The person on the other end of the INMARSAT conversation had not been Heath Cafferty. How he knew, he couldn’t say, but he knew.
Something was wrong.
“Damn wrong,” he mumbled as he shoved a sailor aside to hurry up the ladder toward Combat.
CHAPTER TEN
Captain Ibn Al Jamal bent slightly to avoid the steel overhead of the small hatch as he entered the control room of the Al Nasser. Revolutions were never pleasant.
It seemed he had been fighting his entire life for some cause or other. The war-fighting camaraderie of the crew had dissipated with the executions necessary to gain control of the submarine. Unlike on board Al Solomon, he refused to establish a revolutionary Islamic court to conduct “thumbs-up, thumbs-down” kangaroo trials. Islam was a great religion, not a vindictive one.
“Allah Alakbar,” he whispered softly. Truly, God was great. He had no intention of doing anything further to exacerbate the distrust and fear among the crew.
The Al Solomon’s former XO, now its skipper, had bragged to him less than an hour ago during a short underwater communication exchange, that his Islamic court had already executed six heretics. Boasted! Six heretics!
Captain Ibn Al Jamal had tried tactfully to suggest that it would be better to temper the revolutionary fever until back in port. He had pointed out that it was better to sail with a crew trusting each other, than have it torn apart by paranoid witch-hunts. His younger, zealous counterpart vehemently argued that the revolutionary courts enhanced solidarity. Ibn Al Jamal knew that zealotry enhanced solidarity only when one individual remained.
Even without asking, the younger man enthusiastically volunteered how effective the garrote had proved in executing those who opposed the revolution. It had been all that Ibn Al Jamal could do to keep his recent lunch down.
He recalled how his lips had curled in revulsion over his counterpart’s pleasure in the trials and the executions. The only thing those executed were guilty of was an inability to express their faith in such a way as to convince the zealots of their religious beliefs. Individualism in revolutions and religions is never tolerated. It is mistrusted. One can never be a pacifist during a revolution or a benign agnostic when religion leads it.
The initial executions that had been necessary in order to seize control of the Al Nasser had damaged crew confidence and sown huge seeds of fear and distrust. The past two days had witnessed some easing of tension, but he knew only time would restore confidence and camaraderie and he had doubts that he had time to do it. The Americans would be coming. They never missed a conflict or a war.
He returned to the problem of the Al Solomon. He imagined how the trials on the other Algerian Kilo submarine sowed fear, rising in each officer and sailor as they anxiously waited to see if they were next.
He shook his head. No. Revolutionary courts were not an instrument of Islam. They were vindictive instruments that allowed the dormant sadism in man’s heart to burst forth and run unchecked — much like the French Revolution over two hundred years ago. Ibn Al Jamal’s disappointment in the revolution was beginning to fester and the revolution was only two days old. He prayed he had not made a mistake. A mistake that was un correctable he knew.
What he was witnessing in the other submarine and had heard before they submerged and started on these missions had nothing to do with the benevolence that Islam preached — his Islam. The Islam he practiced daily and Allah who he worshipped without reservation. Such zealotry as on the Al Solomon tore apart the very fabric of the Koran subscribed to by him and the majority of devout Moslems.
Tolerance and understanding paved the true path for a proper Moslem. He leaned his head against the bulkhead and uttered a short prayer, starting it with the familiar “Allah Alakbar wa Allah Alzim. ” A few seconds later Ibn Al Jamal raised his head, blinked his eyes, and moved to the sonar console to watch the soothing pattern as the sounds in the water wove its magic on the screen.
Al Nasser had its challenges — like the attempted mutiny yesterday by the engineers. Revolutions were never without their “challenges.” In the freezer two bodies lay stacked on top of each other. It had been a nasty affair, with bullets flying inside the submarine. The submerged boat had been lucky — the shots fired hit the bodies of the mutineers.
A bullet underwater could be more dangerous than a bullet fired inside an aircraft. An aircraft could always recover, or have survivors once it crashed, but a submarine hit the bottom and stayed there … a living tomb or water imploded shell.
The freezer on the Al Solomon held six victims of revolutionary zeal. Killed not in self-defense or survival, but in religious zealotry. Ibn Al Jamal prayed his counterpart on the Al Solomon kept enough crew alive to complete the mission.
Revolution was like a game of poker. No one knew the true winner until the game finished. Losers fell even as cards were shuffled, but the ultimate winner always boiled down to two players. He shut his eyes and wondered whether he would be a winner and live, or a loser and die, as he rode the erratic ebb and flow in the sea of revolutionary chaos. Nothing challenged a sailor’s loyalty more than a change in leadership. A leadership that failed to provide clear-cut objectives or goals. He knew this. He had spent the past two days trying to reassure the crew of their roles. He needed their loyalty. The new government needed their patriotism. Loyalty, like respect, had to be earned. He sighed. How could he recover that loyalty when even his loyalty was being peppered with doubts? It was hard for Ibn Al Jamal to reconcile Islam with the actions of a man like the new captain of the Al Solomon. He was glad both his parents were dead and did not have to see what Algeria was becoming.
He patted the sonar technician on the shoulder before moving to the helmsman. The escape of the two submarines out of Mers El Kebir had been with Allah’s grace. He smoothed the chart on the plotting table. They would avoid the naval base at Mers El Kebir on their return. The last report showed the base at Oran still remained in loyalist hands.
Ibn Al Jamal reviewed the orders issued, including the instructions to the Al Solomon skipper to return to Algiers in thirty days unless otherwise directed. But, the Al Solomon had to remain outside the Strait of Gibraltar for thirty days.
Al Jamal hoped the young man listened to orders.
He had this uncomfortable feeling, like an angry itch in the middle of his back that couldn’t be quite reached no matter how you twisted and turned. He knew the inexperienced captain of the Al Solomon endangered their mission — of that he was sure. The young man was lost in the passions of inquisitions and seemed more interested in executing his people than his mission.
They were now in the Atlantic Ocean. A quick peep through the periscope showed the sun below the horizon and summer night slowly descending. At 2210 hours, Al Nasser and Al Solomon exchanged a single sonar ping to locate each other. Twenty minutes later they rendezvoused south of Tarifa, Spain — the windsurfing capital of Europe.
He was surprised the Al Solomon made it safely through the crowded Strait of Gibraltar, such was his lack of confidence in its skipper.
He clicked the UWC twice. A return click acknowledged his underwater communication signal. Al Jamal ordered the Al Nasser to descend to fifty-five fathoms and slowed his speed to underway, barely making way, just enough to keep the bow pointed toward the wide Atlantic.
Behind, the Al Solomon maintained course at thirty fathoms.
A single ping fifteen minutes later by the Al Nasser verified that its sister submarine had passed and was in front of them. Captain Ibn Al Jamal waited another half hour and when five single sonar pings failed to detect the Al Solomon he uttered a blessing for the crew of the other submarine. Now, he had his own mission to do. He should have reminded the young captain about the thirty days. To return sooner would endanger the submarine.