Free Red Star Rogue by Kenneth Sewell

retrofit.
    When running on the surface or snorkeling, the navigator would extend an antenna from the conning tower to obtain a radio-navigational signal transmitted from a known geographic location. Under ideal conditions, the submarine’s position could be established within a hundred-foot radius. A sextant was built into the navigational periscope, giving the navigator a secondary method of calculating his position, using celestial bodies. Positions were periodically confirmed to headquarters through coded, microburst radio transmissions. The senior navigator was Captain-Lieutenant Nikolai Pikulik, and the assistant navigator was Lieutenant Anatoly Dykin.
    The submarine’s radio room was one of the most secure posts in the boat—only specifically cleared personnel could enter the room. It was the submarine’s lifeline to headquarters and the critical nerve center for receiving changes in orders, war alerts, and actual clearances from fleet headquarters to activate and fire missiles. The Soviets knew the Americans were listening to every radio transmission, even though they were sent out over the airways in undecipherable microbursts. The job of radio man was one of the submarine’s most important, and Senior Lieutenant Alexander Zarnakov held the post of radio electronic officer.
    The K-129 had another assigned officer whose job went beyond the functions of the boat itself. A radio intelligence officer was stationed on the submarine to collect information on enemy shipping, antisubmarine warfare activities, and land-based military facilities. This officer eavesdropped on maritime, aviation, and shore radio traffic wherever the boat sailed. Senior Lieutenant Vladimir Mosyachkin was the radio intelligence officer. He assisted the radio operator in transmitting and receiving signals involved in the boat’s regular operations.
    When the Soviets and Americans began deploying strategic nuclear missiles, a new type of high-tech submarine officer had to be trained. These specialists—submarine missile officers—were required to become expert in nuclear weaponry, ballistics, and the emerging new launch technology. K-129’s weapons officer was Captain Third Rank Gennady Panarin. The assistant weapons officer was Captain-Lieutenant Victor Zuev.
    In addition to its three Serb ballistic missiles, K-129 carried two other strategic weapons. Two of the submarine’s sixteen torpedoes were equipped with nuclear warheads, to be used in an attack on a U.S. carrier task force or fired into an enemy’s harbor, shoreline city, or military installation for maximum strategic damage. The remaining, regular torpedoes were intended for use against Allied submarines or surface warships. The torpedo/mine officer was Captain Third Rank Eugeny Kovalev.
    While these operational officers had to display a high degree of technical initiative to keep their substandard boats working, there was no room for innovation when it came to carrying out the mission. The strict controls of missile submarine operations extended all the way up the chain of command to Moscow.
    No other arm of the Soviet military establishment was more rigidly controlled than the ballistic missile submarine force. Even fleet commanders, such as Admiral Ivan Amelko of the Pacific Fleet, had little discretion in assigning missions to the missile boats. The K-129’s division commander, Admiral Dygalo, and squadron commander, Admiral Rudolf A. Golosov, had no authority to dispatch or alter a mission for any of the missile submarines under their commands. These frontline admirals were primarily conveyors of the orders to the boat captains.
    Authority for the strategic deployment of K-129 and other missile submarines in the fleets was vested in supreme naval headquarters in Moscow. Admiral of the Soviet navy Sergey Gorshkov was the real commander of the Soviet missile submarine fleets. He took his orders exclusively from General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev and that dictator’s small