Chase didn’t say anything for a moment. His eyes darted among the three others in the room: David, Susan, and the other CIA officer.
“You want me to hunt down Lena Chou? Is that why I’m here?”
“Who better?”
Chase looked at his brother, annoyed.
Susan continued. “You know her, and you won’t underestimate her.”
“Do you have any leads?”
“She was spotted getting on a plane from Beijing to Russia twelve hours ago. Our SIGINT tracked that plane to Helsinki. We lost her at that point. But the expectation is that she’s going to be connecting with one of this South Sword Team.” Susan gestured to the monitor that showed where the Chinese prisoner sat. “We think she’s going to meet with an American mole. Chase, tell me, why would Cheng Jinshan risk sending Lena Chou back into the United States to meet with one person?”
“Because he wants it done right. He trusts her. And rightfully so. She’s very good at what she does.”
“Exactly.”
Chase said, “Where do I go from here?”
“You’ll be back and forth between the JSOC base for now. We’re not ready for you yet. But when we say go, you’ll need to move fast.”
28
Admiral Manning evaluated the imagery. Dozens of white wakes in a vast blue ocean. The picture had been taken from an Air Force Global Hawk, the data transfer complete shortly before it had been shot down by Chinese fighters. The two Chinese carriers of the Chinese Northern Fleet were surrounded by over forty escorts and support vessels. Where the Southern Fleet contained a sizable contingent of troop transports, the Northern Fleet did not. More teeth and claws. Less soft underbelly.
“When was it taken?”
“We just got it, sir. The IWC told me to show you immediately,” the young intelligence officer answered.
The call to GQ sounded over the 1MC, and Admiral Manning walked out of the secure compartment and into another.
“Battle Watch Captain, why are we going to GQ?”
“Sir, the Ford CO ordered it. One of our F-18s flying surveillance was just lit up by an air defense radar, sir.”
Admiral Manning looked up at the movie-theater-sized screen at the front of the darkened room. The screen was carved into several sections, each showing important tactical information. Dozens of men and women were typing and talking at the rows of duty stations just in front of the screen. The battle watch captain and his assistants sat on an elevated row of terminals in the rear of the space. The BWC was the admiral’s senior watch stander. This one was a Navy lieutenant commander and wore the double-anchored wings of a naval flight officer.
“Both the CAG and the commodore are looking for you, sir.”
Admiral Manning nodded. The sound of afterburner igniting above them filled the room as the admiral walked out. The sound continued for a number of seconds, followed by a WHOOSH, and then another. The admiral walked into the air wing’s secure compartment, where their own duty officers were yelling into phones and headsets, moving pieces on a magnetic whiteboard, and typing on computers.
“CAG, everyone good?”
The CAG was looking between one of the computer screens and the flight schedule with one of the lieutenants on his staff. “Everything’s good, sir. We’re launching our strike package now.”
“Coordination with Air Force assets going smoothly?”
“Most Air Force assets are on deck. And they’re over a thousand miles away with limited tankers. But we expect their alerts to be airborne within the next few minutes. So far so good, sir.”
“The Chinese fleet looks like it’s out of range of the ships. Is—”
The CAG looked slightly impatient. “They are. Our attack aircraft and Air Force assets are going to be first. The commodore expects his destroyers to be in range within the next two hours. We’ll coordinate with him and update you, Admiral.”
If not for the seriousness of the situation, the admiral would have smiled. Decades of training for this moment, and now it was here. He felt like a parent with his adult children. The kids didn’t need him to tell them what to do; he had trained them well.
“Keep me informed.”
“Yes, sir.”
Admiral Manning went down to the Zulu cell next. The commodore stood menacingly over the same young lieutenant who had convinced him to have the CAG add more surveillance flights.
“Commodore, everything going well?”
The commodore ran down a laundry list of status reports, mostly ship degradations, and finally finished with, “But yes, sir. Everything is going well. We’ll work with CAG and Strike Group to coordinate.”
“Very well.”
The commodore then stepped over to the side of the room to add a bit more about submarine movements. When they were finished, Admiral Manning headed back to sit with his battle watch captain. Real-time updates on the second battle of Midway began coming in fast and furious.
On board one of the Chinese carriers, the Chinese fleet commander received word that American fighters were inbound. He gave the order to launch Chinese fighters and was soon notified that his ships had turned on their air defense radars and begun launching their surface-to-air missiles.
The Chinese fleet commander knew the battle would be fast. With aircraft and missiles all supersonic, the time of flight for each wave was mere minutes. This would be the climax of his life, he realized. Of many lives. Scientists had been working on these technologies, working on improvements to various characteristics like the effectiveness of radar target acquisition and the range of each missile. Testing and training. Entire lives of military service dedicated to the expertise of each specific aspect of war. Yet it would be decided in mere seconds, with any number of variables contributing to the ultimate victory. The wind could be the deciding factor. Or the water temperature. Or how quickly one of the pilots pressed a series of buttons.
“Surface-to-air missiles are hitting their targets, Admiral. Combat Officer estimates that at least ten enemy aircraft have been shot down.” Ten. Out of how many? They would be in range to let loose their strike packages soon.
“Send in the fighters.”
“Yes, sir.”
Above the Chinese carriers, stacks of Chinese fighter aircraft were flying circles at their maximum endurance airspeed, trying to conserve fuel for when they were given the okay to head into battle. The radio call came quick and terse. The squadron commander gave orders to his pilots and they separated into several formations at different altitudes. Jammers were on, radars off on all but a few. Shortly after they pointed their headings east, the aircraft with radars on communicated the targeting information to the others over their network.
Lieutenant Suggs had once again been given permission to get on the flight schedule. Everyone wanted to fly this mission, and he was no exception. But slipping a bottle of scotch to the scheduler in the air wing had helped his case.
Suggs shot down two aircraft within the first few minutes of combat. His eyes and mind were hitting sensory overload. The sheer number of hostile air contacts was overwhelming.
His weapons system officer said, “Hey, Suggs, come right to zero-eight-zero. I think I’ve got one of the carriers.”
Suggs banked the Superhornet sharply and lined up on his attack profile. Moments later, the aircraft fired an antiship missile, which dropped low over the ocean and sped towards its targets.
The Chinese admiral tried to keep apprised of the battle’s status, but the volume of information was overwhelming.