German forces were on high alert in Greece and Italy.

Jeffrey scanned wider parts of the big-picture plot.

Turkey’s defenses were strengthening along her western border with German-occupied Bulgaria and Greece, to dissuade the Axis from getting too ambitious there at Turkey’s expense.

Egypt and Israel were also on maximum alert. Israeli armor, with Egyptian permission, was moving through the Sinai Peninsula on high-speed tank-transporter tractor-trailers, to add to the tanks already arrayed well west of the Nile to meet any German offensive out of Libya. Jeffrey was still worried that Israel might have tunnel vision: Attacks on them in the past, from the west, always came through the Sinai. And some of their greatest land-battle victories were won in the Sinai, or by penetrating into the main part of Egypt. Those ekranoplans, with their tremendous mobility, might indeed go for the pivotal flank attack at Tel Aviv that Jeffrey feared.

Israel is well aware that the German-owned ekranoplans exist. No warning I could give would tell them something they don’t know.

According to the data, so far there were very few air skirmishes, or artillery or cruise-missile duels.

“Sir Captain,” the radioman said, “text message coming. Is for you.”

“Who’s the sender?”

“Not yet… Bad enemy jamming. Garbled. Message repeating.” It took several more tries before the message