Myles paused; both Patterson and Lloyd had valid arguments. The president wasn’t thrilled with the idea of putting U.S. military personnel directly on the firing line again, particularly the submarines of Squadron Fifteen that had borne the brunt of the war. Still, the odds of stopping the rogue Indian submarine were considerably better with the U.S. submarines involved. And offering to send America’s best had political capital of its own. It didn’t take long for Myles to come to a decision.
“All right, here’s what we’re going to do. Andy, I need you to get the Chinese ambassador here as soon as you can. It’s my job to deliver the bad news, and make the pitch for our assistance, Joanna, you’ll help me with that. Andy, then contact Foreign Secretary Jadeja and let him know what we’re doing.”
Lloyd opened his mouth to protest, but Myles cut him off.
“Yes, I know, this will be the second time we’ve gone around the Indian ambassador. It can’t be helped… I’ll personally apologize when this crisis is over, okay? Then I want you to contact the Russian ambassador and tell them what we’re up to. We need to keep them in the loop. Finally, set up a meeting with the Littoral Alliance for Joanna, after she’s helped me with the Chinese ambassador.” Lloyd nodded tightly, acknowledging his orders.
Joanna sighed. “Up until now, the plot and everything connected with it has been kept secret, to avoid tipping our hand. Now, the conspirators in India appear to have been tipped off. At least two are on the run, and the Indian government is trying to recall the boat, and failing that, tracking it down and sinking it. Is there any more reason for strict secrecy?”
“You mean, like the massive embarrassment the Indian and Russian governments would suffer, and the possible panic and chaos it could trigger in China? Those reasons?” Myles was smiling, but it disappeared quickly. “If the Indians could have scooped up the conspirators before Chakra had sailed, the first time the world would have heard of the plot would have been when we issued a joint press release.”
Myles continued. “The Chinese will keep this close, but we have to assume that telling the entire Littoral Alliance means news will eventually leak out, and then there will be hell to pay. All we can do is find and kill Chakra as quickly as possible. I’ll send my communications people to your staff to get briefed, and they can get started on preparing our official response.
“Joanna, your first task is to run out of this room and call Simonis’s staff. Set up a VTC for you to brief the commodore and his submarine captains, and tell them what they need to do. We’ve kept most of them in the dark long enough. You can brief the CNO after you’ve scheduled the videoconference.”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“All right, then, let’s get to it people! We have a wayward boat to catch.”
The nagging electronic buzz dragged him to consciousness. For the second time that night, the secure phone was ringing. Simonis got out of bed and slowly shuffled to the phone on the other side of the bedroom. Blinking sleep from his eyes, he picked up the handset. “Simonis,” he yawned.
“Commodore, Ops, sorry to wake you, sir, but Dr. Patterson just called. She wants a secure VTC with you and the available sub skippers in one hour.”
Simonis looked at his wristwatch and grunted. It hadn’t been nine hours since COMSUBPAC issued the warning order. “Understood. Did she even give you a clue as to what this is about, Rich?”
“No, sir. She seemed to be in a big hurry and only said it was a high-priority mission that would involve sortieing the entire squadron. She promised a full explanation during the VTC.”
“Very well. Call Mitchell, Dobson, and Nevens and have them report to the squadron conference room in forty-five minutes. Then send a flash precedence message to Texas to come to PD and link in; I want Pascovich in on this one,” directed Simonis.
“Yes, sir. Do you want me to send a driver to pick you up?”
“No, I’ll drive myself in. And make sure someone calls the CSO.”
“He’s next on my list, sir,” replied Walker.
“Good. I’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”
Jerry hustled into the conference room only to find few people milling about. They were engaged in idle chatter, waiting for the VTC to begin. Taking a quick look around the room, Jerry was surprised not to see Simonis already in his seat. Dropping his cover and notebook onto one of the tables, Jerry made a beeline for the coffee mess. As he poured himself a cup, he caught the operations officer’s eye. Jerry’s facial expression silently asked the question, “What the hell is going on?”
Walker only shook his head and shrugged. He didn’t know. Great. I hope this doesn’t have anything to do with my meeting with Samant, thought Jerry. But his gut told him otherwise.
Sipping his coffee, Jerry kept an eye on the door. It wasn’t long before Scott Nevens and Bruce Dobson walked in along with a number of Squadron Fifteen staff members. Jerry greeted his fellow captains and joined in a speculative discussion about the second summons — he didn’t share what little he knew or suspected. After a few minutes, Captain Charles Simonis and his Chief Staff Officer, Captain Glenn Jacobs, entered the conference room. The commodore swiftly scanned the space, locked eyes with Jerry, and motioned for him to break away and come over. Jerry politely excused himself and approached Simonis. The commodore didn’t look happy.
“Yes, sir?” solicited Jerry.
“Captain, if you have any insights into this upcoming confab, I’d appreciate hearing them.” The commodore was visibly frustrated. “I don’t like being kept in the dark, Captain. There’s been no hint of a problem in our AOR; SUBPAC’s warning order came out of the blue. Now, we have this zero dark thirty videoconference with the national security advisor…”
“I think it may have something to do with the information provided by Captain Samant,” Jerry volunteered. “I can’t think of anything else going on in our theater that could have Dr. Patterson so anxious.”
“Do you really believe this Indian nuclear conspiracy theory?” asked Simonis. The tone of his voice betrayed his skepticism.
“I trust Alex Petrov, Commodore, implicitly. He’s a good man, and a damn fine submariner. If he was sufficiently alarmed about this ‘conspiracy theory’ to contact us, covertly, then I think we should be worried.”
“But what about this Indian captain?” Simonis challenged. “What evidence do we have that he’s telling us the truth?”
Jerry glanced around the room and spoke with a lowered voice. “Sir, as I said when I got back from D.C., there is evidence to support Samant’s claims, but I’m not at liberty to discuss it with you.”
Simonis’s jaw tightened. The commodore had been more than a little miffed when Jerry respectfully declined to discuss the evidence earlier, as it was in a special access program that Simonis wasn’t cleared for. The commodore completely agreed with the concept of compartmenting sensitive information, but in this case, he believed he had a legitimate “need to know.”
“But Captain Samant seemed genuinely concerned, sir,” continued Jerry. “As for my impression of the man, he’s a very good boat driver, and I can attest to the fact that he was a royal pain in the ass.”
Simonis nodded. “Very well, Captain. I guess we’ll just have to wait for Dr. Patterson to enlighten us.”
“Commodore,” called out Jacobs, interrupting the conversation. “We have Texas up on the secure video link.”