Bosun Hoong was busy as well, simultaneously endeavoring to both coordinate the repair job and to organize the handful of green seamen who would constitute the Five Sixteen boat’s new crew. Given the volume and intensity of his language, neither was proving to be an easy task.
The problems that Zhou was confronting would not be easily resolved either. Captain Li and the political officer had perished when the flag boat had been destroyed by a wild shot from the Silkworm battery. The squadron first officer and his exec were dead as well, dying at least at the hands of the enemy.
Zhou still thought of himself as a junior officer, and yet, now, he was the new squadron commander. Fleet Headquarters here in Shanghai seemed to have neither the authorization, interest, or resources to provide a replacement. Nor, with the submarine force away and clear, did they seem to have any orders for the squadron.
They were on their own, an unusual state of affairs for any PLA military unit. Zhou knew what must be done. He must rally the squadron again. He must get them through the trauma of the losses they had taken and he must prepare them for battle again. Most of all, he must find them a worth mission.
Unbidden, an image filled his mind. An image of the towering bladelike bow of a ghost ship looming out of the haze.
31
** FLASH RED FLASH RED FLASH RED FLASH RED FLASH RED **
** SECURITY AUTHENTICATOR; STINGRAY-BRAVO-SIX-SIX-ZERO **
ACTIVE-SECURE************CHECK-VERIFY-GO**
** LIVE FIRE ALERT NOTIFICATION **
FROM. CINC-7
TO: ALL 7TH FLEET LAND/AIR/SEA ELEMENTS ON THE ORDERS OF THE NATIONAL COMMAND AUTHORITY THE FOLLOWING MODIFICATIONS TO 7TH FLEET OPERATIONAL R. O.E. WILL BE PLACED IN EFFECT, AS OF 1200 HOURS ZONE TIME, AUGUST 18, 2006.
1. MAXIMUM PRIORITY WILL BE GIVEN TO THE LOCATION AND IDENTIFICATION OF ANY AND ALL PRC HAN AND XIA CLASS NUCLEAR SUBMARINES CURRENTLY OPERATING IN ASIAN AND PACIFIC WATERS.
2. UPON LOCATION AND POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION, SAID PRC VESSELS ARE TO BE FIRED UPON AND SUNK AT ALL COSTS.
32
“Letter from your ex-wife, Doc?” Amanda inquired with a half-smile.
“Better,” Golden replied with a theatrical sigh. “It’s a letter from my ex-wife’s lawyer. The dance may be over, but the malady lingers on.”
The majority of the Cunningham’s senior officers relaxed around the wardroom table as the steward served lunch. The exception was Ken Hiro. With the ship closed up to wartime cruising mode, the Duke’s exec and C.O. were going on watch down in the Combat Information Center. This meal was Amanda’s chance to stand down a little from the load.
The ship’s surgeon made a show of refolding the page and tucking it back into his pocket. “Captain, you should be very grateful to Marilyn.”
Amanda set down her coffee cup. “How’s that, Doctor?”
“Because of her, you get me. If I leave the service and go up on the beach, she can get her claws into me more easily. However, if I stay out at sea, I get a little intermittent peace and quiet. There’s no contest!”
A ripple of laughter ran around the table.
“Come on, Doc,” Arkady needled. “It couldn’t have been all that bad. You married the woman.”
“Listen, flyboy,” Golden replied synthesizing a Yiddish accent. “my ex-wife and I first moved in together, she had to get rid of her cat. I’m allergic. If I’d have known then what I know now, I’d have kept the cat and gotten rid of Marilyn! For the cat, I could have taken pills!”
It was a good light moment, but it couldn’t last.
“Hey, Captain,” Chief Thomson said. “What’s the latest on the sub hunt?”
“We’re still pretty much where we stood last night,” Amanda replied, cutting the first bite from her hot turkey sandwich. “The mission intent is still to keep the Reds from breaking out into the open Pacific.”
Amanda found herself sliding back into her briefing mode, the attention of her officers fixing on her. “Just now, all deepwater exits out of the East China Sea are being blockaded by a multinational submarine and surface task group. The Korean Navy is covering the Straits of Korea. The Taiwanese have the Formosa Strait. The Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force has the northern end of the Ryukyu island chain, and Seventh Fleet has the southern.
“All the perimeter secured, the containment area will be systematically saturated with ASW assets. We find the boomer, fix its location, and then we kill it. By the book.”
“Does anyone have any theories about where this sucker is now?” Frank Mckelsie asked.
“Look under your chair,” Christine Rendino said. “The current sitguess is that the Reds are hiding out here in the deep waters west of the Ryukyus, waiting for the chance to make a bolt for one of the channels.”
“Then what are we doing hanging around out here on our own?”
“We’re not quite on our own,” Amanda replied. “A secondary picket line of surface units is being deployed out along the Ryukyu trench ahead of the main line of containment. Our mission intent is to flush the Red wolfpack back into the shallower waters nearer the China coast.
“It’s a mixed bag of units, JSDF and Taiwanese Navy mostly. Since we haven’t had the chance to work up as part of Task Force 7.1’s regular ASW team, we were the logical contribution from the U.S. force pool.” She paused for another sip of coffee. “Or at least that was how it was explained to me.”
“Yeah.”
The Duke’s officers turned to their meal, each striving to ignore an unspoken truth that hovered over the table. The atomic submarine is the ultimate oceanic predator, the deadliest enemy of the surface warship. Hunting for one out in the deepwater jungle is something like being a sapper probing for a hidden land mine. Sometimes “success” takes the form of a sudden terminal explosion.
They were granted time enough to eat. The mess man was just cutting the dessert on the sideboard when the overhead speaker cut in.
“Wardroom, this is the CIC.”
Amanda’s command headset was lying in its usual place beside her plate. Snatching the earphones up, she settled them into place. “Wardroom, aye. What’s up, Ken?”
“Somebody’s initiated an active sonar search off to the southeast. Range unknown, but over the horizon. We think it may be the next picket ship down the line.”
“Any sighting report?”
“Not yet. We … stand by … Sighting report coming in now. Taiwanese Navy frigate Po Yang now reporting a possible SSN contact. They are pursuing the target, attempting to identify.”
Everyone around the table had their eyes fixed on Amanda, awaiting her word.
“Chris,” she whispered off mike. “The Po Yang, what do you have?”
“Ex-U.S. Navy Knox-class frigate. Purchased 1995. Systems updated in Taiwanese yards. ASROC ASW launcher forward, two triple sets of torpedo tubes amidships. Facilities for a single Kaman Super Sprite LAMPS helo.” A computer might have been using the Intel’s voice as she rattled off the list of facts. “SQS-26 hull sonar and an SQR-18 towed array, both with augmentation packages.”
Amanda’s-gaze flicked across to her tactical officer. “Dix, a Knox versus a Han or a Xia. Who has the edge?”
The TACCO shrugged. “If it’s one-on-one, ma’am, it’ll go to whoever gets off the first shot. On the other hand, if this is one of our bogeys, he may have a couple of swim buddies out there with him.”