“Note is transmitted.”
“Check for downloads.”
“Already checking. Here comes some tactical information.”
“Display it on the screen,” Jake said.
He stepped down from the conn and bent over the room’s central navigation plot. The Spratly Islands peppered an overhead view of the South China Sea.
Jake knew the Subtics tactical computer system could produce higher resolution graphics, but he preferred the classic two-dimensional symbolic representation of man-made assets. To the east, a crosshair represented the Wraith. One hundred and thirty miles to the northwest, a trio of red squares materialized.
“A Chinese task force,” Henri said. “Three ships. A frigate and two smaller escorts.”
“No shit,” Jake said. “Just what we hoped for. They’ve been moving closer to us in their patrol pattern.”
“Someone is blessing us with excellent intelligence.”
Jake wondered how much debt Olivia McDonald believed he now owed her. Such real-time information carried a price.
“And here is a note from Pierre,” Henri said. “It’s a response to your report. He says the task force is expected to maintain its easterly track throughout the next six hours.”
“That will put them in range,” Jake said.
“That’s what Pierre says. He’s given his order to engage. I’m receiving a concurring message from Philippine fleet command now.”
“Bingo,” Jake said. “We have a target. Let’s go hunting.”
CHAPTER 5
Jake pointed a stylus at an overhead view of landmasses one hundred miles west of the Philippines. The crosshair of the Wraith inched away from a reef, attempting an intercept course with the trio of red square icons representing the Chinese task force.
“We’re one hundred and sixteen nautical miles from the closest Chinese escort,” he said. “And they’re heading south, roughly, averaging eighteen knots on course one-six-eight.”
“They’re probably going faster than that but cutting back and forth in a submarine-evasion pattern,” Flores said. “That’s how I would transit when I commanded my ship.”
“Makes sense,” Jake said. “Hand me the printout, Henri.”
The Frenchman stretched his arm across the table, and Jake grabbed the clipboard.
“And that’s what the intelligence report supports. They’re in a zigzag course, alternating their heading randomly for each ship. I guess when you get a satellite dedicated to watching a ship, you can see everything.”
“There’s no guarantee that this is satellite intelligence,” Henri said. “But someone is giving us everything we need.”
Jake looked back to the printout.
“It says here that the frigate is a Jiangkai II class,” he said. “Respectable anti-air defense for a frigate. Thirty-two vertical launch cells with anti-air missiles, and a decent anti-air radar suite. No sense in shooting missiles at it unless we’re in really close and don’t give it time to react.”
Flores looked at him and raised an eyebrow.
“You expected to encounter a Jiangkai II, didn’t you? You certainly had advanced intelligence on the Chinese patrol patterns.”
“Of course,” Jake said. “But I’m not going to risk getting within sight of that ship. Without a MESMA system, we don’t have the endurance anyway. I’m going after an escort.”
He read further, scanning the section of the report showing the capabilities of his target.
“Two Jiangdao-class corvettes. Minimal point defense against missiles. This one here is our target.”
He tapped the stylus on the closest red square. A name appeared on the electronic chart.
“Impressive,” he said. “Our intelligence is so good that we know which specific ship it is. It’s the Luzhou. I intend to engage the Luzhou with two Exocet missiles.”
“Just two missiles?” Flores asked.
Down deep, a part of Jake wanted his attack to fail. Although he accepted that he belonged on a submarine reshaping world boundaries, the killing had started to sicken him.
He credited — or blamed — the phenomenon on a god that his wife forced him to research. To his surprise, his fact checking had allowed the possibility of such a deity’s existence, and a distracting inner Jake-God dialogue ran in his mental background.
He shut his eyes and looked back to the paper to clear his mind. He pushed away thoughts of a god, specifically his dubious Christian God, and silently requested of said deity that if He in fact existed, would He please guide his upcoming attack on the Chinese task force.
Either that, or could He at least stay out of the way.
“Yeah,” he said. “Just two. If I launch all six, it’s a sure kill. But if I’m trying to convince the Chinese that I’m a Malaysian sub trying to optimize my attack against a ship with weak air defenses, I hold back the other missiles to use against the other ships. There’s a fifty-fifty chance that the ship is dark anyway.”
“Dark?” Flores asked. “Do you mean EMCON?”
“Yes. Emissions control. Keeping its radars off so that nobody except people like us with access to satellite intelligence knows where it is.”
“We don’t know that it’s satellite intelligence,” Henri said. “It could be an American submarine trailing them for all we know. Or possibly a spying aircraft.”
“I’m betting it’s satellite intel, but we may never know. The point is, the target may be dark and won’t even see it coming.”
“Can’t we use our own sensors to tell if the Chinese radar systems are transmitting?” Flores asked.
Jake considered the difference between a submarine’s small-aperture radar mast perched a couple meters above wave tops versus a surface ship’s elevated and larger radio frequency sensors. There was no comparison.
“I’ll raise the radio mast before launching to see if I can sniff a radar system, but a submarine’s electronic sensory measures suite is weak versus that of a surface ship. And we’re disadvantaged since it’s so low to the water and our horizon is only a few miles away.”
“If they defend themselves?” Flores asked. “Then you will have wasted two missiles.”
Jake found the Philippine future submarine commander annoying, but he blamed eager nervousness.
“If so, it won’t matter. They’ll realize what almost hit them, review the short list of people who could have fired at them, and voila, they’ll be pissed at the Malaysians. This mission is accomplished just by making it look like a credible attack.”
“I see. That’s why you’re not attacking the frigate. It wouldn’t look credible. It would easily defend itself.”
“Correct.”
“Then why not go after the frigate with torpedoes?”
Jake reminded himself to remain patient. The entire Philippine submarine fleet’s expertise rested on Flores’ shoulders, and he gave him leeway in his questioning.
“You do realize from our mission brief that a torpedo attack isn’t part of this phase?”
“Yes, I agree that there was no mention of a torpedo attack, but there was also no restriction against it. If you have a chance to sink a Chinese frigate and lay the blame on the Malaysians, I highly recommend it.”
The concept struck Jake as viable, and he wondered if Renard had watered down his plan due to his request for humane slow-kill weapons and minimized casualties.
“I’ll consider it,” Jake said. “But let’s see how the Chinese react. Torpedoes may end up being necessary in defense anyway.”
“Thank you,” Flores said. “I don’t mean to second-guess you, but I see no other way to apprentice your skills.”
Jake thought he noticed insincerity in the Philippine officer’s gratitude, but he dismissed it as paranoia.