Markov also knew that a newly placed buoy wouldn’t start pinging until the controlling aircraft told it to. This time the American plane must be waiting until it had laid the whole pattern, whatever its shape.
He desperately wished he knew the location of the aircraft and its pattern. He could use his periscope to spot the plane, but that meant slowing the Dribinov down and exposing its periscope mast to radar and visual detection. That was suicide under these conditions.
He stopped. No, not suicide. They were not going to kill him, only warn him away. Well, he had a little warning for them.
“Comrade Captain! New active signals. Behind and to starboard.”
Markov glanced at the sonar display and made an instant decision. “Deploy a decoy! Left full rudder! Steady on course zero four five.” He turned to the sonar operator hunched over his display. The man had one hand clapped to his earphones while the other danced across his controls. “How strong is the signal? Are we being detected?”
The sonarman shrugged. “Unknown, sir. We were nearly beam-on to one of them. We should be out of range quickly, though.”
“We’ve got him, sir, on the edge. The joker zigged on us.”
Brown pulled at his jaw. “Can we drop on him?” The air controller didn’t hesitate. “Yes, sir. Five hundred yards?”
“Yeah. How precise is your fix?” Brown wanted to scare the bastard out there, not kill him. Not yet.
“Good, sir. It’s a strong return. Present course is zero eight zero, speed is… one knot.” The controller’s voice faltered.
Crap. Brown had seen this stunt before. “That’s not the sub. That’s a decoy!” This sub driver was smart. He’d popped a noisemaking decoy out of one of his signal ejectors and probably turned the other way, hoping the Americans would follow the wrong one. Well, they had. The controller started giving directions to his planes. “Whiskey Four, this is Alpha Whiskey. Pattern Charlie Three, centered on datum.” He looked at Brown. “Sir, if we keep using circular patterns, the S-3s are gonna run out of buoys in a hurry.”
Brown pondered that, but only for a few seconds. “Keep it up. We’ve got ten aircraft, and we’re going to use them. I’ll start arranging resupply flights of sonobuoys from Japan and the Philippines. If I have to, I’ll strip the Pacific, but I’m not letting any sub close to this force.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” The controller nodded and turned back to his task. The admiral’s answer was the only one that made sense, but there were going to be a lot of busy supply officers from here to Pearl Harbor.
The S-3 Viking wheeled into position to lay its sonobuoy pattern. From the outside it looked pretty slow. All the action went on inside the sub hunter’s cabin.
Whiskey Four’s tactical coordinator, or TACCO, sat on a computer display that showed all known information about the contact and the units “prosecuting” it. He heard the order from the Connie for a new sonobuoy pattern and keyed it onto the screen. The tactical computer looked at the plane’s position, the contact’s last known course and speed, and the ordered buoy pattern. Its microprocessors began calculating the positions of the buoys in the water, including such factors as the sonar conditions and the plane’s distance from the sub’s assumed position.
Up forward, Whiskey Four’s pilot sat with his hands in his lap as the computer took over the controls and started banking the S-3 toward the plotted position of the first buoy it planned to drop. He controlled the surge of irritation he always felt when the TACCO’s toy turned him into a passenger. It was difficult, but good ASW work required absolute precision, and five years of experience had taught him that only a computer-controlled buoy drop could guarantee that kind of accuracy.
In the plane’s belly a burly crewman loaded buoys into a bank of launch tubes. As each slid into place, the S-3’s tactical computer gave it a quick burst of instructions — how deep to lower its microphone, which radio channel to use when sending data back, and a slew of other commands needed to make it work.
When Whiskey Four reached the computer-selected start position, it released its first buoy. The canister slid down the launch tube and out into the aircraft’s slipstream. A small parachute snapped open and the sonobuoy slid downwind into the water. Others followed at: regular intervals. The TACCO watched as small symbols appeared on his screen, marching slowly in a circle around a moving symbol that showed where the enemy sub might be.
He waited until the Viking had dropped the last buoy in this pattern and then leveled out of its long bank. With a smile on his face he pressed a key and imagined the sound waves that were now radiating outward through the cold water below. Knock, knock, tough guy.
“Four’s got a solid return, Admiral. Course one seven zero, speed four knots.”
Brown smiled. “He’s still trying to work south. Persistent bugger, I’ll give him that.” His smile disappeared. “Okay, Tim. Drop another charge, this time five hundred yards in front of him.” The admiral leaned closer to study the ASW plot. The sub driver out there had guts, maybe too many to keep pussyfooting around like this. “How close is he now?”
“Forty-two miles from Constellation. Thirty-five miles from the forward edge of our screen.” The ASW controller sounded just a tad impatient. Brown knew he should back away and let his subordinates do their jobs. They couldn’t find it easy trying to work with him staring over their shoulders. He allowed himself a minor twinge of conscience over that and then refocused his mind on the hunt.
He tapped the aircraft status board, pondering his next move. Then he nodded to the ASW controller. “All right. Let’s give the Vikings some help.”
The rumbling had been louder this time, and Markov well understood the message it carried. He’d used up ten percent of his battery charge trying to break free of the last field, and he’d almost succeeded. Almost.
But now the rumbling explosion of the American depth charge rang in his ears like laughter. All right. He would use their own laughter against them. “Full speed. Steer for the place where the depth charge exploded.”
His control room crew leapt to obey.
Markov was gambling again. He knew the depth charge explosion would rumble through the sea for several minutes, and the water it had roiled would return confused echoes to the American active sonars. Dribinov’s high-speed propeller noise should be cloaked by those echoes — allowing him to merge his sub with them, wait for the echoes to fade, and then motor away quietly. The Soviet crew listened carefully, and Markov slowed the sub’s electric motors as the rumbling subsided. Two minutes later Dribinov reached the “knuckle” in the water formed when the depth charge exploded. A little turbulence remained, gently rocking the sub’s mass left and right. “All stop,” Markov called out softly. Knuckles did not move.
He looked at the gauges showing the submarine’s battery charge level. That minute and a half at full power had considerably reduced his battery charge. The same power that would last for days while creeping at three knots could be used up by an hour’s dash at twenty knots.
His first officer followed his gaze and arched an eyebrow in an unspoken question. Now what? Markov spread his hands, careful not to bump anything that might make noise. They drifted for five minutes in complete silence, hoping the search would move away from them. At last Markov ordered, “Speed three knots, course one eight zero.” Dead south, toward the Americans again.