Coyote could have dealt with the fear alone. But today there were other things on his mind. The confrontation with Magruder, for instance … and the close scrutiny he felt from CAG. The captain seemed determined to find fault with Viper Squadron and its commanding officer, and the extra pressure to perform was the last thing Coyote needed right now. And on top of that Stramaglia was flying as his wingman, and that worried him. The man was a brilliant instructor and a natural fighter jock, but he’d never heard a shot fired in anger in his entire Navy career. Two years behind a Pentagon desk had changed Matt Magruder. What had nearly a decade ashore done to Stramaglia?
Too many worries … too many distractions. Coyote knew what that could do to a pilot. He remembered his first time back up in a Tomcat after the North Korean incident, when the memory of being shot down and captured, the fear of losing Julie, had been overwhelming. The same kind of uncertainty gripped him now.
“Hey, dudes, I got something!” Malibu’s cheerful voice roused him from his reverie. “Bearing three-four-five multiple targets! Multiple targets!”
“Three-four-five …” he heard Nichols muttering over the ICS. “Where …? Yeah! I got ‘em, Skipper! Got ‘em! It’s faint with all this clutter, but I got bogies on the screen!”
Over the radio Coyote heard Stramaglia’s growl. “Tighten up and go to afterburner. This is the real thing!”
“Range is one-for-oh, closing,” Nichols reported. “Angels one.”
“What’s the count?” Coyote asked as he shoved the throttles forward.
“Can’t tell … damn this shit!”
“Easy, John-Boy,” he said with a steady voice that belied his own inner turmoil. Everyone was on edge, not just him. This time there was none of the uncertainty they had felt the day of the Bear hunt, but knowing the score didn’t necessarily make things any easier. The Soviets were far more capable opponents than Libyans or Iraqis or North Koreans.
“Range one-twenty,” someone said on the radio.
“All right, weapons are free,” Stramaglia said. “Let’s get some use out of the Phoenix today.”
Coyote already had his selector switch set to launch the AIM-54 Phoenix. It was the Navy’s longest-ranged air-to-air missile, capable of reaching out and knocking down a target over a hundred nautical miles away. The Tomcat had been specifically designed to carry Phoenix, using the sophisticated AWG-9 radar/fire-control system. Each aircraft in Viper squadron carried four of the deadly missiles plus two Sidewinders for close-in attacks. Given the high success rate of the Phoenix — eighty-five-percent accuracy was the usual figure — the squadron stood a good chance of knocking out most, even all of the Soviet bombers they had detected earlier.
If only they could be sure of the enemy numbers now. The intense jamming could have covered a group breaking off from the main body.
“All right, boys, show ‘em what you’ve got!” Stramaglia said over the radio. “Fight’s on!” That was the traditional call to Top Gun students announcing the beginning of an exercise.
“Got a lock!” Nichols said. “Got a lock!”
Coyote’s finger tightened on the fire control, and a Phoenix leapt from the Tomcat’s wing with a roar of flame and thunder.
CHAPTER 15
“Torpedo! Torpedo in the water!”
Emelyanov looked up at the call from the sonar operator. The atmosphere in the cramped, red-lit control room had been thick with tension ever since the passive towed sonar array had first detected the passing American aircraft above them. It hadn’t taken the enemy long to begin the hunt, using sonobuoys to send out pings of sound that had echoed through the sub’s steel hull. Nonetheless the captain had counted on more time before the hunters triangulated on the Komsomolets Thilsiskiy. Whoever the American was, he’d been incredibly lucky to spot the boat before Emelyanov’s evasive maneuvers had taken him out of harm’s way.
Too late now to dwell on the question of luck. “Take him to three hundred feet,” Emelyanov snapped. “Fire control, ready decoys.”
“Fifteen degrees down angle on planes.” That was Captain-Lieutenant Yuri Borisovich Shvachko, the submarine’s starpom. The Exec picked up a PA microphone and pressed the switch. “Dive! Dive!”
As the deck began to angle downward Emelyanov swallowed and looked across the control room toward the sonar repeater station. “Sonar, report.”
“Range eight hundred meters, closing,” the sailor at the repeater answered promptly. “Bearing one-one-six. Speed fifty knots”
The Americans had dropped the torpedo almost on top of the sub. Emelyanov didn’t waste time cursing. “Helm, come to course one-one-six. Flank speed!”
“Left full rudder. Increase to flank speed.” The Exec’s voice was cold, level, giving away no hint of emotion or concern. Emelyanov felt a flash of admiration for the way the young officer carried himself. Shvachko knew as well as anyone just how risky the maneuver his captain had just ordered really was. It was a testament to the way he had trained all of his crew, officers and seamen alike.
In theory turning into the enemy torpedo was the most effective defense they had. In the best-case scenario, the torp would hit the sub before it had time to arm. At least they might hope to get past it, buy a few more minutes of safety before it could turn around and use its sonar to reacquire and home in on the sub. But it was still incredibly risky.
“Decoys ready, Captain!” the fire-control officer announced.
“Range five hundred, closing,” the sonar operator added.
Emelyanov’s hands gripped the edge of the chart table of their own accord. He could feel the sweat trickling down his face. He had been through countless exercises in preparation for a moment like this, but the reality was nothing like the simulations or the practice runs against Soviet hunters.
“Four hundred … three-fifty … three hundred …”
“Depth now two-twenty-five meters,” the planesman reported.
There was an inversion layer somewhere around 250 meters beneath the surface, a layer of water where the temperature rose sharply. Thermal variations could distort or block sonar signals, providing a narrow pocket of safety where a sub could disappear from its pursuers for a time. If they could get there, they might be able to break contact.
If …
“Range two-fifty … two hundred …” The ping of the torpedo’s active sonar was growing steadily louder and faster as the range closed.
“Fire decoy!” Emelyanov ordered. “Helm, come to course one-two-five!” Silently, he uttered an old prayer his Ukrainian mother had taught him.
His eyes met Dobrotin’s. He wondered for an instant what the zampolit would think if he knew the captain was seeking solace in the religion still officially rejected by the Communist Party despite all the efforts of the liberal reformers.
Then the torpedo struck.
Tombstone Magruder found it hard to believe that they were involved in a battle. There was none of the excitement, the adrenaline, the feeling of life and death hanging on every move they made that characterized the combats he was used to. The Viking crew was cool, professional, almost matter-of-fact as they waited to see the results of their first attack.
“Torpedo running,” Curtis reported. “Running … sub’s put out a decoy now … Hit!” His voice rose suddenly, cracking with sudden emotion for the first time. “That’s got to be a hit, by God!”