let the buoyancy of their escape hoods take them to the surface.
Unfortunately, the submarine had been especially sloppy about discharging its garbage and food waste. As a result, a small school of sharks had taken to following immediately in her wake, and they found still-living flesh far more tasty than the remains of the crews’ meals.
The sharks munched their way through the first egress groups, until satiated, and then left the second group alone. The captain was part of that group as the last man to leave the ship.
The captain turned on the speaker to allow the sounds of the other submarine breaking up to fill the ship. It was not some gruesome ritual, but a simple reminder of the reality of what they did for a living. Each man thought he was alone when he felt a sweep of sympathy and despair for the other submariners, yet not one of them would have traded places with them. They might regret killing other men but under the same circumstances they would do it again. After all, if the submarine’s mines found their targets, far more men would die.
Finally, when the last creak and groan of mental stress died down, the captain said, “Communications depth. Are the mine positions ready to go into the Link?”
“Yes, Captain, they are.”
“Very well. What to do about them is the carrier’s problem, not ours.” He turned to his XO. “How is Harding doing?”
“Doc says he’s as stable as he’s going to get. If you can arrange the transport, Doc thinks he can withstand it.”
The captain took a deep breath and shook off the tension and fear of the last several minutes. It was time to refocus.
“Admiral, I need a medical evacuation from my ship to the carrier.” He recounted the details of Harding’s injuries, concluding with, “When can I expect the helo?”
TWENTY-SIX
Batman turned to his air operations officer. Captain Bill “Copycat” Hart was a Tomcat driver himself, a post command senior aviator who knew how to take care of his people. Over the course of the cruise, Batman had developed the utmost respect for him. “Copycat, this whole thing stinks. Tell the helo squadron commander that I want a helo overhead that submarine within the next five minutes. Peel off a couple of our Tomcats as an escort.” Batman’s voice took on a peculiarly gentle note. “If that sub skipper is willing to risk his ass to talk to us about it, then I’m sure as hell going to get his boy out of there.”
It took a little longer than five minutes — more like seven — but a helo loaded with a doctor, two corpsmen, and life-support equipment was en route to the submarine immediately. And the skipper of the helo squadron took the mission himself, with his XO in the copilot’s seat. Between them, they had almost four decades of aviation experience.
A metal frame structure was attached to their hatch, and once overhead, it was lowered to the surface, now broached by
Petty Officer Apples gently slid the last electronic card home, and gave it a gentle pat. He refastened the cover plate for the data processor, then turned to look up at his chief. “If this doesn’t do it, I don’t know what will.”
Chief Clark looked down on him with approval. “I’ll tell the captain that we’re ready to go online.
Chief Clark found the captain on the bridge, making the conning officer nervous as he observed his station- keeping. “Captain, sir, ready to try it out.”
“It’d better work.”
“I can’t promise anything, sir. We swapped out every piece of every component we had. We should be able to bring up a good enough resolution off the radar for fire control, but the IFF is definitely shot.”
The captain grunted. “The aviators will just have to stay in their return corridors, then. Go on, light it off. We’ll deal with any problems as they arise.”
Chief Clark went back down to the data control center, and nodded at his petty officer. “Put her online.”
Fingers trembling, Apple toggled on the power switch. He let the components warm up, then energized the antenna. Slowly, he increased rotation speed until it was at max. Then he put it online.
In combat, the radar screens flash on with a salt-and-pepper clutter on every bearing. The pixels wavered on and off, creating a blurry, grainy pattern. As he watched, Chief Clark groaned. All those hours, all the time — dammit, where was the problem? Just as he started to despair, the radar picture snapped into sharp, clear resolution, and a computer began assigning identification tags to the contacts.
Chief Clark breathed a sigh of relief. He turned to tell the captain, only to find he was already standing behind him. There was a light of approval in the man’s eyes that did not show in his voice. “Excellent work. Tell Apple.” Saying no more, the captain picked up the tactical mike. “
Wadi looked at the assembled pilots. They were the cream of the crop, the best that Iran had to offer. “I will lead the flight myself,” he said. “And now, let us go. It is time for us to retake our rightful place in the world.”
With a loud cheer, the pilots broke formation and raced to their aircraft. As their last duties, the Russians had been required to fuel the aircraft and have them ready for launch. After a quick preflight, the pilots scrambled up boarding ladders, assisted by plane captains, and strapped themselves in.
Rat studied the picture developing on her F-14’s TIDs and didn’t like what she was seeing at all: three large groups of blips inching their way toward the carrier battle group from Iraq. One of the early warning E-2C Hawkeyes had detected a flight of twelve Tu-22M Backfire-B bombers approaching at a range of 350 miles.
The Backfire was a Russian-built swing-wing bomber capable of carrying two AS-4 air-to-surface missiles. The AS-4, code-named “Kitchen” in NATO nomenclature, yielded a 2,205 pound warhead and had a maximum range of 450 miles, which meant it was already within range of striking
“Looks like they’re heading straight for the
“Negative on that.” Rat switched her radar from Range-While-Scan mode to Track-While-Scan and guided her targeting brackets to the lead Tu-22M. After hooking, then designating it, she allotted the remainder of her Phoenix missiles. The plan called for the three division wings to target the bomber formations, while the lead, flown by Lobo would hold her Phoenix in reserve in case any of the bombers launched on Jefferson.
“Fastball,” Davis said. “I’ve targeted the lead elements of the eastern group. They’re at one hundred miles and closing. It’s your dot.”
Morrow watched the flight of Backfires on his Tomcat’s Television Camera System (TCS) with great concern. The TCS, mounted under the Tomcat’s nose, provided passive target acquisition and identification at ranges far beyond the naked eye. At this range, they were nothing more than a small dot. But given the distance, Morrow was sure that what he was seeing was an enemy bomber of some sort.
