critical to both sides at this point, gentlemen. As long as it’s in friendly
hands we have a point of reentry into Norway, and the Soviets know it.
Everything boils down now to how long Lindstrom can hold out there.”
“Without effective air?” Stramaglia snorted. “The Russkies’ll pry them
out of there inside a week.”
Aiken nodded. “That’s our estimation, Captain. At the moment they are
overextended, but once they’ve consolidated their position they are sure to
muster enough strength to threaten Bergen.”
“Thank you for your rundown, Commander,” Tarrant said, moving back toward
the podium. The lights came up as Aiken took his seat in the front row.
“Gentlemen, that’s the situation as it stands now … but there is one
important addition Commander Aiken didn’t mention. Yesterday evening, the
White House received a communique from the Soviet government reiterating their
position that the conflict in Norway is a strictly local matter. In addition,
they have declared that all foreign military vessels should stay clear of the
Norwegian Sea in an area defined by the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom line,
extended from the Scottish coast to Jutland. I believe the phrase they used
was ‘to avoid accidental escalation of the current regional hostilities.’ In
essence they are saying that any warship entering their exclusion zone is
liable to come under attack.”
“But that undermines the whole principal of freedom of the seas,” the
captain of the John A. Winslow, Commander Robert Jackson, said incredulously.
“I mean, that was one of the things we were fighting for in the Indian Ocean,
wasn’t it? Do the Russians really think we’d accept something like that?”
Tarrant spread his hands. “The Soviets have never understood our theory
of seapower, Captain,” he said. “I doubt if they realize how critical this
issue is to American strategic thinking. In any event, it seems to have hit
home in Washington. The new orders I received last night call on us to take
the battle group into the Norwegian Sea in direct opposition to the exclusion
zone the Russians have laid down.”
“Then we’re going in to help Norway, Admiral?” Commander Bart Thompson of
the frigate Stephen Decatur asked.
“Not yet, Captain,” Tarrant told him. “The Rules of Engagement are very
clear. We’re to test the Russian determination to keep us out of the
Norwegian Sea, but we only fire if fired upon. The decision to actively
support Norway hasn’t been made yet.”
“Hell, there might not be a Norway if we don’t do something soon,”
Captain Brandt said harshly. “Can’t they see that?”
Tarrant fixed him with a cold look. “We’re not talking about Saddam
Hussein or the North Koreans this time, Captain,” he said in a quiet voice.
“No matter how much things have changed since the Wall came down, these are
still the Russians we’re up against this time around. If we push too hard,
too fast, we could end up with nukes flying.”
There was a mutter of agreement around the room. Suddenly the specter of
World War III was back among them, closer and more real than it had been since
the face-off between Kennedy and Khrushchev. It was sobering to think where
this confrontation in Scandinavia might lead.
And Carrier Battle Group 14 was sailing right into the middle of it all.
CHAPTER 7
Tuesday, 10 June, 1997
1543 hours Zulu (1343 hours Zone)
Hangar deck, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson
The North Atlantic
“What’s the status on this one, Chief?” Tombstone Magruder had to shout
over the din that echoed through Jefferson’s cavernous hangar deck.
Stretching for two thirds of the carrier’s 1,092-foot length and fully two
decks high, the huge chamber was crowded with aircraft and the men from
Department V who were in charge of maintaining and outfitting them. As
always, being down here gave Magruder a sense of just how small a part the
aviators and NFOs really played in the operation of the carrier Air Wing.
From plane captains down to purple-shirted “grapes” who handled refueling on
the flight deck, these men regarded those aircraft as their own … and quite
rightly. Without them, the aviators couldn’t fly.
The brown-shirted plane captain whose name Tombstone hadn’t caught over
the noise of the hangar deck gestured at the wing of the A-6E Intruder in