The Missile Officer acknowledged and prepared to launch two of Krasnoyarsk’s Pantsir-M short-range anti-air missiles. A watchstander seated at one of the fire control consoles reported, “Anti-air missiles Three-four and Five-one have accepted targeting.”
Novikov initiated the next step. “Open starboard missile hatches Three and Five,” he ordered, preparing to launch the last missile in tube Three and the first missile in tube Five.
“Missile hatches Three and Five are open,” the Missile Officer reported. “Ready to Fire.”
Novikov surveyed the approaching HAAWCs — they had almost completed their descent and were beginning to level off as they approached their torpedo release points.
“Fire!”
Two missiles were launched from the submarine, streaking upward and then veering toward their targets. Unlike the ASW helicopters, the HAAWCs had no defensive measures and no way to even detect the incoming weapons. Both missiles slammed into the HAAWCs and exploded, sending two small fireballs spiraling into the ocean.
Novikov searched the sky and checked the radar monitor for additional HAAWCs or ASW helicopters — there were none — then checked on the American warships. All three had changed course to the east, attempting to evade the torpedoes chasing them.
He lowered the periscope, then ordered, “Diving Officer, make your depth fifty meters.” Turning to his Watch Officer, he ordered, “Shift propulsion to the main engines.”
The Watch Officer complied, and a moment later reported that the shift was complete.
“Steersman, ahead flank,” Novikov ordered. No new course was required; he had already ordered Krasnoyarsk onto the optimal pursuit path.
If an American warship survived the current torpedo attack, it would make the final encounter all the sweeter. Three Akulas were inbound from the north, not far behind the American ships, with Krasnoyarsk pursuing from the west. On the other side of the evading warships, the Strait of Hormuz was blocked by mines.
There would soon be nowhere for the Americans to run.
66
USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT
As USS Theodore Roosevelt surged through the dark green water at ahead flank, Captain Ryan Noss looked over his shoulder through the aft Bridge window, his gaze settling on the torpedo that had just finished snaking back and forth into the aircraft carrier’s frothy white wake. On each side of the hundred-thousand-ton ship, the Arleigh Burke — class destroyers USS Halsey and USS O’Kane kept falling behind, each with a torpedo also in its wake, steadily closing. Three other torpedoes had failed to latch onto their assigned targets and had continued north, while Theodore Roosevelt and her escorts sped east.
Moments ago, after the incoming torpedoes had been spotted and Theodore Roosevelt had turned to evade them, Noss had watched two HAAWCs get shot down, similar to the loss of the MH-60R helicopters the previous day. The Russian submarine that had fired the torpedoes was still out there and had undoubtedly begun its pursuit. The knowledge that three more Russian submarines were closing from the north and that the carrier and her escorts were headed toward a minefield stretching across the Strait of Hormuz hovered in the background of Noss’s thoughts, but he pushed that concern aside for the moment. The far more urgent issue was how to shake the trailing torpedo that was steadily gaining on his ship.
Maybe, if Theodore Roosevelt increased speed, the carrier could keep the torpedo chasing it at bay until it ran out of fuel. But the aircraft carrier was already at ahead flank. Noss needed more speed, and the only option was to increase reactor power above the authorized limit.
Noss picked up the 23-MC, issuing orders to DC Central. “RO, Captain. Override reactor protection and increase shaft turns to one hundred and twenty percent power.”
The Reactor Officer acknowledged, and Noss felt vibrations in the deck as the main engines strained under the increased steam load. Theodore Roosevelt surged forward as the carrier’s four screws churned the water more rapidly, and Noss watched his ship slowly increase speed.
Stepping close to the aft Bridge window, he studied the incoming torpedo. It was still gaining on the carrier, but not as rapidly.
Both destroyers, having fallen notably behind the aircraft carrier, were in dire straits. The torpedoes had almost closed the remaining distance. Both ships began an evasive maneuver called an Anderson turn — essentially a turn forming a complete circle. The torpedoes would follow the destroyers, and once each ship crossed its wake where it began the turn, each torpedo would be forced to choose which wake to follow. Hopefully, it would choose the wrong one.
Each destroyer crossed its wake and Noss watched tensely, hoping the torpedoes would be tricked into following the original wake. But he was observing from a distance, unable to discern what the torpedoes had done. Both ships turned sharply away from their original wakes, steadying up as they increased speed, having slowed down during the sharp turn due to the immense rudders digging into the water.
As both ships returned to flank speed, Noss was about to breathe a sigh of relief when USS Halsey was engulfed in a geyser shooting two hundred feet into the air. Seconds later, USS O’Kane was similarly shrouded as a water plume shot up from beneath the warship, falling back down in a misty rain. As the air cleared, Noss hoped that neither ship had suffered a mortal wound. But both destroyers slowed down, and Noss noted that in each case, the ship’s bow was no longer aligned with its stern. The keel on each ship had been broken. It would only be a matter of time before each warship went to the bottom.
Noss’s attention returned to the torpedo chasing Theodore Roosevelt, which had continued to close. The torpedoes chasing the destroyers had ignored the decoys trailing behind the warships — the new Russian Futlyar torpedoes were superior to the previous model indeed, able to ignore the small countermeasures trailed behind the massive warships. He concluded that the torpedo chasing Roosevelt would not be fooled either.
Their only hope was to either outrun the torpedo or successfully confuse it with an Anderson turn. Lieutenant Commander Michael Beresford, the aircraft carrier’s Officer of the Deck during General Quarters, decided to give the Anderson turn a try.
“Helm, left full rudder!” Beresford called out.
He kept the rudder on as the carrier circled around, and Roosevelt crossed its original wake a minute later, the torpedo not far behind.
“Shift your rudder!” Beresford ordered, “Steady course one-two-zero.”
Beresford steered the carrier onto a thirty-degree tangent from its original course, hoping the torpedo chose the wake heading to the left rather than the right. All eyes on the Bridge turned aft, watching the torpedo reach the intersecting wakes. Noss momentarily lost the light green trail as the torpedo traveled into the dual wakes, his hope rising each second the torpedo failed to reappear. Finally, a light green trail emerged, snaking within the starboard wake.
The torpedo hadn’t been fooled.
By now the torpedo was only a thousand yards behind Theodore Roosevelt. Noss estimated they had less than a minute before the torpedo reached the carrier’s stern, the last place he wanted to get hit by a torpedo. It would destroy the rudders and propellers, reducing the carrier to a drifting hunk of metal, awaiting the coup de grâce that would send it to the bottom.