Twilight War Vignettes

[Raellus]

T2K Gdansk
October X, 2000
Baltic Sea, approximately Y km north of Gdansk, Poland

"Do you recognize her?"

The captain steps aside so that his first officer can take a look through the attack periscope. A few seconds pass.

"Is that the Friedrich Engels?"

"It could be," Captain Delbruk opines, impressed. "The Russians changed the hull numbers, so it could be one of her sisters."

Four Volksmarine (DDR navy) Riga-class frigates had sortied during the Wiedervereinigung, joining the Russian Baltic fleet at Baltiysk. The Friedrich Engels was one of them. Whatever her true identity, The U24's quarry is silhouetted against the rising sun, the distinctive profile of the gun-heavy Riga-class frigate standing out in start contrast to its washed out background.

The Soviet Baltic Fleet is really scraping the bottom of the barrel now.
Captain Delbruk retakes command of the periscope.

"Sonar?" he asks.

"No change. Wait!" the sonar operator grimaces, adjusts the volume on the outputs. "Anchor chains. Engines are spinning up."

"ECM?"

"Their radar is off."

"Probably heading back to her patrol box. Fire control?"

"Ready, captain."

The seemingly unwitting frigate is a sitting duck.

"Flood tube 1. Local control. Kapitänleutnant, care to do the honors?"
The young first officer raises his eyebrows at his captain. Delbruk smiles, nods.

"Thank you, sir," Lt. Ulrich answers, stepping back to the periscope. "Fire control, Tube 1, on my mark…

"Fire."

The crew can hear and feel the jolt of the DM2A1 Seal torpedo leaving the forward tube. Electrical impulses fed to the torpedo through the fiber optic cable trailing behind it direct the weapon towards the target, now just barely making way.

"Sonar?" Captain Delbruk asks.

"Still nothing," the operator reports, "I don't think she knows."

"Poor bastards," someone mutters. The comment is answered by a brief bout of soft, nervous laughter.

Several seconds pass. Lt. Ulrich watches events unfold through the lenses of the attack periscope. A huge geyser erupts amidships. The Riga appears to jump out of the water for a couple of heartbeats. When the towering curtain of spray finally falls away, the target vessel is split in half, bow and stern both sinking rapidly.

"Shall we surface, rescue survivors?"

Captain Delbruk smirks. "We don't have the space. Besides, they're probably Russians. Let them try their luck with the Polish fishermen they've been terrorizing."

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