The captain ordered his submarine to stay above the layer, able to duck beneath it in seconds. The tactical display was evolving now. He had a workable bearing on Kirov. Almost good enough to shoot on, though he still needed range data. There seemed to be a pair of escorts between him and the cruiser, and unless he had a proper range estimate, any missile he launched at the Soviet flagship might attack a destroyer or frigate by mistake. In the interim, the solution on the attack director set the Harpoons to fly straight for what he believed to be the battle cruiser Kirov.
Chicago began to zigzag left and right of her course track. As the submarine changed her position, the bearing to her sonar contacts changed also. The tracking party could use the submarine’s own course deviation as a baseline to compute ranges to the various contacts. A straightforward process-essentially an exercise in high-school trigonometry-it nevertheless took time because they had to estimate the speed and course of the moving targets. Even computer support couldn’t make the process go much faster, and one of his quartermasters took great pride in his ability to use a circular slide rule and race the computer to a hard solution.
The tension seemed to grow by degrees, then it plateaued. The years of training were paying off. Data was handled, plotted, and acted upon in seconds. The crew suddenly seemed a physical part of the gear they were operating, their feelings shut off, their emotions submerged, only the sweat on their foreheads betraying that they were men after all, and not machines. They depended absolutely on their sonar operators. Sound energy was their only indication of what was happening, and each new bearing report triggered furious activity. It was clear that their targets were zigzagging, which made the range computations even more difficult.
“Conn, sonar! Active sonobuoy close aboard to port! Below the layer, I think.”
“Right full rudder, all ahead two-thirds,” the executive officer ordered instantly.
McCafferty went to sonar and plugged in a set of headphones. The pings were loud but . . . distorted, he thought. If the buoy was below the temperature gradient, the signals radiating upward would be unable to detect his submarine-probably. “Signal strength?” he asked.
“Strong,” the chief replied. “Even money they might have picked us up. Five hundred yards farther out and they lose us for sure.”
“Okay, they can’t monitor them all at once.”
The XO moved Chicago a thousand yards before returning to base course. Overhead, they knew, was a Bear-F ASW aircraft armed with homing torpedoes and a crew whose job it was to listen to the sonobuoy signals. How good were the buoys and the men? That was one thing that they didn’t know. Three tense minutes passed and nothing happened.
“All ahead one-third, come left to three-two-one,” the executive officer ordered. They were now through the line of buoys. Three more such lines were between them and their target. They’d nearly determined range for three of the escorts, but not to the Kirov yet.
“Okay, people, the Bears are behind us. That’s one less thing to worry about. Range to the nearest ship?” he asked the approach officer.
“Twenty-six thousand yards. We think he’s a Sovremenny. The Kresta is about five thousand yards east of him. He’s pinging away with hull and VDS sonars.” McCafferty nodded. The variable-depth sonar would be below the layer and had scant chance of detecting them. The hull sonar they’d have to pay attention to, but it wouldn’t be a problem for a while yet. Okay, the captain thought, things are going pretty much according to the plan-
“Conn, sonar, torpedoes in the water, bearing three-two-zero! Signal faint. Say again torpedoes in the water, three-two-zero, bearing changing —additional, lots of active sonars just lit up. We’re getting increased screw noises for all contacts.” McCafferty was in the sonar room before the report ended.
“Torpedo bearing change?”
“Yes! Moving left-to-right-Jesus, I think somebody’s attacking the Russians. Impact!” The chief jabbed his finger at the display. A series of three bright spokes appeared right on the bearing to Kirov. The display suddenly went berserk. The high-and medium-frequency segment lit up with active sonar lines. The lines indicating ships became brighter as the ships increased engine speeds and changed direction as they began to maneuver.
“Secondary explosion on this contact-holy shit! Lots of explosions in the water now. Depth charges, maybe, something’s really ripping the water up. There’s another torpedo-way off, bearing changing right to left.”
The display was now too complex for McCafferty to follow. The chief expanded the time scale to allow easier interpretation, but only he and his experienced operators could understand it.
“Skipper, it looks like somebody just got inside on them and launched an attack. He got three solid hits on Kirov, and now they’re trying to beat on him. These two ships appear to be converging on something. Another torpedo in the water, don’t know whose. Gawd, look at all these explosions!”
McCafferty went aft.
“Periscope depth, now!” Chicago angled upward, taking a minute to reach her position.
He saw what might have been a mast on the horizon, and a column of black smoke, bearing three-two-zero. Over twenty radars were operating along with a number of voice radios.
“Down scope. We have any target solutions?”
“No, sir,” the XO answered. “When they started maneuvering, all our data went to hell.”
“How far to the next sonobuoy line?”
“Two miles. We’re positioned to run right through a gap.”
“Make your depth eight hundred feet. Ahead full, move us in.”
Chicago’s engines sprang into life, accelerating the submarine to thirty knots. The executive officer dived the boat to eight hundred feet, ducking deep below a sonobuoy set for shallow search. McCafferty stood over the chart table, took a pen from his pocket, and unconsciously began chewing on the plastic end as he watched his sub’s course take him closer and closer to the enemy formation. Sonar performance dropped virtually to nil with the high speed, but soon the low-frequency sounds of the exploding ordnance echoed through the steel hull. Chicago ran for twenty minutes, zigzagging slightly to avoid the Russian sonobuoys, as the firecontrol men kept updating their solutions.
“Okay, all ahead one-third and take her back up to periscope depth,” McCafferty said. “Tracking party, stand by for a firing run.”
The sonar picture cleared up rapidly. The Soviets were continuing to hunt frantically for whoever had fired at their flagship. One ship’s trace was entirely gone-at least one Russian ship had been sunk or crippled. Explosions rippled through the water, punctuated by the screeing sound of homing torpedoes. All were close enough to be a matter of real concern.
“Shooting observation. Up scope!”
The search periscope slid upward. McCafferty caught it low and swept the horizon. “I-Jesus!” The TV monitor showed a Bear only half a mile to their right, heading north for the formation. He could see seven ships, mainly mast tops, but one Sovremenny-class destroyer was hull-down, perhaps four miles away. The smoke he’d seen before was gone. The water resounded with the noise of Russian sonars.
“Raise the radar, power-up, and stand by.”
A petty officer pushed the button to raise the submarine’s surface-search radar, activated the system, but kept it in standby mode.
“Energize and give me two sweeps,” the captain ordered. There was a real danger here. The Soviets would almost certainly detect the submarine’s radar and try to attack it.
The radar was on for a total of twelve seconds. It “painted” a total of twenty-six targets on the screen, two of them close together about where he would have expected Kirov to be. The radar operator read off ranges and bearing, which were entered into the Mk-117 fire-control director and relayed to the Harpoon missiles in the torpedo tubes, giving them bearing to target and the range at which to switch on their seeker-heads. The weapons officer checked his status lights, then selected the two most promising targets for the missiles.
“Set!”
“Flood tubes.” McCafferty watched the weapons-panel operator go through the launch sequence. “Opening outer doors.”
“Solution checked and valid,” the weapons officer said calmly. “Firing sequence: two, one, three.”
“Shoot!” McCafferty ordered.
“Fire two.” The submarine shuddered as the powerful impulse of high-pressure air ejected the weapon from the tube, followed by the whoosh of water entering the void. “Fire one . . . fire three. Two, one, and three fired, sir. Torpedo tube doors are shut, pumping out to reload.”
“Reload with Mark-48s. Prepare to fire Tomahawks!” McCafferty said. The fire-control men switched the attack director over to activate the bow-mounted missiles.
“Up scope!” The quartermaster spun the control wheel. McCafferty let it come all the way up. He could see the smoke trail of the last Harpoon, and right behind it . . . McCafferty slapped the periscope handles up and stepped back. “Helix heading in! Take her down, all ahead flank!” The submarine raced downward. A Soviet antisub helicopter had seen the missile launch and was racing in at them. “Left full rudder.”