“Conn, Sonar, we’re getting helicopter engines.”
“Where are they?”
“The bearings are scattered, but it looks like most of them are concentrating in the west at bearing two eight five.”
“What do you figure they’re doing, Captain?” Keebes asked.
“Probably overflying the Javelin launch zone at the west mouth of the channel. Maybe they think we were there when we launched and they’re searching a zone around the liftoff.”
“From liftoff point to the east down the channel,” Keebes added, “which means they’re on the way.”
“Sonar, Captain, are the choppers converging on one bearing?”
“Yes, all choppers are now bearing two eight zero to two nine zero.”
“Coming or going?”
“Doppler’s not applicable here, sir.”
“What do your ears tell you?”
“Coming, sir. Definitely inbound.”
Pacino looked at Keebes.
“They’re sweeping eastward, squeezing us between the choppers on the west and the carrier on the east. And the only noises they’ll hear in this channel are us and the Tampa.”
“And Tampa is a lot louder than we are.”
“I know. Mr. Turner, can you arm and launch the Mark 80 SLAAMs without the periscope being up?”
“Yes sir.”
“Arm all of them.”
“What are you going to do?” Keebes cut in.
“Score a few choppers.”
“We’ve only got nine missiles.”
“That’s nine choppers,” Pacino said.
“Conn, Sonar, we are now getting jet engines out of the east. Looks like the carrier is launching the Yaks at us. Jets are inbound at high speed.”
“Sir,” Turner reported, “ETA of the destroyers at our position is eighteen minutes. But they should be in SS-N-14 range within nine.”
“Helicopters are getting closer. Captain,” Sonar Chief Jeb reported.
“Bearings to the aircraft are spreading.”
Pacino waited, ears straining, waiting for the first ping of a dipping sonar indicating the helicopters had found the Seawolf.
“Conn, Sonar, we’re getting distant dipping sonar pings, some east, some west. The closer ones are west.”
“So, Captain,” Jack Morris said, his arms crossed over his chest. “Did you think it would be this bad?”
“You call this bad, Morris? So far no one’s launched a single weapon at us. Wait till the ordnance starts going off before you get in a sweat.”
But what Pacino was thinking as he stared at the firecontrol display was: Where the hell was Donchez’s air support?
The Nimitz-class carrier USS Ronald Reagan steamed through the rain and the mist and the dark, plowing through the Korea Bay’s whitecaps, her search radar rotating once every ten seconds, the American flag flapping from the highest yardarm of the tall central mast, the masthead lights illuminating the spray of the rain and the number 76 painted on the island, her air wing’s aircraft secured in the hangar decks in the bowels of the 105,000-ton ship. A ring of dim red lights in the island marked the bridge, where the officer of the deck drove the ship, the ships of Surface Action Group 57 in formation around the carrier, each in her assigned position and monitored by the bridge crew.
One level below, the flight-operations center was quiet, the room stuffed full of consoles for the radars and communications gear that would provide tactical control of the air wing once it was airborne. A level below flight ops was the tactical flag command center, also known as the flag plot room, where Admiral Richard Donchez stared out over the darkened flight deck of the Reagan and held the red handset of the NESTOR satellite secure-voice radio-telephone to his ear, a deep frown on his face.
“Mr. Secretary, I have a lot of American lives at stake here. I can’t get the submarines out without air cover. I need an hour of flight operations and I can neutralize the Chinese fleet — yessir, I know that … I understand that, but do you realize they will bomb these ships to the bottom of the bay? We’ve monitored every weapon launch by the Seawolf, and by our calculations she is out of weapons. That’s right, sir … I know, but if you count sunken ships, that’s at least one torpedo per sinking. The Chinese have several squadrons of ASW helos and jets up, scouring the bay. The subs only have a few miles to go, and they’re out of there …”
Donchez paused for a long moment, listening, rubbing his forehead. Finally he nodded and spoke, saying only “Roger, Donchez out.” He replaced the red handset, then looked up at Rummel.
“Sir, what did the SecDef say?”
“He’s worried that our international partners will think we’re beating up on the poor Chinese. That we still don’t want it known that we were in the bay spying. That this is an embarrassment to the Administration. That this is more firepower than we asked for in the first place. That torpedoes shot from subs are one thing, that carrier-launched aircraft are another. That this whole thing is turning into the President’s personal flap. He said he was convening a meeting with the President and the national security staff and that he’d make our case. He said he’d contact us in an hour.”
“That could be too late—”
“I know. Get the SAG up here.”
Rummel called the bridge and told them to send the SAG to Flag Plot. It only took a few minutes, during which Donchez hunched over the oversized Go Hai Bay chart.
The door opened and shut behind Rear Admiral Patterson Wilkes-Charles III, the commander of the surface action group, including the carrier, the fleet and the air wing. Wilkes-Charles, a tall, thin blond man, was in working khakis, his only insignia his admiral’s stars and his surface warfare pin over his left pocket. It was unusual for a SAG to be a surface officer, even though the task force was primarily surface ships — usually SAGs were ex-carrier commanders.
Carrier captains were inevitably fighter pilots first, surface ship commanders second. But Wilkes-Charles had commanded a frigate, a destroyer, a nuclear cruiser and Aegis cruiser, as well as a helicopter carrier, just before his promotion to rear admiral. He was the hero of the surface warfare community, living proof that a black-shoe officer could command a carrier group without flying an F-14 fighter first. Wilkes Charles had been marked as a golden boy when he was a midshipman at Annapolis, groomed for command, always the first promoted in his class of officers.
Still, Donchez couldn’t help but wonder why. Wilkes Charles had never been close to combat, had been in Korea during the Gulf War, and had never done anything special during his command tours to justify the Pentagon’s apparent love of him. But then, neither had he run aground, had any serious accidents, gotten divorced, gotten drunk in front of the brass, or any of the other things that could ruin a Navy career. He was competent, personable, friendly, but hardly original or aggressive. Still, he was the SAG, which meant he controlled the operational deployment of the surface and air forces, which in turn meant Donchez would need to go through him to get this operation going.
“Admiral Donchez, good to see you. Should I have some sandwiches brought up, sir? Would you like coffee?” Wilkes-Charles smiled, his even teeth shining even in the red fluorescent lights.
“No thanks. Pat,” Donchez said. He decided to give it to the SAG straight.
“Listen, Pat, we still don’t have authorization from the President to go.”
“We’re at a point of no return, Admiral.”