An nuclear submarine in the North Atlantic has a reactor incident and is compelled to surface. The naval command of its erstwhile adversary offers assistance, which is rejected because of misplaced national pride and a fear of revealing secrets. The stricken submarine’s crew is unable to control the situation, and the submarine sinks, threatening the lives of all aboard and sparking an international crisis.
This scenario reads like a composite of the series of Soviet and Russian submarine disasters that culminated in the loss of KURSK in August 2000. In fact, it comes from a 1982 Soviet film, Incident at Map Grid 36-80, and the luckless submarine is American. The film is one of a dozen or so thrillers directed by Mikhail Tumanishvili. While it predates the much better known Hunt for Red October by eight years, this work cannot compare with its US counterpart in either suspense or production values. Yet al I the same it is worth watching, even two decades after its release. It gives us lengthy scenes of the Soviet Navy in action, and more importantly, it provides invaluable insights into a mindset that still drives the Russian Navy.
Incident al Map Grid 36-80 is a not-very-distinguished example of that typical late Cold War genre, the geopolitical thriller. Its plot is straightforward-the Soviet North Sea Fleet is conducting Fall exercises, and of course is being shadowed by air, surface, and subsurface units of the US Navy. Operating immediately outside the Soviet exercise area is a nuclear attack submarine USS BARRA-CUDA, partnered with a P-3C Orion. To give his team real-life training, the submarine’s weapons officer sets up a cruise missile strike profile on seven Soviet surface ships, including the exercise flagship, VTOL carrier KIEV. He assures a nervous subordinate that the missiles cannot be launched accidentally, as the firing computer is locked and the only override controls are in the commanding officer’s stateroom.
In the middle of the exercise BARRACUDA suffers a reactor accident. Ordinarily it would surface to survey the extent of the casualty and make repairs. In order to maintain secrecy, the commanding officer, Captain Turner, orders a technician to enter the contaminated compartment and conduct the survey while the submarine is still submerged. While the rising level of radiation forces the submarine to surface, the technician, Allen, has already been exposed to a lethal dose. In his bitterness he breaks into Turner’s stateroom, triggers all computer overrides, and then breaks into the communication compartment and broadcasts an SOS. Finally, Allen leaps into a life raft and paddles away into the astonishingly calm October waters off North Cape, shouting for those crew members in earshot to save themselves and Jet him die.
The Soviet exercise commander, Admiral Spirin, is alerted to this incident when one of his reconnaissance aircraft spots the crippled submarine and reports abnormally high radiation levels. He immediately contacts his US counterpart, Admiral Rink, and offers assistance. Rink assures him that the submarine is in control of the situation and no assistance is needed. Minutes later Spirin receives BARRACUDA ‘s SOS. He immediately orders a rescue team sent out.
The rescuers will ride to Map Grid 36-80 in a specially designed enclosed boat strapped to the belly of a modified Tu-16 BADGER. Over the submarine the boat will detach, parachuting down with rescuers aboard. There is one hitch-the rescue aircraft does not have the range to reach the US submarine without refueling. While a tanker is available and in the air, it does not have enough fuel aboard to refuel the rescue aircraft and itself return to base. Without hesitation Spirin orders the tanker to drain itself dry, fly back as far as possible, and ditch when the last drop of fuel is gone. He will have a second rescue team on hand to pick up any survivors.
The humiliation of being offered assistance from the Soviets unnerves Admiral Rink. He orders Turner not to allow the Soviet rescuers to board his submarine or off-load its crew. The obedient Turner fires a nasty-looking Colt .45 over the heads of his would-be rescuers, while another American follows up with a burst of semiautomatic fire. Rink also orders the P-3C to prevent the rescue attempt by interfering with the air-to-air refueling. When this fails, Rink cashiers the hapless pilot on the spot.
Meanwhile, below decks on BARRACUDA, things are going from bad to worse. Not only is the reactor out of control-no longer locked, the firing computer has ordered cruise missiles fired at the two nearest Soviet ships, including KIEV. Fortunately the Soviets are able to shoot down the two incoming using SA-N-3 surface-to-air missiles and YAK-36 fighters. But Admiral Spirin’s patience is at an end. He gives the Americans ten minutes to scuttle their submarine; otherwise he will sink it himself. A heartbroken Turner is the last to leave for the safety of the Soviet rescue boat. He watches sadly as his submarine sinks slowly beneath the waves. In a thrilling climax to the movie, the tanker pilot saves his crew by disobeying orders and crash-landing at a deserted World War II German airfield right on the coast.
Meanwhile, below decks on BARRACUDA, things are going from bad to worse. Not only is the reactor out of control-no longer locked, the firing computer has ordered cruise missiles fired at the two nearest Soviet ships, including KIEV. Fortunately the Soviets are able to shoot down the two incoming using SA-N-3 surface-to-air missiles and YAK-36 fighters. But Admiral Spirin’s patience is at an end. He gives the Americans ten minutes to scuttle their submarine; otherwise he will sink it himself. A heartbroken Turner is the last to leave for the safety of the Soviet rescue boat. He watches sadly as his submarine sinks slowly beneath the waves. In a thrilling climax to the movie, the tanker pilot saves his crew by disobeying orders and crash-landing at a deserted World War II German airfield right on the coast.
An interesting facet of the film is its portrayal of the US Navy. Tumanishvili was out to create an impression of Americanness rather than portray American naval personnel with strict accuracy. The results can be jarring or amusing to US audiences, although it must be conceded that the effect is more true to life than Sean Connery’s performance as Captain Ramius in Hunt for Red October. Tumanishvili cast Baits-actors from Latvia, Lithuania, and Esto-nia-to play most of the American roles, presumably because they appeared more Western to his Soviet audience than Russians would have. All the film’s Americans have fairly pronounced foreign accents, and they do not differentiate between American and British English usage. In an attempt to portray the multiethnic nature of the US military, an African actor portrays a P-3C crew member-at other points in the film, African-Americans are portrayed by actors in blackface.
This Jack of concern for strict accuracy extends to uniforms, insignia, ranks, nomenclature, behavior, and dialogue. One example is that US naval aviators-like their Soviet counterparts-are given army-style ranks. Thus, the pilot of the P-3C is Major Armstrong.
On several occasions, US mission commanders acknowledge a transmission in the Russian manner. For instance, Captain Turner says,”1 am BARRACUDA” rather than “This is BARRACUDA.” 1 It might be noted at this point that the subtitles are incomplete and occasionally misleading, and complicate the viewer’s problem in identifying and tracking the various characters.
One of the big attractions of the film is its portrayal of then state-of-the-art Soviet military equipment and platforms in actual operation. Not surprisingly, both the Americans and the Soviets use Soviet systems in this film. For example, the P-3C is actually an 11-38 MAY, US surface ships are played by KRESTA-class cruisers with American-style hull numbers painted on, and a VICTOR I plays USS BARRACUDA. All the interior scenes are filmed either in an actual Soviet submarine or in sets modeled on Soviet submarines. When BARRACUDA fires cruise missiles at KIEV, we see SHADDOCKs blasting off. We see Y AK-36 flight operations from KIEV, AA-3-N missiles shooting down the ASMs, and-most spectacular of all, a complete wing-tip to wing-tip aerial refueling operation between two BADGERs. We are reminded of the throw away nature of Soviet military equipment when we learn that as an eight-year-old aircraft, Yolk’s BADGER tanker is viewed as worn out and ready for the scrap heap. Because of US emphasis on repair and preventive maintenance, aircraft often are kept flying for twenty years or longer.
From the opening scenes, when his collie brings him his slippers at sunrise, it is clear that Major Gennadi Volk is the film’ s hero. Volk, pilot of the Tu-16 tanker, is highly regarded by subordinates and superiors alike, but at thirty he is at a career dead end unless he upgrades to a more advanced aircraft. This he refuses to do, for reasons he has not shared with his wife, and the old timers in his squadron will not disclose to newcomers. Toward the end of the film we learn the secret-Volk and his navigator, Captain Sergei Skiba, have flown together for the past eight years, since Skiba pulled him from the wreckage of a plane crash. Skiba is 47, past the mandatory retirement age for his grade. However, a regulation allows him to continue in the service so long as he is part of a functioning crew. Volk is ruining his own career so that his friend can keep flying.
The issue is pointed enough that Admiral Spirin himself ex-presses his frustration that he cannot promote Volk. The North Fleet naval air commander, Major General Pavlov, decides to resolve the situation by flying with the tanker during the exercise. The stirring events of the day allow Pavlov to observe Volk at his best and most daring. That evening the tanker crew, including Pavlov, meet for a dinner party at Yolk’s apartment. Skiba pulls the general aside and gives him his letter requesting retirement. Pavlov shakes his hand and tells him he’s done the right thing. At the end of the film we see Lieutenant Colonel Volk flying off in his brand-new Tu-95 BEAR D reconnaissance aircraft.
A running theme in the film is the demands military service places on marriages. Yolk’s wife is highly discontented with the role she is expected to play, a patient Penelope eternally waiting for her husband’s return. When preparing for the dinner party, she vents her feelings on Nadezhda Pavlova, the general’s wife. Pavlova essentially tells her to suck it up. The nature of her own marriage is reinforced at dinner. Pavlov was hit by flying glass in the crash landing, but he does not worry his wife with his near escape. Instead, he tells her that his face is bandaged because he was scratched by a kitten. At other points in the film we see a crusty old warrant officer chewing out a conscript for marrying a seventeen-year-old girl, and hear Skiba bemoaning the choices that have left him a middle-aged bachelor. One contrast Tumanishvili draws between American and Russian life is family size; Yolk’s pregnant wife avers that the uncertainty in her life means she will only have one child, while Armstrong has relentlessly sired a string of girls (he tells Volkov his fourth has just been born, and he insists he won’t stop until he gets a son).
These subthemes allow us many insights-into the domestic life of Russian naval officers, many details of their service life, Russian perception of Americans, and, through Tumanishvili’s portrayal of American servicemen, unconscious attitudes really held by Russian military professionals.
The film portrays the US main adversary in an unexpectedly human and sympathetic manner. The Americans we see really are nice guys. Friendly relations spring up automatically between US and Soviet military personnel, until the rigid, authoritarian US military system gets in the way. When Spirin receives BARRA-CUDA ‘s SOS he curses Rink for deceiving him, until a staff officer makes excuses for the American. The P-3C and Yolk’s tanker have encountered each other in the Arctic skies many times, and the two have established a friendly relationship. Armstrong jokingly calls Volk the Wo/f(volk means wolf in Russian), he and Volk know each other’s family life in considerable detail, and Armstrong is able to see immediately that his usual co-pilot. Captain Gremyatchkin, is not in the cockpit and asks after him in some concern. Yet when Admiral Rink orders him to buzz Yolk’s tanker in the midst of refueling operations-threatening the lives of everyone aboard both Soviet aircraft-he hushes the objections of a subordinate by saying that orders must always be obeyed. Even Turner is shown as a competent commander who is trapped into destructive behavior by the need to save face and the orders of his superiors.
With the perspective of hindsight, we can see that the scenario in this film foreshadows the real-life tragedy that unfolded two decades later, when the Russian Northern Fleet commander refused British and US offers of assistance following the sinking of the submarine KURSK. The attitudes and actions attributed to Americans in this film also appeared in real-life Soviet behavior when the YANKEE-Class submarine K-219 sank in 1986 and the MIKE-Class submarine LENINSKIY KOMSOMOLETS sank in 1989. It is this feature of Incident at Map Grid 36-BOthat makes an otherwise mediocre action picture still worth watching, its subconscious projection of Soviet and Russian attitudes onto the American adversary
