Tiger's Claw: A Novel

the fantail when the JH-37 came in for landing. Because of its long range and size and because getting it back on board the carrier took so much preparation, the JH-37 was often sent off to land bases until the decks could be made ready. In accordance with the carrier operations restrictions initiated by China, the number one and two waist catapults had aircraft parked on them.

After hooking up to the catapult shuttle and holdback bar, the big Xian turbofans were run up to full military power, the exhaust so powerful that it shook the heavy steel blast deflector behind it. When the catapult was fired and the breakaway holdback bar released, it always appeared as if it was impossible for the big bomber to actually accelerate quickly enough to make it down the three hundred feet of deck and become airborne before tumbling over the edge and splashing into the ocean. But, sure enough, the big bomber rumbled into the sky, shaking the deck with the blast of its big engines, and it was quickly lost from view. In its antisubmarine role, it could patrol as far as three hundred miles from the carrier and stay aloft for six hours.

After the JH-37 was away, the air defense fighters were next. Like the Zhenyuan, China’s first aircraft carrier, the Zheng He had a mix of fighters in its arsenal: two squadrons, each with fifteen JN-15 multirole fighters, China’s first domestically produced carrier-based fighter, a reverse-engineered copy of the Russian Su-33 carrier fighter; and one squadron of ten JN-20 advanced air superiority fighters. The JN-20s were definitely the “show” planes of the fleet and were rarely flown except for qualifications, proficiency, or when foreign patrol planes were in the area, so the JN-15s were used for routine patrols.

Along on this sortie but not part of the Zheng He’s complement was another aircraft orbiting around the carrier battle group at five thousand feet above the South China Sea: a Shaanxi Y-8 medium four-engine land-based turboprop transport plane, a Chinese-made copy of the Russian Antonov-12 transport, that had launched a few hours earlier. The Y-8 was configured as both an airborne early-warning aircraft and an antisubmarine warfare plane, with a fixed “Balance Beam” air search radar mounted atop the fuselage, a surface search radar on the chin, and a magnetic anomaly detector, or MAD, mounted on a long boom on the tail. The MAD sensed the change in the earth’s magnetic field when a submarine moved through it, alerting an operator to its presence. Once alerted, the Y-8 would start a search pattern, dropping sonobuoys to help track the submarine, and once located, it would drop depth charges to try to destroy the sub or vector in carrier-based antisubmarine helicopters to attack. The Y-8 was China’s first long-range surveillance and antisubmarine warfare aircraft, purpose-made for patrolling China’s long coastline.

For this special patrol, the Y-8 was armed with a special weapon, one that was designed to cement China’s claim on the inner island ring once and for all.

Normally the Y-8 would not patrol more than one or two hundred miles from Chinese mainland ports and coastal military bases, but they had special intelligence of a target that had to be located, and they were determined to do so.

Less than two hours later: “Bridge, Combat, the Y-8 has made MAD contact and is beginning its orbit, range one-thirty kilometers, bearing three-zero-zero,” the combat systems officer radioed to Admiral Weng.

The range was too great for their helicopters, Weng knew, and it would take them a couple hours to close the distance. “Have the Y-8 maintain MAD contact, but make sure it does not drop sonobuoys,” he ordered. “I do not want our friends to be alerted yet. Helm, steer three-zero-zero, best possible speed. Operations, ready a flight of Z-9s to prosecute the target when we are in range. Make sure the crew of the JH-37 is advised and tell them to be ready.”

The phone from the flag bridge beeped, and Weng picked it up immediately. “Report,” Admiral Hu ordered.

“Right where our intelligence said it would be, sir,” Weng replied. “Our intelligence agents reported that the Taiwanese intelligence-gathering submarine Fuchou zhe was going to put to sea yesterday from its base in Kaohsiung and attempt a simulated missile and torpedo attack on the Zheng He battle group. I have ordered the Y-8 to maintain contact. The JN-15 fighters are on normal air patrols. I have ordered another flight of antisubmarine helicopters to be ready when we receive the order. The JH- 37 is standing by and ready. We should be in position for helicopter and escort ASW operations in about two hours.”

“Very well, Admiral.”

“Sir, on our present course and speed, we will intercept the Fuchou zhe in Taiwanese waters,” Weng said. “Am I approved to continue, sir?”

“There is no such thing as ‘Taiwanese waters,’ Admiral Weng,” Hu said, the derision thick in his voice. “Yes, you will continue. The submarine is in violation of operational restrictions on submerged submarines. An example must be made.”

REPUBLIC OF CHINA SUBMARINE FUCHOU ZHE (AVENGER), SOUTH CHINA SEA

A SHORT TIME LATER

“We have received the latest position information on the Zheng He battle group, Captain,” the operations officer aboard the Taiwanese Type 800 submarine Avenger reported. He plotted the position on the chart in the con. “About thirty kilometers to the south.”

Captain Yao nodded. “We will be in range of their patrol helicopters soon,” he said. “Get a last GPS update for the inertial navigation system, then we will go to patrol depth and commence ultraquiet operations.”

“Yes, sir.” The submarine Avenger was at periscope depth now, getting radio messages and updating its position by a GPS receiver mounted on the periscope mast, but in seconds it received a final GPS update and the mast was lowered to avoid detection. The Avenger then commenced a steep dive to four hundred feet and began ultraquiet operations. The Avenger was a former Israeli Dolphin-class diesel-electric attack submarine, built in Germany, and was already one of the quietest submarines in the world, but on ultraquiet all possible means for extraneous noise was eliminated; the crew was even directed to walk carefully, not slam hatches or drop metal objects, and speak in whispers even on the intercom. Submerged speed was cut in half, which made the days that much longer, but hunting ships was a patient man’s game anyway.

Avenger was fitted with ten torpedo tubes, six of which were larger twenty-five- inch tubes capable of firing Tomahawk cruise missiles. Taiwan was not currently allowed to buy any sub-launched cruise missiles from the United States, so the larger torpedo tubes were fitted with liners that allowed them to fire twenty-one-inch diameter torpedoes; it carried a total of sixteen twenty-one-inch wire-guided torpedoes. Avenger was also armed with a new weapon system: IDAS, or Integrated Defense and Attack System, which was a torpedo-launched laser- or infrared-guided missile capable of attacking ships, land targets, and even antisubmarine helicopters at ranges out to thirty kilometers—IDAS was the first missile in the world to attack aircraft while the launch platform was submerged. Two of Avenger’s torpedo tubes, one forward and one aft, each carried a magazine of four IDAS missiles.

About an hour later the sonar operator whispered on intercom: “Captain, sonar contact, bearing two-five- zero, aircraft, sounds like a patrol helicopter.” The passive sonar could pick up any sounds traveling through the water, and computers analyzed the sounds and took an educated guess at what it might be.

“Slow to five knots, turn left heading one-six-zero,” Yao ordered. A patrol helicopter’s dipping sonar was probably one of the submarine’s most dreaded adversaries other than another submarine, and the only way to avoid being detected by its active sonar signal was to get as far away from it as quickly as possible while not being detected. It became a cat-and-mouse game as the helicopter transmitted its signal then moved, and the submarine had to respond with its own move.

“Let us try a simulated IDAS attack on this helicopter,” Captain Yao said. “Periscope depth, half standard rate. Stand by on IDAS, simulated attack on airborne target. Flood tube three.” The Avenger rose ever so slowly to a depth of sixty feet. “Bearing to helicopter?”

“Bearing to helicopter three-five-two.”

Yao turned the periscope until the lens was pointing toward three-five-two degrees, then slowly raised it