Twelve hours after the attack, he had gone up to periscope depth, which had allowed them to establish a satellite link with South Sea Fleet. He had updated the fleet with the battle damage assessment. The response had been immediate.
SINK US NAVY DESTROYER 099. CRITICAL AND TIME-SENSITIVE CARGO ON BOARD MUST NOT REACH MAINLAND. SINK US NAVY DESTROYER 099 PRIOR TO REACHING 200 MILES OF SHORE, AND WITHIN 48 HOURS OF RECEIVING THIS MESSAGE.
Before receiving those orders, they had been following the destroyer to the northwest, but allowing it to open distance. The captain was worried that if they traveled too fast, the submarine would make so much noise that the destroyer would hear them. The US Navy warship had a helicopter on board. One with a dipping sonar. He wanted nothing to do with it.
But after the orders from South Sea Fleet had come in, the submarine captain had commanded his men to sprint ahead and change course to due north. They lost time while reeling in the towed-array sonar, as that activity limited their speed. Once the towed-array was in, however, the captain was able to use the nuclear-powered submarine’s impressive speed advantage to cut off the destroyer’s path to land. The US Navy warship’s initial travel direction put them farther away from land. If they had cargo on board that they needed to take to shore, they would surely have to turn back east at some point.
During the six-hour sprint to the north, his sonar men had lost contact with the destroyer. When they slowed down, they once again brought out the towed-array.
The initial readouts from the sonar room were confusing. None of their sonar contacts had the obvious signature of the destroyer. There was one very suspicious contact that was heading east at high speed, however. The sonar technicians had informed the captain that the contact sounded like a group of ships, with characteristics similar to both a warship and a large merchant.
Without visual confirmation, the captain couldn’t be certain that this was his target. The captain didn’t want to fire on it until he knew.
Attacking that group of ships would hurt him in several ways. One, it would help the Americans to learn his position. It would also waste his valuable anti-ship weapons. With the war that had obviously just begun, they were now worth their weight in gold. Also, firing his weapons without seeing his target would mean that his chances of success were greatly decreased. And lastly, he didn’t want to risk sinking an innocent merchant ship.
The captain instead had positioned their nuclear attack submarine almost directly in the track’s path, offset by only a few thousand yards. If all had gone according to plan, that would have allowed him to fire his torpedo right off the bow of the target. It would have been a very easy kill. He sighed. Would have been…
The first reports of sonobuoys being dropped had come about an hour ago.
“Conn, sonar, buoy splash bearing zero-two-five.”
The buoys kept coming. Rows and rows of them, spread out for several dozen kilometers ahead of his target. No surface contacts were nearby. And his sonar operators had not reported hearing any aircraft noises. That could mean only one thing. A maritime patrol aircraft had arrived on station. One that was capable of dropping many buoys and operating at a high enough altitude that the submarine couldn’t hear it. One of the new American P-8s.
The thought was chilling.
Their submarine was now right in the middle of this giant sonobuoy field. It was like treading water in the middle of a school of Portuguese man-o’-war jellyfish that were attracted to movement. As long as his submarine stayed quiet and still, there was a very good chance that they could remain hidden. But if they moved, the deadly sensors would detect the submarine, bringing great pain and danger.
The US warship, or at least the track that he assumed included the US warship, was now only twenty-five kilometers away. Soon the submarine captain would be able to see it with his periscope.
If he was willing to risk getting that shallow.
The only thing worse than a submarine being detected by sonar was a submarine that was visually spotted by an aircrew. He decided to wait. Just be patient, he told himself. Let them get closer.
The executive officer shot the captain a worried look. “Sir, we will need to make a decision soon.”
“Yes. But not yet. We need to—”
The sonar supervisor said, “Captain, buoy splash. Very close to us this time.”
“How far away?”
“One is less than one thousand meters, sir.”
The captain swore to himself, but his face remained calm. If they were dropping them that close…
“Come hard right to zero-four-five. Increase speed to all ahead full.”
The echo of repeated commands sounded throughout the space. The captain stood over the tactical chart, one of his junior officers updating it with the latest reports from the sonar team.
He wiped sweat from his forehead. The game had just moved to the next phase.
The DICASS sonobuoys began sending pulses of sound energy out into the deep ocean water. The sound waves expanded in every direction, and bounced back to the buoy when they hit something. That data was then sent from the buoy to the P-8 and MH-60R by radio. Both of the aircraft had sophisticated onboard computers that would analyze the sound data from the buoys, and turn it into valuable information: target distance, course, and speed.
“It’s a good ping, sir. We have solid contact.” The AW manning the sonar station was the first one to say anything after the pings had gone out.
The O-4 standing over him patted the enlisted man on the back. He then turned to look down the narrow passageway of the aircraft. He pointed at one of the junior officers. “Vector in the helo for torp drop.”
The junior Naval flight officer nodded and adjusted his lip microphone. He took a breath and said, “Cutlass 471, Pelican, come left to two-six-five.”
Plug said, “Left two-six-five.” He yanked the stick to the left, banking the helicopter and watching the heading indicator. Then he leveled it off on a new heading of two-six-five. Plug snuck a look over at Juan’s tactical display, checking that they were indeed flying toward the hostile submarine track.
“Cutlass, Pelican, standby for torpedo drop.”
Juan said, “Roger, Pelican.”
Juan wondered what the Chinese in the submarine were going through right now. All he could see was the same blue ocean racing along a few hundred feet below his feet. But that sub was down there. He shook the thought from his mind. Now he only had one job. Press the button.
“Cutlass, Pelican, come right to three-one-zero.”
“Right three-one-zero.”
The helicopter banked sharply and then leveled off on the new heading. Adrenaline was pumping through his veins. Juan’s eyes scanned all his instruments and then gripped the hand control unit that would allow him to launch the torpedo.
“Stand by for torpedo drop. On my mark. Three… two… one… mark.”
His breathing quickened. Pulse racing, Juan lifted up the small plastic protective cap and pressed the torpedo release button. Immediately, he felt the aircraft shudder with the sudden loss of over six hundred pounds of weight.
AWR1 yelled, “Torpedo away! Good ’chute!” There was a brief pause, and then he said, “It’s in the water.”
Juan made the radio call. “Torpedo is in the water.”
He again listened to the noise from one of the passive buoys, wanting to hear the sound of the torpedo — and what they all hoped would be a good hit.