John Schettler - Kirov

“Sound general quarters, sir?” said Samsonov.

“Not yet,” Karpov smiled. “They'll wake up soon enough. Monitor those contacts closely, Yazov. Notify me at fifty kilometer intervals.”

“Sir, inbound contacts at one-zero-zero, and closing.”

“Shouldn't we notify the Admiral?” said Samsonov, a look of concern on his thick features.

Karpov put a hand on his shoulder pointing at his combat systems. “Keep your nose here, Samsonov. No need to bother Volsky. Let him sleep. You and I will swat this air strike down as easily as we did the last one. It will be over before the Admiral can get his britches on. We will fire in salvos of eight missiles each. Configure your system accordingly. Mister Yazov will feed you your initial targeting data.”

They waited until Yazov reported the leading contacts at fifty kilometers, and Karpov gave Samsonov his orders. “Sound general quarters, and then fire your first salvo immediately, Samsonov.”

“Aye, sir”

The quiet of the ship was broken by the jangling alarm and the sharp, tearing sound of the missile defense battery firing. The Gauntlet system was deployed on the aft deck, just forward of the helicopter landing pad, with four missile bays on either side of the ship. A vertical launch system like the S-300s, the missiles were ejected by catapult before igniting their engines to rapidly climb before leveling off to engage their active radars. By the time Samsonov fired the incoming British pilots and planes were forty kilometers out and ready to run the gauntlet. The next twenty minutes would be the most harrowing moments of their lives.

A couple of Fulmars from 809 Squadron were out in front, and Lieutenant Miller was the first to see the bright flashing lights racing up through the pre-dawn sky. “Look there, Les,” he thumbed as he called out the sighting to his tactical officer, Leslie Barrow. “The Germans have wind of us!”

“See any planes?” Barrow was craning his neck to look for German spotter planes or Me-109s, but saw nothing. By the time he turned his gaze again on the oncoming rockets they were perilously close, bearing in as if they had some magnetic attraction to his plane.

“Oh! Lookout now-” It was the last thing Miller said before a missile exploded very near his plane, its small 15 kilo warhead just enough to deliver a deadly shower of razor sharp shrapnel which tore his wing apart. Another Fulmar was suddenly “lit up” and the remaining planes quickly tipped their wings over and sped off into steep dives in the hopes of evading the rockets. For one pilot, the maneuver worked when the missile targeting his plane was unable to respond quick enough and make the turn to catch him. It simply moved on to another target. For another, transfixed by the oncoming rocket, his only thought was to fire his forward machine guns all out and, amazingly, he scored a hit, knocking the missile down before it could kill him. Another fell into a steep dive, aghast to see a second group of rockets streaking by below his plane, like a school of angry sharks smelling blood in the water as they vectored in on other targets.

Karpov had selected the perfect reprisal for a widely dispersed air attack like this. To the missile system, the high altitude fighters seemed like the primary incoming strike planes, and the low, slow Albacore torpedo bombers were much like sea skimming cruise missiles they might have launched. The missiles could handle either target type with ease. Some lanced up to strike the fighters, others sliced through the darkness until they were on top of the Albacores, then fell upon them, knocking down one plane after another.

827 Squadron off Victorious got hit particularly hard. Bond’s plane was blown apart, the debris vanishing into a swelling wave with a smoky hiss. McKendrick took it in the rightmost wing and went cart wheeling into the angry sea. Turnbull swooped low, banking suddenly to avoid a great wave and managed to fool the first rocket bearing down on him, yet another behind it found his plane and blew off his tail and half the rear fuselage. The shark-like missiles were having a feeding frenzy, and Olsen gaped in amazement, seeing one rocket maneuver sharply in a tight turn to leap after another hapless, lumbering Albacore. Greenslade went down next, then Miles. Only Olsen remained, shaken and stunned by what he had seen when the last of the rockets had finally flashed by. Five of the ten planes in 827 Squadron were gone within minutes. Three others would also die before they ever set eyes on their target.

It was much the same with 817 Squadron off the Furious. Squadron leader Sanderson had his nine Albacores in three groups of three planes each when the rockets came for them. Lee’s plane was an instant fireball, and Gorrie and Train went the same way. The other two flights split up and were frantically skipping over the crests of the waves, so low now that the spay and foam of the sea obscured one pilot’s vision and he plowed right into an oncoming wave. Two planes escaped. Sanderson died when a rocket actually struck a wave and exploded right in front of him, sending a rain of hot shrapnel rattling against his plane, shattering his wind screen and killing him instantly. Another had his top wing blown clean off by the high splinter penetration shrapnel of the missile warhead. He pulled hard on the stick in the hopes of avoiding the sea only to have a second rocket detonate itself right in front of the exposed belly of his plane and sheer it apart as though it had been struck with a thousand whirling razors.

The action could be seen three miles away by the frightened pilots of 812 Squadron. This was the only section of the attack that had not yet been targeted, for 812 was flying in nine of the older Swordfish torpedo bombers. The ‘old Stringbags’ seemed lost in the clutter of the wave tops, their canvass fuselage and wings wet with sea spray, but much more difficult to detect. Yet they watched, horror stricken, as the sky was lit up with the fiery trails of the rockets, their long white contrails just beginning to catch the light of dawn. The pilots all split up, banking and veering through the waves.

Wilkenson, Baker and Cross were out in front, and soon they saw what looked like a distant shadow on the far horizon. Eager to spot the possible target, Cross pulled his Swordfish up to gain some altitude, and it was only that unwise maneuver that enabled the young Lieutenant Yazov to get a fix on the Swordfish group.

Aboard Kirov, Yazov shouted out a sudden warning. “Con, new contact, 10 kilometers out and closing! Feeding target to CIC.” He had been so busy tracking on the other contact groups that he had not seen the signal winking in and out of resolution on his screen-the old Stringbags flying low and slow, and scarcely noticed in the heat of his very first live combat trial.

Samsonov had been firing his underdeck missile modules in pairs, with four missiles each for a barrage of 8 as Karpov had directed. Yet he knew that, within minutes, this new contact would be inside the minimum acquisition range of his system, and so he quickly redirected one module at this new threat. The missiles barely had time to turn and acquire after being catapulted out of their vertical launch tubes, inclining and igniting their engines to rocket away from the ship. Only two of the four found targets. Knocking down Jones and Heath. The other planes forged on until they had closed to three kilometers range.

“Tally ho!” Shouted one pilot over his radio when he spotted the ship ahead. Yet it looked nothing whatsoever like an aircraft carrier. As Maughan, Kindell and Sinclair steered their flight of three Swordfish in, Kirov responded with a lethal new evolution of its air defense system.

A unique feature of the new Gauntlet system was its close integration with a 30mm Gatling gun mount adjacent to each missile bank, one on each side of the aft quarter of the ship. This system automatically engaged and locked on to the oncoming Swordfish when missile lock was not obtained. The computer controlled barrels swung around to bear on the targets, jerked up and down briefly, then rattled off a withering burst of 30mm shells that literally tore the first plane to pieces. It was as if a kite had been blasted by buckshot at close range, riddled with so many holes that it could no longer have any structure.