FOUR
Friday June 2, 1967
“SKIPPER.”
MacDonald heard the voice along the outer rim of his doze, pulling him back from the comfort of a near-dream of him home with his wife, Brenda, the joyful sounds of Rachel, twelve, and Danny Junior, eight, in the background. A comforting vision that had accompanied him on this voyage.
Without opening his eyes, he shifted in his chair on the bridge. “What is it, Lieutenant Goldstein?” The warmth of the early morning sun on his face disappeared.
“Sir, radar is showing a couple of contacts that are going to pass close to us—well, at least one of them. Combat recommends we alter course to open up our passage.”
He opened his eyes. Goldstein stood between him and the Pacific sun. “You’re blocking my morning sun, Mr. Goldstein.”
The officer shifted quickly to the side. “Sir, Combat—”
“I heard you the first time.” He pushed himself completely upright. The boatswain mate of the watch handed him his cup filled with hot coffee. “Thanks, Boats.” He yawned.
“How close are they going to pass and how long until we reach the point where we see them?”
“One is going to pass about two thousand yards off our bow. Unless the second one changes its speed or course, it will be a CBDR.”
CBDR stood for “constant bearing, decreasing range.” A ship said to be CBDR was one you would collide with somewhere along the way, as the range between the two of you decreased and neither of you changed your course or speed.
“Time?”
Goldstein cleared his throat. “Sir, we can see the closest one. He’s about twenty thousand yards off our port bow. The second one radar has just over the horizon, about twenty nautical miles out.”
MacDonald stepped down from the chair and strolled to the port bridge wing. Goldstein trailed along the left side of him a couple of paces behind.
MacDonald stepped through the opened hatch into the glare of the sun, realizing he’d left his cap beside his chair. His wife had warned him to keep his face covered because of his proclivity to sunburn. It was that Irish-Scot pigment, she kept telling him.
“Merchant,” MacDonald mumbled.
“Yes, sir. Out of Hong Kong.”
“British.”
“Flying the British Hong Kong flag, sir.”
“How much will it upset our ASW team if we turn or change speed?” MacDonald asked.
“Mr. Burnham didn’t say, sir.”
“Mr. Burnham has the watch?”
Goldstein nodded.
“Have you tried bridge-to-bridge with the merchant?”
“No, sir. You said radio silence.”
“What’s your recommendation?”
“I recommend we alter course twenty degrees to starboard, sir. It’ll open up our passing range to eight thousand yards, then once passed, we can return to base course of two-two-zero.”
“When?”
“When?”
“Yes, Mr. Goldstein. When should we turn?”
“Captain, as soon as possible.”
“Tell Combat what we are doing, then do it.”
Goldstein disappeared back into the bridge. MacDonald stood alone, watching the merchant vessel, scanning the empty ocean surface. He was more surprised over the lone merchant occupying their space than over the closeness of approach. In this part of the China Sea merchant traffic was usually heavy. But nothing was as heavy as ships transiting the Strait of Gibraltar.
He had made the mistake once of transiting the mouth to the Mediterranean during the evening, figuring the traffic would be lighter. It was worse. And it was at night. During the night, the Moroccan drug runners joined the fray in their dash to the Spanish coast with hashish. Two ships in the middle of the morning in the middle of the China Sea were barely worth bothering about.
“Combat concurs, Skipper.”
MacDonald turned. Goldstein stood straddled-legged across the hatchway, one leg on the bridge wing and the other inside the bridge. MacDonald realized how thin Goldstein was as the man stood there, his long neck giving him a flamingo appearance. Like those pink flamingos MacDonald’s mom thought looked so attractive in her flower beds back in Middletown, New Jersey, home of AT&T. “Then let’s do it.”
He turned back to the merchant. Inside, Goldstein issued orders for a ten-degree rudder to port.
MacDonald gripped the railing lightly as the Dale tilted slightly to the left and changed course. Ten degrees wasn’t much, but changing course and speed was the easy way to ensure distance between the two vessels increased. Two thousand yards was a nautical mile, which for a landlubber might seem a lot, but at sea two thousand yards was a small distance that disappeared rapidly if two ships discovered themselves suddenly on a collision course. More distance meant more time to react.
“Distance to contact?”
Goldstein shouted from his position behind the navigation plotting table, where the quartermaster of the watch was taking bearings from the radar repeater, “We show sixteen thousand yards.”
MacDonald glanced inside the bridge. The second-class quartermaster was doing a quick maneuvering board calculation to see how the course change would affect their distance. Quartermaster was one of the oldest ratings in the navy. That and boatswain mate. Quartermasters served the navigators, ensuring the ship arrived at the right port at the right time, while the boatswain mates did the work of keeping the ship shipshape. Ratings from the days of sail that kept the navy moving, through the decades of coal, to today’s modern steam-driven plants and growing number of nuclear-powered ships.
MacDonald’s forehead wrinkled. He looked at his wristwatch. An Omega his wife gave him on their tenth wedding anniversary five years ago. At the time, they could not afford it and he wanted to return it, but she insisted. “Fifteen to eight,” he mumbled quietly. Her pert smile. The twinkle in her eyes when she was happy. She had been right about how every time he looked at the expensive watch he would remember her. If Goldstein had left him alone in his chair, he could have visited longer with her.
“I thought you said twenty thousand yards?”
“Yes, sir, but . . .”
“But what?” he asked sharply when Goldstein failed to finish his sentence.
“Sir, I think it has changed course also.”
MacDonald turned his attention back to the merchant. “Bring me my binoculars!”
A few seconds later the boatswain mate of the watch handed them to MacDonald. He quickly raised them, spotted the merchant in his lens, and swept the glasses to the stern of the ship. The wake came into view. He followed the wake. “The merchant is turning to starboard!”
“Sir, it’s turning into us!” Goldstein said.
“Distance?”
“Twelve thousand yards.”
Six nautical miles. Still plenty of maneuvering room.
“Sir, we have CBDR!” the quartermaster shouted to Goldstein, the words reaching MacDonald.
MacDonald kept telling himself, Plenty of time, plenty of time. Give Goldstein a chance.
“Captain, recommend increase speed to twenty knots, maintain course.”
“Solution?”
“Merchant will pass astern of us.”
MacDonald lifted his glasses and looked at the wake again. The merchant was still turning. He dropped the binoculars and looked at the midships bridge of the merchant. He could see the starboard side of the ship, angling its bow as it turned. He looked at the wake again. No sign the ship had quit turning, then the wake was blocked by the port bow.
“The merchant is still turning, Mr. Goldstein, and he is turning so his direction will take him toward us.”
“Yes, sir, but his speed is about eight knots. If we kick her up to twenty for about ten minutes, then . . .”
“You’re assuming she is going to retain constant speed.”
“No, sir,” Goldstein answered.
MacDonald detected confidence in the officer of the deck’s reply. “Why?”
“Distance eleven thousand yards, slight right-bearing drift,” the quartermaster of the watch announced. “Will cross in front of us, less than one thousand yards!”
Still too close.
Still closing, but the bearing drift meant they were no longer on a collision course, unless the merchant took the bow of the Dale off.
MacDonald raised his glasses. The wake was visible again and now it was twisting left behind the merchant. So the merchant captain had realized the dilemma both ships had placed themselves in in their efforts to avoid each other and had shifted his rudder. The merchant was tilting left as it came about smartly to port. This would open the separation even farther. Even as he watched, MacDonald saw the left-bearing drift of the merchant begin, meaning that even at this speed the merchant would pass close down the port side of the Dale.
“Twenty knots is going to cause our ASW teams to have to start over,” MacDonald said, his voice raised.
“Yes, sir, but it’s either restart TMA in a few minutes or find ourselves changing course again, and the TMA solution will be even more garbled.”
He was impressed. Goldstein had stood up to him, even if he did detect a slight tremor in the voice.
“Mr. Goldstein, seems to me you have the deck.”
“Helmsman, ring up bells for twenty knots!” Goldstein shouted. “Ten-degree starboard rudder.”
Several seconds passed before MacDonald felt the power of the Dale’s steam engines as they kicked in. The destroyer seemed to leap out of the water. The motion drift to port of the merchant ship increased. MacDonald smiled. Another officer had passed his standards. Goldstein was still a little rough around the edges for his liking, but with the trait of self-confidence combined with more time on the bridge, the junior officer might turn into a good officer of the deck.
Below in Combat, the Blue ASW Team were ripping the edges of the trace paper away from the tape, folding the penciled calculations to one side, and putting on new paper. At twenty knots, they would have to start over.
BOCHARKOV hiccupped.
“It’s the cabbage,” Ignatova offered.
“If it was the cabbage, I’d be farting like the rest of the crew,” he whispered back, waving his hand in front of his face.
They laughed.
“Passing one hundred meters!” Lieutenant Yakovitch, the officer of the deck, shouted.
“I think with Yakovitch on duty, the noise of the sump pump below will be the second thing the Americans detect.”
Bocharkov grunted. “Noise in the water is the curse of submariners. How else would we be so successful against the American submarines?”
“Give them our cabbage.”
“Passing ninety meters!”
“Lieutenant Yakovitch!” the XO called. “Could you lower it a little? That operatic bass voice of yours is shaking the bulkheads.”
Yakovitch smiled. He was proud of his amateur opera career. He cleared his throat to the amusement of the men in the control room.
Chief Ship Starshina Uvarova turned from his position of hovering over the helmsman, rolled his eyes, and nodded at Bocharkov.
“Even my senior enlisted man approves of your command, Vladmiri,” Bocharkov added softly.
“Aye, sir!” Yakovitch replied, his booming voice not one octave lower.
Bocharkov smiled, the right side of his lip turning upward. “XO, I haven’t heard a report from Boyevaya Chast’ 4 in a few minutes. Hit them and see if our communicators still have underwater communications with the K-56.”
Ignatova nodded and stepped to the sound-powered phone talker. “Give Communications a check and tell the communications officer to give me a call.”
Almost immediately the internal communications box squawked. Ignatova looked down at the buttons and pushed in BCh-4. Across the small control room compartment, Bocharkov listened as the XO chewed the communications officer’s butt about not keeping the control room informed on the communications ongoing between the K-122 and K-56 Echo submarines. Here they were surfacing simultaneously with another submarine—neither quite sure where the other was—and Bocharkov needed to know exactly what was happening around them. Oceans were so big that seldom did submarines collide with other ships and subs, but every so often, it did happen.
One of the sound-powered phone talkers pressed his headset to his ear, acknowledged the unseen talker on the other end, and then lifted the right side off his ear.
“Lieutenant Yakovitch, Bch-3 reports they believe they have faint noise of an American warship.”
BCh-3 was the communications channel for Sonar and the torpedo rooms.
Bocharkov straightened off the bulkhead and walked toward the far end of the control room, where Sonar was located.
“Sir! K-56 is surfacing. The K-56 has us located off their starboard side.”
“Starboard side?” Uvarova said briskly. “What does that mean? Starboard side—how far starboard side?”
Bocharkov had been going to ask the same thing, but his senior enlisted sailor had beat him to it. Ignatova looked at him. Bocharkov nodded. It was the right question, but one the chief ship starshina should have known the answer to.
“If they can hear us, then we have to be a couple hundred yards minimum, Chief Ship Starshina Uvarova,” Ignatova answered. “How else would his sonar array be able to pick up a directional noise?”
Bocharkov reached up and grabbed a handhold as the K-122 continued upward toward the surface.
“Sorry, XO!”
“An American destroyer, Captain,” Yakovitch said as he walked uphill toward Bocharkov. “Sonar is sure now. They have an American destroyer making high speeds, sir.”
“I’m heading to Sonar now. What direction? Range?”
“Bearing is zero-four-zero, sir. Range unknown.”
“It’s coming from the direction of the American carrier battle group. Means the Americans have not given up on us,” Ignatova added.
“Also means we need to know how far away they are. If we are picking them up now, then they cannot be too far from us,” Bocharkov said, stroking his chin. “Have we set the anti- surface warfare team, XO?”
“With your permission, sir?”
Bocharkov grunted without answering. He continued toward Sonar. Behind him, Ignatova gave the orders bringing the submarine to general quarters. Neither officer expected the Americans to attack them, but if they had to make emergency maneuvers, they would need the crew prepared to react immediately. Bocharkov did not want to surface if they were detecting enemy presence, but his orders were explicit and they would not be on the surface long.
“XO, make sure the K-56 knows about the contact.”
“If he didn’t grunt, we wouldn’t know he was listening,” one of the sailors on the plane whispered to the other.
A slap hit him upside the head. Uvarova leaned down. “Shut up, comrade, and keep your eyes on your job. He is the captain. He can grunt. He can fart if he wants to. You on the other hand are barely a starshina and had better not fart or grunt when I tell you to do something.”
The sailor rubbed his head. “Yes, Chief Ship Starshina Uvarova.”
MACDONALD watched the merchant pass harmlessly down their port side, quickly exposing its stern as it maneuvered farther to port, opening even more distance between the two ships.
“Now, Mr. Goldstein, tell me about the other contact you had.”
“It’s opening, sir. It has changed to a more southerly direction.”
“Let’s bring her back down to eight knots so the ASW team can clear up their picture and bring her back onto base course two-two-zero.”
“Captain!” the boatswain mate of the watch shouted from next to the 1MC speaker mounted near the captain’s chair.
“What is it, Lowe?”
“Combat requests your presence, sir.”
MacDonald looked at Goldstein. “Good job, Mr. Goldstein.” He walked past the OOD, hearing the quartermaster announce, “Captain off the bridge,” as he passed through the hatch leading to the combat information center.
“Captain in Combat” came the mirror-image announcement as he walked into the darkened space. The combat information center watch officer met him near the doorway.
“What you got, Lieutenant Burnham?”
“Sir, Sonar is getting some unusual noise on our contact and I thought you should know.”
MacDonald was a step behind Burnham as the two officers hurried aft to the sonar portion of Combat.
Burnham jerked the curtain apart. “Captain’s here,” the combat watch officer said, making MacDonald think of it as more a warning than an announcement.
“Skipper, we have an anomaly here, sir,” Lieutenant Junior Grade Burkeet said.
“An anomaly? I like anomalies, Mr. Burkeet.”
“Yes, sir,” Burkeet answered warily. The ASW officer touched Oliver. “You tell him.”
Petty Officer Oliver pulled the left side of the headset away from his ear. “Sir, for the last seven to ten minutes I’ve been listening to the contact noise as it cycled up and down from faint to loud.” The sonar technician glanced up at MacDonald. “Made me think of what you said about convergence and direct zones. But if it was direct, then we should be within several miles of them.” He paused.
“Go ahead, Oliver,” MacDonald encouraged.
“Well, sir, I think we have two submarines out there. I don’t think we’ve been tracking one submarine, but two.”
“Do you have two different lines of bearing?”
“No, sir, but what if the two submarines are traveling together? One nearer to us, which would explain the louder sounds, and one farther away, which would explain the fainter one.”
“I think it makes sense, Skipper,” Burkeet said.
MacDonald’s lower lip pushed upward for a few seconds as he thought about it. They had had the same line of bearings on a contact since they first detected it several hours ago. The VQ-1 reconnaissance aircraft had visually sighted only one. The airdales had even identified the class as an Echo I before scooting back to Guam for their cold beer. His forehead wrinkled, his eyes narrowed. “Okay, Mr. Burkeet, why does it make sense?”
The ASW officer smiled. “It would explain why we are not getting any direct passive noise in the water, Skipper. We are listening to two convergence zone noises. Both submarines are over the horizon out of direct noise contact, but the noises of both are bouncing off the thermocline layer below and the surface of the water. They are both traveling at slightly different speeds, but the contacts are so close that their noises merge, making them seem like one contact.”
When MacDonald nodded, Burkeet continued, confidence growing in his voice. “That explains why we sometimes hear the faint noise mixed with the stronger one.”
“One of the submarines is closer,” Burnham offered.
“How close?”
“Don’t know, Captain.”
“There is something else, Skipper,” Oliver interrupted.
All three officers turned to the sonar technician.
“What’s that?” MacDonald asked.
“Since we detected the noises, they have never been together. I mean you hear one, then the other would cycle through. That’s because as we move through the water, our sonar is passing through the convergence-zone bounces of each of them. The sounds never really merged until the past half hour or so. That is why we thought we only had one.” Oliver slipped his headset back on. “And these two are both Echo class submarines.”
“That makes sense,” Burkeet argued.
MacDonald grunted. “Okay, Oliver, let’s say we buy this argument there are two of them. Are you telling me that we are going to run over one of them and if we keep going we’ll come in contact with another one?”
Oliver shook his head sharply. “No, sir,” he replied confidently. “These two submarines are together now. They are sailing side by side.”
Several seconds of silence passed before Burnham asked, “How can you tell?”
“The noise synched in the last few minutes, sir.” Oliver held his hands up side by side, palms down. “They have to be near each other because the faint noise and the louder noise are together now, riding the convergence zone bounces like a couple of lovers in a roller coaster.” He waved his right hand. “This submarine’s noise is arriving simultaneously with the louder noise of the other submarine.” The sonar technician made a motion with his left hand, and then dropped them both, before turning back to the console. “No, sir, both of these submarines are together.”
“Kind of a Soviet wolf pack,” Burkeet offered.
MacDonald stroked his chin for a few seconds. “Okay, I’m not completely convinced, Petty Officer Oliver, but you make a good analytical argument.” He looked at Lieutenant Burnham. “Tom, let’s get a message off to Commander U.S. Seventh Fleet, Admiral Green on the Kitty Hawk, and to Commander Naval Intelligence telling them of the possibility that we have two submarines.”
“Probability,” Burkeet corrected.
MacDonald glared for a moment, then his face relaxed. He looked at Oliver. “You are sure we have two contacts and both are Echo class submarines?”
“Same sound signatures, Skipper,” Oliver answered quickly. “And, Skipper, I’ll stake my reputation that we have two submarines out here.”
Burkeet smiled and nodded sharply at MacDonald.
MacDonald nodded, his lips clenched tight for a moment. “Petty Officer Oliver, I cannot ask for much more proof when you stake your reputation on it.” He reached out and patted the sailor’s shoulder twice. “But, even if you are wrong, you did right in bringing this to my attention.”
“I’ll get the message ready to go.”
“Good, Mr. Burkeet. Oh! By the way, change possible to probable submarines.”
Lieutenant Commander Joe Tucker, the executive officer of the USS Dale, walked through the open aft hatch. “Do submarines steam, or do they nuke when they move?”
“Morning, XO,” Burnham acknowledged. “The Echo class submarines are all nuclear-powered.”
“Echo class?”
MacDonald turned to his exec. “Morning, Joe. Seems our hot-running young sonar tech has gotten him two Echo class submarines ahead of us. Glad you’re here.”
Tucker nodded. “Just came from Radio, sir, reading the morning traffic, and did a quick tour through Engineering checking their logs.”
MacDonald stepped out of the small sonar space. Burnham hurried toward the ASW plotting table along the port bulkhead of Combat. The curtain fell back in place as MacDonald and Joe Tucker walked toward the bridge. A minute later the two men were standing on the starboard bridge wing.
“Mornings like this make me glad I made the navy a career,” MacDonald said, taking a deep breath.
“The Pacific is like a beautiful woman when she’s calm, no clouds on the horizon, and the slight breeze makes you feel alive. A sight to behold and enjoy.”
MacDonald chuckled. “Everything we do in the navy is feminine, with men running it. The ship is a ‘she.’ The oceans are ‘her’ and even the storms are named after women.”
“Storms are named after women because when they arrive they are wild and wet, and when they leave they take everything with them.”
“It’s almost as if we men—we few brave men—did that because we miss them. Be good to get back to San Diego and the family for a few months,” MacDonald added.
“You married guys are all alike. Now, for us certified bachelors, a six-month cruise is a chance to change the scenery at home port.”
“I think I like coming home to the same woman, and one I love.”
“Well, for me, I like coming home to different women, and I love them all.”
“How did we get on this subject?”
“Something about oceans started it.”
“What’s the status report, XO?”
“We are going to have to refuel soon. I sent off a logistics request message to the USS Mispillion. She is headed toward Olongapo from Yankee Station. We can rendezvous with her in three days, if we are still out here. We should get a reply back to our logistics request sometime today.”
“Let me know when the LOGREQ comes in, XO. Until we know for certain we can take on more fuel from the Mispillion , keep me apprised about it. It would be embarrassing to run out of fuel in the middle of the ocean.”
“If we don’t rendezvous with someone and get some fuel soon, we are going to be rigging sails in five days. We are under half now.”
MacDonald nodded. “Should have topped off the other night when the rest of the battle group did.”
“Wasn’t our call, sir. Dawn was breaking and Admiral Green didn’t want to conduct under-way replenishment during the daylight hours.”
MacDonald’s forehead wrinkled. “I wondered about that. That was unlike Green. I always wonder if he knows something we don’t.”
“Let’s hope so. Otherwise why waste a lot of pay on admirals who only know as much as we do?”
Goldstein filled the hatchway. “Captain, Combat asks for your presence again. They think the submarine is surfacing.”
“Submarines,” MacDonald corrected. “They think we have two of them.”
“Aye, sir,” Goldstein acknowledged and quickly stepped back into the bridge.
MacDonald and Tucker hurried through the bridge to the acknowledgments of quartermasters. Opening the hatch separating the bridge from the darkened spaces of Combat, the two officers were quickly gone from the Pacific morning daylight.
Burnham met them at the hatch. “Skipper, Sonar believes either one or both of the submarines are surfacing.”
The three worked their way aft toward Sonar. “Why?” MacDonald asked, but before Burnham could answer, he had already pulled the curtain apart. “What you got, Mr. Burkeet?”
“Petty Officer Oliver—”
“Sir, the submarine noises are increasing and at least one of them is now direct. I think they are above the layer.”
“If we have direct noise, then they have to be no more than twenty . . . twenty-five . . . thirty nautical miles from us,” Burkeet added.
MacDonald turned to Joe Tucker. “XO, take the bridge.”
“We should see them on radar shortly,” Burnham offered as Joe Tucker bumped by him on the way forward.
MacDonald’s eyes widened. “Shut down the radar, Lieutenant.”
“But, sir—”
“Shut it down. If they are surfacing, their electronic warfare gear will detect us.” He looked down at Oliver. “Let’s see our sonar expert here drive the Dale toward them.”
From Combat came the shout of the electronic warfare operator. “I’ve got a snoop tray radar! Snoop tray!”
MacDonald’s head shot up. “Snoop tray radar” was the NATO name for the surface search radar on the Echo class submarines. A thrill of excitement shot through him. Now he had both Sonar and EW confirming at least one submarine. He moved forward through Combat at a fast pace to where the EW operator manned his position. “Direction?”
“Bearing two one eight degrees, Skipper.”
“Lieutenant Burnham! You got our radar secured?”
“Yes, sir,” the combat information center watch officer acknowledged calmly.
MacDonald let out a sigh of relief. “Well, gentlemen,” he said to the Combat watch standers. “Looks as if we have found one of our submarines.”
“Second snoop tray radar active. Belay my last, sir! It just shut down.”
“Then there are two of those sons of a bitches out here,” MacDonald said, drawing a round of applause from the sailors. An applause more for the excitement of the moment than for the skipper. He motioned it quiet. “They’re going to know they’re being chased,” he said in a loud voice. “We want to know why two submarines surfaced in the middle of the morning in the middle of the ocean. We don’t want them to hear us before we see them.” He looked at Burnham. “Make sure our message reflects current contact status.”
MacDonald crawled up into his chair. The XO was on the bridge. They had three days of fuel and they had two submarines ahead of them. MacDonald mentally crossed his fingers, hoping he had shut down the Dale radar before the Soviets detected them. A two-submarine contact was unusual and, for a quick moment, he felt a slight chill. “Why have they surfaced?” he asked himself softly.
“Sir?” Burnham asked from in front of him, where he was gathering the data for the message.
“Nothing. Just thinking out loud.” Around him the instincts of a well-trained warship took over. He felt the ship shift course slightly, knowing few others would have detected the movement, but over ten years at sea had given him nautical insight most would never realize and no one could ever explain except to other sailors.
THE K-122 broke surface. The bow shot upward a few feet before splashing down on the ocean, sending sprays of water upward ten meters or more. The rest of the light gray boat moved quickly forward.
The conning tower hatch clanged on the metal deck of the boat, with a starshina scrambling through the narrow opening onto the bridge, the young sailor never pausing as he hurried up the ladder to his watch station. The second man through the hatch was Bocharkov. His thin frame made his life within the strict confines of the K-122 better than most.
Bocharkov looked at the K-56 off his starboard side about three hundred meters. He lifted the cover of the sound tube. “Control room, this is the skipper. Right ten-degree rudder, speed two knots.”
The speed quickly fell off as the engineering room responded to the command. Since the skipper of the K-56 was senior to Bocharkov, the Echo II submarine would maintain course and speed as the Echo I K-122 maneuvered closer.
The whistle of the tube drew Bocharkov’s attention. “Captain here,” he answered.
“Sir, Sonar reports the American warship slowed his speed then increased it again.”
That could mean many things, he thought. “Line of bearing?”
“Zero-three-five, Captain.”
“Signal strength?”
“Remaining about the same right now, sir.”
He flipped the tube shut. The American warship was looking for him. He’d do the same if the roles were reversed.
“Sir, K-56 signals for one of us to turn off his surface search radar. They are interfering with each other.”
“Turn ours off.”
On the deck of the K-56, three sailors had inflated a small yellow rubber raft and were easing over the side of the submarine. Watching the sailors was an officer dressed in the darker uniform of a Spetsnaz.
Bocharkov lifted the tube covering. “Rudders amidships!”
From the control room came the answering acknowledgment. Bocharkov glanced aft and watched for several seconds, until he saw the change in the direction of the wake. Then he looked at the K-56. They were about one hundred meters apart. The wind against the sail of the K-56 and the wave action would push the other boat toward them, closing the gap, but he estimated they had nearly half an hour before he would have to maneuver to open distance again. In a half hour, he expected to be gone, back beneath the waves of the ocean where the world of the submariner operated.
“Control room, Skipper. Keep just enough revolutions on the shaft to keep us steady. I want to be under way without making way.”
“Aye, sir,” came the acknowledgment from below.
“And get our embarkation party topside. The K-56 nearly has its boat in the water and we don’t have our sailors topside!”
As if responding to Bocharkov’s command, sailors poured up through the aft escape hatch. He lifted his binoculars again and focused on the Spetsnaz. Maybe all submarines had the Special Forces on them now. Maybe they had special orders to protect against a defection or, worse, a Soviet commander who decided the time to fight the Americans was on his mission. Many, such as him, knew it was only a matter of time before the growing strength of the Soviet Navy rivaled, then passed the world giant. Giants did not appreciate being surpassed.
“Captain Bocharkov!” a bullhorn called from across the gap.
He dropped the binoculars, squinted as he raised his hands to shield his eyes, and looked at the conning tower of the other boat. He smiled when he recognized his comrade from Grechko Naval Academy and now neighbor in Kamchatka.
Captain Second Rank Fedor Gerasimovich stood on the bridge of the K-56. Gerasimovich raised his hand and waved when he saw Bocharkov looking in his direction.
Bocharkov waved before leaning down to the tube. “Have someone bring me the bullhorn.” He looked over at Gerasimovich and raised his hand with his index finger extended.
“I understand, comrade. While you wait for your bullhorn, let me introduce Lieutenant Dolinski—Uri Dolinski.”
The Spetsnaz officer on the main deck dropped his hands, came to attention, and saluted Bocharkov. Bocharkov returned the salute.
“He is transferring from me to you, my friend. He is the technical expert assigned for this strange mission no one will tell me about.” The bullhorn squeaked like fingers down a chalkboard, causing everyone to wince. A couple of the sailors covered their ears.
From the hatch came Ignatova, a bullhorn tucked under his arm.
Bocharkov took it from him. “Any more news on the contact?”
Ignatova shook his head as he stood. “Same strength as passed along earlier, Captain. EW reports no radar of electronic intelligence contacts.”
Electronic intelligence was the new buzzword of the fleet. Taken from the American publication Proceedings, it had quickly spread throughout the Soviet Navy. As much as they knew the Americans were the enemy, there was also a slight tinge of envy over their navy.
Envy of their strength, and their ability to sail anywhere in the world on a moment’s notice, to have such allies who offered port facilities anywhere in the world.
“What’s that?” Ignatova asked, nodding at the K-56.
From the bridge on the conning tower of the K-56, metal waterproof boxes were being handed down the narrow ladder from sailor to sailor. When the first one reached the deck, the sailors there set it at the feet of the Spetsnaz, who pulled a small notebook from his back pocket and checked something in it against the writing on the box.
“The Spetsnaz is Lieutenant Uri Dolinski. He is transferring from the K-56—”
“I am also transferring equipment you will need for your mission, Comrade Captain!” The bullhorn voice from the K-56 interrupted. “Only about seven thousand tons of it,” Gerasimovich said, jokingly. “No, no, not that much, just five boxes. Should not be enough to change the trim of the K-122.”
Bocharkov lifted the bullhorn. “Fedor, it is good to see you, comrade. I trust you have had a good voyage, and when you return to Kamchatka, please tell my wife and the wives of the other crew members of the K-122 that we are all well and are looking forward to our return.”
“I will do that.” Gerasimovich dropped the bullhorn, leaned over the bridge, and said something to Dolinski. The Spetsnaz officer saluted the captain second rank and then said something to the sailors. Soon the working party were moving the five boxes toward the deployed inflatable raft.
“I think the American is coming this way,” Bocharkov said softly to Ignatova.
Ignatova glanced at him. “Sonar seems to think he is searching the area where we were sighted by the American reconnaissance aircraft, Captain.”
Bocharkov nodded. “If the American captain is a novice, then that is what he is doing. If not, then he is headed this way.”
“We will detect his radar before he detects us.”
The Spetsnaz officer slid into the raft, where four sailors had already taken position. The boxes were carefully transferred from the main deck to the raft.
Bocharkov grunted. He glanced down at the bullhorn to make sure it was off. “How long have we had the American warship on sonar?”
“Nearly an hour.”
“And has the bearing shifted significantly? One moment it is zero-four-zero, then the next a few degrees more, and now we have it bearing zero-three-five.”
“But we detected it when it was moving at such a speed it could not possibly have detected our noise.”
Bocharkov turned and studied Ignatova’s face for moment, hoping his XO was joking, which would have been out of context for the serious officer. He believed those without humor lacked the intellectual flexibility to examine different perspectives of a complex situation. But then, of course, he was the captain and he could believe anything he wanted while on board the K-122, because whatever the captain believed became gospel for the crew. He sighed. With the exception of the zampolit. Party-political officers always believed everyone but themselves was bordering on a traitorous act.
The rubber raft pushed away from K-56; the put-put sound of the small engine rode the wind toward the K-122. The wave action was picking up a little, Bocharkov realized. Yesterday, when they were conducting the missile firing exercise, the waves barely lapped the sides. Now not even the faint wake behind the raft was discernible.
“It could have detected us before it increased speed, XO. It could have been following us without us knowing it, then for some reason increased speed, giving us an opportunity to know it was there.”
“You are probably right, Captain,” Ignatova responded, as he should to Bocharkov’s statement.
“But you do not believe that idea, do you?” Before Ignatova could answer, Bocharkov set the bullhorn down on the deck and raised his binoculars to focus on the small raft headed his way. “There are many reasons ships at sea have to increase speed. Everything from avoiding other ships in the area to zooming after a contact so it can have better signal strength.”
“Aye, Captain, you are probably right, but if I may offer a counterargument.”
“You may.”
“Maybe we picked up the warship as it was speeding to our last known location and slowing down when it reached it.”
“Then we would have a spectacular sonar, XO. We would have picked up the warship over a hundred kilometers from here.”
He dropped his binoculars and leaned over the aft portion of the bridge where the raft was making its approach.
“XO, after we are submerged, I want to meet with our Spetsnaz officers. I think there is more here than they are telling us.”
“They are Spetsnaz, sir. There is always more to whatever they are doing than they tell those who do not wear the black. Fact is, I don’t think they like telling each other what they are doing. One-way trips are their fantasy.”
Bocharkov shook his head. “Hope you are wrong, Vladmiri. If it is a one-way trip, inside Subic Bay is not where they would want it to end.”
Chief Starshina Trush, his face hidden by the heavy Cossack beard and hair, was shouting at the sailors on the stern, giving orders about casting lines. Before one of the sailors could toss a line to the raft, the chief had jerked it away and tossed it underhanded to one of the sailors on the raft. A few seconds later the raft was tight against the hull and the sailors were awkwardly moving the heavy boxes on board, to the profanity of Chief Starshina Trush.
Bocharkov grunted. “Get the lieutenant and his boxes aboard and down below. I want to get off the surface as soon as possible, XO. I dislike intensely being on the surface in daylight.”
“CONTACT bearing three three five relative,” cried the sound-powered phone talker on the bridge. On board ships there were two types of bearings. One was the normal compass bearing based on true north; the other was the relative bearing, which considered the bow as always pointing zero-zero-zero.
MacDonald stepped quickly into the bridge even as he looked toward the bow. “Who, where?” he shouted.
“Topside signal bridge watch reports two low contacts in the water off our port bow, Skipper.”
MacDonald grabbed his binoculars. “Make sure Combat knows,” he ordered, jerking his finger at Goldstein as he stepped back onto the port bridge wing.
“They know.”
Dale had them, he told himself. Dead ahead practically. Two Soviet submarines. Had to be them. Nothing else in this direction. Oliver, I could kiss you, you ugly sonarman son of a bitch. Just let them be our Echos. Of course, they could be fishing vessels out of the Philippines.
“They know, sir,” Goldstein repeated quietly to the hatchway.
“Very well, Sam. Tell them to keep piping up the contact information.”
MacDonald lifted the glasses, focusing them as he scanned the horizon. There was nothing there. Where were the low-riders? He could not see anything, but then the signal bridge was another twenty to twenty-five feet higher. They had a higher height-of-eye. It also meant the Dale had to be about fifteen nautical miles from the contacts. Let them be our Soviet submarines. Only on the ocean could one truly tell the earth was round, and no matter where you sailed, the horizon was always fifteen nautical miles away.
He let out a deep breath. Decisions, decisions, decisions. What he decided now would determine how Dale would chase these submarines once they spotted him and submerged. Submerging was a given. Submarines fought submerged, and once spotted, both would blow their ballasts—Sonar would hear them doing that—and they would drop like rocks into the abyss below. If warriors of the sea could earn points for “gotchas,” then Dale would earn a bunch. . . .
What the hell are you doing? he asked himself. You’re acting like some junior officer about to lose his virginity after a long night of heavy dancing. Stop it, Danny, he told himself. This is just one more antisubmarine warfare operation and regardless of whether the contacts are fishing vessels or Soviet Echo submarines, Dale will follow protocol. Lord, just let them be those Soviet sons of bitches.
The XO, Joe Tucker, stepped onto the bridge wing. MacDonald lowered his glasses for a second.
“Has to be the submarines,” Tucker offered, raising his binoculars in tandem with MacDonald.
“I have my fingers crossed.”
“Nothing else out in this direction according to Sonar.” Tucker dropped his binoculars. “What now, Skipper?”
MacDonald dropped his glasses, letting them hang from the strap around his neck. “This is the tricky part, Joe Tucker,” he said.
“What have you done before in a situation like this?”
MacDonald smiled, then laughed slightly. “Funny you should ask, XO. I don’t think any American destroyer has ever sneaked up on two surfaced Soviet submarines.”
“I don’t expect they’ll be surfaced once they see us.”
“They have to know we are here. Or at least have a line of bearing on us,” MacDonald opined softly. “This close, if their sonar team is worth a damn, they would have picked up our prop noise long ago.”
Tucker shook his head slightly. “We’re a pretty quiet ship.”
“We are a surface ship putting noise in the water. Noise is a signature a good sonar team can interpret with ease. If they have picked us up—let’s assume they have—then what are they thinking?”
“They are thinking we are after them?”
MacDonald nodded. “That’s what you and I would think. But who knows what Crazy Ivan thinks. Maybe he gets his ‘gotchas’ from some other misguided tactic.”
“Such as the closer we get before he pulls the plug the more points he gets?” Joe Tucker shook his head. “Kind of a crazy way to play the game.”
“Yeah. His sonar team might believe they are picking up our noise from hundreds of miles away.”
“I don’t think they’re as dumb as we would like to believe.”
“I don’t either, but when I was in Combat earlier, we still did not know if our contacts were twenty miles from us or a hundred. All we knew was which direction the noise was coming from. We have been on this base course of two-two-zero for over twelve hours. If they have a reciprocal contact on us, then they have to figure we are in pursuit.”
MacDonald raised his glasses and looked in the direction of the contacts. From the bridge came another report of them lying motionless on a left-stern-to-left-bow angle.
“Why are they surfaced?” MacDonald lowered his binoculars.
“Skipper,” Goldstein said from the hatchway. “Combat reports Snoop Tray radar still active.”
“Don’t know why they haven’t picked us up yet?” Joe Tucker asked.
“They will shortly,” MacDonald replied sharply. “So, XO, what do you recommend?”
“I recommend we come up to full speed, flip on the radar, put on face paint, run up the Jolly Roger, and see how close we can get to them.” He shrugged. “We aren’t going to sneak up on them, so the faster we go, the closer we’ll get before they slam their foot on the gas and head for the deep.” The XO braced both hands on the above-waist-high metal railing. “No reason to try to sneak up on them. Even the piss-poor Snoop Tray is going to hit us after we get about half our ship up over the horizon where it can paint us.” Joe Tucker leaned forward and looked at the sea beneath the Dale. “The slight seas might be disrupting their video return a little, but any second now that Soviet piece-of-shit radar is going to detect us.”
MacDonald nodded, his forehead wrinkling in concentration a few seconds before a broad grin spread beneath the pencil-thin mustache. “XO, let’s do it. Tell Sonar they are about to lose contact, but be prepared to reengage. Once they submerge . . .”
“They’re together. They’ll remain together.” Joe Tucker leaned away from the railing.
“I agree, XO.” MacDonald stuck his head back into the bridge area. “Lieutenant Goldstein, bring us up to ‘all ahead flank.’ Tell Combat to prepare a submarine contact report for release at my order.”
“Has to be them.”
“Just want to make sure before I fire off a message to Seventh Fleet and get all those P-3 airdales wetting their pants with excitement.”
He wondered if the Dale would really be the first destroyer to catch two Soviet submarines on the surface in the middle of the ocean. Might be another folktale, but one thing for sure: He was going to be sure the contacts were submarines before he sent the message.
“Skipper,” Goldstein said from the hatchway. “Signal bridge watch reports the two contacts as submarines.”
MacDonald let out a deep breath. “Is he sure?”
“I can ask him.”
“Lieutenant, ask him to confirm the sighting and ask him to have the on-duty—”
“I’ll go,” Joe Tucker said, turning to the nearby ladder and sprinting up it to the signal bridge directly above them.
MacDonald watched the XO disappear across the deck. Less than a minute later Joe Tucker was leaning over the railing above him, a broad grin stretched from ear to ear. “You can release that message, Skipper. You got them!” Joe Tucker wet two fingers and dipped them as if scoring a dunk in basketball. “Dos puntos!”
The Dale engines kicked in and MacDonald grabbed the railing. A smile spread across his face as the destroyer leaped forward, heading toward the surfaced submarines.
“Officer of the deck! Activate the surface search radar!” No reason to try to hide now.
DOWN below, Oliver threw his headset down on the small shelf below the sonar console. “Damn it!” he shouted, rubbing his ears. He looked at Lieutenant Junior Grade Burkeet. Burkeet fell into Chief Stalzer as the Dale leaped forward, the propellers churning up the ocean behind the destroyer as the four steam-driven engines sped toward twenty-two knots.
“Sir, we are drowning out any passive noise from the contacts.”
“Don’t need sonar right now, Petty Officer Oliver,” Chief Stalzer said. “We have them on visual.” He reached forward and slapped the sonar technician on the shoulder. “Good job for a short-timer.”
CAPTAIN Second Rank Fedor Gerasimovich lifted his bullhorn. “Captain Bocharkov! Our radar reports a contact bearing zero-four-zero degrees heading our way. Range . . .” The bullhorn squeaked, the noise causing Gerasimovich to lift it away from his lips. It stopped almost immediately and he quickly lifted the bullhorn back. “I said, comrade, the contact is horizon distance—about twenty-five kilometers!”
Bocharkov raised his glasses and trained them in the direction of the contact. He could see nothing. The voice tube whistled. He dropped his glasses and lifted the covering. “Go ahead.”
“Sir, I have increased rotation on the American warship. He is increasing his speed.”
“What is his bearing?”
“We hold him at zero-three-five with slight bearing drift to the right.”
“Do you think it is the Americans?” Ignatova asked, nodding toward the horizon where K-56 had reported the contact.
Bocharkov grunted. He leaned over the railing. “Get that raft off my boat! And get those boxes belowdecks, Chief!”
Chief Trush held his hand to his ear. “What?” he mouthed.
Bocharkov lifted the bullhorn and repeated his instructions. Trush snapped a salute then scurried to carry them out. Trush’s bass voice was easily heard above the ocean noise as he screamed, shouted, and pushed the sailors to action.
With the bullhorn near his lips, Bocharkov turned it toward Gerasimovich, who had heard the orders. “Fedor, it may be an American warship.”
Gerasimovich nodded. “Here is what I recommend, Captain Bocharkov . . .” He briefly outlined his idea. And when he finished, he added, “You are the high-valued unit for this mission. If we do this, then I will pull him away from you. Once you’re in his baffles, I recommend you turn toward the Philippines. By the time I lose him, you will be free.”
Bocharkov looked at Ignatova. Ignatova had his glasses trained off the port side of the boat, scanning the horizon. “What do you think?”
“I think I can make out a mast clearing the horizon. It is American Navy dark gray.”
Bocharkov lifted his glasses. Across the narrow strip of water separating the two powerful Soviet submarines Gerasimovich was doing the same thing. Motion was what usually identified a contact, so Bocharkov waited and a few seconds passed before a slight motion drew his attention. “Looks like the main mast.”
“Looks like a main mast with an antenna that is turning.”
Bocharkov lifted the voice tube covering. “Control room, Captain. Does the electronic warfare operator have anything in the direction of zero-four-zero true?”
Immediately, the voice of Lieutenant Commander Orlov, the operations officer, answered with a negative.
“It’s turning but they have it turned off. Wait a minute, Skipper! Belay my last. Electronic warfare has a surface search radar in that direction. It is an American warship—probably destroyer!” Orlov shouted.
“Fast speed, radar on. What are they thinking?” Ignatova asked.
“He knows when we see him we will submerge. He wants to get as close to us as possible. He wants to see us. Photograph us. He knows we know he is coming.”
“I would think he would try to sneak up on us.”
Bocharkov grunted. “Most likely his EW detected the K-56’s surface search radar. And, as we have with theirs, he would have know that our sonar operators had probably detected him.” He laughed softly. “Smart captain. I would have done the same. Full speed ahead and see how close I can get before the submarines submerge. Being closer means being able to reestablish contact sooner.”
The voice tube whistled again. “Skipper,” Orlov said. “Sonar confirms the radar contact is the same as the sonar contact. It is the American destroyer cresting the horizon.”
Bocharkov acknowledged Orlov’s report. He lifted his bullhorn and quickly agreed to Gerasimovich’s idea. Amidships of the K-122, the raft was released. The sailors cranked the small engine, and the raft started its slow transit toward the K-56. The two starshinas leaned forward as if urging the raft ahead.
Bocharkov looked down at the main deck. Trush was clearing the sailors off topside, urging them down the aft escape hatch into the aft torpedo room. What was so damn important that Soviet Pacific Fleet headquarters had risked two submarines by having them surface in the daylight? He’d know soon enough. And why in the hell did he have to have another Spetsnaz aboard his boat?
“Clear the decks, XO,” Bocharkov said. He lifted the voice tube and told the control room to prepare to dive, but not to dive until he gave the order. He lifted his bullhorn, pointing it toward the K-56. “Fedor! I owe you a drink in Kamchatka.”
“No, I owe you one, comrade. I have not had an opportunity to pit my wits against the Americans. You have had all the fun. If you get home before me, tell the wives I am not far behind.”
Bocharkov handed the bullhorn to one of the topside watches. He turned to them. “You sailors, get belowdecks.” Then he hit the dive button. The ooga noise common to both the Soviet and the American navies echoed across the open ocean. Bucharkov looked across the narrowing distance between the two submarines. The raft had bumped against the K-56 hull, and sailors were quickly pulling the two men out of it. The cap on the last sailor flew off, landing in the water near the raft.
Another sailor topside, a security expert, raised the AK-47 cradled in his arm, pointed it at the raft, and fired. The quick burst of the automatic weapon sent dozens of bullets into the inflated rim. Gerasimovich saluted Bocharkov, who returned the gesture. He did a quick look fore and aft, satisfying himself that both escape hatches were secured and no one other than him was above deck. Then he quickly scurried down the ladder, securing the hatch after him. In seconds he was in the control room.
“Orders?” Ignatova asked loudly.
“Take the boat to two hundred meters.”
“Two hundred meters!” Ignatova relayed.
Across the control room the order was repeated by Lieutenant Commander Burian Orlov. Chief Ship Starshina Uvarova, chief of the boat, pulled the hydraulic levers back, his eyes locked on the meters above them as the ballasts filled.
“Passing fifty meters,” Orlov said from his position halfway between the helmsman and the planesman. “Angle on the bow twenty degrees. Recommend speed eight knots.”
Bocharkov said nothing. After a few seconds, Ignatova asked softly, “Sir, should we increase speed to eight knots?”
Bocharkov shook his head. “No, keep the speed to barely making way. Keep taking us down.”
The sound of the ballasts filling on the K-56 as it submerged vibrated through the boat. Every person in the control room with the exception of Bocharkov glanced upward. There would be thoughts of the K-56 submerging faster than their submarine. Collisions at sea were terrible things, but none more terrible than two submarines colliding out of sight beneath the waves.
They had no way of knowing that the K-56 would remain on the surface until they were sure the Americans had seen them. Then like the wounded grouse on the plains drawing a predator away from its nest, Gerasimovich would lure the Americans northwest, away from the K-122.
“Passing seventy-five meters,” Orlov said, his voice slightly louder than the last report.
“Continue to two hundred meters,” Bocharkov said. “Maintain two knots speed.”
More noise from the K-56 reached their ears as Bocharkov’s comrade Gerasimovich engaged both propellers on the other submarine. The noise was the shafts increasing in rotation, the slight vibration of the props boring through the water overhead as the other submarine changed its direction away from the K-122.
If he were Fedor Gerasimovich, Bocharkcov thought, he would take the K-56 up to twenty knots. Twenty knots was not a tactically good move, but the noise would draw the American to him and mask any noise K-122 was generating into the water.
“Passing one hundred meters.”
“Very well,” Ignatova answered.
“Angle on the bow twenty degrees. Speed remains two knots.”
Two knots was just enough forward motion to keep the K-122 pointed in the same direction. When a submarine dropped through varying depths of temperature and currents, without some speed the ocean could gain control, twisting and turning the boat on its way downward. And if you hit a river current, you could find yourself ripped along with it until you put on a burst of speed to break through. Bocharkov let out a deep breath. With the K-56 whipping up knuckles in the water above them, he had little doubt the Americans would not hear the K-122. All he had to do was wait comfortably beneath the layer until the Americans and the K-56 disappeared northward.
“CAPTAIN, signal bridge lookout reports one of the submarines is submerging. The other one has a small boat tied up alongside.”
“Thanks, Lieutenant Goldstein.” MacDonald lifted his glasses. He wished he were up on the signal bridge instead of the XO, but his job was here or in Combat.
A sailor burst through the hatch, the ship’s camera in his hand. When he saw the skipper, he stopped abruptly, snapped a salute. “Sorry, sir.”
“Don’t be.” He pointed upward. “Get up there and get us some photographs.”
He sighed. The sailor’s boondockers clanged on the metal rungs as the young man ran up the ladder. He hoped the photographer was able to get a shot of both submarines together. It would be a nice memento to hang up in the wardroom. But if one was submerging, the sailor would have to act fast.
He lifted the binoculars again, training them off the port side of the bow. The submarines were in view down. He smiled. He had his two submarines, and as he watched, water washed over the bow and stern of the one on the left. MacDonald hummed. “Gotcha,” he whispered. “More than dos puntos in any man’s book.”
The binoculars were not as powerful as the deck-mounted set being used on the signal bridge by the XO. The speck on the side of the other submarine must be the raft reported a moment ago. As MacDonald watched, the stick figures of the Soviet sailors started to disappear. The speck disappeared also. Then the control tower of the first submarine was gone. One below the waterline and one to go.
“Skipper!” Joe Tucker shouted from above.
Reluctantly he lowered his binoculars and shielded his eyes as he looked upward.
“They’ve cast off the raft.” Joe Tucker laughed. “Man-oh-man, you should have seen them Soviet bastards scurrying for their lives. We have surprised the hell out of them!”
“You got that right, Joe Tucker.” He lifted the binoculars again. Christ, he wanted to be on the signal bridge.
“And we may have a photograph of both submarines together. If we do, we only have the conning tower of the first submarine alongside the second.”
MacDonald lowered the binoculars. “Give that sailor extra liberty in Olongapo, XO, if he caught both of them.” Maybe this was going to be a winning day all around.
He had started to lift his binoculars again as Lieutenant Burnham stepped onto the bridge wing with his glasses strung around his neck. “Captain, I just got to see this, sir.”
“Aren’t you the CICWO?”
“Commander Stillman has it now, sir. I had the four-to-eight watch, but stayed for the fun.”
Lieutenant Commander Stillman was the chief engineer and the third senior person on board the Dale.
“Very well.” He discovered he liked the idea of having someone else enjoy this moment of nautical success with him—even if that someone was Burnham. Dale should get at least a “Bravo Zulu” from Seventh Fleet on this victory.
Water washed across the bow and stern of the second submarine. The submarine propellers churned a gigantic wake as the second Echo headed for the depths. Even with the bow underwater, the speed this skipper was kicking up to escape the “terrible, frightening Americans” gave MacDonald an extra burst of adrenaline. It was going to be easy to keep contact on that one.
When you’re frightened or seeking an escape, it is amazing how even the most respected officer sometimes allows emotions to win over tactics. Whoever the skipper was of the second boat had to be a novice or lack self control, unlike the first submarine, which had just eased below the surface before taking off.
MacDonald lowered the binoculars and stepped inside the bridge. He flipped the 12MC button on the voice box. “Combat, Captain here. What is the distance to the contacts?”
“Nine miles, sir,” Stillman replied, “and closing.”
“Very well.” He turned to Goldstein. “Officer of the Deck, bring us down to eight knots.” MacDonald put both hands on the small shelf that ran the length of the bridge, beneath the forward windows. “You see that spot of water where we had those two submarines?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, Mr. Goldstein, I want the Dale to sail right through it.” Around the bridge everyone was smiling. They had rattled the Soviets. What a great way to start a navy day!
MacDonald went back out on the bridge wing. Burnham was grinning from ear to ear. The clanging of someone coming down from the signal bridge drew MacDonald’s attention.
“Well, Joe Tucker,” he said, a swagger in his voice. “Looks as if we had good—”
“Skipper, the Soviets left something in the water.”
MacDonald faced the bow, shielding his eyes with his hand. “What?”
“I think it was the raft. We startled them so fast . . .”
Goldstein stuck his head outside the bridge. “Sir, Sonar has one of the submarines, tracking it on course three-three-zero.”
“Tell them to continue tracking.”
“Sir, should I change our course also?”
MacDonald shook his head. “Not yet, Lieutenant.” He turned to Joe Tucker. “XO, let’s see what they left behind.”
THIRTY minutes later a bow hook pulled a sailor’s hat onto the midships deck of the motionless Dale. Wind was pushing the half-sunken rubber raft toward the hull. Ten minutes more and the sailors had it on the main deck. MacDonald and Joe Tucker stood looking at it with arms folded.
Chief Warrant Officer Jimmy “Tiny” Smith handed the cap to MacDonald. “Sir, don’t see any pants with it.”
“Pants?” MacDonald asked.
“Yes, sir. If we scared him out of his hat, then maybe we scared him out of his pants, too,” the first division officer said.
MacDonald turned the soaked hat over and over in his hand. The lettering across the brow was Cyrillic, but the number 56 was easily recognized. “Fifty-six?” he asked aloud. He looked at the XO. “Well, Joe Tucker, looks as if we have the identity of one of those submarines.”
“Sir, what do you want me to do with this raft?” Smith asked.
“Warrant, have your boatswain mates wrap it up for Naval Intelligence. Those intel weenies enjoy having little things like this to add to their collection. Who knows? Someday they may have an entire submarine out at Northwest, Virginia, in that hangar.”
“What hangar?” Tiny Smith asked.
Both officers laughed.