Just then Weed entered the room.
“Weed,” Matson asked. “What assets do you have south of here?”
Unsure of what was going on, Weed took a moment before he answered to do a mental roll call that all present were read-in to Century Ratchet.
“Norman Kleiss has a Fire Scout detachment and one Sierra with two crews. Not sure where they are now, but they’ve been working south.”
“They are still down there,” Captain Browne nodded.
Matson nodded. “Great. Okay, Weed, contact them and get the Fire Scout airborne. Need to find these fuckers now.”
Captain Sanders joined them, and the officers plotted their next moves. With time short — the yacht moved one mile closer to the safety of Colombian territorial waters every three minutes — they had to act. There was no time to “ask” Washington for orders, no time to ask SOUTHCOM in Miami for guidance. A clear act of war had been committed, and the brain trust of Coral Sea was in no mood to let the perpetrators squirm free without any effort to stop them. Forgiveness could be sought later. Sanders called the bridge and spoke with the Navigator. Within minutes, they felt the ship heel to port and accelerate.
The chase was on.
But one other person aboard Coral Sea needed to be part of the decision-making process.
Meyerkopf was incredulous. In his thirty years in uniform he had never heard of such a thing. He was the Strike Group Commander, the Senior Officer Present Afloat, and he was in the dark about what his strike group was involved in! Subordinates on his own flagship were fighting a quasi-war under his nose! Why hadn’t he been briefed on Century Ratchet?
He glared at Sanders and Matson — and at his own Chief of Staff, Ed Browne, aviators all. Betrayal. Confusion. They seemed to be running the show. And who is this commander they called Weed? NSA? CIA? What the hell is going on? After Weed finished reading him in, Matson spoke first.
“Admiral, I’m sorry you weren’t on the cleared list for Century Ratchet, but our orders were clear.”
“You’ve been sinking and shooting down drug runners for the past three weeks?”
“In a manner of speaking, sir. Commander Hopper’s personnel are using your ships and aircraft.”
“Behind my back?” Meyerkopf shot back. Matson didn’t have an answer.
“Sir,” Captain Sanders jumped in, “we didn’t ask for this arrangement. This came from Fleet Forces with elaborate cover stories and a small need-to-know contingent for this strike group. All of us are in the middle here, but after what happened this morning, and the fact that time is of the essence, we needed to act first and bring you in second.