Control room, U.S.S. Galveston
Fifty miles Northwest of Trondheim, Norway
Commander Mark Colby stretched his long legs under the chart table and
listened to the low voices of the men manning Galveston’s control room
stations. He was tall for a submariner, and was developing a perpetual stoop
from the cramped conditions he had to endure as part of the Silent Service.
Sometimes Colby thought he had been born into the wrong era. He would
have felt at home commanding one of the old-time frigates in the age of Jones
or Preble, pacing the quarterdeck and feeling the wind on his cheek as his
command maneuvered under full sail to close the range with her quarry and
unleash the fury of her broadside.
But there wasn’t room to pace the confines of an attack sub’s control
room, so Colby had to be content with sitting still and listening to terse
reports and his Exec’s crisp, precise orders.
Still, Galveston had one thing in common with the frigates of Colby’s
idle daydreams. When she had closed to the appropriate range, she could let
loose a devastating broadside of her own.
In this case, the broadside would take the form of six Tomahawk TLAM
missiles, each carrying a warhead with more sheer destructive power than a
whole fleet of vessels from the days of wooden ships and iron men. The
Tomahawk cruise missile had proven itself in the Gulf War, forming a powerful
part of the initial bombardment that had opened the air war against Iraq.
While tonight’s attack would be nothing near the scope of that assault,
flights of the deadly missiles from Galveston and her sister ship Bangor would
surely disrupt their target and cause plenty of damage to keep the Russians
occupied while Admiral Tarrant launched the main attack of Operation Ragnarok.
When the orders had first come in from the admiral, tight-beamed and
bounced off a passing satellite to reduce the chance the subs would be
detected, Colby had been disappointed that Galveston’s role was essentially
diversionary. She carried cruise missiles for antiship attacks as well as the
TLAMs, after all. But on careful consideration he had finally decided the
admiral was right. The Soviets possessed both ASW and anti-air abilities that
would have sharply curtailed a sub-launched attack. Galveston wouldn’t have
been able to get in close enough to launch a short-range sneak attack, but a
missile launch from longer range would have run into the antimissile defenses
of the Soviet ships escorting the critical troop transports. Galveston just
didn’t have enough missiles to saturate those defenses … the whole carrier
battle group probably couldn’t have done that, even with the missile capacity
of the Aegis cruiser.
In a situation like this, even the smart weapons of modern high-tech
warfare couldn’t match the smartest weapon of them all–the pilot in the
cockpit of an attack airplane. That was the weapon best suited for
penetrating the enemy defenses in this conflict.
Lieutenant Commander Richard Damien looked across the chart table at him.
“Time, Skipper,” he said. “All tubes loaded and ready.”
“What about our friends?” Colby asked.
Damien frowned. “Still at the edge of detection range. I think we can
outrun them if we have to.”
For several hours they’d been dodging a Russian squadron working up and
down the Norwegian coast, apparently searching close in to shore for submarine
activity. No doubt the Norwegian navy had been giving the Soviets headaches
by slipping some of their small conventionally powered coastal subs in behind
the Russian fleet to play havoc with supply ships. If Colby had been free to
choose the time for the launch, he would have waited to see if the Soviets
moved further off, but the admiral’s timetable was tight. “Fire all,” he said
softly.
“Fire all! Fire all!” Damien called, and the bridge talker took up the
chant and relayed the message to the weapons officer. Seconds later the
submarine shuddered as the Tomahawk missiles left her torpedo tubes in quick
succession.
“Come to course two-one-five,” Colby went on. “Make her depth two
hundred feet, and go to maximum revs.”
As Galveston started her turn, the missiles broke the surface above her,
and leapt skyward with their rocket motors lighting up the long, dim twilight