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  Jeffrey felt himself blushing.

  “No. Don’t feel bad. I’m glad to see you’re not an opportunist. You don’t have an inflated view of your place in the world.”

  “I try not to, anyway,” Jeffrey said.

  “The best way you can help me is to help your country…. Do you feel ready for another war patrol, immediately?”

  “Yes, Mr. President.”

  “I mean really immediately. Like getting under way tonight.”

  So a major crisis is definitely on. That’s why all those submarine admirals were acting all stirred up.

  Jeffrey ran a quick mental tally of the status of his ship. “If we can load what we need and get out of dry dock on such short notice. Yes.”

  “You did it once before. I mean do you, personally, with whatever scars you bear inside from what you’ve been through in combat lately, feel ready this very instant for more?”

  Jeffrey nodded. His adrenaline was pumping now. This type of challenge he liked.

  The president stood and walked to an easel, picking up a marker pen and pulling off its cap. “Remember easels?” he said.

  “They’re a bit old-fashioned, sir.”

  “Sometimes I like to be an old-fashioned guy…. I gave many a briefing using marker pen and paper, back when I was in your pay grade, an ambitious young officer myself…. Are you an ambitious person, Captain?”

  Jeffrey was taken aback again by the president’s change of subject. “Yes. I have to say I am.”

  “Good. Because your next mission task is very ambitious. I wouldn’t want to think you weren’t up to it.”

  Jeffrey decided to hold his tongue.

  “The better you understand what’s involved, the better you’ll do your job and be able to motivate your people.” The president began drawing squiggly curves along both sides of the blank page on the big pad on the easel. He tapped points on the curve on the left.

  “The U.S., Canada, Mexico,” he said. “All Allies… Central America, mostly neutral so far, except for our friend Costa Rica, which is too bad because Panama won’t let our warships use the canal. South America, also mostly neutral, except for Venezuela and Chile, at opposite ends of the continent from each other.”

  Jeffrey nodded. The U.S. received a lot of oil and natural gas from Venezuela, shipped through the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico.

  The president pointed to the right side of the easel chart and worked his way down the page. “The UK, Occupied Europe. The Afrika Corps’ big holdings, our Central African pocket, and the Boers down here.”

  “Yes.” Jeffrey nodded. Libya was a nuclear no-man’s-land since the Germans had nuked Tripoli — without real provocation — at the war’s outbreak. Egypt and Jordan were protected from Axis incursions by Israel’s small but potent nuclear umbrella. Most other Middle Eastern nations were neutral, as was every country in Asia.

  The president stepped back and looked at the map he’d drawn. He added a series of little Xs. “The U.S. East Coast ports and navy bases.” He drew a line from the U.S. diagonally across the map to the middle of the African west coast. “Our main line of supply, for the moment, to our forces holding out in Africa… At least until we can pick up the pieces in the Indian Ocean and get supplies to them that way. The loss of Diego Garcia was a very hard blow.”

  “I understand.”

  “The Congo basin and surrounding highlands are some of the best defensive terrain in the world. Steep mountain escarpments, massive river barriers to cross, pestilential jungles… That’s the main reason the pocket has survived this long.”

  “The Sahara and Kalahari Deserts are owned by the Axis,” Jeffrey stated.

  “Germans here.” The president pointed to the Sahara, in the northern part of Africa. “Boers here.” He pointed to the Kalahari, in the south. “Us in the middle, but most of our tanks in that theater ended up on the bottom of the sea.”

  “I remember.” In the initial ambush that had started the war, three American aircraft carriers were also sunk or damaged beyond practical repair.

  “Here’s the deal, Captain. The Axis is making a big buildup in both their parts of Africa. It’s evident they intend to launch a new offensive soon, out of the good tank country in the deserts and into the Congo basin. They intend to envelop the Allied pocket, cut it off from both coasts…. We’ve known for months we don’t have anything near the massive airlift capacity needed to keep the pocket open in the face of a major enemy offensive. It’s just too far to fly, planes spend too much time in the air compared to on the ground unloading. And it’s simply too vast an area, with huge numbers of soldiers and civilians needing sustenance, for the cargo tonnage to make it through by air.”

  “It sounds pretty serious, sir.” Jeffrey knew Germany possessed a culture of war fighting on the Dark Continent that went well beyond General Rommel’s famous exploits: in World War I, they’d had a big troop contingent in southern Africa, jockeying with the British over colonies both countries held there. That German Army — including loyal native formations — performed brilliantly in the awful jungle. They had been undefeated in the field when German resistance in Europe collapsed in 1918…. And South Africa under old apartheid owned a strong and self-reliant defense force, well blooded repulsing incursions by then Communist-dominated neighboring states. The Boers thus could draw on a whole generation of white males, now in their late thirties and up, every one of whom had two years of hardening military service — before democracy was forced on them from the outside in ’94. These men and their sons now formed the core of the Boer Army; the many South Africans of English ancestry — and blacks faced with the choice between obedience and starving — further bulked up combat units or worked in logistics and admin support. Pro-apartheid South Africans also had a long track record of secret collaborations with foreign powers on nuclear arms — in the seventies and eighties it was Israel…. Later it was the schemers behind the new Imperial Germany.

  “We intend to punch through the Atlantic with a major resupply convoy, to get food and medical supplies and weapons and ammo to the pocket. A really huge resupply convoy, Captain, escorted by the most powerful naval fleet ever assembled. I won’t say how many carrier battle groups, it’s classified and you don’t need to know. Their air wings and the weapons load-outs on all the cruisers and destroyers and frigates will be optimized for a balance of antisubmarine warfare and cruise-missile defense. Not to mention protection by a lot of our fast-attack subs… I won’t say the number, you do need to know, but this room might not be secure enough.”

  “Yes, sir.” Gears began to turn in Jeffrey’s head.

  “We expect the Axis is as aware of this resupply effort as we are of their upcoming offensive. So both sides are locked in a deadly race, our convoy versus their land attack. Who can get the jump on whom, which of us achieves our big goal first… We expect the bad guys to throw everything they have at sea at the convoy and escorts. And they’re rushing right now to get their land offensive ready and moving…. It’s very touch and go how much of the convoy will make it, and whether the remnants will even get there before the Axis land push opens and our pocket gets pinched off. The time pressure here is appalling.”

  Jeffrey digested all this soberly. He knew from old wargames of the USSR assaulting NATO in Europe that the Pentagon expected 50 percent losses in Atlantic reinforcement convoys hounded by Soviet attack submarines. Now Germany had nuclear subs, including fast and quiet ones she’d grabbed from France. “The situation sounds very critical, Mr. President.”

  “It is. Believe me, it is.”

  “Just where does Challenger come in?”

  The president drew a big question mark over Northern Europe on the briefing map. “You know the Germans with help from Russia have built a new ceramic-hulled nuclear submarine similar in basic concept to our steel-hulled SSGNs.”

  Jeffrey nodded. SSGN was the designation for a handful of Ohio-class strategic-missile boomer subs whose missile tubes and related weapons-
targeting equipment were modified. Each of the two dozen vertical tubes in the “Sherwood Forest” aft of the sail — “conning tower” in old-style parlance — was fitted with a sleeve. Within that sleeve the tube held seven Tactical Tomahawks or other cruise missiles instead of a single submarine-launched ICBM tipped with multiple hydrogen bombs. A single SSGN could carry about 150 Tomahawks, a very strong force for projecting power onto land.

  “Until today we had no idea where the new German SSGN was being hidden, Captain. Now we’re pretty sure we do. Infrared and visual satellite surveillance data seem to jibe with a garbled report the Brits say they got from a Norwegian resistance group. A short-lived but odd heat signature out of ventilator shafts from under a mountain in northernmost Norway. Sabotage attempted but failed. Then suddenly increased signal traffic between Russian surface warships in the Norwegian Sea. All of this just within the last hour or two… The different pieces of the puzzle strongly suggest the German SSGN is putting to sea, if she hasn’t already.”

  “Armed with a hundred fifty nuclear-tipped supersonic antiship cruise missiles.” Jeffrey made it a statement not a question. He was truly stimulated, and very worried, now.

  “Yes. And we don’t know if they’ve got any of those scary Mach eight missiles left…. The Axis is under huge time pressure too, getting their SSGN into combat. One of the few things we do know about this monster is its name, by the way. The Admiral von Scheer.”

  “Cute,” Jeffrey said sarcastically.

  “Yes, the ironic historical reference has not been lost on our naval intelligence people.”

  “The von Scheer is going after the convoy. Our convoy’s sailing is forcing their hand.”

  “Roger that.” The president drew a dotted line on the map, from the question mark in Northern Europe diagonally down toward the mid-Atlantic. “And you, Captain Fuller, and your crew and your ship, are going to go after the von Scheer.”

  “Sink the von Scheer, protect the convoy, relieve the African pocket.”

  “Precisely. We’re playing a very high-stakes game of dominoes here. If the von Scheer sinks you, or gets past you and destroys the convoy, all the dominoes fall. If we lose our toehold in Africa, I don’t want to think how we’ll ever dislodge the Axis from there or continental Europe.”

  “Understood.” A big buildup in Britain and then a D-day-like invasion across the English Channel were out of the question in the face of atomic weapons. Jeffrey realized his new orders demanded the utmost from him tactically, with serious strategic consequences depending on whether he won or lost against the German SSGN. Part of him groaned inside, knowing how relentlessly taxed his body and mind would be in the impending confrontation. His skills at thinking on his feet, and at keeping his crew focused and levelheaded amid deafening chaos and grinding uncertainty, would be tested to the ultimate limit.

  “Good,” the president said. “I’m glad to see you’re taking this so seriously. It’s a very serious business.”

  The president took the pen and drew a question mark on South America. “Another danger area. Instability and risk.” He drew a dotted line from Brazil and Argentina up toward the mid-Atlantic. “Notice where all the lines intersect.”

  “Right in the Atlantic Narrows,” Jeffrey said.

  “Yup. The narrowest part of the whole Atlantic Ocean, where the northeast tip of Brazil juts out toward the westernmost tip of North Africa. A nautical choke point, one that’s going to become a tactical nuclear maelstrom soon.”

  “If the Axis can gain control of that part of Brazil,” Jeffrey said, “and given what they hold in western Africa, they’d be able to cut the Atlantic Ocean in half around that choke point. Subsonic cruise missiles launched from the opposing coasts could overlap their reach, hit any surface ships or planes that try to move north or south.” Cruise-missile design always traded off range against speed, Jeffrey knew. Tactical Tomahawks, which went about as fast as a Boeing 747, had a range of nearly 1,500 miles; the North Atlantic was more than twice that wide. The von Scheer’s Mach 2.5 Modified Shipwrecks, in contrast, ran out of fuel after 500 miles; the South Atlantic was up to ten times that far across.

  “I’m sure that’s exactly the Axis objective, Captain…. There are many levels to what’s going on here, wheels within wheels. We still don’t know quite what the Germans are up to in Latin America, but we strongly suspect their agents and moles and sympathizers are behind Brazil and Argentina being on the verge of open hostilities. It is definitely in the interest of the Axis Powers for fighting to break out in South America. It costs the Berlin-Boer nasties little, and costs the Allied cause a great deal.”

  “Everything’s happening at once.”

  “The masterminds of the Axis are too good at moving countries around like chess pieces. They’re also very good at seizing the initiative and forcing us to react defensively. One thing I learned as a West Point plebe is that if you keep losing the initiative and can’t regain it, you lose the war.”

  Jeffrey studied the map, with all its Xs and question marks and intersecting lines, for a very long time.

  The president cleared his throat. “You’ll be filled in more on your specific role by your direct superiors shortly. I wanted to give you the overall picture myself. So I could see your face, know who you are as a person. I’ll feel a lot better, understanding what sort of man is captain of USS Challenger. I’m a big believer in personal relationships. A politician has to be. As a former military man, I’m a believer in knowing my key subordinates well. Your place in all this will be very key, and your ship is no ordinary submarine.”

  The president looked at the map, and for a moment his face was haggard and drawn. His eyes looked pained and sad, as if he was thinking of all the death and destruction to come in the next few days and weeks. The body count in this war was terrible already.

  Then the president set his jaw and his eyes cleared and grew harder. Jeffrey sensed the meeting was wrapping up. The president came closer. Jeffrey stood.

  “I see now why you’re such an effective commanding officer, Captain. You’re a very direct guy. You zero in on your mission, period. You don’t look over your shoulder when it’s your job to lead the charge…. When we win this war, ourcountry is going to need good men and women to pick up the pieces and help the world rebuild. If I’m reelected this November, and can steward the country into a thriving new peacetime somehow, there are going to be all sorts of important jobs to be filled here in Washington, inside and outside the military.”

  Jeffrey thought of that map again, the intersecting lines in the Atlantic Narrows. The impending clash of forces might determine the whole outcome of the war. Things might get so hot that atomic weapons would start to be used without restraint on land. The war, up to this point such a volatile trade-off between immensity of hitting power and compulsion for survival, could escalate in the days to come into a fearsome doomsday scenario.

  “I have to ask you again, Mr. President. Exactly what is it you want from me?”

  “Nothing you don’t want to give me.”

  “Please don’t be so cryptic, sir.”

  The president pointed at the easel map. “Just get out there, and win another resounding victory, and come home alive.”

  CHAPTER 4

  When Jeffrey left the president, the crowd at the reception was just thinning out. Boy, if they only knew what I know now. Every nerve in his body felt electrified.

  Jeffrey tried to act as calmly as he could, to maintain the air of decorum befitting a Medal of Honor winner, and to protect the secrecy of what he’d just learned. There were nosy reporters everywhere, and the country was entering a heightened state of national emergency — triggered by the sailing of the von Scheer and the relief convoy. Jeffrey expected to be rushed back to New London, Connecticut, any moment, to rejoin Challenger in her home port and then get under way. He decided to stop in a men’s room while he could.

  As he unzipped his fly he heard a loudspeaker announcement: “NBC drill. Th
is is a drill. Lockdown is in effect until further notice.”

  NBC stood for nuclear-biological-chemical. The drill meant the staff and building engineers were rushing through standardized measures to make the hotel airtight. The ventilation system was stopped and the rooftop intake and outlet vents were shuttered automatically. All public and service entrances and exits were also sealed.

  Such drills were a common aspect of life on the U.S. East Coast these days, in major structures from office towers to hospitals to schools. The threat-detection hardware and communications gear, and the procedures and the practice drills, went back several years, to the wave of increased homeland protection forced upon the country by the War on Terror. All this was coming in very handy now: Jeffrey knew radioactive dust, from the battles that raged out at sea, sometimes reached the coast in local hot spots that could be dangerous. Civil defense was no joke. There were stiff fines for people leaving home without their gas-mask satchels. National Guard units were on call 24/7 in all jurisdictions, outfitted with mobile decontamination equipment; the National Weather Service tracked the movement of winds from the Atlantic carefully, with a network of sampling stations to check for radioactivity every minute. And government price controls went well beyond enforcing prewar levels on many staple goods, to defend against panic inflation. Now controversial laws set mandatory minimums on house and apartment sales — based on prewar market appraisal data — to prevent any mass exodus from vulnerable areas. Some people argued these severe executive orders were unconstitutional, but the president stood firm and told the people to stand firm too. If you can’t find a willing buyer at prewar prices, the president addressed the nation on live TV, then wait to sell after the war. Jeffrey figured that by the time dissenting lawsuits reached the U.S. Supreme Court, the war would be over in any case, one way or another.

  Jeffrey finished washing his hands. As he walked to the ballroom, the crowd continued its murmur and hubbub, largely undisturbed by the NBC drill. Swallowing iodide tablets was part of most people’s daily health routine; nobody used unfiltered tap water. Survivalist books, and emergency supply stores, did a land-office business — Geiger counters and gas-mask filters were two top-selling items. The populace adapted as best they could.