Man on Ice: Russia vs the USA - in Alaska

NINE

Stephanie stood to the left of the Oval Office desk listening to the conversation between the Russian and American leaders on speakerphone. President Christopher Swain stood, hand on hip, his eyes moving around the information on screens on his desk. He was an athletic figure with short curly gray hair and the face of a ponderous academic with eyes that emanated authority. A dozen or so officials from Defense, State, and the intelligence agencies clustered around two pastel-yellow sofas that faced each other midway in the room. Holland stood next to Slater by a window in the oval curve.

‘I’m sorry to interrupt your evening, Viktor,’ Swain said with a tone far more relaxed than the atmosphere of the room.

‘Not at all, Chris,’ said Lagutov. ‘I would have called you, but I only learned this myself from news broadcasts. We have a new regional commander in the east. He told me that an emergency radio call was intercepted at our base on Ratmonova, the island that you call Big Diomede. A pregnant girl’s life was in critical danger, and he ordered a helicopter across to help her. In the heat of the moment, no one remembered to let you guys know. I’m sorry for the panic. But the good news is that I’ve just heard the baby has been delivered by emergency Caesarean section, a little girl, and both she and the mother are stable.’

‘Thank you, Viktor.’ Swain kept glancing at his own tablet and a wall screen constantly updated with satellite and radar images. ‘And are they still with you?’

‘They are,’ continued Lagutov in his casual tone. ‘The baby has been named Iyaroak, which means apple of the eye in Inupiat, their native language.’

A ticker tape processed from the Situation Room below ran on the screen. All cellphones jammed. No contact Little Diomede.

‘And are her parents with her?’ The ticker read: Russian attack 4 KA-52s 3 troop carrier M-8s.’ The screen showed radar images of Russian helicopters crossing the border.

‘Two relatives are there.’

‘That’s good. She needs family with her.’ The ticker read: Heavy cloud. No satellite. Holland paced, a measured contrast against Swain’s calmness. Swain’s tablet relayed a feed from the Tin City radar station, the closest site to the Diomede islands. Four Black Hawk helicopters were an hour away. Six F-22 fighters had been scrambled from the Elmendorf-Richardson airbase in Anchorage.

‘We’ll send a helicopter across to pick up the mother and baby and fly them to Nome,’ said Swain.

Lagutov allowed a moment of hesitation which Swain filled. ‘Jim Hoskins, Governor of Alaska, can fly to Nome with your consul-general. They’ll do a photo op. You and I can talk about our friendship and Russia helping an American in crisis.’

‘I’m told you don’t have helicopters available,’ Lagutov said abruptly.

The Oval Office atmosphere tensed. The Russian radar stations on the eastern coastline would detect that Black Hawks and F-22s were close. Either Lagutov was lying or he wasn’t being briefed, which could be worse because it meant he wasn’t in charge. Or he did know and he was winging it because he did not have a Plan B, unimaginable as it might seem.

‘Apparently, that’s fixed.’ Swain’s tone hardened slightly. Prusak motioned that he should keep talking. ‘It seems with helicopters we’ve gone from famine to feast, a Black Hawk at Teller and one at Kotzebue, both mainland settlements. So, we’ll send one straight to your base on Big Diomede to pick them up—’

‘Hold, Chris,’ interjected Lagutov. ‘Someone here’s updating me.’

The ticker tape read: Nuclear submarines Seawolf-class Connecticut and Virginia-class Washington in Arctic region. 190 minutes out.

Prusak switched the line so the Russian side could hear nothing.

‘If those subs are under the ice, they’re not much good against these.’ Holland’s finger jabbed towards the images of the four Russian attack helicopters.

Defense Secretary Mike Pacolli contradicted him: ‘The Connecticut carries IDAS missiles that can bring down a helicopter from a submerged position, and if you’d ever seen one of those beasts break up through ice, you would not treat their presence lightly.’

Holland glared. ‘This is a ground war, Mr Secretary. It needs boots on ice, not computers under the sea.’

‘What else do you have, Mike?’ asked Swain.

‘Refueling tankers for the F22s are airborne, sir. Drones, two AWACs, and satellites deployed. A marine battalion is on its way to Wales. That is twenty-five miles from Little Diomede. They’ll go in by helicopter or across the ice to the island.’

Holland brushed his hand down his cheek, unable to hide his surprise at the speed with which the whole range of American military options had swung into action. His campaign had been against a coward who had failed to protect America. He was seeing for the first time how the authority of one man can deploy such immense military power.

‘This is the easy part,’ said Swain. ‘The tough bit is making sure we don’t use them.’

Lagutov was back, his tone formal. ‘President Swain, I’m patching you through to Admiral Alexander Vitruk, the commander of our Far East Military Region. He took the initiative to go straight to Krusenstern when he heard of the medical emergency. Admiral Vitruk can enlighten us all.’

‘Krusenstern is Little Diomede,’ Stephanie mouthed to Swain.

A photograph of Vitruk, tanned, lean, purposeful, appeared on one of the Oval Office screens. As soon as he spoke, voice authentication confirmed that this was indeed the dominant figure who ran the Russian Far East. His bio-data unfolded next to the photograph. A veteran of Russia’s campaigns in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria, he had forged friendships with the Chinese, North Koreans, and Mongolians. He had been a defense attaché in Washington, DC, had visited Nome and Anchorage, and had even initiated joint US — Russian training exercises out of Elmendorf-Richardson.

‘This is a humanitarian mission, Mr President,’ said Vitruk. ‘They pleaded with us to save these lives and that is what we are doing.’

Without identifying himself, Matt Prusak cut in. He could not allow the President to speak directly to the regional commander of a foreign adversary. The Russian would put it all over their media as President Swain pleading for help. ‘We have a Black Hawk en route to bring back the patient, Admiral,’ Prusak said. ‘You are being patched through to General Davies of our Northern Command with whom you can discuss details.’

‘That will not be necessary,’ Vitruk replied. ‘Your aircraft cannot enter Russian sovereign airspace. If it does, I cannot guarantee its safety.’