Debt Of Honor by Clancy, Tom

Clark’s mind was racing, trying to decide if the man was sincere or not.

“We face similar problems, as you have probably heard. The question is,

what do we do now?”

The torment on the man’s face was clear. “I do not know. I asked for this

meeting in the hope that your government will understand that not everyone

here is mad.”

” You must not think of yourself as a traitor, Koga-san,” Clark said after a

moment’s consideration. “Truly you are not. What does a man do when he

feels that his government is taking incorrect action? And you are correct in

your judgment that the possible consequences of this current course of ac-

tion could well be serious. My country has neither the time nor the energy to

waste on conflict, but if it is forced on us, well, then we must react. Now I

must ask you a question.”

“Yes, I know.” Koga looked down at the table. He thought about reach-

ing for his drink, but was too afraid that his hand would shake.

“Will you work with us to prevent this from happening?” This is some-

thing/or somebody a hell of a lot more senior than I am, John told himself,

but he was here, and the senior pukes were not.

“Doing what?”

“I lack the seniority to tell you exactly what that might be, but I can con

vey requests from my government. At the very least we will ask you for

information, and perhaps for influence. You are still respected within gov

ernment circles. You still have friends and allies in the Diet. We will not ask

you to compromise those things. They are too valuable to be thrown away.”

“I can speak out against this madness. I can-”

“You can do many things, Koga-san, but please, for the sake of your

country and mine, please do nothing without first considering the effects you

will achieve by taking action.” My next career change, Clark thought. I’olit-

mil «ninsflor “We arc agreed, me we nol, that I he objective here is to

avoid a major war?”

“Hai.”

“Any fool can start a war,” Chuve/ announced, thanking Providence for

his master’s courses. “It taken » beilei iiuin to prevent one, and it takes care-

ful thought.”

“I will listen to your counsel I tlo not promise you that I will follow it.

But I will listen.”

Clark nodded. “That is all we can ask.” The rest of the meeting was pro-

cedural. Another such rcndc/vous would be loo dangerous. Kimura would

handle messages from this |x»ml on. Clark and Chavez left first, heading

back to their hotel by li It was a very different affair from dealing with

Mohammed Abclul Corp. Kopa was honorable, bright, and wanted to do the

right thing, even it it entailed treason. But John realized that his words to the

man hadn’t just been part of the seduction dance. At a certain point, state

policy became a mailer of conscience, and he was grateful that this man

seemed to have one.

“Straight board shut,” the chief of the boat announced from his post on the

port-forward corner of the attack center. As was normal, the submarine’s

most senior enlisted man was the diving officer. Every opening in the ship’s

hull was closed tight, the red circles on the diving board replaced now with

red hori/.ontul dashes. “Pressure in the boat.”

“All systems aligned and checked for dive. The compensation is entered.

We are rigged for dive,” the OOD announced.

“Okay, let’s take her down. Dive the ship. Make your depth one hundred

feet.” Claggett looked around the compartment, first checking the status

boards, then checking the men. Tennessee hadn’t been underwater for more

than a year. Neither had her crew, and he looked around for any first-dive

nerves as the officer of the deck gave the proper commands for the evolu-

tion. It was normal that a few of the younger men shook their heads, remind-

ing themselves that they were submariners, after all, and supposedly used to

this. The sounds of escaping air made that clear enough. Tennessee took a

gentle five-degree down angle at the bow. For the next few minutes the sub-

marine would be checked for trim to see that the ship was properly balanced

and that all onboard systems really did work, as all tests and inspections had

already made certain. That process required half an hour. Claggett could

well have gone faster, and the next time he certainly would, but for the mo-

ment it was time to get everyone comfortable again.

“Mr. Shaw, come left to new course two-one-zero.”

“Aye, helm, left ten degrees rudder, come to new course two-one-zero.”

The helmsman responded properly, bringing the submarine to her base

course.

“All ahead lull.” Clagjjetl ordered.

“All ahead full, aye.” The full-speed bell would take Tennessee to

twenty-six knots. There were actually four more knots of speed available

with a Hank bell. It was a little-known fact that someone had made a mistake

with the Ohio-class of boomers. Designed for a maximum speed of just over

twenty-six knots, the first full-power trials on the lead boat in the class had

lopped out at just over twenty-nine, and later models had been marginally

taster still. Well, Claggett thought with a smile, the U.S. Navy had never

Iven especially interested in slow ships; they were less likely to dodge out of

harm’s way.

“So far, so good,” Claggett observed to his OOD.

Lieutenant Shaw nodded. Another officer on his way out of the Navy,

he’d been tapped as the boat’s navigator, and having served with Dutch

(‘laggett before, he’d not objected to coming back one more time. “Speed’s

coming up nicely, Cap’n.”

“We’ve been saving a lot of neutrons lately.”

“What’s the mission?”

“Not sure yet, but damned if we aren’t the biggest fast-attack submarine

ever made,” Claggett observed.

“Time to stream.”

“Then do it, Mr. Shaw.”

A minute later the submarine’s lengthy towed-sonar was allowed to de-

ploy aft, guided into the ship’s wake via the starboard-side after diving

plane. Even at high speed, the thin-line array immediately began providing

data to the sonarmen forward of the attack center. Tennessee was at full

speed now, diving deeper to eight hundred feet. The increased water pres-

sure eliminated the chance of cavitation coming off her sophisticated screw

system. Her natural-circulation reactor plant gave off no pump noise. Her

smooth lines created no flow noise at all. Inside, crewmen wore rubber-soled

shoes. Turbines were mounted on decks connected to the hull via springs to

isolate and decouple propulsion sounds. Designed to radiate no noise at all,

and universally referred to even by the fast-attack community as “black

holes,” the class really was the quietest thing man had ever put to sea. Big,

with nowhere near the speed and maneuverability of the smaller attack

boats, Tennessee and her sisters were still ahead in the most important cate-

gory of performance. Even whales had a hard time hearing one.

Force-on-force, Robby Jackson thought again. If that’s impossible, then

what? “Well, if we can’t play this like a prizefight, then we play it like a

card game,” he said to himself, alone in his office. He looked up in surprise,

then realized that he’d heard his own words spoken aloud.

It wasn’t very professional to be angry, but Rear Admiral Jackson was

indulging himself with anger for the moment. The enemy-that was the term

he was using now-assumed that he and his colleagues in J-3 could not con-

struct an effective response to their moves. To them it was a matter of space

and lime anil force. Space was measured in thousands of miles. Time was

being measured in months and years. Force was being measured in divisions

and fleets.

What if they were wrong? Jackson asked himself.

Shemya to Tokyo was two thousand miles. Elmendorf to Tokyo was an-

other thousand. But space was time. Time to them was the number of

months or years required to rebuild a navy capable of doing what had been

done in 1944, but that wasn’t in the cards, and therefore was irrelevant. And

force wasn’t everything you had. Force was what you managed to deliver to

the places that needed to be hit. Everything else was wasted energy, wasn’t

it?

More important still was perception. His adversaries perceived that their

own limiting factors applied to others as well. They defined the contest in

their terms, and if that’s how America played the game, then America would

lose. So his most important task was to make up his own set of rules. And so

he would, Jackson told himself. That’s where he began, on a clear sheet of

unlined white paper, with frequent looks at the world map on his wall.

Whoever had run the night watch at CIA was intelligent enough, Ryan

thought. Intelligent enough to know that information received at three in the

morning could wait until six, which bespoke a degree of judgment rare in the