Tanaka joined the watchstanders in the control room after viewing the scenario develop on the Second Captain, the sounds of the two American submarines on the sonar sets for the last twenty minutes. Hiro Mazdai had been frantic, asking Tanaka to call battlestations immediately and fire four Nagasaki torpedoes at the contacts.
Tanaka looked at him, knowing the Americans were nearly blind. He had insisted to the officers that they treat the Americans with caution, and caution might seem to dictate that the enemy submarines be fired at immediately upon detection ten kilometers before. But to Tanaka the height of fear was not equivalent to caution.
Firing Nagasakis blindly was foolish and had no meaning. He wanted to sneak up on the Americans, determine their range, speed and course precisely, then put the four Nagasakis out, two per submarine, when he knew exactly where in the ocean the enemy subs were. That was caution.
He also refused to man battlestations. That just made noise and put the crew in a trigger-happy mood. They needed to be able to fight a prolonged war from their normal steaming watch sections, he insisted. They were panicky now with the first American in their sights, but there would be more, many more, perhaps another dozen or two dozen, and Tanaka would train the officers to consider this almost routine. Precise, controlled, cautious, planned, and routine. This was a time for the mind, not the stomach, he told Mazdai.
The conning officer. Lieutenant Commander Kami, had driven the ship slowly closer, keeping his eye open for a maneuver by the Americans. Not that he was concerned if the American submarines fired at him. Their torpedoes were of little consequence. The Destiny II class had a computer-controlled SCM sonar system in the bow and the stern. The SCM, sonar countermeasures, was an electronic ventriloquist that could confuse any American torpedo. When the torpedo pinged a sonar pulse at them the SCM ventriloquist sonar would hear it, electronically modify it and send out a return pulse precisely shifted in frequency, distorted and sent early, all arranged to arrive so as to confuse the pinging sonar system. Any incoming torpedo that encountered their SCM system would turn in circles, as confused as a blind sheepdog, or blow up in the middle of the sea.
And even if one of their inferior torpedoes did close range in spite of the SCM system, the Two class could take a hit of that size and not sink. It would take several direct hits to put a Two class, with its double hull, down for good. A single direct hit would be an inconvenience, perhaps even shut down the Second Captain for a few scary moments, but beyond that there was little to fear from the Americans.
Finally it was time to attack. The ship was in position, the targets’ locations and speeds and courses absolutely known to the Second Captain, the Nagasaki torpedoes warm and ready to fire. Tanaka considered giving the order to fire from his stateroom but rejected the idea.
He put on his uniform tunic, buttoned the high collar, straightened his hair and proceeded to the control room.
The eyes of the men met his, and to his disgust they all showed fear. Even Mazdai seemed nervous.
“Mr. First,” Tanaka said, “launch Nagasaki torpedoes one and two at the southwestern American, torpedoes three and four at the American bearing west, presets as indicated in the Second Captain.”
“Aye, Captain,” Mazdai said, looking grateful to finally be doing something.
The torpedoes were away.
Tanaka did not stay to monitor their progress. He walked back along the central passageway to his stateroom and sat down at the Second Captain console to watch the torpedoes as they sped to the targets. He selected the upper display to the sonar-detection system, already forgetting about these first two Americans, concentrating instead on finding the next American boats.
Pastor was still on the sonar console when the trace showed up on the screen. He placed the electronic cursor on it and listened. It was definitely man-made, a tremendous whooshing noise.
“We’ve got something here,” he told Hazelton. The sonar tech put his cursor on it.
Pastor noted that the trace diverged into two, then three, finally four. Two of the traces moved across the screen as they were going quickly across Birmingham’s bow. The other remained at a constant bearing. Hazelton clicked his boom microphone to the control speaker circuit.
“Conn, Sonar, torpedo in the water, bearing zero seven zero! I say again, torpedo in the water—”
Pastor threw his headset down and ran through the door to control, where he found the officer of the deck standing on the conn with his hand in his pocket and his mouth open, paralyzed by what the instructors at Prospective Commanding Officer school referred to as the “aw shit factor.” It wasn’t that Strait was panicking, his mind was simply overwhelmed, overloaded with data. He had to take in the notion of the incoming torpedo before he could react to it, and this was so far outside his experience level that it could take up to three seconds for him to process the information.
Pastor had no such time lag. He was full of adrenaline as he went to the conn.
“All ahead flank! Maneuvering cavitate! Right fifteen degrees rudder, steady course two five zero! Dive, make your depth one thousand feet! Ready the Mark 21 countermeasure in the aft signal ejector! Load the forward signal ejector with SLOT buoy marked’code 3.”
For the next thirty seconds Pastor kicked his crew, getting them over the shock, getting them moving. Thirty seconds after that there was no more to do. He had bumped reactor power to 100 percent at flank speed, he had dived deeper to 1000 feet to keep the screw from boiling up sheets of bubbles that would add to their noise signature, he had launched a countermeasure that simulated the sounds of the ship and he had turned and run from the torpedo. All that was left was to launch the signal ejector’s radio buoy that would notify Admiral Pacino they were under attack. He hesitated, knowing that to launch the radio buoy was an admission of defeat, that that could be the last thing anyone would ever hear from the USS Birmingham.
“Launch the SLOT buoy in the forward signal ejector.”
“Launch forward signal ejector, aye, sir,” Strait said, punching the red mushroom button, the radio buoy now away.
Pastor leaned over the pos-two display; the junior officer of the deck was trying to rig a solution to the firing submarine, assuming it had fired from the bearing that the torpedo was first detected. But when that assumed solution was compared to the bearing to the Jacksonville set up on pos three, any torpedo Birmingham fired at the enemy would pass right by Jacksonville first.
Pastor was not about to give up trying. Just because the firing Destiny submarine was on the other side of Jacksonville did not mean that he couldn’t fire. It just meant that the torpedo would need to remain in transit mode until it was on the other side of the friendly submarine.
There was a problem — his knowledge of the position of the Jacksonville was based on her preattack position. Just as he had maneuvered Birmingham in response to the torpedo, he knew Jack Stolz would be maneuvering Jacksonville to get away from the torpedoes launched at her from the Destiny. That was what those other two contacts had been.
Still, he might be able to get a solution on the Jacksonville and avoid putting a torpedo in her. He set up pos three in dot-stacked mode, all the while dimly aware of his crew filing into the room for battlestations, the immediate action they took when a torpedo in the water was called. Someone handed Pastor a headset. He put it on, still adjusting the knobs on pos three, anchoring Jacksonville’s position at the time it zigged, maneuvered away from the torpedo. There was a minute or two of data that was garbage since that was during the time that Birmingham was also maneuvering. Sweat poured off Pastor’s face and dripped onto the console. He wiped it away, concentrating as hard as he ever had in his life on the firecontrol display in front of him, trying to visualize the sea above, the location of the hostile sub, its position relative to the Jacksonville, where Jacksonville would turn after the torpedo was fired at her. The tactical problem was turning into a nightmare, and suddenly it began to matter less when the sounds of the torpedo sonar pulse cut into the control room, the sonar noise as loud as a referee’s whistle blown a foot from his ear, the sound piercing and painful. It kept up, a short blast every fifteen seconds, each one closer. Pastor sweated over the solution to the Jacksonville, finally felt comfortable with it. He glanced down at the pos two screen, the assumed solution to the firing ship based on the bearing to the incoming torpedo, then compared that with the solution to the Jacksonville.