Ghosts of Bungo Suido Read Online Free Page B

when we’re down below and getting hammered on. The guys’ll get used to it.”
    “I hope so, Cob, ’cause this cat’s not gonna change his stripes. We’re out here to do a job of bloody work, and I’m just the guy, unfortunately, to take the fight to them for a change.”
    “They’re good guys, Cap’n, but most of ’em are real young, remember?”
    Gar knew Cob was right about that. The average age on board was probably twenty.
    “Captain, please contact Conn,” came over the announcing system.
    Gar grabbed the nearest sound-powered phone handset, set the dial for Conn, and twirled the handle once, causing a squeaking noise at the other end. The exec picked up the phone.
    “Whatcha got, XO?”
    “Plot has these guys zigzagging. We’re gonna be on ’em pretty quick—their true speed of advance is only six knots. I’m assuming a surfaced attack unless we discover another escort. I’d like to set battle stations, surface, in ten minutes.”
    “Make it so, XO. Keep the gun team below until we know for damned sure there aren’t any more escorts. And Russ? I want you to conduct the next attacks. I’ll be up there shortly, but I’m gonna sit back and watch the whole picture while you sink these tankers. Okay?”
    “Absolutely,” Russ said.
    Gar hung up the phone and told Cob they’d be back at GQ in ten minutes. Cob hurried away to spread the word. Gar made his way to Forward Officers’ Country for a quick head call.
    One of the submarine force’s superstars in terms of tonnage sunk, Commander Dudley “Mush” Morton, had introduced a different command-and-control approach to submarine attacks. Prior to Morton, the captain and only the captain conducted every attack. He manned the scope, supervised the TDC, approved the plot solution, chose the attack bearings and methods, and did everything but push the firing button. Morton, who became famous for conducting most of his attacks on the surface, realized that there was too much data coming at him during an attack, so he decided to step back from the minutiae of the actual attack in order to better grasp the big picture: where the target was, where the escorts were, where the next target was going to be, where the best escape routes lay, what the radar picture showed, and so on. Morton let his XO, another superstar named Richard O’Kane, execute the individual torpedo attacks, while he, Morton, made sure some other part of the tactical picture wasn’t getting ready to bite them in the ass.
    The result was a superbly trained exec who could go on to a command of his own already highly experienced in attacking Jap ships, as O’Kane had amply demonstrated. To do it required a very confident captain and an equally competent exec. Gar hadn’t adopted this system yet, but, having removed the warships from this particular convoy, small as it was, he felt this was the time to let Russ have a shot and try out Morton’s system. As in every other aspect of submarine command, until you actually tried it, you never knew.
    He went back to Control, where the battle teams were already taking their places in the red glow of the night-lights. He told everybody there that the XO was going to run the attacks and that he was going sit back and criticize. There were grins all around, albeit nervous grins. He knew he was going to have to work on this problem. A scared crew was a dangerous crew—a man who’s afraid will freeze faster than a man who’s on the hunt with his blood up. Training, he reminded himself. We have to do more training.
    “Set battle stations, surface.”
    He climbed the ladder into the dim red light of the conning tower to begin the dance. The stream of cold fresh air whistling through the hatch to the bridge was wonderful. The diesels were purring as only Fairbanks Morse engines could. The exec was getting ready to go up to the bridge, where he would conduct the torpedo attacks against the two tankers up ahead. Instead of the periscope he’d be