Men of War

Chapter 28

Major General Zhu Hong boldly strode down the long aisle into the Security Council, a red bound book under his arm. He seated himself in the front row of the Chinese delegation, and to see a military officer there was quite an omen, as well as a message to the world that now watched with nervous interest on their television screens when they could pull themselves away from the thousand other distractions of the day.

The heated discussion had been a typical theater of back and forth, with one side making pronouncements, condemnations and threats, while the other side sat stolidly waiting to make reprisal. Neither side was listening to the other, and the stage was now littered with props and maps and displays showing photographs and documents. The Japanese Ambassador showed video footage of the sinking of the small DDE Oyoko. The Chinese Ambassador showed photos of families weeping for the sailors lost aboard the submarine Li Zhu. The Japanese showed film of the captured Coast Guard cutter Howo, and its hostage crew paraded before cameras in China. The Chinese showed Japanese troops illegally landing on the reputed Chinese soil of Diaoyutai, and the burning of the frigates Weifang and Shouyang.

On it went, with the Japanese showing the terrible destruction of their helicopter carrier Hyuga and then the final images of the missiles exploding on Naha airfield, a barrage of six ballistic warheads that had cratered the runways and blasted a hanger to pieces there, with smoke and fire making a dramatic backdrop to the scene. He shook his finger in solemn admonition, stating that this was the homeland of the Japanese nation, and of that there could be no dispute. The escalation, he said was a cowardly act by a nation who had suffered military defeat at sea and a desperate attempt to save face, and nothing more.

The Chinese Ambassador brushed his accusations aside as nothing more than the mutterings of an old fisherman, which brought the only ripple of muted laughter to the scene, quashed quickly when the Japanese Ambassador stood stiffly and led his delegation out of the room.

The issue then passed to the American Ambassador, who lamented the inability of nations to resolve their disputes without resort to military conflict, before stating that China should be well aware of its obligations on the world stage.

The Chinese Ambassador retorted by showing satellite photographs of the American carrier Eisenhower at Diego Garcia, and asking where it was going? “Before the distinguished American Ambassador decides to lecture the People’s Republic of China regarding its obligations, perhaps it would explain why this aircraft carrier now hastens to the scene. It appears that the United States is also quick to put forward a military solution to the dispute now under discussion, so their words are hollow when they presume to point a finger at China in this matter.”

To this the Americans gravely trotted out even more placards with additional satellite photography mounted and showing the dramatic buildup on the coast of the Taiwan Strait, week by week, as amphibious ships were being loaded, the power plants of more frigates and destroyers blooming alive on infrared, the aircraft lining up on coastal air fields, and finally the movement of mobile ballistic missile launchers.

“Mister Ambassador,” he said pointedly, “We now note that the Chinese military has deployed army troops amounting to three full divisions on this coastline, with up to two brigade sized elements now loading on the ships in these photographs. The islands now under dispute in this discussion do not have sufficient space for even a tiny portion force. So kindly tell us where these troops are going? Why is China loading weapons and men of war on ships?”

The cat named Taiwan was quickly out of the bag, as it was no mystery as to what the Chinese intended. It was the Chinese Autumn Moon festival back home that September, and the Taiwanese Ambassador angrily held up the traditional festival moon cakes he had obtained that had been molded in the shape of his home island. “The Republic Of China,” he scolded, “is not a confection to be eaten by our greedy neighbors to the west! Taiwan will state categorically that it will oppose any and all attempts to violate its territorial integrity with the full might of its armed forces on land, air and sea.”

To this the People’s Republic Of China warned that they may attempt to do so, but would soon find their efforts lacking and they would be wiser now to acquiesce and submit to the authority of their rightful masters in Beijing. He spoke at length of the long years that China waited patiently for her wayward son to come home, until he had well tried the patience of every delegation in the room prompting the Taiwanese Ambassador to slap his hand on the table demanding to be heard in the middle of this diatribe.

He rudely reminded China that his nation did not stand alone, nor did the Japanese nation stand alone, which set the American delegation to nervous whispers as the inevitable strings of attachment would eventually bind both Taipei and Tokyo to Washington, the work of treaties and mutual defense agreements that had stood for eighty years.

China shouted down the Ambassador, berating his bad manners. “The younger son should never presume to speak thusly before his elders,” he said angrily. Then he reminded the audience that the People’s Republic did not stand alone either, which set the Russian delegation to nervous whispers, and on it went.

When the American delegation next took the floor to make their closing statement they did so with gravity and a somber, well rehearsed candor. “Yes, gentlemen, it is clear that treaties and obligations now force the United States to the regretful step of deploying deterrent forces in the region, in the hope that they may never have to speak in anger over these matters, but with the firm resolve to do so should China persist in this aggression and threaten or attack any party to the treaties and mutual understandings I now speak of.”

China’s Ambassador took this for the threat it was, looked hotly at the Russian delegation, and began reminding the Americans that SinoPac was also an organization dedicated to peace, but not peace at any price, and that any interference in what it considered the internal affairs of the Chinese people in the matter of Diaoyutai or Taiwan would be treated as an act of war.

It was then that Major General Zhu Hong, made his sudden appearance, striding boldly down the aisle and throwing his thick red book on the table as he took the microphone.

“I too, have pictures to show,” he said coldly, and he proceeded to hold up photos of the USS Washington battlegroup at Yokohama, now putting out to sea, the USS Nimitz battlegroup leaving Hawaii after a recent port call and now heading west, the USS Eisenhower battlegroup now moving east towards the Singapore Strait.

Then he held up one last photo, of a chalky while stretch of sand in the Gobi desert, around which there was drawn a thin red outline in the obvious shape of an aircraft carrier. He pointed out two deep craters that would have been direct hits on the flight deck by ballistic missiles fired from a range of 2000 kilometers. The day was long gone, he said, when the American Navy ships could carry the big stick their president Theodore Roosevelt first gave them. China had big sticks of its own, and then, to the utter shock of everyone present, and right before the worldwide television audience, General Zhu threatened the United States with a nuclear attack if it became embroiled in a conflict between China and Taiwan.

“If the Americans bring their fleets and send their aircraft onto the disputed zone to violate China’s territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons,” Zhu Hong told the stunned circle of balding men around the Security Council. “And should the United States respond in kind, we Chinese will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all of the cities east of Xian. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared to see hundreds of cities destroyed by our missiles,” he added gravely. “When it is all over, we estimate our population will be reduced to some 300 million, roughly equal to the population of the United States today. But if that tomorrow comes, your people will all be gone. There will be no United States to speak of.” His cold calculus concluded, the General stood up, taking his thick red book in arm. “This has been decided,” he said with finality. “There will be no further discussion.” Then he turned and strode up the aisle, quickly followed by the whole of the Chinese delegation.

The stunned delegations watched them go, unable to believe such a threat could be so callously pronounced in the Security Council chambers. At the American delegation, Ambassador Stevenson was shaking his head in sheer disbelief. He turned to his assistant, James Porter, and frowned.

“Never let your vigilance drop when the ships start sliding off the spillways in the Pacific, Mister Porter. The Chinese have been building them for the last fifteen years, and now it’s come to this again. Once you build the damn things the men in white and blue uniforms want to use them.” He heard a quiet tone sound, and realized one of his staff members in the second row had just received a call. Stevenson turned, a grave expression on his face as the young staffer leaned in and whispered the latest news.

Stevenson quickly zipped up his attaché case and stood, feeling the blood flow into his long legs after the grueling three hour session. He knew he would be making a full report to the brass to receive further instructions within the hour. “Better get General Gabriel on the line as soon as we reach the office. And I’m sure Admirals Ferguson and Richardson at PACOM will want to weigh in on this… Who else? Carlisle at PACAF, and probably Ghortney too.”

“Ghortney, sir? He’s ready for the retirement ceremony next month.”

“It may have to wait, Porter. Looks like we’ll need a Fleet Admiral again soon and Ghortney’s at the top of the list. He’s an old carrier commander. Perhaps that fifth star might convince him to stick around.”

“That’s an awful lot of admirals in on one call sir. Will this go through the Joint Chiefs or the Oval Office?”

“Probably both. Such insanity has to be dealt with,” he said in a low voice, “and the sooner we get about it, the better.”

High above the Pacific, NROL-50 was watching the latest developments very closely from space, and 2nd Lieutenant Matt Eden was on the duty roster that day at the Naval Intelligence Center. He was taking a good long look at airfields throughout Central and Southern China, and especially at sites where more advance air squadrons were known to be deployed. The Chinese Air Force had taken a good hard jab to the nose in that recent engagement with the Japanese. He had heard the intelligence circulating through his analysis unit, and was not surprised.

A gaggle of J-10s up against six Silent Eagles and three JF-35s, he mused? Fat chance. The Chinese should have left those J-10s on the tarmac where they belong. It was an aerodynamically unstable design from the get—go, and needed fly by wire flight control systems to keep the planes from flying apart in a tight turn or other maneuver that overstressed the aircraft. It was a great plane when the flight control system worked, but when that wire was cut by a good pair of electronic clippers…

He smiled, wondering if the Japanese had tried anything similar to the in-flight NS-111—that was now a top secret addition to the noses of some very select squadrons of aircraft in the USAF. In any case, they Eagles probably had them in their crosshairs well before those J-10s could lock and load. It was over before it started.

But this latest development he had been watching was a little more troubling. He had checked three key airfields now, and the story was the same. The supposedly hidden underground bunkers were starting to see some daylight for a change. He had seen a planes emerging in groups of six and quickly maneuvering for takeoff. The top down silhouette was unmistakable, and he was quickly counting noses, realizing he was seeing a very significant deployment here. Ten minutes later he was on the phone to his deputy commander with some very bad news. It looks like the Chinese mean business this time he thought.

“Deputy Commander. Go ahead.”

“Deep Black Ten, sir. Lieutenant Eden reporting. The bats have left their caves.”

“Single sighting?”

“No sir, I have it in triplicate and I’m rolling over for three more vectors and some additional photography.”

“Very well…We’ll see what they have over at ASIA and Keyhole. I’m sure they’ve been more than curious this week. Check three more, and get those photos in my inbox ASAP.”

“Right, sir. Eden out.” They were going to check with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. Whoopi doo! He ran a mental finger about in circles. Well, they would have the same thing in their inboxes soon enough. Eden was inwardly pleased that the Deputy Commander took his report as breaking news. The Keyhole crowd will be on it in minutes now, but he had it first.

My, my, he thought—Vampires. The Chinese didn’t call them that. Their handle was more culturally appropriate: Shen Long, the Mighty Dragon. It’s original name had been much more to the point: Jian-20 or Killer-20, the annihilator. The US had taken them down a peg or two by calling them bats and, as they were particularly nasty bats, the term Vampire that had long been associated with an incoming threat was an easy evolution. But call them what you will, the new fifth generation J-20 stealth fighters would live up to the name, and then some. They usually slumbered in their deep hidden bunkers, with only occasional outings to let us know what they had if they ever needed it, but not today.

When the plane was first flight tested nine years ago in 2012 during a visit to China by then Defense Secretary Gates, US analysts stated the J-20 had the potential to “put some of our capabilities at risk.” Eden smiled inwardly at that, thinking of the men in the planes and ships that might soon have to face down these Vampires. The thought that higher government had reduced them, and the machines they operated, to mere ‘capabilities’ was somewhat disturbing.

The Lieutenant knew what was happening here. It was quite evident. Japan got herself in a scrap and Taiwan is next in line. But Uncle Sam lives just down the street, and the carriers were coming, the symbol of American power and prestige at sea for over eighty years. The J-20 was a premier fifth generation maritime strike aircraft capable of long range, penetrating attacks against formidable air defense environments. Now the big and relatively slow aircraft carriers would face an opponent with the range to reach and attack them by more than one means. The Vampires may soon be riding the buffalo’s back, he thought, and I get to sit here and watch it in living HD video.

His satellite roll maneuver was nearly complete, and his board read green for new target coordinates. He’d have a look at three more airfields, but had little doubt that the story would be the same. This is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better, he thought… A whole lot worse.

Chapter 29

CV-16 was the carrier Liaoning, named for a swift river that flowed through China’s northeast province by the same name. In an odd irony, the second character that made up the name of this ship of war was ‘ning’, the symbol for ‘peace.’ The province’s strategic location on the Yellow Sea adjacent to North Korea on one side to the east, and the capitol of Beijing to the southwest, had given it the auspicious nickname of the Golden Triangle. There a long peninsula reached from the province towards the Chinese mainland and out into the Yellow Sea, and near its tip was the big naval center and harbor of Dailan.

It was a massive complex, a major terminal for the arrival and storage of the oil being burned by China’s enormous economy. Parts of the harbor were occupied by the big Dialan West Pacific Oil refinery, its squat metal storage tanks gleaming in long rows along much of the eastern arm of land that created the Gulf of Dailan.

Across that wide bay the western shores saw the city gathered in a warren of high rise concrete residential buildings that rose in massive clusters, their tops often shadowed by tall red metal cranes where new floors were being added as China continued to build its infrastructure. Ninety percent of all the large industrial cranes on earth were in the People’s Republic, and they did not sit idle. City after city was a bustling hive of energy and new construction, with some places seeing the simultaneous construction of upwards of fifty new high rise buildings as any given time. There were no more than ten to twenty new buildings of equal stature under construction in the whole of the United States, which showed how profoundly the industrial power of the world now rested on China’s broad shoulders.

South of Dialan was the Xiaopingdao Submarine base where the new Type 094 and 095 submarines were docked, along with older Ming class diesel boats that had been hand-me-downs from the Russians years ago, their old Romeo class. Even further south was Lushan harbor, the old Port Arthur that had been a bone of contention in the 1890s between China and Japan. The Tiger Tai Peninsula protecting the bay there still had old scars of war, with the ruins of fortifications dating back to the 1800s. There were also several airfields, the airbase at Tuchengzi, weapons bunkers, SAM sites and other obvious signs of military activity.

There, sitting proudly in the harbor itself, was the Liaoning, the Ex-Varyag, brother ship of the Russian carrier Kusnetsov. Its freshly painted ski-jump forward deck swept upwards in an elegant yet highly functional design. The Chinese had acquired the unfinished carrier from Ukraine for the paltry sum of only 18 million, with an additional two million for the blueprints. After haggling with the Turks for three years to get permission to tow the ship through the Bosporus Strait, the Chinese set about with loving care and considerable industry to finished the job of her construction and fitting out. The old name passed to an aging Russian cruiser now based at Vladivostok, and the Chinese christened the ship Liaoning, all 67,500 tons, now trimmed out with navy white and gray paint and festooned with colorful flags.

Being the first fleet carrier in the Chinese Navy, Laioning occupied the place of honor that any elder son would have in the family. Two newer and larger carriers had been under construction since 2012 and were rapidly being readied for their trial by fire. Liaoning was now an elder brother indeed, as the first Shenyang J-15 fighter had successfully landed on its decks on the 25th of November, in the year 2012. The decks had been given a good zinc chromate primer and then covered with a durable non-skid surface. The superstructure and island had been fitted out with the new Sea Eagle search radars and electronics, including advanced phased array radar. Air defenses were added, including four Flying Leopard FL-3000N missile batteries in a big lunchbox of 24 fire and forget TY-90 SAMs, each capable of passive RF tracking and infrared guidance with a range of nine kilometers. It was, however, a last chance terminal defense weapon, just like the two Type 1030 CWIS 30mm Gatling guns that covered her rear port and starboard quarters.

The real bite from any carrier was in its air wing, and Liaoning would carry a minimum strike wing of thirty-two J-15 fighters, a Chinese knock off of the deadly Russian SU-33, their navalized version of the SU-27 Flanker. A subflight of six Z-8 helos and two new Russian KA-31 AEW helos would complete her wing. In the months prior to its initial deployment, pilots and flight crews rehearsed their roles in an extensive training program that took place on the roof of the Naval Research Center at Wuhan. A complete full size mockup of the carrier’s deck and island had been built there for rigorous training.

The so called ‘threat environment’ a ship would find itself in was constantly evolving as new missiles and aircraft were deployed, and its defenses had to evolve to meet new challenges, year after year. The J-15Bs of 2021 were an upgrade from the originals, and now a proven and capable aircraft. The men who fought in the ships had also evolved. Now, nine years later, Liaoning’s original Captain Zhang Zheng had risen to the post of Admiral in charge of the entire Dialan Naval complex, overseeing all operations in the Yellow Sea Command.

Admiral Zhang Zheng was an intelligent, experienced and technically competent man. Born to a military family in 1969 he was now fifty two, and had sacrificed much for the navy life he so loved. At the academy he had pledged that he would not marry until he first became captain of a ship, and he had forsaken the lures of lucrative business opportunities to remain in the service all these many years. He had served on a frigate, guided missile destroyer, and eventually was given the great rose of the fleet when he took command of Liaoning in September of 2012.

Zhang studied abroad in the United Kingdom at the Defense Language Institute and the British Joint Services Command and Staff College. As such he was fluent in English, as were many others aboard Liaoning, which became China’s international ship for a time after its commissioning. Ninety-eight percent of the crew aboard the carrier were graduates of that same college. Now Zhang would be taking over as commander of the Dialan Naval District, though he still would hold the title of official commissar of the carrier Liaoning. It was a difficult moment when he left the ship, saluting proudly to the crew assembled on the deck in their dress whites, and struggling to hold his emotions in hand.

The next time a flotilla of surface action vessels took to the sea they would not have to wait for fighters lumbering in from coastal bases over 400 kilometers away. This time the swift, agile Shenyang J-15 Feisha ‘Flying Sharks’ would be circling overhead, waiting for prey. China’s eldest brother was going to war, but Liaoning would not sail alone.

Far to the south a second carrier was ready to put to sea at the Sanya naval base at Hainan, the new Taifeng, or Typhoon class super-carrier, China’s first of two in this class. It’s sister ship the Haifeng or Seawind was also feverishly fitting out at the Jiangnan Shipyards of Shanghai. Laid down in 2012 and 2014, these two new designs would be China first indigenous aircraft carriers, all of 72,000 tons, with an air wing of sixty-eight advanced strike fighters. Taifeng knew a challenger was coming in CVN Eisenhower, and the ship was being readied to bar the way on her maiden voyage.

The war of words at the United Nations had reached as startling and final an end as the sudden lethal descent of the ballistic missiles that fell on Naha, Okinawa. Now the gloves were off, and the next time ships and planes deployed in the region it would be with the expectation that any contact they encountered was a hostile enemy.

“So what do we do about this situation?” said Rod Leyman, White House Chief of Staff. He was meeting with Lt. Commander William Reed, a defense analyst expert for many years who had been called in to the West Wing to brief the civilian decision makers there. After the startling theater at the UN that day, secure phone lines had been jammed throughout DC, Langley and the Pentagon. “Are the Chinese blowing smoke up our ass here with this nuclear threat?”

“It was very unusual to see the military march in like that, sir, and with such a pronouncement one might easily think it was meant for public consumption.”

“Yes, just a little taste of fear to get the folks back home here all worked up. Well I must tell you that several senior officers think we ought to take this very seriously.”

“Of course, sir. Any aspect regarding potential use of nuclear weapons needs to be taken very seriously. Thank God we’ve only seen one go off in anger over all these decades.”

Leyman wasn’t quite sure what Reed meant with that, but moved on, and the Lieutenant Commander kicked himself inwardly for the slip. Yes, there had only been one—the one that put down the Mississippi in 1941, and though the United States had two bombs ready for the Japanese by late 1944, saner heads had prevailed and Japan surrendered before they had to be used. But even now, over eighty years later, few men really knew the whole story of what had happened in the Atlantic that day in early August, 1941. He made a note to watch himself, and listened to Leyman’s next question.

“There’s been a recommendation that we take down their satellites, and do it now.”

“That’s a sound preventative strategy, sir. The real high ground in modern warfare is outer space. We’ve got systems in place that can go after their birds; they have some limited capability to go after ours. But whoever strikes first is going to have a real edge. Thumbing the other guy in the eye in the first round is a tried and true tactic.”

“I’ll take that as a yes from you. Now, speaking of satellites, we got a report that the Chinese were moving some planes from inland airfields to the coast.” He handed Reed a photo from his briefing file. “Can you tell me about them?”

Reed took a long look, nodding his head as if he expected the development. “J-20s,” he said matter of factly. “It’s an advanced stealth type strike aircraft, sir.”

“Well is it as good as our fighters? The Navy is all up in a tither over this.”

“It’s a decent aircraft, sir, low-observable airframe, particularly from the forward aspect, and a good weapons suite. It’s fast, and it has the range to get out after targets well off shore—a combat radius of over 2000 kilometers. Our older fighters will have some trouble with it one-on-one. Put a Vampire out there against a Hornet and the other side may have the edge.”

“Vampire? I thought these things were called Dragons?”

“The Chinese name is Mighty Dragon, sir. We just call them Vampires, or bats for short. In some ways they’re a stealthy version of the old Russian Mig-25 Foxbat… hence the handle.”

“Well what I want to know, Commander Reed, is whether or not these things are going to beat us.”

“I can’t tell you that for certain, sir. What I can say is this. That FA-18 Hornet we put out there may be past its prime, but it won’t be alone. We have a couple of carrier squadrons with our new F-35 Lightnings. But there’s more to all this than which plane is better. It isn’t just stealth and missiles that will decide this thing, sir. A good combat aircraft today has a long checklist. Yes, its radar signature and missiles count for a lot, but then there are things like its integrated electronics, the reliability of its radar and engines, the Electronic Warfare system it’s using, the ability to synthesize both onboard and off board sensor data—information from satellites, ground based systems and other assets like AEW or AWACS planes. Then we get to how good that pilot is, the training he has and the maintenance routines that put his plane in the air that day. And how long can he stay there? That takes a well practiced and reliable air refueling capability. Wrap it all up with good hardware and software and you’ve got the whole package—the real modern aircraft worth the name when it comes to war fighting.”

“So what’s the bottom line, Mister Reed. Is that what the Chinese are going to be throwing at our carrier task forces if we send in the Eisenhower and Nimitz?”

“No sir, I don’t think so. These planes have a few things on the list, and I’ve already mentioned those: good range, speed, stealth and weapons. As for everything else on my list, I don’t think they can come anywhere near us, sir. We’ve been at this for years, decades. This new J-20 was just delivered in large numbers three years ago. We estimate they may have no more than a hundred in inventory, and this will be their first invitation to the dance. As for pilots, they’ll have some good ones in the seat, some bad ones, and some miserable ones. But every plane we send up is going to have a rip-snortin’ expert in the harness, and that’s no brag, sir. So think of these planes like darts. They’ll throw them at us, and occasionally they’ll hit something.”

“Our carriers?”

“They’ll try, but they’ll have to get through hell’s gate first, sir. I think they will most likely make high speed runs at our AEW assets, at-sea replenishment ships, command ships, the smaller Marine Amphibious carriers will be more vulnerable than our fleet carriers. But it’s never quite like that, sir. These targets aren’t sitting out there alone. We’re a highly integrated Air/Sea combat force. All those assets will have a carrier air wing up and angry for defense, sir, and if you want to know what our boys are capable of just ask Saddam or the Ayatollah.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, Mister Reed, but Saddam is dead,” Leyman said glibly.

“My point exactly, sir.”

“Then you believe we can safely move these two CV battlegroups — say into the East China Sea?”

“I think I would stand off just a little farther out, sir. We don’t need to be in those waters to project our force there. Remember, we’ve got assets at Kadena on Okinawa as well.”

“Yes, but look what happened at Naha. Are we to expect a rain of these ballistic missiles on our airfields in the region as well?”

“If we get into it, I would certainly count on that, sir. I described those J-20s as aimed darts. Well the ballistic missiles are another matter entirely. Think of them as arrows, and fired by some very good archers.”

“Can we stop these things, Commander?”

“We can try, sir. And to bring it back full circle, I would begin with the satellites, and I wouldn’t waste much more time with that. The General made a real show if it in the UN when he dragged out that photo of a cratered airstrip in the Gobi. Yes, they can hit a target, as we clearly saw, but they have to know where it is, sir. As it stands now, they can sit up there with satellites and see exactly where Eisenhower and Nimitz are at this very moment. Take down those satellites and they’ll have to rely on three other things: air reconnaissance, submarines, or over the horizon radar. We can shoot down the first one, find and kill the second one with our own subs, and jam the third one. But the satellites? You’ve got one option, sir. Get them as soon as you can.”

Leyman took that all in and slowly set his briefing file on the table. “I see,” he said. “Well just how many of these ballistic missiles are we talking about, Mister Reed? All it took was six of the damn things to raise hell at Naha.”

“I’m afraid they have quite a few more than that, sir.”

“How many? Are we talking about a couple hundred here?”

Reed rubbed his nose, and then looked Leyman in the eye and told it to him straight. “No sir, we’re talking about a couple thousand, over 2,200 by our latest estimates.”

“My God…” Leyman reached for a glass of water.

“And then there’s one other matter, sir.”

“For heaven’s sake, these damn missiles are quite enough, but go ahead, Commander. What else have they got in their back pocket I need to know about?”

“Well, sir… They have the Russians.”

Chapter 30

Admiral Volsky sat behind the big desk in Abramov’s old office at Naval Headquarters, Fokino. It was now his new home, his new ship, and somehow being chained to a desk forced home the realization that comes to every admiral over the age of sixty years—the bone yard was not far off. This was the last post he would likely hold in the navy, and the shadow of imminent retirement was already darkening the light of his long and distinguished career. Soon he would be like the old ships in the graveyard bays of Sakhalin and Kamchatka, and the sight of the rusting hulk of the second original Kirov Class battlecruiser, Admiral Lazarev, seemed to mock him where it rode at anchor near the Fleet Munitions Depot down in Abrek Bay.

Yes, he thought, There you sit, Lazarev, just as I sit here at Abramov’s old desk. This chair was his, and now it’s mine until they drag me off to some desolate harbor where I can rust my last years away. Maybe one day they will name a ship after me, the Admiral Leonid Volsky, and then I will live again and cut through the open seas under a starry night… But not today. Now I have other matters to attend to, the things that choked the veins and arteries of old Abramov and put him in that hospital bed. And the worst of it is knowing the futility of it all—knowing the dark end it all comes to, and sitting here trying to find a way to still be a serving Fleet Admiral in the Russian Navy while I strive to prevent the very thing that the ships and men I command were made for.

We build them, and by God we will use them one day. That was the sad and inevitable logic of war. The Admiral Lazarev had not seen much action in her brief career. She was laid down in the old harbor at Leningrad in 1981, commissioned in 1984, sailed about for a time with visits to Aden, Luanda, Vietnam, and then sat uselessly at her port berthing, retired in 1999. Her heart was ripped out a few years later when they unloaded her nuclear fuel, just like Abramov.

His eye wandered to the squat buildings southwest around Chazhma Bay where the Ship Repair Facility received the old depleted fuel that was at the heart of the fleet’s nuclear powered submarines. The long thin steel of the Trans-Siberian railway would receive fresh fuel from the Machine Building Plant in Elektrostal and return spent fuel assemblies for storage or reprocessing at the Mayak Chemical Combine in Chelyabinsk. Heart surgery, he thought, wondering how many years he had left himself.

Nothing lasts forever…

His Chief of Staff, Talanov, buzzed him, breaking his reverie with the news he had been expecting. “Good morning, Admiral, Captain Karpov and Captain Fedorov are waiting as ordered. Shall I send them in?”

“Please do. Thank you, Mister Talanov.”

The door opened and the two men entered, smiling to see the Admiral again. Volsky stood to shake their hands, invigorated to see them, and gesturing warmly to the two chairs before the polished maple desk.

“Well, gentlemen, I expect you have seen the theatrics at the United Nations. Astounding to think the Chinese would make such a display.”

“The talk is that there has been a split between the civilian leadership and the military, sir,” said Karpov.

“Perhaps,” said Volsky. “The Chinese ambassador seemed as surprised as everyone else when that general stormed in and took the microphone. So now they are pouring over their maps over there, and pointing fingers at islands and rattling off numbers and the names of men and ships they will send there to fight. There is nothing more dangerous than an Admiral or General with a compass and a map. Sadly, that applies equally to me at this moment. I called you here because Moscow wants us to mobilize the fleet and make a strong show of force in accordance with our ‘obligations’ under the SinoPac treaty.” He used his fingers to put quotation marks around the word “obligations,” a cynical look on his face. “Of course the Americans are also dipping that same old tea bag into their hot water, and so the table will soon be set for some very uncomfortable company in these waters.”

“It appears so, sir,” said Fedorov. “I’ve been watching for the clear warning signs we were privileged to learn about from that Australian newspaper. We’ve already avoided one tripwire when we spared the Key West, and I suppose that was mutual, as they could have put torpedoes into us long before Tasarov’s equipment came back on-line and we knew the sub was even there. Yet it looks like that may have only bought us a brief respite. The other warning signs are shaping up in the news now like a bad storm on the horizon.”

“Quite so,” said Volsky. “We received word this morning that the Chinese are lighting the fires under that old carrier they bought some years ago. The Liaoning is blooming on infrared and getting ready to put out to sea from Dialan. We’ve seen deliveries of additional J-15 fighters on satellite, and their new J-20s. They’re putting together a strong flotilla this time. This was the next major incident mentioned in that newspaper, was it not?”

“Yes, sir,” said Fedorov. “Yet the spin on that report in the article we found seemed to indicate that the American submarine that sunk the Liaoning did so in reprisal for the loss of the Key West. We’ve already re-written that part of the story.”

“Perhaps, but I tend to think this attack on Liaoning was also meant to send a strong message to the Chinese not to attempt an invasion of Taiwan.”

“Yes, sir, but it would be an alarming way to do so. A telephone would serve just as well, or a microphone at the UN.”

“Very true,” Volsky smiled. “Perhaps the Americans will act intelligently in this situation and this attack will not occur. But remember Dostoyevsky: it takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently. I wonder if the Americans have that missing factor in this situation. They’ve had their way on the world stage since the end of World War Two. They won’t like the Chinese starting to throw their weight around, and may act stupidly.”

“Well it seems we may have only bought ourselves a couple week’s delay in the course of events, sir. That article stated that the Liaoning sunk on September 7th, and here it is weeks later on the 21st and it has not yet left Dialan. CV Eisenhower is presently in the Strait of Malacca and approaching Singapore. It was supposed to have been sunk a week ago, so events are running about two weeks late. That time has been filled by the incident in the Diaoyutai Island group and this war of words in the UN. Unfortunately, it may have worsened the situation. There was no mention of that incident in that newspaper we found, but now the Japanese are also involved. That means the US is obligated by two treaties. This may compel them to take stronger action.”

“The question is whether the Americans will attack Liaoning this time,” said Karpov. “If they do then the dominoes are falling as before. But even if they do not attack the ship, I think these dominoes are going to fall another way.”

“Correct,” said Volsky. “This is why there may be some wisdom in what Moscow wants for the moment, strange as that may sound. If we make a strong show of force now, it might convince the Americans that they will have to deal with us along with the Chinese. It could give them pause, and perhaps allow time for negotiations. I have already spoken with their Admiral Richardson and expressed my sentiments on the matter. He seems a reasonable man, but may soon be compelled to act by the civilian leadership over there, just as I am now.”

“There was news today that their Admiral Ghortney may be named Fleet Admiral and replace him,” said Fedorov. “That is very rare event to see a five star Admiral there. It only happens during wartime.”

“Yes, the Americans have sent a strong signal with this move. Richardson came up through their nuclear propulsion division, but Ghortney is a carrier man, a fighting Admiral. Let us hope the Chinese get the message. We certainly would, but they haven’t had a nice long eighty year cold war with the Americans. We have instincts and understand the nuances of an adversarial relationship like that. The Chinese may not yet know how to play the game. They have made their first move by pushing a pawn out to challenge the Japanese for those useless islands, but it is clear they now mean to post a strong knight on Taiwan. The Americans will play out the Ruy Lopez, of course. And post a Bishop with their carrier battlegroups holding a knife to that knight’s neck.” Volsky was referring to the famous Ruy Lopez chess opening where a white bishop immediately sortied to challenge the black knight. “But as for the moves we must now make, and the message we must send, I’m afraid no one is getting any sleep at the RVSN.” He was referring to Russia’s strategic missile command center. “The missile fields of Svobodnyy may soon be warming up the silos. Hopefully it will not come to that any time soon, but in the near term I will have some orders for you now. I hope the ship is seaworthy, Mister Karpov.”

“We’ve done a great deal in the last week, sir. Byko has had men in the water every day reinforcing that hull patch, and we’ve done more metal work from the inside. The Fregat system is up and running again, and they’ve mounted a new sensor on the top mast, though they still have a lot of work to do there before it’s functional. As for the aft citadel, I’m afraid all we could do was clear the wreckage, clean it up, and throw a coat of paint over it. They put up some bare frame steel beams to support a new roof and laid down some metal plating there to keep out the elements, but there’s no armor to speak of. The space is just being used for storage and other equipment. The damage aft from that bomb hit we took has been patched over, but we still have no fire control system for the Klinok silos there, so we’ll be a little light on SAMs for that system. I told them to load the missiles anyway. We can always move them, and Rodenko is seeing about cross circuiting with the forward fire control radars. To compensate, they replaced our S-300s with a nice new upgrade.”

“The S-400s?”

Karpov nodded in the affirmative. “All three range variants.” The newest Russian ship-based air defense system, S-400F Triumf, was a ‘suite’ of air defense missiles that utilized the new long-range 40N6 missile effective out to 400 kilometers, 250 miles, with a bigger 180kg warhead.

“That will be an unpleasant surprise for the Americans,” said the Admiral.

“Indeed, sir. As for the rest, we’ve completed missile reloads for the Moskit-IIs and other SSMs late last night and they are moving away the cranes.”

“Then you will be ready to put to sea directly?”

“The ship is ready, sir.”

Fedorov had a troubled look on his face and spoke up, haltingly at first, but gaining more resolve as he went. “Sir… I have a request to make. Are you aware of the incident with Markov over at the test bed center?”

“The missing man? Yes, Dobrynin reported it, but I have been too busy to follow up. I had him seal off that facility, and I suspect you have been doing some digging on the matter, right Fedorov?”

“I have, sir.” He told the Admiral what he had discovered about the changed passage in the naval history chronology, and his thoughts about Orlov. Karpov folded his arms, thinking they had put this to rest, but bearing with the situation as Fedorov had his say.

“Very mysterious,” said Volsky. “You suspect the British found that magazine article and cancelled their operation, and then your book changed? That is somewhat disturbing if it is true.”

“Indeed, sir, but only one book changed—the one I bought in the city when we arrived. My original book is just as it was.”

“What does that mean, Fedorov?”

“It means that we remain in a privileged position sir. We are unaffected by the changes in the history, at least this is what I believed at first. But then I discovered something else. Another crewman went missing the same day Markov vanished, a matoc named Yolkin in supply. He went into town to fill an order for Martinov and never returned.”

“I see,” said Volsky. “Well as much as I hate to suggest it, this may be a simple AWOL, Mister Fedorov. Who knows why this man was missing? It could be a girlfriend, or some other matter that sent him off.”

“Possibly, sir, but I did some further research. Inspector Kapustin was somewhat perturbed when he discovered they had no records in Moscow for any of the men we listed as casualties. Well we must now add yet another man to that list—Yolkin. I checked with Moscow on him as well. There is no record that such a man was ever signed on to our active duty roster.”

“But we’re sitting here discussing the man,” said Volsky. “I remember him, short, a little heavy set, and his nose was always red from the cold when we were up north.”

“Yes, and the men in his section remember him as well, sir. But there is no longer a physical record of him, not even in the backup of the data we made before we purged our logs and files. It’s changed, sir, just like the book. It was made after we shifted forward, and did not come from the world we left behind in Severomorsk. I interviewed Yolkin’s closest friends, found out his birth date and went so far as to look for this man’s birth certificate. There are lots of Yolkins, of course, but not this one. He’s vanished, just like Markov, but it’s as if he never even existed…”

That statement surprised Volsky, and lent considerable weight to Fedorov’s argument. “Never existed? Are you telling me the incident with Markov caused this man’s life history to be changed to a point where he was never even born?”

“All I can say for certain is that there is now no record of his existence, no birth certificate, school records, medical records, tax or credit information. Yolkin has been completely erased from the ledger of life. It could have been a side effect from the Markov incident, but he died within minutes of his appearance in Vladivostok of 1942. I found the police report in the wartime archives. They found his wallet, of course, and when they saw his identification they probably assumed it was a fraudulent ID, though I’m willing to bet that if he had any Rubles in there it would have raised an eyebrow or two. It’s hard to make any connection between Markov and Yolkin’s disappearance, other than the fact that they both vanished the same day, which could have been coincidental.”

“Then how, Fedorov? How do you explain this?”

“I wish I could tell you, Admiral. More time and research might lead me to a more definitive answer, but there is one other possibility—Orlov.”

“Orlov? He would have died long ago. How could he be responsible?”

“This is what I first believed, Admiral—that Orlov’s life and fate had been sealed, and that the world we returned to here was therefore the final result of any change he may have worked on the history. It was easy to think he may have had something to do with this imminent war we are facing, but I discarded that. There are too many thumbs in that pie to blame it all on Orlov. Then I discovered something in my research on the man.” He reached into his coat pocket and handed the letter he had shared with Karpov to the Admiral, who read it with a silent sadness shrouding his features.

Volsky read the last few lines aloud: “Be heroes, be valiant men of war so that history will remember you as defenders of the Rodina. Should you ever find this, and learn my fate, I hope that you, courageous Russian sailors, will avenge my death.” He folded the letter slowly, setting it in the desk.

“Very sad,” he said. “Avenge him? We do not yet know how he died, or at who’s hands. Kizlyar… Yes there was an NKVD division operating there once. Strange that you should find it, but I do not understand how that changes anything here, or causes a man like Yolkin to simply disappear.”

“This is what I told him,” said Karpov. “He suggested we attempt to go find Orlov and bring him home, but there is a little more on our plate to deal with now.”

“Go and find him? What do you mean, Fedorov?”

The young Captain explained what he had suggested, and then admitted that Karpov had convinced him that such a mission would not be feasible with the ship given their present circumstances. “But there is one thing I wish to bring up, sir,” he pressed on.

“It has to do with that letter, and yes, also with these crazy ideas I have in my head now about bringing Orlov home. I was doing some reading on all this—theoretical papers on the idea of movement through time. Believe it or not, there are serious minds who have contemplated this possibility. Well, I found a paper published by an American physicist—a man named Paul Dorland. His ideas were very radical, and he posited a complete theory of time travel and how it might be possible through the creation of a controlled micro black hole. I was trying to discover some reason for the odd effects caused by Rod-25, but it wasn’t the physics in his paper that caught my attention, it was this amazing glossary of terms he had dreamt up to define how time travel would work, and what the consequences would be should it ever occur. He put forward an idea, a term that he called a Nexus Point. The essence of it was that once a willful agent with the power to act determined to do something to alter the past, time seems to be suddenly held in abeyance. The outcomes and possibilities resulting from this person’s decisions and actions seem to have an effect on what actually happens, and the power to physically change events—just like that book changed or like Yolkin vanished, or like Voloshin when he discovered his wife and apartment were missing and killed himself.”

“I don’t understand,” said Volsky. “Nexus Point?”

“The way he explained it was that time flowed like a river. So then think of a whirlpool in that stream. This is the Nexus Point, the place where different streams of time merge and flow together and then resolve to some new direction. In that whirlpool anything might happen. Imagine a leaf caught up in it, swirling about. When it finally returns to the river it might have moved to a different place, taken a different course. Kirov was a leaf in the stream of time sir, but I don’t think our journey is over yet. I think we are still caught up in the maelstrom. We still have Rod-25, and the power to use it and, as long as we do, then nothing is decided and we cannot return to the normal flow of the river.”

“You are saying that our possession of Rod-25 is the problem?”

“Both the problem and the solution, sir. Rod-25 caused this dilemma, but it is also the only means we have of redressing it. With it we have the power to change the order of events again—to change the flow of time and all the history from 1942 to the present. We can rewrite the headlines we read in that newspaper. We have already edited the story, but now we can make it new.”

Karpov’s eyes were alight as he listened, for he had heard that same Siren song and been tempted by time and fate long ago. “Yes, we do have that power,” he said in a low voice. “This Rod-25 business. It worked it’s magic at the test bed facility just as it did aboard Kirov.”

“Exactly,” said Fedorov. “As long as Rod-25 remains viable, it enables time displacement. Rig it up in a low power twelve rod reactor as Dobrynin did at the test center and we get missing magazines, teacups, chairs, and Markov. Put it back on the ship with its twin 24 rod reactors and we get a battlecruiser making visits to the high seas of 1942!”

Volsky raised his eyebrows with astonishment. “You never cease to amaze me, Fedorov. You bring this insanity into the room and actually make it sound rational. What you are saying is that your discovery of that letter makes it possible for us to do something about Orlov, yes?”

“Correct, sir. We now know exactly where he is on a given time and place. We have the equivalent of his GPS coordinates in the history, and we have the means of going there ourselves, finding him, and bringing him back. We have the power.”

“But only if we use the ship…” Volsky frowned. “This is correct what I say, yes? If we use the test bed facility we have a one way street. There is no reactor at the other end with Rod-25 to send us home.”

“Right, sir. That facility does not seem to have the power to move anything but loose objects within a limited range of the core. Yet as we have seen in a more powerful reactor setting Rod-25 can move an entire ship! We then have options. We have helicopters, men like Sergeant Troyak and his Marines.”

“Men of war,” said Volsky, remembering Orlov’s last plaintive letter. “So what you are suggesting is that fate is waiting on us? That until this possibility no longer exists, the world will never rest at ease and settle down again?”

“Something like that, sir.”

“And if we were to do such a thing as you suggest, undertake a kind of rescue operation, what then?”

“Then we will have at least packed out our trash,” said Karpov. “Forgive my speaking of Orlov in those terms, but we will have recovered the man and his damn Computer Jacket and cleaned up the last of the mess we created.”

Fedorov seized on that point. “After all, sir, didn’t you find it strange that we appeared here at the precise moment necessary to either kill or spare the Key West? It’s as if time was forcing us to make that choice so she could get on with her business. Now we have this letter, and yes, more unfinished business. Don’t you feel it? The moment seems breathless. Things are building and building to some climax, but time is waiting—waiting for us to make another choice.”

Volsky, took a long breath, settling into his chair, thinking. “Then we have two options that I can see. One is to get this Rod-25 back aboard Kirov, and hope that perhaps we might do something one day, presuming this strange displacement ever happens again. And the other choice is to utterly destroy that control rod and close the matter here and now, and then we live with what comes next, and forfeit the power to change it ever again, except by means of blood and steel in the here and now.” He had a distant look in his eyes, as if seeing the days past or perhaps peering into some unknown future and seeing it as a real place and time in his imagination.

“So what do we do, sir?” said Karpov. “What do we do with the greatest power anyone has ever seen on this earth—the power to change everything, the entire world? There’s a great dragon out there, and it’s about to start a war. We’ve already seen the end of that story. What do we do about it?”

Volsky smiled, still thinking. “This reminds me of the old Chinese proverb,” he said at last. “If you ignore the dragon, it will eat you. If you try to confront the dragon it will overpower you. But if you ride the dragon, you will take advantage of its might and power. Gentlemen… We can’t ignore this, and I’m not sure we can win this war by confrontation on our own, or prevent it from taking place. But by God, yes, we do have power, Karpov, and we can ride the Dragon’s back.”