H.M.S. Unseen (45 page)

For half an hour they moved forward, now steering course three-one-five. Still on passive, still watching the screen for the slightest indication. But it was to no avail. HMS
Unseen
possessed all of the most diabolical attributes of stealth and silence that were common to the Russian Kilo. If she stayed slow at around five knots, she was literally impossible to hear. And
Columbia
was hearing nothing. The only information Mike Krause and his sonar team had was that the submarine was probably an Upholder, clearly the tiresomely named
Unseen.
She had showed up right on time at 18.55 South, 52.20 East, her last-known position. And she was last seen heading north 200 miles off the east coast of Madagascar. Destination unknown.

The CO knew that he probably could open up on active sonar and pick up his fleeing opponent. But that course of action had its dangers.
Unseen
was a very quiet, possibly hostile submarine, and she could be within 10 miles of him. He had been told not to sink anyone without POSIDENT, and he could not swear that he had it. And there was the possibility of a preemptive shot against him, at short range, with short notice. Mike Krause was not too happy about any of that.

And it was with some irritation that the CO came back to PD at 1300 and accessed the satellite to inform SUBLANT he had traveled flat out, but had been too late. By about fifteen minutes. To give chase now on active sonar, Mike Krause felt he needed new rules of engagement. Caution was his watchword. He was no Boomer Dunning.

By now Admiral Morgan had joined Joe Mulligan on the line to Alan Cattee in Hawaii, and news of the near miss spread an aura of gloom, lightened only by the fact that Ben Adnam had certainly provided data.

Nonetheless, Admiral Morgan decided to test him again, and he went back into the interrogation room and barked at the captured terrorist. “Sonofabitch was not there…the goddamned ocean was deserted…you told me there would be a fueling tanker in the area and my team found nothing. If you’re bullshitting me, Adnam, you might be spending your last day on this earth.”

If Adnam’s nerve was going, he betrayed nothing. “Admiral Morgan, I gave you the best information I have. But you know and I know that a refueling point can change at any time. The time and position can be pushed forward or back. My reading of this situation is that the submarine had already fueled and gone by, and is still proceeding north for possibly another 3,000 miles, into the deep waters of the Arabian Sea toward the Strait of Hormuz.”

He was uncertain of the precise destination, but he knew the projected route. When he had left
Unseen
the plan was to run north in shallower coastal water toward Oman. He thought it unlikely that Iraq would be able to keep the submarine, and that they might scuttle it in the Arabian Sea. Alternately, he believed it possible they might sell it to another Middle Eastern country, possibly Iran, which had superior submarine facilities, and which might pay very highly for such a boat.

“It’s a pretty goddamned hot property for that, isn’t it,” grunted Morgan.

“True, but ships can be altered. And Iran has excellent facilities for working on submarines. I do not, however, have firm information about their intentions. The plan was always that I should leave the ship in the Atlantic. When my mission was complete.”

Either way, Commander Adnam had indicated that the newly refueled
Unseen
would make for a point 400 miles east of Mombasa. From there he said it would run up the long coast of Somalia, past the Horn of Africa, and across the Gulf of Aden into the national waters of Oman, west of the ops area for the American CVBGs.

Admiral Art Barry’s Battle Group was steaming north under the clear skies of the southern Arabian Basin, way south of the Gulf of Oman, in depths of more than seventeen thousand feet. The giant carrier
Ronald Reagan,
pitching heavily forward, through great ocean swells, at over 20 knots, was surrounded by a formidable arsenal of Naval firepower, two cruisers, three destroyers, four guided-missile frigates, a nuclear submarine, and a big fleet replenishment ship.

SUBPAC sent a signal to Admiral Barry that arrived at midnight. In broad terms it detailed the possible route of HMS
Unseen
as supplied by her former commanding officer to Admiral Morgan. Admiral Cattee had been advised that
Columbia
was planning to follow that route in the hope of catching the fleeing Iraqi captain. The stolen Royal Navy submarine was expected to make the final 300 miles into the Strait of Hormuz on her battery; thus she could be expected to come shallow to snorkel-charge, maybe twice, when she was between 500 and 350 miles south of the strait, close to the Omani coastline.

Admiral Mulligan suggested that Admiral Barry conduct a search in that area beginning in two weeks…on May 10. The ideal solution, so far as he was concerned, was to hunt the submarine to exhaustion, force her to the surface, then board and search, identifying precisely who they were and who had controlled her operations. Then sink her. No word was mentioned about her precise activities over the past three months. But Art Barry was quite sure about the tone of the signal. Urgent.

And he sent immediately for his destroyer escort squadron commander, COMDESRON, Captain Chuck Freeburg, and his Group Operations Officer, Captain Amos Clark from North Dakota. The three men ordered coffee and pondered the charts. It was no problem to arrive off the Omani coast in plenty of time; the question was whether to take the entire force, or just peel off three destroyers or frigates and send them on alone.

Admiral Barry thought they might need fixed-wing aircraft as well as helos for such a search. This would mean the whole force would move over to the western reaches of the Arabian Sea. That decision was up to him, and he made it quickly. Everyone would go to help find the Royal Navy submarine that was causing so much angst at headquarters. “Jesus,” said Captain Freeburg. “Right here we got the CNO and COMSUBLANT acting on information from Arnold Morgan. That’s not big. That’s monstrous. Guys, we better find this sucker.”

The trouble was the sheer size of the new search area. Basically the Americans would have to take a NW/SE line 500 miles from the strait, and conduct their search in a seascape of almost 200,000 square miles. The fixed-wing aircraft would be crucial to the operation, and the carrier itself would need to operate from the center of the area.

Admiral Barry made his course adjustments and reduced the speed of his flotilla. Meanwhile, nearly 3,000 miles to the southwest, Commander Krause searched in vain for a sign of the vanished
Unseen.
But there was nothing.

On the morning of May 4, the first two Lockheed S-3B Viking ASW aircraft roared off the deck of the
Ronald Reagan
, heading in toward the Omani coast, cruising at 300 knots. Both of these Navy ASW aircraft could carry four Mark 5 depth charges, or four Mk 46 torpedoes. But today their mission was not to destroy, just to locate.

Like
Columbia,
they found nothing. And they searched for three days in relays. But on May 7, one of them picked up a radar contact 400 miles to the south of the strait. The Viking came in low and dropped sonobuoys, but the contact had long since disappeared. To the trained Navy pilot, that meant one thing…the submarine was snorkeling when it picked up the radar of the aircraft, which caused it instantly to slip away beneath the surface. But the Viking pilot was definite. He had it. The clue was strong, the contact was snorkeling 180 miles east of the Omani port of Al-Jawarah.

The Americans knew two facts. They had interrupted and hopefully prevented the submarine’s full battery-charge, and from now on it must be continuously harassed.
Unseen must
come to periscope depth again soon, probably within 100 miles. Art Barry’s pilots were ready. They got it again, surprisingly, 110 miles to the north, and this time they had a guided-missile frigate within strike range: Captain Bill Richards’s 4,000-ton Oliver Hazard Perry-Class USS
Ingraham
, patrolling 15 miles to the east.

Right now
Unseen
was 90 miles east of the southern tip of the island of Masirah, and again she picked up the Viking’s radar and instantly vanished below the surface. It was early in the afternoon, and the Americans knew the submarine would be forced back, within hours, to charge that battery. And, on his way in, at high speed, was Captain Richards, the former XO of the destroyer
O’Bannon,
his face still terribly scarred from flying glass from the same nuclear blast that had destroyed the
Thomas Jefferson
.

He ordered
Ingraham
to her maximum 29 knots and the sleek, heavily armed frigate, with her crew of 206 at battle stations, came swiftly into the main search area, just to the north of
Unseen
’s last known.

The Americans now had a hot datum. They had two radar fixes from the Viking. They knew the submarine’s speed of advance, 5 knots, and they knew her course, zero-four-zero, which would probably go to zero-zero-zero as she struggled north, now in desperation, toward the Gulf of Oman, gateway to Gulf of Iran. Essentially they had 270 miles to catch her before she turned into more populated narrow waters, patrolled by the navies of Oman and Iran.

Captain Richards had an excellent intelligence assessment from Langley.
“Your target has acoustic characteristics of Brit U-Class. Mission: hunt to exhaustion, board, POSIDENT submarine, arrest crew. Shoot only in self-defense.”

Tactics for the frigate commander were clear. He must use every available asset to flood the quite limited area with fixed-wing, helicopter, and surface-ship radar. That way
Unseen
could not come up without being detected. That way Captain Richards could home in for the final moves in this elaborate and lethal game.

At 2205 the rogue submarine was forced to periscope depth by her dying battery. Again she put up her snorkel mast, because by then she was gasping for air—air to flow through the diesel generators while she tried to restore her electric power.
Unseen
was like a drowning whale, and the American harpoonists picked her up instantly on the radar screen of their patrolling helicopter. The U.S. pilot began tracking the submarine, reporting her every move back to
Ingraham.

Captain Richards reacted swiftly, ordered his sonar active, and sent his own helicopter in to assist.
Unseen
picked up the American’s electronic beam immediately, but her latest fifteen-minute battery charge was insufficient. The battery had been just about dead flat a half hour previously. Time was running out for the stolen submarine.

Lieutenant Commander Alaam ordered
Unseen
deep. But he knew it must be for the last time. The submarine was simply running out of power, and the American frigate was very close.
Unseen
was caught in the classic chess position—Morton’s Fork—when the rook checks the king but threatens the queen at the same time. If
Unseen
stayed deep, it would run out of power completely. If it came to periscope depth, the Americans would force it deep again or blow its mast away. If it came to the surface, the Americans would capture them all and execute them. There was no escape. Lieutenant Commander Alaam must have known. This was checkmate.

Captain Richards knew his opponent was trapped.

Five minutes later, at 2255,
Unseen
’s lights and other systems suddenly wavered. Lieutenant Commander Rajavi reported the battery was at zero percent charge. Flat, that is. So flat you could barely see it sideways. And shortly before 2300 Lieutenant Commander Alaam ordered
Unseen
to periscope depth to try to snorkel for the last time.

Captain Richards, 4,200 yards off her starboard beam, picked her up before the submarine’s diesels had even started. And he ordered his Italian-built OTO Melara 3-inch gun into action. Sixty seconds later they had blown off the top of
Unseen
’s ESM mast, ending all communications. They had blasted the periscope, rendering the submarine “blind,” and they had obliterated the snorkel mast, making further recharging impossible at PD.

And now
Unseen
was finally forced to the surface. She came rising out of the dark Arabian Sea, the water cascading down her hull, but there was no sign of her crew. The American helicopter circled the submarine and, with the aid of flares, photographed her unique missile system from several angles. But the pilot reported no activity.

The frigate commander ordered two Mk 46 torpedoes to be readied in tubes one and two. Then he sent an immediate communication to the Flag, explaining that
Unseen
is stopped on the surface with a flat battery, no communications and no periscope. Engines not running, so probably all hatches shut. He believed boarding might be difficult. The crew has not surrendered, nor even come to the bridge. Indeed, it appears to be battened down inside the hull. Captain Richards was afraid the crew might just scuttle her. However, he confirmed he was quite prepared to press on and break into her, using whatever explosive was necessary, then neutralize the crew. He would await further instructions.

Admiral Barry considered this was one for the hierarchy and sent an immediate signal to SUBPAC, who appeared to be running the operation. The three American admirals, Morgan, Mulligan, and Cattee, separated by thousands of miles, spoke tersely on the conference line.

“Look, I’m not sure we need this bullshit,” said Admiral Morgan. “We know exactly who these guys are. We know where they got their ship, and we know what they’ve been doing. We also know they’re Iraqi. We’ve got their goddamned former commanding officer just up the road calling the shots for us.”

“Right.” Admiral Mulligan concurred. “And boarding is dangerous. These maniacs might just blow the ship apart with a lot of our guys on the casing. I really do not want to run those sorts of risks, because they are not necessary…my decision, therefore, is that we should bang it out right now, before the fucking thing breaks loose again.”