“But they can fire intercontinental ballistic missiles?”
“Yes, sir. This Brentwood in San Diego thought at first that the oil was accidentally discharged, as an enemy sub wouldn’t deliberately leak oil. But now he seems to think it’s the old Russian problem. Good at quantity — they made at least thirteen Golf-class subs that we know of. But they’re not good at quality. That is, the leaks were probably from either poor design or lines squeezed by the pressure on the hull.”
“You think we can find them, Admiral?”
The CNO exhaled slowly. “We can put everything in the area — saturate the coast with ASW. Drop hundreds of active sonar buoys, which will send out pulses, unlike our SOSUS arrays on the bottom. Should be able to get echoes. But we need it carefully coordinated, Mr. President. If we don’t know exactly where all our ASW ships are at any moment, one of our ships could mistake an echo from one of our own for one of the Russian subs. One thing I would recommend, Mr. President, is that we shift as many mobile surface-to-air missiles from the midwestern states to the West Coast as possible. Fly them in if necessary on Galaxy transports.”
“So that,” interjected the president, “if either of these Soviet diesels, wherever they are, do fire, we stand a chance of intercepting them?”
“That’s the general idea, sir, yes. But hopefully we can corner them before they get off any shots. If we find them, I’m sure we can sink them — their speed can’t outrun us. I’ve already ordered a cluster of surface-to-air mobiles around San Diego, Bangor, Washington State, and Norfolk sub pens. Brentwood believes San Diego is the target, and I’d go for that. I mean, with their slow speed and limited battery power, they’d have to start up engines if they were to go further north to attack targets up there.”
“If these diesel-electrics fire from close in, what’s our response time? I mean how long would we have to intercept?”
“Response time would be just about zero, Mr. President — if they’re going for targets like San Diego right on the seaboard.”
“Has this Brentwood any suggestions?”
“Yes, sir. He wants overlapping Airborne patrols up and down the coast looking for diesel oil patches.”
“Have you done it? Sounds like a good idea.”
“They’re on patrol now, sir,” reported Air Force General Allet.
“Will they be able to spot anything at night?”
“Yes, sir — infrared and patch color distinguishers are aboard as well as MAD — magnetic anomaly detectors — and sonar buoys. We’ve also got the satellites on the job, but unless the subs are near the surface, emitting heat for thermal patches, the satellites are only of limited use in this case.”
“Now, gentlemen,” said Mayne, “I don’t want any foul-ups here. From what you’ve told me, we need first-rate coordination between the navy, airborne ASW, and—”
“We’re already working on that now, Mr. President.”
“What?” Mayne’s outburst was so sharp that Trainor thought the migraine must be winning the battle. But it was plain anger, straight from the heart. “Now, don’t you boys go jurisdictional on me. There isn’t time to play bureaucratic parlor games about who’s going to be cock of the walk. I would think this Brentwood is the man for the job. Seems to me he’s made some pretty sound deductions so far. He’s been in on the ground floor. What say we appoint him?”
There was an awkward silence, ended by Trainor. “Ah, Mr. President? Captain Brentwood was the commander of the USS Blaine.”
Mayne nodded, readily remembering the ship, for it was the attack on her as well as the NKA forces pouring over the DMZ in Korea that had been the flash point that had started the whole war.
“Yes, yes, I know,” he answered. “Fished him out when some of his men were still aboard, as I recall. Suspected cowardice.”
“We can’t say that for certain, Mr. President,” began Admiral Horton, “but I would advise against appointing someone who has been named ‘an interested party’ in the inquiry that followed.”
“But as I understood it, the evidence was circumstantial,” replied Mayne. “That is, he could have been helped, pushed overboard or whatever, by a member of the crew who had every right to do so if he felt the ship was going down.”
“Yes, sir — it could bear that interpretation.”
“Benefit of doubt, gentlemen,” said Mayne. “Besides, he followed this oil business with some diligence. I say give him a boat.”
The CNO flushed. Mayne’s persistent use of “boat” instead of “ship” annoyed him intensely, particularly as he suspected that Mayne deliberately used it whenever he was being particularly dismissive of naval tradition.
“Give him a boat and put him in charge,” said Mayne. “He’s Johnny-on-the-spot.”
The admiral wasn’t agreeing or disagreeing, keeping his options open. “I should point out, Mr. President, that if we were to do this, Brentwood couldn’t retain his present rank, and it might send out an ambiguous message to—”
“Admiral!” The change in Mayne’s tone was ice-cold. “As your commander in chief, I order you to assign coordination of this operation on the West Coast to Captain Brentwood and to assign him, without delay, command of the fastest, most up-to-date ASW ship afloat. Do you read me?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“I want to know — by dispatch rider, if AT and T can’t get this goddamn phone service back in shape — within fifteen minutes the name of the ship to which this Brentwood has been assigned. It’s vital he have no bureaucratic hindrance whatsoever — so he’ll have to be put in overall command of West Coast naval defense as well. Now, if this means slapping a few more gold rings on his sleeve, do it, and do so without delay. Make him an admiral if you have to.” The president turned to Trainor. “Paul!”
“Yes, sir?”
“Have an executive order typed up to this effect immediately. I’ll sign so the admiral here can take it with him. And I want it done in five minutes. Get Rosey onto it. She’s the fastest.”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“Then get me San Diego on the short-wave relay if you have to, and the admiral can inform the base commander there verbally.”
“I can’t use plain language on the phone, Mr. President,” interjected the CNO. “I mean, if the Russians know what we’re up to—”
“Have you a verbal code?” asked the president.
“Yes, sir. I can read out a letter-for-word code. Have you a Bible?”
“My glory, Admiral. Isn’t that the most logical book the Russians would expect for a letter-to-word code?”
“We don’t use the King James version, Mr. President. We use one of the modernized versions.”
“Oh, all right,” said Mayne. “In that case you’re quite safe. No one’ll understand it.”
While they were waiting for typed authorization, Mayne told the chiefs, “One thing the British won’t do is promote quickly in the field. Class system, you see.” He paused. “By God, I hope we haven’t lost Doug Freeman. Now, there’s a general who’d promote in the field. Made a private a captain once in the Dortmund-Bielefeld pocket to get the job done.”
The base commander’s office in San Diego was in a flap. “Frankenstein”—he of IX-44E — had suddenly been propelled to no less than admiral.