To Kill the Potemkin

7

On the stroke of midnight an inbound tanker passed a large red navigation buoy eleven miles outside the Naples breakwater. The sailors on the tanker's bridge scarcely glanced at the revolving light buoy, and no one noticed a much smaller float that had attached itself magnetically to the buoy. Eight inches in diameter, the float had a two-foot-long antenna extending into the air and a thin wire descending into the depths. At the far end of the wire, 150 feet down, USS Mako hovered in ambush.

She had been on-station for six hours, waiting for the message from the Sixth Fleet shore command that would announce Barracuda's departure. Having spent a dozen patrols lying off Soviet ports waiting for Russian submarines to exit, the crew was accustomed to picket duty.

The tide had turned and Barrcuda was about to exit the bay under the tanker's sound screen. Captain Flowers joked that Netts himself was on the tanker, intentionally fouling the water with noise pollution. Like everyone else on Mako, Flowers wished for Barracuda's, ultimate success, but regretted that if it came it would be at his expense. His orders were to stop Barracuda the moment she emerged from the channel and put a quick end to "Netts's Folly."

"Radio to control. Target under way."

Flowers wasted no time. "Cut loose that buoy," he ordered. "Control to weapons, he's moving. Load dummies in tubes one and two."

The weapons officer, Lt. North, stared at the blip on his screen that was Barracuda, just as he had stared a month before at the blip that was Leninsky Komsomol when she sailed from Leningrad into the Gulf of Finland. Should Barracuda elude the picket and reach blue water, she could outrun Mako and reach the fleet in thirty hours.

The rules of the war game established a combat-free zone within a radius of ten miles around Naples. Outside the ten-mile limit, a submarine "kill" would be registered by the firing of a dummy torpedo and a sonar blast, to be judged as a hit or a miss by umpires aboard each ship. Torpedoes fired at other submarines would contain no propellant. Immediately after being ejected from the tubes, they would sink. Only the torpedoes Barracuda fired at Kitty Hawk would make a run to the target. With no warhead the fish would bounce off the huge hull of the carrier, causing no significant damage.

"Control to sonar, listen up. He's moving."

Mako's sonar room was larger, quieter and more comfortable than the cramped sonar room on Barracuda. With her more sophisticated sonars, computers and fire control systems, plus the element of surprise, Mako seemed to have every advantage. The sonarmen expected Barracuda to proceed seven or eight miles into the bay and submerge under their noses.

"Sonar to control. We have her, bearing three four six. Course one two three. Speed four knots. Range nineteen thousand yards. She's turning. Bearing three four seven, three four eight, three four nine. Captain" — the operator's voice suddenly rose with astonishment—"she's submerging."

The sonar operators listened to Barracuda's machinery as she submerged, prop cavitating noisily in the shallow water of the bay. The sounds were muddled by the tanker that was now between the two subs.

Suddenly the machinery noises stopped. They heard the tanker, the ping of the fixed beacon that guided ships in and out of the harbor, but no submarine.

"Sonar to control. We lost her on the passive array. She disappeared."

"Springfield's guessed that we're here," said the XO, Commander Poland.

"Control to sonar. Echo-range," ordered Flowers. "Find her."

"Sonar to control. Echo-ranging."

The bottom of the bay was studded with rocks, sunken ships, mounds of garbage and waste from the deeply dredged channels, all of which deflected and distorted the sonar pulses from Mako's echo rangers, transforming her sonar screen into an undecipherable maze.

In the control room Flowers scratched his jaw, took off his headset and rubbed his ears.

Poland said, "She's gone turbo-electric. She's trying to sneak out on the quiet."

The captain nodded, knowing that ballistic missile submarines occasionally left port under turbo-electric power in order to evade a waiting attack sub. All SSN officers were, of course, familiar with the tactic.

"The question is," said Flowers, "does Springfield come after us or try to escape?"

"I think he'll run," the XO said. "He's faster than we are and he'll try to get around us. He'll use the islands."

Pointing at the electronic chart that displayed the Bay of Naples and the islands of Procia, Ischia and Capri just offshore, the XO said, "If Springfield can get behind one of the islands and block our sonar he can escape. The channel between Capri and the mainland is the deepest and the safest for passage. I reckon he'll go south, here, around Capri. He's already moving in that direction."

"All right," said Flowers. "We have to go somewhere and Capri is as good a place as any. We sure as hell can't stay here now that he knows where we are. Sonar, belay the echo ranger. All ahead half. Course one three one. Let's try not to run into the son of a bitch."

Originally Springfield had proposed to Netts that Barracuda make a run for Capri, counting on Barracuda's speed to get her past any picket. Netts rejected that as too obvious. He suggested that Springfield hide the ship in the Gulf of Pozzuoli until the picket either was sunk or gave up and returned to the fleet. After eluding the picket. Barracuda would run north, pass through the Strait of Bonifacio between Sardinia and Corsica, sail down the west coast of Sardinia and surprise the fleet with an attack from the north.

The plan was dangerous. First, Barracuda had to maneuver in the bay and then in the shallow gulf without colliding with a submerged obstacle. To do this it was necessary to echo-range and thereby announce her location to Mako. Both Springfield and Netts found this unacceptable.

Sorensen provided the solution. The Bay of Naples was seeded with fixed sonars that transmitted sonic beacons on regular frequencies to guide ships in and out of port at times of low visibility. Sorensen demonstrated how it was possible to echo-range on the same frequency as one of the beacons. "All we have to do," Sorensen told the captain, "is time the pulse to coincide with the moment Barracuda is directly in line between the fixed array and the picket. If it doesn't work, we'll still be inside the ten-mile limit and he can't shoot us."

"If it doesn't work, Sorensen," Springfield said, "this exercise will be over in five minutes, not five days."

When Springfield submerged less than a mile out into the bay, he did the one thing no one on Mako expected. It was a most precarious gambit. The channel was barely deep enough to act as a sonar buffer, but the tanker coming through should provide enough cover to disguise his maneuvers.

Once underwater, Sorensen immediately picked up the tanker and the garbled but distinct sound of coolant pumps throbbing ten miles away. He logged it and told Hoek he heard only pumps and no gears or prop. He knew the sub was hovering, but the sound was too distorted by other noises in the channel for an absolute fix. Hoek, watching the sonar display on his attack console, guessed that the sub was under buoy number five, and busily plotted an attack.

Springfield took Barracuda on a wide sweeping turn to the left at very slow speed. When the ship was lined up between the beacon and buoy number five, he ordered sonar to echo-range once on the beacon's frequency. Sorensen sent one narrow-beamed pulse of sound out into the channel. A single blip appeared on the screen, a sub lying quietly at radio depth.

"Lieutenant, we've got him."

"Bearing?"

"Bearing one five one."

"Speed?"

"Zero zero, repeat zero zero."

"Range?"

"One eight five zero zero yards. He's under buoy number five."

Sorensen recognized her signature.

"It's Mako," he said a split second before the computer.

Springfield ordered, "All stop."

In the engine room turbine number one whirred to a halt. In the maneuvering room an engineer throttled back the steam. The main feed pumps, with less work to do, became as quiet as possible. In the heat exchangers just enough steam was produced to power the turbogenerators. Although with a loss in overall efficiency, the power from the generators could be used to run an electric motor coupled directly to the propeller shaft. The system had been devised to provide emergency propulsion if both main turbines failed. Barracuda would be slower than before, but she also would be almost totally silent.

When the propeller stopped turning. Barracuda's momentum carried her forward several hundred yards. By the time she came to a complete stop, her turbogenerators and electric motor were engaged.

With a clear picture of the bottom and the traffic in the harbor. Barracuda made a tight 180-degree turn inside the bay, carefully picked her way through the wrecks and silt mounds and crept north around the point of La Gaiola and into the Gulf of Pozzuoli. Sorensen informed Springfield that Mako held her southerly course. Making a great deal of noise with her own machinery, Mako apparently did not notice Barracuda's maneuver.

As soon as Barracuda cleared the point, Sorensen picked up the signal from the beacon attached to the hull of U-62. Most of the gulf was too shallow for submerged operation, but Springfield had studied the charts carefully and had determined that he could hide Barracuda behind the wreck. Using the beacon as a guide, Springfield cautiously maneuvered into a position that allowed the rusting hulk of the dead German sub to shield Barracuda from probing sonars. The ship hovered just above the bottom. Right on time the battery in the beacon went dead.

Sorensen kicked his chair away and stood at his console, listening to Mako conduct her search. After a few minutes she disappeared behind Capri.

"Control to weapons. Load a dummy in tube number one."

"Weapons, aye. Loading dummy."

In the torpedo room the torpedomen loaded a dummy Mark 37 wire-guided torpedo into tube number one.

"Flood tube."

"Flooding tube, aye."

Sorensen and Fogarty heard seawater rush into the torpedo tube. The ship tilted forward.

"Correct the trim, if you please, Mr. Pisaro."

The ship came back to dead level.

"Control to sonar. This is the captain."

"Sonar to control, aye."

"Well done, Sorensen."

"Thank you, sir."

"Now be quiet," Sorensen said to Fogarty. "This is a special treat. It's not often we get to lie quietly in shallow water like this. You never know what you might hear. Maybe we fooled that other ship and maybe we didn't. For all I know the Italians are going to drop sonar buoys right on top of us any minute. They go splish, just like that, sounds like a big fish jumping, and then they drop a Lulu and it's time to say adios."

Suddenly he sat up with a jerk. "Sonar to control," he said into his intercom. "Lieutenant, Mako is coming back this way, bearing one four three, course two five two, speed eight knots, range thirty thousand yards."

In the control room every officer experienced a rush of adrenaline. Mako was going to pass right across Barracuda's bow and give her a clean shot. Hoek was tracking the target on his weapons console, waiting for Mako's tangent to carry her beyond the ten-mile limit.

Navigating on a course that would intercept Barracuda coming out from behind the island of Ischia, Mako crossed the mouth of the Gulf of Pozzuoli at an oblique angle. Her side-to-side sweeping sonar would pick up Barracuda's coolant pumps once the angle cleared U-62, but it would be too late.

"Sorensen," said Hoek, "get ready. When I give the order to fire, you give them a blast with the target-seeking frequency."

"Yes sir, Mr. Hoek." Sorensen nodded to Fogarty. "You do it, kid. You blast 'em."

Fogarty watched the screen. "He's around the point," he said.

Sorensen held up his thumb. "Go."

"Sonar to weapons," Fogarty said. "Lock on weapons guidance."

"Weapons guidance locked on sonar," said Hoek over the intercom. "Tracking target."

"Five, four, three, two, one. Fire."

The ship bucked as it spat out a torpedo, and the bow angled up for a moment until the trim computer automatically pumped water forward to compensate for the loss in weight. Sorensen listened to confirm the torpedo was a dummy. The motor never kicked in and it sank into the mud of the gulf.

Hoek was yelling through the intercom, "Sorensen, what's the matter with you? Hit them with the target sonar."

Fogarty stared at his console. The narrow-beam echo ranger was locked onto Mako and tracking her course, but Fogarty, remembering his own recent sonar lashing, couldn't help thinking of the sonar operators whose eardrums were about to take a pounding. Another moment's delay and those same operators would hear the sound of the dummy whooshing out of the tube, and they would return the favor. Reluctantly, he pushed the button on his console.

Glaring at Fogarty, Sorensen said, "The next time you hesitate on a direct order will be your last."

Sound. Fogarty had learned, traveled through warm shallow seawater at 4921.25 feet per second. 12.33 seconds later two men were screaming in Mako's sonar room, and three more in her control room.

On Barracuda there were cheers. Hoek even did a little war dance in his seat.

Mako was now hors de combat, and five of her crew had ringing ears. The umpire aboard Mako immediately noted the "kill," as did Billings, the umpire aboard Barracuda. Both ships sent up radio buoys.

"Well done," said Flowers. "Congratulations."

"Sorry about your men," answered Springfield. "Buy you a drink in Norfolk."

"Sink the Hawk and I'll buy you one."

Springfield retracted his buoy, and Barracuda continued north for three hours on electric power, making sure there was no second picket. Finally the main turbine was cut in.

"All ahead full," ordered Springfield, and Barracuda lunged forward like a dolphin.