Operation Tidespring Pt.2
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HMNB Scapa Flow, 3rd April 1983, 11:28 Local Time (11:28 GMT)
There were times when Admiral Sir Jonathan Fraiser wished someone else was CinC-Home[1], and today was definitely one of these times. As much as he personally dislike the Prime Minister, 'the scruffy little man from No.10' at least the decision to wait until one was clear of how the Americans would react to a massive British Task Force sailing to make war with one of Washington's closest mates made sense. The Task Force on it's own would have nigh on no chance to withstand a concerted effort by the APN[1] Atlantic Fleet with only two British Fleet Carriers and two Dreadnoughts forming the core. What might be more than ample to fight the Argies if they were stupid enough to sortie was nothing against the Americans if they really decided to bring everything they had to bear. He rose from his chair and walked out out of his Office onto the balcony overlooking the place where HMS Hood was moored since she had last moved in 1950. The mighty Battlecruiser of old was still in commission just like HMS Warspite in London and HMS Victory in Portsmouth and once again he thought about what men like Murray, Beattie and the others who had fought these ships during World War Two would do in a situation like this. It was not that the Royal Navy was short of ships to use, the British Carrier force actually outnumbered that of the UAPR, but right now the Falkland Islands Task Force was tied to port and only politics kept it here.
He looked out over the anchorage and in the distance he could see the hulks of the four Capital Ships that formed the core of the Task Force as they floated at anchor.
“Sir?” came the voice of his aide and broke his train of thought. “Sir, the First Sea Lord is on the phone.”
“I'll be right up.”
He picked up the phone.
“Vincent, what can I do for you?” he asked.
His old friend and First Sea Lord came straight to the point.
“What's the status of the Task Force?”
Fraiser knew the figures by heart. “Thunderchild and Dreadnought have finished taking on 16'' shells and provisions, refuelling is complete. Ark Royal and King George VI only need their Air Groups, even though we'll have to send Ark Royal in for new Reactor fuel rods in three months.[3] Devonshire has finished taking on missiles and the Destroyers will be assembled in another day.”
Outside observers would marvel at how fast this Task Force had been assembled, but the Royal Navy always kept two Carriers and at least one Dreadnought within Home Waters; the horror of the Battle of the Blockade where the only Nazi Aircraft Carrier had sunk six British Dreadnoughts because all RN Carriers had been in the Med wouldn't leave the institutional memory of the Fleet and the Nation any time soon.[4] That it had been Thunderchilds and Dreadnoughts rotation for Home Duty was just a coincidence.
Devonshire was a bit of a black sheep though. Several years ago the Cruiser had at first had problems with the (then-) new Broadsword Anti-ship missiles[5] until a humbled contractor had amended a guidance software glitch that had slipped through Quality control, then last year her Fire Control Computer had decided to crash randomly until it was discovered that during a systems upgrade someone had miswired the data feeds between the weapons systems and the Battlesbridge, and only yesterday the ammunition hoists for the autoloader of the forward 8'' turret had decided to fail, only the impressively fast reaction of her Chief Engineer had prevented an interruption of the loading process. At least she was working properly now.
“She working properly?” the First Sea Lord asked.
“Oh yes, Sir. I can see from here that they are provisioning her now.”
“Good. By the way, the Canadians have offered the Vimy Ridge.”
Fraiser grimaced. Not that he liked refusing an additional Carrier deck, and the old Girl had proven her worth during the Indonesian Civil War, but accepting her would mean that with the brand new HMCS Warrior still without a full Air group Canada would be without America-based Carrier cover and that was something CinC-Home never risked as an unwritten but still very official rule.
However it wasn't as if he needed her. The Rapiers that the two Carriers carried alone would be more than enough to erect a near impenetrable umbrella of Air Cover over the fleet.
“When can they set sail?”
“Kaveney tells me that he needs another day, two at most to complete missile loading and reprovisioning. After that it depends on when the Booties can embark the First Marine Rifles.”
Vice Admiral Frederic Kaveney was a protégée of the of the Third Sea Lord and in spite of that a very competent Officer, he was the fist Imp[6] to rise this far in the Navy, and wardrooms handled him as the next CinC Home once Fraiser retired next year.
He still questioned the wisdom of running the vital landing ships as part of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary instead of directly administering them through the Navy, but the First Sea Lord on the other hand was convinced that their status as RFA had been instrumental in disguising them from a Government that had been even more penny-pinching than any other in living memory and that had almost cost the Empire it's sixth Dreadnought which had only been saved due to the timely intervention of the Indian Defence Council that had at the time been enlarging the RIN as far as the Empire Act of 1938 allowed them.
These times were long since gone, but the slashing of the Defence budget in the 1960s had let the Navy especially short of assets to respond to the Indonesian Civil war when it had broken out in 1971, and the then First Sea Lord and the present one had spent the rest of the decade rebuilding the Royal Navy as it were. At least the Fleet was back in shape now for what she had to do.
British Embassy, Washington City, 3rd April 1983, 11:55 Local Time (15:55 GMT)
The TV sets had been set up so that every member of the Ambassador's Staff could monitor the American Nation-wide TV stations for any reaction to the outbreak of war between the People's Republic of Argentinia and the British Empire. For the last two days none of the Civil Servants in the room had slept very much, but whenever Ambassador Sir Miles McAuliffe[7] had asked for an audience with the Chairman of the Central Committee of the People's Council he had been denied and so London had been forced to hold of it's own Official reaction save for a short announcement to all three Chambers of Parliament[8] by the Prime Minister.
“Sir, there is a telephone call for you.”
McAuliffe rose and walked into his Office.
“It's the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Sir.”
“About bloody time.” the Ambassador grumbled as he took the phone from his secretary. “McAuliffe.”
“Mr. Ambassador, this is the Office of the People's Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Comrade Comrade Arthur would like to speak to you as soon as possible.”
The British Ambassador suppressed the anger he felt at being ignored for two days, but he felt it in his bones that it had taken that long for the Americans to decided on what to do, so instead he simply said:
“I can be over there in half an hour.”
“Comrade Arthur will be waiting.”
The line went dead with a click.
“Jennifer, get down to the Comms Room and tell them to notify London I am meeting the Secretary for Foreign Affairs in half an hour.”
He didn't wait for confirmation and instead picked up the phone.
“Michael, have my car ready this instant, we are going for a ride.”
Office of the People's Secretary for Foreign Affairs, 3rd April 1983, 12:26 Local Time (16:26 GMT)
It was different from all the other meetings the two men had had over the years, but at the very least both were aware that the crisis that would most likely result from this meeting wasn't between the two countries directly, so at least one could talk to each other without the air of mutual hatred that would have been present had it been otherwise
If push came to shove then the Americans could hate with a passion but as long as one remained civil, so did they.
“Mr. Ambassador, the Committee is deeply concerned about what is going on in the South Atlantic.”
Of course he would. As the son of an Expat, McAuliffe knew more about American Mentality than most Britons, and it was to be expected that the Americans would back the Argentinians.
“Comrade Secretary, Her Majesty's Government deeply regrets the outbreak of hostilities over this matter, but sovereign British Territory has been invaded and to be frank, we cannot let that stand.”
The playing field was level now, in diplolese the two men had told each other what their respective Governments wanted, and both had to admit that it wasn't really surprising. Comrade People's Secretary for Foreign Affairs Henry Arthur had warned the Committee that the British would never accept a Foreign Flag over the Falklands any more than the UAPR over the Florida Keys. Most of the others had agreed albeit for different reasons. The Secretary for Transportation and Infrastructure had maintained that the British would try to retake the Islands because it would 'undermine their Imperialist position' in Africa and Asia, but the man was an ideological Zealot of the worst sort and could be discounted for anything that wasn't rail or highways. On the other hand Arthur's colleague at the Commissariat for Foreign Trade was the same sort of realist as Arthur himself and had said that the British would see this not so much as a loss of face but rather more as a stab into the very centre of their self-conception that had defined the Empire in the years since the end of World War Two. Arthur was inclined to agree, but the two of them were on their own, the majority had come to the consensus that the British would in the end back down if the right sort of pressure was applied.
However, as the Secretary for Defence had pointed out, stopping the British from doing something was impossible short of actually shooting at them, no British Government worth it's salt would back down even if the UAPR demanded that the Falklands be handed over on pain of war. To prove this, the Secretary had pointed at the increased alert status of the Allied Forces north of the Canadian border, and in the end it had been agreed that very, very quiet logistical and somewhat more open diplomatic support were the safest course of action, not that McAuliffe would know this when he left this Office.
“Quite. The Committee understands this,” Arthur said and hoped the little white lie wouldn't be spotted, “but the People's Republic of Argentinia has various legitimate grievances, and the UAPR would look most favourably to a League of Nations mediation.”
That too wasn't surprising. McAuliffe could all but hear the cries of anger in the Foreign and Imperial Affairs Offices when this made it's way to Whitehall. The League might not be as useless as the old one had been before the war and McAuliffe was sure that the British Representative would bring the matter up at the extraordinary session scheduled to begin tomorrow, but there was no chance in hell that the Government would even consider signing away the Falklands without a supreme effort to retake them.
“I will pass that on, Comrade Secretary. I have also been instructed to tell you the basic position of the British Empire on the matter is no less than immediate withdrawal of any and all Argentine Forces from British territory and territorial waters.”
That was actually more than the initial memo from No.10 had said, but the recent escalation was slowly pushing London to adopt a more firm position. Say what you want about the sitting PM's political agenda, he did have a spine when it counted.
“However Comrade Secretary, unless your Intelligence services have gone on holiday you must know that we are assembling a Task Force, and Her Majesty's Government would be most displeased about any interference with this Task Force.”
Arthur was taken aback. Was this Englishman insinuating that the APN was interfering with British Naval movements? The UAPR would like to see the British base in the South Atlantic removed yes, and it had been decided that Intelligence would be passed on to the Argentinians but any action that would rock the boat with the British wasn't wanted at this point in time, not when the still somewhat shaky hold of the current Chairman of the Committee onto the reigns of Government needed to be cemented, never mind the fact that playing powergames with the British was always a risky thing to do.
“As long as this Task Force is only meant to retake the Falklands, we will not interfere.”
Soon enough Ambassador McAuliffe was heading back to the Embassy and wondered just how high the Foreign Secretary would jump.
Message sent by the Admiralty to CinC-Home and CinC Falklands Task Force
ADMTY SENDS:
REC: CINC-HOME; CINC-FALK TASK FORCE
CC: -
MESSAGE BEGINS:
A) RE AM INTENTIONS: FO INDICATES THAT AMERICAN INTENTIONS ARE NOT RPT NOT IN CONFLICT WITH OP PLAN
B) 1ST MRN RIFLES EMBARKED RFA MARKET GARDEN, RFA OBVIATE, RFA DOWNFALL, RFA KRISTIANSSAND, RFA JAVA, RFA CHRONOMETER, RFA DEADLIGHT
C) SAIL TASK FORCE AS DIRECTED AND PREPARE TO EXCUTE OPERATION TIDESPRING
D)ROE OPTION BAKER
E) TASK FORCE NOW DESIGNATED FORCE Z
F) GOOD HUNTING
SIGNED: ADM. GALLERY, FIRST SEA LORD
MESSAGE ENDS
ADMTY SENDS END
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[1]Commander in Chief Home Fleet, TTLs equivalent of CINCLANT
[2] American People's Navy. Still feels very strange to write that...
[3] Exactly what it sounds like. Ark Royal belongs to the Illustrious Class of Nuclear Carriers, the only other in the Class being Lusty herself, while KGVI leads her own class of CVNs.
[4]The worst ever defeat I suffered in any game of Hearts of Iron 2. Mind you it was a blessing in disguise from a story-telling point of view, because that was the best way to convince everyone that Carriers are the way to go.
[5] Broadsword is TTL's Harpoon.
[6]Imp is shorthand for Imperials, meaning locals coming from the former Colonies.
[7]Yes. The TTL son of Anthony 'Nuts' McAuliffe who happened to be a para Officer in the British Army during WW2.
[8] The third being the Imperial Parliament, made up of elected representatives of the various local Governments that administer the former Colonies, now known as Imperial Dominions to prevent confusion with Canada and the ANZACs. While we're at it: Dick Winters served in McAuliffes Regiment, and the most prominent of the other expat Officers was Omar Bradley. Ike, Marshal and Patton died during the Civil War.
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