Yet not alone…. There were other lions on the prowl, loping their way towards the grey dawn, and Karpov, Kirov and all the rest, were going to meet them.
Chapter 32
The conversation between Karpov and Harada was short and cold. The two men had spoken earlier, each one baiting and taunting the other, and this was no different.
“What brings you to my hunting grounds?” said Karpov. “I thought I was clear about what would happen to you if you ever darkened my horizon again.”
“It seems you paid a visit to our naval facilities at Truk recently,” said Harada. “Yet you left without paying the bill. I’m here to collect.”
At that Karpov literally laughed. “Oh? What are you going to do here, Captain, throw chopsticks at me? Don’t be stupid. You’re no threat to me now, and you know it. And neither is that Seahawk you have up there looking for me. Thanks for the tip-off on your location.”
“We can see your helo up as well,” said Harada. “You’re getting sloppy, Karpov. I’ve got a fix on your 226 to within a 9 second certainty, and that nice fat battlecruiser of yours makes an easy target.”
“For what? We can count, Captain. You threw 8 SSMs at us, and the last we heard, your class has no internal magazines for reloads. Forgive me for pointing out the obvious, but it’s a long way to your home port in 2021, and I don’t think you made the trip lately.”
Both sides had helos up, each looking for the other. They saw each other clearly enough on their radars, but neither had acquired a surface ship contact. The Seahawk off Takami had moved out about 50 nautical miles from the ship, and it located the KA-226 Karpov had launched for maritime surveillance, pegging its position 220 miles slightly southeast of Ponape.
Behind Takami, Admiral Kita’s task force was moving in two groups, cruising at a sedate 20 knots, with every ship observing EMCON, running dark. Their helos and planes were all armed and ready for the fight, and it appeared that Captain Harada’s plan had worked just as he imagined it would. Kita had the destroyer Kirishima out in front, followed by Takami’s sister ship Atago. Behind them came Akagi and Kaga, trailed by the destroyer Kongo. About 20 nautical miles behind this formation, the new DD escort Takao led the fleet replenishment ship Omi, which was attended by the old helicopter destroyer Kurama. They were all on a heading of 195 south, but when Takami sent over the presumed location of the KA-226, Admiral Kita made a hard turn to port, coming to 240 degrees southwest, aiming right for that helo. Takami turned with them, heading right for Ponape, and expecting that their quarry was somewhere in the 260 plus miles of open ocean.
Kirov had been moving northwest on a course of 300 degrees, but now Karpov also turned to meet the expected heading of his adversary. The ship began a wide circle to the northeast an hour after sunrise. As for Gromyko, he was about 135 miles from Kirov, on the exact new heading Karpov had ordered.
Nikolin looked over at Karpov, indicating he had just received a communication from Blackbird. Their helo had just picked up the first surface contact of the day, and the data was being simultaneously fed to Rodenko’s station, and also by secure datalink to Kazan. Karpov immediately ordered the contact designated ‘Hostile,’ and the game was on. The Russians had been moving north, intending to then turn northwest to bypass Ponape. Kazan was well ahead, about 150 miles to the northeast. The Japanese were coming south from Eniwetok, and so when Takami was spotted it was 165 nautical miles from Kirov, but only about 50 nautical miles northwest of Gromyko’s boat. As soon as he received the contact data, the wily sub Captain immediately ordered a turn northwest to a heading of 295.
Kazan was cruising just over the thermocline layer at 20 knots, without even a whisper of cavitation at that speed. From that location, his depth about 420 feet, he could use his hull mounted sonar to listen to contacts above him, and then also deploy a towed sonar array, which would descend down below the layer. That was the deep sound channel, where noise traveled best in the ocean. He seldom went there, except to pass through to a deeper region of the sea, or perhaps to simply hover there, silent and still, letting Chernov’s ears feast in that sound channel.
Now the element of surprise was acting as the dealer in this poker game, handing out cards to both sides. Harada had no idea that Karpov was really gunning for him, or that Kazan even existed, and he was now being hunted by two very dangerous opponents. Yet Karpov had no idea Kita’s task force was out their either, as it was well beyond his own surface radar range, and his Blackbird had only just picked up Takami, while Kita’s ships were now between 75 and 130 nautical miles behind his leading picket.
Karpov also thought he was simply about to try and spear a slippery fish with his missiles. He knew Takami still had her potent SAM defenses, but he was unaware that they had replenished all their SSMs from the stores aboard Omi, and now had been restored to full inventory on all missiles.
“Mister Rodenko,” said Karpov. “What is their present heading?”
“Sir, they are running on 215 degrees, at 20 knots. They’re aimed right at us.”
“Interesting. That Seahawk of theirs must have spotted us as well. I could fire on it now, but their ship is fairly close, is it not?”
“About 35 miles west of the helo,” said Rodenko. “They might cover that with their SAM envelope.”
“Yes… So we’ll wait. That helo isn’t any threat, at least not to us. Since we’re data linked to Kazan, Gromyko knows it’s there and can act accordingly. Let’s just ease on in a little closer. I’ll get it in a moment. As for Takami, I’d prefer to use the Moskit-II system instead of our MOS-IIIs.”
“You could hit them now with the Moskit system if we use the lighter 250kg warheads,” said Fedorov.
“Yes, but I think we’ll get in closer, throw four Moskit-IIs and follow them with a Zircon Mos-III.”
“You expect them to let you close the range?”
“Well, have a look for yourself, Fedorov. They’re coming right at us. Brazen little bastards, yes?”
Karpov did not know it, but his hubris was leading him to make his first great mistake. He was unconcerned about being spotted, which was something he would have worked hard to prevent under any other circumstances. But he did not think Takami could hurt him, so why worry about being detected? He was already running with all sensors active, indifferent to any threat. Yet Fedorov seemed uncomfortable with this scenario, and Karpov turned, giving him a look.
“Something bothering you?” he asked his number one.
“This just doesn’t feel right….” Fedorov had a look on his face that Karpov had seen many times before. “Why would they be vectoring in on us like this if they had no means of hurting us? They have everything to lose, and nothing to gain.”