Tick… tick… tick…
Zero…
Chapter Ten: Cry Havoc, and Let Slip the Dogs of War, Take One
The war was bound to be merciless. Wars that begin with sneak attacks always are.
London/Near London, England
“Five minutes, Captain,” the young enlisted seaman said.
Captain Ilya Ivanovich Mikhalkov nodded. The Akula-II-class submarine Vladimir Putin had been lurking near England for nearly a week, waiting for the firing command, and that worried him. The Putin might have been one of Russia’s latest submarines, designed to serve as both a hunter-killer and shore-assault ship, but he had no illusions as to its fate if a European ship stumbled across them. Technically, they were lurking in international waters, but so close to Europe, they might encounter more than just the Royal Navy. The Dutch might be military lightweights, but they had a navy, while the French were known to patrol these waters too.
He mentally reviewed the sealed orders he had been given before the nuclear-powered submarine had been sent out from its base in the north. They had been simple; head to a predetermined location, or as near as practical, and then wait. At a certain time, they were to listen for instructions; if they received the command, they were to fire their cruise missiles at the targets and return to base, sinking any European shipping they encountered along the way. If they received no command, they were to maintain radio silence and wait until they ran short of supplies; the mission would only be cancelled by shortages. There had been no provision for a recall command; it was too easy to fake.
They’d taken up position, far enough from most shipping to be fairly certain of avoiding detection, and waited. The Putin was a new ship, built to new specifications, and tested, but there was always something for the crew to do. The design had been vastly improved, ever since several of the class had been built for India and China; the Russians had quietly built a new one for themselves for every one they had exported to foreign buyers. Iran had bought several before the Americans had closed them down permanently; Algeria and Libya had expressed interest in purchasing some for their ambitions in the Mediterranean. He had every confidence in his ship.
Two days ago, they had received the order; a simple ‘go’ command and a time. They’d had their targets selected already; it had surprised him to discover that the targets were all within the English capital, London. He had assumed, at first, that they would be making a point to the British — like the new government had done from time to time by sending a Backfire or a Blackjack into British airspace to remind them that they had the capability — but instead… they had real orders to fire. It made him proud; a long career in the Russian Navy had finally given him a chance to fight for his country.
“Confirm our location,” he ordered. The seas around them were surprisingly empty; the antenna was almost impossible to detect under normal circumstances, but he knew from the ballistic missile submarine captains that they had to be very careful. The GPS position check had to be perfect, or they might miss their targets; the die had been cast and the Putin would not be found wanting. “Make sure that the targets are perfectly locked.”
“Targets confirmed,” the weapons officer said. If anything, he was more nervous than Mikhalkov himself; the cruise missiles had been tested time and time again before they had left harbour, but it was too late for them to replace a malfunctioning missile. The Putin carried thirty missiles in its bays, but a delay could be fatal; the British ships would come boiling out of their harbours with blood on their minds, the minute they launched the first missile. “All missiles report ready.”
Mikhalkov’s hand shook slightly as he pulled the key from around his neck. “I confirm that all of the targets have been locked,” he said, glancing down at the display. Thirty targets glowed red in the dim light of the submarine. “Mr Exec?”
His first officer nodded. “Target’s locked, Captain,” he said. There was a minute left to go. The first officer inserted his key and twisted it once. “Armed and ready.”
It was not as elaborate a procedure as launching nuclear missiles from a ballistic missile submarine, but Mikhalkov knew that it was important; an accidental launch from the Putin could have disastrous consequences. The Russian Navy was full of stories about missiles that had accidentally been fired, or storage dumps during the bad old days following the end of the Cold War, where a single spark had triggered an explosion that had set off nuclear warning sensors around the world. The Putin Government had started a long-term program for reforming and repairing the worst of the damage; the new President had completed the program. The Russian Navy was again one of the most dangerous in the world.
Mikhalkov watched as the weapons officer inserted his key and twisted it. He wanted to say something dramatic, but words failed him; he inserted his own key and turned it, activating the firing sequence. Thirty missiles, packed into tubes, ready to launch in a rapid-fire sequence. His breath was coming short as the display changed again; one single tap and the missiles would be launched.
The countdown reached zero.
“Firing,” he said. He pressed the firing key and held it down for the precise number of seconds. Moments later, the first of the missiles was launched… and the war began. “May God have mercy on us all.”
There was one station in PJHQ that was manned at all times; the ballistic missile warning system. The British Government might have shared the general opinion that the threat of all-out nuclear war had ended with the Cold War, but the threat of a rogue state remained in existence. The possibility that North Korea might launch a missile towards America if the war went badly — as it might well — was ever-present, and the British government needed the most up to date information. Besides, it was at least theoretically possible for terrorists to produce homemade cruise missiles.
Captain Katy Harland was on duty when it happened; the links to the orbiting European satellites began to go down. She instantly activated the emergency procedure, linking several other radars into the main warning network, before trying to establish what had gone wrong. The European military satellites, boosted into orbit by the ESA, had been problematic right from the start; she, like many of the other staff in PJHQ, regarded them with some suspicion, even if the ESA kept claiming that all the bugs were being worked out of the system. Moments later, alarms started to sound…
For a long moment, Katy just stared at the display; hundreds of red icons were flickering into existence. Out of habit, she glanced at the console to ensure that someone wasn't playing a training tape; it wouldn’t be the first time that someone had accidentally started a training program that had been mistaken for the real thing. The new icons were appearing from the sea and were being picked up now by conventional radar systems, heading in towards London. Entire sections of the command network were starting to fail; Katy realised that it was not a drill.
“Trigger the alert, now,” she snapped. It was a simple task, but one difficult to actually accept doing, except in drills; she hit the command and hoped that she wasn’t too late. The alert command should have warned the handful of TMD batteries around London that they would be needed, but she saw now that it was too late. One of the missiles — two of the missiles — was heading right for the PJHQ. The air raid alarm was sounding and staff were beating feet towards the bomb shelter, but it was too late. There were only moments left as the supersonic missiles raced closer towards their targets.