Shattered Trident (43 page)

General Su, the chief of staff, stated flatly, “We have to change our grand strategy.” When there was no immediate agreement, Su explained, “I’m a soldier. We’re trained to make an estimate of the situation, evaluate possible courses of action, and then choose the best one. My estimate of our situation is that we are losing this war. The trends are all in the wrong direction. What do we do about this?”

Chen answered him. “There are only two choices. We either agree to a cease-fire, which amounts to a surrender, or escalate.”

There was dead silence in the room as the others absorbed the idea. Chen reasoned, “We must evaluate both courses before we choose. Adopting either one has benefits, and costs.

“To remove the risk of anyone being accused of disloyalty or defeatism, I will discuss the benefits of a cease-fire. The damage to our economy stops. Oil begins flowing again. The losses of equipment and men cease. What are the costs, Comrades?” He gestured to the others at the table.

Zhang said, “Unbelievable loss of prestige. The world would accuse us of being a failed superpower.”

“The failure of Trident,” General Su added.

“But the plan has already failed,” General Ye Jin countered. “We will never be able to exploit the South China Sea’s resources, as we had planned.”

“We could use a cease-fire to mobilize and reposition our forces, then aim for a more limited objective,” General Wen suggested.

Su quickly shook his head. “It won’t work, Minister. Trident depended on surprise, on getting strong forces in place before our opponents could react. I don’t think anyone here truly appreciated just how vital a factor surprise was.”

Zhang added, “And we didn’t expect such a unified response. The sudden appearance of the Littoral Alliance has completely changed the political calculus in this region. If we had known of its existence, would we have even started the operation?”

“That is not the issue, Generals,” Chen insisted. “What are the costs to China of a cease-fire?”

Zhang looked thoughtful. “I’ve already mentioned the loss of prestige abroad. Domestically, we face widespread unrest. Energy supplies will be tight this winter, even if we restart imports immediately. Many industries are damaged, and our export markets will be lost for years, perhaps a decade. Unemployment, especially in the cities, will rise sharply.”

“The best we can all hope for, personally, is resignation,” Chen observed, “followed by a retirement in disgrace. That may not be the end of it, though. The next government will be looking for ways to assuage the citizens’ anger. Accusations of criminal conduct and show trials are one method of placating the masses.” Chen had stated the uncomfortable truth. Nobody expected justice in China, unless it served the party’s purposes.

“Our economy crumbling, our citizens angry, the world turned against us. Regardless of my own fate, this is not what I dreamt of for China.” Zhang’s voice was hard. “If this is the aftermath of a cease-fire, then we must keep fighting.”

“But we cannot win,” Su reminded him. “The South China Sea is lost to us.”

“Then we change the war,” Zhang explained. “Instead of three or four countries, we are fighting an expanding coalition that now encircles us. We must recognize our new situation.”

Chen asked, “Then what is our goal? How do we win?”

Zhang replied, “We bring enough force to bear to make them ask for a cease-fire, on our terms. We demand free passage of the ocean straits and removal of all economic sanctions.

“They haven’t faced our full power yet. We’ve limited ourselves because of the military ties some countries have with the United States. We know America doesn’t want this war. There’s pressure in the American government to renounce the treaties. Let’s call the alliance’s bluff.”

“We change the war,” Chen repeated, testing the idea in his mind. “A full range of attacks against all alliance members, short of nuclear weapons. We remove the restrictions we’ve placed on our submarines. Allow them to attack any alliance shipping—it won’t matter that they’ve disabled the automatic identification system. Any ship approaching an alliance port will be attacked. And we withdraw from the territories in the South China Sea we’ve captured.”

“That was one of the alliance’s demands,” Su reminded him.

“The garrisons on those islands have been under constant siege. They can only be supplied by air, which costs fuel we can’t spare. They are also at considerable risk from Japanese fighters staged in the Philippines.”

Su nodded his agreement. “You’re right. They can be sustained only with great effort, but cannot not be expanded, or exploited for further gain. What about Vietnam?”

“I see no reason to suspend that campaign,” Chen replied. “Indeed, with the cancelation of Trident, we should be able to allocate more resources to that front. And where is General Hu?”

An aide left, in search of the Second Artillery commander. Chen said, “I remember his briefing argued for missile strikes on Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines. He can now add Taiwan to the list.”

8 September 2016

1310 Local Time

North American Air Defense Directorate

Peterson Air Force Base

Colorado Springs, Colorado

They’d been on high alert since word had come from Washington about Taiwan’s decision. Not that they hadn’t been on high alert before, with half the Pacific shooting at the other half.

“Heaven help us, they went and did it!” the controller announced, hitting the audible alarm and calling the duty officer. “Multiple launches from within China!” He didn’t even try to count the dots on the screen. The computer kept track, but the number kept climbing. Finally, he reported, “I’m seeing sixty-plus launches.”

The duty officer, a major, didn’t wait to see where they were headed. They wouldn’t know that until after boost phase ended, a couple of minutes from now.

“Make sure PACOM’s seeing this,” the major ordered as he picked up the red phone. “This is Major Markowitz at NORAD. I have flash traffic for the NMJIC duty officer.”

8 September 2016

1315 Local Time

White House Situation Room

Washington, D.C.

Ray Kirkpatrick was keeping vigil when the word arrived. When he phoned the residence, Myles answered after one ring.

“It’s happened, Mr. President. Multiple Chinese ballistic missile launches.”

“Do we know where they’re going?” Myles asked, sounding resigned.

“Not yet, sir. It’s too early.”

Myles appeared in the situation room five minutes later, dressed in maroon sweats that had
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
printed on the shirt. The call had caught him just as he was getting ready to go to the gym.

Kirkpatrick greeted him with, “None of them are headed for U.S. territory. Targets are in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and the Philippines. NORAD says they’re DF-21s.”

The president nodded an acknowledgement as he studied the display. “That’s one nightmare avoided, then. Where will they hit first?”

Kirkpatrick pointed to a window on a side display. “Taiwan. Time of flight is six minutes. They’ll be hitting about now.”

“Taiwan’s got Patriot,” Myles observed.

“Yes, Mr. President. I was reviewing their order of battle. Eight batteries on line, with PAC-2 and PAC-3 missiles. And three Sky Bow batteries.”

As they spoke, the display operator zoomed the view in so that the island of Taiwan filled the screen. Nine hostile missile symbols crawled in from the west. Their apparent slow speed was deceptive. Much of their movement was in the vertical plane.

Projected targets appeared, and Kirkpatrick called them out. “Two at Tsoying Naval Base where their submarines are berthed. Three at the BMD radar on Leshan Mountain, and … the Mailiao oil refinery. Four missiles headed there.” Surprise filled his report.

“Payback. Makes sense.” Myles’s tone changed to puzzlement. “What’s happening? Shouldn’t the defenses be engaging them?”

“Yes, sir, they’re just in range.” One hostile missile headed for the sub base disappeared, then another, but that was it. As the two watched, the remaining seven symbols merged with their projected targets, then disappeared.

“I don’t get it.” Kirkpatrick’s tone mixed worry and confusion. “The display showed at least three batteries in range. Only one engaged. The sub base is untouched, but the other two targets…”

“Find out what happened,” barked Myles. “If the Chinese have put a hex on our interceptors, we need to find out.”

Kirkpatrick turned and started walking quickly toward the watch floor, when Myles’s voice called him to a stop. “And Ray, get our submarines clear of the area. This war is now beyond our abilities to stop.”

9 September 2016

0211 Local Time

JDS
Atago
(DDG-177)

Off the Noto Peninsula, in the Sea of Japan

Captain Okubo Atsushi checked his watch and smiled. Four and a quarter minutes to battle stations manned and ready. Of course, they had good reason for being so quick.

Okubo picked up the shipwide PA microphone. “This is the captain. Our national air defense network has detected ballistic missiles fired by China, headed for targets across Japan. They will enter our engagement range in a little over a minute. We are the first line of defense. Center your thoughts, do your jobs. Today you will all be heroes!”

“Sir, Seasnake Two is airborne.” The helicopter controller’s voice came over his headset.

“Tell him to watch for suspicious surface craft, as well as submarines.” Okubo had been flying the rotors off his two helicopters since they’d assumed this station. He was uncomfortable with the “bathtub” he’d been assigned, a box on the map just ten miles square. Warships were designed to move. Staying in the same area while radiating his radar nonstop was an open invitation to the Chinese.

But it was necessary. The central display was zoomed well out, showing the entire Sea of Japan. Okubo could see not only his ship, but also
Myoko
to the north and
Ashigara
to the south, their missile coverage overlapping to protect all of Honshu and Shikoku, and part of Kyushu. He’d asked for, and been honored with, the center station: the hot spot, guarding Tokyo. Unfortunately, to prevent gaps in the coverage the defending ships were glued to their stations.

Lieutenant Takagi, the missile officer, reported, “Our radar has detected the missiles. We have a good track.” The hostile symbols on the display shifted slightly as the secondhand data from the air defense network was replaced by information directly from the destroyer’s own SPY-1D radar.
Atago
could have fired using the other sensor data, but this was better.

“Radar detects five targets. Engaging closest three.” Takagi’s voice was even. He had said those words hundreds of times in synthetic exercises. Okubo depended on that familiarity now.

“Use standard firing doctrine.” Takagi acknowledged the order with a nod. The system would assign two missiles to each target. In full autonomous mode, the Aegis fire control system would fire automatically when the hostiles were in range.

The only limitation was that they only had three illuminators, so their first salvo would only engage three of the five possible targets. A second salvo would go after the other two, plus any stragglers from first engagement, but it would follow ten seconds later, and the hostiles would be farther downrange.

“Captain! Seasnake’s radar has multiple high-speed contacts, inbound! Range forty-seven nautical miles, bearing two nine two.”

Okubo looked at the display. Datalinked from the helicopter’s radar, four “unknown” contacts had appeared on the screen, but he could see the symbols move across the display, much too fast for a surface vessel. The helicopter’s surface-search radar beam was pointed down. Normally it wouldn’t even see aircraft. These were clearly air contacts, but they must be skimming the surface.

How fast? It took the computer two beats to get enough information to calculate the speed, and numbers appeared next to the unknown contacts. Almost six hundred knots. Large, subsonic, but no radar emissions? Were they cruise missiles? But fired from what? Then they disappeared from the display. Okubo’s insides turned to ice.

Normally,
Atago
could deal easily with aerial contacts like these, whatever they were, but the Aegis fire control system was in ballistic missile defense mode. It couldn’t engage aerodynamic contacts at the same time as ballistic missiles, and the Chinese were taking advantage of that. And he couldn’t shift from aerial targets to ballistic missiles and back quickly enough to deal with both threats. He was committed.

“Launching in thirty seconds.” The missile officer’s voice was steady, focused.

“Tell Falcon flight to radiate and engage,” Okubo ordered quickly. The unknown contacts were very low, and still over
Atago
’s radar horizon. Falcon flight, four F-2 fighters silently loitering at high altitude, was only ten miles to the east. They were high enough to see the intruders as soon as they lit off their radars.

A siren on the weather decks sounded, loud enough to be heard even in CIC. The controller announced, “Ten seconds,” and Okubo reflexively braced himself, although there was no need.

The first missile’s roar was background for the air controller’s report. “Falcon flight’s radars are on.” After a moment’s pause, “They have our unknowns—classified as Flankers. Falcons are firing.” All through the narrative, Okubo could hear
Atago
launching SM3 missiles, each roar following another at one-second intervals.

The four air contacts reappeared on the screen, now labeled as “hostile aircraft.” They were accelerating, and climbing. “Still no radar emissions from the aircraft,” the air controller reported.

The last of six SM3 missiles left
Atago,
roaring toward the incoming hostile missiles.

Okubo saw new contacts on the display at the same time the air controller made his report. “Four new, very small contacts, evaluated as missiles. Range to
Atago
twenty-five nautical miles.”