Red Storm Rising

20. The Dance of the Vampires

Toland had been a busy fellow for the past twelve hours. The data on Iceland came in slowly, one confusing piece at a time, and even now he didn't have enough to call a clear picture. The group's orders had been changed, though only after too many hours of indecision. The mission to reinforce Iceland was a washout. For the past ten hours the battle group had been heading due east toward friendly air cover from England and France. Someone had decided that if the Marines could not go to Iceland, then they might find useful employment in Germany. Bob had expected them to be diverted to Norway, where a Marine Amphibious Brigade was already in place, but getting them there could prove difficult. A furious air battle had been raging over northern Norway for almost twenty hours, with losses heavy on both sides. The Norwegians had started the war with scarcely a hundred modem fighters. They were screaming for help, but there was no help for anyone as yet.

"They're not just chewing the Norwegians up," Toland observed. "They're driving them south. Most of the attacks are on the northern bases, and they're not giving them any breather at all."

Chip nodded. "That figures. Gives their Backfires a straighter shot at us. Briefing time."

"Yeah." Toland packed up his notes and walked again toward flag country. It was easier this time.

"Okay, Commander," Admiral Baker said. "Start with the peripheries."

"Nothing much seems to be happening in the Pacific as yet. The Soviets are evidently putting a lot of diplomatic pressure on Japan. The same story they've given the rest of the world-it's all a German plot."

"Horseshit," Baker observed.

"True enough, Admiral, but it's a plausible enough story that Greece is refusing to honor its treaty commitments, and a lot of neutral and third-world countries are buying it. Anyway, the Russians are making noises about giving the Sakhalin Islands back if they play ball-or pounding hell out of them if they don't. Bottom line: Japan is not allowing any bases on its soil to be used for offensive strikes against the Soviet Union. What we have in Korea is needed there. The only carrier group we have in the Western Pacific is centered on Midway. They're well out to sea at present, and they don't have the moxie to go after Kamchatka alone. There's some air activity in the South China Sea west of the Philippines, but nothing major yet. Cam Ranh Bay appears to be empty of Soviet shipping. So the Pacific is quiet, but that won't last long.

"In the Indian Ocean, somebody launched a missile attack against Diego Garcia, probably a submarine. Not much damage-just about everything there was sent out to sea five days ago-but it got their attention. At last report, their 10 squadron was at fifteen-north, ninety-east, a long way from our guys, and heading south.

"No activity at all on NATO's southern flank. The Turks aren't about to attack Russia on their own hook, and Greece is staying out of what they call 'this German-Russian dispute.' So Ivan has a secure southern flank, too, and so far it looks like he's happy enough to keep it that way. So far the Russians are only fighting in Western Europe and against selected American installations elsewhere. They are telling anyone who'll listen that they don't even want to fight us. They've even guaranteed the safety of American tourists and businessmen in the Soviet Union. Supposedly, they're flying them all out through India. We've underestimated the political dimension here, sir. So far it's working for them.

"Okay. In Europe their operations began with from twenty to thirty Spetznaz commando attacks throughout Germany. For the most part they were defeated, but they scored big in two places. The port of Hamburg has been blocked. A pair of merchantmen was scuttled in the main channel, and the team that pulled it off got away clean. The same thing was attempted in Bremen-they blocked one channel partially and burned three ships at one of the container terminals. This team didn't get away. The other attacks were against nuclear weapons storage sites, communications posts, and one big one against a tank site. Our guys were ready for it. We took losses, but those Spetznaz troops got chewed up in most cases.

"The Soviet Army attacked west just before dawn yesterday. The good news here is that the Air Force pulled something really wild. That new Stealth fighter we've been hearing rumblings about is in squadron service, and it was used to raise a lot of hell behind Russian lines. The Air Force says they've got air superiority, or something close to it, so Ivan must have taken a big hit. Whatever they did, the initial Russian attack was not as powerful as expected. They're moving forward, but as of midnight nothing more than fifteen kilometers, and in two places they got stopped cold. So far no word on nukes or chemical weapons. Losses are reported heavy on both sides, especially up in northern Germany, where they moved the farthest. Hamburg is threatened. The Kiel Canal may have been hit with an airborne or airmobile attack, we're not sure, but part is under Russian control. That situation is a little confused. A lot of activity on the Baltic, too. The fast attack boats of the German and Danish navies claim to have beaten up hard on a combined Soviet and East German attack, but again things are pretty confused."

Toland went on to describe the situation in Norway.

"The direct threats against us are from submarines and aircraft. Ivan's subs have been pretty busy. We have reports of twenty-two merchant ships sunk. The worst was Ocean Star, a Panamanian-flag passenger liner coming back from a Med cruise. Eight hundred miles northwest of Gibraltar she took a missile hit, type unknown, but probably from a Juliet. She burned, lots of casualties. Two Spanish frigates are moving in for the search-and-rescue.

"We have three submarines reported close to our course track, an Echo, a Tango, and a Foxtrot. There could be more, but intelligence reports have most of them south and west of us. When Iceland got neutralized, we lost the G-I-UK SOSUS line, and that will allow Ivan's subs an easier access to the North Atlantic. SACLANT is dispatching subs to block the gaps. They'll have to hustle; we have reports of numerous Soviet submarines heading for the Denmark Strait."

"How many subs have we taken out?" Svenson asked.

''Lajes and Brunswick claim four kills. The P-3s got off to a good start. The bad news here is that one Orion is missing, and another reported being shot at by a sub-launched missile. This is being evaluated now, and we expect something firm by noon. In any case, the main threat to us now appears to be from aircraft, not subs. That could change by tomorrow, though."

"One day at a time. Get to Iceland," Baker ordered.

"The reports we had yesterday were correct. Evidently a regimental-sized unit came in by sea, and the rest of its division was airlifted in, starting around 1400 hours. We have to assume they're all in by now."

"Fighters?" Svenson asked.

"None reported, but it's possible. Iceland has four usable airfields-"

"Wrong, Toland, it's three," Baker said harshly.

"Beg pardon, sir, four. The big base is Keflavik. Five runways, two of them over ten thousand feet long. We built the place to stage B-52s out of, and it's quite a facility. Ivan got it virtually intact. His attack was planned deliberately not to crater the runways. Second, they have the civilian airfield at Reykjavik. The longest runway there is about two thousand meters, plenty big enough for fighters, and it's got a city wrapped around it. Hitting that place means running the risk of civilian casualties. On the north side of the island is Akureyri, one hard-surface strip. The fourth one, Admiral, is old Keflavik, about two miles southeast of the current NATO air base. It shows on the maps as unusable, but I ran into a guy who put in two years on Iceland. That strip is usable, certainly for rough-surface-capable aircraft like our C- 130. The base personnel use it for racing their go-carts and sports cars. He thinks you could use fighters out of there, too. Finally, every city on that island has a gravel strip for their domestic airline. The AUG-23 and several other Russian fighters have a rough-field capability, and could use any one of those."

"You're full of good news," observed Nimitz's commander, air group, known as the CAG. "What about the other base facilities, like fuel?"

"The fuel depot right on the base was destroyed in the attack, but the base tank-farm was not, and neither was the new terminal at Hakotstanger. Unless somebody takes it out, we've left the Russians enough jet fuel to operate for months."

"How solid is all this?" Baker wanted to know.

"We have an eyeball report from a Navy P-3 crew who surveyed the damage immediately after the attack. The RAF sent two recce birds for a look-see. The first one got good shots of Keflavik and the surrounding area. The second didn't make it back, reason unknown."

"SAMs." The CAG really looked unhappy now.

Toland nodded. "A good bet. The photos show vehicles consistent with the presence of a reinforced Soviet Air Rifle division. Icelandic radio and TV are off the air. The Brits report contact with ham radio operators on the Icelandic coast, but nothing at all is coming out of the southwest corner of the island. That's where most of the people are, and it looks to be completely under Soviet control. We're getting some intel information, but it can't last."

"What you're telling us is that we can't expect raid warning from the Norwegians, and we've lost our picket fence at Iceland. What other assets do we have?" Svenson asked.

"Evidently something. I've been told to expect possible raid warning from an asset code-named Realtime. If a large force of Soviet aircraft leaves Kola, we ought to know about it."

"What's Realtime?" the CAG asked.

"They didn't tell me that."

"Submarine." Baker smiled thinly. "Jesus protect him when he transmits. Well, Ivan sent his bombers against Iceland yesterday. Anybody wonder where they'll be coming today?"

"In case anyone wants it, my official intelligence estimate is, right here," Toland said.

"Always nice to have a professional opinion," the CAG observed acidly. "We ought to head north and pound on those Russians"-by training and experience the CAG was an attack pilot-"but we can't do that until we deal with the Backfires. What is the strength of the threat to us?"

"I'm assuming no assistance from the Air Force units. With Soviet Naval Aviation alone we have six regiments of strike aircraft, three each of Backfires and Badgers. One regiment of Badger jammers. One regiment of Bear reconnaissance birds. Add some tanker assets to that. Twenty-seven aircraft to the regiment. That's about a hundred sixty strike aircraft, each of which can carry two or three air-to-surface missiles."

"Those Badgers will have to stretch to get here. The round trip must be a good four thousand miles, even if they cut across Norway. Those are tired old birds," CAG said. "What about their satellites?"

Toland checked his watch. "There will be a RORSAT pass over us in fifty-two minutes. They got us twelve hours ago, too."

"I hope the Air Force gets its act together with their ASAT pretty soon," Svenson said quietly. "If Ivan can real-time that satellite intelligence, they don't need those damned Bears. They can figure our course easily enough, and it's only a four-hour cruise down here for them."

"Try a course change as it passes overhead?" CAG wondered.

"Not much point in it," Baker replied. "We've been heading east for ten hours. They can't miss that, and we can only do twenty knots. We can give them a plus-minus of eighty miles. How long does it take to fly that?"

Toland noted that Svenson and the CAG didn't like that decision, but neither disputed the point. He'd been told that Baker wasn't a man to argue with, and wondered if that was a good trait in a combat commander.

Edwards took some solace in having predicted the cold front's arrival properly. The rain had come exactly on time, just after midnight. If there was anything to make the worst situation worse still, it was a steady cold rain. The showers were intermittent now, a ceiling of gray clouds two thousand feet over their heads, blown along by thirty-knot winds toward Iceland's mountainous center.

"Where are the fighters?" Edwards asked. He swept Reykjavik airport with his binoculars, but couldn't find the six fighters he'd reported on the previous evening. All the transports were gone also. He saw one Soviet helicopter and some tanks. There was very little traffic on the streets and roads he could see. Certainly not much for a Monday morning. Surely the commercial fishermen would be driving to their boats? "Anybody see them lift out?"

"No, sir. Weather we had last night, the whole Russian Air Force could have come in and left." Sergeant Smith was annoyed too, mainly with the weather. "Could be in those hangars, maybe."

About 2300 the previous night, they'd observed a streak of light like that of a rocket taking off, but whatever it had been aimed at had been lost in a rain shower. Edwards had not reported that, halfway wondering if it might have been lightning.

"What's that? That's no tank. Garcia, check it out-five hundred yards west of the terminal." The lieutenant handed the glasses over.

"Okay. That's some kinda tracked vehicle. Looks like it has some sort of-not a gun, there's three of them. Rocket launcher, maybe."

"SAMs," the sergeant commented. "How much you wanna bet that's what we saw shot off last night?"

"E.T., phone home." Edwards started putting his radio together.

"How many launchers and what type?" Doghouse asked.

"We see one launcher, possibly three missiles on it. We can't tell the type. I wouldn't know the difference anyway. They might have fired off a missile last night about 2300 local."

"Why the hell didn't you tell us?" Doghouse demanded.

"'Cause I didn't know what it was!'' Edwards nearly yelled. "Goddammit! We're reporting on everything we see, and you don't even believe half of what we tell you!"

"Settle down, Beagle. We believe you. I know it's hard. Anything else happening?"

"He knows it's hard," Edwards told his men. "Can't see much activity at all, Doghouse. Stiff early, but we'd expect civilian traffic on the streets."

"Copy that. Okay now, Edwards, real fast, what's your father's middle name?"

"Doesn't have one," Edwards said. "What-"

"The name of his boat?"

"The Annie Jay. What the hell is this?"

"What happened to your girlfriend Sandy?"

It was like a knife in the guts. The tone of his voice answered for him. "You go and fuck yourself 1"

"Copy that," the voice replied. "Sorry, Lieutenant, but you had to pass that test. We have no further orders for you yet. Tell you the truth, nobody's decided what to do about you. Stay cool and avoid contact. Same transmission schedule. If you get tagged and they try to make you play radio games, start off every transmission with our call sign and say that everything is going great. Got that? Going great."

"Roger. If you hear me say that, you know something's wrong. Out."

The major commanding the Air Force detachment was enjoying himself despite having been up for over thirty hours. Keflavik was a magnificent base, and the paratroopers had captured it nearly intact. Most importantly, the Americans had thoughtfully stored their maintenance equipment in protective shelters dispersed throughout the base, and all of it had survived. As he watched from the smashed control tower, a half-dozen sweeper trucks were brushing the last fragments from runway nine. In thirty minutes it would be safe to use. Eight fuel bowsers sat filled and ready on the field, and by the end of the day the pipeline should be repaired. Then this would be a fully functional Soviet air base.

"How long before our fighters arrive?"

"Thirty minutes, Comrade Major."

"Get the radar operating."

The Soviets had packed most of the equipment for a forward air base in one of the Fucik's barges. A mobile long-range radar was now operating just west of the main runway intersection, plus a van from which ground controllers could direct radar intercepts of incoming targets. Three truck-vans of spare parts and air-to-air missiles were on the base, and three hundred maintenance personnel had been flown in the previous day. A full battery of SA-11 missiles guarded the runways, plus eight mobile antiaircraft guns and a platoon of infantrymen armed with handheld SAMs for low-flying raiders. The only hangup had been with the SAMs, and the replacements flown in a few hours ago had already been loaded on the launcher vehicles. Any NATO aircraft that came waltzing into Iceland was in for a rude surprise, as a Royal Air Force Jaguar had discovered the night before, shot out of the sky over Reykjavik before its pilot could react.

"Runway nine is cleared for operation," the radio operator reported. "Excellent! Now get them working on one-eight. I want every strip operational by this afternoon."

"What's that?" Edwards saw it first for a change. The wide silver wings of a Badger bomber skirted in and out of the lower cloud layer. Then something else. It was smaller, and it disappeared back into the clouds.

"Was that a fighter?"

"I didn't see anything, sir." Garcia had been looking in the wrong direction. The sound passed overhead, the distinctive whine of turbojets on a low throttle setting.

The lieutenant was becoming a master at getting his radio in operation. "Doghouse, this is Beagle, and things are rotten. Do you copy?"

"Roger, Beagle. What do you have for us?"

"We have aircraft flying overhead, westbound, probably for Keflavik. Stand by."

"I can hear 'em, but I don't see nothin'." Garcia handed the glasses over.

"I saw one twin-engine aircraft, probably a bomber, and one other aircraft, a lot smaller, like a fighter. We have aircraft sounds overhead, but we got solid clouds at about two thousand feet. No more visual sightings."

"You say heading towards Keflavik?"

"That's affirm. The bomber appeared to be westbound and descending."

"Any chance you can walk back to Keflavik to see what's happening there?"

Edwards didn't speak for a second. Couldn't the bastard read a map? That meant walking thirty miles over bare ground.

"Negative. Say again, negative, no chance. Over."

"Understood, Beagle. Sorry about that. I had orders to ask. Get back to us when you have a better count. You're doing good, guys. Hang in there. Out."

"They asked if we wanted to walk over to Keflavik," Edwards announced as he took off his headset. "I said no."

"Real good, sir," Smith observed. At least Air Force officers weren't total idiots.

The first MiG-29 Fulcrum landed at Keflavik a minute later. It taxied behind a base jeep and stopped close to the tower. The major in command of the base was there to meet it.

"Welcome to Keflavik!"

"Excellent. Find me a lavatory," the colonel replied.

The major motioned him to his own jeep-the Americans had left seventy jeeps behind, plus over three hundred private automobiles-and drove toward the tower. The American radios had been destroyed, but the plumbing was made of sterner stuff.

"How many?"

"Six," the colonel answered. "A Goddamned Norwegian F-16 jumped us off Hammerfest and got one before we knew he was there. Another aborted with engine trouble, and a third had to land at Akureyri. Do we have men there?"

"Not yet. We have only one helicopter. More should be coming in today." They pulled to the door. "Inside, second door on the right."

"Thank you, Comrade Major!" The colonel was back in three minutes. "The unglamorous side of flying fighter aircraft. Somehow we never warn our cadets about this."

"Here, coffee. The previous occupants were most kind to us." The major unscrewed an American thermos. The colonel took the cup, savoring the flavor as though it were fine brandy while he watched his fighters land. "We have your missiles all ready for you, and we can refuel every aircraft from our trucks. How soon can you fly again?"

"I'd prefer that my men get at least two hours to rest and eat. And I want those aircraft dispersed after they're fueled. Have you been hit yet?"

"Only two reconnaissance aircraft, and we killed one. If we're lucky-"

"Luck is for fools. The American will hit us today. I would."

"We have a new intel source on Iceland, code name Beagle," Toland reported. They were in the carrier's Combat Information Center now. "He counted over eighty transport flights into Reykjavik last night, at least six fighters with them. That's enough airlift capacity for a whole airborne division and then some. Doghouse in Scotland says that they have an unconfirmed report of Soviet fighters landing now."

"Have to be a long-range one. Foxhound, maybe a Fulcrum," CAG said. "If they have them to spare. Well, we weren't planning to visit the place just yet. We might have a problem with them trying raid-escort, though."

"Any word on E-3 support from the U.K." Baker asked Svenson.

"Looks like none."

"Toland, when do you expect our friends to arrive?"

"The RORSAT passes overhead in twenty minutes. They'll probably want that data before they take off. They could take off at any time after that, Admiral. If the Backfires tank up partway down and proceed at max power, two hours. That's worst case. More likely four to five hours."

"CAG?"

The air group commander looked tense. "Each carrier has a Hummer radar bird up, a pair of F-14 Tomcats with each. Two more Tomcats on the catapults, ready to go at five minutes' notice, another Hummer and a tanker. The rest of the fighters are at plus-fifteen on the roof, loaded and fueled. The flight crews are briefed. One Prowler over the formation, the rest ready to go at fifteen. The A-7s have buddy stores rigged. We're ready. Foch has her Crusaders at plus-fifteen. Good birds, but short legs. When the time comes we'll use them for overhead coverage."

The Radar Ocean Reconnaissance Satellite, called a RORSAT, passed over the formation at 0310. Its radar transmitter noted the formation and its cameras tracked in on their wakes. Five minutes later, the data was in Moscow. Fifteen minutes after that, flight crews were given their final brief at four military air bases grouped around the city of Kirovsk on the Kola Peninsula. The crews were quiet, no less tense than their American targets. Both sides mulled over the same thoughts. This was the exercise both sides had practiced for over fifteen years. Millions of hours of planning, studies and simulations were about to be put to the test.

The Badgers lifted off first, pushed by their twin Mikulin engines. Each takeoff was an effort. The bombers were so heavily loaded that the tower controllers reached out with their minds to wish every aircraft into the still morning air. Once off the ground they headed north, forming up into loose regimental formations just north of Murmansk before heading west and skirting past the North Cape, before their slow left turns took them toward the North Atlantic.

Twenty miles off the North Russian coast, USS Narwhal hovered beneath the surface of a slate-gray sea. The quietest submarine in the U.S. fleet, she was a specialized intelligence-gathering platform that spent more time on the Soviet coast than did some ships in the Russian Navy Her three thin ESM antennae were raised, as was a million-dollar search periscope. Technicians aboard listened in on low-power radio conversations between aircraft as they formed up. Three uniformed intelligence specialists and a civilian from the National Security Agency evaluated the strength of the raid and decided that it was large enough to risk a warning broadcast. An additional mast was raised and aimed at a communications satellite twenty-four thousand miles away. The burst transmission lasted less than a fifteenth of a second.

The message was automatically relayed to four separate communications stations, and within thirty seconds was at SACLANT headquarters. Five minutes after that, Toland had the yellow message form in his hand. He walked immediately to Admiral Baker, and handed the message over:

Baker checked his watch. "Fast work. CAG?"

The air group commander looked at the form and walked to a phone. "Shoot off the plus-fives, recall the patrol aircraft when they get to station, and set up two more Tomcats and a Hummer on plus-five. I want the returning aircraft turned around immediately. Reserve one catapult for tankers." He came back. "With your permission, sir, I propose to put another pair of F-14s and another Hummer up in an hour, and put all the fighters on plus-five. At 0600, the rest of the fighters go up, with tankers in support. We'll meet them with everything we have about two hundred miles out and kick their ass."

"Very well. Comments?"

Svenson looked pensively at the master plot. Circles were already being drawn for the farthest possible advance of the Soviet bombers.

"The Brits get the same warning?"

"Yes, sir," Toland answered. "Norwegians, too. With luck, one or the other might make contact with the raid and nibble at it some, maybe put a trailer with them."

"Nice idea, but don't count on it. If I was running the attack, I'd come way west and turn south right over Iceland." Svenson looked back at the plot. "You think Realtime would have broadcast a warning for BearDs?"

"My information, sir, is that they are allowed to broadcast only for three regiments or more. Ten or twenty Bears wouldn't be enough. They might not even notice."

"So right now we probably have a herd of Bears out there, not emitting anything, just flying around listening for our radar signals."

Toland nodded agreement. The battle group was a circle of ships with a radius of thirty miles, the carriers and troop ships in the center surrounded by nine missile-armed escorts and six more specialized antisubmarine ships. None of the ships had a radar transmitter working. Instead they got all their electronic information from the two circling E-2C air surveillance aircraft, known colloquially as Hummers, whose radars swept a circle over four hundred miles across.

The drama being played out was more complex than the most intricate game. More than a dozen variable factors could interact, with their permutations running into the thousands. Radar detection range depended on altitude and consequent distance to the horizon that neither eyes nor radar can see past. An aircraft could avoid, or at least delay, detection by skimming the waves. But this carried severe penalties in fuel consumption and range.

They bad to locate the battle group without being detected by it first. The Russians knew where the carrier group was, but it would move in the four hours required for the bombers to get there. Their missiles needed precise information if they were to home in on the raid's primary target, the two American and one French carrier, or the mission was a wasted effort.

Putting the group's fighters on station to intercept the incoming raid depended on expert prognostication of its direction and speed. Their job: to locate and engage the bombers before they could find the carriers.

For both sides, the fundamental choice was whether or not to radiate, to use their radar transmitters. Either choice carried benefits and dangers, and there was no "best" solution to the problem. Nearly every American ship carried powerful air-search radars that could locate the raid two hundred or more miles away. But those radar signals could be detected at an even greater range, generating a return signal, that would potentially allow the Soviets to circle the formation, pinpoint it, then converge in from all points of the compass.

The game was hide and seek, played over a million square miles of ocean. The losers died.

The Soviet Bear-D reconnaissance bombers were passing south of Iceland. There were ten of them, covering a front of a thousand miles. The monstrous propeller-driven aircraft were packed full of electronics gear and crewed by men with years of training and experience in locating the American carrier groups. At the nose, tail, and wingtips, sensitive antennae were already reaching out, searching for the signals from American radar transmitters. They would close on those signals, chart them with great care, but remain forever outside the estimated detection radius. Their greatest fear was that the Americans would use no radar at all, or that they would switch their sets on and off at random intervals and locations, which posed the danger of the Bears' blundering directly into armed ships and aircraft. The Bear had twenty hours of endurance, but the penalty for it was virtually no combat capability. It was too slow to run from an interceptor, and had no ability to fight one. "We have located the enemy battle force," the crews' bitter joke ran: "Dosvidania, Rodinia!" But they were a proud group of professionals. The attack bombers depended on them-as did their country.

Eight hundred miles north of Iceland, the Badgers altered their course to one-eight-zero, due south at five hundred knots. They had avoided the still-dangerous Norwegians, and it was not thought that the British would reach this far out. These air crews kept a nervous watch out their windows nevertheless, their own electronic sensors fully operative and under constant scrutiny. An attack by tactical fighters against Iceland was expected at any time, and the bomber crews knew that any NATO fighter pilot worthy of his name would instantly jettison his bombload for a chance at air-to-air combat with so helpless a target as a twenty-year-old Badger. They had reached the end of their useful lives. Cracks were developing in the wings. The turbine blades in their jet engines were worn, reducing performance and fuel efficiency.

Two hundred miles behind them, the Backfire bombers were finishing their refueling operations. The Tu-22Ms had been accompanied by tankers, and, after topping off their tanks, they headed south, slightly west of the Badgers' course track. With an AS-6 Kingfish missile hanging under each wing, the Backfires, too, were potentially vulnerable, but the Backfire had the ability to run at high Mach numbers and stood a fair chance at survival, even in the face of determined fighter opposition. Their crews were the elite of Soviet Naval Aviation, well-paid and pampered by Soviet society, their commanders had reminded them at the regimental briefings. Now it was time to deliver.

All three groups of aircraft came south at optimum cruise speed, their flight crews monitoring fuel consumption, engine heat, and many other gauges for the long over-water flight.

Toland stepped outside for a breath of air. It was a fine morning, the cottonball clouds overhead turning briefly pink from the sunrise. Saratoga and Foch were visible on the horizon, perhaps eight miles away, their size impressive even at this distance. Closer in, Ticonderoga was cutting through the five-foot seas, white-painted missiles visible on her twin launchers. A few blinker lights traded signals. Otherwise the ships in view were gray shapes without noise, waiting. Nimitz's deck was covered with aircraft. F-14 Tomcat interceptors sat everywhere. Two were hooked up on the midships catapults, only a hundred feet from him, their two-man flight crews dozing. The fighters carried Phoenix long-range missiles. The attack bombers carried buddy-store tanks instead of weapons. They'd be used to refuel the fighters in flight, enabling them to remain aloft an extra two hours. Deck crewmen in multicolored shirts scurried about, checking and rechecking the aircraft. The carrier began turning to port, coming around into the westerly wind in preparation for launching aircraft. He checked his watch. 0558. Time to get back to CIC. The carrier would go to general quarters in two minutes. The intelligence watch officer took one more breath of fresh sea air and wondered if it would be his last.

"Contact!" the technician said over the Bear's interphone. "Signals indicate an American airborne radar transmitter, carrier type."

"Give me a bearing!" the pilot commanded.

"Patience, Comrade Major." The technician made an adjustment on his board. His radio-interferometers timed the signals as they arrived at antennae arrayed all over the aircraft. "Southeast. Bearing to signal is one-three-one. Signal strength one. He is quite distant. Bearing is not changing as yet. I recommend we maintain a constant course for the present."

The pilot and copilot exchanged a look, but no words. Somewhere off to their left was an American E-2C Hawkeye radar aircraft. A flight crew of two-a radar intercept officer and two radar operators. It could manage the air battle for over a hundred enemy aircraft, could vector a missile-armed interceptor in at them within seconds of detection. The pilot wondered just how accurate his information was on the Hawkeye's radar. What if they had already detected his Bear? He knew the answer to that. His first warning would come when he detected the fire-control radar of an American F-14 Tomcat heading right at him. The Bear held course one-eight-zero while the plotting officer tracked the change in bearing to the radar signal. In ten minutes they might just have an accurate fix. If they lived that long. They would not break radio silence until they had a fix.

"I have it," the plotting officer reported. "Estimate distance to contact is six hundred fifty kilometers, position forty-seven degrees, nine minutes north, thirty-four degrees, fifty minutes west."

"Get it out," the pilot ordered. A directional HF antenna in the aircraft's tail fin turned within its housing and radioed the information to the raid commander, whose Bear command aircraft was a hundred miles behind the snoopers.

The raid commander compared this datum with that from the reconnaissance satellite. Now he had two pieces of information. The Americans' position three hours ago was sixty miles south of the estimated plot for the Hawkeye. The Americans probably had two of them up, northeast and northwest of the formation. That was normal fleet doctrine. So, the carrier group was right about… here. The Badgers were heading right for it. They would encounter the American radar coverage in… two hours. Good, he said to himself. Everything is going according to plan.

Toland watched the aircraft plot in silence. The radar picture from the Hawkeyes was being transmitted to the carrier by digital radio link, enabling the battle group commander to follow everything. The same data went to the group air defense boss on Ticonderoga and every other ship fitted with the Naval Tactical Data System. That included the French ships, which had long since been equipped to operate closely with the U.S. Navy. So far there was nothing to be seen except the tracks of American military and commercial aircraft ferrying men and supplies across the ocean, and dependents back to the States. These were beginning to swing south. Warned that an air battle was possible, the pilots of DC-10s and C-5As were prudently keeping out of the way, even if it meant having to land and refuel on the way to their destinations.

The group's forty-eight Tomcat interceptors were now mostly on station, spread in a line three hundred miles across. Each pair of Tomcats had a tanker aircraft in attendance. The attack birds, Corsairs and Intruders, carried oversized fuel tanks with refueling drogues attached, and one by one the Tomcats were already beginning to top off their fuel tanks from them. Soon the Corsairs began returning to their carriers for refills. They could keep this up for hours. The aircraft remaining on the carriers were spotted on the decks for immediate takeoff. If a raid came in, they would be shot off the catapults at once to eliminate the fire hazard inherent in any type of aircraft.

Toland had seen all this before, but could not fail to be amazed by it. Everything was going as smoothly as a ballet. The aircraft loitered at their stations, tracing lazy, fuel-efficient circles in the sky. The carriers were racing east now at thirty knots to make up the distance lost during launch operations. The Marines' landing ships Saipan, Ponce, and Newport could make only about twenty knots, and were essentially defenseless. East of the group, carrier S-3A Viking and land-based P-3C Orion antisubmarine aircraft were patrolling for Soviet submarines. They reported to the group ASW commander on the destroyer Caron. There was as yet nothing for anyone to direct his frustration against. The old story known to all fighting men. You wait.

The raid commander was rapidly accumulating data. He now had positions on four American Hawkeyes. The first two had barely been plotted when the second pair had showed up, outside and south of the first. The Americans had unwittingly given him a very accurate picture of where the battle group was, and the steady eastward drift of the Hawkeyes gave him course and speed. His Bears were now in a wide semicircle around the Americans, and the Badgers were thirty minutes north of American radar cover, four hundred miles north of the estimated location of the ships.

"Send to Group A: 'Enemy formation at grid coordinates 456/810, speed twenty, course one-zero-zero. Execute Attack Plan A at 0615 Zulu time.' Send the same to Group B. Tactical control of Group B switches to Team East Coordinator." The battle had begun.

The Badger crews exchanged looks of relief. They had detected the American radar signals fifteen minutes before, and knew that each kilometer south meant a greater chance that they would run into a cloud of enemy fighters. Aboard each aircraft the navigator and bombardier worked quickly to feed strike information into the Kelt missiles slung under each wing.

Eight hundred miles to their southwest, the Backfire crews advanced their throttles slightly, plotting a course to the datum point supplied by the raid commander. Having circled far around the American formation, they would now be controlled by the strike officer aboard the first Bear to make electronic contact with the Hawkeyes. They had a solid fix on the NATO formation, but they needed better if they were to locate and engage the carriers. These crews were not relieved, but excited. Now came the challenging part. The battle plan had been formulated a year before and practiced-over land exclusively-five times. Four times it had worked.

Aboard eighty Badger bombers, pilots checked their watches, counting off the seconds to 0615 Zulu.

"Launch!"

The lead Badger launched eight seconds early. First one, then the second, aircraft-shaped Kelt dropped free of its pylon, falling several hundred feet before their turbojet engines ran up to full power. Running on autopilot, the Kelts climbed back to thirty thousand feet and cruised on south at six hundred knots indicated air speed. The bomber crews watched their birds proceed for a minute or two, then each of the bombers turned slowly and gracefully for home, their mission done. Six Badger-J stand-off jamming aircraft continued south. They would stay sixty kilometers behind the Kelts. Their crews were nervous but confident. It would not be easy for American radar to bum through their powerful jammers, and in any case, the Americans would soon have many targets to concern them.

The Kelts continued on, straight and level. They carried their own electronic equipment, which would be triggered automatically by sensors in their tail fins. When they entered the theoretical arc of the Hawkeyes' radar range, transponders in their noses clicked on.

"Radar contacts! Designate Raid-1, bearing three-four-niner, range four-six-zero miles. Numerous contacts, count one-four-zero contacts, course one-seven-five, speed six hundred knots."

The master tactical scope plotted the contacts electronically, and a pair of plexiglass plates showed another visual display.

"So, here they come," Baker said quietly. "Right on time. Comments?"

"I-" Toland didn't get a chance.

The computer display went white.

"Clipper Base, this is Hawk-Three. We're getting some jamming," reported the senior airborne control officer. "We plot six, possibly seven jammers, bearing three-four-zero to zero-three-zero. Pretty powerful stuff. Estimate we have stand-off jammers, but no escort jammers. Contacts are lost for the present. Estimate burn-through in ten minutes. Request weapons free, and release to vector intercepts."

Baker looked over to his air operations officer. "Let's get things started."

Air/Ops nodded and picked up a microphone. "Hawk-Three, this is Clipper Base. Weapons free. I say again, weapons are free. Release authority is granted. Splash me some bombers. Out."

Svenson frowned at the display. "Admiral, we're coming about to clear decks. Recommend the formation stays together now." He got a nod. "Clipper Fleet, this is Clipper Base, come left to two-seven-zero. Launch all remaining aircraft. Execute."

On the single command, the formation made a hundred-eighty-degree left turn. Those ships that did not as yet have missiles on their launchers rectified this. Fire-control radars were trained north, but kept in standby mode. Thirty different captains waited for the word to activate.

She was pissed off. Sure, she thought, I'm good enough to fly. I'm good enough to be an instructor pilot for the Eagle. Engineering test pilot, assistant project officer for the ASAT program-I'm good enough to get an invite to Houston, even-but will they let me fly combat? No, there's a war going on and I'm nothing but a Goddamned ferry pilot!

"Shit." Her name was Amy Nakamura. She was a major, United States Air Force, with three thousand hours of jet time, two-thirds of it in F-15s. Short and stocky like many fighter pilots, only her father had ever called her beautiful. He also called her Bunny. When her fellow pilots found that one out, they shortened it to Buns. She and three men were ferrying four brand-new Eagle fighters to Germany where others-men! — would get to use them properly. They each carried fast-pack conformal fuel tanks to make the trip in one long hop, and for self-defense a single Sidewinder missile, plus their usual load of 20mm cannon shells. The Russians let women fly combat in World War II! she thought. A couple even made ace!

"Hey, Buns, check your three o'clock!" called her wingman.

Nakamura had phenomenal eyesight, but she could scarcely believe it. "Tell me what you see, Butch."

"Badgers…?"

"Fuckin' Tu-16 Badgers-tallyho! Where's the Navy supposed to be?"

"Close. Try and raise 'em, Buns!"

"Navy task force, Navy task force, this is Air Force ferry flight Golf-Four-Niner. We are eastbound with four Foxtrot-One-Fives. We have a visual on a Russian bomber formation position-shit, do you read, over?"

"Who the hell is that?" a Hawkeye crewman asked aloud.

The communications technician answered, "Golf-Four-Niner, we need authentication. November Four Whiskey." This could be a Russian playing radio games

Major Nakamura swore to herself as she ran her finger down the list of communication codes. There! "Alpha Six Hotel."

"Golf-Four-Niner, this is Navy Hawk-One, say your position. Warning, we are calling in the clans on those Badgers. You'd better get clear, acknowledge."

"Like hell, Navy, I got visual on three-plus Badgers northbound, position forty-nine north, thirty-three east."

"Northbound?" the intercept officer said. "Golf, this is Hawk-One. Confirm your visual. Say again your visual."

"Hawk-One, this is Golf, I now have a dozen Badger, say again Tango-Uniform-One-Six bombers visual, south of my position, heading towards me and closing fast. We are engaging. Out."

"Nothing on radar, boss," the radar operator said. "That's way the hell north of here."

"Then what the hell is he talking about?"

Major Amelia "Buns" Nakamura reached down without looking to toggle up her missile and head-up display to tactical. Then she flipped the switch for her air-intercept radar. Her IFF system interrogated the target as a possible friendly and came up blank. That was enough.

"Frank, take your element east. Butch, follow me. Everybody watch your fuel states. Charge!"

The Badger pilots were a little too relaxed, now that the most dangerous part of their mission was behind them. They didn't spot the four American fighters until they were less than a mile away, their robin's-egg-blue paint blending them in perfectly with the clear morning sky.

Buns selected her cannon for the first pass and triggered two hundred rounds into the cockpit of a Badger. The twin-engine bomber went instantly out of control and rolled over like a dead whale. One. The major howled with delight, pulled the Eagle up into a five-g loop, then over to dive on the next target. The Soviets were alerted now, and the second Badger attempted to dive away. It had not the slightest chance. Nakamura fired her Sidewinder from a range of less than a mile and watched the missile trace all the way into the Badger's left-side engine, and blast the wing right off the airplane. Two. Another Badger was three miles ahead. Patience, she told herself. You have a big speed advantage. She nearly forgot that the Russian bomber had tail guns. A Soviet sergeant reminded her of it, missing, but scaring the hell out of her. The Eagle jerked in a six-g turn to the left and closed on a parallel course before turning in. The next burst from her cannon exploded the Badger in midair, and she had to dive to avoid the wreckage. The engagement lasted all of ninety seconds, and she was wringing wet with perspiration.

"Butch, where are you?"

"I got one! Buns, I got one!" The Eagle pulled up alongside.

Nakamura looked around. Suddenly the sky was clear. Where had they all gone?

"Navy Hawk-One, this is Golf, do you read, over?"

"Roger, Golf."

"Okay, Navy. We just smoked four, repeat four, Badgers for you."

'Make that five, Buns!" the other element leader called in.

"Something's wrong, sir." The radar operator on Hawk-One motioned to his scope. "We have these buggers just popped through, and they say they bagged some, gotta be three, four hundred miles away."

"Clipper Base, this is Hawk-One, we just had contact with an Air Force ferry flight eastbound. They claim they just splashed five Badgers northbound several hundred miles north of us. Say again northbound."

Toland's eyebrows went up.

"Probably some had to abort," Baker observed. "This is close to their fuel limit, isn't it?"

"Yes, sir," replied Air/Ops. He didn't look happy with his own answer.

"Burn-through," announced the radar operator. "We have reacquired the targets."

The Kelts had flown on, oblivious to the furor around them. Their radar transponders made them look like hundred-ten-foot Badgers. Their own white-noise jammers came on, somewhat obscuring them yet again on the radar scopes, and autopilot controls began to jerk them up, down, left, right, in hundred-meter leaps as an aircraft might do when trying to avoid a missile. The Kelts had been real missiles once, but on retirement from front-line service six years earlier, their warheads had been replaced with additional fuel tankage, and they had been relegated to a role as target drones, a purpose they were serving admirably now.

"Tallyho!" The first squadron of twelve Tomcats was now a hundred fifty miles away. The Kelts showed up perfectly on radar, and the intercept officers in the back seat of each fighter quickly established target tracks. The Kelts were approaching what would have been nominal missile-launch distance-if they were the bombers everyone thought they were.

The Tomcats launched a volley of million-dollar AIM-54C Phoenix missiles at a range of a hundred forty miles. The missiles blazed in on their targets at Mach-5, directed by the fighters' targeting radars. In under a minute the forty-eight missiles had killed thirty-nine targets. The first squadron broke clear as the second came into launch position.

"Admiral, something is wrong here," Toland said quietly.

"What might that be?" Baker liked the way things were going. Enemy bomber tracks were being wiped off his screen just as the war games had predicted they would.

"The Russians are coming in dumb, sir."

"So?"

"So this far the Soviets have not been very dumb! Admiral, why aren't the Backfires going supersonic? Why one attack group? Why one direction?"

"Fuel constraints," Baker answered. "The Badgers are at the limit of their fuel, they have to come in direct."

"But not the Backfires!"

"The course is right, the raid count is right." Baker shook his head and concentrated on the tactical plot.

The second squadron of fighters had just launched. Unable to get a head-on shot, their missile accuracy suffered somewhat. They killed thirty-four targets with forty-eight missiles. There had been a hundred fifty-seven targets plotted.

The third and fourth Tomcat squadrons arrived together and launched as a group. When their Phoenixes had been fully expended, nineteen targets were left. The two fighter squadrons moved in to engage the remaining targets with their cannon.

"Clipper Base, this is SAM Boss. We're going to have some leakers. Recommend we start lighting up SAM radars."

"Roger, SAM Boss. Permission granted," answered the group tactical warfare coordinator.

"I have air-search radars, bearing zero-three-seven," the Bear ESM officer noted. "They have detected us. Recommend we illuminate also." The Bear lit off its Big Bulge look-down radar.

"New radar contact. Designate Raid-2-"

"What?" snapped Baker. Next came a call from the fighters.

"Clipper Base, this is Slugger Lead. I have a visual on my target." The squadron commander was trying to examine the target on his long-range TV camera. When he spoke, the anguish in his voice was manifest. "Warning, warning, this is not a Badger. We've been shooting at Kelt missiles!"

"Raid-2 is seventy-three aircraft, bearing two-one-seven, range one-three-zero miles. We have a Big Bulge radar tracking the formation," said the CIC talker.

Toland cringed as the new contacts were plotted. "Admiral, we've been had."

The group tactical warfare officer was pale as he toggled his microphone. "Air Warning Red. Weapons free! Threat axis is two-one-seven. All ships turn as necessary to unmask batteries."

The Tomcats had all been drawn off, leaving the formation practically naked. The only armed fighters over the formation were Foch's eight Crusaders, long since retired from the American inventory. On a terse command from their carrier, they went to afterburner and rocketed southwest toward the Backfires. Too late.

The Bear already had a clear picture of the American formations. The Russians could not determine ship type, but they could tell large from small, and identify the missile cruiser Ticonderoga by her distinctive radar emissions. The carriers would be close to her. The Bear relayed the information to her consorts. A minute later, the seventy Backfire bombers launched their hundred forty AS-6 Kingfish missiles and turned north at full military power. The Kingfish was nothing like the Kelt. Powered by a liquid-fuel rocket engine, it accelerated to nine hundred knots and began its descent, its radar-homing head tracking on a preprogrammed target area ten miles wide. Every ship in the center of the formation had several missiles assigned.

"Vampire, Vampire!" the CIC talker said aboard Ticonderoga. "We have numerous incoming missiles. Weapons free."

The group antiair warfare officer ordered the cruiser's Aegis weapons system into full automatic mode. Tico had been built with this exact situation in mind. Her powerful radar/computer system immediately identified the incoming missiles as hostile and assigned each a priority of destruction. The computer was completely on its own, free to fire on its electronic will at anything diagnosed as a threat. Numbers, symbols, and vectors paraded across the master tactical display. The fore and aft twin missile launchers trained out at the first targets and awaited the orders to fire. Aegis was state-of-the-art, the best SAM system yet devised, but it had one major weakness: Tico carried only ninety-six SM2 surface-to-air missiles; there were one hundred forty incoming Kingfish. The computer had not been programmed to think about that.

Aboard Nimitz, Toland could feel the carrier heeling into a radical turn, her engines advanced to flank speed, driving the massive warship at over thirty-five knots. Her nuclear-powered escorts, Virginia and California, were also tracking the Kingfish, their own missiles trained out on their launchers.

The Kingfish were at eight thousand feet, one hundred miles out, covering a mile every four seconds. Each had now selected a target, choosing the largest within their fields of view. Nimitz was the nearest large ship, with her missile-ship escorts to her north.

Tico launched her first quartet of missiles as the targets reached a range of ninety-nine miles. The rockets exploded into the air, leaving a trail of pale gray smoke. They had barely cleared the launch rails when the mounts went vertical and swiveled to receive their reloads. The load-and-fire time was under eight seconds. The cruiser would average one missile fired every two seconds. Just over three minutes later, her missile magazines were empty. The cruiser emerged from the base of an enormous gray arch of smoke. Her only remaining defenses were her gun systems.

The SAMs raced in at their targets with a closing speed of over two thousand miles per hour, directed in by the reflected waves of the ship's own fire-control radars. At a range of a hundred fifty yards from their targets, the warheads detonated. The Aegis system did quite well. Just over 60 percent of the targets were destroyed. There were now eighty-two incoming missiles targeted on a total of eight ships.

Other missile-equipped ships joined the fray. In several cases two or three missiles were sent for the same target, usually killing it. The number of incoming "vampires" dropped to seventy, then sixty, but the number was not dropping quickly enough. The identity of the targets was now known to everyone. Powerful active jamming equipment came on. Ships began a radical series of maneuvers like some stylized dance, with scant attention paid to station-keeping. Collision at sea was now the least of anyone's worries. When the Kingfish got to within twenty miles, every ship in the formation began to fire off chaff rockets, which filled the air with millions of aluminized Mylar fragments that fluttered on the air, creating dozens of new targets for the missiles to select from. Some of the Kingfish lost lock with their targets and started chasing Mylar ghosts. Two of them got lost, and selected new targets on the far side of the formation.

The radar picture on Nimitz suddenly was obscured. What had been discrete pips designating the positions of ships in the formation became shapeless clouds. Only the missiles stayed constant: inverted V-shapes, with line vectors to designate direction and speed. The last wave of SAMs killed three more. The vampire count was down to forty-one. Toland counted five heading for Nimitz Topside, the final defensive weapons were now tracking the targets. These were the CIWS, 20mm Gatling guns, radar-equipped to explode incoming missiles at a range of under two thousand yards. Designed to operate in a fully automatic mode, the two after gun mounts on the carrier angled up and began to track the first pair of incoming Kingfish. The portside mount fired first, the six-barrel cannon making a sound like that of an enormous zipper. Its radar system tracked the target, and tracked the outgoing slugs, adjusting fire to make the two meet.

The leading Kingfish exploded eight hundred yards from Nimitz's port quarter. The thousand kilograms of high explosive rocked the ship. Toland felt it, wondering if the ship had been hit. Around him, the CIC crewmen were concentrating frantically on their jobs. One target track vanished from the screen. Four left.

The next Kingfish approached the carrier's bow and was blasted out of the sky by the forward CIWS, too close aboard. Fragments ripped across the carrier's deck, killing a dozen exposed crewmen.

Number three was decoyed by a chaff cloud and ran straight into the sea half a mile behind the carrier. The warhead caused the carrier to vibrate and raised a column of water a thousand feet into the air.

The fourth and fifth missiles came in from aft, not a hundred yards apart. The after gun mount tracked on both, but couldn't decide which to engage first. It went into Reset mode and petulantly didn't engage any. The missiles hit within a second of one another, one on the after port corner of the flight deck, the other on the number two arrestor wire.

Toland was thrown fifteen feet, and slammed against a radar console. Next he saw a wall of pink flame that washed briefly over him. Then came the noises. First the thunder of the explosion. Then the screams. The after CIC bulkhead was no longer there; instead there was a mass of flame. Men twenty feet away were ablaze, staggering and screaming before his eyes. Toland's only thought was escape. He bolted for the watertight door. It opened miraculously under his hand and he ran to starboard. The ship's fire-suppression systems were already on, showering everything with a curtain of saltwater. His skin burned from it as he emerged, hair and uniform singed, to the flight deck catwalk. A sailor directed a water hose on him, nearly knocking him over the side.

"Fire in CIC!" Toland gasped.

"What the hell ain't!" the sailor screamed.

Toland fell to his knees and looked outboard. Foch had been to their north, he remembered. Now there was a pillar of smoke. As he watched, the last Kingfish was detonated a hundred feet over Saratoga's flight deck. The carrier seemed undamaged. Three miles away, Ticonderoga's after superstructure was shredded and ablaze from a rocket that had blown up within yards of her. On the horizon a ball of flame announced the destruction of yet another-my God, Toland thought, might that be Saipan? She had two thousand Marines aboard…

"Get forward, you dumbass!" a firefighter yelled at him. Another man emerged to the catwalk.

"Toland, you all right?" It was Captain Svenson, his shirt torn away and his chest bleeding from a half-dozen cuts.

"Yes, sir," Bob answered.

"Get to the bridge. Tell 'em to put the wind on the starboard beam. Move!" Svenson jumped up onto the flight deck.

Toland did likewise, racing forward. The deck was awash in firefighting foam, slippery as oil. Toland ran recklessly, falling hard on the deck before he reached the carrier's island. He was in the pilothouse in under a minute.

"Captain says put the wind on the starboard beam!" Toland said.

"It is on the fucking beam!" the executive officer snapped back. The bridge deck was covered with broken glass. "How's the skipper?"

"Alive. He's aft with the fire."

"And who the hell are you?" the XO demanded.

"Toland, group intel. I was in CIC."

"Then you're one lucky bastard. That second bird hit fifty yards from you. Captain got out? Anyone else?"

"I don't know. Burning like hell."

"Looks like you caught part of it, Commander."

Bob's face felt as if he'd shaved with a piece of glass. His eyebrows crumpled to his touch. "Flashburns, I guess. I'll be okay. What do you want me to do?"

The XO pointed to Toland's water wings. "Can you conn the ship.? Okay, do it. Nothing left to run into anyway. I'm going aft to take charge of the fire. Communications are out, radar's out, but the engines are okay and the hull's in good shape. Mr. Bice has the deck. Mr. Toland has the conn," XO announced as he left.

Toland hadn't conned anything bigger than a Boston Whaler in over ten years, and now he had a damaged carrier. He took a pair of binoculars and looked around to see what ships were nearby. What he saw chilled him.

Saratoga was the only ship that looked intact, but on second glance her radar mast was askew. Foch was lower in the water than she ought to have been, and ablaze from bow to stem.

"Where's Saipan?"

"Blew up like a fucking firework," Commander Bice replied. "Holy Jesus, there were twenty-five hundred men aboard! Tico took one close aboard. Foch took three hits, looks like she's gone. Two frigates and a destroyer gone, too-just fucking gone, man! Who fucked up? You were in CIC, right? Who fucked up?"

The eight French Crusaders were just making contact with the Backfires. The Russian bombers were on afterburner and were nearly as fast as the fighters. The carrier pilots had all heard their ship go off the air and were consumed with rage at what had happened, no longer the cool professionals who drove fighters off ships. Only ten Backfires were within their reach. They got six of them with their missiles and damaged two more before they had to break off.

USS Caron, the senior undamaged ship, tracked the Russians on her radar, calling Britain for fighters to intercept them on the trip home. But the Russians had anticipated this, and detoured far west of the British Isles, meeting their tankers four hundred miles west of Norway.

Already the Russians were evaluating the results of their mission. The first major battle of modem carriers and missile-armed bombers had been won and lost. Both sides knew which was which.

The fire on Nimitz was out within an hour. With no aircraft aboard, there were few combustibles about, and the ship's firefighting abilities equaled that of a large city. Toland brought her back to an easterly course. Saratoga was recovering aircraft, refueling them, and sending all but the fighters to the beach. Three frigates and a destroyer lingered to recover survivors, as the large ships turned back toward Europe.

"All ahead full," Svenson ordered from his seat on the bridge. "Toland, you all right?"

"No complaints." No point in it, the ship's hospital was more than full with hundreds of major injury cases. h hundreds of major injury cases. There was no count of the dead yet, and Toland didn't want to think about that.

"You were right," the captain said, his voice angry and subdued. "You were right. They made it too easy and we fell for it."

"There'll be another day, Captain.,

"You're Goddamned right there will! We're heading for Southampton.

See if the Brits can fix anything this big. My regulars are still busy aft. Think you can handle the conn a little longer?"

"Yes, sir. "

Nimitz and her nuclear escorts bent on full speed, nearly forty knots, and rapidly left the formation behind. A reckless move, racing too fast for antisubmarine patrols, but a submarine would have to move quickly indeed to catch them.