Fatin Amrani knew that anti-submarine warfare (ASW) had come a long way from the developments put into service during WWII and during the time when his aged vessel was built. However, it was still a game of cat and mouse, which was keeping Amrani moving forward with his plans to blow up a shitpot of commercial vessels before they entered the Panama Canal. His three predecessors had made mistakes and died, along with their crews. Ali Reza had been brilliant but lost to a superior submarine and a very competent captain.
Amrani had no delusions of being a strategist or an escape artist. He had accepted his fate. He would die this day, but people would go down with him. His old submarine was nothing more than a large suicide vest loaded with torpedoes packed full of time worn Torpex explosives rescued from surplus munition dumps. It sat silently on the bottom in 80 feet of water, just outside the Port of Colón on the Atlantic side of the Panama Canal, next to the wreckage of the Lyon, a sunken schooner from Jamaica, and an unidentified vessel from Havana, Cuba. They collided in 1818, and although there wasn’t much left of either of them, it was a perfect place to park a submarine and not get noticed. Amrani had researched wrecks in the area and found this spot to start his attack. He knew the wrecks would be listed on all the modern submarines’ computer charts.
A large cargo ship, part of the Maersk fleet, was crossing directly in front of Amrani’s Whiskey-class sub. It had a forty-eight-foot draft and made an easy target, even for a ghost vessel of a once mighty wolfpack of the German navy. Fatin Amrani blew ballast and rose to the depth of thirty feet, leveled out, and sent two remanufactured torpedoes directly broadside of the monstrous container ship. Both found their mark and at least one penetrated the second hull, causing instant flooding. Shortly after, it began to list. Even though Amrani didn’t get to see it, the Maersk ship sunk in sixty-five feet of water. Only part of her superstructure remained out of the water. The crew of twenty-one seamen survived with some injuries.
*****
Within minutes of the torpedoes striking the Maersk ship, Commander Richard Somerville got the bad news. On the previous day, England had sent the Royal Navy Type 23 Frigate Warspite II to help ferret out the last remaining jihadist submarine and sink it. It was the perfect ship for the job since its main purpose was submarine detection and warfare.
Regardless of his rank, the men on board called him “Captain Somerville,” out of respect for the position he held as head man on board.
“Look at old wrecks—that’s where I’d hide if I had an old German U-boat. Ping ’em, drop acoustic buoys, and check the computer histories of the shape of the old wrecks,” Somerville said. He walked over to the sonar operators station and looked at the screen for a while. Meanwhile, he directed the ship on a course that took them directly over the site of the two 1818 wrecks. As soon as he got there, he ordered the Warspite II to drop four depth charges right on the wreck. Of course, the sub had moved, but it sent a clear signal to Fatin Amrani that this British ship was out to kill him. If he were spotted, there would be no throw-back depth charges sent overboard; instead, they would launch homing torpedoes, which would be guided to the target. Great Britain had just purchased new Mark 48 self-propelled torpedoes with 650 pounds of explosives in each from the US Navy. Along with the underwater hardware, the British Government had also installed the American Aegis tracking system which could lock on 100 targets at one time.
Richard Somerville knew nothing else besides the Navy. So many Somervilles had been officers in the Royal Navy, going back two hundred years. He was born to do this job. One of the youngest commanders at age 28, this assignment would either propel him to captain’s rank very quickly or glue him to his current rank forever, if he screwed it up. Standing six-feet, three-inches tall, with a handsome face and striking blue eyes, he looked the part of any rank he might strive to achieve. The ocean, ships, war, and the navy ran through his veins, put there by generations of Somerville men.
The explosions right under his ship made him cringe momentarily. One of his great-great uncles had piloted the Lyon at one time, and here he was erasing it, or at the least, disturbing a graveyard of a once-fine vessel. It had been an ostentatious move on Somerville’s part. Make some noise and rattle some sabers. Let your enemy know there is a big, bad ship after you. He wondered if Amrani felt any fear. There should be no doubt that Somerville was out to kill him.
*****
Amrani was treating this mission as one with suicide being the end goal, but only after all the torpedoes had been exhausted, and he had rammed his submarine broadside of any ship unlucky enough to be close by. Now he was by another wreck, recently sunk for divers to explore. All the dangerous doors and hatches had been removed, along with anything else that might snag a diver. He didn’t have to wait long as a huge cruise ship passed by overhead. He moved above the wreck and loaded his forward tubes with four torpedoes, took aim, and ordered the first two torpedoes to be fired.
The cruise ship Mother of the Seas took evasive action, turned in the direction of the torpedoes, and watched as the two fish traveled along each side of the ship and missed it entirely. Both the torpedoes continued on and struck a small cargo ship, sinking it within minutes. Her small crew of nine lost one man. He appeared to have been below when the vessel was struck.
The sub maneuvered out to have another shot at the cruise ship. Amrani’s vessel achieved a perfect set up for two more torpedoes. He fired a T-bone-type strike that couldn’t miss. It couldn’t miss as long as an anti-torpedo chaser hadn’t been launched from the Warspite II. Faster, more accurate, and guided by a system the German submarine captains couldn’t have imagined, the two aged torpedoes were intercepted and destroyed about 100 yards before they struck the cruise ship. The U-boat had already headed down and out. Amrani quickly moved to shelter behind an enormous container ship, submerged just about equal with the big vessel’s draft. It took a little while for Somerville to find it. When he did, four torpedoes were headed his way. Amrani was determined to use his entire arsenal before he was finished. The Warspite II sent out anti-torpedo devices against them and fired one round at the U-Boat, which was diving for cover.
Once close to the bottom of the harbor, the U-boat fired two rounds at the big container ship and two torpedoes at the approaching Royal Navy frigate before the M48 torpedo split the old cold war relic in half. Somerville was able to defend against the two fish traveling towards them, but one of the U-boat rounds found its mark right below the bow of the ship. It began to take on water, but water-tight compartments kept it from both listing and sinking.
Richard Somerville and his crew hovered over the wreck of the U-boat for an hour. Bodies were recovered, but there were no survivors. There were no more jihadist submarines. They were doomed from the beginning due to better-equipped ships and modern equipment. The effort was a gallant attempt, but the militants were woefully outclassed in all areas. They did some damage, but an overall disaster was averted, and all the cruise ships were left unscathed.
The threat of submarines and scud missiles had been eliminated and the battle for the Miraflores was going well, but some of the deadliest weapons of the jihadists’ plot against the Panama Canal had yet to be released.