The Situation Room Duty Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Buchanan, met him at the door with a cup of coffee. “No disrespect intended, sir, but you look like death on a cracker.”
Frank accepted the coffee and downed about half of the steaming liquid in two large gulps. “This better not be decaf,” he said. “I don’t have the strength to kill you, but I can drool on your shoes and cry a lot.”
The Duty Officer smiled. “I wouldn’t give decaf to my worst enemy, sir.”
Frank chugged down the second half of the coffee and found a seat at the empty conference table.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ve got some brain cells coming on line. So what have we got?”
“My team is putting together some visuals for briefing the president,” said Buchanan. “But they’re not ready to look at yet.”
“I don’t need a dog and pony show,” Frank said. “Just tell me why you got me out of bed.”
“We think we’ve lost a guided missile destroyer down in the blockade zone.”
The qualifying word in that sentence caught Frank’s attention. “We think we lost a ship? Isn’t that sort of a binary solution set? Either we’ve lost one, or we haven’t, right?”
“At the moment, Fourth Fleet is calling it a probable loss,” the Duty Officer said. “No absolute proof, but that’s where the indicators are pointing.”
Frank regarded the now-empty coffee cup with a doleful eye. “Alright. Spell it out for me.”
“The ship in question is the USS Walter W. Winterburn, an Arleigh Burke class missile shooter out of Mayport, Florida, assigned to blockade duty south of Cuba. She was last located about thirty nautical miles west of Grand Cayman. At zero-three-eighteen hours local time, the ship reported an incoming torpedo over Navy Red and the fleet tactical nets. Based on speed and acoustic characteristics, their initial classification listed the weapon as a probable supercav.”
“And?”
“And that was the Winterburn’s final communication. The ship went silent on all radio channels, dropped off of the tactical networks, and disappeared from radar. She’s also not showing up on satellite imagery. SOUTHCOM has already managed to divert a high-altitude surveillance drone to the area. It picked up some infrared footage of floating debris, but not even much of that. No survivors spotted, and no sign of the ship. Just a big empty place where a U.S. Navy destroyer used to be.”
“Our North Korean super sub again?” Frank asked.
“That’s SOUTHCOM’s prime suspect,” the Duty Officer said. “Unless there are two hostile units down there with supercavitating weapons.”
Frank nodded. “What else are we doing about this?”
“There are three P-8 Poseidon’s en route to the area of interest. One assigned to search for the Winterburn, and the others to hunt for the enemy sub. And the Harry S. Truman Strike Group is steaming northwest to get within helo range. When they’re close enough, they’ll launch SH-60s for search and rescue.”
Frank’s bleary eyes were suddenly wide open. “Hang on a sec… We’ve got an aircraft carrier moving toward this killer submarine?”
“Yes, sir. SOUTHCOM needs the air resources for SAR and ASW. Nobody’s got more of that than a carrier strike group.”
“Is the president in the loop on this?” Frank asked.
“I’m not sure, sir,” the Duty Officer said.
“Well we need to find out, and pretty damned fast. If he doesn’t know, we have to tell him immediately.”
“We were planning to wait until the briefing materials were—”
“Forget about the brief!” Frank snapped. “We’ve got a nuclear aircraft carrier steaming blindly toward an unknown threat that’s already killed two of our warships.”
“Not blindly, sir,” the Duty Officer said. “The Truman is protected by escort ships with sonar, ASW helos, and two fast attack subs in associative support.”
“All of which are armed with conventional torpedoes,” Frank said, “just like USS Mahan was, and you know what happened to her.”
He sat up straighter in his chair. “Have you seen the post-mission analysis of that engagement, Colonel? The Mahan dropped an ASROC right in the sweet spot, maybe fifty or sixty yards off the target’s bow. You couldn’t ask for a cleaner shot. By the time that weapon got up to speed, the sub was already outside of the attack envelope. It blew past like that ASROC was tied to an anchor. And about thirty seconds later, the Mahan was blasted out of the water.”
The Duty Officer seemed about to respond, but Frank cut him off. “I don’t care how many antisubmarine warfare assets the Truman has. If they’re depending on ordinary torpedoes to stop a supercav submarine, then they’re basically defenseless. Which means that we’re sending an aircraft carrier strike group — the ultimate symbol of American military power projection — into a fucking meat grinder. We couldn’t give Kim Yong-nam a bigger birthday present if we offered him the keys to the White House.”
Frank leaned across the conference table and reached for the nearest telephone. “You’ve got two minutes to get your ducks in a row, Colonel. I’m waking up the president.”
CHAPTER 45
//TTTTTTTTTT//
//TOP SECRET//
//FLASH//FLASH//FLASH//
//011148Z MAR//
FM USSOUTHCOM//
TO CARSTRKGRU EIGHT//
INFO COMFOURTHFLEET//
SUBJ/CHANGE IN TASKING/IMMEDIATE EXECUTE//
REF/A/RMG/USSOUTHCOM/011023Z MAR//
NARR/REF A IS SAR AND ASW TASKING ISSUED BY U.S. SOUTHERN COMMAND FOLLOWING 010818Z MAR ATTACK ON USS WALTER W. WINTERBURN IN CARIBBEAN SEA.//
1. (SECR) REF A IS CANCELLED AND RESCINDED.
2. (TS) HOSTILE SUPERCAVITATING SUBMARINE OPERATING IN CARIBBEAN BLOCKADE ZONE HAS DEMONSTRATED SUSTAINED SPEEDS EXCEEDING THREE-HUNDRED (300) KNOTS. SUCCESSFUL ENGAGEMENT OF THIS CONTACT USING CURRENT U.S. INVENTORY ASW WEAPONS IS CONSIDERED HIGHLY UNLIKELY, DUE TO EXTREME SPEED DISADVANTAGE.
3. (TS) BY PRESIDENTIAL ORDER, USS HARRY S. TRUMAN AND ALL SURFACE AND SUBSURFACE ASSETS ATTACHED TO CARRIER STRIKE GROUP EIGHT ARE DIRECTED TO WITHDRAW AT BEST AVAILABLE SPEED, AND REMAIN AT LEAST ONE-HUNDRED (100) NAUTICAL MILES EAST OF LONGITUDE 75W.
4. (TS) STRIKE GROUP AIR ASSETS MAY OPERATE WEST OF LONGITUDE 75W, AS REQUIRED FOR DEFENSIVE DEPLOYMENTS AND OPERATIONAL MISSION PARAMETERS. SUBJECT TO CURRENT RULES OF ENGAGEMENT, STRIKE GROUP AIRCRAFT MAY CONDUCT OR SUPPORT ASW OPERATIONS WEST OF LONGITUDE 75W, BUT NO SURFACE OR SUBSURFACE VESSELS FROM CARSTRKGRU EIGHT WILL ACCOMPANY THEM.
5. (TS) IF THE SUPERCAVITATING SUBMARINE CONTACT IS DETECTED EAST OF LONGITUDE 75W, USS HARRY S. TRUMAN AND ALL ATTACHED SURFACE AND SUBSURFACE ASSETS ARE ORDERED TO BREAK OFF CONTACT, AVOID DIRECT ENGAGEMENT, AND WITHDRAW TO A SAFE AREA AS DETERMINED BY THE TACTICAL SITUATION.
6. (SECR) COMFOURTHFLEET WILL ISSUE ADDITIONAL ORDERS AND AMPLIFYING INTELLIGENCE.
7. (SECR) IMMEDIATE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF THIS ORDER IS REQUIRED.
8. (UNCL) ADMIRAL COOK SENDS.
//011148Z MAR//
//FLASH//FLASH//FLASH//
//TOP SECRET//
//TTTTTTTTTT//
Admiral Carey Hatcher swished his razor in the sink to rinse away the accumulated shaving cream. As he tapped away the excess water he inspected his reflection in the stainless steel mirror for any stray stubble.