“Well, sir, the Japanese spent a lot of money on their surveillance towed array sonar, called ULTASS. The Japanese sold it to the South Koreans who integrated it into a couple of their subs and their several Aegis destroyers and smaller patrol ships. They fed the data into their torpedoes and antiship missiles automatically so that they were fire-and-forget within seconds of detecting the enemy subs. We didn’t hear about any of this until today as a result of our communications losses. It seems the South Korean torpedoes were very deadly against those quiet diesel submarines. Some of them had apparently been lying submerged off the South Korean coastlines for a week or more. The South Korean studies and mapping of the ocean floor off their coastline apparently had identified every rock more than three meters in diameter. When the South Korean subs painted the ocean floor with sonar, they knew exactly what was already there in the way of rock formations and so on, and what were quietly laying submarines. They blasted the hell out of them. We should survey our coastline like that!
“It seems they sunk a number of surface craft during the North’s amphibious assault on Inchon as well. The North didn’t pull it off near as well as McArthur in 1950. They didn’t get it right before those twenty-foot tides changed, with the consequence that a lot of their landing craft got stuck and became sitting ducks. The South Korean destroyer escorts and patrol boats slaughtered them with long range naval fires as they stuck in the mud. The rapid fire automatic 155 mm AGS guns with high velocity guided munitions that they put on their patrol boats did it. I’m glad to say that we sold them those guns. The North lost a lot more men and equipment than they ever imagined. We didn’t know the South Korean Navy was that sophisticated. Their destroyers and destroyer escorts sailed out of the area for a day or two playing chicken, to return in time to wallop the North Korean Navy when things were most pressing.”
“What’s the latest word on how the ground forces are doing?”
“Things are turning around, Mr. President. Since the nuclear exchange, the South Koreans have given the North a lot stiffer resistance than any one expected. They have launched a guerilla type effort that is showing signs of increasing organization. This is especially true in the eastern part of the peninsula, in the Taebok Mountains. Company- and battalion-sized South Korean units, acting independently, have begun to attack and defeat regimental sized North Korean units. South Korean civilians are beginning to take part in the fighting. The civilians are giving the South Korean Army their food and anything they think can help. It seems the North Korean logistical train has broken down, with their forces running out of food, fuel, and ammunition. There are indications that some North Korean units are beginning to retreat. We don’t know if they are doing this under orders or on their own as a result of pressure from the ROKs. Some of them are retreating through hot areas where tactical nukes were used, apparently unaware of the danger. A lot of them are going to unwittingly commit suicide in doing so. From what we can gather, the ROKs are pursuing them up to those hot areas and then stopping. Consequently, the North Koreans are spending more time in them, to rest and regroup, considering it a respite from the pressure of the ROKs. The ROKs are obviously quite content to let them maximize their own dose of radiation poisoning. It strongly suggests that the North didn’t train its troops very well in NBC, that is, Nuclear, Biological or Chemical warfare.” (NBC, or sometimes referred to as CBR, for chemical, biological and radiological warfare).
Chapter 21
When the SpaceX Dragon rocket with the new shuttle clamped to it began to roll out of its hangar at the Florida launch site, some observers began to call the base. Word was passed to a local newspaper that a shuttle flight might be in progress. A call to NASA by the local paper informed the inquisitive reporter that they were merely rolling it out to do some open-air testing. Being somewhat suspicious, the newspaper put a van with a cameraman and reporter on the perimeter to monitor what was happening. When six astronauts were observed through the powerful lens of the telescope, the cameras began to whirl. A second call went to NASA headquarters in Houston, but again, the response was the same. The crew was going aboard to test several systems rather than in the simulators. New space suits needed to be tested on board to ensure their integration into the shuttle’s onboard systems. NASA told the inquisitive reporters that each suit was tailored to the individual astronaut and their position on the shuttle, so they had to do that under outdoor simulations.
Larry Corning, Diane Foster and Robert Hatcher were all excited and scared out of their wits. Marine Colonel Nathan Berry, Mission Commander, laughed to himself but just grinned at his charges. “Relax folks, this is the most enjoyable ride you will ever have in your lives. Greg and I will give you the view of a lifetime.” Commander Gregory Fletcher, US Navy, second-in-command, computer engineer and navigator, just looked at the passengers and grimaced to himself. He didn’t want them to observe his concern for their preparation with only a two-week crash course on being astronauts. The third member of the crew, Cathy Slayton, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF, aerospace engineer, with several shuttle flights to her credit, had already proven herself a capable astronaut and boom handler extraordinaire. The two gals had immediately bonded.
One hour later, the shuttle lifted off. In thirty minutes, it was orbiting in the same orbit as their first satellite objective. Colonel Berry fired the maneuvering rockets that slowed the shuttle, then gently brought it within meters of the satellite. LTC Slayton opened the shuttle bay and maneuvered the arm to very gently rotate the satellite to bring its “handles” to the appropriate position so that it could be securely grasped. Commander Fletcher donned his space suit for a brief space walk. He went through the airlock while LTC Slayton was securing the satellite. He fired his backpack rockets, which gently propelled him to the satellite. There, he quite carefully folded the solar panels into place. He checked the boom hands to ensure the satellite was properly locked in place. He turned towards the shuttle and gave LTC Slayton a salute. Slayton heard him say, “OK, take it away!”
Now securely locked in position by the boom, she gingerly brought it into the cargo bay of the shuttle. She closed the shuttle bay doors. Commander Fletcher entered the bay with the shuttle, more or less riding on the boom. Slayton then pressurized the bay so that the three passengers could examine the satellite in the bay without having to make a space walk. Fletcher went back through the airlock to climb out of his space suit to give the three scientists room to do their job.
“Ok, people, let’s go take a look at your satellite and see what you can do to fix it,” said Colonel Berry, as he un-strapped himself from his seat. “I’ll stay in the command cockpit while you folks do your thing.”
Drs. Hatcher, Foster and Corning slowly guided themselves over to the hatch leading to the shuttle bay. Once in the shuttle bay, they slowly examined the external surfaces for damage. Seeing none, Dr. Corning began to unscrew the cover plates which covered the computers. He placed the screws in a magnetized dish which he placed on the boom arm. Removing the two computers, he unplugged their hard drives and handed them to Diane Foster. He then began to examine the solar panels by unfolding them and examining them one at a time. Visual inspection suggested the wafers were burned out. He would have to test them for confirmation. They would require replacing if seriously damaged.
Dr. Foster moved back into the shuttle where the necessary instrumentation for testing was located. Twenty minutes later, Corning followed her in with one section of a solar panel. He removed the wafers and connected them to a micro voltmeter. Nothing. They were dead, fried, burned out. He moved back into the shuttle bay and, snapping himself in place by his belt lines, began to remove all four of the burned-out solar panels. He secured them to the bay wall with bungee cords equipped with T hooks that mated in small slots in the structural ribs of the bay. He then opened a long but very shallow locker along the bay wall. He removed the new solar panels one at a time and very carefully folded them, then screwed them in place on the satellite. They were far too big to remain unfolded in the shuttle bay. The panel locker would protrude too far into the shuttle bay if they were stored folded. After replacing all four panels, he floated back to the hatch by giving himself a gentle shove off the boom.
Hatcher came into the shuttle bay to examine the positioning rockets and their controls of the satellite. These were what moved the satellite from orbit to orbit or rotated it to achieve the proper viewing angle. He found no problems with any of them after one hour of examination. He replaced small bottles of liquid fuel for each of the rockets, then moved back into the command area of the shuttle.
Dr. Foster was engrossed in examining the lines of codes. The readings she got indicated that they had been scrambled. All circuits were working normally, they were just sending nonsense signals that could neither be received nor read.
“This is deliberate. This is sabotage of the highest order. I don’t know who had access to these command modes, but they have been deliberately scrambled. Somebody built a worm into this that made it an unintelligible mess upon receipt of a signal. They all have to be replaced. It will take hours on a mega computer, bigger than anything we have on board, hours, and maybe days, to unscramble it and identify the worm. We need to put the new codes in and get that satellite back in working order. We’ll take these boards with us and see what they reveal back on Terra Firma.” She wrote “scrambled” on the hard drives and packed them in a small lock box. Then she removed two new hard drives and handed them to Corning. He looked at her with a fixed stare. Then she realized why.
“Don’t worry, I programmed this myself. I am the only one who knows the codes in these, and I have secured the only copies of them where no one else in the world knows.”
“OK Di, I believe you. I’ll go stick them in the satellite right now so we can get out of here. This weightlessness bugs me.” He grinned and pushed himself away from her computer screen towards the hatch. He carefully replaced the computer hard drives in the satellite and returned to the command area. “How soon can we get out of here?” he asked.
COL Berry just grinned, and said, “We are coming up on an orbital path in about an hour and thirty minutes. We’ll touch down in Houston in no time.”
Berry turned to Slayton and said, “Let’s get that satellite back in orbit, Colonel. I think the man here must have a hot date tonight.” Cathy Slayton grinned, knowing that it was really Berry who had the hot date.
“Aye aye, Colonel,” she replied with a grin and wink. She checked the airlock and hatch doors, then strapped herself into her seat and began to open the shuttle bay doors. Once fully opened, she carefully raised the boom arm to its maximum height, then opened the claws of the boom to release the satellite. When the claws opened, they gave the satellite a very gentle shove, which sent it a few meters away from the ship and the boom arm. Carefully, she lowered the boom back into the shuttle bay, then closed the bay doors. “Satellite free, boom secure, bay doors closed and locked. Do you want to test it while we are here, Dr. Foster?”
“Absolutely,” she cried. She spun her chair around and sent a simple maneuver signal to the satellite, which caused the rockets to ignite and send the satellite a mile higher. Then she positioned the satellite to focus on earth and initiated its television camera. The image she received on her computer screen was bright and clear. Next, she signaled the infra-red camera to initiate photography. The image was clean and crisp.
“Big Eye is back in business!” she exclaimed, then realized what she had said. No one however, seemed to pay any attention at all.
“How do we know, Di, that it won’t be disrupted again?”
“It will take another nuclear blast with a large EMP pulse to do it. I redid the codes differently than before. It won’t respond to any signal but mine. It disregards all others. That way, nobody can interfere. Regarding another EMP event, it will have to be up here in space, pretty close to the satellite. I lined these circuit boards with a gold over layer to ensure that far off pulses won’t screw it up. Anything below 50,000 feet shouldn’t interfere with it at all.”
“Smart girl,” Berry said. He had been admiring her figure from afar for the last two weeks. She smiled in return.
“Alright, back to business. Coming up on the orbital re-entry point. Everybody in your seats. Get buckled and double check.” He spun around, buckled himself in, tugged on them, and then began throwing switches as Greg went down the checklist. Cathy Slayton began to double check their entry data.
“Re-entry point in ten minutes,” stated the LTC navigator and boom girl Friday. Greg kept going down the checklist, while Slayton checked in with NASA in Houston. They confirmed her readings and gave them a go. At the countdown, Berry ignited the shuttle rocket and positioned the shuttle for a glide path to Houston. Forty-five minutes later they touched down at NASA.
After coming to a stop, Dr. Foster put the damaged hard drives in her carry-on bag. They deplaned, so to speak, to a waiting vehicle who took them immediately to NASA. The first thing Diane Foster did was to hand the hard drives over to the Flight Director. “I need maximum computer power. I don’t know what you have here, but I will need about one million gigabytes computing power to do this in hours. Otherwise, it will take days.”
“And you shall have it. When do you want it? I suggest you shower and eat, and maybe even sleep for a while, before tackling this.”
“No, I’m too excited to sleep. I’ll eat and shower, but then I’ll start on this.”
Once out of their space suits, they all showered and moved to the chow hall. It was evident they already considered themselves a team, the three scientists and the shuttle crew.
At the console, Diane Foster plugged in the hard drive and began to decipher the codes. Three hours later, she fell asleep. Three hours after that an alarm went off which awakened her. The computer identified a worm that was programmed in when the program was written. She copies that information on a thumb drive and then continued. She found a second worm embedded in the program as a back up, in case the first worm failed. She put that on a separate thumb drive. Another hour went by, and the nanoboard had been completely scanned. She plugged in the second hard drive and had her answer six hours later. It was clean. She called the Flight Director. “I need a secure phone, now.”
“I have one on my desk you can use. You can punch in a direct dial to the President, to Fred Gateway or to Ed McCluskey if you like.”
She nodded in agreement, and said, “Let’s go to your office.” Once there, she said, “Excuse me, but I must make this call to Ed McCluskey in absolute privacy.” He picked up the phone, punched some buttons and handed it to her. When she heard the voice on the other end, she said “Siphonoptera” as a code word only the two of them knew. He replied with “Quintus Atillius,” a response that only he knew. They each knew they had the right party.
“What do you have, Doctor?”
She sighed, “I hate to say this, but we have a mole in the organization. Only one hard drive had been reprogrammed, and it was done on the ground floor. Someone in our organization who has the highest of clearance did this. Only a handful of such people had access. I can’t identify who for sure, but I have some ideas.”
“NASA has a Lear jet there. Put Mike back on, and I’ll have the three of you here in a couple of hours.”
She put down the phone and walked over to the door. Flight Director Mike Shannon was leaning against the opposite wall of the corridor. “Ed wants to speak to you.”
He walked in and picked up the phone. “This is Mike.”
“Mike, get those people on your Lear, and get them here as quickly as is safely possible.”
“I think I can get them airborne in about forty-five minutes. About three hours’ flight time, I’ll have them there in time for supper. Anything else?”
“That’s it. Thanks, Mike.”
Mike punched a number into his phone. “Get the Lear ready and warmed up as quickly as possible. Flight plan is for Andrews Air Force Base. Let me know ten minutes before you are ready. Call me on my cell,” and he hung up. “Let’s round up the rest of the crew.” Four hours later, the Lear landed at Andrews, where a three-car escort was waiting for them. All three cars had deeply tinted windows and looked alike. The cars played shuffleboard across the tarmac as a somewhat feeble effort at the old game of pea under the shell.
Fred Gateway, Jim Neville and Ed McCluskey were waiting for them at Langley, CIA headquarters. Drs. Hatcher and Corning were warmly greeted by the three and congratulated, but then escorted elsewhere for debriefing. Dr. Foster accompanied the three to a separate room where two other men whom she did not know were waiting. They were not introduced, so she did not ask.
Ed McCluskey opened with, “What did you find, Doctor?”
“The big news is a worm. The solar panels were also fried by an EMP but easily replaced.” She produced the hard drives and stated, “This drive was programmed with two worms. This second drive is clean. With the exception of me, the same people did not work on both drives. That narrows our field down to about four people, those who worked only on this drive. Whoever did this had to know the type, configuration of both the hardware and software, and access to these drives of the onboard computers. I am sure you will put those people under intense scrutiny.”
“Is there anyone in particular you suspect, Dr.?” asked Fred Gateway. She lowered her head as she thought. She had suspicions but was reluctant to express them as she had no proof, only a gut level feeling. Out of concern of leveling possibly false charges which might do irreparable harm to one’s career and possibly their life, she finally said, “No, there is no one I particularly suspect.”
“Can you tell us why these worms were not picked up before the satellite was sent into orbit, Doctor?”
“There are over 2.5 million lines of code on each of these hard drives. To do so would require a computer review of enormous magnitude. Very few computers in the world have enough power to do that. Even so, it took six hours for NASA’s largest to find these two worms. It is virtually impossible to detect them. The initial worm was actually broken into several parts so that it would appear as an error that the code writer failed to erase or correct. The result was that the individual pieces would cascade together as they received their signals. The individual pieces would appear as nonsense and not be worth the effort to dig out these pieces, possibly damaging other codes. You would most likely do more damage than good. You could almost liken it to a piece of DNA in a gene whose function was not recognized nor appreciated. Maybe a better illustration would be a piece of shrapnel in a critical anatomical location in a wounded soldier that would result in greater damage removing it than if you left it in place.”
