The Hunt for Red October - Tom Clancy [0]
By Jack Ryan Enterprises, Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Clancy, Tom, 1947–
The hunt for Red October.
1. Title
PS3553.L245H8 1984 813′.54 84-16569
ISBN 0-87021-285-0
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
All the characters in this book, with the exception of Sergey Gorshkov, Yuri Padorin, Oleg Penkovskiy, Valery Sablin, Hans Tofte, and Greville Wynne, are fictitious, and and resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidential. The names, incidents, dialogue, and opinions expressed are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Nothing is intended or should be interpreted as expressing or representing the views of the U.S. Navy or any other department or agency of any government body.
04 03 02 01 41 40 39 38 37
For Ralph Chatham,
A sub driver who spoke the truth,
And for all the men who wear dolphins
THE FIRST DAY
FRIDAY, 3 DECEMBER
The Red October
Captain First Rank Marko Ramius of the Soviet Navy was dressed for the Arctic conditions normal to the Northern Fleet submarine base at Polyarnyy. Five layers of wool and oilskin enclosed him. A dirty harbor tug pushed his submarine's bow around to the north, facing down the channel. The dock that had held his Red October for two interminable months was now a water-filled concrete box, one of the many specially built to shelter strategic missile submarines from the harsh elements. On its edge a collection of sailors and dockyard workers watched his ship sail in stolid Russian fashion, without a wave or a cheer.
"Engines ahead slow, Kamarov," he ordered. The tug slid out of the way, and Ramius glanced aft to see the water stirring from the force of the twin bronze propellers. The tug's commander waved. Ramius returned the gesture. The tug had done a simple job, but done it quickly and well. The Red October, a Typhoon-class sub, moved under her own power towards the main ship channel of the Kola Fjord.
"There's Purga, Captain." Gregoriy Kamarov pointed to the icebreaker that would escort them to sea. Ramius nodded. The two hours required to transit the channel would tax not his seamanship but his endurance. There was a cold north wind blowing, the only sort of north wind in this part of the world. Late autumn had been surprisingly mild, and scarcely any snow had fallen in an area that measures it in meters; then a week before a major winter storm had savaged the Murmansk coast, breaking pieces off the Arctic icepack. The icebreaker was no formality. The Purga would butt aside any ice that might have drifted overnight into the channel. It would not do at all for the Soviet Navy's newest missile submarine to be damaged by an errant chunk of frozen water.
The water in the fjord was choppy, driven by the brisk wind. It began to lap over the October's spherical bow, rolling back down the flat missile deck which lay before the towering black sail. The water was coated with the bilge oil of numberless ships, filth that would not evaporate in the low temperatures and that left a black ring on the rocky walls of the fjord as though from the bath of a slovenly giant. An altogether apt simile, Ramius thought. The Soviet giant cared little for the dirt it left on the face of the earth, he grumbled to himself. He had learned his seamanship as a boy on inshore fishing boats, and knew what it was to be in harmony with nature.
"Increase speed to one-third," he said. Kamarov repeated his captain's order over the bridge telephone. The water stirred more as the October moved astern of the Purga. Captain Lieutenant Kamarov was the ship's navigator, his last duty station having been harbor pilot for the large combatant vessels based on both sides of the wide inlet. The two officers kept a weather eye on the armed icebreaker three hundred meters ahead. The Purga's after deck had a handful of crewmen stomping about in the cold, one wearing the white