Silent and Unseen

by Alfred McLaren

  As a result, many days during our mission were flat calm with heavy fog, making it difficult to see much of anything. We did sight several diesel electric-powered Soviet Golf II–class SSBs and tried to trail a nuclear-powered Hotel II–class SSBN.2 Each had a long sail that housed three vertical missile tubes abaft the bridge. The SS-N-5 nuclear ballistic missiles they carried had a range of 750 nautical miles, according to a later analysis.3 We hoped that the Hotel II might be deploying to a forward area off the continental United States, but we lost it shortly after it submerged and increased speed. We increased our own speed in order to remain within a comfortable trailing position, but that caused us to lose contact. For reasons mentioned earlier, Skipjack did not have good capability for detecting, much less tracking, a contact whenever it was necessary to increase her speed to more than five knots.

  Among other duties during this mission, I was photographic officer, and one long-range photo of a Soviet submarine that I managed to take created some excitement on board and high interest back in port. The sub I photographed was subsequently termed “the Monster” by the intelligence community. No one at the time had any idea what type it might be. In retrospect, it may well have been what was later to be termed the Golf III, a one-of-a-kind Soviet Northern Fleet SSBN, which had a much longer sail than usual, in order to accommodate six missile tubes. It was estimated that each could hold a Soviet SS-N-8 ballistic missile with a range of approximately 4,500 miles.4

  During our transit home we were delighted to receive the news that Skipjack had been awarded the Battle Efficiency “E” for Submarine Division 102 for fiscal year 1964. The past twelve months had been tough. We all felt strongly that we richly deserved the accolades. We were also feeling quite pleased and proud that we had spent the better part of two successful, and undetected, months in what would surely have been our forward deployment area should the United States go into a hot war with the Soviets.

  We were not in port at New London very long before our much-respected skipper, Cdr. Shep Jenks, was relieved on 7 August 1964 by Lt. Cdr. Paul D. Tomb. Commander Jenks went on to become commanding officer of a new-construction nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine.

  It was hard to see Shep Jenks leave. I had served with him as both navigator and engineer officer for over a year and a half. He was a quiet and reserved man, but a real professional. We all knew where we stood with him. I particularly admired the way he empowered each of us to take charge and fully do the job assigned. By not micromanaging us, he gave all of us maximum opportunity to grow professionally and helped us gain the necessary confidence to take on even greater responsibilities. At the same time, he was always available and approachable when we needed advice or instruction. As I reflect back, I appreciate even more fully his example. The two years I spent with him did much to prepare me for my own submarine command.

  Our new skipper, Paul Tomb, came to us from the Blue Crew of the ballistic missile submarine, USS Theodore Roosevelt (SSBN 600), where he had been exec since September 1962. Prior to that, he had been Roosevelt’s commissioning/new-construction engineer officer. Previous submarine duty included tours on both the nuclear attack submarine USS Sargo and the diesel attack boat USS Tilefish (SS 307).

  The Playmate of the Month’s Short Reign

  It was late August 1964 and we were preparing to head off to the North Atlantic in another month for a lengthy exercise with U.S. Navy and NATO forces. After that we were scheduled for visits to Le Havre, France; and Portland, England. Our crew was really looking forward to the months ahead. As part of our workup we would be going to sea on local operations with a new captain who had taken command just a few weeks earlier. It would be his first opportunity to show us what kind of skipper he would be. He was slated to remain with the boat through our remaining months at sea, until the spring of 1965. He would then take it through a lengthy overhaul and reactor refueling at the naval shipyard in Charleston, South Carolina.

  Captain Tomb seemed a genial, confident sort—more informal with the officers and men than our previous two had been. He took part in the general kibitzing around the wardroom table during meals, and we soon became comfortable with him. Operationally, however, he was still an unknown. No one on board had previously served with him. We thus had no idea or feel for how he would handle stressful situations, which are certain to occur from time to time at sea and where a commanding officer’s knowledge and experience really count. At least we were not heading off on a Cold War mission or special operation. The local operations followed by the voyage to the eastern Atlantic would be more of a lark. The mood that prevailed throughout the boat was thus more light-hearted and less tense than usual.

  Within days of his reporting on board, it became obvious that Captain Tomb was fond of Playboy magazine. Rumors that he had a large cache of the magazines in his stateroom quickly spread throughout the boat. In the course of receiving routine reports, he was frequently seen to have his face deep in the centerfold of a playmate of the month. Our previous commanding officer, by contrast, had come across as somewhat austere and distant. None of us would dare to have been seen with any such magazine during his time. It’s not that he ever said anything to discourage us—it just didn’t seem like a good idea. Our wardroom bachelors were careful to tone down their descriptions of recent liberty escapades on shore whenever the captain was within listening distance. With this captain the wardroom atmosphere was just the opposite.

  During the first days of a weeklong local operation, the new skipper became sufficiently comfortable with Skipjack’s officers to share his playmate of the month centerfolds. The second morning under way he taped up one of his favorites on a wardroom bulkhead, or wall. He located it where he could best see and enjoy her from where he sat at the head of the dining table. She was certainly a lovely thing, with an exceptional smile in addition to all her other charms on display. One could readily see why the captain liked this particular playmate.

  Well, after midnight some dirty dog—yours truly—altered the playmate of the month’s appearance in a most dastardly fashion. She was now, inexplicably, missing two front teeth, leaving a disfiguring gap.

  Probably no more than a half dozen of the officers and crew saw the altered playmate of the month before the captain did. After their initial laughter, they began to worry about his reaction. The senior steward’s mate, SDC Peter William Ungacta Sococo, a commissioning crewmember on Skipjack and veteran of sixteen war patrols on USS Stingray (SS 186) during World War II, predicted fireworks.5

  Captain Tomb, still half asleep, wandered into the wardroom and sat down in his usual seat at the head of the table. His mood was jovial, and he wished us all good morning as he took a first sip of coffee. The wardroom table was full. Those of us who had already begun our breakfast hunched over our plates or bowls as we waited for what was to come.

  The captain looked up toward the bulkhead with a broad smile of pleasure to greet la favorita, as she was known. In a flash his expression changed to shocked disbelief, then to red-faced anger. “What the hell, what the GD hell!” he exclaimed.

  He jumped up and ran out, dragging back the exec, Bill Purdum, from his bunk to view what he loudly swore was “an out-and-out atrocity.” Skipjack’s exec, whom we called the commissar for good reason, took one look and was not amused. Both captain and the exec scanned our faces hoping to detect the guilty party. They had no doubt it was an inside job. We officers greeted them with sorrowful expressions of sympathy and outrage, wanting to laugh but realizing this was definitely not the time.

  The captain was angrier than any of us could possibly have expected. As we hurried to finish our breakfasts, he continued to rant and rave, promising it would go very hard on the culprit who had defaced la favorita, from restriction on board with only bread and water to a general court-martial. “Oh, boy,” I thought to myself as I wolfed down my cereal. “I’ve done it now.” Finishing up, I excused myself to “go take care of some urgent business in the control room” and m
ade my exit.

  Several officers riveted to the wardroom table later reported that the captain suddenly stormed out of his seat and ripped the centerfold off the bulkhead, tearing it into shreds and crumpling it. All agreed that, if discovered, the guilty party would find his naval career in jeopardy.

  We tiptoed around the captain during the next several days. The exec tried his best to uncover the truth, but we held our tongues. Later in the day the captain announced that his “store of Playboy magazines would no longer be available to the wardroom.”

  I was glad not to have been standing the 8:00 p.m. to midnight watch, or I would have been part of the small group that fell under suspicion. Other than the occasional outburst by the captain that always seemed to occur when I was in the wardroom, the situation calmed down. By the time we reached our first liberty port of Le Havre, France, in mid-October, his good humor had returned, and the rest of our cruise proceeded without incident.

  In the years that followed, Captain Tomb and I had occasion to serve in the same localities on both the East and West Coasts, and we often saw each other socially. Never, however, did I come close to confessing that I was the one who had despoiled his beloved playmate. Finally, at a party that he and his wife Beth were hosting, when he was in command of the submarine base in Pearl Harbor, just a few years short of my retirement, I confessed, after a few drinks. Paul Tomb roared with laughter.

  “Hell, Fred, I knew it all along,” he said. “Why do you think I carried on so whenever you were in the wardroom? I knew right away who had done it. Your reputation for general mischief was known to me long before I reported on board.” We had a few more drinks, and I further confessed that he had certainly fooled me into uncharacteristically lying low for quite a while.

  The Mid-Atlantic Switch

  Skipjack departed New London in mid-September 1964 for advanced operations with NATO forces in the mid- and eastern Atlantic. The crew looked forward to what constituted a minor deployment for the better part of two months. We would be operating fully submerged most of the time, both with and against British and French navy surface ASW forces in major exercises entitled Masterstroke and Teamwork. These exercises would be much as we had done in the past with both U.S. and Allied surface and air forces. The various higher commands claimed that sufficient advancement in their ASW tactics and capabilities against the nuclear attack submarine warranted putting these to the test. In between operations we would be enjoying a few days of liberty in Le Havre and, toward the end of our deployment, Portland. Le Havre would be our first pit stop. A great number of us had every intention, of course, of heading off to Paris. We just had to wait as patiently as we could until the lines went over and Skipjack was safely secured to the pier.

  Mary and I were expecting our third child at the time. Captain Tomb most graciously arranged for me to remain behind in New London until after the baby was born. Also remaining on shore was our electrical officer, Lt. Thomas W. “Tom” Habermas, who would be getting married at roughly the same time. Arrangements were further made for Tom and me, and our DivCom Henry R. Hanssen, to be transferred to Skipjack in the mid-Atlantic. This would be courtesy of USS Seawolf (SSN 575), which was heading east for other, more-classified reasons. Hanssen in turn was excited about the trip and the prospects for going ashore in Le Havre—so much so that he sent his formal dinner dress plus some of his best civilian suits and golf clubs ahead on Skipjack. Commander Hanssen was a most genial and entertaining shipmate and much liked by us all, and we looked forward to having him with us.

  My daughter Erin was born, and Tom got married, and he and the DivCom and I boarded Seawolf and got under way for a mid-ocean rendezvous with Skipjack. She came to the surface near the pre-agreed mid-Atlantic rendezvous point and established communications with Skipjack. We were within sight of each other within the hour.

  It was a dark, overcast day in mid-September, although visibility was good with just a light wind. Of some concern was a heavy, rolling swell that dominated the sea surface. Conditions were determined to be safe enough, however, for an at-sea transfer via Seawolf’s two-man rubber life raft. The two submarines maneuvered to within twenty to thirty yards of each other. A heaving line was thrown from Skipjack to Seawolf. Attached to it was a somewhat larger-diameter line, which would be used to tow the life raft back and forth between our two boats. As soon as both boats were ready and the life raft lowered into the water, Tom and I quickly donned life jackets and boarded. Whatever we had carried with us on Seawolf was carefully lowered down to us. The DivCom was to follow on the second trip.

  Once we were seated with our life vests tightened, Skipjack’s deck crew pulled us across the intervening water and secured us alongside with both bow and stern lines. Even so, the raft rode up and down Skipjack’s hull as much as eight to ten feet with every swell. We first had to throw the gear we were carrying with us to someone topside. That went fine. We then prepared to leap, on the upswing, from the narrow gunwale of the life raft to the outstretched hand of one of the nearest men on deck. It was a somewhat hairy move, to put it mildly. I jumped first and got safely on board without difficulty, but Tom missed the outstretched hand. He fell back within the life raft sufficiently hard that one foot plunged straight through the bottom of the life raft. The raft immediately began flooding. Tom moved smartly and made it on his second try.

  The raft was completely filled with water by this time and had to be towed back to Seawolf, hauled on board, and evaluated for its condition. Efforts to repair the leaking came to naught. A second life raft was not readily available. After much discussion, it was reluctantly agreed that it would not be safe to try to transfer the DivCom to Skipjack. I will never forget Commander Hanssen’s disappointed expression as we waved goodbye to each other over the little stretch of water that separated us and headed off on our respective missions. Unfortunately for him, his clothing and golf clubs remained with us. If I had been in his shoes, I think I would have decided to swim for it.

  Safe on board, Tom and I both looked forward to having a good steak.

  How to Save a Steak for Later

  A typical crew of ninety men would eat almost four thousand pounds of steak during the course of a two-month operation or deployment such as the one we had recently completed. Steak, of course, meant T-bone, porterhouse, rib eye, sirloin, tenderloin, or New York strip cuts. It definitely did not mean Swiss steak or tough round steak. Skipjack had superb cooks, and steaks were served as often as four or five times a week for either lunch or dinner. Most crewmembers could put away a good pound of it at a sitting, and sometimes twice as much, preferably grilled. The cooks went to a lot of effort to ensure that those who liked them rare or well done got them that way. A few submarines, particularly in the Pacific, even carried their own homemade charcoal broilers—generally modified leftover, half-barrel drums—that could be placed on deck for barbeques during in-port or at-anchor periods.

  My fellow officers were noted for their voracious appetites, so we had to be Johnny-on-the-spot to make sure we got all we wanted. The steward’s mates always stored leftovers in the tiny wardroom pantry refrigerator following the meals when they were served. The pantry provided a last hope for those of us who hadn’t had enough to eat to return to the trough one more time. As longtime steak lovers, a few of the sneakier crewmembers and I discovered that we had to get to those set-asides within an hour or so.

  I had been assigned to stand the 8:00 p.m. to midnight watch as officer of the deck (conning officer) in the control room during Skipjack’s high-speed submerged transit across the eastern Atlantic, en route to the scheduled rendezvous for exercises with our NATO allies. I was to keep these same hours as a command watch officer during the course of the exercises. Back in New London before Skipjack departed, I noted that we had loaded a larger-than-normal supply of high-quality steaks. Following my debarkation from Seawolf, I was eagerly looking forward to eating my fair share. What I considered my fair share in those days should probably be explained:
it generally consisted of at least two good-sized steaks during lunch or dinner, and then one more. The latter would be retrieved from the wardroom pantry ahead of the other “alligators” an hour or so after the meal. Not the most healthful diet, but very satisfying to a young man.

  It had been some time since I had taken the 8:00 p.m. to midnight watch on a steady basis. It was generally assigned to the more junior officers, because it usually meant we had to leave our meal early in order to relieve the watch on time. It also meant we missed out on a leisurely dessert and the chance to visit and share a movie with our brother officers afterward. As I recall, I had been asked by the exec to take this particular watch to train up another prospective officer of the deck and submerged operations conning officer. In any case, it was not my favorite watch.

  During the first few nights, as soon as I got off watch each evening, well after midnight, I immediately headed to the wardroom pantry to check what might be left over from dinner. Each time I found the pickings to be pretty slim, if not nonexistent. I quickly came up with a tactic to remedy the problem. After an hour or so on watch, I would call for a relief so I could use the head. I would then make a beeline for the wardroom pantry, open the refrigerator, spear a leftover steak, and take a few minutes to eat it. Soon the ruse caught the attention of the captain so that I considered it unwise to continue. Besides, it wasn’t easy to get a brother officer to relieve me for longer than a few minutes.

  Sooner or later, however, I came up with a better solution. Like my previous tactic, I would induce another qualified officer to relieve me for a minute or so, run down to the wardroom pantry, snap open the refrigerator door, seize the biggest and most desirable leftover steak, and take a big ragged bite out of it, then shove it beneath all the other steaks on the plate, close the door, and rush back to resume the watch.