After slowing, Mack ordered the OOD to deploy the TB-23 towed array for its long-range tonal-detection capability. The report came back exactly as he’d hoped — no contacts on the towed array. The sonar room watch standers watched their consoles and waited for Mack’s next orders.
“Officer of the deck, prepare to come to periscope depth,” Captain Mackey ordered. Mack wanted to relay information about the safety of their route back to the Independence Battle Group.
“Prepare to come to periscope depth, aye, sir,” the OOD replied.
But Mack didn’t get the chance to report to Independence. Before Cheyenne came shallow enough to transmit, she began to receive message traffic over the floating wire.
“Sir,” the communicator reported, “it looks like we just got new orders!”
Mack went to the radio room, grabbed the sheet of printer paper, and quickly read the message.
“Looks like a strike mission to me,” the communicator said, with a note of eagerness and brashness. “What do you think, sir?”
That annoyed Mack. It was a breach of protocol, and not smart. He looked at the communicator and shook his head. “Call a meeting in the wardroom in ten minutes,” he said, putting an edge in his tone. “I want the executive officer, the combat systems officer, the operations officer, and yourself there.”
The communicator knew he’d screwed up. “Ten minutes, in the wardroom, aye, sir,” he said. The cocky note was gone from his voice.
Cheyenne returned to a patrol depth of 247 feet since the first thermal layer was gone, and within eight minutes all requested officers were waiting for Captain Mackey to arrive in Cheyenne’s wardroom. Mack came in five minutes late. He carried a plain manila folder in his hand.
“Gentlemen,” he said. “I have called this meeting in order to pass on our new orders. From our present position in the South China Sea, we are to proceed to the north of the Chinese-held Spratly Islands. Once there, three hundred miles north, we will launch six Tomahawk land-attack missiles at the Chinese submarine base that has recently been set up near Cuarteron Reef, one of the islands in the Spratly chain.”
He paused to see how the others would react. He was pleased to see that, while there was some tension, it was mostly excitement, with only a touch of healthy caution. He was also pleased that the communicator kept his mouth shut.
“As you all know,” Mack continued, “naval intelligence has reported large numbers of Chinese submarines operating in this area. We’ve confirmed this with our own detections. Our new orders are to do something about that.” He paused again, making sure that everyone was paying full attention. “We are going to enter the belly of the beast,” he said. “We will launch our Tomahawks as ordered, and then we will meet up with the submarine tender USS McKee in order to rearm.” He grinned and added, “Maybe we’ll even get a quick glimpse of life on the surface.”
His lighthearted joke helped to ease the tension slightly. The assembled officers had a few questions. They discussed their options, and then Mack dismissed them to return to their duties. When he had returned to the conn, he used the 1MC to inform the crew of their new mission. From there on out, Cheyenne would use sound-powered phones instead of general announcing systems.
Forty-five minutes later Cheyenne once again went to periscope depth. The seas had abated somewhat, but copying SSIXS required the use of the long, multipurpose communications mast to preclude the loss of synch caused by waves slapping over the Type 18 periscope communications antenna.
Mack stayed at that depth just long enough to receive preliminary Tomahawk targeting data. This information, which they would confirm when they got closer to their launch position, would be fed to their cruise missiles prior to launching the Tomahawks. Mack hoped the weather would be better north of the Spratlys.
When the data transfer was complete, Cheyenne detached from the Independence Battle Group without report and proceeded on her own. Mack had enjoyed having the carrier nearby for backup and air defense, but now Cheyenne was going back to doing what she did best: operating on her own, sneaking up on the enemy, and blowing them to hell.
Three hundred fifty miles southwest of Cuarteron Reef, running at four hundred twenty-five feet, Cheyenne picked up her first contact. Mack was in the sonar room.
“Captain,” the sonar supervisor reported, “we have a sonar contact bearing 020 on the spherical array. The contact’s intermittent, so I think we’re receiving the sound source via a convergence zone. We pick her up loud and clear, then we lose her and don’t hear anything for a while.”
While normal sound traveled through water in waves that gave at least some predictability, there were some areas in which sound waves were turned up toward the surface and then often bounced back into the sea. These were called convergence zones, and they could allow sonar to detect these sound waves at far greater ranges than would otherwise be possible. If the water was deep enough and the sound velocity excess was present at depth, these zones commonly occurred about every thirty miles. In a way, the ray paths of the acoustic energy were much like AM radio transmissions, which could travel in a straight line, then bounce off the ground and up into the atmosphere, and then come back to earth. This allowed AM frequencies to broadcast much farther than FM, though beyond their immediate range they could be picked up only in pockets and were more affected by weather.
“My guess,” the sonar supervisor added, “is that it’s in the second convergence zone from us.” That would put the signal’s source at a range of more than sixty nautical miles, or 120,000 yards.
“Keep an eye on that contact,” Mack said. If the sonar supervisor was right and Cheyenne‘s operators had indeed heard their sonar contact through a convergence zone, then the signal’s source was far out of Cheyenne’s weapons range. It also meant that the thermal gradients in the deeper waters of the South China Sea had not been eroded by the storms. But if the sonar supervisor was wrong, Cheyenne could be in for some very dangerous close combat.
Sixty-three miles away, 200 feet below the surface of the South China Sea, crept one of the newest additions to the Chinese fleet, and one of China’s best submarine captains. The Chinese Kilo submarine had been in service for less than two years and had made its crew very proud.
The first Chinese Kilo submarines had been bought from Russia in 1993 and delivered in February 1995. The Chinese had planned to buy up to fifteen of these powerful diesel submarines and had hoped that they would be able to build five more themselves, under license from Russia.
This particular submarine had excellent equipment, with the exception of her passive sonar outfit. That was the problem with all Russian submarines, as its captain knew. The Russians could not make a decent passive submarine sonar — at least not one that his country would be allowed to buy.
And that was a problem. At any given moment, there might be an American Los Angeles class submarine sneaking up on his position, and he would never know it until it was too late.
The captain of the Chinese submarine wasn’t too worried about it, though. His was the lead ship of three. Below the waves, his Kilo was working in tandem with an older Romeo class diesel submarine. Above them, Jinan, a Luda class destroyer, patrolled the surface. Their mission was to hunt down and destroy any American ships and submarines. In addition, there was another Kilo well off to the side — not part of his task force, but it could provide assistance if he needed it.