Armageddon Mode

CHAPTER 13

Admiral Magruder stood backstage with a number of other presidential aides and advisors, as well as the ever-present Secret Service men with their wire microphones and searching, emotionless expressions. From the off-stage wings behind the curtains, he listened and watched as the President conducted his press conference. He’d already delivered his speech, announcing to the world the Indian attack on U.S. Navy ships, and now he was fielding questions from the reporters who packed the press room. Batteries of lights flooded the President and the banks of microphones on the stage lectern before him with their glare.

Steadicams, each bearing a different logo of a TV networks or news service, were trained on him, and there was a steady whirr and click in the background as camera shutters were triggered.

“Mr. President,” a reporter from ABC was asking. “Does the attack on our ships mean war with India?”

“As I said before,” the President replied. “The United States of America will not tolerate any abridgement of our freedom of the seas, anywhere in the world. We will not tolerate attacks on our vessels or against our people. I think we amply demonstrated that resolve, that commitment in the military action against North Korea last year. It doesn’t matter who the aggressor is; an attack upon the military forces of the United States will be met by an appropriate response.

“Now, this certainly does not mean that a state of war exists between the United States and the Indian Federation. It also does not mean that we are unwilling to talk … in fact, we are more than willing to open negotiations that could lead to a clarification of this problem and, I might add, a reduction of tensions throughout the region over there. The United States is capable of defending its interests without resorting to outright war.” He pointed at an upraised hand. “Yes? Here in front?”

“Bob Rutherford, NBC. Mr. President, you said in your speech that a Russian naval force has joined our carrier group off the Indian coast.

Does this mean that Russia and the United States are considering unilateral military action against India, without waiting for the final UN Security Council vote? And if you are considering a military response, what form might that action take?”

The President gave his best self-deprecating smile. “Well, Bob, you know I can’t give you any specifics on a question like that. All I can say is that this Administration will not rule out any action at this time, and that includes a military response. The leadership of the Commonwealth of Independent States has gone on record as saying that they support our declaration of the rights of shipping in international waters. The UN vote supports that declaration, and both of our countries stand ready to enforce those rights in whatever way seems appropriate. Yes? Over there, the lady in blue. Yes?”

“Linda Bellows, Associated Press. Mr. President, what about Pakistan’s threat to use atomic weapons against India, and India’s declaration that they will meet nuclear weapons with nuclear weapons of their own? Is there any danger in our military forces becoming involved in a nuclear war in the Indian Ocean?”

“I’m glad you asked that question, Linda. It is our position, and, I might add, the position of every other nation engaged in the debate in the UN, that the use of nuclear weapons in this conflict is unthinkable and must be discouraged by every means at the world’s disposal. Now, I don’t think I need to add that a nuclear escalation at this stage of the game is extremely unlikely. While both India and Pakistan have a nuclear capability, being able to build a bomb and being able to assemble one small enough to deliver by plane or missile are two very different things.”

Magruder listened as the President continued to answer the questions. We will defend our rights, the world is with us, and the situation is under control: those were the three dominant themes running through each statement he made.

Abruptly, the President said, “Thank you very much,” and strode from the stage.

“Mr. President! Mr. President!” A chorus of calls followed him, as a forest of waving arms tried to signal for his attention. “Mr. President! What about …”

The President brushed past Magruder as he stepped off the stage, and the admiral heard his low-voiced mutter to an aide. “Thank God that’s over with.”

Magruder watched the man vanish around a corner with his entourage and smiled to himself. There’d been considerable worry among the President’s advisors about how the press conference might go, but it seemed to have come off well. By now, the Washington correspondents of each of the networks would be recapping the speech before the camera, repeating the President’s message. We will defend our rights. The world is with us. The situation is under control.

He turned to follow the Presidential party. “Admiral!” a woman’s voice called from behind him. “Admiral Magruder!”

Magruder looked around, already choosing his words for a firm refusal to add anything to the President’s statements. He believed in a free press but was less than enthusiastic about the persistence with which that press sometimes pursued their duties.

Then his eyes widened. He knew the woman.

She was tall and attractive, with shoulder-length blond hair and dark eyes that seemed to mirror some inner worry. A portable tape recorder was clutched in one hand, and she wore her press badge and White House admission ID pinned to the lapel of a smartly tailored beige business suit. “Admiral Magruder? Do you remember me?”

“Certainly, Miss Drake,” he said, smiling. “It’s a small world, isn’t it?”

She flashed a smile, though her eyes still held a dark and haunted look.

Pamela Drake, a reporter for ACN News, had been a guest aboard the Jefferson two months before, while she was covering the political unrest in Thailand. Magruder’s nephew had become involved with her there.

Admiral Magruder had known Pamela was in Washington. He’d seen her often enough on the ACN Evening News. But Washington was a big city.

He’d not expected to run into her in person.

Matt had written once since Magruder had been transferred to Washington.

In the letter, he’d mentioned the possibility of marrying the woman.

Looking at her now, Magruder could certainly understand Matt’s feelings.

For a moment, Magruder thought that Pamela was following her reporter’s instincts and was about to ask him something relating to the press conference. The question she did ask caught him by surprise. “Admiral, have you heard anything from Matt? Do you know if he’s all right?”

Magruder managed a grin. “I’m afraid I haven’t heard a thing, but that’s no cause for alarm. He’s not much of a letter writer. At least, not to old SOBS like me.”

She smiled back. “He won’t tell me a thing either. Did you know we might be getting married?” Magruder nodded. “He said something about it.”

“Then you can understand why I want to know. Is … is the crisis over there as bad as everyone’s making out? Will there be a war?”

He wondered if, after all, she was questioning him as a reporter rather than as his nephew’s fiance. No, he decided, looking into her eyes. The worry, the pain there had nothing to do with her career.

“Pamela, there’s really nothing more I can tell you. There’s danger, certainly. Matt’s in a dangerous profession. You know that. As to any extra danger … I guess we all just have to wait and see.”

“I … know, Admiral. I’ll tell you the truth, I’ve been worried sick about Matt ever since Bangkok. I’m afraid I’ve been pushing him to leave the service.”

Magruder’s mouth tightened as he thought how best to reply. “Well, that’ll have to be his decision, won’t it?”

“Our decision, Admiral.”

“Hmm.” He hesitated, trapped by an abrupt and unaccountable anger. He suddenly found himself comparing the Drake woman to his sister-in-law Kathy, Matt’s mother. His brother Sam had not come back from a Navy raid over a Hanoi bridge in 1968. He remembered the look on Kathy’s face when she learned that her son had been accepted as a Navy aviator candidate. There’d been pain and fear, yes … but also a burning and enormous pride.

He forced the anger back. The girl had no way of putting things in perspective … and maybe that was to be expected. “Miss Drake, I don’t want to dampen the flames of true love, but you ought to remember that there are over six thousand other men on the Jefferson besides Matt.

Counting our supply ships and the attack sub assigned to CBG-14, there’s another twenty-eight hundred men in the rest of the carrier group, every one of them with a wife or a girlfriend or a fiance or a mother … someone who cares for them and is scared to death that they’re not coming back. What makes you so special?” She stiffened. “As I said, Admiral, it’s our decision. Our life. I–I’m sorry I troubled you.”

A twinge of conscience twisted in him. He opened his mouth to say something soothing, but Pamela Drake had already gone.

Tom Magruder watched her slim back and blond hair receding with the crowd of reporters. Then he shrugged, turned, and followed after the President.

Rear Admiral Vaughn stood with Captain Bersticer and other members of his staff just inside the open door leading from the island onto the flight deck, a scowl creasing his face. All of the officers wore their dress whites instead of khakis to mark the formality of the occasion, but Vaughn chaffed at the ceremonial trappings. The stupidity, the wrongness of his orders still stung, and he wasn’t sure he was going to be able to pull off the coming meeting without getting angry.

Correction, he thought. He was already angry. What was going to be difficult was not letting that anger show.

A staff officer standing at Vaughn’s elbow was wearing one of the ubiquitous Mickey Mouse headsets worn by deck personnel who needed to stay in touch with the ship’s radio network. “They’re inbound, Admiral,” the officer said. “Five minutes.”

He nodded, his scowl deepening. Admiral Vaughn did not like this at all.

“It is imperative that a close working relationship with your counterparts in SOVINDRON be established as quickly as possible,” his orders, received at 0300 that morning, had read. “To facilitate the exchange of necessary battle codes and communications protocols, you are directed to receive Rear Admiral Mcolai Sergeivich Dmitriev aboard your command at the earliest practical opportunity.”

Fine. He would welcome the admiral, shake the bastard’s hand even. What had followed in the orders was worse.

“Effective 26 March, you are further directed to shift your flag to CG-66, U.S.S. Vicksburg, the better to monitor ship deployments and possible air threats to your command. Commonwealth naval liaison officers will be assigned by Admiral Dmitriev as observers aboard CG-66, to facilitate joint tactical and strategic operations between vessels of CBG-14 and SOVINDRON.”

Micromanagement. It had doomed military operations before this one.

Somehow, the Washington bureaucracies, both military and civilian, always thought that they knew how to fight the war from the safety and comfort of the Potomac better than the men who were actually in the field. How many times had narrow-minded, fuzzy-headed, point-by-point direction from the rear screwed up an operation better left to the man in charge on the spot?

Vaughn had hoped to deal with the Russian presence at Turban Station by ignoring it. It wasn’t as though the battle group needed the Russians.

If anything, the Russians would be a definite hindrance in any upcoming conflict. Their ASW was more primitive, their ships noisier than their American counterparts. They had no weapon system at all like Phoenix and nothing like Vicksburg’s Aegis or SPY-1 radar. The entire history of Soviet big-carrier operations was only a few years old, and Vaughn had no confidence in their abilities to handle blue-water air operations with so-called “navalized” Frontal Aviation aircraft and inexperienced pilots.

But he was being forced to work closely with the sons of bitches, and he didn’t like it, didn’t like it at all. His orders were specific and to the point, signed by Admiral Fletcher T. Grimes, Chief of Naval Operations, and originating with the National Command Authority. That meant the President himself, and the National Security Council, and you couldn’t get any more high-powered than that.

It also meant that the decision was as much a political one as something born of military necessity. In this case, the Politics far outweighed the military practicalities. Mixing the two naval squadrons, Vaughn thought, was a recipe for certain disaster.

But Charles Lee Vaughn was a flag officer of the United States Navy, and questioning the orders did not even occur to him. Grumbling about orders, however, was the Navy man’s ancient and inalienable right. “What do you want to bet the Soviets worked all this out just to get a good look at Aegis?” he asked.

Captain Bersticer was standing between him and the open door leading out to the flight deck. “Could be, sir. The Russians have been wanting to look inside a Ticonderoga-class cruiser for a long time now.”

“Well, they won’t get a look now. Not at my expense. Did you pass my message to Cunningham?”

“Yes, sir. His intelligence officer has things well in hand, sir.”

“He’d damn well better. I don’t want these Russian bastards using this as an excuse to get their prying claws on Aegis.”

“They’re coming, sir,” the officer with the Mickey Mouse helmet called.

There was a stir among the officers and men waiting in the lee of Jefferson’s island. Vaughn could hear a distant, thuttering sound in the air that rose rapidly above the calls and last-minute shufflings of the greeting party.

Vaughn moved to where he could see past Bersticer and looked through the open door. The morning sun was still low, and the carrier’s island cast a deep and moody shadow across the mid-deck where the Russian helo was supposed to land. A mackerel sky still tinged with the reds and oranges of a fiery dawn glowed above the horizon. The thuttering grew louder, more insistent.

The helicopter was one of the new Ka-27s, a boxy-looking machine with the NATO code name Helix. Like other Russian naval helos, it used two counter-rotating main rotors, one set directly above the other, eliminating the need for a tail rotor or boom. Instead, it had a stubby tail with two massive stabilizer fins that, to American eyes, gave it an oddly unbalanced, incomplete look.

Vaughn watched as it drifted out of the early morning light and was eclipsed by the island’s shadow. The machine hovered for a moment, then settled to the deck with a bounce on four landing wheels, following the guidance of a yellow shirt who brought it in with crisp movements of a pair of bright-colored wands. The red star painted on the stabilizer looked very much out of place on an American carrier deck. Curiously, the machine also had the Aeroflot logo picked out in Cyrillic lettering on its hull. Vaughn remembered that the national airline of the former USSR had close connections with the Russian military services.

“Wait, boys,” Vaughn said as his aides made last-moment adjustments to their uniforms and began to move toward the door. “We’ll let them show themselves first. It’s our carrier, after all.”

As the rotors whined to a halt, U.S. sailors in dress whites were already unrolling a red carpet across the steel deck. The Helix’s cargo compartment door slid open with a bang, as a chief boatswain’s mate raised a bosun’s pipe to his mouth and sounded a piercing, welcoming shrill. Behind him, the ranks of Jefferson’s Marines, resplendent in their red-and-blue Class As, snapped to present arms, and as the pipe’s notes died away, Jefferson’s band crashed into an unrecognizable clashing that the tone-deaf Vaughn could only assume held some meaning for the Russians.

A Russian crewman appeared in the open cargo door, unfolding a metal ladder that extended to the Jefferson’s deck. The helo looked fairly roomy inside. The Helix normally served in the ASW role and would have had little space aboard for passengers. This one, evidently, had been refitted for use as a personnel carrier.

A heavyset man with steel-gray hair and a scowl to match Vaughn’s own stepped down the ladder and onto the carpet, planting his feet on Jefferson’s deck as though defying anyone present to move him. He wore a blue uniform with one large and one slender gold bar on his sleeves and the insignia of a Russian naval kontr-admiral. Three other officers with less gold on their uniforms and caps, with fewer medals on their breasts, emerged from the helo and took their places behind their admiral. “Show time, Admiral,” Bersticer said.

“Right. Let’s get on with it.” Settling a facsimile of a smile in place, Vaughn followed his chief of staff out through the door and onto the flight deck.

Flight operations had been suspended for the time being, of course, and Jefferson’s roof was strangely quiet and still as Vaughn marched those long twenty yards to where the Helix was parked. He was conscious of the eyes on him. Vulture’s Row, the railed open area high atop Jefferson’s island below the billboard tangle of radar antennae and masts, was crowded with those sailors who’d managed to jockey a ringside seat for themselves. Others watched silently from the walkways around the flight deck’s borders, from the catwalks set along the island’s sides, from vantage points on and under the A-6 Intruders and F-14 Tomcats parked wing by folded wing along the edge of the roof. Vaughn stopped six feet from Kontr-Admiral Dmitriev and stood there stiffly, uncertain of what to do next. The Russian admiral gave him a wintry smile and raised one hand to the gold-heavy bill of his peaked cap.

“Permission to come aboard, Admiral,” he said.

The Russian’s English was quite good, Vaughn thought as he returned the salute, though the man rolled the word “admiral” about his mouth in a rather odd way. “Permission granted. Welcome aboard the Thomas Jefferson, Admiral Dmitriev.”

“I think, Admiral Vaughn, that this must be historic day.” Dmitriev extended his hand. “Closest I have been to American nuclear carrier before today was reconnaissance photos taken by one of our Tupolev bombers.”

Damn right it’s a historic day, you gold-braid son of a bitch, Vaughn thought as he reluctantly took Dmitriev’s hand and shook it. The phrase “a day that shall live in infamy” ran through his mind. “If you would care to come with me, please?” he said. “You can sample the hospitality of our wardroom.”

“Spasebah,” the Russian replied. “Thank you. However, it is my wish that we spend no time on ceremony procedures. Our reconnaissance satellites have detected evidence of massive activity at Indian coastal bases. Is possible Indians are planning air strike against our forces.”

“Our satellites are watching those bases as well, Admiral.”

He’d seen the latest TENCAP images of Jamnagar and Uttarlai only a few minutes earlier. He wondered how recent the Russians’ military intelligence was. TENCAP — Tactical Exploitation of National CAPABILITIES — was a new military communications system that allowed U.S. commanders in the field to tap photo intelligence data directly off American reconnaissance satellites, and Vaughn doubted that the Russians, with their historic emphasis on centralized command and control, had anything similar.

The photos Vaughn had seen that morning had been worrisome. Jamnagar, an Indian military air base on the Gulf of Kutch, was a hive of activity as military aircraft of every size and description assembled there from other airfields deeper in the Indian subcontinent. Satellite photos from Jaisaimer and Uttarlai, bases three hundred miles to the north, showed similar buildups of IAF forces. Surveillance of the Soviet-American task force had been intensifying over the past ten hours, mostly from Indian Bear-F and Illyushin-38 “May” naval aircraft, and the Indian navy appeared to be assembling a major task force at Bombay, centered on both of their carriers, plus a Kresta-II cruiser and numerous smaller vessels. That air and sea armada might be assembling to support further Indian operations against Pakistan, but the possibility that they had American targets in mind could not be dismissed.

“Then you are aware of seriousness of our position,” Dmitriev said, responding to Vaughn’s blunt statement. The Russian turned and gestured toward the three high-ranking officers who stood stiffly at parade rest behind him. “I have brought men who will serve as Soviet liaisons aboard your Aegis command ship. Admiral Vaughn, may I present Kapitan Pervogo Ranga Sharov, my Chief of Staff. Kapitan Viorogo Ranga Besedin, my Tactical Officer. Kapitan Tretyego Ranga Pokrovsky, of Kreml Air Department. All are excellent officers and have my complete confidence and respect. All speak English good as me.”

Each Russian officer saluted as he was introduced. Vaughn merely nodded to each in turn. Surely the dictates of formal military courtesy did not require him to return the salutes of these … these spies.

Vaughn had no doubt at all that the three men had had ties with the former Soviet military intelligence, the infamous GRU.

“Preparations are not yet complete aboard the Vicksburg,” Vaughn replied. It would help, he thought, if he could stall the Russians here for a time, while the Aegis cruiser’s people prepared for these unwelcome visitors. “I assure you that we are carefully monitoring Indian air and sea activities, and that we will have ample time to board Vicksburg if they make a hostile move. We might as well wait here until they are ready for us over there.”

The Russians did not seem pleased and grumbled among themselves in Russian. Vaughn had given them no choice, however. They could only scowl, shrug, and nod. “Very well, Admiral,” Dmitriev said. “Lead way, if you please.”

Vaughn turned and strode back toward the island, the thump of each footstep muffled by the red carpet on the deck. What had the President been thinking when he dreamed this one up? The world might be a different place, the Russians might no longer be the threat they once had been … but so far as Vaughn was concerned, they still presented a greater threat to America and her interests than any ten Indias. Hell, Moscow had provided the Indians with their Migs and Kresta IIS, their Bear reconnaissance aircraft and Fox-Trot submarines in the first place.

They were the enemy.