Fatal Thunder: A Jerry Mitchell Novel (33 page)

“Captain Mitra has been questioned,” Kumar told Samant and Petrov. “He confirms that five weapons were loaded early yesterday evening, and that
Chakra
set sail at about 2115—over three hours ago. He also said the deployment orders were delivered by Vice Admiral Dhankhar personally.”

Samant shook his head. “Jain’s undoubtedly gone deep and ordered a flank bell by now, putting as much distance between
Chakra
and Vizag as possible. At least, that’s what I would do. Even if we alerted the patrol squadron at INS
Rajali
immediately, it would be another hour, maybe two, before they could even hope to have a maritime patrol aircraft in the rough vicinity. That puts her about two hundred miles out into the Bay of Bengal.”

“That’s a very large area for a single patrol plane to cover,” remarked Petrov. “And if Jain is smart enough to drop down to a moderate tactical speed, he’ll be very hard to find. Even for a new U.S. P-8 Poseidon aircraft.”

“He’s that smart. I trained him.” Samant’s face showed a mixture of pride and regret.

“We can sortie the fleet! Chase him down!” Kumar exclaimed.

Both Samant and Petrov smirked at the naive comment. “That wouldn’t help. In fact, all that extra noise in the water would only make it easier for Jain to get away,” Samant grunted. “No, the only assets we have that even have a chance of catching him right now are aircraft. But, as Aleks has already said, the odds are not good.”

“What if Jain has been deceived? You’ve said he was impressionable, Girish. You could send out radio messages with the truth. Tell him about Dhankhar’s lies, and order him to return to base,” suggested Petrov.

Samant shrugged. “We certainly need to try that, Aleks. But I fear his orders will address that contingency. If he stays deep, and I suspect he will, only a VLF radio system can reach him, and the regular maintenance on the transmitter at INS
Kattabomman
hasn’t been completed yet.”

A deep scowl popped on Petrov’s face. “I know about that project, there are several Russian technicians supporting it. That work should have been finished some time ago, who’s in charge of that effort?” he grumbled in frustration.

Samant’s expression was one of utter amazement. Petrov saw the “Duh” look on his friend’s face, winced, and rubbed his brow. “Of course. Dhankhar. I knew that.”

“Then the situation is hopeless!” Kumar moaned.

“Not hopeless, at least not yet,” replied Samant with stern determination. “But we do need to ask for assistance. Aleks?”

Petrov nodded, took out his cell phone, and punched a few buttons. Raising the phone to his ear, he looked at the CBI director and explained, “It’s times like this when one learns to appreciate friends in high places.”

It took but a moment for the call to go through; the recipient answered quickly. “Dr. Patterson, this is Aleks Petrov. I have some bad news.”

6 April 2017

1600 EST

The Oval Office, the White House

Washington, D.C.

Joanna Patterson didn’t respond to Evangeline McDowell’s greeting. It was questionable whether she even heard it. Marching deliberately, Patterson thrust her finger toward the door, and the Secret Service agent opened it without blinking. He’d been warned to admit the national security advisor without delay. Bursting into the Oval Office, she could see Secretary of State Lloyd speaking with the president. Joanna didn’t care what they were talking about, and didn’t even greet her boss.

“
Chakra
’s gone, and Dhankhar has escaped,” she announced pointedly.

“WHAT!?” howled Lloyd. Myles let out a groan and cradled his face in his hands.

“How in God’s name did the Indians botch it so badly? I thought we gave them plenty of warning!” Lloyd complained.

“Apparently the number-two man at the Indian Central Bureau of Investigation was in on the conspiracy. It looks like he warned Dhankhar and then stalled the investigation long enough for the admiral and the boat to disappear.
Chakra
set sail almost four hours ago with the five nuclear-armed torpedoes on board,” answered Patterson.

“Joanna, who told you this?” asked a strained Myles.

“Alex Petrov just called me from the shipyard. They just executed the raid to seize the sub and arrest Dhankhar. Both were gone, Orlav as well. Petrov and Samant are at the torpedo workshop with the CBI director right now.”

“I see. What do the Indians intend to do?”

“There really isn’t much they can do, Mr. President. They’ll scramble maritime patrol aircraft, but the odds aren’t in their favor. Unless
Chakra
’s new captain does something stupid, an Akula-class boat has the advantage. And Samant has said he trained the man well, so we have to assume he won’t do something stupid,” replied Joanna grimly.

Myles rose and walked around his desk, struggling to come to grips with the nightmare unfolding before them, the nightmare they had tried so hard to prevent. Taking a deep breath and straightening himself, he laid the obvious next question on his advisors. “All right, what do we do now?”

“The cat’s out of the bag, Mr. President. We have to tell the Chinese,” sighed Lloyd.

Joanna nodded. “I concur with the secretary of state, Mr. President.”

The president began pacing, considering his advisors’ recommendation. There really wasn’t a choice. “Agreed,” he said finally. “And we’ll have to inform the Russians as well. But isn’t there something we can do to be more proactive? I don’t like the idea of warning the Chinese and then just watching.”

“We should speak with the Littoral Alliance, get them involved. They have good ASW forces, and it would be in their interest to assist in hunting down
Chakra
,” Lloyd suggested.

Myles nodded his head, thinking.

“The best platform to hunt down a submarine is another submarine, Mr. President,” offered Joanna. “
We
have the most capable boats in theater at Guam.”

“Squadron Fifteen,” affirmed Myles.

“Yes, sir.”

Lloyd was visibly unhappy with Patterson’s idea and voiced his objection. “But Joanna, if
Chakra
is bent on attacking Chinese ports, then she’ll be entering Chinese waters. Our boats would have to go into those same territorial waters to chase them. What makes you think the Chinese will tolerate the presence of our subs?”

“The Chinese know we have the best submarines, and they know what it’s going to take to find and stop
Chakra
. They won’t like it, not one bit, and they’ll likely complain, but that doesn’t change the fact that we substantially boost their chances of preventing a nuclear warhead from going off in one or more of their ports. Furthermore, if the Chinese do detect one of our subs, it doesn’t sound like an Akula; you can tell the difference.”

Myles paused; both Patterson and Lloyd had valid arguments. The president wasn’t thrilled with the idea of putting U.S. military personnel directly on the firing line again, particularly the submarines of Squadron Fifteen that had borne the brunt of the war. Still, the odds of stopping the rogue Indian submarine were considerably better with the U.S. submarines involved. And offering to send America’s best had political capital of its own. It didn’t take long for Myles to come to a decision.

“All right, here’s what we’re going to do. Andy, I need you to get the Chinese ambassador here as soon as you can. It’s my job to deliver the bad news, and make the pitch for our assistance, Joanna, you’ll help me with that. Andy, then contact Foreign Secretary Jadeja and let him know what we’re doing.”

Lloyd opened his mouth to protest, but Myles cut him off.

“Yes, I know, this will be the second time we’ve gone around the Indian ambassador. It can’t be helped … I’ll personally apologize when this crisis is over, okay? Then I want you to contact the Russian ambassador and tell them what we’re up to. We need to keep them in the loop. Finally, set up a meeting with the Littoral Alliance for Joanna, after she’s helped me with the Chinese ambassador.” Lloyd nodded tightly, acknowledging his orders.

Joanna sighed. “Up until now, the plot and everything connected with it has been kept secret, to avoid tipping our hand. Now, the conspirators in India appear to have been tipped off. At least two are on the run, and the Indian government is trying to recall the boat, and failing that, tracking it down and sinking it. Is there any more reason for strict secrecy?”

“You mean, like the massive embarrassment the Indian and Russian governments would suffer, and the possible panic and chaos it could trigger in China? Those reasons?” Myles was smiling, but it disappeared quickly. “If the Indians could have scooped up the conspirators before
Chakra
had sailed, the first time the world would have heard of the plot would have been when we issued a joint press release.”

Myles continued. “The Chinese will keep this close, but we have to assume that telling the entire Littoral Alliance means news will eventually leak out, and then there will be hell to pay. All we can do is find and kill
Chakra
as quickly as possible. I’ll send my communications people to your staff to get briefed, and they can get started on preparing our official response.

“Joanna, your first task is to run out of this room and call Simonis’s staff. Set up a VTC for you to brief the commodore and his submarine captains, and tell them what they need to do. We’ve kept
most
of them in the dark long enough. You can brief the CNO after you’ve scheduled the videoconference.”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

“All right, then, let’s get to it people! We have a wayward boat to catch.”

7 April 2017

0430 Local Time

Squadron Fifteen Commander’s Residence

Naval Base Guam

The nagging electronic buzz dragged him to consciousness. For the second time that night, the secure phone was ringing. Simonis got out of bed and slowly shuffled to the phone on the other side of the bedroom. Blinking sleep from his eyes, he picked up the handset. “Simonis,” he yawned.

“Commodore, Ops, sorry to wake you, sir, but Dr. Patterson just called. She wants a secure VTC with you and the available sub skippers in one hour.”

Simonis looked at his wristwatch and grunted. It hadn’t been nine hours since COMSUBPAC issued the warning order. “Understood. Did she even give you a clue as to what this is about, Rich?”

“No, sir. She seemed to be in a big hurry and only said it was a high-priority mission that would involve sortieing the entire squadron. She promised a full explanation during the VTC.”

“Very well. Call Mitchell, Dobson, and Nevens and have them report to the squadron conference room in forty-five minutes. Then send a flash precedence message to
Texas
to come to PD and link in; I want Pascovich in on this one,” directed Simonis.

“Yes, sir. Do you want me to send a driver to pick you up?”

“No, I’ll drive myself in. And make sure someone calls the CSO.”

“He’s next on my list, sir,” replied Walker.

“Good. I’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”

*   *   *

Jerry hustled into the conference room only to find few people milling about. They were engaged in idle chatter, waiting for the VTC to begin. Taking a quick look around the room, Jerry was surprised not to see Simonis already in his seat. Dropping his cover and notebook onto one of the tables, Jerry made a beeline for the coffee mess. As he poured himself a cup, he caught the operations officer’s eye. Jerry’s facial expression silently asked the question, “What the hell is going on?”

Walker only shook his head and shrugged. He didn’t know.
Great. I hope this doesn’t have anything to do with my meeting with Samant,
thought Jerry. But his gut told him otherwise.

Sipping his coffee, Jerry kept an eye on the door. It wasn’t long before Scott Nevens and Bruce Dobson walked in along with a number of Squadron Fifteen staff members. Jerry greeted his fellow captains and joined in a speculative discussion about the second summons—he didn’t share what little he knew or suspected. After a few minutes, Captain Charles Simonis and his Chief Staff Officer, Captain Glenn Jacobs, entered the conference room. The commodore swiftly scanned the space, locked eyes with Jerry, and motioned for him to break away and come over. Jerry politely excused himself and approached Simonis. The commodore didn’t look happy.

“Yes, sir?” solicited Jerry.

“Captain, if you have any insights into this upcoming confab, I’d appreciate hearing them.” The commodore was visibly frustrated. “I don’t like being kept in the dark, Captain. There’s been no hint of a problem in our AOR; SUBPAC’s warning order came out of the blue. Now, we have this zero dark thirty videoconference with the national security advisor…”

“I think it may have something to do with the information provided by Captain Samant,” Jerry volunteered. “I can’t think of anything else going on in our theater that could have Dr. Patterson so anxious.”

“Do you really believe this Indian nuclear conspiracy theory?” asked Simonis. The tone of his voice betrayed his skepticism.

“I trust Alex Petrov, Commodore, implicitly. He’s a good man, and a damn fine submariner. If he was sufficiently alarmed about this ‘conspiracy theory’ to contact us, covertly, then I think we should be worried.”

“But what about this Indian captain?” Simonis challenged. “What evidence do we have that he’s telling us the truth?”

Jerry glanced around the room and spoke with a lowered voice. “Sir, as I said when I got back from D.C., there
is
evidence to support Samant’s claims, but I’m not at liberty to discuss it with you.”

Simonis’s jaw tightened. The commodore had been more than a little miffed when Jerry respectfully declined to discuss the evidence earlier, as it was in a special access program that Simonis wasn’t cleared for. The commodore completely agreed with the concept of compartmenting sensitive information, but in this case, he believed he had a legitimate “need to know.”

“But Captain Samant seemed genuinely concerned, sir,” continued Jerry. “As for my impression of the man, he’s a very good boat driver, and I can attest to the fact that he was a royal pain in the ass.”