The Sum of all Fears Part 38

"Tell him the oxygen rots your brain."

"Dominic's thinking CalTech."

"No kidding? h.e.l.l, I can help him out."

The rest of the drive occupied itself with small talk. Mancuso swept into his office and closed the soundproof door behind Jones after ordering coffee from his steward.

"What's the problem, Ron?"

Jones hesitated just a fraction before answering. "I think somebody was tracking Maine. Maine. " "

"Track an Ohio? Come on."

"Where is she now?"

"Heading back out to sea, as a matter of fact. Blue Crew is embarked. She links up with a 688 when she clears the strait for some noise checks, then clears to her patrol area." Mancuso could discuss almost anything with Jones. His company consulted on the sonar technology for all submarines and antisubmarine platforms in the U.S. fleet, and that necessarily included a lot of operational information.

"Got any Gold Crew guys on base now?"

"The Captain's off on vacation. XO's here, Dutch Claggett. Know him?"

"Wasn't he on the Norfolk Norfolk? Black guy, right?"

"That's right."

"I've heard good stuff about him. He did a nice job on a carrier group on his command quals. I was riding a P-3 when he kicked their a.s.s."

"You heard right. He's being deep-dipped. This time next year he'll be taking command of a fast-attack."

"Who's his skipper?"

"Harry Ricks. Heard of him, too?"

Jones looked at the floor and muttered something. "I got a new guy working for me, retired chief whose last tour was with Ricks. Is he as bad as I hear?"

"Ricks is a super engineer," Mancuso said. "I mean it. He's a genius at that stuff."

"Fine, skipper, so are you, but does Ricks know how to drive?"

"Want some coffee, Ron?" Mancuso gestured at the pot.

"You might want Commander Claggett here, sir." Jones rose and got his own coffee. "Since when have you turned diplomat?"

"Command responsibilities, Ron. I never told outsiders about the crazy stuff you did on Dallas. Dallas."

Jones turned and laughed. "Okay, you got me there. I have the sonar a.n.a.lysis in my briefcase. I need to see his course tracks, depth records, that stuff. I think there's a good chance Maine Maine had a trailer, and that, Bart, is no s.h.i.t." had a trailer, and that, Bart, is no s.h.i.t."

Mancuso lifted his phone. "Find Lieutenant Commander Claggett. I need him in my office at once. Thank you. Ron, how sure-"

"I did the a.n.a.lysis myself. One of my people looked it over and caught a whiff. I spent fifty hours ma.s.saging the data. One chance in three, maybe more, that she was being trailed."

Bart Mancuso set his coffee cup down. "That's really hard to believe."

"I know. That very fact may be skewing my a.n.a.lysis. It is kinda incredible."

It was an article of faith in the United States Navy that its fleet ballistic-missile submarines had never, not ever, not once been tracked while on deterrence patrol. As with most articles of faith, however, it had caveats.

The location of American missile-sub bases was not a secret. Even the United Parcel Service deliverymen who dropped off packages knew what to look for. In its quest for cost-efficiency, the Navy mainly used civilian security officers-"rentacops" -at its bases. Except that Marines were used wherever there were nuclear weapons. Wherever you saw Marines, there were nukes about. That was called a security measure. The missile boats themselves were unmistakably different from the smaller fast-attack subs. The ship names were on the Navy register, and the sailors of those ships wore ballcaps identifying them by name and hull number. With knowledge available to anyone, the Soviets knew where to station their own fast-attack boats to catch the American "boomers" on the way out to sea.

At first this had not been a problem. The first cla.s.ses of Soviet fast-attack submarines had been equipped with "Helen Keller" sonars that could neither see nor hear, and the boats themselves had been noisier than unm.u.f.fled automobiles. All that had changed with the advent of the Victor-III cla.s.s, which approximated a late American 594-cla.s.s in radiated noise levels, and began to approach adequacy in sonar performance. Victor-IIIs had occasionally turned up at the Juan de Fuca Strait-and elsewhere-waiting for a U.S. missile sub to deploy, and in some cases, since harbor entrances are typically restricted waters, they had established contact and held on tight. That occasionally had included active sonar-lashing, both unnerving and annoying to American sub crews. As a result, U.S. fast-attack subs often accompanied missile submarines to sea. Their mission was to force the Soviet subs off. This was accomplished by the simple expedient of offering an additional target for sonar, confusing the tactical situation, or sometimes by forcing the Russian submarine off-track by ramming-called "shouldering," to defuse that most obscene of marine terms. In fact, American boomers had been tracked, only in shallow water, only near well-known harbors, and only for brief periods of time. As soon as the American subs reached deep water, their tactics were to increase speed to degrade the trailing sub's sonar performance, to maneuver evasively, and then go quiet. At that point-every time-the American submarine broke contact. The Soviet sub lost its track, and became the prey instead of the hunter. Missile submarines typically had highly drilled torpedo departments, and the more aggressive skippers would have all four of their tubes loaded with Mark 48 torpedoes with solutions set on the now-blinded Soviet sub as they watched them wander away in vulnerable befuddlement.

The simple fact was that American missile submarines were invulnerable in their patrol areas. When fast-attack boats were sent in to hunt them, care had to be given to operating depths-much like traffic control for commercial aircraft-lest an inadvertent ramming occur. American fast-attack boats, even the most advanced 688-cla.s.s, had rarely tracked missile submarines, and the cases where Ohios had been tracked could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Nearly all involved a grievous mistake made by the missile-boat skippers, the ultimate "black mark in the copybook," and even then only a very good and very lucky fast-attack skipper had managed to pull it off-and never ever without being counterdetected. Omaha Omaha had one of the best drivers in the Pacific Fleet, and he had failed to find had one of the best drivers in the Pacific Fleet, and he had failed to find Maine Maine despite having some good intelligence data provided-better than anything a Soviet commander would ever get. despite having some good intelligence data provided-better than anything a Soviet commander would ever get.

"Good morning, sir," Dutch Claggett said on his way through the door. "I was right down the hall at personnel."

"Commander, this is Dr. Ron Jones."

"This the Jonesy you like to brag on, sir?" Claggett took the civilian's hand.

"None of those stories are true," Jones said.

Claggett stopped cold when he saw the looks. "Somebody die or something?"

"Grab a seat," Mancuso said. "Ron thinks you might have been tracked on your last patrol."

"Bulls.h.i.t," Claggett observed. "Excuse me, sir."

"You're pretty confident," Jones said.

"Maine is the best submarine we own, Dr. Jones. We are a black hole. We don't radiate sound, we suck it in from around us." is the best submarine we own, Dr. Jones. We are a black hole. We don't radiate sound, we suck it in from around us."

"You know the party line, Commander. Now, can we talk business?" Ron unlocked his briefcase and pulled out a heavy sheaf of computer printouts. "Right around the halfway point in your patrol."

"Okay, yeah, that's when we snuck up behind Omaha. Omaha."

"I'm not talking about that. Omaha Omaha was in front of you," Jones said, flipping to the right page. was in front of you," Jones said, flipping to the right page.

"I still don't believe it, but I'll look at what you got."

The computer pages were essentially a graphic printout of two "waterfall" sonar displays. They bore time and true-bearing references. A separate set showed environmental data, mainly water temperature.

"You had a lot of clutter to worry about," Jones said, pointing to notations on the pages. "Fourteen fishing boats, half a dozen deep-draft merchant ships, and I see the humpbacks were up to thin out the krill. So your sonar crew was busy, maybe a little overloaded. You also had a pretty hard layer."

"All that's right," Claggett allowed.

"What's this?" Jones pointed to a blossom of noise on the display.

"Well, we were tracking Omaha, Omaha, and the Captain decided to rattle their cage with a water slug." and the Captain decided to rattle their cage with a water slug."

"No s.h.i.t?" Jones asked. "Well, that explains his reaction. I guess they changed their underwear and headed north. You never would have pulled that off on me, by the way."

"Think so?"

"Yeah, I think so," Jones replied. "I always paid real good attention to what was aft of us. I've been out on Ohios, Commander, okay? You can be tracked. Anybody can. It isn't just the platform. Now, look here."

The printout was a computer-generated cacophony of dots that seemed for the most part to show nothing but random noise, as though a convention of ants had walked across the pages for hours. As with all truly random events, this one had irregularities, places where for one reason or another the ants had never trod, or places where a large number had congregated and then dispersed.

"This line of bearing," Jones said. "This pattern comes back eight times, and it comes back only when the layer thins out."

Commander Claggett frowned. "Eight, you say? These two could be reverbs from the fishing boats, or really distant CZ-CONTACTS." He flipped through the pages. Claggett knew his sonar. "This is thin."

"That's why your people didn't catch it, either aboard or here. But that's why I got the contract to back-check your people," Jones said. "Who was out there?"

"Commodore?" Claggett asked, and got a nod. "There was an Akula-cla.s.s out there somewhere. The P-3s lost him south of Kodiak, so he was within maybe six hundred miles of us. That doesn't mean this is him."

"Which one?"

"Admiral Lunin," Claggett answered. Claggett answered.

"Captain Dubinin?"

"Jesus, you are are cleared pretty good," Mancuso noted. "They say he's very good." cleared pretty good," Mancuso noted. "They say he's very good."

"Ought to be, we have a mutual friend. Is Commander Claggett cleared for that?"

"No. Sorry, Dutch, but that is really black."

"He ought to be cleared for that," Jones said. "This secrecy c.r.a.p goes way too far, Bart."

"Rules are rules."

"Yeah, sure. Anyway, this is the one that twigged me. Last page." Ron flipped through to the end. "You were coming up to antenna depth ..."

"Yeah; practice on the missiles."

"You made some hull noises."

"We came up fast, and the hull's made of steel, not elastic," Claggett said in some annoyance. "So?"

"So your hull went up through the layer faster than your 'tail' did. Your towed array caught this."

Claggett and Mancuso both went very quiet. What they saw was a fuzzy vertical line, but the line was in a frequency range that denoted a Soviet submarine's acoustical signature. It was by no means conclusive evidence, but it, like all the other things Jones had notated, was dead aft of Maine's Maine's course. course.

"Now, if I was a betting man, which I'm not, of course, I'd give you two-to-one that while you were underneath the layer, someone might have been tooling along just over top, letting his tail hang under it. He caught your hull transient, saw you were going shallow, and ducked under the layer just as you came over it. Cute move, but your big up-angle meant that your tail stayed down longer than it should have, and that's where this signature came from."

"But there's nothing after that."

"Nothing at all," Jones admitted. "It never came back. From there on to the end of the tapes, nothing but random noise and otherwise-identified contacts."

"It's pretty thin, Ron," Mancuso said, standing up to straighten his back.

"I know. That's why I flew out. In writing it would never sell."

"What do you know about Russian sonar that we don't?"

"Getting better ... approaching where we were, oh, ten or twelve years ago. They pay more attention to broad-band than we do-that's changing now. I sold the Pentagon on taking another look at the broad-band integration system Texas Instruments has been working on. Commander, what you said before about being a black hole. It cuts both ways. You can't see a black hole, but you can can detect it. What if you track an Ohio by what should be there but isn't?" detect it. What if you track an Ohio by what should be there but isn't?"

"Background noise?"

"Yep." Jones nodded. "You make a hole in it. You make a black spot where there's no noise. If he can really isolate a line of bearing on his gear, and if he's got really good filters, and one dynamite sonar operator, I think it's possible-if something else cues you in." something else cues you in."

"That's real real thin." thin."

Jones granted that observation. "But it's not impossible. I ran the numbers. It's not good, but it's not impossible. Moreover, we can track below ambient now. Maybe they can, too. I'm hearing they've started turning out a new large-aperture tail-the one designed by the guys outside Murmansk. Good as a BQR-15 used to be."

"I don't believe it," Mancuso said.

"I do, skipper. It's not new technology. What do we know about Lunin Lunin?"

"She's in overhaul right now. Let's see." Mancuso turned to look at the polar-projection chart on his office wall. "If that was him, then if he headed straight back to base ... it's possible, possible, technically speaking, but you're a.s.suming a h.e.l.l of a lot." technically speaking, but you're a.s.suming a h.e.l.l of a lot."

"I'm saying that this bird was just in the neighborhood when you fired that water slug, that you headed south, and so did he, that you gave him a hull transient which he reacted to, and then he broke contact on his own. The data is thin, but it fits-maybe, I grant you, maybe. maybe. That's what they pay me for, guys." That's what they pay me for, guys."

"I commended Ricks for rattling Omaha's Omaha's cage like that," Mancuso said after a moment. "I want aggressive skippers." cage like that," Mancuso said after a moment. "I want aggressive skippers."

Jones chuckled to break the tension in the room. "I wonder why, Bart?"

"Dutch knows about that job we had on the beach, that pickup we did."

"That was a little exciting," Jones admitted.

"One chance in three...."

"The probability increases if you a.s.sume the other skipper is smart. Dubinin had a great teacher."

"What are you two talking about?" Lieutenant Commander Claggett asked in some exasperation.

"You know we have all sorts of data on the Russian Typhoon cla.s.s, lots more on their torpedoes. Ever wonder how we got all that data, Commander?"

"Ron, G.o.dd.a.m.n it!"

"I didn't break any rules, skipper, and besides, he needs to know."

"I can't do that and you know it."

"Fine, Bart." Jones paused. "Commander, you may speculate on how we got all that information in one great big lump. You might even guess right."

Claggett had heard a few rumbles, like why the Eight-Ten dock at Norfolk had been closed so long a few years before. There was a story floated about, spoken only in submarine wardrooms far at sea and well below the surface, that somehow the U.S. Navy had gotten its hands on a Russian missile sub, how a very strange reactor had turned up at the Navy's nuclear-power school in Idaho for tests and then had disappeared, how complete drawings and and some hardware from Soviet torpedoes had magically appeared in Groton, and how two night missile shots out of Vandenberg Air Force Base had not appeared to be American missiles at all. Lots of operational intelligence had come into the fleet, very good stuff, stuff that sounded like it had come from someone who knew what the h.e.l.l he was talking about-not always the case with intelligence information-on Soviet submarine tactics and training. Claggett needed only look at Mancuso's uniform to see the ribbon that denoted a Distinguished Service Medal, America's highest peacetime decoration. The ribbon had a star on it, indicating a second such award. Mancuso was rather young for a squadron command, and very young indeed to be selected for Rear Admiral (Lower Half). And here was a former enlisted man who'd sailed with Mancuso, and now called him some hardware from Soviet torpedoes had magically appeared in Groton, and how two night missile shots out of Vandenberg Air Force Base had not appeared to be American missiles at all. Lots of operational intelligence had come into the fleet, very good stuff, stuff that sounded like it had come from someone who knew what the h.e.l.l he was talking about-not always the case with intelligence information-on Soviet submarine tactics and training. Claggett needed only look at Mancuso's uniform to see the ribbon that denoted a Distinguished Service Medal, America's highest peacetime decoration. The ribbon had a star on it, indicating a second such award. Mancuso was rather young for a squadron command, and very young indeed to be selected for Rear Admiral (Lower Half). And here was a former enlisted man who'd sailed with Mancuso, and now called him Bart. Bart. He nodded to Dr. Jones. He nodded to Dr. Jones.