THE second wave of missiles hit just after midnight. And along with it, a contact report arrived from Pittsburgh. Two Song-class boats, at the midpoint of the strait. The data link with the ROC defense network came up sporadically, along with the relayed picture from the AWACS orbiting east of the island. During the times it was up, it showed dozens of warheads rising from the mainland, turning east, and accelerating. Donnie and the Terror concentrated on any that might be targeted on the capital. But Beijing seemed to be consciously avoiding the city, or indeed, any heavily populated region.
Which might not be as good a sign as it seemed … Chip Fang, looking ragged, slumped next to Dan at the command desk in CIC. His thin chest was wrapped in a Savo Island foul-weather jacket. And under that … Dan did a double take. “Where’d you pick that up, Chip?”
The Taiwanese patted the olive-and-black shemagh tucked ascot-like into his collar. “I had to buy it. Expensive, too.”
“I thought we were out, in the ship’s store.”
“You are.” Fang smirked. “A private transaction. Where’d you get them?”
“Jebel Ali. Should have bought an extra hundred. I didn’t know they’d be this popular.”
“My uncle has a textile mill. We can run you off a few thousand. For less than you would expect.” Fang sobered. “But they’re probably shut down now. Our whole workforce is in the reserves. They’re mobilized, I’m sure.”
Dan nodded, eyeing the weapons inventory tote. Worrying over how few rounds he had left. Especially the Block 4s. But help was on the way. USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, with a full strike group, would be on scene in two days.
At that point, Dan and Savo would have done their job, and TF 779.1 would most likely be relieved. They’d head for Guam to rearm and resupply, prior to being folded in with units currently finishing hasty overhauls in West Coast ports.
At least that was what he hoped for.
Fang bent into his earphones. He spoke rapidly in Chinese, then listened again.
The 21MC lit. “TAO, Engineering. CO there?”
Dan hit the lever. “Go ahead, Bart.”
“Sir, that tanker refuel, got a time and rendezvous yet?”
“Thought XO passed that to you. Early tomorrow. Five thousand tons, out of Hualien. Comms on channel 22. He does us, then Mitscher, Curtis Wilbur, Chokai, Kurama. In that order.”
“Copy. Does Noah know that? First Division’s gonna have to set up if we’re doing an astern fueling.”
Dan scratched his head. “Can you make sure they do? A lot’s cooking up here. We’ll need to hook up, top off, and return freedom to maneuver as quickly as we can.”
Danenhower signed off as Fang laid down his earphones. “What’s the news?” Dan asked.
“Not good. The mainland’s announced this latest barrage is retaliation for a raid on their base on Yongxing. Woody Island, you might know it as.”
“Woody … that’s in the Paracels?” As the liaison nodded, Dan did too, but for a different reason. The left hook he’d expected. But not as a raid … A raid, though, would be how Beijing would present it.… Doubtless the full might of Strike One and the Vietnamese were surging over the islands at this very moment. And each time the Chinese tried to reinforce, they’d have to do so under U.S. air out of Cam Ranh Bay and the old airfield at Da Nang.
He put that aside. “How’s the population taking it?”
Fang said the Republic of China had prepared for this for generations. The reserves were mobilized. “Almost two million men. They can shell us, bomb us all they like. But they will have to conquer us one by one. And to do that, they will have to cross the strait, put their boots on our sand, and kill us all.”
Dan pushed back from the command desk, hoping the civilian leadership was as determined.
If they weren’t, his task group could be caught in a nutcracker. Pinched between the lodgment in the Senkakus, and a newly “reunited” Taiwan, there was no way the Navy could hold the Miyako Strait. Or the Bashi Channel and Luzon Strait, either. Would that satisfy General Zhang—no, President Zhang now—and a triumphant China? Or would it be only the first step on a career of conquest?
He felt pretty sure he knew the answer to that one.
* * *
BY dawn over two hundred warheads had fallen. Fang reported Leshan Mountain had been hit again and was no longer operational. The airfields had been sledgehammered, with both cratering and cluster antipersonnel ordnance, to discourage runway repair. Special operations forces had been reported landing on Penghu Island, in the middle of the strait. The ROC Army was counterattacking, attempting to drive them back into the sea.
Then, for two hours, a massive, obviously carefully planned air blitz, comprising nearly two full wings of bombers covered by fighters and jammers, had worked over Hengshan and Chiashan, the major air-defense headquarters near Taipei, with earth-penetrating bombs. Only a few interceptors rose to challenge them. Fang said they were being husbanded, to unleash against the invasion fleet. Amy Singhe had pleaded with Dan to take them out with Standards. He’d weighed the decision. And said, finally, that the situation lay outside his rules of engagement. They weren’t attacking the civilian population.
Now it was 0800. He paced the bridge, trying to conceal impatience and apprehension. Puffy white clouds grazed across a pale sky. Wind eight knots, from 120 true. One- to two-foot seas.
“Now secure from flight quarters,” Nuckols announced over the 1MC. Red Hawk 202 was laying a trail of brownish-gray exhaust, heading north. Dan wanted “Strafer” Wilker, loaded with flares and chaff, between him and Uotsuri. Both Ku-band radars were radiating now, so he assumed both triple-A batteries were active.
“Right rudder, come to course 130. Make pitch and turns for ten knots,” Ensign Mytsalo murmured.
All but nodding off, Dan leaned on the bulwark of the bridge wing as Mytsalo carefully chiseled the bow in behind a surprisingly small, blue-hulled, white-superstructured products tanker. Bao Shan III. A puke-green wake unrolled from her stern. A drogue porpoised, throwing spray as it bounded. Sea sparrows darted above the rocking foam. Dan remembered the old seamen’s lore: Low-flying birds meant a storm on its way. Though these were probably just skimming the churned-up wake in hopes of an early lunch.
He blew out, impatient, but kept his expression mild. Better too slow than too fast; an overshoot could plow them into the other’s stern. USS Curtis Wilbur’s low gray outline rode off to the west, placed to intercept any surprises from the direction of the mainland. Even farther out, Pittsburgh lay in wait for subsurface intruders.
But so far, aside from the test probe by the Song-class and the old nuke boat, no Chinese subs had tried to pierce their barrier. Which was puzzling. Were they sneaking through so covertly he just hadn’t detected them? But Pittsburgh, Wilbur, and Mitscher all had their tails streamed, and Kurama’s helos had laid sonobuoys. Had the whole sub fleet made it through before he’d latched the gate?
Or were they holding back, waiting for the allies and their carrier groups to move in close enough for a crushing, overwhelming right cross?
The fog of uncertainty had descended on the battlefield, thickened by jamming, distance, and the lack of recon. All he could do was execute his last orders … and maybe, if he had to, look past their wording, to what Seventh Fleet and PaCom would have ordered, if they’d seen the situation up close. The way the U.S. Navy had always operated.
Always bearing in mind that whoever stepped over the line had better turn out to be right.
“Put the eye of the ship right beside it. Which side doesn’t matter,” he told Mytsalo. “But crowd in close, to make it easy for the folks on deck. They have to get that grapnel on it, and that won’t be easy.”
“Captain. Good morning.” At the doorway to the pilothouse, Dave Branscombe held his salute. Dan beckoned the comm officer onto the wing with a crooked finger.
“Skipper, we have the response to your message to the Korean task force commander. Admiral Jung. We’ve set you up HF voice. Just remember, it’s an uncovered net.”
Dan nodded. Min Jun Jung was a savvy officer, and the Koreans were good seamen, aggressive and tough. Their ships were short on creature comforts, but fast and heavily armed. Just now, Jung’s force was at sea, covering the Korea Strait. Dan checked his watch. “Remote to the bridge?… Good. Call sign?”
“You’re still ‘Ringmaster.’ Admiral Jung is ‘War Drums.’”
“JOOD … range and bearing to Mitscher.”
Dan listened with half an ear, eyeing the drogue, which Pardees’s and Chief Anschutz’s boatswains were manhandling up to the break in the forecastle. It was lashed to a cable, which was in turn made fast to a five-inch refueling hose, unreeling off the tanker’s stern. The engineers were standing by an already-connected feeder stub. Make the hose up, signal the tanker to start pumping, and they’d be sucking aboard Jet A1 at a thousand gallons a minute. It would take half an hour to top off Savo’s tanks. By noon he wanted everyone fully refueled and on their way to the outer limit of the Orange Zone.
Time to see if he could get some help. Taking a last glance down at the forecastle, where the engineers were gathered, he went into the pilothouse. Unsocketed the red phone, reminded himself he was on a nonsecure net, and hit the Transmit button. “War Drums, this is Ringmaster actual. Over.”
The answer came back at once, and surprisingly clear for an over-the-horizon high-frequency message. “This is War Drums actual. Good to talk to you, Dan. I always thought we’d meet again.”
Dan pictured him. Oversized hands, small dark eyes, the scent of expensive mentholated cigarettes and too-sweet cologne. His English was almost perfect, with a touch of California. “Hello, Min. Congrats on the promotion. Over.”
“Same to you. Good to have you back. Just wish it wasn’t for the current reason. Over.”
“This is Ringmaster. Understand. Uh, is Commander Hwang still with you?”
“He commands Jeonnam, one of my units of the Third Fleet.”
Okay, they were getting into classified territory. But he had to know one fact. “This is Ringmaster. Interrogative. Are you under command of combined, uh, authorities? Or national authorities?” In wartime, the entire South Korean navy came under U.S. Navy command, so operations could be coordinated.
“This is War Drums. Command has not yet been transferred.”
Okay, which meant he and Jung didn’t have to ask permission from Fleet. “Roger that. Are you in receipt of our message of 0220 local? Outlining Operation Dragonglass.”
“War Drums. We have your message, and clearance from Seoul. I believe this move should have been made earlier. However, I am eager to participate. Have hopscotched several units toward you in anticipation. Including flagship. We will come up on the frequencies specified. Over.”
Dan blew out again, stymied by the insecure net. He wanted to discuss deployment. The last readouts, before the satellites had gone down, had shown ten South Korean units in the Tsushima/Korea Strait area, including Sejong The Great, Jung’s flagship, two destroyers, two submarines, and seven Ulsan-class frigates. They were heavy on ASW and surface armament, but light on antiair defenses, though the flagship had a full Aegis radar and combat system. The smaller corvettes and patrol boats had hung back in the Tsushima Strait.
But he had to assume the enemy was listening to each word they exchanged. He fingered his chin. There’d been a way, once, to get over-the-horizon data link without satellites. “Slow Lead” wasn’t fast, and using HF to communicate had other limitations. But if Jung had KG-84A crypto equipment, they could link. Once they got close enough for covered VHF, they could even coordinate their attack by voice, in real time.
He glanced down at the forecastle, then out at the stern of the tanker. Was it closer? Chief Van Gogh was aiming a laser range finder. He was relieved to see Cheryl Staurulakis standing by the OOD. “Uh, this is Ringmaster. Excellent. If the balloon goes up, we’ll need to move fast. If you would like to move farther in my direction, that will reduce the time necessary to join up. Over.”
Jung acknowledged, and Dan signed off. He resocketed the handset and stood watching as, down on the deck, an engineer twirled a finger in the “start pumping” signal.
* * *
OVER the next few hours he shifted Savo to 25 degrees 36 minutes north, 121 degrees 30 minutes east, twenty miles off Taipei. Close enough to keep a decent angle on any incomers, but nearer to the strait at its narrowest point. As each screen unit reported “fueling complete,” he assigned it to a new station farther west.
Once Kurama had completed fueling, and the tanker had disappeared over the horizon back to Hualien, he repositioned the helicopter carrier to the center of the strait. She would goalie. Unless the Chinese mounted a major push right there, right then, she and the fixed-wing ASW assets should cover his temporary absence.
After lunch from a tray at his command seat, he went over the plan once more with a fatigued-looking Mills and a very wilted Staurulakis.
Then they waited.
* * *
HE managed to squirrel away in his cabin for a nap, and fell asleep almost instantly. Into a dreamless, black void.
And woke, to his surprise, several hours later, almost refreshed. No one had called. He checked with CIC and the bridge on the phone. Then stepped into the shower.
He had a hand on the control before he noticed the tag-out. Only certain systems had been cooked with saturated steam. Legionella savoiensis might even yet be lingering. He pulled on gym shorts and a T-shirt. Got his Hydra from the charging station. Toed into flip-flops, and carried soap dish, shampoo, a towel, and a change of underwear, socks, and coveralls down to officers’ country. Showered, shampooed, shaved, he let himself out into the passageway feeling freshly issued.
To nearly collide with a short, rotund black woman in a flowered dashiki. Aisha Ar-Rahim was toting a bundle of papers locked to a clipboard. She clutched them to her chest, as if protecting them from him. She looked drawn, cheeks puffy. Behind her was a slight strawberry-blond woman he recognized after a moment. “Special Agent,” he said. “Petty Officer Ryan.”
“Good afternoon, Captain.”
No mistaking it, she was avoiding his gaze. The woman seemed to nurse some concealed dislike. For him? For white men? Christians? For all men? He cleared his throat, and dabbed at a trickle with the towel. “How’s it going? Any progress?”
“We’re narrowing down our list.” Ar-Rahim made as if to slide past.
He took her elbow to detain her. Big mistake. She flinched away, eyes blazing. “Don’t touch, Captain!”
“I wasn’t—sorry. Just wanted to ask if there was anything else I could do to help.”
“The investigation is proceeding, Captain Lenson. When I have a conclusion, I’ll let you know.” She grimaced, apparently catching Ryan’s horrified look, and backtracked. “Your people are being helpful.”
“Even the chiefs?”
“We’re making progress. Unfortunately, with the DNA gone, it will be more difficult to make a charge stick.”
“Well, I meant what I said. If you can narrow down to three, four suspects, we’ll lock them down. I don’t want this guy walking around. If I have to restrict the suspects to their battle stations, so be it.”
“Very well.” She started away, Ryan at her heel like an obedient Labrador, then wheeled back, loose robe swishing out around her ankles. “One question.”
“Shoot.” He evened the ends of the towel; he needed to get back to CIC.
“These drills, repair, flooding, abandon ship—even at night—your crew seems very tired. As, if you will excuse me, do you.”
“We exercise all the time, Special Agent. SOP.”
“I’ve ridden a lot of ships, Captain. They don’t drill like you do. And the chief corpsman. Grissett. Do you know he’s worried about you? Your exhaustion. Your mental state.”
“News to me, Special Agent.”
“He’s afraid to tell you.”
“But asked you to mention it?”
“No. He didn’t. Still, you’re pushing too hard. Your crew. And yourself.”
“Maybe because I’ve seen what happens to a ship that wasn’t ready.”
“You mean Horn?”
So she’d read his record. He said evenly, “Yes. I don’t plan ever to go into harm’s way without being fully prepared. If that means I have to ‘push too hard,’ so be it.”
She met his eye at last. “You seem tense to me too, Captain. Do you expect a battle?”
“This is a warship, Special Agent. And we’re in a war zone. So, yes, we could see action.” He took a deep breath. “If you hear general quarters, lay to your cabin. If things go really bad, it might not matter if you catch this guy. We’ll all go down together.”
“That’s what Corpsman Ryan here was saying.”
“Well, she’s right. But until then, yeah, by all means, pursue your investigation.”
He evened the ends of the towel one last time, and turned away. But he could feel her gaze on his back.
* * *
THE hours oozed by. EW reported jammers going active, then shutting down, on the mainland. Like an orchestra tuning up. He considered going back to his cabin, but instead reclined his seat in CIC and tried to relax. Until, around 1700, strikes began lifting from the military airstrips. He still didn’t have linkage with ROC air defense, so all he had was Savo’s own Aegis. Still, it lit dozens of contacts. A swarm of hornets milled, coalescing, then turning east. They ate up the hundred-mile crossing minute by minute. More contacts winked on over the island. ROC fighters, dispersed, concealed, but rising now to intercept. He admired their courage. But there were so few. So very few.
Blue semicircles met red carets. Flickered, and went out. Red symbols vanished too. But the swarms inched onward, clicking closer to the island with every sweep of Savo’s SPY-1.
“We’re seeing a lot of surface radars coming on,” the EW petty officer called. Dan got up, back creaking, and went to stand behind him as he called out various commercial and military ship radars. Dan sent a Flash reporting the beginning of the invasion. He got an acknowledgment but nothing more.
Matt Mills and Chip Fang started a plot. By local dusk, putting together what Mills observed with the intel on the Chinese op plan Fang had brought with him, they were able to brief him. Two transit lanes were being set up, out of Fuzhou and Quanzhou. Fang suspected there might be more farther south, out of radar range. “The lead units are emerging,” he murmured. “A powerful force. Not just amphibious units. Also commercial transports. Hydrofoils. Surface effect craft.”
Dan braced with legs apart as Savo rolled. As the birds had predicted, the wind was rising. Which would pitch up the seas, but probably not enough to discommode a cross-channel movement. “Is it possible this is a feint?”
“Not with this level of effort, Captain. And not with the submarine pre-positioning Pittsburgh reported this morning.” Fang eyed the pencil sketch of the transit channels he’d laid out on the command desk. “This will be at least two divisions. Most likely, four. The northern elements are stronger than we anticipated. Which means the landing may not be on the southern beaches.”
“Okay, then what’s the landing point?”
Fang ran his fingers along the coastline. “Taiwan is mountainous. We have always considered there are only a few possible places they could come ashore. That, of course, is where we have concentrated our defenses. It does seem, so far, as if their analysis is the same as our own. With a significant exception. We expected several landing points. Instead, they are concentrating their preparatory bombing on one. On the military airfield and air-defense battery just south of Hsinchu.”
Dan peered at the map. A city. The mouth of a river. But the hydrography didn’t look all that promising. “Uh—where’s the beach?”
“You’re right. It is not great terrain. Mudflats, mostly. But, as you recall, Inchon had mudflats. It does offers advantages to a small force with heavy air support. Which they have, from the Putian complex, across the strait.” Fang looked sober. “Our army will inflict heavy losses. But if they can take the airfield, and cut the main north-south road, they will isolate Taipei. It also gives them a small port. We will mine it, but they can send their air-cushion vehicles up the river to destroy the bridges. Again, reducing north-south movement and our ability to reinforce.”
A silence went around the table. Finally Fang murmured, “If America truly wished to help … Once the mainlanders are ashore, it will be difficult to dislodge them.”
Dan took a deep breath. The Koreans were on board. Enthusiastically, but that was Min Jun Jung’s way. The Japanese had made it clear they would follow Dan in, if he went. The only thing he was missing was Fleet authorization. And they’d be waiting on PaCom, who would be waiting on the Joint Chiefs. “I’m going to need a few minutes,” he muttered. The others looked down at the maps, or up at the displays. Where the first wave was setting out into the open sea.
It meant men would die. Chinese, yes. Americans, possibly. Koreans and Japanese, too, probably.
“I’m going outside the skin of the ship for a minute,” he told Mills. The operations officer nodded.
When he let himself out the sky was orange, peach-blossom, lavender. The colors burned like soundless fire under the high, fluffy, beautiful clouds common to the Western Pacific. Each detached from its peers, like them, yet separate, they skated past overhead. With a steady humming whoosh Savo churned through three-foot seas the color of burnt glass. Leaning over the lifelines, he tracked tiny sprigs of algae, no, some kind of weed passing down the side. They bobbed serenely, each, no doubt, freighted with its own tiny creatures. Until Savo’s bow wave creamed over them, tearing those universes apart.
War would tear many universes apart.
He lifted his face to a gleaming Venus low in the west. China had perceived weakness, friction, and opportunity. A tyrant had grabbed the levers of power, and steered her toward war.
But now was no time for regrets. It was a time for warriors. Not that he thought of himself as one, precisely. But ready or not, he seemed to be the guy on the spot.
He strolled aft, hands locked behind him, toward the boat deck. The whalelike bulk of the hoisted inflatable.
The Navy hadn’t carried out a night surface attack since 1945. He could lose a ship. Hell, facing the waves of aircraft, not to mention the bristling guard-line of destroyers and frigates, he could lose all his ships.
He had two choices. One: stay in position and request orders. Which obviously weren’t going to come until it was too late. It would be safer. Stay put. Wait.
Two: make the decision himself. Grasp the nettle. Strike when the invaders were at sea.
Savo’s motto. He’d never liked it, but it sounded right just now. Hard blows.
The sun glowered with a last despairing flash, heatless and sullen scarlet. The sea burned gold. Then, somehow, it sucked the sun down into it, the deep red orb shimmering like a stranded jellyfish on a brazen beach.
Dan stood watching, fingers tucked into the belt loops of his coveralls. Hoping they all would see it rise again tomorrow.
Then turned away, and let himself back into Combat.