War Plan Red (31 page)

Mayan reread the message. “Sir, we’re practically in Swedish territorial waters. Is this all they can give us: two PCs?”

“It’ll just have to do. Meantime, we have to establish a patrol line near Göteborg. As you know, gentlemen, there are no restrictions on submarines transiting these waters to reach the Baltic Sea, but they must do it while on the surface and with proper advance warning. Transiting submerged is an altogether different matter. It smacks of secrecy and also violates treaties established to prevent transit of neutral waters by belligerents in time of war.”

“Sir, if we can find them, do we attack?” Garborg asked, swaying as the ship lurched underfoot.

“Yes,” Bayer said, then added, “if we find them in Norwegian territorial waters.” He grabbed an empty coffee mug about to fly off the heaving plot table and returned it to Garborg. “I don’t want to create an international incident reminiscent of the Cold War, but we must enforce the rules.”

“Might they be heading for The Sound?” Mayan said.

“Who knows what they’re up to,” Bayer said. “They’re Russians. Russians do bizarre things. I mean, you’ve heard of Russian roulette, haven’t you?” He tapped the chart. “When Norsk and Kalix arrive, they can anchor the western end of our patrol line. We are not to interfere with commercial traffic in any way. Also, this weather will play hell with our VDS.”

Garborg grimaced, knowing how difficult it was going to be to deploy the cable and sonar receptor.

Bayer was thinking the same thing. “Mind the hands, Mr. Garborg,” cautioned the captain. “I don’t want to lose anyone overboard. Not for a damned Russian, I don’t.”

Mikhail Grishkov, dressed in good civilian clothes, got out of a black Zhiguli in front of the pair of green gates at the entrance to the Novodevichy Cemetery on Luzhnetsky Proyzed. He waited until the Zhiguli drove off to the parking lot, then crossed to the kiosk and bought a ticket to enter the cemetery.

“Tour?” asked the ticket seller.

Grishkov shook his head and, turning away and pausing for a moment, turned up the astrakhan collar of his topcoat. It was a filthy gray Moscow day threatening snow, and he was glad he wore a fedora and gloves.

Grishkov marveled at how times had changed. For more than thirty years the cemetery, without explanation, had been closed to the public. Everyone knew it had been closed because the controversial Nikita Khrushchev, after being denounced by Leonid Brezhnev, had been buried here rather than in Red Square with other Soviet leaders. During the Cold War, to visit his grave was to commit a crime against the state. Then came glasnost and with it the rehabilitation of Khrushchev and the reopening of the cemetery so ordinary citizens could visit his grave as well as the graves of famous Russians like Anton Chekhov and the composer Aleksandr Scriabin.

Admiral Stashinsky’s insistence on meeting at Khrushchev’s grave on such a cold day annoyed Grishkov. But then, Stashinsky had entered the navy as a midshipman only weeks after the Cuban Missile Crisis broke, when Khrushchev had Kennedy by the balls. Perhaps Stashinsky wanted to make a point about those long-ago events. Grishkov kept his head down and thought how much better to make the point someplace warm, like Stashinsky’s sumptuous office, with its fireplace and hot tea.

A cold wind blowing off the Moskva River plastered dead leaves against Grishkov’s trouser legs. He put his head down and held on to his fedora, which was threatening to fly away, and started down the long tree-lined walkway that led to the once-infamous gravesite at the rear of the cemetery. He acknowledged the babushki, grandmothers posted throughout the cemetery, no matter what the weather, to give tourists directions.

Up ahead he saw the black and white marble slab that marked Khrushchev’s grave: black and white to symbolize the contrasts, it was said, if not the contradictions of Khrushchev’s rule. Grishkov found the site pleasantly quiet, the only disruptions a helicopter wok-wok-woking northeast up the Moskva River and the singing of traffic on the expressway carving past the cemetery on the south.

At first Grishkov didn’t see Stashinsky. Only after a group of six American tourists viewing the grave had moved on did he notice the admiral, also dressed in civilian clothes, standing with hands deep in the pockets of his topcoat.

Stashinsky seemed to sense Grishkov’s presence. Or perhaps it was when a member of his security detail made his presence known to Grishkov by stepping out from behind a tall headstone nearby.

“Mikhail Vladimirovich!” Stashinsky stripped off a glove and approached Grishkov with a hand extended. “But you are alone.”

Grishkov glanced at the security man. “I am used to being alone.”

Stashinsky frowned. “You should take precautions. Everyone in Russia is a target today.”

“I feel safe here with you, Admiral.”

Stashinsky made no more of it and steered Grishkov toward Khrushchev’s grave. “I used to come here fairly often, but now it’s only twice a year. Thank you for indulging me.”

Grishkov said nothing.

In the biting cold Stashinsky’s face looked dead gray and showed patches of white beard stubble he’d missed shaving. “I want to apologize for the rude way I treated you during our last meeting. It was unfair to criticize you for things over which you have no control. I’m speaking of course about the Barents Sea operation. I spoke to the President and he understands now.”

“Please, there is no need to apologize.”

They came to the grave and halted. Stashinsky stood with fingers linked and head slightly bowed, looking at the cold marble. “It’s ironic, don’t you think, that Khrushchev was the architect of his own downfall. His denunciation of Stalin, the breach with China, the Cuban Missile Crisis. It seems an appropriate lesson for our present situation.”

“What situation is that, Admiral?”

“Our confrontation with the Americans.”

Their shoulders began to collect snowflakes spiraling from the sky.

“I’ve read everything written about Khrushchev,” said Stashinsky. “He made mistakes but was a great man. Mind, I’m not suggesting we should return to those days, but there was a sense of purpose we Russians shared, especially those of us in the military. This of course was before your time, Mikhail Vladimirovich. We were fighting for the survival of our motherland against the Americans.”

Grishkov said nothing.

Snowflakes clung to Stashinsky’s hair. He brushed them away as he said, “The only mistake Khrushchev made was not being tough enough. He had Kennedy by the balls and let him go. Had he stuck to his plan, he could have wrung concessions out of Kennedy and could have kept our missiles in Cuba.”

“And could have started a nuclear war,” Grishkov said.

“I’ve studied the evidence and don’t believe it would have come to that. Kennedy was weak and inexperienced. He was on the verge of shitting his pants and was ready to give in when Khrushchev made his fatal error.”

“He overestimated Kennedy’s resolve and capitulated first.”

“Now you see my point.”

“You think we need to get tough with the Americans over the K-363.”

“Of course. We know they want to find and sink the K-363 before we do.”

Grishkov noticed that the snow had started coming down heavier.

“The Americans don’t want Zakayev to fall into our hands,” Stashinsky said. “They want him dead.”

Grishkov nodded.

“They don’t want him to tell us things that might be damaging to the U.S. Things that might undermine the summit meeting and the U.S. plan to topple Iran and Syria and for which they need our cooperation.

And most of all, because they don’t want us to know about U.S. involvement in Chechnya and support for Zakayev.”

Grishkov held Stashinsky’s gaze. “I thought that rumor had been put to bed.”

Stashinsky snorted again. “Rumors have a way of coming back like a bad dream. I will tell you this, Mikhail Vladimirovich: The information I have comes from the top, from one of Moscow’s most senior individuals. Someone who has access to highly privileged information—information so secret that only three men other than the president have seen it.”

“And you are one of them.”

“It’s all there. Not in black and white, mind you, no hard evidence, nothing that would stand up in a court of law. Always there are prevarications and caveats and nuances of interpretation. But if one reads between the lines and applies common sense, you can see why the Americans are so eager to get rid of Zakayev. Because they have blood on their hands.”

Grishkov ran through in his mind how the people at the top might have gotten such damaging evidence of U.S. involvement with Zakayev and Chechen terrorism. But Stashinsky was saying, “The American naval officer, Drummond. It was his failure to head off Zakayev that set off the alarm for the Americans.”

“Yes, I remember Drummond: murdered in questionable circumstances, in Murmansk. There was a sailor involved.”

“A setup, I assure you, Mikhail Vladimirovich. Zakayev handled it. The FSB investigated and wrote a report. Now we have the Amerikanski, Scott, on the K-480.” Stashinsky growled. “The K-480. A Russian submarine with two Americans aboard, one of them a naval officer, the other one a woman. A woman! What was I thinking when I authorized it? I should have had my head examined.”

“She’s a scientist,” Grishkov offered.

“She’s a spy.”

“But there’s also the FSB officer, Abakov. He’s Russian.”

Stashinsky waved a hand. “The Americans still claim to know nothing of the K-480’s whereabouts. As you reported, they are putting on an act that they’re looking into the possibility she’s gone down.”

Grishkov nodded. Stashinsky’s hair was getting snowier; so was Grishkov’s fedora. They saw a pair of male tourists coming toward them. One held a deployed green, white, and red Cinzano umbrella over their heads.

“We absolutely must find Zakayev and Litvanov before the Americans do,” Stashinsky said. “Even if it means shifting all our forces out of the Barents Sea to the south.”

“That will take days.”

“Then use what you have in the Baltic. Everything. Even if you have to send in every helicopter and plane and auxiliary and oiler and barge we have. Just do it. The only thing the Americans understand is force and resolve. We have to demonstrate what we are capable of.”

“I’ll do what I can. But I must tell you, Admiral, we are not in good shape in the Baltic. The Americans know it too. If we do what you say, it may send the wrong signal and make us look desperate.”

“On the contrary, it will clog up the Baltic and make it difficult for them to operate freely. I’m for anything that will impede their hunt for the K-363.”

“It may also impede our own hunt for the K-363.”

“We are looking for only one submarine, not an entire fleet.”

“Actually, if this American, Scott, shows up, we may end up having to deal with two submarines. It could be difficult telling them apart. I wouldn’t want to make a mistake and sink the wrong one. It could happen, you know. And if it did, the Americans would shit their pants.”

Stashinsky smiled and pointed to Khrushchev’s grave, turning white with snow. “I think Nikita would like that.”

16

North of Anholt

A fter sorting for hours through dozens of false contacts, sonar reported: “Kapitan, contact! A submarine—an Akula!”

Scott donned a pair of spare headphones and listened to it. How many times had he heard Akulas while patrolling off the Kola Peninsula, in the Atlantic Ocean off Spain, and once off the coast of South Carolina?

“Faint. Very faint. A three-hundred-hertz line bearing zero-three-two; for sure it’s the K-363.”

Scott had slowed their headlong dash across the Skagerrak, and, north of Læsø, had started hunting for the K-363. At first there had been nothing to hear but the normal squeal and pop of sea life, the groaning shift of sand and bottom debris, and the sound of wind-driven waves, which provided perfect cover for a submarine.

Scott had hesitated to deploy the submarine’s ultra sensitive towed sonar array from its stowage pod on the after vertical fin, fearing that the noise it would make reeling out might alert the K-363. To find their target, he was relying solely on the K-480’s MGK-503 passive bow sonar array and the sensitive ears of his sonarmen.

The K-363 was quiet but not totally silent. Her slowly turning seven-bladed prop created a corkscrew of collapsing bubbles and low-amplitude pressure ridges that bounced off the seabed and radiated outward from the coast. Little by little the MGK-503 sonar suite stripped away the K-363’s cover. A half hour into the search a green spike—a three-hundred-hertz tone—began to crawl down a video monitor in the sonar room.

“Fire Control. Range?”

“Under twenty kilometers, Kapitan.”

Scott checked the bathythermograph readout. The K-480 was enveloped in a layer of cold water, which had piped long-range sound reception from the slow-moving K-363 into the K-480’s sonar.

“Bearing?”

“Three-three-zero, steady.”

“Excellent. Can you nail down his base course?”

“Aye, Kapitan.”

“Now let’s see if we can ease on in without being detected,” Scott explained to Abakov, who by now had a good grasp of tactics.

“Maybe he’s already heard us,” Abakov said. “And is expecting us.”

“Maybe,” Scott said. “But he’s operating on the edge, where his sonar’s ability to detect targets is degraded.”

“Because he’s in littoral waters?”

“Exactly. We may be able to sneak right up on him and stick a fish up his ass.”

Scott glanced at the fire control console. The K-480’s four 650mm torpedo tubes were loaded with Type 65-76 antiship torpedoes and the 533mm tubes held TEST-71M antisubmarine acoustic wire-guided homing torpedoes. She also had six 400mm bow tubes loaded with acoustic decoys. Rows of illuminated green lights on the fire control console indicated the status of each weapon and decoy.

“Kapitan, Fire Control. Target is on base course one five-two degrees.”

Scott laid a steel rule on the chart’s compass rose and saw that 152 degrees from due north pointed south-southeast to the entrance of The Sound. The K-480’s present course was the hypotenuse of a right-angle triangle, while the K-363’s course was the height. If nothing changed, the two submarines would meet at the tip of the triangle.