Kazan had moved north, running very deep and sprinting at 35 knots. With the enemy coming south, he waited for the range to close, and at 19:00 he decided to slow down and get up above the layer to deploy his towed sonar array. It would trail down below the layer into the deep sound channel, and Chernov would have the best chance of hearing the enemy carriers. What he heard instead surprised him, and it was almost right on top of them.
“Con—Sonar. Surface contact! Fast revolutions, and very close. I make it no more than 12 nautical miles, south by southwest…. Heading 217 and running fast, over 30 knots from the sound of it.”
Gromyko came over to have a look, thinking. “Read it for me Chernov. Stop beating around the bush.” He smiled.
“Yes sir. I’ve got it now. DDE Takao. That’s one of their new Ashai Class Destroyers optimized for ASW.” He gave Gromyko a worrisome look.
“Do you think they have us?”
“I doubt it, sir. Not at that speed. But they may get wind of us soon at this range. I’d be real cautious here.”
That was going to force Gromyko’s hand. He was carrier hunting, and as yet they had no contacts of that type. Carriers seldom travel in isolation, and he reasoned that this was probably a screening escort. He was getting close.
Now he was going to have to decide what to do with this destroyer. To attack it might entail considerable risk. He was right behind that ship, right in its wake, which was a good place to be if they were listening for him. He could put missiles on it and, just to give himself that option, he turned to Belanov and gave the order.
“Come shallow to 130 feet and slow to 12 knots. Ready one Zircon and two Onyx missiles for firing.”
He was planning a repeat performance of the attack that had taken out Takami. The boat slid up through the opaline sea, stealth of another kind as it slowly ran shallow. Twelve knots would keep him nice and quiet at that depth, just below cavitation threshold, and he ran for fifteen minutes, letting Chernov listen for any sign that they may have been spotted. For all he knew, that escort destroyer might have helos up this very minute. This was very risky, but he had been emboldened by the successful strike on Takami.
This time, he was trying to sneak into the theater with half a ticket stub. He had only ordered three missiles, instead of the six that he had used to take out Takami, and now he thought twice about that. Happenstance could further reduce the odds of a successful hit.
“Belanov,” he said to his sturdy XO. “The Zircon failed to acquire numerous times in close range combat, did it not?”
“Yes sir. It didn’t make the dog leg turn correctly if I recall the results I read from early trials.”
Gromyko clenched his jaw at that. The Zircon was programmed to always fire off axis, actually moving away from the target before it made a dogleg turn to acquire it with its active homing radars. This missile had tremendous range and speed, and if the target was too close, it could easily overshoot. Even if it had been told where to find its enemy, it often failed to acquire or turn as expected. The missile would then go soaring up over 44,000 feet, racing away into the heavens at over 4000 knots.
Too damn close, thought Gromyko. This new missile was touchy. They had been lucky that the barrage he sent at Takami had all turned and tracked true. But what if they failed to do so here? It was simply too fast, and now he knew it needed room to acquire. 12 nautical miles just wasn’t enough, or so he began to reason. As for the Onyx, it was tried and true, a sea skimmer that the ‘Surface Dogs’ called the Moskit II with their variant. It would go right for the enemy ship, at about 1450 knots, skimming low at just 30 feet, which would reduce its target profile and aspect.
The Japanese destroyer might see it at 9 miles out and start jamming as it started to fire its missile defenses, though this ship was not carrying the Standard Missile 2 that had proved so effective against the Russian missiles thus far. Instead it was carrying 32 RIM-162B ESSM evolved Sea Sparrow missiles, quad-packed in the Mk-41 VLS modules. It was a weapon that had originally been designed as an air launched missile, now evolved to fight at sea and defeat these fast moving hypersonic Russian missiles like the Zircon. The Sparrows could accelerate to Mach 4, and had very good maneuverability, with perhaps a 90% chance of scoring a kill. The speed of the Russian missiles and their small radar returns, probably lowered those odds to 70%, but two missiles were usually sent after each SSM.
To be or not to be…. Now he had to decide whether or not to engage. He could just as easily continue looking for those carriers. Thus far, Chernov had heard no sign of a sonobuoy being deployed, which would be common for a helo up there hunting for him. Yet if he engaged here, and he did not get a hit early on, he would be facing the prospect of attack by ASW helos off the Takao, and possibly off the carrier he was looking for as well. It had to be close by…. Somewhere.
“Secure from missile combat and belay that order to run shallow. Hold present depth and all ahead flank.”
“Aye sir, depth currently 420 and all ahead flank.”
He ran on his current heading for about 30 minutes, pleased with the stillness of the situation. It seemed to him that the enemy had not acquired him, so at 20:00 he made a turn to come to 235, on roughly the same heading as Takao. Chernov reported his contact was now very old, and its position report no longer reliable, but Gromyko had a good idea where the destroyer was. He liked his position when he was in the ship’s wake, but knew his torpedoes would never catch it if he fired from there. Instead he sprinted west, then turned southwest on 235, putting him in a position to get a decent firing angle on the destroyer if he got a firm location again. He was faster than the other ship, and would slowly close on it over time. In the meantime, he would pause every 15 minutes to let Chernov listen, and freshen up his contact on Takao. Then he would increase to flank again, and sprint.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Ivan Gromyko was a very patient man.
Chapter 3
Admiral Kita soon realized that he could not continue operations against Kirov in the short run. They had recovered the first 100 men rescued from Takami, but he still had that operation underway, another 100 crewmen in the water out there, which was one more mission out and back for his helos and Ospreys. While one side of him wanted to strike while the iron was hot, another voice raised caution.
What sunk the Takami ? It had to be that Russian sub, because nothing Kirov fired touched the ship. Now here he was, his entire TF racing in pursuit of the Russian battlecruiser, and cavitating like a pack of wailing banshees.
“Captain Jenzu,” he said. “I think we ought to slow things down here.”
“Sir?”
“With Kazan out there, that sub is likely to pick up our position easily enough, and all we have in close is Takao, with one helo up on ASW watch. It’s pretty thin. If we run after the battlecruiser, we could be ambushed again, and losing Takami was difficult enough. Send orders to the forward screen. They are to come about and move north. The fleet will conclude search and rescue operations. You may plot the intercept course. I want my destroyer screen back.”