And if that were true, he just might have an explosive situation on his hands. Starting a war with China would not look at all good in his service record.
But the way things were shaping up, it was possible that he wouldn't be given any other options.
"Whalesong, this is Hammerhead! Whalesong, this is Hammerhead!" Again and again Morton keyed his Motorola, trying to reach the Pittsburgh over the scrambled command channel. There was no answer, and since none of the SEALs could raise the sub on any of their radios, there were only two possibilities open. Either the Pittsburgh's communications were out, or the submarine had submerged.
Either way, the timing sucked.
The three SEALs had reemerged from the depths of the freighter's aft cargo hold, and were now crouching in the shelter afforded by some oil drums stacked on the main deck just forward of the bridge house. With flashlights doused, they again wore their starlight masks, which turned the glow from the bridge overhead into a fierce, green-yellow glare and rendered the deck nearly day-bright.
According to the op plan, they needed to get a final go/no-go from Special Operations Command, by way of the Pittsburgh's communications center. Plan Alfa had them take down the freighter themselves. Bravo had them return to the sea for recovery aboard the Pittsburgh, at which point the Kuei Mei would either be sunk by the Pittsburgh or boarded by conventional forces off of an American Coast Guard cutter.
That the matter was still in doubt was a testament to the incredible power of bureaucracy. The civilians who needed to make the decision about the Kuei Mei's fate wanted all of the information before making that decision. Morton understood that. In his line of work, good, solid intel was worth a hell of a lot more than gold. But in this case, it deprived the SEAL Team on-site with the freedom to make their own decisions based on the tacsit as they saw it. Micromanagement was never a good option in a combat situation. Jimmy Carter had tried running the op personally during Operation Eagle's Claw, the attempt to rescue the American hostages in Iran back in 1980, and in the end General Beckwith, in command on the ground at Desert One, had elected to have "communications difficulties."
Morton looked up at the black and unpromising sky. A light rain, lashed by a stiff wind, was starting to fall. If they'd brought their own satcom gear, they might have established a direct link to SOCOM at Fort Bragg. But the team had already been heavily loaded for an underwater lockout and approach, so the decision had been made to relay all communications through the waiting Pittsburgh.
Only now the 'Burgh was out of touch. And if they didn't make contact soon, Morton know he would have to make his own decision about this cluster fuck without Washington's help, a notion that at the moment was looking better and better.
Lieutenant Ralph Henderson, Pittsburgh's navigation officer, looked up from the starboard chart table. "Turn complete," he said. "We're in his baffles, sir."
"Should be," Garrett replied. "If he didn't change course while we were swinging around behind him."
Not being able to see, playing the game with sound and maneuver alone, was a real challenge. Things were a lot tougher when you couldn't see the other guy, when even the sound he was making was so faint it was like following whispers down an echo-ridden alley. Worse, passive sonar only gave relative bearing on the target, not range — with only an occasional educated guess on the actual distance if the sonar team was very good. Pittsburgh's sonar people were the best, but Garrett had to keep reminding himself that their determinations were only guesses. If the sierra contact up ahead had maintained his speed and course throughout the maneuver, he ought to be about six hundred yards in front of Pittsburgh's bluntly rounded bow. The first law of military tactics, however, was that the other fellow never did what he was supposed to do.
"Sonar, this is the Captain. You still have Sierra One-two?"
"Captain, Sonar," Chief Schuster's voice came back. "Intermittent contact, sir. We're picking up some prop wash. Sounds like we're smack in his baffles. Range, I'd make it about five hundred, five hundred fifty yards."
Even the quietest submarine stirred the water astern with its screw. That caused some noise, of course… and also left the water turbulent, making sonar reception difficult through the disturbance. The result was that a submarine was largely deaf to the area dead astern; a stalking sub could follow literally in its wake, able to hear the prey without being heard in turn. Tactically, it was the ideal place to be when hunting another submarine.
It was also dangerous. If the Kilo up ahead decided to stop or slow suddenly, Pittsburgh could ride right up his wake and smack him in the ass — an embarrassment, to say the least, and a possible international incident best avoided. Back in the wild and woolly days of the Cold War, there'd been a number of collisions between U.S. and Soviet subs hunting one another, boats whose skippers had been unlucky, become careless, or, just as bad, had been too aggressive.
Garrett's first responsibility — after the captain's ever-present responsibility to ship and crew — was to the mission, which meant the safety of the SEAL team aboard that freighter, the successful completion of their operation, and their safe recovery afterward. The Kilo was germane to all of that only in so far as it became a threat — to the Pittsburgh first, then to the mission.
Stewart joined Garrett at the chart table. "Skipper, I'm going over it and over it," he said, shaking his head, "and I still can't figure it. What the hell is a Kilo doing way out here?"
"If he is Chinese," Henderson added, "he's a hell of a long way from home. Kilos have a top range of, what? Three thousand miles, before they have to refuel? That would almost take him from the China Sea to the West Coast along the Great Circle… and leave him stranded."
"Maybe he's Russian," Stewart said, "operating out of Petro. That would extend his trans-Pacific range a bit."
"He'd still need to meet with a sub-provisioning ship out here to make it home," Garrett said. "Kilos just aren't meant to be used at long range. Stew, we need some updated intel on ship movements out here, with an emphasis on sub tenders."
"I'll have Sparks get on that, as soon as we can get a transmission out."
"Good."
The problem was, the Kilo was a threat, both to the Pittsburgh and to the mission. Garrett refused to believe that the other sub was here by accident. It was deliberately trailing the Chinese freighter, which probably meant it was an escort, protecting the freighter and its mission. And that meant that the Kilo and the 'Burgh were already on an intercept course, whatever the plot table might say.
Suddenly, the control room seemed a bit crowded to Garrett… as if a whole host of politicians, bureaucrats, and armchair-bound second-guessers were watching over his shoulder. No matter what he did in the next few minutes, there was a better than even chance that someone would very soon be pointing out how he'd made exactly the wrong decision.
"Maneuvering," he said. "Planes, up five degrees. Bring us to periscope depth."