The Killing Straits
Prussian Straits
It had been apparent from all the time-stalling and bargaining the Prussian leader had no intention for an unconditional surrender and disarmament, it was time for SENSE to act again.
The Prussian straits had been closed off to friendly forces since the day the Prussian 4th High Seas Fleet had routed the SENSE fleet in a naval disaster that had cut off sea-borne supplies coming in to the troops of Pronamdy, it was thanks to the overworked transport elements of the XAF that the invasion force was kept out of serious supply trouble. But still, if a renewed offensive was going to be supported, the Prussian Straits had to be open to SENSE forces again. It was time for a rematch, this time with a much larger force of the Xing Shianan Task Force Greg Paul and Shingapooru 1st Central Fleet.
How times have changed. Now SENSE had the larger, plus more advanced fleets in battle.
And Captain Ravi Kuman of the XSS Alabaster knew that full well, it had been a busy 12 hours for those not involved in lying down and keeping still and quiet while the submarine was on ultra quiet mode. Inching about 450 feet under the dark waters at a 3 knots. Tension hung in the air, almost palatable to all those on the submarine. The ultra quiet had been called about half a day ago, after they had reached their lurking positions following a two day, 15 knot dash. The Alabaster had been involved in the battle of the Fuchs Sea, and scored amazingly well there, killing four enemy submarines and damaging two other. Now rearmed and supplied, she was ready for more action.
The XSS Alabaster, registry number NCC 1701 was the first of her era, a new class of submarines to replacing the small fleet of seven ageing Los Angles 688I subs they had managed to acquire mothballed from the USN a few years back. The Alabaster class was developed indigenously and introduced to the fleet just a year and a half ago, with ten ships in service. And five of these Alabasters were now screening a large area ahead of the SENSE fleet entering the Prussian Gulf.
The Alabaster was a small submarine, just 95 meters in length and crewed by forty-five, giving high priority to automation and digitization to reduce required manpower. The form of the triple-hulled submarine was smooth, with no abrupt angles with a design that employed computer-calculated mimicry of the bodies of fishes to reduce drag and the possibly of cavitation in rough areas that would compromise stealth. The propulsion system dispensed with the traditional screw and instead relied on pump jet technology, a setup that sucked it and expelled water for propulsion more akin to a jet engine then a prop that was far quieter.
And that stealth was now enhanced by the implementation of the ultra quiet drill, a procedure in which all non-essential equipment that would generate noise was turned off, everything that might rattle, fall, break or otherwise make noise secured, and all crew not necessary in the operation of the ship lie in their bunks and make as little noise as possible. Crew working moved about moved silently and carefully, and spoke to each other with hushed voices. The only item on the menu during ultra quiet was sandwiches, which didnÂ’t cost too much noise to prepare, and could be consumed quietly. The Alabaster was a black hole of silence in the ocean, as it crept forward silently, listening intently for anything out of the ordinary.
But too much stealth could be a drawback, for the ocean was a bath of natural acoustics, noise sources caused by biologics (biological entities) or seismic activity. And one of the methods that involved hunting an overly stealthy submarine would show up as a hole of silence in the waters that moved about occasionally. The Alabaster countered that by actively masking its acoustic hole with a carefully moderating recording of ambient ocean sound levels being emitted via the sub’s smart skin. The smart skin of the Alabaster’s outer hull was a marvel of technology, containing Conformal Acoustic Velocity Sonar (CAVES) arrays and various other sensors, dispensing with the maintenance–intensive traditional hull sensor arrays that required extensive rigging. The advanced skin of the submarine acted as one gigantic underwater sensor for it, acting as passive and soars, and even a Magnetic Anomaly Detector (MAD) array, giving the Alabaster unrivaled sensor ability and coverage which was further enhanced by its more conventional systems like the towed array.
The mission was simple, infiltrate the Prussian straits ahead of the SENSE fleet, and take out any Prussian targets that presented themselves, with subsurface targets as priority. It was a mission Ravi was confident the Alabaster and her crew could accomplish, with spectacular results.
Ravi was told to expect the Prussian 4th High Seas Fleet and possibly more, plus a rag tag addition of whatever Prussian ships from badly pounded fleets that no longer existed. But save for the Prussian annihilation at the Sea of Fuchs, the Prussian subs were still relatively intact, and that was all Ravi was told. Force Integration and information sharing was starting to catch on the surface navies, but it was another underwater. Besides having regular updates on battle situations and intelligence through the radio, the subs worked on a lot less ready information then surface units, technology not yet being able to transmit the required amount of data to underwater sources efficiently. The Xing Shianan subs had to rely mainly on their advanced sensors and their Commanding Officers, which had to make the best of whatever information they received from the surface.
But that was probably why Hunter Killer SSNs like Alabaster worked along, though sometimes they did work in packs. On this mission though, the Alabaster was going in with a sister sub, the XSS Bethlehem some seventeen thousand yards abreast on the port side.
“Conn sonar, we have new contacts, bearing 010 and 005, designate Masters 22 and 23,” The sonar operator reported. “Range 68,000 yards, looks like we found our Prussian subs.”
Ravi grinned. He had been tracking the noisy Prussian surface elements for a long time now, which was streaming around at flank speed heading out to engage the SENSE fleet which they had detected on coming in on their radars. But his main targets were the Prussian submarines. It was time to move into action.
The Alabaster carried Mk 96 ADCAP-D torpedoes, which had twice the range of the Prussian Mk 48 ADCAP. In addition to superior speed of eighty knots, the Prussian weapons did sixty at best.
But it was no time to be complacent, the Alabaster currently had the advantage, and Ravi intended to use it to its full advantage. At his command, the Alabaster increased speed and started making maneuvers to gain more sonar information on their targets.
“Conn sonar, we have addition contacts, bearing 015 and 013, designate Master 24 and 25. Masters 22, 23, 24 and 25…” The sonar operator paused. “They are Prussian Virginia SSNs sir, blade count indicates they’re doing about twenty five knots, headed straight our way.”
The Prussian submarines were moving along with the surface fleet as they charged down the Prussian Straits towards the Alabaster and Bethlehem, using the noisy surface fleet to mask their own sonar signatures. It worked, to an extent. But had they known about the capabilities of the Alabaster class sonar abilities, they would have been better of lurking around on ultra quiet. They never got a chance to learn that tip. The noise of the surface fleet drowned their own capable sonar suites and they never heard the Alabasters already targeting them.
Another twenty minutes passed, the fleet was about 40 nautical miles away from them, well within the ADCAP-DÂ’s 80 mile range.
“Generate firing solutions on Masters 22 to 25.” Ravi said. “Rig ship for depth charge. Prepare tubes one through four for electrical firing. Open the muzzle doors when ready.”
At that command, the TMA operator worked to compute the optimal firing solution while the weapons crew primed the ADCAP-Ds for the firing. The tube was pressurized to outside pressure and the muzzle doors open, exposing the weapons to the outside sea. The torpedoes would be fired electrically, swimming out of the tube on their own power rather then usually being launched nosily out via compressed air. They were just a step away from firing.
“Firing solution ready.” The Target Motion Analysis operator announced.
“Very well, match generated bearing and fire tubes 1 through 4.” Ravi gave the order to shoot. The Otto fuel engines of the torpedoes came to life, powering their pump jets and they swam out of the tubes, spearing at a leisurely rate of 20 knots through the waters of the Prussian Straits.
“Tubes launched sir, units are running normally.” The weapons operator said.
Trailing a fine guidance wire, the ADCAP-Ds swam towards the approaching fleet with a combined speed of 45 knots. It took about the good part of an hour for the units to meet the fleet, traveling over 40 nautical miles. They had not detected it until it was too late.
“Torpedoes have acquired targets.” Reported the weapons operator. The ADCAP-Ds had found the enemy submarines with their own sonars and no longer needed to be guided by Alabaster’s fire control system via their guidance wires.
“Cut the wires, shut the outer doors, and reload tubes one through four.” Ordered Ravi.
The ADCAP-Ds powered up to full attack speed and bore down on their targets at over eighty knots. The Prussian Virginias detected the now-extremely noisy torpedoes, got off hasty snapshots down their bearing with their own weapons, and turned tail to run, zig-zagging and popping off decoys and gas generators in an attempt to fool the torpedoes homing on three times their speed. It was futile; the ADCAP-Ds ignored the countermeasures entirely and bore straight into the hulls of the Prussian subs.
“Conn, sonar, multiple explosions, bearing 010.”
They could hear the sounds of the dying submarines as they strained their reactors, their rapidly spinning screws trying to fight the downward pull of water it entered their ruptured hulls. It was futile. Not too long later came the screeching of steel as the viselike grip of the Prussian Straits crushed the pressure vessels of the Prussian subs as they sank below their crush dept. Their desperate return snapshots, fired in the thick of their own fleet all fell short. Worse, one found a friendly target, a destroyer, and destroyed it.
Ravi was satisfied, another four more kills for the Alabaster. The Bethlehem scored a few minutes later, downing another three submarines, two of them the ones Ravi had damaged in the Sea of Fuchs, their damaged screws making the noise of a gravel truck as they tried to run from the torpedoes. The two Alabaster subs spent the next few hours sowing panic amidst the Prussian fleet as they fired torpedo after torpedo at them, going for the anti-air elements like the Aegis cruisers, effectively removing them. The Prussian fleet launched anti-submarine helicopters and pinged the area with active sonar on full, but the submarines were already moving away, having done their part. The Prussian fleet had lost its submarine and aegis support, and it was to get worse.
As they headed towards what they could see on their radar as the SENSE fleet consisting of Shingapooru fleets, they came under missile attack and air attack from the undetected Xing Shiana Task Force Greg Paul hiding some distance behind the Shingapooru fleet. The Prussians had been lured into a trap. Lacking their aegis systems and outranged by the Xing Shiana missiles and aircraft, plus Shingapooru carrier aircraft. The Prussians tried their best to make it within their own missile launch range, charging through the kill zone of cruise missiles and planes, fighting all the way. It was useless, the Prussian 4th High Fleet plus the rag tag additions were set aflame. Losing over two hundred ships without even making it halfway near enough to launch their own weapons, so effective was the SENSE attack that they took not a single casualty. As they sailed past what was once the Prussian fleet, they picked up survivors. There were not many, so sudden was their destruction that few had chance to abandon their ships. The firepower being put out by SENSE forces five times what was used in the Battle of the Sea of Fuchs. Only 360 Prussian sailors were rescued, a staggering 43,000 plus Prussians lost their lives in the last desperate attempt to stem the tide. The Prussian navy was finished.
The Prussian Straits now belonged firmly to SENSE, the Pronamdy supply line reopened again. Fresh numbers of supplies, troops and instruments of war started to pour in within twelve hours of the naval victory, and their number rapidly grew.