Red Storm Rising

32. New Names, New Faces

"Good morning, Ed." Commander, Naval Surface Forces, U.S. Atlantic Fleet was seated behind a desk covered with dispatches that seemed to be organized into piles. Morning-half an hour after midnight. Morris hadn't left Norfolk since arriving at dawn on the previous day. If he went home, he'd have to sleep again…

"Morning, sir. What can I do for you?" Morris didn't want to sit down.

"You want to go back out?" COMNAVSURFLANT asked bluntly.

"Who with?"

"Reuben James's skipper came down with a bleeding ulcer. They flew him in this morning. She arrives in another hour with the 'phibs from PACFLT. I'm assigning her to convoy duty. We have a big one assembling in New York harbor. Eighty ships, all big, all fast, loaded with heavy equipment for Germany. It sails in four days with a heavy U.S./ U.K. escort, plus carrier support. Reuben James will be in port long enough to refuel and reprovision. She sails for New York this evening in company with HMS Battleaxe. If you're up to it, I want you to take her."

The Vice Admiral eyed Morris closely. "She's yours if you want her. You up to it?"

"My personal gear's still aboard Pharris." Morris temporized. Did he really want to go back out?

"Packed up and on the way down, Ed."

There were plenty of men who could do it, Morris thought. The operations staff he'd been working with since he arrived in Norfolk was full of people who'd leap at this. Go back to sea and put it on the line again-or drive back every night to an empty home and nightmares?

"If you want me, I'll take her."

The northern horizon flashed with artillery fire that backlit the trees. The sky was never free of the thunder. The drive to the divisional command post was a mere fifteen kilometers from Alfeld. Three vicious air attacks and twenty separate artillery barrages had converted the morning drive into a nightmare lasting into dusk and beyond.

The forward headquarters of 20th Tanks was now the command post for the entire drive toward Hameln. Lieutenant General Beregovoy, who had relieved Alekseyev, now wore the hats of commander 20th Tanks and operational maneuver group commander The OMG concept had been one of the most precious Soviet pre-war ideas. The "daring thrust" would open a corridor into the enemy's rear, and the operational-maneuver group would exploit it, racing into the corridor to seize important economic or political targets. Alekseyev stood with his back against an armored vehicle, looking north at the flashing outline of a forest. Another thing that hasn't gone according to plan, he thought. As if we expected NATO to cooperate with our plans!

There was a yellow flash overhead. Alekseyev blinked his eyes clear and watched the fireball turn to a comet that fell to the earth, landing several kilometers away. Ours or theirs? he wondered. Another promising young life snuffed out by a missile. Now we kill our young men with robots. Who said mankind was not using his technology to worthwhile ends?

He had prepared his whole life for this. Four years in officer school. The difficult initiation as a junior officer, promotion to command a company. Three more years at Frunze Military Academy in Moscow after he'd been recognized as a rising star. Then command of a battalion. Back to Moscow to the Voroshilov Academy of the General Staff. Top man in his class. Command of a regiment, then a division. All for this?

A field hospital was in the trees five hundred meters away, and the wind carried the shrieks of the wounded to the command post. Not like that in the movies he'd watched as a child-and still watched. The wounded were supposed to suffer in quiet, determined dignity, puffing on cigarettes proffered by the kindly, hardworking medics, waiting their turn for the courageous, hardworking surgeons and the pretty, dedicated nurses. A fucking lie, all of it a monstrous fucking lie, he told himself The profession for which he had prepared his life was organized murder. He sent boys with pimples on their faces into a landscape rained on with steel and watered with blood. The burns were the worst. The tank crews who escaped from their brewed-up vehicles with their clothes alight-they never stopped screaming. Those killed by shock or the pistol of a merciful officer were only replaced by more. The lucky ones who reached the casualty-clearing stations found medics too busy to offer cigarettes, and doctors who were dropping from fatigue.

His brilliant tactical success at Alfeld had led nowhere yet, and he wondered in his soul if it ever would, if he had cast young lives away for nothing more than words in books written by men who did their best to forget the horrors they had inflicted and endured.

Second thoughts now, Pasha? he asked himself. And what of those four colonels you had shot? Rather late to discover a conscience, isn't it? But now it wasn't a map-table game or an exercise at Shpola, nor a handful of routine training accidents. It was one thing for a company commander to see all this after following orders from above. It was another for the man who gave the orders to view his handiwork.

"There is nothing so terrible as a battle won-except a battle lost." Alekseyev remembered the quote from Wellington's commentary on Waterloo, one of the two million books in the Frunze library. Certainly not something written by a Russian general. Why had he ever been allowed to read that? If soldiers read more of those remarks and less of glory, then what would they do when their political masters ordered them to march? Now there, the General told himself, there is a radical idea… He urinated against a tree and walked back towards the command post.

He found Beregovoy leaning over the map. A good man, and an effective soldier, Alekseyev knew, what did he think of all this?

"Comrade, that Belgian brigade just reappeared. It's attacking our left flank. They caught two regiments moving into new positions. We have a problem here."

Alekseyev strode to Beregovoy's side and surveyed the available units. NATO still was not cooperating. The attack had come at the junction of two divisions, one worn out, the other fresh but unblooded. A lieutenant moved some counters. The Soviet regiments were pulling back.

"Keep the reserve regiment in place," Alekseyev ordered. "Have this one move northwest. We'll try to catch the Belgians' flank as they approach this road junction." Professionalism dies hard in the soldier.

"Well, there it is." Edwards handed his binoculars to Sergeant Smith. Hvammsfjordur was still miles away. Their first sight of it came from the top of a two-thousand-foot hill. A sparkling river below them fed into the fjord, more than ten miles away. Everyone kept low, afraid to be skylined with the low sun behind them. Edwards broke out his radio.

"Doghouse, this is Beagle. The objective is in sight." This was a particularly dumb thing to say, Edwards knew. Hvammsfjordur was almost thirty miles long, about ten miles across at its widest point.

The man in Scotland was impressed. Edwards's party had covered fifteen kilometers in the past ten hours.

"What kind of shape are you in?"

"If you want us to go any farther, fella, this radio might malfunction."

"Roger, copy that." The major tried not to laugh. "Where exactly are you?"

"About five miles east of Hill 578. Now that we're here, maybe you might tell us why," Edwards suggested.

"If you see any, repeat any Russian activity, we want to know about it immediately. One guy taking a leak against a rock, we want to know about it. Do you copy that?"

"Roger. You want the size in inches. No Russkies in view yet. Some ruins to our left, and a farm a ways downriver from us. Nothing moving at either place. Any particular location you want us?"

"We're working on that. Sit tight for the moment. Find a nice place to hide and stay put. What's your food situation?"

"We have enough fish to last out the day, and I can see a lake where we might get some more. Remember when you said you'd have some pizzas sent out, Doghouse? Right now I'd kill for one. Pepperoni and onions."

"Fish is good for you. Beagle, your signal strength is down. You want to start thinking about conserving your batteries. Anything else to report?"

"Negative. We'll be back if we see anything. Out." Edwards slapped his hand down on the power switch. "People, we are home!"

"That's nice, skipper." Smith laughed. "Where's home?"

"Budhardalur is other side that mountain," Vigdis offered. "My Uncle Helgi live there."

We could probably get a decent meal there, Edwards told himself. Maybe some lamb, a few beers or something stronger, and a bed… a real, soft bed with sheets and the down quilts they use here. A bath, hot water to shave. Toothpaste. Edwards could smell every part of himself They tried to wash in the streams when they could, but mostly they couldn't. I smell like a goat, Edwards thought. Whatever a goat smells like. But we didn't walk this far to do something as stupid as that.

"Sarge, let's secure this place."

"You got it, skipper. Rodgers, sack out. Garcia, you and me have the first watch. Four hours. You take that little knoll over there. I'll head over to the right." Smith stood and looked down at Edwards. "Good idea that we all get some rest while we can, skipper."

"Sounds great to me. You see anything important, give me a kick." Smith nodded and moved about a hundred yards.

Rodgers was already half asleep, his head resting on his folded jacket. The private's rifle was cradled on his chest.

"We stay here?" Vigdis asked.

"I'd sure like to go see your uncle, but there might be Russians in that town. How do you feel?"

"Tired."

"Tired as us?" he asked with a grin.

"Yes, tired as you," she admitted. Vigdis lay back next to Edwards. She was filthy. Her woolen sweater was torn in several places, and her boots scuffed beyond repair. "What will happen to us now?"

"I don't know. They wanted us here for a reason, though."

"But they don't tell you reason!" she objected.

Now there's an intelligent observation, Edwards thought.

"They tell you and you not tell us?" Vigdis asked.

"No, you know as much as I do."

"Michael, why all this happen? Why do the Russians come here?"

"I don't know."

"But you are officer. You must know." Vigdis propped herself up on her elbows. She seemed genuinely astonished. Edwards smiled. He couldn't blame her for being confused. Iceland's only armed force was its police. A real-to-life Peaceable Kingdom, the country had no military to speak of A few small armed ships for fishery protection and the police were all the country had ever needed to maintain security. This war had ruined their perfect record. For a thousand years, without an army or a navy, Iceland had never been attacked. It had only happened now because they were in the way. He wondered if that would have happened if NATO hadn't built its base at Keflavik. Of course not! You idiot, you've seen what wonderful folks the Russians are! NATO base or not, Iceland was in their way. But why the hell had all this happened?

"Vigdis, I'm a meteorologist-a weatherman, I predict the weather for the Air Force." That only made her more confused.

"Not soldier? Not, ah, Marine soldier?"

Mike shook his head. "I'm an officer in the U.S. Air Force, yes, but I am not really a soldier like the sergeant. I have a different job."

"But you save my life. You are soldier."

"Yeah, I suppose I am-by accident."

"When this all over, what will you do?" Her eyes held a great deal of interest now.

"One thing at a time." He was thinking in terms of hours, not days or weeks. If we do survive, then what? Put that one aside. First comes survival You think about "after the war," and there won't be any. "I'm too tired to think about that. Let's get some sleep."

She fought it. He knew that she wanted to know things he hadn't consciously considered, but she was more fatigued than she'd admitted, and ten minutes later she was asleep. She snored. Mike hadn't noticed before. This was no china doll. She had strengths and weaknesses, good points and bad. She had the face of an angel, but she'd gotten herself pregnant-so what! Edwards thought. She's braver than she's beautiful. She saved my life when that chopper came in on us. A man could do far worse.

Edwards commanded himself to lie down and sleep. He couldn't think about this. First he had to survive.

"If the area checks out?" the major asked. He had never really expected Edwards and his party to make it this far, not with eight thousand Russian troops on the island. Every time he thought about those five people trekking over bare, rocky ground and Soviet helicopters circling overhead, his skin crawled.

"Around midnight, I think," the man from Special Operations Executive said. You could see the smile crinkling the skin around his eyepatch. "You chaps had better decorate this young man. I've been in his boots myself You cannot imagine how difficult it is to do what these people have done. And having a bloody Hind helicopter sit right on top of them! I've always said it's the quiet little bastards that you have to watch out for."

"In any case, it's time we got some professionals in to back them up," pronounced the captain of Royal Marines.

"Make sure they take in some food," suggested the USAF major.

"So, what's the problem?" Nakamura asked.

"There are irregularities in some of the rocket motor casings," the engineer explained.

"'Irregularities, meaning they go boom?"

"Possibly," the engineer admitted.

"Super," said Major Nakamura. "I'm supposed to carry that monster seventeen miles straight the hell up and then find out who goes into orbit, me or it!"

"When this sort of rocket explodes, it doesn't do much. It just breaks into a couple of pieces that burn out by themselves."

"I imagine from seventeen miles off it doesn't look like much-what about when the sucker ignites twenty feet from my F-15?" A long way to skydive, Buns thought.

"I'm sorry, Major. This rocket motor is nearly ten years old. Nobody checked our spec sheet on proper storage after it was mated with the ASAT warhead. We've checked it out with X rays and ultrasound. I think it's okay, but I might be wrong," the man from Lockheed said. Of the six remaining ASAT missiles, three had been decertified by the man for cracks in the solid-fuel propellant. The other three were question marks. "You want the truth or you want a song and dance?"

"You gotta fly it, Major," the deputy commander of Tactical Air Command said. "It's your decision."

"Can we rig it so the bird doesn't ignite until I'm clear?"

"How long will you need?" the engineer asked. Buns thought about her speed and maneuverability at that altitude.

"Say ten or fifteen seconds."

"I'll have to make a small change in the programming software, but that shouldn't be much of a problem. We'll have to make sure that the missile will retain enough forward velocity to keep its launch attitude, though. You sure that's enough time?"

"No. We'll have to check that out on the simulator, too. How long we got?"

"Minimum two days, maximum six days. Depends on the Navy," replied the General.

"Great."

"Here's some good news," Toland announced. "An Air Force F-15 Eagle fighter was flying over a fast convoy north of the Azores. Two Bears came looking for the ships and the Eagle got 'em both. That makes three in the past four days. The Backfire raid appears to have aborted."

"What's their position?" the group captain asked.

Toland ran his hand along the chart, checking latitude and longitude against the numbers on the dispatch form. "Looks like right about here, and that datum is twenty minutes old."

"That puts them over Iceland in just under two hours."

"What about tankers?" the Navy fighter commander asked.

"Not on such short notice."

"We can stretch that far with two fighters, using another two for buddy stores, but it only gives them about twenty minutes on station, under five on burner, and a ten-minute reserve when they get back here." The fighter boss whistled. "Close. Too close. We have to wave off on this."

A phone rang. The British base commander grabbed.

"Group Captain Mallory. Yes… very well, scramble." He hung up. Klaxons went off at the ready shack half a mile away. Fighter pilots raced to their aircraft. "Ivan's settled the argument in any case, Commander. Your radar aircraft report heavy jamming activity inbound from the north."

The commander raced out the door and jumped into a jeep.

The drive from SACLANT headquarters took ten minutes. The Marines at the main gate were checking everyone and everything carefully, even a Chevy with a three-star flag. They drove to the waterfront amid an unending flurry of activity. Trains rolled down the tracks set in the streets, repair shops and testing facilities worked around the clock. Even the McDonald's on the road immediately outside was working a twenty-four-hour day, feeding hamburgers and fries to the men who took a few minutes for nourishment. For sailors spending a day or so on land it was an important, if seemingly trivial, touchstone. The car turned right as it reached the docks, past the submarine piers to the ones that held destroyers.

"She's brand new, only a month in commission, just about long enough to calibrate the electronics, and they must have shaved some time on that," the Admiral said. "Captain Wilkens did continuous workups on the transit from San Diego, but nothing with helicopters yet. PACFLT kept hers, and I can't give you a regular helo complement either. All we have left is one Seahawk-F variant, a prototype helo they were evaluating down at Jacksonville."

"The one with the dipping sonar?" Ed Morris asked. "I can live with that. How about a driver who knows how to use it?"

"It's covered. Lieutenant Commander O'Malley. We pulled him out of a training billet at Jax."

"I've heard the name. He was doing systems qualifications on Moosbrugger when I was tactical action officer on John Rodgers. Yeah, he knows the job."

"Have to drop you off here. I'll be back in an hour, after I have a look at what's left of the Kidd."

Reuben James. Her raked clipper bow marked with hull number 57 hung over the dock like a guillotine blade. His weariness momentarily forgotten, Morris stepped out of the Chevy to examine his new command with all the quiet enthusiasm of a man with his newborn child.

He'd seen FFG-7-class frigates, but never been aboard one. Her severe hull lines reminded him of a Cigarette racing yacht. Six five-inch mooring lines secured her to the pier, but the sleek form already seemed to be straining at them. At only 3900 tons full load, not a large ship but manifestly a fast one to go in harm's way.

Her superstructure was an aesthetic embarrassment, with all the grace of a brick garage, topped with antenna whips and radar masts that looked like they had been built by a child's erector set, but Morris saw the functional simplicity of the design. The frigate's forty missiles were tucked away in circular racks forward. Her boxy after deckhouse contained enough room for a pair of deadly ASW helicopters. Her hull was sleek because speed required it. Her superstructure was boxy because it had to be. This was a warship, and whatever beauty Reuben James might have had was accidental.

Sailors wearing blue shirts and jeans moved rapidly across three gangways, bringing supplies aboard for an immediate sailing. Morris walked briskly to the after gangway. A Marine guard saluted him at the foot of the brow and an officer on the frigate's deck frantically ordered preparations to receive his new CO. The ship's bell was struck four times, and Commander Ed Morris assumed his new identity.

"Reuben James, arriving."

Morris saluted the colors, then the officer of the deck.

"Sir, we didn't expect you for another-" the lieutenant blurted.

"How's the work going?" Morris cut him off.

"Two more hours, tops, sir."

"Fine." Morris smiled. "We can worry about the Mickey Mouse later. Get back to work, Mister-"

"Lyles, sir. Ship control officer."

And what the hell is that? Morris wondered. "Okay, Mr. Lyles. Where's the XO?"

"Right here, skipper." The executive officer had grease on his shirt and a smudge on his cheek. "I was in the generator room. Pardon the way I look."

"What kind of shape are we in?"

"It'll do. Full load of fuel and weapons. The tail's fully calibrated-"

"How'd you do that so fast?"

"It wasn't easy, sir, but we got it done. How's Captain Wilkens?"

"The docs say he'll be all right, but-well, he's out of the business for a while. I'm Ed Morris." Captain and executive officer shook hands.

"Frank Ernst. First time I've operated in the Atlantic Fleet." The lieutenant commander smiled crookedly. "Picked a great time for it.

Anyway, we're in good shape, skipper. Everything works. Our helo pilot's up in the Combat Information Center with the tactical guys. We got Jerry the Hammer. I played ball with him at Annapolis, he's good people. We got three real good chiefs. One's a qualified officer of the deck. The crew's on the young side, but I'd say we're about as ready as you could ask. Ready to sail in two, three hours, tops. Where's your personal gear, sir?"

"It ought to be here in half an hour. What was the problem below?"

"No sweat. An oil line let go on number-three diesel generator. Yard goof, wasn't welded right. It's fixed. You'll love the engine room, skipper. On builder's trials in five-foot seas we topped out at thirty-one-and-a-half knots." Ernst raised his eyebrows. "Fast enough?"

"And the stabilizers?" Morris asked.

"They work just fine, skipper."

"What about the ASW troops?"

"Let's meet 'em."

Morris followed his XO into the superstructure. They proceeded forward between the two helicopter hangars, then to the left past officers country and up a ladder. The Combat Information Center was located one level below and just aft of the bridge, adjoining the commanding officer's stateroom. Dark as a cave, it was newer than Pharris's and larger, but no less crammed. Twenty or more people were at work running a simulation.

"No, Goddammit! howled a loud voice. "You have to react faster. This here's a Victor, and he ain't gonna wait for you to make up your damn mind!"

"Attention on deck! Captain in Combat," called Ernst.

"As you were," called Morris. "Who's that loud sunuvabitch?"

A barrel-chested man emerged from the shadows. His eyes were surrounded by crinkles from looking into too many low suns. So this was Jerry the Hammer O'Malley. He knew him only by a crackling voice on a UHF radio, and by his reputation as a sub-hunter who cared more for his trade than promotion boards.

"I guess you mean me, Captain. O'Malley. I'm supposed to drive your Seahawk-Foxtrot."

"You're right about the Victor. One of those bastards blew my first ship near in half."

"Sorry to hear that, but you oughta know that Ivan's putting his best skippers in the Victors. She handles better than anything else they got, and that rewards a smart driver. So you were up against the varsity. Did you have him outside?"

Morris shook his head. "We were late picking him up, just coming off a sprint, and acoustical conditions weren't all that great, but we detected him, he couldn't have been more than five miles out. We had the helo after him, just about had him localized, then he broke contact neat as you please and got inside on us."

"Yeah, the Victor's good at that. Pump-fake, I call it. He starts going one way, then turns hard the other, leaves a knuckle in the water, and probably a noisemaker, too, right in the middle of it. Then he dives down under the layer and makes a quick sprint in. They've been refining that tactic for the past few years, and we've had trouble programming a reliable counter for it. You need a sharp crew in the helo, and you need good teamwork with these guys here."

"Unless you read my report, my friend, you must be a mind reader."

"Right, Captain. But all the minds I read think in Russian. The pump-fake's what the Victor is best at, and you have to pay attention, what with his ability to accelerate and turn so quick. What I've been trying to teach people is when he shows turn to port, you start thinkin' he's really going to starboard, and you slide over maybe two thousand yards and wait a minute or two, then you hammer the bastard hard and pickle off the fish before he can react."

"And if you're wrong?"

"Then you're wrong, skipper. Mostly, though, Ivan's predictable-if you think like a submariner and you look at his tactical situation instead of your own. You can't keep him from running away, but his mission is to close on the target, and you can make life real hard for him if he does."

Morris looked O'Malley hard in the eyes. He didn't like having the loss of his first command analyzed so glibly. But there was no time for these thoughts. O'Malley was a pro, and if there was a man to handle another Victor, this might be the one. "You all ready?"

"The bird is at the air station. We'll join up after you clear the capes. I wanted to talk things over with the ASW team while we had the time. We're gonna play outside ASW picket?"

"Probably. With a towed-array, it doesn't figure that we're going to be in close. And we might be teamed with a Brit for the convoy mission."

"Fair enough. If you want my opinion, we have a pretty solid ASW team here. We might just give the bad guys a hard time. Weren't you on Rodgers a few years back?"

"When you were working with the Moose We worked together twice, but never met. I was 'X-Ray Mike' when we exercised against Skate"

"I thought I remembered you." O'Malley came closer and dropped his voice. "How bad is it out there?"

"Bad enough. We lost the G-I-UK line. We're getting some pretty good SURTASS info, but you can bet Ivan's going to be gunning for those tuna boats pretty soon. Between the air threat and the sub threat-I don't know." His face showed more than his voice did. Close friends dead or missing. His own first command blown in half. Morris was tired in a way that sleep alone would not cure.

O'Malley nodded. "Skipper, we got us a shiny new frigate, a great new helo, and a tail. We can hold our end up."

"Well, we'll have a shot soon enough. We sail for New York in two hours and take a convoy out on Wednesday."

"Alone?" O'Malley asked.

"No, we'll have Brit company for the New York run, HMS Battleaxe. The orders haven't been confirmed yet, but it looks like we'll be working together all the way across."

"That'll be useful," Ernst agreed. "Come on aft, skipper, I'll show you what we're up to." The sonar room was aft of CIC, closed off by a curtain. Here real lighting was on, as opposed to the darkened, red-light world of Combat.

"Jeez, nobody ever tells me anything!" growled a young lieutenant commander. "Good morning, Captain. I'm Lenner, combat systems officer."

"How come you're not at your scope?"

"We froze the game, skipper, and I wanted to check out the display on playback."

"I brought the game tape myself," O'Malley explained. "This is the track of a Victor-III that faked out one of our carriers in the eastern Med last year. See here? That's the pump-fake. You'll notice that the contact fades out, then brightens up. That's the noisemaker inside the knuckle. At this point he ducked under the layer and sprinted inside the screen. Would've hit the carrier, too, because they didn't get him for another ten minutes. That"-he jammed his finger at the display-"is what you look for. This tells you you're up against a driver who knows his stuff, and he's out for your ass." Morris examined the screen closely enough to recognize the pattern. He'd seen it once before.

"What if they use the maneuver to break clear?" Lenner asked.

"Because if they can break contact, why not break contact towards the target?" Morris asked quietly, noting that he had a very young combat systems officer.

"That's right, skipper." O'Malley nodded ruefully. "Like I said, this is a standard tactic for them, and it rewards a sharp driver. The aggressive ones will always bore in. The ones who break off-that's effectively a kill. We have to reacquire, but so do they. With a twenty-knot speed of advance, once we get past them, they have to play catch-up. That means making noise. The guy who runs away probably won't run the risk, or if he does, he'll do it badly and we'll get him. No, this tactic is for the guy who really wants to get in close. Question is, how many of their skippers are that aggressive?"

"Enough." Morris looked away for a moment. "How's the helicopter complement?"

"Only one flight crew for the bird. My copilot's pretty green, but our onboard systems operator's a first-class petty officer who's been around the block a few times. The maintenance guys are a pickup bunch, mostly from the readiness group at Jax. I've talked to them, they should do just fine."

"We got berths for them all?" Morris asked.

Ernst shook his head. "Not hardly. We're packed pretty tight."

"O'Malley, is your copilot deck-qualified?"

"Not on a frigate. I am-hell, I did some of the first systems trials back in '78. We'll have to do workups on the way to New York, both day and night to get my ensign in the groove. Scratch team, skipper. The bird doesn't even belong to an operational squadron."

"You sounded confident a minute ago," Morris objected.

"I am fairly confident," O'Malley said. "My people know how to use the tools they got. They're sharp kids. They'll learn fast. And we even get to make up our own call signs." A wide grin. Certain things are important to aviators. There was one other unspoken message: when O'Malley referred to the aviation department as "my people," he meant that he didn't want any interference in how he ran his shop. Morris ignored it. He didn't want an argument, not now.

"Okay, XO, let's look around. O'Malley, I expect we'll rendezvous off the capes."

"The helo's ready to launch right now, Captain. We'll be there when you want us."

Morris nodded and went forward. The captain's personal ladder to the bridge was a bare three feet from the CIC door, and his own. He trotted up-or tried to, his legs rubbery with exhaustion.

"Captain on the bridge!" a petty officer announced.

Morris was not impressed. He was appalled to see that the ship's "wheel" was only a brass dial about the size of a telephone's. The helmsman actually had a seat, offset from the centerline, and to his right was a clear plastic box containing the direct-control throttle to the ship's jet-turbine engines. A metal rod suspended from the overhead ran completely from one side of the pilothouse to the other at a height that allowed it to be grabbed easily in heavy seas, and eloquent comment on this ship's stability.

"Have you served on a 'fig' before, sir?" the XO asked.

"Never been aboard one," Morris answered. The heads of the four men on bridge watch each turned a hair at that. "I know the weapons systems; I was part of the design team at NAVSEA back a few years ago, and I know more or less how she handles."

"She handles, sir. Like a sports car," Ernst assured him. "You'll especially like the way we can turn the engines off, drift as quiet as a log, then be up to thirty knots in two minutes flat."

"How quickly can we get under way?"

"Ten minutes from your say-so, Captain. The engine lube oil is already warmed up. There's a harbor tug standing by to assist us away from the dock."

"NAVSURFLANT, arriving," boomed the announcing system. Two minutes later, the Admiral appeared in the pilothouse.

"I have a man bringing your gear up. What do you think?"

"XO, will you see to the provisioning?" Morris said to Ernst, then, "Shall we discover my stateroom together, Admiral?"

A steward was waiting for them below with a tray of coffee and sandwiches. Morris poured himself a cup, another for the Admiral, and ignored the food.

"Sir, I've never handled one of these before. I don't know the engines-"

"You've got a great chief engineer and she's a dream to handle. Besides, you have your conning officers. You're a weapons and tactics man, Ed. All your work is done in CIC. We need you out there."

"Fair enough, sir."

"XO, take her out," Morris ordered two hours later. He watched Ernst's every move, embarrassed that he had to depend on another to do it.

But it was amazingly easy. The wind was off the pier, and the frigate had a huge sail area that invited help. As the mooring lines were slackened off, the wind and the auxiliary power units located on the hull directly under the bridge pushed James's bow into the clear, then the gas turbine engines moved her forward into the channel. Ernst took his time, though he was clearly capable of doing it faster. Morris took careful note of this, too. The man didn't want to make his captain look bad.

From there on it was easy, and Ed Morris watched his new crew at work. He'd heard stories about the California Navy-like, okay, man-but the quartermasters at the chart table updated the position with crisp assurance, despite the unfamiliar harbor. They glided noiselessly past the piers of the navy yard. He saw empty berths that would not soon be filled, and not a few ships whose sleek gray hulls were marred with scorched holes and twisted steel. Kidd was there, her forward superstructure wrecked by a Russian missile that had gotten past her multilayered defenses. One of his sailors was looking that way, too, a boy still in his teens, puffing on a cigarette which he flicked over the side. Morris wanted to ask what he was thinking, but could scarcely describe his own thoughts.

It went quickly after that. They turned east at the empty carrier berthings, over the Hampton bridge-tunnel, then past the crowded amphibious basin at Little Creek. Now the sea beckoned them, forbiddingly gray under the cloudy sky.

HMS Battleaxe was already out there, three miles ahead, a subtly different shade on her hull, and the White Ensign fluttering at her mast. A signal light started blinking at them.

WHAT THE DEVIL IS A REUBEN JAMES, Battleaxe wanted to know.

"How do you want to answer that, sir?" a signalman asked.

Morris laughed, the ominous spell broken. "Signal, 'At least we don't name warships for our mother-in-law.'"

"All right!" The petty officer loved it.

"The Blinder isn't supposed to be able to carry missiles," Toland said, but what he saw gave the lie to that intelligence assessment. Six missiles had gotten through the defending fighters and landed inside the perimeter of the RAF base. Two aircraft were burning, half a mile away, and one of the base's radars was wrecked.

"Well, now we know why their activity has been light the past few days. They were refitting their bombers to deal with our new fighter force," Group Captain Mallory said, surveying the damage to his base. "Action, reaction. We learn, they learn."

The fighters were returning. Toland counted them off in his head. He came up short by two Tornados and one Tomcat. As soon as the landing rolls were completed, each fighter taxied to its shelter. The RAF did not have enough permanent ones. Three of the American fighters ended up in sandbag revetments, where ground crews immediately refueled and rearmed their aircraft. The crews climbed down their ladders to waiting jeeps and were driven off for debriefing.

"Bastards used our own trick on us!" one Tomcat pilot exclaimed.

"Okay, what did you run into?"

"There were two groups, about ten miles apart. Lead group was NEG-23 Floggers with the Blinders behind them. The MiGs launched before we did. They really knocked our radars back with white noise, and some of their fighters were using something brand new, a deceptive jammer we haven't run across yet. They must have been at the edge of their fuel, 'cause they didn't try to mix it up with us. I guess they just wanted to keep us off the bombers until they launched. Damn near worked. A flight of Tornados came around them on the left and bagged four of the Blinders, I think. We got a pair of MiGs-no Blinders-and the boss vectored the rest of the Toms onto the missiles. I splashed two. Anyway, Ivan's changed tactics on us. We lost one Tomcat, I don't know what got him."

"Next time," another pilot said. "We go up with some of our missiles preset to go after the jammers. We didn't have enough time to set that up. If we can get the jammers first, it'll be easier to handle the fighters."

And then the Russians will change their tactics again, Toland thought. Well, at least we have them reacting to us for a change

After eight hours of vicious fighting that saw artillery fire dropping on the forward command post, Beregovoy and Alekseyev stopped the Belgian counterattack. But stopping them wasn't enough. They'd advanced six kilometers before running into a solid wall of tanks and missiles, and the Belgian artillery was laying heavy intermittent fire on the main road supporting the Russian advance toward Hameln. Certainly they were preparing for another attack, Alekseyev thought. We have to hit them first-but with what? He needed his three divisions to advance on the British formations standing before Hameln.

"Every time we break through," Major Sergetov observed quietly, "they slow us down and counterattack. This was not supposed to happen."

"A splendid observation!" Alekseyev snarled, then regained his temper. "We expected that a breakthrough would have the same effect as in the last war against the Germans. The problem is these new light antitank missiles. Three men and a jeep"-he even used the American title for it-"can race along the road, set up, fire one or two missiles, be gone before we can react, then repeat the process a few hundred meters away. Defensive firepower was never so strong before, and we failed to appreciate how effectively a handful of rearguard troops can slow down an advancing column. Our security is based on movement"-Alekseyev explained the basic lesson from tank school-"a mobile force under these conditions cannot afford to be slowed down. A simple breakthrough is not enough! We must blast a massive enough! We must blast a massive hole in their front and race at least twenty kilometers to be free of these roving missile-crews. Only then can we switch over to true mobile doctrine."

"You say we cannot win?" Sergetov had begun to have his own doubts, but did not expect to hear them from his commander.

"I say what I did four months ago, and I was correct: this campaign of ours has become a war of attrition. For the moment, technology has defeated the military art, ours and theirs. What we're doing now is seeing who runs out of men and arms first."

"We have more of both," Sergetov said.

"That is true, Ivan Mikhailovich. I have many more young men to throw away." More casualties were arriving at the field hospital. The line of trucks running in and out never stopped.

"Comrade General, I received a message from my father. He wishes to know how things progress at the front. What should I tell him?"

Alekseyev walked away from his aide for a minute to ponder that.

"Ivan Mikhailovich, tell the Minister that NATO opposition is far more serious than we expected. The key now is supplies. We need the best information we can get on NATO's supply situation and a determined effort to worsen that situation. We have received little information on how well the naval operations to kill NATO convoys are going. I need that in order to evaluate NATO's endurance. I don't want analyses out of Moscow. I want the raw data."

"You are unhappy with what we get from Moscow?"

"We were told that NATO was politically divided and militarily uncoordinated. How would you evaluate that report, Comrade Major?" Alekseyev asked sharply. "I can't go through military channels with that sort of request, can I? Write up your travel orders. I want you back here in thirty-six hours. I'm sure we'll still be here."

"They should be there in half an hour."

"Roger that, Doghouse", Edwards replied. "Like I said, no Russians visible. We haven't seen any aircraft all day. There was some movement on the road west of us six hours ago. Four jeep-type vehicles. Too far off to tell what was in them, and they were southbound. The coast is clear. Over."

"Okay, let us know when they get there."

"Will do. Out." Edwards killed the radio. "People, we got some friends coming in."

"Who and when, skipper?" Smith asked at once.

"Didn't say, but they'll be here in half an hour. Must be an air drop."

"They come take us out?" Vigdis asked.

"No, they can't land a plane here. Sarge, you got any opinions?"

"Same as yours, I 'spect."

The plane was early, and for once Edwards saw it first. The C-130 Hercules four-engine transport skimmed down from the northwest, only a few hundred feet over the eastern slope of the ridge they were on. A stiff breeze blew from the west as four small shapes emerged from the aft cargo door and the Hercules turned abruptly north to leave the area. Edwards concentrated on the descending parachutes. Instead of drifting down into the valley below them, the parachutists were coming straight down to a rock-filled slope.

"Oh, shit, he misjudged the wind! Come on!"

The parachutes dropped below them as they ran downhill. One by one they stopped, losing their shape in the semidarkness as the men landed. Edwards and his party moved rapidly, trying to remember where the men had landed. Their camouflage 'chutes turned invisible as Soon as they touched the ground.

"Halt!"

"Okay, okay. We're here to meet you", Edwards said.

"Identify yourself!" The voice had an English accent.

"Code name Beagle."

"Proper name?"

"Edwards, first lieutenant, U.S. Air Force."

"Approach slowly, mate."

Mike went forward alone. At length he saw a vague shape half-hidden by a rock. The shape held a submachine gun.

"Who are you?"

"Sergeant Nichols, Royal Marines. You picked a bloody poor place to receive us, Lieutenant."

"I didn't do it!" Edwards answered. "We didn't know you were coming until an hour ago."

"Balls-up, another bloody balls-up." The man stood and walked forward with a pronounced limp. "Parachuting's dangerous enough without coming into a fucking rock garden!" Another figure came up.

"We found the lieutenant-I think he's dead!"

"Need help?" Mike asked.

"I need to wake up and find myself home in bed."

Edwards soon found that the party sent to rescue him-or whatever their mission was-had gotten off to a disastrous start. The lieutenant in command of the group had landed on one boulder and fallen backward on another. His head hung from the rest of his body as if on a string. Nichols had sprained his ankle badly, and the other two were uninjured but shaken. It took over an hour to locate all their gear. There was no time for sentiment. The lieutenant was wrapped in his parachute and covered with loose rocks. Edwards led the rest back to his perch on the hilltop. At least they'd brought a new battery pack for his radio.

"Doghouse, this is Beagle, and things suck, over."

"What took so long?"

"Tell that Herky-Bird driver to get a new eye doctor. The Marines you sent here got their boss killed, and their sergeant ripped his ankle up."

"Have you been spotted?"

"Negative. They landed in rocks. It's a miracle they weren't all killed. We're back on the hilltop. We covered our tracks."

Sergeant Nichols was a smoker. He and Smith found a sheltered spot to light up.

"Sounds rather excitable, your lieutenant."

"He's only a wing-wiper, but he's doin' all right. How's the ankle?"

"I'll have to walk on it whether it's fit or not. Does he know what he's about?"

"The skipper? I watched him kill three Russians with a knife. That good enough?"

"Bloody hell."