Island Warriors

The final leg of the triad, and the only one Waterson hadn’t visited in situ, although he had seen one of them before launch, was a defense support program consisting of satellites positioned about twenty-two thousand miles above the equator. The satellites monitored other areas known to have ballistic missile launch capabilities and, along with large ocean areas’ satellites sensors, detected the heat generated from a missile launch and transmitted data to ground stations.

All three legs of the triad were operated by and reported to the United States Air Force Space Command, which provided strategic warning of detected missiles to the National Command Authority.

“Got it on Dane and overhead,” Vail said. The correlating data blipped into being on Waterson’s screen, confirming the detection his Judy had brought him. “Cheyenne’s got a copy on the data.”

Waterson felt his stomach tighten. Suddenly, he had the urgent need to take a leak, as his body responded to the flood of adrenaline.

Observation Island operated alone. No fighter cover, no missile cruisers, nothing. For self-defense, she possessed two close-in weapons system setups, as much as a reassurance to the crew as for any real protection value.

They all knew what the score was. If the balloon went up and the world went to shit, their ship’s life expectancy dropped dramatically. The last thing Russia or China wanted was an extremely sensitive radar detection ship keeping an eye on the goings on, and Waterson figured they’d be in the initial targeting package any staff put together.

It was something that they’d all been briefed on when they’d come on board. Just a fact of life, that your survivability might go to shit in the blink of an eye. It wasn’t something they talked about — part of life in a blue suit, Waterson figured — and the crew onboard Observation Island sure wasn’t the only one in that boat.

But before, it hadn’t seemed quite so damned personal.

“Tracking,” Waterson announced. “I got a target line — medium confidence — looks like it will hit open water twenty miles north of Taiwan.”

Twenty miles. Within the margin of error for earlier ballistic missiles, but everything Waterson had seen on the latest technology being tested by China indicated that they’d gotten their targeting accuracy down to a matter of meters. Although the U.S. was still far ahead of them, measuring their missiles’ accuracy in inches, Waterson figured that it didn’t matter that much in the short range. You were just as dead if a Chinese missile hit ten meters away or two inches away. It was on the longer flights that it came into play, when a missile traversing thousands of miles to reach the continental U.S. might develop much larger variances and end up hitting, say, Burke, Virginia, instead of the Capitol building in D.C.

Twenty miles. That ought to be enough. Not saying I’d like it much if I were fishing the waters north of Taiwan, but enough so that it ought to miss land.

Unless there’s a screwup, right? And isn’t that why you do live fire tests, to find out if the wonderful targeting accuracy that every one of your computer models swears exists is actually ground in truth?

The data and symbology on his screen blinked once, then disappeared into a flurry of harmless pixels. “Self- destruct?” Vail asked hopefully. “Or we lose data link?”

“Yeah,” Waterson answered. “Data link is okay, but I got snow — they must have self-destructed.”

Silence fell in the compartment as they all kept close watch on their respective screens, praying that it was over but afraid just yet to hope that it was.

“Nothing else,” Waterson announced finally as the static cleared from his screen. “Clear scope.”

And thank God for that. It means this probably is a test, probably there won’t be a missile launched at us, and I may just live long enough to see those grandkids start first grade.

It was at moments like this that life back in Montana looked very, very appealing.

The Taiwanese frigate The Marshall P’eng

Off the western coast of Taiwan

Tuesday, September 3

0300 local (GMT +8)

The blood of ancient warriors ran in Taiwanese Navy Captain Chang Tso-Lin’s veins. Both family oral traditions and written records traced his lineage back to ancient days. He himself was named for a warlord from the last century. He carried on that tradition with a quiet pride.

He was well regarded by both his superiors and his subordinates. His crew worshipped him, regarding him as a patriarch of their shipboard family. Many of them had ancestors who had served with Chang Tso-Lin’s ancestors, and they were proud of that connection. He was regarded within the Navy as a rising young tiger, selected early for command, and known as an astute tactician. He was a humble man in bearing but he insisted on perfection in his crew and demanded even more of himself. He was a naval officer any nation would be proud to claim.

That he was assigned to command Marshall P’eng was no accident of timing. The Taiwanese had seen this day coming for decades, and were well aware that their fragile freedom rested on the shaky goodwill of their American friends. They were exceptionally conscientious in selecting captains for ships that would work with the Americans directly, but there had been no question about Chang Tso-Lin. He was, simply, the finest the nation had to offer.

Chang had completed his early education in Taiwan, but once his potential became apparent, he’d been sent to the United States for graduate school. His command of English was fluent and colloquial, on par with a professional linguist. He understood not only the language but the American culture as well, and, in his heart of hearts, had even briefly considered the possibility of emigrating. But his sense of family honor and duty to his country was far too strong to permit it to be any more than a brief fantasy. He put it aside almost immediately, turned his attention back to his work and did as his nation had asked him.

The Marshall P’eng steamed in calm waters today, her boilers providing power to turn the shafts. The ship was an old U.S. Knox-class frigate, considered too weary and battered for further service in the American Navy.

A wasteful attitude, as far as Captain Chang was concerned. The ship was structurally sound, and with careful maintenance and dedication, had been restored to a virtually pristine condition. Her engine room was spotless, her radars tightly tuned and deadly. She was in a higher state of readiness and efficiency then she ever had been in the American Navy.

He had to admit, though, that his nation’s policy of not transferring people as often as the Americans did had something to do with it, as well. Men were stationed on Marshall P’eng for years, and knew her quirks and peculiarities. They had more ownership in her than their American counterparts had had, and it was a matter of personal pride to every man that she both looked and performed her best.

Currently, the only American presence in the area was an Aegis-class cruiser, the USS Lake Champlain. She’d been on station for two months, popping in and out of port on liberty visits as often as her schedule permitted, and Chang had come to know her captain well. Captain James Norfolk was a typical American, brash and blunt, overflowing with vital energy and good cheer. His ship itself was a marvel to Chang, containing advanced electronics and weaponry that his country would not see for decades. It seemed to entrust such technological capabilities to what — by Taiwanese standards — amounted to a pickup crew. The cruiser captain himself would be in command for only eighteen months. Chang’s tour, by contrast, was a minimum of five years.

Nevertheless, Chang and Norfolk quickly came to understand each other as only professional sailors could do. Chang privately considered some of the captain’s tactical plans to be foolhardy, but he recognized that the superior weaponry and fire control systems could quickly compensate for any overconfidence on the part of the cruiser’s crew.

The cruiser was ten miles to the north, conducting a slow, methodical search of her assigned operating area. The ship’s last liberty had been cut short when the Taiwanese government began to notice escalating tensions. Norfolk was not so sure he agreed, but he was an accommodating fellow. He rousted his crew and put to sea with almost everyone onboard. The helicopters were still ferrying back and forth almost daily to reprovision them and bring along stragglers.

Chang walked to the bridge wing and stared off to the east. Somewhere over the horizon lay China. Not that being over the horizon mattered anymore. In terms of weapons and fire-control solutions, they were virtually next