Scimitar SL-2

Make your speed 25, depth 200.”

The Yellow Sea was notoriously shallow, and the last part of the journey, through China’s most forbidden waters, would have to be completed on the surface right below the American satellites.

Admiral Badr wished to conduct the voyage with as little observation as possible, nonetheless, but, in the end, so what? A Russian-built submarine headed for a Chinese base, mostly through international waters — no one was obliged to tell Washington anything. The Pentagon did not, after all, own the oceans of the world. China and Russia were perfectly entitled to move their underwater boats around, visiting each other’s ports.

Admiral Badr smiled grimly…Just as long as they don’t find out where we’re going in the end, he thought.

Generally, he was pleased with the handling of the big submarine. Her titanium hull, which had originally made her so expensive, helped give her low radiated-noise reduction, but she had proved very costly to complete and would be even more so to run.

Essentially she had never been to sea until a year ago. She’d made one long, unhurried, and uneventful journey halfway around the world, and been in a long and thorough overhaul in the yards of China’s Southern Fleet ever since. She handled like a new ship, her nuclear reactor running smoothly, providing all of her power, enabling her to stay underwater for months at a time if necessary.

When armed, the Barracuda could pack a terrific bang. She was a guided-missile ship and fired the outstanding Russian “fire and forget” SS-N-21 Granat-type cruises from deep beneath the surface. Right now her missile magazines were empty, a situation that would be rectified as soon as she reached Huludao.

Admiral Badr, Iranian by birth and son of the C in C of the Ayatollah’s Navy in Bandar Abbas, was an accomplished handler of a nuclear submarine. And he aimed Barracuda II north, crossing the line of the Japan current on the 30th parallel, running into waters around 300 feet deep — friendly waters patrolled by his Chinese buddies.

So far as Ben Badr was concerned, this was a pleasant cruise, among colleagues he knew well, alongside whom he had fought and triumphed in Barracuda I. He looked forward to the coming months with immense anticipation. And the words of his father were always fresh in his mind…Stay as deep as possible, as quiet as possible, and when danger threatens, as slow as possible. That way your chances of being detected in that big nuclear boat are close to zero.

It was almost 2300 hours now on the pitch-dark and rainswept East China Sea, and the Barracuda held to course three-five-zero some 300 miles due east of Shanghai. They were headed more or less directly towards the beautiful subtropical island of Jejudo, the 13-mile-long remnant of a long-extinct volcano situated off the southwesternmost tip of South Korea.

Ben Badr intended to leave this sun-kissed tourist paradise, “Korea’s Hawaii,” 60 miles off his starboard beam as he continued north into the Yellow Sea, where life would become a great deal more testing and staying alert paramount.

The southern part of the Yellow Sea was a particularly busy spot. A veritable highway for tankers and freighters out of the big westerly ports that serviced Seoul, and the other great seaport of Kunsan, and the heavy tanker and freight traffic in and out of Nampo. In addition, there was constant fishing-boat traffic, also from South Korea, not to mention the ships of the Chinese Navy from both the Eastern and North fleets. The sonar of any submarine commanding officer had to be permanently on high alert through here.

Now, as the four bells of the watch tolled the midnight hour inside the submarine, the Korean freighter Yongdo was just clearing the West Sea Floodgates outside Nampo harbor 420 miles to the north, her elderly diesel engines driving her twin shafts in a shudder that might easily have been a protest.

It was a stark contrast to the silk-smooth hum of the Barracuda’s turbines, driving the submarine swiftly into the Yellow Sea, now only 100 feet below the rainswept surface of the ocean.

General Ravi and Ahmed had slept much of the day, dined with the CO and his first officer, and were now on the bridge of the Yongdo as honored guests. You don’t sell a shipload of guided missiles and two hugely expensive nuclear warheads every day. Not even in North Korea.

The Yongdo’s journey would be a little more than 400 miles, and somewhere in the northern reaches of this forbidden sea, she would be passed by the Barracuda, which was scheduled to dock in Huludao early on Saturday evening. Ravi wondered if he would see her come by, since she would most certainly be on the surface. It was strange to think of his old shipmate and great friend Ben Badr charging up the same piece of ocean as he and Ahmed.

They could see little in the dark, but there was a considerable swell, and the freighter soon began to pitch and yaw. Captain Cho said not to worry, it never got much worse, but General Rashood nevertheless had a fleeting feeling of dread. It would be a real drag if his precious cargo went down. For obvious reasons it could scarcely be insured, and the terms were ex-factory. Those missiles hit the seabed and the losses would be born by the new owners.

They were 240 miles west to the Bohai Haixia — the Yellow Sea Strait — and here navigation was extremely tricky. The narrow seaway between the Provinces of Shandong to the South and the seaward headland of Liaodong Province to the North was guarded by the Chinese, much like the White House is protected by the Americans.

This was the choke point containing two large areas completely prohibited to shipping and the one place where the Chinese Navy can apprehend an intruder with ease. Not even the most daring submarine CO would attempt underwater passage, through the middle, where the water was less than 80 feet deep.

The chart looked like an obstacle course — fishing banned, anchoring banned, oil pipelines, Naval waters. Endless patrol boats. Rocks, wrecks, sandbars, and constant “forbidden entry” signs. Don’t even think about it. The Chinese, with a nuclear shipbuilding program in full operation on the distant shores to the north, had much to protect from the West, indeed much to hide.

Even the friendly little North Korean freighter Yongdo would have a Navy escort in the small hours of Friday morning. As would the Barracuda several hours later.

The Yongdo was there first, by midnight on Friday, with the Barracuda charging along behind, gaining with every hour. Still underwater, in 26 fathoms, Ben Badr knew he would shortly have to come to periscope depth as the sea shelved up into the Strait and then to the dead-end section of the Yellow Sea.

With every mile they covered, he was more and more pleased with his crew. Everyone had learned an enormous amount in the previous two years — the training with the Russians in Araguba, the endless courses in nuclear physics, nuclear reactors, turbines, propulsion, engineering, electronics, hydrology, weapons and guidance systems.

And alongside him, there were no longer rookies, but seasoned submariners. There was his number two, the Executive Officer, Capt. Ali Akbar Mohtaj, the former reactor room engineer who had commanded this very ship halfway around the world.

There was Commander Abbas Shafii, another engineer, nuclear specialist from General Rashood’s home province of Kerman. He would take overall command of the control area. There was the Chief of Boat, Chief Petty Officer (CPD) Ali Zahedi, and CPO Ardeshir Tikku, who would take overall command of the top three computer panels in the reactor control room.

A first-class electronics Lieutenant Commander from Tehran who had three tours of duty in Iran’s Kilo-Class diesel-electrics was also onboard; and he was highly valued since he had sailed with Captain Mohtaj from Araguba to Zhanjiang the previous year.

In addition to the always-comforting presence of General Rashood, there was his cheerful personal bodyguard Ahmed Sabah, who acted as a huge help in crew relations, cheerfully complimenting the men on their work. It was as if his words came from the Hamas military boss himself, and Ben Badr knew it served great purpose towards the general morale of people working under stress, spending weeks on end without laying eyes on the world outside.

And then, of course, the beautiful, slender, steely-eyed Shakira, the General’s wife, Ahmed’s sister, one of the most trusted operatives in the entire Hamas organization, the Palestinian freedom fighter who had saved the life of Maj. Ray Kerman when he was hopelessly trapped in a murderous shoot-out in the wrong end of Hebron.

In return, General Rashood had allowed free rein to his wife’s talent, encouraging her to develop her principal