“Closing speed?”
“Five hundred plus knots, sir.”
Weapons status: Peter ran the check in his head.
The Sea Cat launcher was battened down, inoperable in the storm. It would take several minutes to unlock and to warm up.
The main battery was unmanned.
Nobody had been allowed topside for several hours because of the wild seas so the two single 20-mm cannon were under protective tarpaulins like the nearby quadruple Sea Cat launcher on the aft deck house.
He didn’t hesitate.
“Sound Air Defence Stations Condition One and paint the new bogeys with the Sea Cat system as soon as they come within range.”
He heard the clanging of the alarms.
He didn’t have anything to shoot at the incoming bogeys but he’d worry about that later.
“All hands to Air Defence Stations Condition One!”
Peter watched the plot, the bogeys racing ever closer.
Men would be running onto the storm swept decks, into the empty main battery turrets forward, rumbling out of bunks all over the ship.
“CIC to bridge. I recommend we make revs for twenty-eight knots.”
Hugo Montgommery came over the circuit.
“Very good, Peter.” Off intercom he shouted the command to increase speed. Then: “My God, this is like the good old days! Keep up the good work, old man!”
Captain David Penberthy staggered into the CIC as the destroyer’s twin screws began to bite deeper, faster into the angry North Atlantic seas.
“Captain in the CIC!”
“Stay in your chairs!” Talavera’s captain grinned at his young EWO.
Peter stared so hard at the plot he could almost see through it to the other side. If this was a real attack they were going to be treading water or dead in next to no time. If it was some twisted American practical joke it was in extremely bad taste. If Talavera had been at ADSC1 ten minutes ago she’d be opening fire with everything she had some time in the next thirty seconds.
The old man patted his shoulder.
“Right full rudder! The ship will come right to two-seven-zero!”
The order was repeated and the ship lurched up the side of, crested and fell away down the reverse of a swell, rolling with a slow, sickening corkscrewing motion until after an age, she finally settled on her new course.
Peter realised he and the Captain were both watching the readiness board above the plot like two tom cats peering down a mouse hole.
The B turret indicator bulb turned amber, then green.
“Inform Mr Weiss that the main battery may engage the enemy as soon as he has a firing solution,” Captain David Penberthy ordered, tersely.
Chapter 14
“One of our ships actually opened fire on two United States Navy aircraft!” Iain Macleod raged. “It actually opened fire without giving any kind of warning, dammit!”
Jim Callaghan closed the report on his desk, rose to his feet and walked to the window. His first floor office had once been a library and many of the shelves around the walls were empty which he thought was sad. He didn’t respond to the angry complaint. He’d discovered there were times when trying to reason with Iain Macleod was like pouring petrol on a an open fire.
“That madman Christopher will drag us all into a shooting war!”
The Minister of Defence turned and viewed the two men who’d stormed into his office like they owned it. That was a Tory trait, another thing he’d suspected but not known for a fact until he’d started working beside his lifelong political adversaries.
George Edward Peter Thorneycroft, his deputy, was by nature a rather more sanguine man than Iain Macleod. Less brilliant, also but then he had other strengths which Iain Macleod wouldn’t recognise if they punched him in the face. More important, Peter Thorneycroft was actually on speaking terms with the Angry Widow.
“What’s your take on this, Peter?” Jim Callaghan asked, folding his arms and resting his back on the high window sill. He asked the question with a thoughtful directness.
“The First Sea Lord says HMS Talavera was new on station and the Americans should have known better. Six proximity fuzed high explosive shells were fired at two fast moving A4 Skyhawk attack aircraft launched by the USS Enterprise. Neither aircraft identified themselves before undertaking a ‘practice attack run’ on the Talavera. Apparently, this sort of thing happens now and again. “The US Navy’s ‘Western Approaches Squadron’ regards this sort of thing as some kind of demonstration of military ‘virility’. It goes without saying that our people don’t indulge in that sort of nonsense. The United States Navy is fully cognisant of our rules of engagement.”
“How so?” Iain Macleod demanded petulantly.
“We regularly broadcast them in plain English. Every day, in fact.”
“Perhaps, we ought to alter the ‘rules of engagement’?”
Jim Callaghan sniffed. “No. We’re not going to do that, Iain.”
The shorter, stockier Chairman of the Conservative and Unionist Party scowled at the taller man.
“Why not?”
“Because it is always a mistake to show weakness in the face of a bully.”
“Somebody should talk to Christopher!”
“No, that’s not a very good idea,” Peter Thorneycroft decided.
“I’ll bloody well talk to him!”
Jim Callaghan resumed his seat behind his desk. The trouble with the Tories was that they didn’t know if they were coming or they were going. It hadn’t mattered so much in normal, peaceful times of comparative plenty but in the current circumstances it was a disgrace. Tories like Iain Macleod were in quasi-denial, others deluded themselves the Americans had been dealing with their allies in good faith all along, while others like Peter Thorneycroft and Ted Heath were fighting a never ending rearguard action to preserve a sense of reality. It wasn’t until recently that he’d realised, with something of a shock, that of all the Tories the only one who seemed to share his own appreciation of the new realities of the world was the Angry Widow. Politically, ideologically they remained a million miles apart. That was to be expected, nevertheless, he and she shared a common view of what the future held for their country if things carried on the way they’d been going in the last year.
“No, you won’t, Iain,” Jim Callaghan said coolly. “If you interfere again in operational matters I will order your arrest…”
“Don’t be bloody ridiculous!”
“The Treachery Act applies to you in exactly the same way it applies to any other citizen. As does the War Emergency Act upon which the Government to which we both belong owes its authority.”
“Steady on, Jim,” Peter Thorneycroft murmured.
“No, I won’t ‘steady on’,” the Minister of Defence retorted, trying not to lose his temper. “Sooner or later even you idiots will have to recognise that everything has changed. You two, me, all of us here in this Government building are having to sanction things that would have been abhorrent to us thirteen months ago; things for which future generations will rightly condemn us and yet you people are still playing politics. This isn’t a bloody game, gentlemen. Playing politics is a luxury we don’t have. If you want to carry on playing funny buggers and scoring personal points don’t come to me wasting my time. Frankly, if it was up to me,” he looked grimly at Iain Macleod, “I’d kick a few of you and your friends out of this compound. I doubt very much if you’d last very long out there in the real world that my people back in Cardiff have to live in at the moment.”