SSN

    Mack knew that would come as a surprise to his officers. He gave them a moment to absorb that and then continued, "Cheyenne has been asked to 'delouse' and reconnoiter the Formosa Strait so that Jiang can be transported back to China when the moment for him to return to power arrives."

    Mack looked around at the officers present, making eye contact with each of them. "Naval intelligence does not have a firm grasp on what type of enemy warships are in the area. They are expecting large numbers of Luda destroyers and possibly several very dangerous Akula or Kilo submarines. Naval intelligence also reports that large areas of the Formosa Strait are heavily mined, so let's watch our step."

    On that cautionary note, Mack concluded the meeting and the officers went back to their previous duties.

    As Cheyenne pulled away from the Independence Battle Group, Mack thought about the dangers of this new mission. He and his crew had not had much experience with encountering naval mines, but he knew that they presented a great threat to all naval vessels, including submarines. During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the only naval casualties the U.S. suffered came from two inexpensive and low-technology mines. It was an ironic twist on modern warfare, thought Mack, that a mine costing a few thousand dollars could sink a billion-dollar submarine like Cheyenne if the mine were to come into contact with her hull.

    As soon as the meeting in the wardroom was complete, Cheyenne began her long trip north from Independence. USS Bremerton would be leaving the South China Sea and returning to the Indian Ocean. USS Columbia would stay with the Independence Battle Group, acting as ASW escort, in the same SSN(DS) role Cheyenne had played so many times.

    "Make your depth four hundred feet," Mack said. "Make my depth four hundred feet, aye, sir," the OOD said, acknowledging the order.

    "Speed twelve knots," Mack added. This order was also repeated.

    There was no emergency rush for Cheyenne to get to the Formosa Strait. Safety was Mack's primary concern. He would much rather get to his destination stowly and quietly than to arrive there after having to fight his way up north.

    Besides, Mack didn't want to announce his position to the Chinese navy. The strait between China and Taiwan was their home waters, and held the threat of warships coming from all directions. There were four Chinese naval bases within range of Mack's destination. Each of those bases could send submarines, attack craft, or destroyers and aircraft after Cheyenne if they knew she was in their waters.

    Which meant, Mack knew, that he would have to be sure that they didn't find out Cheyenne was there.

    Mack had expected the entire cruise to take slightly more than four days. At the end of the third day, Cheyenne had passed Zhanjiang Naval Base in southern China and was approaching Hong Kong exactly on schedule. So far, she had not detected a single Chinese naval contact, possibly because the Chinese navy was still regrouping after their humiliating loss to the Americans south of the Spratly Islands.

    That string ended at the end of the third day.

    "Conn, sonar," the sonar supervisor reported. "We have a sonar contact bearing 200. Sounds like a surface ship."

    Mack was in the control room when the report came in. He decided that the contact was probably coming from a ship from the naval base directly to their south-u^ci The normal watch station BSY-1 operators started examining the information to attempt to determine the range to the contact.

    "Conn, sonar," the sonar supervisor said, "we have active sonars indicating that there are two Hainan fast attack craft-high-frequency sonars."

    With the section fire-control tracking party manned, the BSY-1 computers began to get the information needed to determine Cheyenne's range to the targets.

    "Conn, sonar, the active sonars are very far away. This is very probably a convergence-zone contact. According to our calculations, they are pinging from over thirty nautical miles away."

    "Sonar, conn, aye," responded Mack for the OOD. "Keep tracking those contacts."

    Mack didn't intend to do anything about the Hainans-not unless he had to. He still wanted to stay silent and undetected, if possible. On the other hand, he couldn't afford to arrive at their destination tailed by a bunch of angry Chinese patrol craft.