"Yes, sir, and you know as well as I do that those cruise missiles would be better employed from a weapons platform that was safely tucked away out of sight a couple of hundred miles offshore, and under about three hundred feet of water. If Beijing decides to cut off talks while we're parked in there, we're going to have a hell of a time getting clear." He cast an uneasy glance toward the swarm of small craft to starboard, just beyond the ominous gray shark-shape of the PLA destroyer. "You know, I keep looking at all of those small boats and remembering that these waters used to be pirate hangouts."
"You think they may try to board and storm us?"
Garrett shook his head. "They wouldn't get through the deck hatches. But I do think about the Cole."
The USS Cole was the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer savaged in Aden Harbor by bin Laden's Al Qaida terrorists eleven months before the attacks on New York and the Pentagon in 2001. The Cole had been in the process of preparing to take on fuel when a small boat came alongside and exploded, ripping a gaping hole in her side, killing seventeen sailors and wounding thirty-nine others. Most Navy personnel today thought of that attack as bin Laden's true declaration of war, a declaration that had been ignored at the time.
"So we keep the Cole in mind and don't let security slip for an instant," Lawless said. "What do you recommend?"
"Armed guards on deck. No local boat allowed to approach within fifty meters."
"That might be tough to enforce in that harbor."
"Yes, sir. Other than that… " He stopped. "Are you authorizing liberty, Captain?"
"Yes. This is supposed to be a diplomatic call, remember. Business as usual… and, no, you guys haven't been shooting live missiles at our friends across the Formosa Strait." He shrugged. "My call, of course, but our orders specified that liberty was to be permitted."
"Then I suggest a word to the hands about security before they go ashore. Small groups ashore one at a time only, rather than port and starboard liberty. We'll want a full watch on board at all times. And let 'em know they could be called back on board at any time, if the situation changes. We treat this as a high-threat situation, and we let no one come close aboard without a real good look-see."
Lawless nodded. "Pretty much what I was going to recommend. Very good, Mr. Garrett. We'll make a sub skipper out of you yet."
The words rankled, but Garrett pushed the jibe aside. Half the time, he still couldn't tell whether Lawless was being humorous but clumsy, or deliberately abusive.
"I do wish I knew what State hoped to accomplish by having us go in there," Garrett said.
"Eh? That's simple. Two birds with one stone, and all that. They demonstrate to Beijing that we're friendly but prepared… and they keep us out of trouble."
"Us? Out of trouble? How do you figure, sir?"
"Easy. Washington knows there are ten-plus Kilo boats operating out here, and us deployed to track them. Right now, the bureaucrats and armchair admirals are wetting their collective pants over the thought that we might go and trigger World War Three…by, just for instance, bumping into one of those Kilos by accident?"
Garrett frowned. "That's not very funny, sir."
"It wasn't intended to be. You know how often our boats brushed with the Russians during the bad old days of the Cold War. The situation is a lot more tense out there now. State is hoping to defuse things a bit… keep us in the area and very visible, but also off somewhere where we won't accidentally trigger a shooting war."
True enough. American attack boat skippers had long had the rep of being particularly aggressive when shadowing Soviet boats. More than once they'd run into the subs they were following, often with damage to both vessels.
And Garrett had had his own run-in with a Chinese Kilo under exactly those circumstances.
"So, to keep us from starting World War Three," Garrett said, "Washington wants us to let those Kilos run free in the strait while we hole up inside a harbor that, twenty-four hours ago, would have been considered an enemy harbor… and which could turn into enemy territory again at any moment." He shook his head in disgust. "Whose side are they on, anyway?"
"All in the cause of world peace, Mr. Garrett. All in the cause of world peace. Have faith in your government. They care for you."
Garrett chuckled, but the sound carried little in the way of humor. "Of course you can trust the government. Just ask any Indian!"
"Have some respect, Mr. Garrett. That's 'Native American,' if you please."
"Aye aye, sir."
The easy banter was interrupted as a harbor tug approached, an ugly little workhorse flying the PRC flag.
Local pilots were emphatically not permitted on board a Navy vessel, but the Seawolf was required to follow the tug into port. The craft signaled its intent with impatient hoots from its whistle, then came about and began leading the Seawolf into the harbor approaches.
And a good thing, too. As the Seawolf slowly rounded the island of Tung Lung Chau and entered Tathong Channel, the tangle of shipping and small craft crowding the waterways around the myriad islands grew denser and even more chaotic. It would be easy to lose oneself in these approaches without a firm knowledge of the waters and the local conditions.
Hong Kong Island proper was a roughly football-shaped land mass perhaps twelve miles across. A semicircular bite snatched out of the northern coast formed the basis for Victoria Harbor and the setting for the busy downtown of Hong Kong itself, the district known as Central. North, across the bay, Kowloon thrust southward like a dagger; beyond, to the north, lay the New Territories and the unimaginably vast sprawl of Mainland China. Ships approached Victoria Bay from east or from west, through winding channels and labyrinths comprised of hundreds of islands, ranging from mere bare rocks and reefs to huge Lantau in the west, an island twice the size of the island of Hong Kong. The crowding, the clutter, the chaos, the noise— all were indescribable.
Past Quarry Bay and around North Point, the harbor pilot tug led the Seawolf slowly into Hong Kong's Victoria Harbor, a seething, teeming traffic jam of boats, ships, and watercraft of every size, tonnage, and description. Hong Kong may have belonged to the PRC for the past six years, but so far Beijing had kept its promise here to enforce "one China, two systems"… allowing Hong Kong's flamboyantly capitalist economic system to continue more or less unchecked, demanding only that Beijing be responsible for its military defense and foreign affairs policy.
The gleaming gold and silver skyscrapers lining the harbor shone as brightly in the afternoon sun as ever, potent symbols of the former British colony's rampant glorification of consumerism and business interspersed with towering advertising boards and signs. The landmarks stood just as they had during the capitalist era: the garish gold, silver, and ceramic facade of the Central Plaza Building; the oddly geometric glass tower of the Bank of China; the stolid polished granite and glass stacks of Exchange Square; and the bizarre steel anvil shape of the Peak Tower atop Victoria Peak, among dozens of other buildings of every shape and description. The futuristic cityscape provided a dramatic, sun-gilded backdrop to fleets of junks that might well have just emerged from the thirteenth century and a starkly alien contrast to the more squalid tenements, condominiums, office buildings, and shacks crowded into the district of Kowloon on the north side of the bay.
Garrett wondered how long Beijing would leave Hong Kong to pursue its gods of commerce and dollars in peace. It was widely assumed throughout the Naval Intelligence community that the PRC was on its best behavior with Hong Kong in hopes of convincing its "renegade province," Taiwan, of the benefits of peaceful assimilation.