War with Russia

Finally, to add insult to injury, there had been the very public humiliation of the President, who had arrived to triumph over his dead enemies and, doubtless, warn of what was to come to those who resisted. Instead, the world had watched on live TV as he shouted and swore at his guards, while burning helicopters fell from the sky behind him.

Bush allowed himself a grim smile at that thought. Yesterday, seeing a bunch of sailors leaning over an iPad and laughing, he had gone to investigate. They had shown him how some wag had superimposed the screaming President’s curses as recorded on live TV—dubbed in English—over the picture of Hitler ranting in the bunker from the film Downfall. Apparently the spoof had gone viral and multilingual. Even as Bush laughed and then told the sailors to get back to work, it had struck him how it made a refreshing change from incessant images of the President as all-conquering warrior and sportsman.

In fact, and just as important, even serious TV journalists and commentators were now suggesting that the President’s very public humiliation might have been the moment that the Baltics started to fight back. First they had laughed. Then they began to take heart. Although Bush doubted the President saw the joke. He could well imagine that the President—not a man known for his sense of humor—now had a score to settle with those who had carried out the attack.

While he was delighted that things were not all going the Russians’ way in the Baltics, his overriding concern remained the Queen Elizabeth and her lack of dedicated escorts. He had voiced that issue to the Captain back in Portsmouth. He had listened and told him to get on with it. Now, like any sailor under orders, he was reconciled to having to put up and shut up. These few ships were all the Navy had been able to deploy at short notice to accompany the Task Group. No amount of worrying was going to magic up new escort ships and subs, let alone air cover from maritime patrol aircraft, in the next couple of days.

Certainly, there was no shortage of friendly assets in the vicinity but, as an ex-Warfare officer himself, he knew there was a massive difference in having a British Nimrod aircraft—scrapped by the last government—flying top cover and was able, at the push of a radio pressel “send” switch, to instantly update the Captain in the Command Center as to the location of any enemy assets; as opposed to the veteran, but nevertheless very capable, German maritime patrol Lockheed P-3C Orion aircraft, which had waggled its wings at them as it flew past half an hour ago, but was still not able to communicate securely with the Queen Elizabeth.

Help, however, was sailing toward them. It would be another couple of days before NATO was able to take command of the operation and the Amphibious Task Group became integrated into a coherent force with the five frigates and destroyers of the NATO Response Force Maritime Component. Meanwhile, he hoped that the Russians were fully preoccupied trying to subdue the Baltics and did not need to further antagonize NATO by having a poke at them. The last thing they needed was to be stalked by a Kilo Class submarine—their highly capable and very quiet diesel-electric attack boat, optimized for anti-shipping and anti-submarine operations in relatively shallow waters like these.

If that were not enough, today had brought a brand new problem. The Admiral was commanding the Task Group from his flagship, Queen Elizabeth. He had ordered them to carry out a practice amphibious landing on the Griefswalder Bodden, the sheltered bay between the island of Ruggen and the north German coastline. This would not only be a useful work-up for the Task Group, which was still learning to operate with the new carrier, but would allow for plenty of media pictures of tough-looking Royal Marines dashing ashore across pristine sandy beaches. The politicians believed that would send a message to the Russians that Britain meant business.

The Admiral’s plan was straightforward. The amphibious ship Bulwark would close in on the coastline, protected by a pair of escort ships operating as a team: the state-of-the-art Type 45 anti-aircraft destroyer Dauntless, and the remaining Type 23 anti-submarine frigate, Lancaster. Meanwhile, the carrier would remain out at sea, together with the anti-aircraft destroyer Daring, acting as picket ship, forward defense, and the two Royal Fleet Auxiliary logistic support ships, which provided first line supplies—and the Queen Elizabeth’s greedy gas turbines would need refueling every two days to keep the tanks topped up.