“Hey, thanks for doing most of the work in there. I’m … I’m going to be all right, but it might take me a few hours. You never know how you’ll react when it happens. I knew a cop back in Detroit. He said the same thing. When he saw his first dead body he threw up. A buddy of his got in a shoot-out with two punks, and when it was over the cop realized that he had shit his pants.”
Phillips chuckled. “At least we avoided that.”
“You better check, Phillips. I’m okay on that score. Right now I’m gonna have a shower.”
Back in the debriefing room, Captain Olson stared at the recorder.
No problem with his aircrew. Everything according to the book. Now he had to compose a supremely diplomatic yet stern communique to the Russian admiral. His message would be approved by, and go out under the name of, Admiral Kenner. It had to be exactly right. They didn’t want any more accidents, even if this one looked premeditated by the Russian pilot. The man had to have had a history of trouble in the Russian Navy.
In the small village of Golovnino, Japanese General Raiden Nishikawa set twenty of his troops to work putting out the fires and taking the injured to the small clinic. He brought a doctor from the prison compound to treat the wounded. Fifteen Russian civilians had died in the missile attack. One of his men had been wounded.
The missile must have been some kind of air-to-air type. It didn’t seem to detonate at once, but skidded down a street, and then exploded near the dock.
He had been on the radio at once, speaking without any prepared statement, shouting at times at the Russians for their attack on his island.
“If there is another such attack, or an attack of any type on my island of Kunashir, I will summarily execute twenty Russian soldiers starting with the officers and working down. There can be no repeat of such an attack, or Russia will suffer many casualties.
“I know it was a Russian plane that launched the missile. Such actions are totally unacceptable. I expect a quick and total apology by the Russian admiral responsible for this pilot.”
General Nishikawa put down the microphone. He had been speaking in Japanese, and he realized it would take some time for the Russians, and the Americans, to translate what he had said.
He had been outside before the attack, checking on his outposts, when he saw a brilliant flash in the air to the west. He hadn’t been sure what it was, but shortly the Russian aircraft had attacked his island.
He shook with rage just thinking about it. This might slow down the Russians’ plans to shell the island at the end of the seven days.
He had no plans at all to leave the island. He had captured it, and he would keep it until he was driven off or dead in its defense.
The general left the military headquarters and toured the damaged area. The fires were mostly put out, and the wounded had been taken care of. Now the wails of the families who had lost loved ones could be heard. He wasn’t used to such sounds of anguish.
They made him think of his father and mother each time he tried to worship at his ancestors’ graves. There had been much wailing, and crying, and agony over the fate of their ancestors’ final resting places.
Nishikawa went back to his office, knowing that he had done the right thing by coming here and capturing this island. He might not win in the military sense. Now he realized it was a heroic but rather stupid thing he had done here. Heroic because he had brought the plight of thousands of Japanese who had ancestors’ graves here to the eyes and ears of the world through the medium of television.
Whether this had produced, or would produce, any long-lasting benefits was the question. If it did not, then indeed he would be branded as a fool, by his own family and by the countless other Japanese families out there who had suffered terrible losses at the hands of the Russians.
He slammed into his headquarters building, and found his second in command.
“Double the guards at the docks, around the bay, everywhere that someone could land a small boat. I think that it’s time we understand that we will not win the diplomatic discussion. They will revert to an attack of some kind. I’m just not sure what it will be. All of our troops will be on alert now twenty-four hours a day.
“Those off duty will wear their uniforms, and weapons are to be in hand at all times. We will be facing a crisis soon. I’m just not sure what it will be, where it will come from, or what nation will be coming here to kill us.
19
The official statement came through an hour after Captain Olson’s message had been delivered. He read it again to be sure he had it right.
“Admiral Kenner, Commanding, U.S. Task Force. Sir. We regret that one of our planes had an electrical and radar malfunction with the result that one of your aircraft was shot down. We offer condolences to the families of the two persons in the plane.
“We understand the immediate retaliation, and the destruction of the offending aircraft, even though the deadly accident had nothing to do with the pilot of the craft. We also have suffered a lost shipmate.
“We strongly urge that we both now maintain a separation between our aircraft. Since you were on the site first, we will relinquish the project of flying cover over the island to your aircraft. We will keep our flights offshore from the island, but in close proximity. This way there will be no reason why one force should be in the sights of the other, or that any lock-on by radar aiming should take place.
“We reserve the right to move onto the island when our seven-day grace period is over. It appears that General Nishikawa is making no preparations to leave.
“Our ships will continue to cover the area to the east of the island, and we will appreciate your recognizing this area and not interfering with our routine patrols.
“We hope that this entire situation can be cleared up with no more loss of life or equipment.”
It was signed by
“Admiral Vladimir Rostow, Russian Naval Forces Commander.”
Captain Olson took the message at once to Admiral Kenner, who had approved the wording of the complaint to the Russians less than an hour ago.
“Accident my jockstrap,” Captain Olson said when the admiral had finished reading the message. “Our pilots heard the Russian pilot of one of the other Flankers say that Sergei must have gone crazy and that the two other Flankers up there had been ordered to shoot down the one who splashed our Tomcat.”
“We’ll be lucky if that’s the only deadly confrontation we have with the Russians,” Kenner said. “This is a damn tense situation. I like the idea of keeping our forces apart this way. Tell the admiral that we accept his statement, and that we’ll cooperate on keeping our forces separated.”
“Good. I’ll write it out and you can okay it.”
Several decks below in the CDC, the watch commander looked over the shoulder of a chief manning a tactical display. This one was from their E-2C Hawkeye on station at thirty thousand feet over the fleet and monitoring anything that drove, flew, or sailed in a 250-to-350-mile radius.
“Look at that sucker go,” the commander said.
“Estimate speed of seventy knots, Commander. Damn, that’s eighty miles an hour over the water. Has to make it an air-cushion craft. The Russians have some. Last we knew, there were thirty-four of them in the Russian fleet. They could carry one in an amphibious ship if they have one in this fleet.”
“Find the specs on them,” the watch commander said. One man moved to a large book, and came back with the answers.