The MiG strained as it pulled out of the dive. The G-forces drained the blood from his face.
The missile abruptly diverted its course away from him.
As Volontov regained control and began climbing, he wondered about the sincerity of the missile battery commander aboard that ship.
He was not certain that it was only a warning shot.
“Yes, General Eisenach, we launched a missile. Purely a warning. It was diverted in the last moments.”
Adm. Gerhard Schmidt was in his flag plot, one deck below the bridge of the Hamburg. The large, thickly padded chair in which he sat was fastened to the deck, but it could swivel between the large port which gave him a view of the sea to the two-meter electronic plotting screen mounted on the interior bulkhead. The screen was now relatively quiet. The wells were indicated as yellow squares. His battle group, comprised of the Hamburg and two destroyers, was shown in green. The two Tornados were just leaving the screen, headed south.
Eisenach mulled that over. “First a Greenpeace ship, now an airplane.”
“There were two airplanes.”
“Visible on radar. American aircraft?”
“No, General. They were Soviets. Most likely a Foxbat and a Fulcrum, according to the radar and infrared signatures.”
“Damn it, Gerhard! The Soviets, now?”
“They were far off their normal reconnaissance runs over the North Sea.” Schmidt sat low in his chair, his elbows placed firmly on the soft armrests. He tapped a forefinger against the earlobe of his jutting left ear. “My assumption was that the Foxbat was taking pictures. This is the first time we have encountered aircraft, and we followed standing policy in challenging them, but the Fulcrum pilot was exceptionally aggressive. He attacked the Tornados.”
“He fired on them?”
“No. But he was not frightened by our airborne tactics. Tactics devised by the air force, I remind you.”
“So you took it upon yourself to order a launch?” Eisenach’s tone carried his agitation.
“They are no longer here.”
“But, Gerhard, rest assured that they will be back.”
Schmidt was left listening to the carrier wave.
He shrugged to himself. He had a large number of missiles available.
Developing photographs aboard Themis was not a simple task. Specialized equipment had been devised which allowed the film to be placed in small compartments, a door closed, then the chemicals released into the compartment. After the prescribed amount of time, the chemicals were sucked out of the compartment. It was time-consuming, and Amy Pearson had spent most of her morning developing the hundreds of pictures — each of them marked with time and coordinates in the upper right-hand corner-brought back by the three Makosharks.
After they were developed, she passed them under a video camera, transferring the images to the more manipulative medium of computer-based imaging. Then she followed the corridors and hatchways back to the Radio Shack in the Command Center to pore over them on one of the consoles.
Donna Amber was standing the morning communications shift, succeeding Sgt. Don Curtis. As soon as Pearson appeared in the hatchway, Amber said, “Colonel, Don Curtis left me a message for you. Says you might want to review the radar tapes.”
“For when, Donna?”
“Uh, let’s see. Nine to nine-fifteen our time, concentrating on the Greenland region.”
“Okay, bring it up, please.”
The radar aboard Themis, with its ninety-foot-wide antenna housed in the massive fiberglass pod on Spoke Fifteen, could radiate up to fifteen million watts of energy, drawing on the nuclear reactor. At full output, it had over 400 miles of range, but that energy usage also dimmed all of the lights and slowed all of the electronic devices aboard the station. It also affected the sensitive instruments on aerospace craft within fifty miles of the satellite.
It was normally operated, from the radar operator’s compartment in the hub, at low power settings, with a range of 215 miles, almost the same distance as the altitude of Themis above the earth. Using I-Band for lateral tracking and G-Band for altitude tracking, the radar was chiefly useful for guiding HoneyBee rockets to docking slots. A few high-flying aircraft or a few rocket launches from Vandenburg Air Force Base, Cape Canaveral, or Baikonur Cosmodrome were sometimes recorded when the Department of Defense had a particular interest. The radar’s computer could scan and track simultaneously, tracking up to 120 targets at the same time. The radar was a key ingredient in the Satellite Defense Initiative system, though that program had now taken on a lower priority.
At 220 miles of scan, the ground clutter reflections, unless over relatively uninhabited areas, could be confusing. The computer filtered out much of the clutter, but with so many targets at surface level, a radar operator could get dizzy.
Because of the orbital rate of Themis, there was a continual movement of the tracking area above the earth. The Greenland region would have been under radar surveillance for less than twenty minutes.
Amber touched an intercom button. “Macklin, you awake?”
“Radar, Mizz Amber.” The title was drawn out, reflecting Sgt. Joe Macklin’s attitude toward the spat he and Donna Amber were having. Pearson had been monitoring it, alert to undue personnel problems.
“Colonel Pearson wants to see last night’s tape. Start it at nine o’clock.”
“Right. Coming up on channel twelve, Sergeant.”
Pearson grabbed a floating tether and pulled herself close to the terminal. She tapped “one-two” into the channel selector board.
The image was manic, radar sweep and blips zipping as the tape was backed up in high-speed reverse.
It stopped, jerked forward, then ran at normal speed.
Amber watched a duplicate on her own screen.
The operator last night had extended the range as soon as he saw radar returns that looked suspicious to him. They appeared on the bottom left of the screen, slowly crossing the screen upward and to the left as Themis moved inexorably toward the south and the earth rotated.
An airborne blip just west of well number fifteen abruptly turned and started climbing fast. Well over Mach 2, Pearson thought. The altitude readout next to the blip showed forty, then fifty, then sixty thousand feet.
“That’s got to be a Foxbat,” Amber said.
“I think you’re right, Donna. And he’s running from something.”
A second aircraft, some twenty-five miles behind the first, turned left, making almost a full circle.
Two blips, so close together they were almost melded, appeared at the bottom of the screen.
“That’s what they’re running from,” Amber said.
“A patrol flight.”
The images were now centered on the screen. Pearson could count all of the wells. Perhaps twelve ships in the area, though the background was snowy.
The single blip dove on the German planes.
Attack?
No. Maybe. The Germans planes parted and dove away.
Seconds later, a new target appeared, separating from one of the ships. It climbed quickly, leaning toward the single aircraft.
“Seaborne missile launch,” Pearson said.
“Damn.”
Then there was a flurry of darting blips, which merged, then separated. Finally, the radar return of the missile faded away as it apparently exploded harmlessly. The single aircraft, now at a much lower altitude, accelerated toward the east, climbing.
Pearson touched the intercom button.
“Radar.”
“Sergeant Macklin, get me a speed and heading on each of the aircraft.”