‘Something will have to be done about the law and order situation in the Lake District,’ she had declared.
‘If we seriously plan to replicate what the US Navy is doing, Prime Minister,” he had explained, diffidently at first. ‘It might help if I explain to you how they go about their business.’ He had spent time in Groton, Connecticut in preparation for his role in project managing the building of the Dreadnought. While he had been in America he had taken the opportunity to tour several of the other facilities crucial to the American SSN program.
‘By all means.’
“The US Navy contracts the Electric Boat Company, and others, to build its nuclear boats at Groton, Connecticut and elsewhere in three or four dedicated sites but that’s only a part of the project. I’ll stick with the example of the Electric Boat Company because that’s probably the biggest contractor when it comes to building hunter killers like Dreadnought. The Electric Boat Company has major facilities at Quonset Point, Rhode Island where the boats are fitted out, and a huge design and engineering operation at New London, Connecticut. The US Navy is so deeply integrated into the activities of the Electric Boat Company, and the other major contractors, that a lot of the time you can’t tell the Navy from the Company; but, and it is a big but, the Electric Boat Company is responsible for the final design, engineering development, building and fitting out of its boats. The Electric Boat Company makes its shareholders rich; but the US Navy gets SSNs in the water. Moreover, most of the time they get their boats in the water on time. Most of the time but not always, because we are talking about applying state of the art, constantly evolving technology and that is always going to challenge timescales.’
‘You’re telling me that we need to nationalise Vickers?’
‘No, Prime Minister. That would probably be the kiss of death to the whole project. If we want new SSNs in the water as soon as possible, and for our existing ones — well, just the one at present — refitted and modernised as required within timescales consistent with the Royal Navy’s real world operational requirements, we can’t afford to let contractors squabble, hoard secrets and technology, or refuse to share relevant experience with each other that we, as a nation, have already paid them, through the nose, to acquire.’
‘I don’t understand where this is going, Admiral Collingwood?’
‘You are asking me to do the impossible, Prime Minister,’ he had confessed. ‘Worse than that, I suspect that you will probably ask me to do it quickly. That is not a problem. That’s what the Navy does. It tries to do the impossible, with or without the resources, quickly because we work for the Queen and the Government of the day calls the tune. All I am asking for is, for once, for the cards to be stacked in my favour.’
‘Specifically?’
‘If we are going to build our future undersea fleet at Barrow-in-Furness the Navy must own the whole peninsula. Whoever is running the show must be God. If you don’t like the way God is running the show you can sack him at any time. But somebody must be in command of the whole thing and you must let that person get on with it. This thing has to be run like the Manhattan project was run in the forty-five war. All or nothing.’
‘You want to be God?’ Margaret Thatcher had smiled and amusement had flickered in her blue eyes.
‘No, Prime Minister. Actually, I’d much prefer to be just another minor deity. Ideally, back at sea with my own command.’
Margaret Thatcher had quizzed him for over two hours on how he would go about building one to two nuclear submarines every year for the next ten years, preferably without bankrupting the country. At several junctures she had requested clarification of general technical engineering and shipbuilding issues. At one point he had reminded her that these were exactly the sort of issues best left to professionals. Notwithstanding, she had gone on asking questions, as was her right.
‘Thank you,’ she had said as the Boeing 707 began to bleed off altitude over the Home Counties on the approach to RAF Brize Norton. ‘You may be right about the need for a God at the heart of things. We shall see. Is there anything I can do to help you personally in the meantime?’
That was one of the oddest moments of Simon Collingwood’s life.
He had not hesitated.
‘Prior to leaving Malta I proposed marriage to a young lady who has charge of two young children. Maya, Yelda and Yannis were among the refugees Dreadnought rescued off Cyprus. Maya was good enough to accept my offer of marriage. However, Maya and the children are stateless and there are certain administrative hurdles to be overcome before they can join me in England. Nothing that can’t be sorted out but I have been warned the red tape is…’
‘They must join you in England as soon as possible!’ The Prime Minister had cried enthusiastically. ‘You have no idea how it cheers one up to hear such a happy story. It is so hard to remind oneself sometimes that despite everything, there is good in the World!’
Simon Collingwood had been horribly embarrassed, lost for words.
‘I shall speak to the Home Secretary immediately we land!’ The Angry Widow had declared triumphantly.
Was that only yesterday?
He stared at the Valiant’s still open pressure hull.
Valiant and Warspite were twenty feet longer than Dreadnought, essentially slightly enlarged versions of the first Royal Navy nuclear boat in most respects other than their propulsion sets. In place of Dreadnought’s Westinghouse S5W reactor, the new boats would have Rolls-Royce pressurized water reactors and an innovation that no US Navy SSN yet incorporated, two Paxman diesel-electric generators to enable genuinely silent running. In comparison with the latest ‘noisy’ American SSNs the Valiant class would be like ghosts.
“Did you really tell the Prime Minister you wanted to be God?” The First Sea Lord asked suddenly.
“Not exactly, sir,” Simon Collingwood grimaced. “I just said that somebody ought to be. God, that is.”
Chapter 34
Rosa Calleja did not usually attempt to rise with or before the dawn to begin the painful process of preparing herself to face the new day, even though she was beginning to feel a little bit guilty taking advantage of her sister and brother-in-law’s seemingly inexhaustible good intentions. When she had been discharged from the St Catherine’s Hospital for Women she had dreaded the prospect of having to return to her parent’s home Mosta. Her mother and father had made no bones about their conviction she had married beneath herself when she married Samuel Calleja. Worse, they were happy to carry on muttering darkly about the circumstances of his disappearance — Sam still had not been officially declared ‘deceased’, nor could he be for at least a year — within the hearing of the immediate Borg-Cantera clan.
Her personal situation was further complicated by the fact that while she had been incapacitated in hospital the Admiralty Dockyards had transferred its housing stock to the Royal Navy. In the way of these bureaucratic exercises, there were always winners and losers. Rosa had discovered to her intense chagrin that she was a loser. Since she was no longer the wife of a Maltese citizen who was actively engaged on ‘vital defence-related work’, the Naval Housing Board had written to her advising her that as she had alternative accommodation — a letter from her father confirmed that she had the option of living in her parents household — it, the NHB, had no further obligation to house her and had consequently given her four week’s notice to vacate the property in which she had lived during the two — and-a-half unhappy years of her married life.