“This one, at the mouth of the Bassein River, is the sole means by which China can have a catastrophic effect on the free and peaceful flow of the world’s oil. Our instructions come direct from the White House. We are to take that Naval base out, on behalf of the government of the United States of America.
“The successful achievement of our objective will not only send the Chinese right back to their home waters, where they belong. It will also deservedly earn the gratitude of every person in the industrialized world. Although they will not know, of course, to whom they are grateful. But we’ll know. And that’s what matters.”
Everyone in the room nodded approval. And Commander Hunter told them that for the purpose of this initial briefing he wished to demonstrate to the entire group precisely where they were going, and how they were going to find their way in, in the pitch dark.
“Okay,” he said, “look at your own charts, and follow my bigger electronic one as we go.” He used a long ruler and pointed it at the rendezvous point where the Shark would arrive with the entire mission on board.
“Right here,” he said pointing precisely, “we get into the ASDV, in about one hundred sixty feet of water. We then take this route, down toward this little island here…and according to our experts we take this route, to this slightly deeper water right here. We believe this flashing light on the red can, marked here, will guide us into a newly dredged channel. Then we pick up the main throughway up to the island of Haing Gyi, where the base is.
“You’ll see right here on your chart, we adjust our course to zero-two-zero and run on up here in the main channel, as far as the next light — right here…it flashes every two seconds. We’ll pick that out probably a mile before we get there. And though we have not absolutely finalized our landing spot, we are leaning toward this area here…Rocky Point.
“It’s a headland with deep water in front, right up to the beach. Maybe fifteen feet. We can swim in there, and it’s far enough away from the base to carry no sentries. About one and a quarter miles. We have to walk that, with our equipment, but there’re no hills, no swamps, and just a tidal river to cross. We’ll take a look when we get there. This looks like a bridge, and if it’s quiet we’ll use it.”
“We coming out the same way, sir?”
“Absolutely not. Because there’s no way we can make our business look like some geothermal accident. The Chinese are going to know it’s us very early on. The ASDV’s too slow, and it’ll need to turn around as soon as it drops us. So they’re bringing in rigid inflatables to get us out fast. The water’s very flat this time of the year. We’ll be back in the submarine in fifty minutes.”
“How many buildings are we planning to hit?”
“Probably three, but the big one’s the power plant. That’s our mission critical. We slam that, the base is useless. There are also a couple of Chinese warships in there. We’ll take a crack at both of them if we can. Just a couple of stickies.”
“Any idea of the strength of the guard, sir?”
“Well, our guys have counted only about eight men patrolling at any one time. Four on the main jetties, and four back here a little, where this destroyer seems to be farther inshore. That probably means if we arrive there at around zero-one-hundred, there’ll be eight guards we may have to eliminate before we enter the power plant. If we’re quiet we may not see any more for two or three hours, by which time I hope we’ll be on our way out.
“If we do have to fight again, we may have to eliminate eight more. But I am not sure that will be necessary.”
“How about knocking down the guardhouse with everyone in it, maybe at midnight when they probably change over?”
“We thought about that. But it’s awfully noisy. And we’re not quite sure where the Chinese keep reinforcements. But we don’t want a bunch of Chink helicopters chasing around all over the goddamned place. Especially as one of ’em might locate and kill us. Generally speaking, we think stealth is the best way to accomplish our objectives.”
“Okay, sir. No problem.”
“Final refinements will be made throughout our journey, via the satellites. We got a lot of guys working on this, and things will develop before we reach the coast of Burma. Broadly speaking, we think the element of surprise will be decisive in our favor.”
“How about the getaway, sir? Can we board the inflatables up close to the base…like we don’t want to end up running through a fucking paddy field for about ten miles pursued by the goddamned coolies, right?”
“Dallas, no we don’t. Neither do we want to look as if we’re running boat trips round the fucking harbor in the middle of the night. We’ll have that organized in another day or so. My own view is we take the edge of the swamp in the south.”
“But that’s a hell of a distance, sir. Do we have any chance of immediate help if we come under fire, or if we are seriously pursued?”
“No, Dallas. I am afraid we do not.”
10
The Battle for Keelung had now lasted for five days, and despite heavy casualties, the Chinese began inexorably to win it. They kept coming forward, landing thousands more men on Chinsan Beach, and calling in more and more air sorties from the mainland. But they left more than 3,000 dead along the Yehliu Road, before they finally forced their way into the inner suburbs of the seaport.
Street by street, block by block, yard by yard they fought their way toward the docks. The Taiwanese defended with their courage high, and they were never really defeated. Merely engulfed.
And then, as the Chinese Army prepared for the one push that would drive them into the vast container port area, the Taiwanese pulled off a master stroke. A team of their Special Forces crossed the railroad out along the Chungshan-1 Road, swam in to the harbor and severed the mooring lines of two massive container ships, just as the tide was turning.
Thirty minutes later, with these two gigantic ships slewed beam-on across the entrance to the docking areas, the Taiwanese scuttled them both with high explosives, partially blocking the main route both into and out of the harbor. It would take the Chinese Navy three more days to drag the wreckage clear and make a free passageway for their big troopships.
Scuttling the containers caused a momentous commotion on the docks, and it allowed the Taiwanese Army to escape cross-country, dropping back to Taipei, leaving the invaders from the mainland victorious but in something less than good order.
For a start, Keelung was a shambles both in the harbor and in the streets. There were debris and rubble everywhere. No one knew how to get anywhere. In addition, there were several isolated pockets of local resistance, and the Chinese were desperately trying to avoid killing civilians.
This was a serious hindrance, since the civilians were well supplied with grenades, rifles and machine guns. And they fought furiously, night and day, to eliminate the invading army using ancient tactics of snipers and booby traps against unsuspecting troops.
Not in living memory had the Chinese armed forces been so extended, engaged in highly complex combined operations. This was an adventure the like of which they had had absolutely no previous experience in modern times. Much of their equipment lacked any form of sophistication, and there were glaring shortcomings in their military processes and procedures.