Seas of Crisis

truly the middle of nowhere.

Someone knocked on his office door.

“Yes!”

His senior aide and deputy chief of staff came in, a captain, second rank — equivalent to a commander in the U.S. Navy. “Sir, is there anything else you’ll be needing?”

Meredov made eye contact. The woman, like him, was a Slav, the main ethnic group within the heart of western Russia. She had a heavy frame and stocky build, with open, expressive, but rather plain features. She carried herself with surprising grace, considering her ample girth.

“No, Irina, I think we’re having another quiet day. You needn’t remain at the office.”

Irina Malenkova perked up. She wanted to get home to her family, in the cheap but sturdy housing provided for married base personnel; reliable day care was part of this package. She turned to leave.

The secure phone rang again. Meredov pursed his lips. The caller ID said it was his counterpart in Anadyr, on the Bering Sea, responsible for the coast to the east and then south of his own jurisdiction — including the Bering Strait. Anadyr had a sheltered harbor and an airport. Using icebreakers when needed, it was navigable most of the year.

He picked up the phone. “Meredov speaking.”

“Have you seen the new intelligence report?” Rear Admiral Balakirev said without preamble or pleasantries.

“I see many reports,” Meredov answered, sounding as blase as he could. Balakirev, a peer, was also a rival, and could be annoying on purpose; the physical resemblance that made some people mistake them for brothers only egged Balakirev on. The two were not brotherly. “Which report?”

“The one about the new German strategy.”

“What new German strategy?” Meredov knew that Russia’s spy services were active in Berlin and Johannesburg, not trusting the regimes there even while Moscow supported them.

Irina overheard this, and halted in midstride.

Balakirev gave the communique’s number and priority code. It was sent via the Defense Council, the highest authority over the Russian military. “You’re on the distribution list. We both have a need to know. It could affect our operational areas and our readiness state.”

“Hold on.” Meredov muted the phone. He asked Irina if they’d gotten this communique.

“Sir, you know I would have told you at once.”

“Check again.”

She hurried out. Meredov unmuted the phone. “We’re searching for our copy.”

Balakirev grunted, sounding bored and superior.

He didn’t call just to make conversation. He never does.

Malenkova returned and shook her head.

“Ours must have been misrouted,” Meredov told Balakirev. Important messages being lost was a longstanding feature of the Russian military. Meredov hadn’t forgotten how, back in 1995, Norway fired a science rocket toward the pole, after more than a week’s prior notice to Russia. The notice got lost somewhere in Moscow’s Defense Ministry, Russian radars thought it was an incoming American ICBM — and before the mix-up was clarified, President Yeltsin had opened the briefcase with the retaliation launch codes. “Not the first time things were delayed or misplaced, and certainly won’t be the last.”

“My, but you’re the cynical one. You should be more careful how you talk. Even secure lines can be monitored by them.”

Meredov did have to be careful. While he wasn’t really frightened of any thought police from the FSB — successor to the old KGB — curiosity and original ideas at the rear-admiral level weren’t encouraged or appreciated by more senior admirals and the Kremlin. The Russian military was run purely from the upper echelons down. Going by the book, following standard doctrine and rigid procedures, was paramount. Centralized control was cherished, maintained by a haughty divide-and-conquer attitude. It often had the effect of making even flag officers, including Balakirev, act like competitive adolescents.

“What does the message say?”

“The Germans want to step up their psychological pressure on the Americans, to get them to finally crack and agree to an armistice. More scare tactics. Their High Command has decided to try to sink one or two American ballistic missile submarines, their Ohio-class, the so-called boomers.”

“They can try. I seriously doubt they’d ever succeed.”

“Being seen by the U.S. to attempt it would be enough, don’t you think?”

The U.S. would confront that classic dilemma whenever a deterrent force suffers attrition: Use it before you lose it. The implicit balance of terror’s unspoken arrangement between Allies and Axis was, no H-bombs unleashed or endangered. Now Meredov was deeply concerned. He knew the fragile thermonuclear threshold had almost been breached more than once. With each new Axis thrust in the war, Berlin and Johannesberg become increasingly reckless. “It changes the entire outlook of the conflict,” Meredov said half to himself.

“And not for the better,” Balakirev answered.

“What measures are we supposed to take?”

“There’s nothing specific in this bulletin.”

No specifics meant no accountability, either, for cooperative action or lack thereof. Typical.

“Other than making sure I sleep badly tonight, was there some other reason you called?”

“I have a problem. Of less strategic importance, I think, but it strikes much closer to home. I need your help.”

“What help?” Meredov was instinctively suspicious.

“Four days ago a few of my forces prosecuted a submerged contact, in the strait on a northerly course. At least the sensors on the barrier fence did indicate a valid contact heading north. They dropped sonobuoys, signal grenades, then depth charges, but there wasn’t anything there.”

“How sure are you of the lack of an actual hostile?”

Balakirev summarized the maneuvers and tactics used, emphasizing the very constricted geography and shallow water. “No submarine could have possibly escaped.”

“False positives are common in antisubmarine operations.”

“This one was different. It all went on under the Americans’ noses. They reacted.”

“How? Did they fire any warning shots?”

“Worse. They filed a diplomatic note with Moscow, protesting an unannounced live-ammunition exercise. As they put it, ‘provocatively close to the treaty line, in a narrow international commercial waterway.’ ”

“How did Moscow answer?”

“They didn’t. Why would they? The decision was made that we owe the Americans nothing.”

“So what’s your problem?”

“The Ministry of Defense passed heat to our mutual boss.” A dour vice admiral in Vladivostok. “He’s taking it out on me.”

“Taking what out?”

“They’re saying that men under my command showed ill discipline, and incompetence, attacking ghosts and letting the American surveillance and signals intercept positions observe Russian forces acting on a full combat footing from point-blank range. Thus betraying vital secrets in a manner that borders on treasonous. On my watch.”

“Sounds like someone’s really out to get you.”

“I responded that the data from the barrier fence are on record, showing definite indications that an unidentified submarine was there.”

Meredov thought this over. The military and internal political considerations were intertwined, as usual. “I see your dilemma. The bureau who designed the fence and sensors, and the commander who maintains them and interprets any signals, refuse to concede that a flaw in their setup could lead to a strongly convincing false-positive contact.”

“Combined, they outnumber me, and they also have better Kremlin connections.”