'Understood, Comrade Admiral.'
'I will be relying on you utterly, Viktor Ivanovich,' Karelin said.
'Everything depends on the Typhoons reaching deep water safely and undetected.
Other PLARB submarines will be dispatched as they become available, but your two Typhoons offer us our best chance. They are the quietest submarines in the fleet and the most reliable. If any vessels can evade the American blockade, it is they.'
'The Americans will have their attack submarines positioned off the mouth of the Kola Inlet, waiting for them to come out.'
'That has been allowed for. ASW forces will sweep the entire area during the attack. As will our own attack subs out of Severodvinsk.'
'I see.' Marchenko hesitated, still studying the map.
'There is something?'
'Only a small question. Why must the Typhoons break out at all?' He gestured toward his office window, at the massive blast doors beyond. 'They could launch on any city in the Union from right outside those doors.'
'Because they will need time, Comrade Rear Admiral, while we deliver our ultimatum and while Leonov considers his options. And sea room to maneuver while that time is passing. Since the Blues now have the necessary launch codes, if they are insane enough to launch, then we can expect the facilities here to be their first target.'
'I… see.' It was obvious Marchenko had not thought of that possibility.
'These submarine shelters were designed to withstand a nuclear blast, of course,' Karelin went on, 'but that would not help us if the mountain over our heads collapses across the entrance. If they can reach their strategic bastions, however, safely beneath the Arctic ice…'
'As in the grand game we've played with the Americans all these years,' Marchenko said, completing the thought. 'Leonov and his people will not know where they are, or when they might surface and fire.'
'Leonov will be forced to surrender or see his major cities, staging areas, and transportation hubs incinerated one by one. Order will be restored to a Soviet Union reborn.'
'Tell me one thing more, Comrade Admiral,' Marchenko said, leaning back in his chair with a thoughtful expression on his face. 'Just between you and me.'
'If I can.'
'Back at the Naval Academy, and later at various staff planning exercises, we ran endless war games covering precisely this sort of situation, an attack by Frontal Aviation against an American carrier battle group approaching Russian waters. I always had the impression that the results were cooked. To keep the officers handling the Russian side from looking bad.'
'That sort of thing happens. I hear they have the same problem at the Pentagon.'
'I wouldn't be surprised. But tell me, what do you think? Can an attack of this sort destroy a carrier battle group? Their defenses are…
formidable.'
Karelin thought about it for a moment. 'I will tell you, Viktor Ivanovich, I'm not sure. In this case, of course, it is not necessary to destroy the Americans… but only to disorient them long enough for our PLARBs to get away.'
'Of course. But I was curious about your estimation of the outcome of the engagement itself. It should be a test of a classic war-gaming scenario.'
'Key to a Yankee carrier battle group are two vessels,' Karelin said, 'and two vessels alone. The aircraft carrier itself, naturally, which is the group's whole reason for being, and the group's Ticonderoga-class Aegis cruiser, which serves as a command and control ship for the formation, coordinating its maneuvers and anti-air defenses.
'Operation Ognevoy will muster some two to three hundred aircraft, including advanced heavy bombers armed with antiship cruise missiles, as well as surface-attack aircraft. Combined with these will be cruise-missile attacks both from shore installations and from submarines.
'What do I think? I think that the battle group's brain ? the Aegis cruiser ? and its heart ? the aircraft carrier ? will both be overwhelmed, completely obliterated in the first wave. The survivors ? the destroyers, frigates, and submarines ? will flee, or be mopped up at our leisure.
'And our Typhoons will be free in the Barents Sea, ready to carry out their orders.'
'And those are, Comrade Admiral? Will they be told to launch without warning, or will they threaten first?'
'Their orders will be to make history, Comrade Rear Admiral,' Karelin said. 'To make history, and to secure ultimate victory for the legitimate government of the Russian Union.'
There was a sharp rap on the door, and Tombstone looked up from the expendables report he was working on at his desk. 'Door's open.'
Brewer Conway walked in. She was a tall, lean, athletic-looking woman, her silver-blond hair kept mannishly short. She was wearing her undress blue shirt and slacks; the Navy woman's traditional blue or white skirt had been replaced by slacks for all but formal dress occasions some time ago. Having women in skirts negotiating the nearly vertical ladders of shipboard companionways had proved to be too much of a distraction for the sailors who, alerted by the almost psychic communications system that stretched from stem to stern on every Navy vessel, tended to congregate at the bottoms of those ladders just as the women began their descents.
'Good afternoon, CAG,' she said. Since she was uncovered, she didn't salute, but she came to attention in front of Tombstone's desk. 'You wanted to see me?'
'Brewer,' Tombstone said, rising. 'At ease. Grab a chair.'
'It's not necessary for you to get up for me when I enter a room, Captain,' she said, moving a chair out from the bulkhead and perching herself on the edge. She seemed tense, Tombstone thought. Or upset.
'Old habits die hard, Commander,' Tombstone said, settling back into his own seat. 'My apologies. I was raised the old-fashioned way. Thanks for coming in.'
'It would be best, sir, if you not treat us any differently from your men. That, after all, is what integration is all about, right?'
'Thank you for the lecture, Commander.'
'Sorry, Sir. I meant no disrespect. What did you want to see me about?'
He sighed. 'I want your impressions, Brewer. Your honest evaluation.
How are your people settling in aboard the Jeff?'
Her expression was guarded. 'Well enough, CAG.'
'No problems with privacy? The shower head schedules? Any instances of harassment or unwanted attention?'
'None worth mentioning, Sir.'
'But there have been incidents.'
'It would be pretty strange if there weren't, Sir.' She hesitated, and for a moment Tombstone thought she was about to say something more. Then she pursed her lips and shook her head. 'No problems, CAG. None that my people can't handle on their own.'
'That's the best way, of course.' Tombstone selected a paper from the several scattered on his desk. 'I have a request here, though, from Lieutenant Kandinsky. She wants to be assigned with another aviator.'
Brewer's eyes widened. 'She should have talked to me about that, CAG.
I'll have a word with her.'
Tombstone considered this. Lieutenant Thelma Kandinsky, call sign 'Sunshine,' was a B/N, a bombardier/navigator, the flight officer who rode right-seat in the A-6E Intruder. Normally, she flew with Lieutenant Commander Bruce 'Willis' Payne, in Jefferson's VA-89, the Death Dealers. Intruder crew assignments were no more permanent than pilot/RIO assignments in Tomcats, though good teams that worked well as a unit tended to stick together. To have a B/N specifically request a change, however, suggested that there was something wrong.
'Is there some kind of trouble between Sunshine and Willis?'
