The Iron Man

by John Watson

In a stunning David v. Goliath debut thriller, John Watson pits the antiquated brute force of an old Soviet World War II battleship fresh out of mothballs against the cutting edge technology of the American war machine. A bunch of pirates want to buy The Stalin, the biggest battleship ever built and now lying redundant in a Russian port. Yakov Zof, formerly one of the Soviet navy's brightest stars and down and out since the collapse of the Union, embarks on a new career as pirate and steers the great ship onto open seas. But then he discovers his fellow pirates are not quite what he thought they were and a great sea battle commences culminating in an extraordinary finale.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Thriller, Fiction

488 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.

Reviews

[Neil · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found myself enjoying this book far more than I hoped I would. It starts off a bit slow, and is a bit ponderous in places, but it did hold my interest all the way through to the end. The way the book was going, I was not sure how it was going to end, to be honest, so I can honestly say I was content with the ending, that I thought it was well-done. The character development was decent over the course of the book; some characters had better development than others, which tends to be the case. I thought it was a fascinating concept that the author came up with a 'final duel' between naval dinosaurs - a Russian WWII-era "super-battleship" against two of America's four Iowa-class battleships.

The book takes place in 1997. A Russian Navy captain is hired to determine if the Stalin is capable of being made seaworthy and going into action after being used as a training vessel for over fifty years. He is told he and the crew he can put together will be paid enough money they can start new lives in another country after the mission is over. Considering the state of the Soviet Union and the Russian Navy, Yakov Zof agrees to see what he can do. The battleship has to be made seaworthy in three months, or all is for naught. Naturally, he succeeds in getting the war vessel 'war-ready' and steals it without any issues.

The plan Zof is originally told is that the battleship is going to be used to steal some gold bullion from two cargo vessels that are transporting it from one destination to another. One of the vessels is an old French cargo ship; the other is a modern, top-of-the-line, luxurious ocean liner. The 'real' plan is for the ocean liner to be damaged and to send out a distress call to lure America's brand new, state-of-the-art missile cruiser into a trap by which all forty of its anti-submarine nuclear warheads will be stolen and sold to a 'secret' Middle Eastern nation (Iraq, of course!). For the most part, the plan works.

Two F-15s attack the Stalin at one point, and it shoots one of the fighters down. The surviving F-15 launches four anti-ship missiles at the battleship, to no effect. Then U.S.S. Jackson (the missile cruiser) also tries to defend itself, the captain mistakenly believing he can take out the 75,000-ton Russian warship without any issues. The Russian battleship survives a missile strike and a torpedo hit before convincing the American captain to surrender his vessel (which he had originally been ordered to do by the Pentagon). What the Russians and their financial backers do not know is that their 'plans' to to sell the nuclear warheads has been found out, as well as where the transfer will take place. The U.S.S. Iowa and the U.S.S. Missouri are sent out to hunt down this Russian behemoth and destroy her. The Americans are triumphant in the end, but it does not all go their way (the U.S.S. Missouri is sunk with all hands and zero survivors).

I thought it was a pretty good book, overall, and a fun read. I thought the author had a novel idea for his book: it is based on the postulation that the Russians built a 'super-battleship' that could easily have taken on the INS Yamato and survived. The Yamato was around 870 feet long, weighed around 64,000 tons, and had 18-inch guns as its main guns. The Stalin was 1000 feet long, weight 75,000 tons, and had 22-inch guns for its main armament. The Stalin also had about two feet of armor plating protecting it - quite a bit more than any other battleship of its time had it really existed. So, I enjoyed the concept of this monstrous relic from WWII 'coming to life' and wreaking havoc in the Southeast Pacific amongst the "modern" Navy. The armament of today's navies are designed to pierce thin hulls; today's naval weapons would have a hard time defeating twenty-four inches of armor that surrounded the Stalin as protection, which the book did a nice job of describing. The Stalin was a beast, no doubt about it! I thought the author did a great job describing it and how it was able to survive against modern weapons for as long as it did.

As much as I enjoyed reading about the Iowa and Missouri tag-teaming the Staling, I would still have enjoyed the New Jersey and Wisconsin being a part of the hunting party of U.S. battleships. That would have been awesome! As it was, I thought the author did a nice job of describing the naval action between these three relics from WWII. It was pretty crazy to read! Especially what with what happened to the Missouri! I honestly did not really expect that to happen. The 'final battle' between the Stalin and the U.S. Navy was pretty crazy and well-written; I really did not know what was going to happen next. I just hoped the U.S. Navy would succeed until the very end.

As much as I enjoyed the book, there did seem to be some discrepancies in it. For example, on page 47, the author says that an American B-57 dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, when it was actually a B-29. I thought maybe the B-57 was 'just' a modified variant of the venerable B-29, but that was not the case. Two different airplanes; one is jet-propelled and the other uses propellers to get around.

I do not know if this is a mistake or not, but he has a Marine officer "quoted" as looking at his superior, a U.S. Army officer (general, I believe it was). I could be wrong about what was going on in the 'war room' because the Marine Corp officer was in the 'hot room' with the other members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; maybe it was just indicative that the U.S. Army held the reigns to power at that moment in time; otherwise, the Marines report to the Navy and not to the USMC.

Finally, I could not decide how realistic the destruction of the battleships at the end of the book turned out to be. It seemed like a chunk of artistic license was made, but that is okay.

Overall, it was a fun book to read (despite is many slow parts in the middle), and I am glad I took the time to read it.

[Heng Li · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought it was a very Good book expecially the naval fight at the end. It was very well described and exciting. It was funny on how CNN found the ship but the US army couldnt

[Abizer · Rating 4 out of 5]

More on the 3.5 stars of the scale.

Interesting thriller, good for a holiday read. The sort of thing that makes a flight go quicker.