Lion Resurgent (54 page)

The secondary fire was being beaten back as the damage control crews sprayed water and foam on to the flames. They were the easy bit; the sea water cooled the steel and made reignition less likely, the foam blanketed still-burning areas and cut off the oxygen supply to the fires. Deploying the two together took skill and training. If used too soon, the water jets would break up the foam blanket and allow air back to the fuel for the fires. Timing was everything.

The primary fire was another matter. Rocket fuel held its own oxidizers and nothing could put it out. The seat of the fire would just have to be contained until the fuel had burned itself out. As long as the steel around it could be cooled, that was possible.

“Chief, compartment ready to be accessed.” The call went out from one of the anonymous figures in the Fearnought suits.

The Duty NCO shuddered slightly to himself. The compartment was one of those in which men had been trapped. They had died, that much was certain, but how? If the compartment was unbreached, the fired would have consumed the air inside and they would have suffocated relatively quickly. If they were unlucky, there would have been an airflow inside. They would have roasted alive as the fires sent the air temperature soaring. Now, the damage control teams would find out.

“Water and foam teams ready. Open her up.” The order was terse. If the fire had exhausted the oxygen, any fires inside the compartment would reignite and send a fireball bursting through the opened hatch. That was why the men in Fearnought suits would be stationed there. If there was breathable air inside, then the fires were really out and there would be no fireball.

A sledgehammer knocked the dogs on the hatch opened and the metal oval swung open. There was no burst of flame or fireball. For the men who had been inside, that meant the worst. There were four of them, crowded around the hatch where they had died struggling to get out. They were brilliant orange-red and the CPO knew that their skin would be as hard and crisp to the touch as crackling on a joint of pork. He looked inside, knowing that it was a sight he would never forget. “Compartment clear. Nothing to do here, move on.”

Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Pentagon, Washington DC

“If these figures are correct, the missile hit rates are abysmal.”

“Around ten to twenty percent for air-to-air weapons, Sir. A bit more for surface-to-air. Of course we don’t know how many misses were actual misses and how many malfunctions. Infra-reds did a lot better than radar homing missiles of course, and skill has a lot to do with it. I suspect novice pilots fired a lot of missiles off when the homing head hadn’t properly locked on. That’s probably why the surface-to-air missiles did a little bit better. We’d expected this of course; years of Red Sun exercises have told us that missiles aren’t the invincible killers than their supporters suggested. That’s why we put nuclear warheads on them and carry as many as we can. We knew AIM-7 had severe problems, at least we now also know that the French Matras have the same difficulties.”

Admiral Haywood looked through the summaries of the reports that Igrat had brought back from London. “The British seem to be mostly saying that no matter how good the air defenses, a few planes will always leak through. I don’t accept that.”

“It reflects their limited defense radius Sir.” The Seer had studied the papers as well and found them what they implied about British perceptions as interesting as the hard evidence they presented on the air battles that had taken place. “They were basically relying on a single ring of fighters plus horizon-range missile defenses. They had no airborne command and control which limited them severely. Why that is, we’re not quite sure. We know Fairey offer an airborne early warning version of the Rotodyne but the Royal Navy don’t appear to have used it. Our guess is that they’ve loaded down the carriers with every strike plane and fighter they had available and left the support birds at home. Understandable, given how far they are down the supply line, but probably not a good decision overall.”

“We’ve got multiple rings of defenses.” Haywood sounded almost smug. “Two rings of fighters and at least four of missiles. And we have command and control aircraft of course. It’s going to be a lot harder to get to our carriers.”

“Of course, sir. The big hit the British have come up with is the vertical launch system. They’re getting improved reliability on their missiles by keeping them in controlled conditions until the moment of firing and a higher rate of fire. Something I think we should look into. Our existing rail launchers tend to freeze up in really bad weather and keeping missiles exposed on them results in a high dud rate. I think the Brits must be on to something with their alternative system. But, having said that, the real defense of our carriers is the knowledge of what we’ll do to any country that tries to attack them The British don’t have that.

“It is also interesting to note how well their Buccaneers did. They came in almost parting the wave tops. We’ve tended to write off coming in at low altitude since it exposes the attacking aircraft to the full weight of an enemy defense, but the Buccaneers came in so low that they made the low altitude attack plan work. Makes one wonder if we should buy some to equip an aggressor squadron. It looks like the Argentine fighter pilots didn’t know how to cope with aircraft that were flying at altitudes measured in single digits. We could fund the purchase as a joint service asset. Or we could invite the British to Red Sun.”

Haywood nodded again. “We could. It looks like we can take them into account again. Thank you Seer, I’ll take all of this under advisement. Of course, everything depends on how well the counter-invasion goes. I’ll say this for the Brits; they’ve certainly come up with some innovative ways of doing things.”

Military Transport
Drakensburg
San Carlos Water, Falkland Islands.

“This remind you of the veroordeel border?” Captain Shumba Geldenhuys was wrapped up in a British Army issue parka and several layers of thermally insulated clothing but was still cold. The shore was a dark shadow that lay around them; the only break was the narrow entrance to the inlet. The position had been carefully chosen. The high hills around it offered some level of protection from low-flying aircraft while the vulnerable areas were covered by the destroyers. Ashore, the black of the hills was interrupted by the occasional flashes of gunfire and the lines of tracers.

“Over there it does.” Lieutenant Bastiaan van Huis. “A night when the stams are restless and their militias keep shooting at nothing. But it is never so bloedige cold on the border.”

“The bloedige Britse moddervoete are clearing the way for us.” Lieutenant Randlehoff was surveying the invasion area with night vision binoculars. “It will be warm enough for them in those hills. We can’t move the armor until daylight but they can get us on to the beach. Word from Rigsby when we are to land?”

“Too veroordeel soon. They’re ferrying the tanks and armored personnel carriers ashore now. We’re next and the artillery behind us.” van Huis shuddered, partially with cold and partly with the sure and certain knowledge that this time he would be facing fellow professional soldiers.

“You would not say too soon of you knew what is coming to these ships broers.” Randlehoff sounded apprehensive. “Work it out for yourselves. The Argies will not fly until dawn, but they will be taking off as soon as the sky is light. That is three hours time. Count an hour to get here. Four hours and these ships will be the targets in a shooting gallery. Count us fortunate to be well ashore by then, broers.”

“Do you think the Britse know that?” Private Meade Dippenaar wasn’t certain if it was his place to ask but nobody said he couldn’t ask questions. Beneath him, chains started to rattle as the first of the Boomslang tank destroyers was lifted up for transfer to a Mexfiote landing raft.

Geldenhuys looked at the sleek Boomslang moving as the chains tightened. “Oh, they know it, broer. They know what the dawn will bring all too bloedige well.”

Operations Room, HMS
Hotspur,
San Carlos Water, Falkland Islands.

“Air raid warning red, red, red.”

“Here they come, right on time.” Sub-Lieutenant Hargreaves was back in the Operations Room after grabbing a few hours sleep while the cruiser squadron and its two escorting destroyers rejoined the amphibious force in San Carlos Water. They’d moved in just after dawn. The cruisers had closed on the beach to provide fire support if needed.
Hero
and
Hotspur
had been assigned to the missile trap position at the entrance to the inlet. The attacking aircraft would have to come through that inlet, the cliffs surrounding the water were steep enough to make that axis of attack near-impossible.

Out to sea, the Sea Mirages from HMS
Furious
were trying to intercept the Argentine Ciclones. By the reports coming in and the chatter on the radio, the Navy fighters had done a good job, but there were only twelve left available and there had been nearly sixty inbound aircraft. They’d downed some but, much more importantly, they’d split the rest of the formation into small groups. The Argentine attack would be coming through in penny packets, not a massive coordinated blow. That alone would give the British destroyers trying to screen the amphibious ships a fighting chance.

The main tactical display showed the four Seadart ships covering the entrance to the inlet.
Gossamer
and
Goldfinch
were in the center of the line with the two H class destroyers on their flanks. Each ship had 48 Seadart missiles available. If the Argentine bombers got past them, they would meet a pair of old C class destroyers with Seaslugs before getting to the amphibious ships beyond. Those amphibs were largely empty now, of men at least. The landing force was ashore and already moving inland to relieve the airmech forces that had been inserted the previous day.
That is a small mercy at least,
Hargreaves thought.
I can’t honestly think of anything worse than an amphib being caught with her troops still on board.

He thumbed the intercom leading up to the bridge wings. There was a new piece of equipment mounted there, known by the arcane initials Outfit DEC. Able Seamen Johnson and Tunney were to operate it. If Hargreaves knew his men right, Johnson would be eating something and Tunney would be prophesying a disaster about to befall the ship. “You two, get your gizmo ready. They’re coming through.”

Four Macchi Ciclones erupted through the entrance to the inlet, their wings tucked right back for maximum speed at low altitude. One turned into a fireball almost instantly as a Seadart from
Gossamer
struck home. It came apart in mid-air. The variable geometry wings separated from the fuselage and spun away as the fuel tanks erupted. The other three aircraft swerved to avoid colliding with the wreckage. In doing so, they dodged a second Seadart from
Gossamer
that missed the lead aircraft by a tiny fraction more than its proximity fuse would compensate. The tail end aircraft wasn’t so lucky, it steered right into a shot from
Goldfinch
that left it streaming black smoke from crippled engines. Out of control and losing altitude, it slammed into the ridge and exploded.

That left just two survivors. They were heading straight for
Goldfinch.
A spray of Seawolf missiles erupted from the destroyer’s secondary battery, taking out a third Ciclone with what appeared to be multiple hits. The surviving Ciclone screamed low over
Goldfinch,
leaving a barrage of retarded bombs falling round the destroyer. Then, it was away, running down San Carlos Water. Its nose-mounted cannon flashed as it strafed the ships in its way. It was surrounded by the black puffs of anti-aircraft gunfire from the remaining destroyers and the amphibious ships. In between the black balls from the larger guns were a hail of brilliant red dots; tracer fire from machine guns that had been hastily lashed to the railings of the warships. The first lesson of the carrier battles had been well-noted; some of the attacking aircraft would get through. The crews had done what they could to beef up the anti-aircraft barrage to deal with the inevitable leakers.

Some of the fire had taken effect. The Ciclone was trailing black smoke as it swept away and climbed over the hills at the end of the inlet. Hargreaves watched him go, wondering if the pilot would survive the long, lonely flight back to the Argentine mainland. Then he swept the bridge electro-optical scope back to
Goldfinch.
The destroyer had been hit hard. She was boiling black smoke from her center section to her bows and was already listing badly. A closer look showed she was down by the bows. Whether she would survive of not was a question Hargreaves couldn’t answer. Another query was running through his mind as he watched
Goldfinch
fighting for her life.
Would the Argentines run out of aircraft before
we
run out of destroyers?
He wasn’t able to answer that question either.

Macchi Ciclone 4-T-189, Over San Carlos Water, Falklands Islands

It was a classic flak-trap. Geography channeled the attacking aircraft through a narrow entrance point. The missile ships were positioned to cover that point with a crossfire. In many ways, it was similar to a land ambush. The answer to it was also similar. One had to attack the jaws of the trap and force them apart to allow the following aircraft to pass through the trap into the mass of amphibious shipping that lay beyond. That was rough on the aircraft that made the first attacks, though.

What made matters worse was that the Ciclone squadrons were battered before this attack had been mounted and looked a lot worse now. Argentina had started with 80 Ciclone bombers and 32 long-range fighters. They’d lost thirteen bombers and twelve fighters in the air battles over Chile and six more of each when Stanley Airfield had been flattened. That had left them with around sixty bombers and fourteen long-range fighters. Then there had been the swirling air battles on the way in as the British Sea Mirages had intercepted the inbound formation. They’d been badly outnumbered but the fighter version of the Ciclone was exactly what the package had said. It was a bomber that had been hastily modified into a fighter by lengthening the fuselage, adding an air-to-air radar and stowage for four radar homing and four infra-red heat-seeking missiles. Deciphering the panicked messages that had come over the radio, Lieutenant Edmundo Salazar knew that his fighter escort had been shredded by the Sea Mirages who had gone on to carve through the bombers. After the Mirages had broken off, presumably running low on fuel and out of ammunition, only forty two of the sixty bombers had been left. Their formation had been broken as they had tried to evade the British fighters and they were arriving over the target area in a thin, steady stream.