Over the speaker, the Operations Room Officer’s voice said, “Bridge — Operations Room. Bogies have gone radar-active. I and J band pulse-Doppler emitters with a cascading pulse repetition rate. Looks like the German Air Force variant of the ECR-90C radar.”
The captain exhaled audibly. “Luftwaffe. That narrows the field a trifle. We’re either dealing with back-fitted Toranados or those damned Eurofighter 2000s.”
“Bridge — Operations Room. Bogies are not responding to Level Two challenges.”
“Is that right?” the captain asked quietly. “Second Officer of the Watch, take missiles to the rails. Shift the gun to anti-air automatic.”
Sub Lieutenant Kensington stood for a few seconds without speaking.
He’d done this a thousand times under simulated conditions, but this was no simulation. There were real planes out there, and real submarines.
“Second Officer of the Watch!” the captain said loudly.
Kensington started. “Yes, sir!”
“Take missiles to the rails, and shift the gun to anti-air automatic.”
Kensington managed to catch himself before he saluted out of reflex.
“Aye-aye, sir!” He keyed a comm box and repeated the captain’s orders to the Operations Room Officer. Were they actually going to shoot? Surely it wouldn’t go that far … or would it? The captain seemed to think so …
Out on the darkened forecastle, the twin arms of the British Aerospace missile launcher rotated up to the zero position. Two small hatches powered smoothly aside, and slender rails extended through the openings to mate with the arms of the launcher. A fraction of a second later, a pair of Sea Dart missiles rode up the vertically aligned rails to lock into place on the arms of the launcher. The rails retracted themselves, and the small hatches closed as soon as they were clear. The entire operation took less than three seconds.
The 114mm Vickers gun was loaded and ready a split-second later. Its barrel instantly slewed to a new position as it locked on the inbound aircraft and tracked their radar returns through the night sky.
“Missiles at the rail, sir,” the Operations Room Officer reported. “The gun is in anti-air automatic.”
“Good,” the captain said. “Ready all torpedo tubes for firing.”
“Aye-aye, sir,” Kensington said. He keyed his comm box and repeated the order to the Operations Room Officer.
“Bring us around to two-six-zero,” the captain said. “Don’t let those subs get past us.”
Lieutenant Bryce’s voice was loud, “Helmsman, right standard rudder.
Steady on course two-six-zero.”
“Helm, aye! Sir, my rudder is right fifteen degrees, coming to new course two-six-zero!”
The Operations Room Officer’s voice came over the speaker.
“Bridge — Operations Room. Bogies will penetrate our inner defense perimeter in five seconds! Request guns and missiles free!”
“Negative!” the captain said. “They’re just trying to scare us into breaking formation so those submarines can get past us. We are not at war, gentlemen. We’ll not fire the first shot!” His next words were drowned out by an earsplitting roar that vibrated the thick bridge windows like tuning forks.
The jets rocketed overhead, not more than ten meters above the foremast. The shriek of their engines was deafening, literally rattling Kensington’s teeth. The glass faceplate of a gyrocompass repeater exploded into fragments under the sudden pressure.
A sliver of flying glass stung Kensington high on the right cheek, burying itself deep under the skin. His involuntary yelp was lost in the cacophonous scream of six pairs of jet engines running at open throttle.
And then the jets were gone, climbing away into the darkness, their afterburners carving blue arcs of flame into the night sky.
Kensington touched his cheek and felt the moistness of his own blood.
His ears were still ringing from the fly-by.
“Steady, lads,” the captain shouted, obviously nearly deafened himself.
“We’ll not fire the first shot,” he repeated. “But if they do, I give you my word that we will fire the last one!”
The Operations Room Officer’s voice came over the speaker again. It was difficult to hear him because he wasn’t yelling like everyone else.
Working farther down in the superstructure, he hadn’t been half-deafened by the jets. “Bridge — Operations Room. Bogies are coming back around for another pass.”
“Keep on those subs!” the captain yelled.
“Bridge — Operations Room. Bogies have locked on us with fire control radar!”
“Damn it!” the captain shouted. “Lock on the lead aircraft!”
Staring out the window, Sub Lieutenant Kensington spotted it first: an orange-white flare in the darkness, followed instantly by five more. Just as his brain was coming to grips with what he was seeing, he heard the Operations Room Officer’s voice.
“Inbound! We have six inbound missiles!”
“Flank speed!” the captain shouted. “Hard left rudder! Guns and missiles free! Engage all targets!”
The deck pitched sharply to the right. Kensington grabbed the crossbar mount of the radar repeater to keep his footing as the ship heeled over into the turn.
Two brilliant flashes of light from the forecastle and twin rumbles, like freight trains passing a half-meter away, announced the launch of HMS York’s first pair of missiles. The British Aerospace Sea Darts hurtled into the sky on fiery white columns of smoke. Perhaps three-quarters of a second later, two Sea Wolf missiles leapt off the deck of HMS Chatham.
The forward chaff launchers fired six times in rapid succession. Six egg-shaped chaff projectiles arced away from the ship, four of them exploding at predetermined distances, spewing clouds of aluminum dust and metallic confetti into the sky to confuse the enemy missiles with false radar targets. The remaining two chaff rounds ignited like roman candles.
They were torch rounds: magnesium flares designed to seduce heat-seeking infrared guided missiles.
The York’s 114mm Vickers deck gun opened fire, and suddenly the night sky seemed to be filled with man-made lightning and thunder.
The starboard Phalanx fired a short burst of 20mm rounds, and was rewarded a second later by a distant explosion as the hardened tungsten bullets shredded an incoming missile. The high-tech Gatling gun swung around toward another incoming missile and fired again.
The port Phalanx mount remained silent, waiting for suitable targets to enter its arc of fire.
Out on the forecastle, a second pair of Sea Dart missiles slid up the loading rails to the launcher.
“Bogies are firing again!” the Operations Room Officer shouted over the speaker. And another half-dozen missiles leapt into the fray.
The Sea Darts blasted the forecastle with fiery exhaust as they shot away into the night.
The German missiles were AS-34B Kormoran 2s. Sea-skimmers that dropped like stones, not leveling out until they were less than two meters above the wave tops.
Following its mid-course inertial guidance program, the first missile waited twelve seconds before activating its nose-mounted targeting radar.
When it did, it immediately located two radar contacts: one large and close, and a second, smaller contact fifty meters beyond. The target selection algorithm running through the missile’s Thompson-CSF digital seeker instantly rejected the nearer/larger target. Large/near targets tended to be chaff decoys. The missile locked on the smaller target, and executed a short S-turn to the left to avoid the chaff cloud.