“Tang,” Commander Jin Long took her to one side, “neither of us signed up for this. We’re not soldiers, were sailors but we must play our part. My Father would laugh at this. Apart from the fact that I’m here doing this stupid fool of a job. He’d be banging heads together.”
“What does your Father do Jin?” She knew he was Politburo but played dumb.
“He’s in the Politburo.”
“What?” she pretended to be shocked. “He is?” Jin nodded and looked to the ground. He looked up at her with sad eyes.
“This,” he waved his hand around is the opposite of what he wants.”
“What’s that?”
“I can’t say Tang, I can’t tell you.” He stood straighter.
“Let’s get the men together, we have a bridge to take. We’ll divide the company into two, you take the righthand wing.”
She stood before her men. “We have an objective, the bridge, let’s go.” They advanced up the hill taking whatever cover they could at the roadside. A few rounds started to zip by from the Rangers up the road, men returned fire. “Not so much,” she shouted, “wait until you see them.” May advanced slowly up the road, keeping her head down, one of her men got on his knees to fire, he got three rounds off when his face erupted in a red mess. He fell.
“Come on move up Chengdu.” What the hell was she doing?
They advanced but were taking fire and casualties at a horrifying rate. She heard explosions from across the road. That would be Jin’s men taking grenade or mortar fire. Minute by minute yard by yard they moved up the hill towards the bridge. The fire and the casualties mounted. What she assumed must have been a mortar bomb landed twenty yards to one side. As she raised her head, she saw what looked like a pizza in front of her. She looked again in horror, the bloody pizza had tufts of black hair and an eye staring back at her. Good God she realised, it’s the inside of someone’s head. The fighting went on for more than an hour, casualties mounted. She heard the gunfire and heavy rounds hitting the other side of the road. May had taken cover in a broken-down shed, she knew they hadn’t the manpower to take the bridge, they had caused casualties among the enemy but not enough. What did she do? Men, Chengdu’s sailors, scurried over from the left hand side of the road. A man half fell into the shed. It was him. “Jin. Jin what happened?”
The bloodstained Commander tried to smile. “We got pushed back, too many, fire too heavy.”
“Jin what do we do?” May asked frantically. “What?” she pushed up her helmet and wiped the hair from her eyes.
May knew the Taiwanese and American troops here were too strong for them and more would follow them.
Here she was fighting her own countrymen. She was on the losing side, which was good, but it could cost her life itself. What a Goddamn nightmare.
THE WAR COMMITTEE MEETING had gone on for hours and clearly had many more hours to go yet. Both boats had gone to periscope depth to reduce visibility. Communications had been sent to the Pentagon and replies had not yet been received.
Nathan stood. “Don’t know about you, but I’m a fixin to get me some vittles. You coming down the galley Frank?” he put on a rarely used Southern Drawl.
“Yes, I think I will.”
“Before you do. Do you want to sleep on board tonight, we’ve got stuff to do and I think it’ll run into tomorrow? Go to the control room and get the XO to flash a periscope message to your boat.”
“Right.” Frank left for the control room. In the Galley they ate mid rats, egg omelette and bacon, and then got to their bunks and slept.
The following day the communications had come in from State side. The planning went on with Yulin naval base on Hainan being the focus.
The base itself is on the south coast of the Island of Hainan in Yalong Bay.
Frank Pike pointed at the map. “Inside this big steel door covering the underwater pen they have at the base. There’ll be an SSBN inside I assume.”
“More than one we think,” Nikki brushed her hair back. “The caverns could hide up to 20 nuclear submarines based on reconnaissance satellite passes. The pens probably house nuclear ballistic missile submarines, so yes. The Department of Defense has estimated that the PLAN will have five Type 094 nuclear ballistic submarines operational each capable of carrying 12 JL-2 ICBM’s. Frank, this is their main base.”
Frank nodded.
“Ok, so this underground complex is their basket of shiny new eggs. What do you do when your eggs are in one basket and it’s under threat?” Pike looked around the table, “that’s right, you disperse.”
“Right,” said Nikki, “we get them as they leave the pen.”
“That is one very protected base,” grinned Nathan, “in Yalong bay, limited access. It’s tough. Outside yeah we have a chance. But out there they disperse quickly.” Nikki stood, hands on hips.
“Nathan, do we have any sea mines?” He shook his head.
“No, we did, but they were offloaded to make way for the Pointers.”
“We do,” Frank brightened, “Stonefish. They’re launched from a torpedo tube or can be dropped by aircraft,” Pike frowned, “but getting into the bay to lay them would be tough, it’s still a large bay. We’d have a chance near the exit. But one detonation and the Chinese Mine disposal ships would be all over the place.”
“Frank,” asked Nikki grinning, “can these Stonefish be carried by say a couple of divers using slings and lifting bags?”
“Yes, they have lugs, I’d say so, hard bloody work but possible.”
She sat and took a drink of her coffee then grinned.
“Then we can spoil Uncle Joe Chinaman’s day. Here’s how we do it.”
Chapter 12
Chief Innes walked down the main companionway and into the control room.
“Sir, you wanted to see me.”
Nathan looked up from his monitor. “Ahh Innes, good. We’ve got a task for you. Have you ever been on one of His Majesties warships?”
“What Sir?”
“I didn’t think so. You’ll be transferring over to HMS Bellerophon for a short while, take your diving equipment. You’ll join one of their divers on a mission. We’ve surfaced, you’ll find a boat party on the deck. They’ll take you and Commander Pike over there. Good luck Innes and enjoy your swim.”
“Yes Sir.” Innes took his dive bag up to the deck, there was Commander Pike in the inflatable. Another crew member arrived with his tanks. The boat made its way over to the SSN floating two hundred yards away in the sunshine.
ON BOARD THE BELLEROPHON Pike helped him down the sail and onto the companionway with his equipment. “Right Innes follow me.” Pike walked off astern and paused outside of a cabin. “Are ye awake Mr Marr?”
A sleepy voice answered. “Ohh, yes Sir, just…” A sailor in shorts and a tee shirt appeared.
“This is Chief Petty Officer Innes of the USN.” He faced Innes and gestured to the sailor at the door. “Sergeant Marr, Royal Marines. He’s SBS, Special Boat Service, they’re similar to your SEALS, although you wouldn’t guess. He functions as our boat’s diver. I’ll brief you on the mission. You plan it, and then the pair of you can let me know how you’re going to do it.” Pike left the pair of them, it was time to dive the boat and get to the Chinese coast.
The two divers sat in the Galley and set to work. Forty minutes later they were ready. Pike joined them.
“Sir, Stonefish is heavy,” Marr pointed to Innes and himself, “so we’re going to deploy the sled. We’ll sling two of them under it and make our way just short of the doors. From there we’ll use lifting bags to get them in position one at a time. I’ve spoken to the Weapons Officer and he says programming them the way that,” Marr looked at Innes, “what’s he called on your boat? Nik?”