Страница 38 из 186
"For example, Major Kaczmarczyk, it's occurred to me that the nature of the developing political situation here in the Cluster is likely to require intervention by the Station's Marines. That means you and your people, as far as Hexapuma is concerned."
"Yes, Sir." Kaczmarczyk was a short, solid, compact man in his late thirties with brown, bristle-cut hair and a neatly groomed mustache. He seemed just a little detached from the naval officers seated around the table with him, but his oddly colored amber-green eyes were very direct as he looked back at his captain.
"I foresee a very broad spectrum of missions for you, Major," Terekhov continued, "and the nature of the political equation is going to require a certain deftness. There may very well be situations in which a hammer is what will be required, although I'm sure everyone would prefer to avoid that. But there will also be situations in which your people are going to be required to perform more as policemen than as combat troops. I realize it's difficult to switch back and forth between those roles, and that the training and mindsets they require are to some extent mutually contradictory. There's nothing we can do about that, unfortunately, so I want you to concentrate on prepping your people to operate in small, independent units at need. I'll try to avoid chopping you up into pe
"I've got good noncoms, Sir," Kaczmarczyk said. "But I don't have a whole lot of warm bodies, and some of those I do have are pretty green."
"Point taken," Terekhov agreed.
The renewed war and the sudden huge increase in the Star Kingdom's territory had combined with the Navy's new construction policies to force changes in the size of the Marine detachments which Manticoran warships embarked. Traditionally, the RMN had assigned companies to light cruisers, and full battalions-including their attached heavy weapons companies-to capital ships. Heavy cruisers and battlecruisers had embarked "short" battalions: regular battalions with the heavy weapons companies detached.
Other navies had embarked far smaller detachments, but prior to the Havenite Wars, the Manticoran Navy's primary responsibilities had been piracy suppression and peacekeeping operations. Blowing pirate cruisers out of space was a straightforward proposition, but the Navy had found that recapturing merchantmen which had been taken by pirates without killing off any surviving members of their original crews required something a bit more delicate than a laser head or a graser. The boarding parties tasked to go over and retake those ships were composed of Marines. So were the boarding parties sent to support Navy inspections of suspected slavers or smugglers. And so were the landing parties sent down in places like Silesia to deal with planet-side riots, attacks on Manticoran nationals, and natural disasters.
Unlike most other navies-including both the SLN and the Star Kingdom's own Grayson ally-Manticoran Marines were also integrated into damage control parties and assigned to man broadside weapons aboard the ships in which they served. Aboard Hexapuma , for example, Kaczmarczyk's perso
But that practice required additional cross-training of the Marines. It took time to produce people who could proficiently perform the multiple tasks assigned to them, and it wasn't cheap. Which was one of the reasons even the RMN had been forced to rethink things a bit.
The increased automation which had allowed the Navy to drastically reduce its manpower (and life support) requirements and pack in additional firepower and defensive systems had been another. Maintaining the traditional size of the Marine detachments would have defeated much of that advantage. Which didn't even consider the fact that the Star Kingdom's sudden expansion required additional garrisons and peacekeeping forces which, particularly so close on the heels of major "peacetime" reductions in the roster strength of both the Navy and the Marines, had stretched the available supply of Marines to the breaking point. The troop strength of both the Marines and the Army was being increased as rapidly as possible, but manpower, not money or industrial capacity, had always been the Star Kingdom's Achilles' heel.
All of which explained why, instead of the four hundred and fifty-four men and women, in three companies, commanded by a major, assigned to a heavy cruiser under the "old" establishment, Captain Kaczmarczyk (who received the "courtesy promotion" to major aboard ship-since a warship could afford no confusion over who one meant when one said "Captain") had barely a hundred and forty in his single company. Even at that, they represented almost half of Hexapuma 's total complement of three hundred and fifty-five.
"We'll just have to do the best we can," Terekhov continued. "I'm hoping that, for the most part, the local governments will be able to deal with their own internal problems. For one thing, if we get involved, we run the risk, as 'imperialist outsiders,' of escalating whatever ill feeling produced the problem in the first place. If they need to call on us at all, I'm hoping it will be either for intelligence support, using our recon systems, or for quick, hard, in-and-out strikes on specific targets.
"In line with that, Major, I'd like you and your intelligence officer to go over these briefs from Commander Chandler." He handed over a slim folio of record chips. "They're planet-by-planet analyses, based on the most recent data available from local law enforcement types. Of course, a lot of that data is probably out of date by now, given transit times, but it's still the best information available. I'd especially like you to look for-"
"Well, Loretta. What do you think of him?"
"I beg your pardon, Sir?" Captain Shoupe looked up from the data chips she'd been sliding into slots in a folio. She and the rest of the staff had just finished their regular daily report on the station's status, and it was early afternoon, shipboard time. Rear Admiral Khumalo always preferred to catch a short nap before di
"I asked what you think of him," Khumalo replied. The rear admiral stood with his back to her, gazing into the cool, glowing depths of one of his holo tapestries. "Captain Terekhov, of course."
"I haven't really had the opportunity to form an opinion of him, Sir," she said after a moment. "He seems pleasant enough."
"Yes, he does, doesn't he?" Khumalo said in a rather distant tone. "Still, he's not quite what I'd expected."
Shoupe said nothing. She simply stood there, waiting patiently. She'd been with Khumalo ever since the rear admiral had been sent out to Talbott, and, almost despite herself, she'd actually grown fond of him. He could be frustrating, vacillating, and vain, and he was definitely one of the Navy's "political" admirals. But he also worked long hours-one of the reasons he liked to catch naps in the afternoon-and whatever his other faults, he was truly determined to bring the a
"I've read the reports on the Battle of Hyacinth, you know," the rear admiral continued after a moment. "It must have been terrible." He turned to look at her. "Have you read the reports, Loretta?"
"No, Sir. I can't say I have."
"Hyacinth was supposed to be in our possession," Khumalo said, walking slowly back over to his desk and sitting behind it. "In fact, it was when Terekhov's convoy was dispatched there. It was supposed to be turned into one of Eighth Fleet's forward supply depots, but the picket force covering it was hit by a Peep counterattack. The picket didn't have any of the new ship types, and the Peeps were in overwhelming strength. The picket commander had no choice but to withdraw, and when Terekhov arrived, he sailed straight into an ambush."
The rear admiral paused for a moment, one hand toying with a richly ornamented dagger he used as a paperweight.
"The Peeps called on him to surrender, you know," he went on after a few seconds. "He refused. He didn't have any of the pod technology, but he did have all of the new electronics, including the latest generations of ECM and the FTL com, and the freighters in his convoy were loaded with all the latest technology, including spare parts and MDMs intended to reammunition Eighth Fleet. He couldn't let that fall into enemy hands, so he tried to fight his way out, at least get the merchantmen back out across the hyper limit.
"He did get two of them out. But he lost six, and his entire division of light cruisers, and three-quarters of his perso
He stared down at the jewel-hilted dagger and drew it from its sheath. Light glittered on its keenly honed edge, and he turned it slowly, watching the reflection.
"What would you have done in his place, Loretta?" he asked softly, and she stiffened. She said nothing for a moment, and he looked up.
"That's not a trick question," he said. "I suppose what I should have asked is what's your opinion of the decision he actually made."
"I think it took a lot of courage, Sir," she said after a moment, her tone still a bit stiff.
"Oh, there's no question of that," Khumalo agreed. "But is courage enough?" She looked a silent question at him, and he shrugged slightly. "The war was almost over, Loretta. By the time he was ambushed at Hyacinth, it was pretty clear nothing the Peeps had was going to stop Eighth Fleet whatever happened. So was it a case of good judgment, or bad? Should he have surrendered his ships, let the Peeps have the technology, knowing they wouldn't have time to take advantage of it?"
"Sir," Shoupe said in a very careful tone, "you're talking about cowardice in the face of the enemy."
"Am I?" He looked at her levelly. "Cowardice, or good sense?"
"Sir," Shoupe began, then paused. Khumalo's career had been primarily that of a military administrator. He'd commanded several fairly important bases and support stations, some quite close to the front in the First Havenite War, but he himself had never commanded in combat. Was it possible he felt threatened by Terekhov's reputation?