“What’s that sir?”
“You’ve been selected to command a submarine of your own soon. I’m considering letting you to take the Miami home as the acting commanding officer. I’m just about ready to pack it in.”
“Captain?”
“I’m also annotating the deck log with your formal recommendation to open range to the Colorado before we were counter-detected.”
“Sir, that annotation will do more harm to you than good for me. It’s destructive.”
“After letting the Colorado get away, my career’s officially over. If I can turn my mistake into your advantage, then let’s do it. You’ve learned a lot from me. My last lesson is to show you how to lose graciously.”
Pacing in the Oval Office, Lance Ryder spoke with David Rankin, his National Security Advisor.
“Let’s face it,” Ryder said. “Admiral Mesher can pump all the sunshine up my ass that he wants, but we’ve had no contact with the Colorado for twenty-eight hours. It’s gone and we’ve got a crisis. We need allied forces to help with this one.”
“Sir, the implications of sharing this are too—”
“This could cost me the Presidency.”
“It would destroy the nation’s confidence. We can’t afford that — not now — not with your neck sticking out in the Middle East. Not when you may have to pry the Chinese off of Taiwan.”
“What other choice do I have?” Ryder asked.
“We can set up others to take the fall. Blame needs to go no higher than Admiral Mesher.”
“If I go down, I go down with my integrity intact.”
“But consider the nation,” Rankin said. “You can’t take this public without creating widespread panic, sir. There are options.”
“What options?”
“We can get help secretly. I could leak this through intelligence channels and get allied resources to join us in the search. We should regain the Colorado when it passes through the Straits of Gibraltar. We can look for the warheads’ radiation if they escape from the ship.”
“Those options might work.”
“We know that the Colorado is in the North Atlantic and probably heading toward Gibraltar, but the third party supporting this hijack doesn’t know that we know. We need to retain that advantage. Silence and secrecy are your best options.”
“Gather the Joint Chiefs, the DCI, and the Secretary of State to discuss using the intelligence channels,” Ryder said. “We’ll keep this quiet until I confer with them.”
Four-foot swells rocked the chained network of three cargo containers under the eleven o’clock sun. The detonator in the top crate generated an electrical pulse. In unison, C-4 charges exploded and tore off the crate’s door.
Attached to the plummeting steel door, a depth charge reached five hundred feet. Bellows sensors registered two hundred and twenty pounds per square inch of water pressure. The weapon exploded.
A shockwave shook the upper crate as water flowed into it and pushed the two buoys from the Colorado against its customized inner jail cell wall. As the inrush subsided, one buoy rose cleanly to the ocean’s surface. The other bumped against the top of the crate prior to ascending. Having sensed immersion in water, the buoys reached the surface and transmitted a doomsday message that the USS Colorado had descended below crush depth.
As the buoys shrieked their message, the three crates descended below them. The metal walls of the remaining airtight crate groaned, creaked, and crumpled as the network of twisted metal plummeted to the ocean floor.
CHAPTER 22
The Taiwanese Minister of Defense sat before his top admirals and generals.
“Beijing has been enforcing an economic exclusive zone, a blockade in reality, against our inbound oil tankers and outbound military vessels. Their air assets have breached our defenses three times and have destroyed our major petroleum refineries. Although they supply refined gasoline and diesel fuel for an exorbitant price, the lack of jet fuel will soon cripple our air assets and half of our Navy.”
Heads nodded somberly.
“With the sinking of three oil tankers inbound for Taipei and Kaoshiung, international insurance companies are withdrawing their assurance for major commercial vessels heading for our island. Diplomatic efforts have failed,” he said.
Again heads nodded.
“I’ve decided that it’s time for us to strike back.”
Eyes around the table brightened.
“Before his departure, my French advisor drafted a plan that will destroy a major Chinese combatant.”
“Where is the Frenchman?” a young admiral asked. “There has been concern that you take his counsel at the risk of rejecting that of your own military leaders.”
The Minister had learned that the admiral, the youngest and most political of his flag officers, was spearheading a quiet insurgency within the Taiwanese military. The admiral sought to shift Taiwan from its defensive posture and retake its traditional offensive tone, concentrating forces and attacking coastal regions of mainland China.
The Minister considered the offensive stance idiotic. It would leave the island unguarded and give China justification to attempt amphibious landings, but the illogical fervor of the youth who supported it gave it life. To protect the island — and his career — the Minister counted on the shock value of his latest endeavor to hush the resistance.
“The Frenchman,” the Minister said, “is presently on an operation.”
The admiral frowned, and the Minister noticed that others at the table shared his displeasure.
“His last operation — the details of which you refuse to share with us — failed in anything but inciting the mainland to accelerate its blockade,” the admiral said.
“His last operation identified one of my deputies as a mole,” the Minister said. “And with that discovery, we will use one of the communication channels that we believe the mole compromised as a way to set a trap.”
“A trap?” the admiral asked and smirked.
“We will make the mainland believe that we are trying to sneak American weapons through their blockade. They will send a combatant to investigate, and that will be their mistake. Our stealth vessel, the Tai Chiang, will destroy the Chinese combatant.”
The admiral became agitated.
“Sir,” he said, “the Tai Chiang is the first ship of its class, and weapon system integration problems are delaying its deployment. The ship has no missiles. Engineers are working on the problem, but it’s not ready to attack a major combatant. And even if it were, it is not designed to exchange blows with larger warships.”
“It has its stealth and torpedoes, does it not?”
“Yes, sir, but—”
“Then you will read the details of the operation left behind by the Frenchman and make the preparations.”
“Sir,” the admiral said. “I will follow orders, of course, but I must question the use of the Tai Chiang. We have frigates capable of major engagement. Why not mass them together with air power and strike—”
The Minister stood and silence enveloped the room.
“I have chosen the Tai Chiang because this is a two-part mission,” he said. “The Tai Chiang will destroy a major combatant and serve as our first step in shattering the Chinese mainland’s resolve in enforcing the blockade.
“Once that is accomplished, we will claim that the Tai Chiang was lost in the exchange, but in reality, it will employ its stealth to continue north for refueling and weapons reload at a secret location in Japan.”