I must speak to Admiral Raeder on this. We will want to reestablish the Naval Airship Division—not with these massive dreadnoughts like Fafnir, but with leaner, faster and smaller airships to be used for fleet reconnaissance. I am sure he will warm to the idea, and they will give the British fits! We can use them to scour the seas and find the Royal Navy, and better yet, to spot the convoys for Döenitz and his wolfpacks, or even attack them. What a marvelous base Iceland would make for our airships. I was a fool not to seize that island in 1940. Now the Americans are there, and the navy tells me there is no way they can keep our troops supplied if we did invade. That may be true, but these airships could have done that job.
Perhaps the Army could use these airships in a similar role in Russia. Yes, they are perfect for scouting out the vast hinterlands of Asia. That is why Volkov built so many, though his fleet has been outmaneuvered and badly beaten by this upstart Siberian. When I send Fafnir and his brother to find out what he has in his pockets over there, we will see how bold he is.
Yet I foresee one potential problem—the airship sheds. It was Churchill who ordered preemptive attacks against our sheds and hangers in the first war. They are massive structures, and easy to spot from the air. They will certainly become prime targets for the RAF, and Volkov has warned me about the Allied bombers on more than one occasion. I could always have them built in occupied Russia, well out of reach of the Allied Bombers. Volkov uses small mooring towers with specialized crews for refueling and maintenance. Those could be built anywhere.
I am told the British Wellingtons have a service ceiling of only 18,000 feet. The Lancasters and American B-17s fly much higher, but our airships can go higher yet, so we could hover over our cities, and shoot down at the bombers with this new 88mm gun I am shown here. That will be a nasty little surprise for the RAF, because they have no fighters that can reach Germany, and even if they did, they could not climb high enough to bother our new Zeppelins.
Why didn’t I see all of this before? Volkov is very clever, and he certainly saw the usefulness of Zeppelins long ago. Very well, I will order the designers to produce the Naval scout model, but first I’ll want this first lot of dreadnaughts. Fafnir’s maiden voyage will prove their worth. I have already given orders that any Zeppelin Master from the first war that still lives is to begin the training programs for the air crews and service personnel required. That will all be left in Goring’s hands, and though he is a bungler when it comes to strategy, the one thing he does get right is logistics.
So then, Raeder has his new ships, and now Goring will have a nice new Zeppelin fleet to darken the skies of our enemies. And I have one very special mission in mind for a ship like Fafnir. Our Uranprojekt will be the weapon that will shake the world to its foundations. Yes… I will give Fafnir the fire of death and destruction, and he will be the dragon that comsumes our enemies—everywhere. Not even America will escape our retribution. In fact, New York may be a much better target than London….
Chapter 9
Captain Putchkin was very tired that day. He took his post on the bridge of the Angara as always, but with little enthusiasm. He had drawn overwatch duty again for Ilanskiy. It was his duty to stand the watch with his Topaz Radar, covering all the taiga north of the city, the direction most enemy raids had come from. One of the bigger ships, the Sevastopol, would be moored at Ilanskiy itself, and Abakan had the south watch.
That nice fat Soviet ship gets the mooring tower this morning. Which means they’ll likely haul up fresh eggs, bread and sausage for breakfast, and perhaps even a few nice girls for the officers. For us, there’s only this endless taiga. How far does it go? One day I must take my airship way up north to the Arctic Sea. Few men have ever seen that territory. But for now, patrol duty, endless, routine, mind numbing patrol duty.
He was a man in his mid 40s, grey at his temples just beginning, a little belly as well, but his father and mother had both been heavy, and he was likely to turn out the same way.
“Elevation?” He said nonchalantly to his Elevatorman, Pavel Kornalev.
“Passing through 2000 meters. Ballast secure and releasing on schedule. Engines one and three running smoothly.”
“Very well, climb to 3000 meters. Ahead two thirds on engines two and four. Up elevator five degrees. We’ll take it nice and easy—God knows we have plenty of time out here. Helmsman, come to zero-four-five degrees northeast. We’ll cruise on over to the Biryusa River and then make our next turn.”
That was the routine, 045 Degrees northeast to the Mirnyy Nob, a sharp bend in the Biryusa River near that village. Then they would just turn north, follow the course of the river up to the Big Bend, and the village of Biryusa itself. They’d then make a turn to port on 330, taking a short cut across the taiga until they saw the river again. This time it would lead them due west, until it made a sharp turn to the north. At that point, they would be about 130 kilometers north of Kansk, completing the first half of their patrol. From there, they would steer 225 southwest until they hit the much bigger Yenisei River, and follow that south until it split. They would take the smaller left fork, a tributary called the Kan River, and that would lead them right to Kansk, with Ilanskiy just a few minutes to the east.
It was just routine now—too much so. Doesn’t Karpov know that Volkov still has men on the ground out here? Yes, we never could account for all the men he airlifted in here in those raids. Most were killed or captured, but I’ll bet my left thumb that some made it clean away into the Taiga. I wouldn’t like their lot, trying to survive out there, and live off the land, particularly in winter. But summer can be even worse. The permafrost melts in places, and the bogs make overland travel damn near impossible. Yes, the bogs, bugs, bears and tigers—Siberia is no place for a man to live with any comfort.
So his morning began that way, finding those rivers, drifting along their winding courses, seeing the sun gleaming on the water, stark in contrast to the green of the forest and taiga below. It wasn’t until they reached the Big Bend in the Biryusa that things got interesting. The buzzer on the bridge gondola sounded noisily, and the Captain looked over his shoulder to see which station was calling. He thought it might be engineering, something with that gimpy tail that had been damaged in that battle with Volkov’s ships. It had been repaired, but was never quite the same as far as he was concerned. He had been an officer on this ship earlier, and now he got the promotion to Captain, his first real command, and he had taken to noticing things like that—any odd quiver or vibration in the rigging of his airship. It was his now, all his.
“Forward Radar Station,” he muttered aloud. “Now what’s this about?” He went over to the intercom, punched the button and spoke. ‘Bridge. This is the Captain.”
“Aye sir, we have a contact to report—just came on the screen, sir. Single contact, bearing 350 true north of our position, range 80 kilometers. Working on elevation now.” He was not reading from an Oko panel, as they were too few to deploy on a small cruiser like Angara. This was just the modified RUS-2 radar set that Karpov had designated Topaz, with a maximum range of about 110 kilometers for airborne surveillance. It was not really very accurate, and the operator was using a combination of the reading received, his own experience, and a good deal of guessing. Yet one thing was certain. Something was out there.