Chapter One

INDOPACOM Command Joint Staff Operations Center

Camp H. M. Smith Aiea, Hawaii

It’s right there below the surface, Admiral Nikki Fury, the INDOPACOM J3, thought as she scanned the watch change over inside the operations center.

I’ve been at work for twelve hours and some of my staff longer. The signs are there. Their quickness of step, no one is ambling around the watch floor.

The hushed conversations, joking all but gone. Their eyes flitting from their displays to the COP, our common operating picture. The tension palpable to anyone with a pulse.

The crew’s commitment to the security of the nation means that very few want to leave. But they have to keep up the staff holiday vacation and reduced manning look I need the Weigon assets to report.

Those in critical positions will pick up the kids and hand them off, or lead a practice then report to one of our alternate locations. We have placed them at MWR, military welfare and recreation facilities and resorts. No one wants to be on vacation or at home when the action starts.

I’m running through likely scenarios when Chief Warrant Officer 5, aka CWO, Anderson steps into my line of sight a mischievous grin on her face.

“What’s the good word, Chief,” I ask.

“Admiral, the instrumentation of the Pacifica Internet of Things is paying off,” Anderson said. “We have additional environmental sensors and critical infrastructure nodes reporting anomalies. We shared the data with their intelligence team who are reporting similar indications of anomalous activity. Per our SOP, General Bennett is coordinating SOF support to the police and NSB.”

“Excellent, show me the anomalies,” I say and logout of my cross-domain console.

I slid left as CWO stepped to the console and authenticated. Seconds later a map popped to the display labeled Secret, and she enlarged it. The display was lit up with IOT and environmental sensors hits, as the saying goes, around the coastline.

She selected JWICS and logged into the network. The map application pulled from the TS repository and updated the display with data from our INTs.

“Is the P-8 testing the quantum radar back in the air?”

“Yes ma’am, it’s here,” she said, pointing to a test coded icon that hides the aircraft’s actual mission.

“Good,” I say, noting its position relative to the Fujian aircraft carrier. It’s Admiral Jun’s flagship. They are keeping their distance, as we planned. That will permit the team aboard the Jimmy Carter to complete their tasking without the P-8 alerting the crew aboard the carrier or the escort ships in the fleet.

“We should see reporting from General Bennetts units within the hour. Task Force Sea Dogs are,” CWO checked her watch, “eleven minutes from anticipated contact.”

I scan the COP, it appears stable, I wouldn’t call it calm, but there is time. “CWO, join us into the SOCPAC domain.”

Anderson switched the console back to Secret and selected the special operations domain. Her clearances, which match mine, permit us to watch the operation unfold via UAV and radio traffic feeds.

#

The UAV that circles overhead has the Weigon swimmers tagged. They have switched out of what I expect were their dry suits they used during infiltration. They are in civilian clothes with sizable packs.

They are walking along a dike with rice paddies to their left and thick jungle on their right. The sun is over their shoulders as they attempt to look like hikers.

I know where they are headed. It’s the only piece of critical infrastructure in the area, a major telecom node. They must believe that they can access the node and use it to disrupt Pacifica wide communications. Once accessed and taken over, they could pass false information that could result in police and first responders heading to fake problems that would open other critical infrastructure to attack.

What they don’t know, and the J6 briefed the command staff on, is that Pacifica has embedded Owl Cyber Defense cross domain and diode technology at their prime telecom nodes. It ensures that only approved protocols and message types are sent between nodes and the master controller. Anything outside the proscribed message types is alerted on and sent to the Pacifica version of a Defensive Cyber Operations team.

There are glints of light from their sides. “Good, but not good enough,” CWO said, pointing at the display. “They are keeping their weapons close to their sides so that we can’t identify them from the drone. But they aren’t using scope caps on their rifle optics and that is sunlight reflecting off the eyepiece.”

CWO speaks from her tactical deployment experience. She deployed with Seal Team 8 to Afghanistan and operated in the field where minimizing their physical signature was a key element of their success. In the eyes of the enemy, the SEALs would appear out of thin air to capture a high value target.

We hear the request to the UAV operator and see their response as the camera zooms out to show the Weigon swimmers in relationship to the Pacifica SEALs and the Sea Dogs. The joint platoon is set up in a classic L shaped ambush.

Time slows down for me as the bad guys enter the ambush.

“Blue Ten, go,” the radio chirps.

I’m not surprised when one of our SEALs rises up and takes down the last man in line. The Weigon soldier goes limp as he is dragged off the trail.

“Light them up,” the Pacifica platoon leader orders.

The video feed comes alive with visible laser beams dancing on the Weigon troops, it’s the platoon’s rifle lasers. Of the five remaining swimmers, three raise their hands and two try to bring their rifles to bear on the platoon. They are gunned down.

The Pacifica SEALs take control of the swimmers that surrendered and check the dead. They are separated, stripped of their weapons and packs and secured. Less than five minutes later the first of the three 160th Night Stalkers helicopters land on the dike and take off. Each has a mix of Pacifica and US SEALs and Weigon swimmers.

“They will stick to their resistance fighter stories and claim no allegiance to Weigon,” CWO said.

“Agreed. The Aussies have tagged the mini-sub and are tracking its return to the mother ship, which they will also tag. They will follow it back to its home base, wherever that may be,” I say. “It’s an excellent opportunity to collect some priority intelligence.”

“None of what we just accessed and observed would have been possible without your push to deploy cross domain at scale across this command and its major components.”

“CWO, do you know how many classifications the COP synthesizes to present the information we use daily?” I ask.

“That’s dark arts for me, Admiral. But if I had to guess I’d say, open source, the three partner classified networks they share, Unclass, Secret, Secret-Rel, Top Secret, and above. About ten total.”

“Thats close, not counting caveats, etc.,” I say. “The highest-level inputs are stripped of any meta-data that would indicate means and methods, then downgraded. It’s a thing of beauty. Video, voice, data from all our domains and classifications.”

“I’m impressed with our ability to share data with our FVEY, five eyes and coalition partners in the region,” CWO said. “The Mission Partner Environment has taken a few years to develop, but its usefulness would be diminished without its cross-domain capabilities.”

“True. Cross domain at scale is the technical foundation on which the command’s cyber and information dominance is built upon. We can take in data from untrusted sources like social media and trusted like data from our Aussie friends. We can move it up and down depending on need and fuse it together in ways we never imagine just five years ago. In today’s world where we need to operate at the speed of light, and share it throughout the coalition force, aka CJADC2, it puts us in an over-match position.”

#

Chapter Two

USS Jimmy Carter

Pacifica Strait

“XO the bridge is yours,” Jake Juconovich, the skipper of the USS Jimmy Carter said, noting their parallel position two hundred feet off their port side.

“XO has the con,” the COB, Chief Of the Boat said.

“Helm make your depth two zero zero feet relative, XO said referring to the Weigon aircraft carrier above, the Fujian.

The COB relayed the order, and the boat began its slow ascent while matching the Fujian’s speed.

The skipper headed to the MMP Multi-Mission Platform. The cyber guys were about to take on the highest priority tasking of their deployment so far. The MMP held an interesting mixture of state-of-the-art technology and black program prototypes.

The mixture of three letter agency cyber experts supported the boat defensive cyber operations, and the SEALs when they deployed. When operating in the Pacific area of operations, they also took various taskings from INDOPACOM via Colonel Lytle.

Today’s mission was more technical than most. Step one was the deployment of the Sharks. They were UUVs, unmanned underwater vehicles that looked and swam like sharks. Their role in the mission was to swim a section of Weigon fishing net and metal cables around the port propeller.

It was an intricate dance that the AI enabled Sharks completed due in part to the Fujian’s slow departure from the area around Pacifica.

On the bridge, the crew heard the ship shutter as sonar reported the Fujian was slowing. The XO passed the message to the skipper in the MMP.

The skipper turned to the flashing light on a wall mounted handset and put it to his ear. “Skipper, the target is slowing. They have transitioned to starboard propulsion only. It appears they are inspecting the port side systems for damage.”

“Acknowledged,” he said. They had time before the Fujian’s crew would give an all clear and they would return to transit mode. The eighty-thousand-ton aircraft carrier would take a few miles to burn off its residual speed.

The Sharks were being recovered as the Trinity fish was deployed. Trinity was the wire guided stealth torpedo that carried the blue laser that would make the connection to device planted aboard the Fujian.

The skipper watched the display as Trinity headed for its target. It slowed, then held station with the Fujian. It was a long minute later that the metadata indicated it had established the blue laser connection.

Victor, the tech reversed the order of operation from what Colonel Lytle had described to Admiral Fury and pushed a firmware update to the catapult. It took seventeen seconds.

It was designed to look like a manually initiated process tied to the master administrators account. Sorry, not sorry, Victor thought.

He flashed a thumbs up to the skipper and his teammate Gina who attempted to access the backdoor in the catapult software. The skipper smiled. She talked to the software aboard the Fujian, the flag ship of the Weigon fleet, like a friend she hadn’t seen in a while.

Weigon characters flowed across the display. Gina opened another window where the translation appeared. She typed furiously for a minute then leaned back in her chair.

“I updated the backdoor code and added an additional access vector,” she said. “I also gifted them the Stux X worm to chase.”

“You can retrieve Trinity,” Victor said.

“Stux X, do I want to know?” The skipper asked.

“Yes, as it’s a mission I believe we will be tasked to perform again,” Victor said a grin spreading across his face. “We just injected code that will infect their control systems leading to disruptions of services from bow to stern of the Fujian. It will not go live until after the code switch that brings the catapult back online in a week.”

“What happens if they fix the cat sooner than in seven days?”

“Stux X uses a covert channel to monitor the cat and will go live with a surge of gremlins the crew will chase for weeks,” Victor said. “While the code waits to surge it will replicate itself all over the ship, so if they find one cell, another will take its place.”

“The Weigon make use of firewall type devices. They haven’t figure out the benefits of using diodes and cross domain guards to segment their shipboard networks and protect them from people like us,” Gina said. She smiled as she fist bumped Victor.

“Did I mention I’m glad you are on our team,” the skipper said a twinkle in his eyes. “Good work,” he said, turning to take in the techs and crew that had deployed the Sharks and brought Trinity aboard.

Back on the bridge, the XO announced. Skipper has the con.

XO handed his boss a message. He read it and nodded.

“Send a message to Admiral Fury, mission complete. In route new tasking best speed.”

“Ay, skipper.”

The COB stood at the skipper’s side and handed him a fresh cup of coffee. “Our crew is the best in the fleet, and they know that, but it would be good to acknowledge them when this is over.”

“If we are still operational in forty-eight hours, we’ll throw the biggest party this boat has ever seen.”

“It’s that spicy topside?”

“Yes, it is COB. Have Lieutenant Denver report. His SEALs have mission that when added to the chaos we just created will help dissuade the Weigon military from continuing the path Admiral Fury believes they are on.”

The COBs eyes went wide for a beat, then darkened as a frown framed his face. “Invasion?” he whispered.

The skipper nodded as the COB left the bridge to collect the SEAL platoon commander.

“Lots of work to do and little time to change the course of history,” the skipper whispered to himself.

#

Chapter Three

Weigon South Pacific Fleet

Flagship Fujian

The ship’s Captain had sent his runner to find Admiral Jun. He was with the CAG, carrier air group commander and his drone specialist as they worked through the after-action-report. The focus of the conversation, what caused the swarm to go offline, never to be seen or heard of again.

A lieutenant with thick black glasses stood. “Sir, there is data to suggest the UAVs were destroyed or caused to malfunction in groups of three.”

“Groups of three are our most common flight pattern,” A major added.

“Millions of Yuan of our most advanced stealth technology just disappeared,” Jun said. “Your report said nothing about the American’s detecting the swarm, do you still believe that is the case?”

The major’s Adams apple bobbed as he stuttered. A runner appeared; he stared at his feet.

Jun opened and inspected the handwritten update from the Captain of the Fujian his XO for the Gray Swan operation.

All ships fueled and replenished.

Gray Swan teams feet dry, moving to staging points.

Assets report staff reductions at key locations INDOPACOM and PACAF.

Without warning, Admiral Jun flew into the bulkhead as the great ship shuddered. His head thumped the steel wall. The CAG picked himself up from the deck, wiped blood seeping into his right eye, and rushed to the admiral’s side.

Jun shook his head to clear his vision. The side of his head hurt, so he explored the center of the pain, his hand came away red. The drone officer called for medical assistance.

The admiral took the CAG’s help and wobbled as he stood. Alarms sounded, calls for medical support crashed over each other on the ship wide system.

Admiral Su Jun scowled at the lack of discipline. The surge of adrenaline steeled his legs, and he strode to the nearest handset and called the bridge. “Captain, get control of your ship, or you will be replaced,” he growled.

“Check your crew,” he ordered the CAG. “And ready the second squadron of drones.”

Jun had never run aground but suspected what had just happened to be similar.

But it can’t be that, we are in the strait.

As he made his way to the bridge, there were scores of beat up and broken bone sailors. The sailors aft mess was just that, food and supplies were everywhere. A covered body highlighted the human toll, as did the blood on the nearby hatch.

Jun stepped through, avoiding the stain. What percentage of the ship’s complement is combat ineffective?

It took another four minutes to reach the bridge even as the sailors made way and pulled their injured teammates aside to clear a path for the admiral.

Contrary to the scene below the bridge was a quiet hum of activity as the Captain and his staff worked the problem.

“Admiral on the bridge,” the officer of the watch called out.

The Captain approached. “Sir. It appears from the debris that we caught a section of discarded fishing net. The problem has cleared itself, but I ordered the shutdown of the starboard side propulsion system so the engineer can assess the system for damage. We lost a J-15 aircraft over the side that was being moved. All other systems are green.”

“Can you fight the ship?”

The Captain snapped to the position of attention. “Yes, sir! My XO is collecting the section injury reports which will be extensive. But our crew redundancies will ensure we can fight at your order admiral.”

“Excellent,” Jun said as he took notice that the ship had slowed. The Fujian had been built for power projection, but its ultimate purpose was war. It was central to the Gray Swan plan and therefore essential that it remained operational.

The admiral took his seat. As he settled in, his aide appeared. He limped to his side and presented him a tray with his tea, a small paper cup with two pills, and a warm wet towel. “Sir, do you require medical assistance?”

“No, thank you Kia,” he said, downing the pills followed by a long sip of tea. He wiped the dried blood from the side of his face and held the towel to his head.

The officer of the watch handed the admiral the report from the CAG.

One fighter lost over the side. One fighter damaged beyond repair.

Three fighter aircraft damaged – require maintenance.

One KJ-600 damaged – require maintenance.

Pilots at 45% readiness, support staff 32%.

Admiral Jun imagined a knife’s edge that separated success from defeat. We are precariously close to being cut off. The image switched to the Supreme Leader turning and walking away.

He needed to report their status to the military leadership who would pass it to their president. How should I word the report, so it doesn’t raise alarm…

Jun looked to his tea. He didn’t believe the leaves had anything useful to say. That flamed the smoldering cider of his destain for the party politico’s that wavered in their belief that Gray Swan was the path to re-integration.

Now is the time we must invade.

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