“Crash dive,” the Captain snapped, after confirming that the signal carried no demands for any reply beyond acknowledgement. Trafalgar headed under water, changing its position to ensure that it would be safe, and headed north. Once he was certain that they were safe – only two u-boats had passed the submarine, neither having the slightest idea that he was there – he ordered the computers to decrypt the message.
“We’re on,” he announced to his exec. “Bring the ship to battle stations.”
From: Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ)
To: HMS Trafalgar
Following the attacks on the UKADR and UKDGE, you are ordered to deploy your cruise missiles against targets specified (see attachment) and then proceed at your discretion into the Baltic Sea and sink any unit of the German Navy you find. Good luck; God save the King.
“I’ve loaded the coordinates into the Tomahawk targeting systems,” Lieutenant-Commander Davidson reported. “We seem to be targeting the German shipyards at Kiel.”
“Priority targets,” Tyson said. “Launch the drone.”
“Aye, sir,” the electronics expert said. “Drone launching… now.”
Trafalgar shuddered slightly as the rocket-propelled drone was launched into the air, climbing rapidly. The drone started to transmit back to its mothership as it discarded the rocket and extended long wings, drifting over Denmark and heading for Kiel.
“I’m keeping it over the water,” the electronics expert said. “It’s radar-invisible, but the Germans will rely a lot more on their eyes and ears.”
“I thought this thing was silent,” Davidson asked sharply. The Germans would be far more inclined to look for the source of a jet engine.
“It is, relatively so,” the electronics expert said. “It may sound a little odd to the Germans and they might try to look for the source.”
They fell silent as the shape of the German battleships came into view. “The Admiral Hipper,” Davidson breathed. A second ship, the Admiral Scheer, hove into view, followed by the skeleton of a battleship, a nearly-completed battleship and an aircraft carrier.
“I wonder if that’s the Bismarck,” Tyson said softly. The drone passed over a handful of cruisers and then two damaged battlecruisers. “Enough,” he said. “Start targeting them. I want a missile on each of the big ships, and then spread more over the u-boat pens and the factories.”
“Yes, sir,” the electronics expert said. He tapped at his computer, carefully targeting each of the big ships, and then spreading several more missiles over the factories. “Sir, should we target the airfield there?”
Every instinct in Tyson’s body screamed to say ‘yes,’ to crush the airfield. He knew that the German planes would not be so bothered by losing an airfield, and then they would have wasted a missile.
“No,” he said. “There’s no point.”
“Yes, sir,” the electronics expert said. The picture from the drone rocked violently. “I think they’ve seen the drone.”
“No shit,” Davidson said. “Get it out of there!”
“Too late,” the electronics expert said. The picture heeled drunkenly as the drone fell down towards the ground, then vanished altogether. “I got the omega scream,” the electronics expert said. “The drone self-destructed. There won’t be any Germans repeating the Iraqi balls-up.”
Tyson nodded. In 2003, the Iraqi Army had wasted countless bullets trying to kill non-existent pilots when a drone had crashed into a marsh. “Let’s not waste time,” he said. “Mr Exec, launch the missiles.”
“Aye, sir,” Davidson said. He twisted his key in the firing console; Tyson added his own key and twisted it. “Missiles launching in thirty seconds.”
Trafalgar shuddered violently as the first missile launched, followed by another, and another, until seventeen missiles, each one carrying high explosive, were launched.
“Radar contact,” the electronics expert said. “German seaplane, following the missiles, I guess.”
Tyson made a quick decision. “Lower the mast and get us out of here,” he snapped. “It’s time to start hunting u-boats.”
Kiel Shipyards
Germany
16th July 1940
Vice-Admiral and Flottenchef Günter Lutjens, German Kriegsmarine, glared at the remains of the strange aircraft. He’d read the extremely oblique briefing from the Kriegsmarine Command – and received a private and considerably more detailed briefing from Generaladmiral Erich Raeder – but he found it hard to believe. Aircraft that flew faster than the speed of sound? Warships that fought with missiles? If the briefing hadn’t been approved by the Fuhrer personally, Lutjens would have suspected that someone was playing a joke on the Kriegsmarine.
Goring would be quite happy to make us look incompetent, Lutjens thought grimly. The portly ‘iron fatty’ was so determined to keep all aircraft under his control that he’d held up the Graf Zeppelin, the aircraft carrier, for months. He scowled; the strange aircraft suggested that the reports were true, which meant…
Something flickered in the sky. His head whipped around; Admiral Hipper exploded with the force of a million bombs. The broken back of the heavy cruiser lifted into the air for a long chilling moment, before falling back to the water. Something else flickered in the sky; he saw it this time, a streak of fire that slammed into the Admiral Scheer, smashing the pocket battleship with ease. Bismarck, the ship he kept pleading to be allowed to send out into the Atlantic once it was finally fitted out, had its stern blown off; Tirpitz exploded in a chain of shattering explosions. Graf Zeppelin, still incomplete, and ‘Carrier B,’ were destroyed in fire.
Lutjens found himself on the ground, clinging on for dear life, as the missiles changed their targeting priorities. U-boat pens were blown open and he thanked God that most of the u-boats were out hunting British ships. Factories and administrative centres were destroyed casualty; some of the missiles seemed to be firebomb warheads as oil and fuel caught fire, spreading across the shipyard.
He blacked out for a long moment. When he opened his eyes, he thought he was in hell; flames were blazing brightly, wiping away the results of years of careful work. Lutjens staggered to his feet and looked around; a handful of ratings were rescuing documents under the command of Kapitän zur See Ernst Lindemann. Lutjens shook his head; Lindemann had been slated for command of Bismarck, something that would now be delayed.
“Herr Flottenchef?” Lindemann asked, as Lutjens staggered up to him. “Do you need medical attention?”
“Nien,” Lutjens said absently, his body swaying. “Tell the Fuhrer,” he gasped. “Tell him to make peace, whatever the price…”
He fell to the ground. He never felt the impact as his head hit the ground.
German Air Base
Pas de Calais, France
16th July 1940
On the advice – unwillingly given – of Captain Jackson, and based on careful studies of the books on the Iraq War, Adolf Galland had given firm orders that pilots were not to sleep anywhere near their planes, and in fact that planes were to be well camouflaged and separated from every other part of the base. The orders had not made him popular with the other Gruppenkommandeurs, but Kesselring and Himmler had backed him up, forcing them to disperse their planes.