“Uncovered? That’s not so good.”
“Better’n nothing. Actually it might be okay. At least for now. Long as we can say, ‘You take the one on the right, we’ll take the one on the left.’ Or whatever.” He looked at the cup. “Was this yours? Sorry.”
“Take it, since you started it. How’s that cooling-system problem? Did we get that taken care of?”
“Slaughenhaupt’s guys replaced the flow rate sensor couple days ago. Part came in on the chopper. You didn’t hear?”
“Probably somebody told me. But it’s been … whatever.”
“Yeah, I get you.” Wenck glanced at the rightmost screen, and winced at something Dan couldn’t even see. “Uh, I better get back. But you know, Dan — I mean, Captain — you got to sort of let go of some of this. Let us take care of business.”
“I thought I was doing that, Donnie. You think I’m getting too micro?”
“It’s not a criticism, sir. You saved all our fucking lives, there on K-79. At least here we got air to breathe.”
“Yeah, there is that.” Dan swallowed, remembering despite himself the terrifying hours beneath the surface in a sub they had to guess at how to run, unable even to read the labels on the gauges, with most of the Iranian navy trying to kill them.
Someone cleared her throat. He looked past Wenck to Lieutenant Singhe, who was tapping her foot. He glanced at his watch again. Five past twelve. “Okay, I’m gonna be with the strike team. Let me know if anything happens.”
“Okay, sir, and remember — every mile we go north out of the basket, the dumber we’re gonna look if Saddam launches again.”
With a reminder he really didn’t need ringing in his ears, Dan joined the team back by the nav table. Their Barcos, their consoles, were the entire center aisle; the little cleared area was a natural meeting place. Some perched in empty ASWS chairs. Others stood with arms folded. Singhe, shoulders sagging, braced herself against the nav table beside Dan. Matt Mills, the combat systems officer, grabbed a folding chair and dragged it over. He nodded to Dan, then gestured to the chair. Dan straightened, not pleased at the offer. He ran his gaze around the faces. Slaughenhaupt. Redmond. Crandall. He knew their names, but he didn’t know this team nearly as well as he’d come to know the Aegis gang. The admiral’s mast in Naples had hit the strike team hardest. Torn the guts out of it, in fact. Half the replacements were off Jen Roald’s staff; the others, fleeted up from lower-ranking enlisted. Neither Noblos nor Wenck had given them high marks. He half turned, to see Almarshadi fitting himself into the end seat on one of the RGN-651 consoles. Then faced front again as Singhe cleared her throat.
“Captain, we just got verbal direction to spin eight TLAM 5. I acked the message. The DesRon strike chief told us over chat we’re going to get some fast plan-and-shoot tasking.”
Dan nodded. “I got a heads-up from the commodore.”
Before she could answer, the red phone labeled TLAM C&R beeped and flashed. “Savo, Pittsburgh, this is Cutlass, over.”
“This is Savo, roger, over,” Singhe said. She had it on speaker, so they could all hear.
“This is DesRon Strike. Just wanted to pass on what you’re about to get MDU’d. The targets are suspected hide sites and C4I nodes in what’s being called the Western Complex, or Western Missile Sites. Where the launches last night came from. Strike will be coordinated with real-time intel. The idea’s to target any TELs which sortie from their pookas and attempt to set up and fire before the strike arrival.
“Break. Savo, how copy, over?”
Singhe glanced up at him; he nodded. “This is Savo, copy all,” she said. “Continue, over.”
“This is Cutlass. We’ll finish validation on our end in five mike, and start the MDU then. I show both shooters active in MIRC, so I’ll pass the MDU over EHF.”
“This is Savo. Works for us, over.”
“Pittsburgh. Good for EHF MDU here also, over.”
“Any problems, I’ll be on Coordination. Also, we tasked extra Charlies. Keep them powered up. The admiral may or may not keep you in the shooter box. Lot of discussion here. Your Charlie Oscar may be getting some questions regarding time and distance. Stay in the loop. Cutlass, out.”
Dan sat back, keeping tabs as Singhe finished the prelaunch brief. He felt uncomfortable with the way mission data was being passed on voice and over chat. This seemed to be a time-sensitive tasking, though, so he didn’t object.
“All missiles mode seven,” said one of the launch controllers.
Singhe said, “Copy mode seven.” She picked up the red phone and gave the Line India report.
The leading FC, who was on chat, said, “MDU inbound.”
“Get it down to TCR. Get it set up. — Captain, just got mission numbers and other data from Cutlass. Request permission to start planning.”
“Permission granted, but don’t execute until the strike controller tasks the missions.”
Dan got up and strolled a slow circuit, looking at each screen. He was settling back into his chair when the 21MC in front of him clicked on. “CO, OOD.”
“Go, Mr. Mytsalo.”
“Sir, report arrival at MODLOC. Request course from here?”
Dan leaned on both elbows, studying the surface picture. Clear, except for the single pip of Lahav off to the southeast. Far to the right, faint indications that might or might not be the mountain peaks behind Beirut. On the rightmost screen the saffron spokes of the search beam clicked steadily back and forth, still scanning the Al-Anbar desert.
Once the Tomahawks crossed the beach headed inland, Syrian air defense would have to recognize where they were aimed. If they passed that word on, whoever controlled the Western Complex would know they were on their way.
Mills said in a low voice, “Our course doesn’t much matter, sir. Whatever minimizes our roll, I’d say.”
“Mr. Mytsalo: Choose a course and reciprocal to mimimize roll.”
A pause, then a startled, “Aye aye, Captain.” Dan grinned, remembering how seldom he’d gotten to make a decision as an ensign. Then sobered. “Matt, what am I overlooking? Anything else we should be doing? We don’t have long until this launch window.”
“Going through the checklist, Captain.”
Dan reached under the desk, found the current NavSea manual for launch procedures, and ran down chapter 4. Amy would be backstopping her team, making sure they followed their own station checklists, but he couldn’t help surreptitiously making sure no one made any stupid mistakes. He knew the procedures. Some of them he’d designed, back at the Cruise Missile Project Office. But he’d actually launched Tomahawks only once before, aboard Horn.
He sucked a breath as he remembered the last-minute glitch in the nav system of one of those missiles, a shorted relay or fried circuit board. The launch code back then had been extremely restrictive. Unless it knew exactly where it was going, the missile would refuse the launch order. And since the system fired weapons in serial then, a hitch in number one meant none of the others would fire either. He’d had to execute a series of S turns, and reposition the ship exactly where the first missile’s gyro had frozen.