As his hearing came back, fire and flood alarms rang throughout the ship. He climbed out of the combat information center and hobbled up a ladder to the bridge to look out at his fleet. Plumes of black smoke rose from at least half of the ships within view. Some were missing altogether.
Then another hypersonic missile slammed into his ship, incinerating him and everyone nearby.
40
David watched as General Schwartz was piped into the Silversmith operations center via secure video conference.
“Susan, David, you’ve got exactly two minutes. What information do you need to pass?”
“Sir, we’re reading communications between PLA battlefield commanders and the Chinese military high command. General Chen and his leadership are now aware that their satellite networks are unreliable. They’ve ordered all Chinese military units to disconnect from satellite-based datalink.”
General Schwartz was surrounded by men in various versions of camouflage utility uniforms. Behind him was the massive tactical operations floor at SOUTHCOM.
“This was expected.”
“Yes, sir. Soon we’ll stop being privy to Chinese military comms. But you need to know that the Chinese military has received orders to begin a large-scale air attack on American units. Chinese fighters and bombers are being scrambled, and all remaining Chinese naval forces are being moved in toward the littorals to support.”
“Understood.”
“One more thing, sir. The Chinese have sent word to their Russian military counterparts. Russian strategic forces are on high alert.”
General Schwartz was like a machine processing information. He spoke to someone off camera. All David could hear was “Recommended COA?”
Someone David couldn’t see replied, “Those targets in Costa Rica are still critical to defeat. We could divert some air assets to…” David couldn’t hear the rest. Military generals hatching out plans and deciding where to move their pieces.
General Schwartz looked up at the screen. “We’re setting ARCHANGEL Phase Two in motion.”
The video call ended.
Immediately after the video call with David, General Schwartz’s air operations staff contacted the strike warfare commander for Operation ARCHANGEL. In the last-minute scramble that always took place during important military operations, screaming men and women in various military operations centers began bargaining with their counterparts in other services and intelligence organizations. Not the least of which was the NSA’s ultra-secret cell filled with cyber operations specialists who had tapped into the Chinese datalink. They were now providing new, last-minute targeting information to American and allied air assets.
The targeting data and mission orders were transmitted to US military units at bases around the world.
This included several remote airfields in Canada.
“A moose! Hightower, check it out, man. I finally saw a moose!”
“That’s great, Jack.” Major Chuck “Hightower” Mason taxied his B-1 to the hold short line of runway three-one at Gander International Airport.
For weeks they had been waiting here in the Canadian wilderness, sleeping in camouflaged trailer barracks that the US Army had set up. Tarps covered their aircraft to make them invisible to overhead surveillance.
Hundreds of jets had been sent here the night of the faux attack on US military bases. Fighters and bombers. Transports filled with maintenance personnel, equipment, and parts. All communication to and from Gander had been cut off for security reasons. No one had spoken to their families since arrival. Their location was classified.
Half the US Air Force had been hidden away in places like Gander, Newfoundland, and a half-dozen other remote locations throughout Canada. Gander, the same place where thirty-eight commercial aircraft were diverted to on September 11, 2001, now held over four hundred American fighters and several squadrons of bombers.
Tonight, they were finally leaving.
Hightower looked out through his cockpit window as hundreds of aircraft performed the elephant walk, the slow taxi toward the runway that was normally used to train for massive sorties. But this wasn’t training. This was a colossal, simultaneous alert launch.
“I got to tell you, Hightower, I’m sure glad I saw a moose before we left. I mean, if we get sent to Canada, I better see some wildlife, you know? Aside from these dumb fighter pilots that we got stuck with.”
Hightower allowed himself a glance. The antlered animal strolled down a nearby road, seemingly oblivious to the thunderous engine noise erupting from the runway every few seconds as the jets took off.
Soon entire squadrons were blasting into the night sky, led by F-35s from the 4th Fighter Squadron, the Fighting Fuujins. Then F-15Es from the 336th Fighter Squadron, the Rocketeers. Hundreds of others followed, including Hightower’s B-1. Canadian air force aircraft also thundered upward, joining their American partners in the transit south. The same thing was occurring at several other airfields across Canada, as well as US bases that hadn’t been part of the deception.
Victoria and Plug had gone from rags to riches. Three days earlier, they had been told that the Navy was reactivating old frigates and refitting them after being in mothballs for so long. Instead, the helicopter squadrons waiting at NAS Jacksonville and NS Mayport were told to join up with the sortied ships of the Atlantic fleet. Ships that, until recently, had been thought damaged or destroyed.
Now they were on DDG-1001, the USS Michael Monsoor. One of the three Zumwalt-class destroyers, the sleek and modern ship cut through the deep blue waters north of Cuba. The USS Michael Monsoor, after traveling through the Panama Canal to the Atlantic several months ago, was one of the ships reportedly damaged beyond repair during the submarine attack on Norfolk.
But that, like so much else, was a ruse.
Plug made the radio call. “MONSOOR control, good morning, Jaguar 600 with you twenty miles to your east at angels one, one dipper, ten difars, two torpedoes, and a partridge in a pear tree.”
“Jaguar, Monsoor control, kick channel four.”
“Roger.”
Plug switched them to a secure communications channel, and they began working with the ship’s tactical airborne controller to help visually identify all of the unknown contacts nearby.
“Jaguar 600, Monsoor control, we’ve just received a one-hour time-late location on a possible submarine. Standby for coordinates.”
The data was transmitted from the ship to the helicopter, and Plug immediately set up their navigational information to direct them there.
“Coming left,” said Victoria, and she banked the aircraft hard left. “Dropping to five hundred feet.”
“Roger five hundred.”
She lowered the collective power lever with her left hand and felt a flutter as the rotor angle changed and they began losing altitude, flying toward an enemy submarine. Victoria tried to keep her thoughts clear, but flashes of her dark past once again crept into her mind’s eye. The submarine attack that had sunk the Stockdale. The submarine attack that had killed her father on the Ford. She began breathing heavier.
“Boss.” Plug was looking at her, his visor up. “You good?”
Victoria glanced over at her copilot and nodded quickly. “Yup.”
Just keep flying.
41
David and his team ate and slept in the Silversmith building for the next few days, on call in case Susan or anyone else needed their expertise as their plans were executed. Most of the team remained in the huddle rooms, reading or talking. Trying not to worry as the clock ticked away. David and Henry, the only ones authorized to be in the Silversmith operations center, returned to give the larger group updates every few hours. But now they had returned to observe.