thruway of the Pentagon, where the senior commands of all three services operated, the Army on the third floor, the Navy and Air Force on the fourth. The President’s National Security Adviser knew this mighty labyrinth as well as he knew the inside of a Los Angeles Class submarine. He made straight for the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and asked the Flag Lieutenant if anyone minded if he used the private elevator he had used when entering the building.
The young officer practically fell over himself organizing a guard to escort the legendary Intelligence admiral to the garage, where “Charlie’s waiting for me — if he values his life, career, and pension, that is.”
They drove out of the dark gloomy garage into an equally dark and gloomy December day. The driver sensed his passenger was in more of a hurry now than he had been earlier, so he drove as fast as he could back across the Potomac and into the downtown traffic. It was raining hard now, and the highway was swept by spray from speeding cars. “Keep going. I’m used to deeper water than this,” the admiral ordered as Charlie gunned the White House limousine straight down the fast lane.
Back at his office in the West Wing, the Admiral was handed a communication requesting his presence in the Oval Office. He picked up the phone and checked with the President’s secretary and was told to “report right away.” There were many problems to deal with this winter, but this President knew the difference between a problem and a potentially life-threatening international incident.
He was staring out at the rain-swept south lawn when Admiral Morgan arrived. He was clearly preoccupied, but he smiled and said, “Hi, Arnold. I’m glad to see you. Anything new in the Malacca Strait?”
“Yessir. It’s the third Kilo all right. Steaming northeast about four hundred miles into the South China Sea. Under Chinese escort. Heading for Haikou, I’d guess.”
“
“Not without causing a fucking uproar,” replied the Admiral. “But there is one thing we must do.”
“Uh-huh?”
“We must make certain that goddamned Kilo, on that goddamned Dutch freighter, is the last goddamned Kilo they ever get.”
“No doubt about that, Admiral. What do you need me to do?”
“You have to inform me, as your NSA, and Admiral Mulligan as the professional head of the United States Navy, and your CJC, that you, and your most senior political colleagues, Bob and Harcourt, authorize the Navy to ensure that not one of the seven remaining Kilos on the China-Russia contract ever arrives in a Chinese port. You must further authorize Joe Mulligan that he has Presidential authorization to use any means at his disposal in order to ensure this instruction is carried out. Save, of course, for either declaring or causing a world war. It will of course be a Black Operation.”
“Right. Do you have any feeling about the diplomatic route?”
“I’d say nothing at the moment, sir. I do not want too many people to realize how worried we are.”
“Yes, of course. I’m seeing the Defense Secretary and the Secretary of State in the next hour. There’ll be a classified memorandum to both you and Admiral Mulligan by the end of the afternoon.”
“Yessir.”
“Oh, Arnold. I do have two questions. First, how much of a grip do we have on the other five Kilos?”
“Sir, there are two hulls under construction in Severodvinsk, not nearly so far advanced as the two we’re worried about. And there are three others at Nizhny Novgorod on the Volga. All of these are close to completion. If we are right, we will have located the final seven for China, and you may assume they will all be on the move by the end of next summer. Your other question, sir?”
“How much risk is there to our own submarines?”
“Some, sir. But every possible advantage is with us. I do not anticipate a major problem.”
“Thank you.”
Eight days passed, and then on the morning of December 12 Arnold Morgan received a phone call from Fort Meade suggesting he might like to drive out to see some newly arrived satellite pictures. Putting the phone down, the Admiral yelled through his open door for someone to get Charlie “on parade real quick.”
Including four minutes to cancel a lunch date, it took forty-one minutes to reach the Fort Meade exit on the Baltimore-Washington Parkway — which was about five minutes off the Admiral’s own record for the White House- Fort Meade dash. Knowing how urgent the situation was, he was a bit disgruntled at how long it had taken them to get to Fort Meade but not as disgruntled as he would have been had Charlie broken his record.
At the entrance to the NSA, Admiral Morgan told Charlie to go get himself some lunch. “I’ll be at least one hour, maybe three. Be here.” As he strode through the door, at least four members of the staff stood rigidly at the mere sight of their former boss.
The Director’s office at Fort Meade, which represents the front line of America’s world military surveillance network, has housed some hard-nosed chiefs in its history, but none quite so pitiless in his pursuit of truth as Arnold Morgan.
The new man in the big chair had been handpicked by Morgan himself before he left for the White House. A New Yorker, Rear Admiral George R. Morris had previously been on patrol in the Far East, in command of the Carrier Battle Group of
Admiral Morris, always a serious, concerned kind of an individual, was a bit jowly in appearance and was known for his rather lugubrious sense of delivery. Right now, as Arnold Morgan was shown into his office, the new Fort Meade Director had taken on the appearance of a lovesick bloodhound.
“Things aren’t looking too clever up in the Barents Sea,” he said, standing to greet Admiral Morgan. “Take a look at this sequence of pictures. They’re in order.”
Admiral Morgan stared down and pushed the pictures closer together, checking the times. “Jesus!” he said. “That’s the Kilos. They’ve dived. How old are these?”
“A few hours, picked ’em up on Big Bird. About five minutes before you arrived I received a message saying they had surfaced about twenty miles offshore and were headed back toward harbor.”
“At least they haven’t left for good.”
“No. Guess not. Looks like they’re continuing to check the boats out and train the Chinese crew.”
“I don’t know how good the Chinese submariners were when they arrived, but if they want to drive those things home safely they have a lot to master. Just to operate the Kilos safely underwater is at least a three-week program. And by the time they start diving they ought to be competent with the hydroplanes, the diesels, the electric motors, and the sensors, the sonar radar, and the ESM. No one in his right mind would dive a submarine without understanding how it works.
“I’m not certain they will have had time to tackle all of the combat systems after just three months, but I do think that by the first or second week in January they will certainly know enough to go home underwater, even if they won’t be a fully trained front-line fighting unit.”
“I suppose, Arnold, the longer they stay in Russia, the more competent and dangerous they become.”
“Correct, George. Our interest is that they leave as soon as possible. And since they haven’t been in any hurry to get those Kilos underwater, my guess is they will clear Pol’arnyj in the next three weeks.”
“I assume we do not plan for the Kilos to reach China?”
“Correct, George. But this is Black.
“Nossir.”
Admiral Morgan picked up the safe line to the Pentagon, direct to the office of the CNO, and requested Admiral Joe Mulligan to expect him within the hour on a matter of high priority. He also requested that Commander Dunning be there as well. He then left Fort Meade as swiftly as he had arrived, telling Charlie to step on it.
Back at the Pentagon, Joe Mulligan was waiting. Admiral Morgan came through the inner door without knocking. “This might be it, Joe,” he said. “K-4 and K-5 both dived today for the first time. Worked offshore for a while, then headed back in. They may be here for the entire winter, but my instincts tell me they’re gonna be on their way home, under their own power, in three weeks. Straight out of harbor, sharp left, and on down the Atlantic. With six Russian submariners on board each boat to assist them. Six weeks from their departure date they’ll be in Canton. That’ll mean exactly one-half of the ten-Kilo contract will have been fulfilled.
“Fort Meade is watching the situation on an hourly basis. We have to move real quick. I’m assuming our plans
