Mutiny: The True Events That Inspired The Hunt for Red October

With a length of just under forty meters, the Tu-16 was more than one-third as long as the warship he was hunting. Powered by a pair of massive Mikulin AM-3 turbojets, the bomber had a maximum speed in excess of 1,000 kilometers per hour, a range of 7,200 kilometers, and a service ceiling of nearly 13,000 meters. He was capable of carrying conventional and nuclear bombs weighing as much as nine thousand kilograms and was armed with a half-dozen 23mm cannons.

Instead of carrying bombs this early morning, each aircraft had been loaded with either one AS-2 Kipper antiship missile or one AS-6 Kingfish missile.

This was more firepower than was needed to take out an American nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

To Kabatov’s way of thinking, this was overkill taken to a ridiculously dangerous level. American warships sometimes operated in the Baltic and, along with Swedish radar installations that had undoubtedly detected the flight as soon as it took off, would have to wonder what the hell was going on.

Wars had begun just like this, he thought. Or at least battles had.

He switched to his command frequency, not bothering to use an encrypted channel. He wanted anyone listening in to know that this wasn’t the beginning of an attack on NATO. “Flight One, this is Flight One Lead. Report, over.”

One by one the commanders of the other nine Badgers reported their positions and altitudes, inbound on Kabatov’s aircraft.

“All operators keep a sharp eye for threat radars. I want to know what’s aimed at us out there.”

“My scope is clear,” Kabatov’s own Yen-D search radar operator reported.

“Roger,” Kabatov acknowledged. He glanced over at his copilot, Lieutenant Demin, who shared the same feelings about this morning’s mission and raised an eyebrow.

“We’ve got our orders, Gennadi.”

“Da,” Kabatov said. “No matter how stupid they are, those are our guys down there. Russians.”

“Mutineers,” Demin pointed out.

“At lot of those boys are going to die before lunch if we follow our orders.”

Demin nodded. “Whatever you want to do, I’ll go along with you.”

“Could mean trouble later on,” Kabatov warned.

Demin grinned, his wide, dark eyes lighting up. “What can they do? Shoot us?”

Kabatov nodded. “They might do just that.”

51. THE BRIDGE

It’s still too foggy to see much of anything beyond their bows, so Sablin walks out onto the port wing and cocks an ear to listen. Vice Admiral Kosov has probably sent ships out after them and possibly a couple of attack aircraft from Skirotava or maybe even Mamonovo Airfield outside Kaliningrad.

But besides that, this is the open Baltic, an area normally heavily traveled by commercial ships flying flags from a dozen different countries, the occasional warship, sometimes U.S. but most often Swedish or West German, and of course KGB patrol boats.

They are blind and they are going too fast. Sablin can almost sense the presence of other ships out there, although he can’t hear anything over the noise of the 30-knot breeze blowing across the deck and sending an icy spray over the bows when they plow into a trough.

He ducks back onto the bridge. Shein is still there, and under the circumstances Sablin doesn’t think it matters if a guard is stationed below to make sure Potulniy and his officers get out. Besides, Shein looks nervous, even frightened, as well he should be.

“Turn on the radar,” Sablin orders.

Soloviev is clearly relieved, but Maksimenko isn’t sure.

“Won’t they see us?” he asks.

“The fleet already knows where we are,” Sablin says. “The moment we were overflown, our position was pinpointed down to the meter. But now we need the radar; we can’t continue blind like this. If we collide with another ship, someone will get killed. Then we would be in serious trouble, and I don’t want that on my conscience.”

All three crewmen look at their zampolit as if he were crazy. How much more trouble can mutineers get into?

Maksimenko turns on the Palm Frond navigation radar and as soon as the set warms up the screen comes alive with targets.

“Eh tvoiu mat,”

Soloviev swears half under his breath.

They are nearly out of the Irben Channel and around the Sörve Peninsula at the southwestern end of Saaremaa Island. From here they are about one hour from international waters, where Sablin believes they will be safe.

If they can make it that far.

“What’s out there?” Sablin demands. “Talk to me.”

It takes an agonizingly long time for Maksimenko to sort out what’s being depicted on the radar screen.

“Ahead of us is nothing but commercial traffic, so far as I can tell,” he says. “We’re not on a collision course with anything, but that’ll change in the next half hour.” He looks up, and at that moment he could be a deer at night caught in the headlights of an onrushing truck.

“What else?” Sablin prompts.

“We’re in trouble.”

“What do you mean?”