Into the Fire

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Lieutenant Commander Choe Dae-jung stood on the bridge wing of the Won Do and thought about what he was about to do. All that day, as they moved cautiously to their assigned operational stations, Choe had prayed his orders would be rescinded. He tried to remember the last time he had prayed, or when the supreme leader and his military advisors had done anything this drastic or this stupid. It seemed like every year or three, there was a skirmish between North Korean and South Korean patrol craft, with the North Korean boats invariably getting the short end of the exchange. The Republic of Korea boats were simply better. The single notable exception to these South Korean — dominated exchanges was the 2010 sinking of the ROK corvette Cheonan. It was believed to have been sunk by a North Korean midget submarine, but blame for the loss of the ship was never confirmed. The fingerprints of North Korea were all over the incident, but China and Russia blocked any censure of Pyongyang by the United Nations. Forty-six South Korean seamen were lost when Cheonan went down. But what the Won Do and her two sister ships were being asked to do was nothing short of an act of war.

“Well, Comrade Choe, are we prepared to execute our assignment for the glory of our nation and the supreme leader?”

Choe looked at the bundled form of Ha Min-ki, Won Do’s recently assigned political officer. It was cold, overcast, and Won Do was steaming in a mixed seaway with an uncertain motion. Yet Ha now seemed immune to the conditions, buoyed by the prospect of the task before them. Clearly, Ha seemed to have no idea of the risky course of action on which they were about to embark or the perils that might await them at the hands of the South Koreans and the Americans. At that moment, Ha represented all that was wrong with his nation and his nation’s leaders. And he hadn’t a clue about the dangerous situation his ship and his crew were about to enter upon. A part of him wanted reach out and choke this pompous political sycophant.

“Comrade Ha, we are about to commence operations per our instructions. This does not require your presence on the bridge. Please return to your stateroom.”

“But … but I have every right to be here to witness this historic event.”

Choe considered this. “Perhaps. But I am still captain of this ship, and your presence on my bridge is at my discretion. You will return to your quarters, and you will stay there, or I will have you forcibly removed and taken there.”

Choe took a step toward him, and Ha stepped back. “This is outrageous. I will comply with your direction, but be assured that your actions and disrespect will be passed along to my superiors. I will see that you are removed from command.”

“So noted,” Choe replied coldly. “Now get off my bridge.” And you may do what you will after this, Choe mused, if we’re still alive. Won Do was now some twenty-five miles west of Inchon and fifteen miles east of the Korean-American mine flotilla. The weather was freshening with the wind building from out of the southwest, bringing moist, warmer air out of the South China Sea, along with a blanket of fog.

Choe sighed and then gave the orders that would, in concert with the other two Sariwon-class corvettes, sow a string of acoustic mines that would deny entry to, or an exodus from, the approaches to the Han River and the city of Seoul, as well as the port of Inchon. As with many North Korean seagoing professionals, Lieutenant Commander Choe was not among the most politically astute members of his military. Nonetheless, he knew he was committing an overt act of war.

The three corvettes began their mine-laying operations in the late afternoon and continued into the evening. Mines were as much a psychological weapon as a kinetic one. Once it was known that there was an active minefield in the area, few sea captains, military or civilian, would want to steam in those waters. As for the South Korean navy, which had some very capable patrol craft and Western-armed destroyers, they would effectively be sealed in port.

Just after dark, two Najin-class frigates slipped their moorings at the North Korean naval base at Haeju and made their way slowly out into Haeju Bay and took a southeasterly heading for the Yellow Sea. Once into open water, they turned south to a heading of one-seven-zero at a speed of twelve knots, keeping a distance of three miles between them. At this course and speed, they would be taken by any orbiting reconnaissance satellite to be two merchantmen leaving the Port of Haeju on routine transit.

The North Korean navy was primitive by Western naval standards, but if there were two vessels that might hold up in an encounter with the more modern navies of Japan, South Korea, or even the United States, it was these two frigates. There were four of them built in the 1970s in North Korean yards. Two had been laid up and cannibalized for parts to keep the two active warships afloat. They were 330 feet long, displaced 1,600 tons, and had a complement of 180 sailors. Both were armed with a recent version of the CSS-N-2 Safflower missile — a variant of the Chinese Silkworm surface-to-surface missile. The frigates were also armed with an array of four-inch and two-inch guns, making them no match for a Western destroyer but capable enough when it came to non-missile-armed patrol craft or minesweepers. Both frigates, Najin Three and Najin Four, had just completed an overhaul at the ship-repair facility at Haeju, so most of their systems were operational, or as operational as two dated frigates could be. Unlike older North Korean naval vessels like Won Do, they were identified by their hull numbers rather than individually named. As a result of their recent yard period, both could make their flank speed of twenty-six knots. As they entered the Yellow Sea, the two ships turned to divergent courses. Najin Three came right to a course of 180 that would bring her to the west of the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong. Najin Four came left to 140, a course that would take the frigate well east of Yeonpyeong Island and between the South Korean mainland and the American-Korean mine-hunting flotilla.

There was also a flurry of after-dark activity on the Ongjin Peninsula of North Korea. Long-range coastal artillery crews took up their positions. Yeonpyeong Island was at the extreme range of their guns, but every few years, the North Korean batteries shelled Yeonpyeong, and the South Koreans answered in kind with their American-made 155 mm self-propelled artillery. These exchanges resulted in a few deaths and casualties and reminded both sides that, while they may have signed a cease-fire accord some sixty years ago, they were still at war.

Aboard the Seventh Fleet flagship, USS Blue Ridge, Lieutenant Hugh Risseeau studied the intelligence summary that the petty officer of the watch had handed him. It was filled with North Korean troop movements and a seemingly unusual number of North Korean naval-unit sightings. Risseeau was fairly new to the Seventh Fleet staff. He was by trade a surface warfare officer with a specialty in communications and was now assigned to the Seventh Fleet as one of the staff communicators. About every ten days, he took his rotation as the staff duty officer, which was where he found himself now. The activity in North Korea seemed out of the ordinary, but he had no real basis for comparison.

“Hey, Senior Chief O’Gara, have you seen this intel summary?”

O’Gara had been on staff for close to two years. He was rated as an operations specialist, and he did have a basis for comparison.

“I did, sir, and there’s a lot more activity than I’ve seen since I’ve been here on staff.”

“What do you make of it, Senior?”

“Hard to tell. With the North Koreans, you never know whether they’re getting ready for war or just posturing to blackmail the international community into giving them more food and fuel. But for all that movement, there’s been very little communications activity.”

Since one of the major responsibilities of the Seventh Fleet was the defense of the Korean Peninsula, all intelligence regarding North and South Korea was to be routed to the Seventh Fleet staff. The intel now being processed came from a variety of electronic intercepts, satellite data, and open-source media collected by the NSA, CIA, the National Reconnaissance Office, the Eighth Army G-2 section at Yongsan Garrison, and Seventh Air Force Intelligence S-2 at Osan Air Base. The information flow was comprehensive and continuous, but it contained none of what Op-Center had passed to the Pentagon, nor any of their early assessment of the mounting danger. Most of what Risseeau and O’Gara were seeing was classified secret traffic but carried the routine routing of “monitor for future developments.” Whatever was brewing would have a direct bearing on a great number of American service personnel. There were some twenty thousand troops in the Eighth Army and eight thousand airmen in the Seventh Air Force.

“So, Senior Chief, what about these three corvettes that seem to be operating along the approaches to the Han River and off Inchon?” Risseeau had pulled up a chart on the big desktop flat screen that showed Seoul, Inchon, and some forty miles west-southwest into the Yellow Sea. “Here’s where they were last evening, and here’s where they are now. They seem to be moving in some sort of an extended formation, close in but still in international waters.”

O’Gara studied the presentation for several minutes. “Your guess is as good as mine, sir, but, best I can tell, they seem to be conducting some sort of mine-laying exercise. It’d make sense as we’re conducting a MINEX with the South Koreans just west of them. But I’ve never seen them operating this close to shore. It’s probably nothing, sir, but we’re not going to get much more out of these satellite passes. If we really want to know what they’re up to, we’re going to have to request a low-level reconnaissance pass.”

“You mean from the Reagan air wing?”

“Tell you what, sir,” he said with a grin. “Why don’t we just pass this requirement over to the Seventh Air Force in Osan. Get a couple of those Air Force flyboys off the golf course and have them do the flyover. Give them a little honest work for a change.”