On the right side of the pier there were six ambulances and three medic trucks lined up behind each other. Two of the medical vehicles had their red and blue lights flashing. Between the parked ambulances stood a refrigerated Navy cargo truck with its rear door open toward the end of the pier. There was a conveyor extending from the back of the truck to the lower pier. It appeared boxes were being loaded from the lower pier onto the Navy truck. The boxes had a strange sticker of bright orange marked “Hazardous Biological Materials.”
On the left side of the pier stood another parked refrigerated truck. Its rear door was open and also facing the lower pier like the truck on the opposite side. Boxes from this truck were going from the truck to the lower pier. Each box was wrapped in clear plastic with a stamp on it that could not be read by the crew members from the bus.
The crew bus slowly parked in a space at right angle to the refrigerated truck on the left side. The bus driver said, “Wait here. I have to check with the Chief.”
The crew bus was parked in an excellent position to see all of the strange pier activity from the right side windows. Everyone in the bus immediately moved to the right side.
The beehive of activity looked like it could be right out of a science fiction horror movie. It was very disturbing. The gruesome scene on the right side of pier included a procession of very ill men all dressed in light surgical blue scrubs. The line of men was slowly moving up the stairs toward the ambulances, most carrying their own rolling stand with bottles of IV solution. Some of the men wore face masks. The greenish glow of the pier lights contributed to the scene’s morbid look. The men looked pale, with sunken eyes and seemed very weak. Some could barely make it up the stairs. Others, too ill to walk, were on gurneys on the lower deck waiting to be hoisted to the upper pier. Between every fourth man there was a medical assistant in a white Hazmat Suit that covered all parts of the body, including the head. One medical assistant in Hazmat gear reached out with a large, white-gloved hand to assist a patient trying to get up the stairs.
The truck on the right was receiving the Hazardous Biological Materials boxes from the ship by way of conveyor from the lower deck. Persons manning this unloading were all in white Hazmat gear. As ambulances filled with ill patients left the pier, their vacant spaces were filled by other waiting ambulances.
The refrigerated truck on the left, closest to the crew bus, was unloading strange boxes presumably to be loaded on board the submarine. These boxes were covered in plain plastic and marked only by a number.
At the very end of the lower pier stood the backlit outline of a black submarine surrounded by small patches of fog. There were no bright lights illuminating the submarine. In addition to moonlight behind the submarine, there were two beams of light coming from open hatches on the sub’s deck and two small lights on the gang plank leading from the pier to the sub.
One crew member in the bus raised the question in everyone’s mind. “What the hell is going on here?”
Another said, “I don’t believe what I’m seeing. It looks like a zombie movie. Something very bad has happened here. What are we getting ourselves into?”
Another asked, “Can you make out the boxes on the left?”
A member replied, “I don’t think they’re munitions. They might be food or some kind of supply that needs refrigeration.”
Whatever pleasant thoughts the crew may have had about this being a Caribbean cruise were quickly dispelled by the scene before them. Little did Wade Hanna realize this tour of duty could be the last voyage of his young life. He could not have expected that he might be exposed to some deadly biological disease onboard his own boat. He did not know he would soon be facing a very dangerous deployment of a Navy SEAL Team a few hundred yards off a hostile Cuban shore. There was no way he could have known that he would soon come face to face with a hostile Russian submarine. He also could not have known that his earlier decision to sign up for Navy reserve would eventually put him in a mutually dangerous standoff with that Russian submarine – ninety meters below the Gulf, while two heads of state on shore would come within minutes of starting a nuclear war.
As Wade Hanna approached the boarding ramp, he tried to imagine the scene filled with people going on a Caribbean cruise. But there was no greeting party, bands, or confetti on this night. Instead, Wade saw the surreal image of ambulances filled with dying men, and strange boxes marked with bright orange Hazardous Biological Stickers. Instead of party hosts, he saw the men dressed in white biological Hazmat suits streaming out of the belly of a black sea creature – one he was about to enter, called SS-438, the Prowfish
No one was around saying “Welcome to the Prowfish.” This was definitely no boarding party for a Caribbean cruise. This scene had “death” written all over it.
As imaginations among the crew drifted as they waited, the bus driver returned and said, “Get your gear. The Chief wants you down on the lower level on the left side with your gear, in that open area.” He pointed to a faded painted square on the lower deck. He added, “Wait there and the Chief will come over as soon as he can.”
As the crew descended the stairs with their gear, a couple of the men looked back to see their bus driving away.
One of them commented, “There goes our ride.”
22
The Army has their Master Sergeants and the Navy has their Chief Petty Officers. The commonly held understanding that these individuals practically “run” their respective branches of service is not unfounded. Chief Petty Officer, Harold Wilks, ran his boat, no question about it. Captains and executive officers frequently relied heavily on these non-commissioned officers to keep a boat running efficiently. A petty officer kept the boat and men in shape, making sure sailors and all mechanical elements functioned smoothly. Most chief petty officers knew the workings of virtually all of the systems on the ship and, more importantly, they knew the Navy.
It was not uncommon for captains and executive officers to consult their chiefs before issuing an important order or taking a position in cases involving personnel problems. Most chiefs in the Navy are lifers who have come up through the ranks.
Wilks had spent 23 years in the Navy, mostly on board submarines. He saw action during the Korean War, and he was on patrol in sensitive mine infested waters before the Vietnam War. Many chiefs can be distant and demanding. Wilks, on the other hand, had a friendlier, outgoing personality than most. Still, men always felt with Wilks that they never wanted to cross him or make him look bad in front of the boat’s commanding officers. A chief also has the power to make the life of a sailor miserable.
The New Orleans crew brought their gear from the bus down the pier stairs to the designated area in lower deck and waited for the chief as instructed.
Within half an hour, the Chief arrived with a clip board in one hand. He looked hurried and said, “Are you the crew from New Orleans?”
The six New Orleans crewmen all said, “Yes, sir!”
The Chief instructed, “Leave your gear here. You three men lend a hand with this unloading.” The Chief pointed to the men and the refrigerated truck on the upper level. The Chief then ordered, “You other three come with me.”
Wade was in the first group and proceeded to get in line with other submarine crew members unloading boxes and carrying them from the end of the conveyor to the staging areas. The unmarked boxes were wrapped with plastic and sealed with tape. There was a small sticker on them with a code number. Initially Wade was quiet, not saying much to the crew members he didn’t know. An older crew member who stood in line one ahead of him said, as he went to pick up a box, “This one is heavy.”
Wade immediately stepped in and took the box. The older crew member said, “Thanks.” The small gesture extended by Wade seemed to break the ice. When the older crew member returned to the line, he turned to Wade and asked, “Are you the crew from New Orleans?”
Wade replied, “Yes.”
The older man said, “That’s a real party town. Don’t you guy
s party a lot?”
“Not as much as people think.”
By this time, a few other crew members on the box line seemed to be warming up a little, and they started to make a few comments as they worked.
Boxes were being individually carried from the conveyor to where they were stacked midway between the end of the conveyor and the submarine. There was another crew taking individual boxes from the stack to the sub. Wade noticed this was the way the line on the other side of the pier was also operating, only in reverse. That line was taking boxes coming off the boat and loading them on the conveyor. After an hour or so, the remaining old crew and the New Orleans crew had warmed up to each other, and regular conversation was taking place between them as they worked.
Wade was carefully listening to the talk and hoping the permanent crew would mention something about their mission. Not a word about it was uttered.
After another 20 boxes, and looking at the truck still only half unloaded, Wade said, “It’s none of my business, but wouldn’t it be better if we set up a chain gang line, water bucket style and move these boxes all the way to the boat?”
One of the older crew members said, “Yeah that might work better.”
Wade asked, “Do you think Chief would mind? Should we get his permission?”
The older crew member answered, “No, Wilks is easy, let’s just do it.”
The other men followed this older crew member’s lead, and the unloading group reorganized themselves into a straight line from the end of the conveyor all the way to the boat, bypassing the interim stack. As each box came off the conveyor, it was handled by each crew member, who passed it on to the next man without leaving position in line.
It quickly became clear that boxes were moving off the truck a lot faster than before. This new line was also moving boxes a lot quicker than the line on the other side of the pier. Not too long after the new line started, Chief Wilks came over and asked, “Whose idea was this?”
Wade, not wanting to call attention to himself, remained silent. Someone from the original crew pointed to Wade said, “That guy from New Orleans.”
Wilks said, “Excellent idea,” and proceeded to get in the chain gang line alongside Wade. The chief was not afraid of hard work and frequently worked alongside his crew members. The enlisted men respected Chief Wilks for his work ethic and knew he was not just about giving orders. After working on the line for a while, he said to Wade, “Close up rank when I leave. I’m going to set this up on the other line.”
So, Wade had his first personal contact with the Chief, and it was positive. Wade knew from his time in New London that getting on the right side of chiefs was critical in the Navy, and this was a good start.
Wilks said as he left, “We have one more truck coming in after this one.”
After the second truck was unloaded, the Chief came over and said to both truck crews, “I’ll meet with the New Orleans crew over by their gear in a few minutes.” The New Orleans crew members from both truck lines assembled with their gear.
Having worked the truck line, the crew better understood Chief Wilks, who came over and gave them a short briefing, “You’re probably wondering what’s going on here. I can’t give you many details, but the captain wants us to get underway as soon as possible.”
“We were on patrol, and many of the crew members came down suddenly with a strange illness. We thought it was just the flu going around, but our ship’s medic, after speaking with shore doctors, said it was more serious. The sick crew members and officers are on their way to the hospital. We were ordered to remove all food stuffs and replace them with special food items that were individually inspected by naval medical technicians and repacked at a special facility on shore. The medics from shore are wearing masks and gloves because the injured are going to a quarantine ward at the local hospital until the illness or disease can be identified. There are men on board in Hazmat suits disinfecting the ship before we can go on board. The captain is in the forward torpedo room meeting with Naval Intelligence officers. We should be able to go on board within the hour. Ensign Clark is preparing a watch and duty schedule and berth assignments. He has some of it already done. I know, Hanna, you and one other member of your crew will berth in the forward torpedo room with me. I’m not sure where everyone else will bunk. I know we’ll be short-crewed, even with the SEAL team on board. I’ll be back as soon as I have the list, and then we can board. The captain wants us underway by midnight.” With this, the Chief left to attend other business.
The New Orleans crew members sat on the deck with their gear, comparing notes. One asked, “Did you see those sick guys? I got a good look at some. They looked like zombies ready to die.”
Another said, “We now know the boxes are food.”
Another noted, “Wilks said we have SEAL team guys on board, but we are still short crewed. I counted sixteen guys going from the ship to the ambulances, and there are only six of us.”
Someone asked, “Did any of you get a good look at the sub?”
Wade said, “I did because of where I was standing in line. It’s gone through some major modifications. The conning tower has been replaced and is much narrower than the original. It’s got the big bulge on the bow to accommodate the latest sonar gear. It’s got the new thin updated bow planes. It’s painted in that flat black coating to reduce sonar signal.”
An older member of their crew spoke up. “Guys, I think we have gotten ourselves into some serious shit here. I don’t know anything about this boat. It doesn’t look like a regular boat to me. It gives me the creeps just looking at it.”
23
While the New Orleans crew waited on the pier with their gear, Captain Hodges was on board the Prowfish meeting with two plain clothes gentleman from Intelligence. The two intelligence officers arrived in a black unmarked car shortly after the Prowfish docked. The meeting was being held in the forward torpedo room, which had already been disinfected by the Hazmat crew. The hatch door was locked with a sign “No Admittance.”
Immediately after notifying CNO that contact had been made with a foreign sub one mile off the coast of Mississippi just southeast of Biloxi, Naval and intelligence agencies went into action. An incident task force was formed which included several cooperating agencies at the Pentagon headed by Naval Intelligence. The agencies forming this Task Force had all been previously involved in various intelligence operations, ranging from Castro’s insurgence to the Soviet naval operations to known paramilitary activity in Latin America. Two senior members of the Task Force were on the pier when Captain Hodges docked.
Steven Marks from Naval Intelligence headed the team. Marks was an intelligence officer with 22 years of experience. He was experienced in running his own covert operations and had been frequently asked to brief the president’s Joint Chiefs of Staff on strategic options. His intelligence reports and presentations were reviewed and respected at the highest level within the Navy’s Chain of Command and had been read by the president. Marks had been involved in Cuban and Latin American intelligence long before Castro came to power.
Chad Simon was a CIA operative and section chief with similar experience in running his own operations and in briefing both the CIA and Joint Chiefs of Staff on undercover operations in Latin America. Simon had also successfully coordinated several joint intelligence operations between the CIA and the NSA. He, like Marks, had been involved in Central American intelligence operations since before Castro came to power. He had also been heavily involved in coordinating activities of the U.S. in the Bay of Pigs invasion.
Simon had spent fifteen years as an undercover operative in three Central American countries, including Cuba. He spoke perfect Spanish and had perfected dialect accents specific to those countries and regions he worked before coming to Washington. Marks and Simon had worked together before on other operations. They understood Latin American politics and had a good working relationship and respect for each other’s capabilities.
The Prowfish inciden
t Task Force was immediately formed after initial contact with the Russian sub by phone calls between two senior Pentagon officers. Marks was designated to head the Task Force with Simon as his second in command. Task force operatives were individually selected by Marks and Simon. The first order to the team was to collect data from various agencies on all Soviet submarine and surface ship movements in the Gulf.
From the moment the taskforce was formed, Marks and Simon were in around-the-clock meetings with their staff, reviewing data to prepare for their meeting with Captain Hodges on the Prowfish. When illness broke out on board, Hodges was forced to break off contact with the Russian sub and come to shore. It would be two days before the Prowfish would dock at Biloxi. Marks and Simon would be there to meet Prowfish when it arrived.
Naval Intelligence and other U.S. intelligence agencies had extensive tracking systems for all Russian ships, including submarines. Shore intelligence tracked the construction of subs from the time a project was approved until it was completed at one of three main Russian ship building facilities. Aerial surveillance identified when a ship was launched and monitored its movement, using a series of classified systems of underwater sonar buoys and underwater sonar receiving cables aligned in grids – in oceans all over the world. This system was in existence and was called SOSUS (Sound Surveillance System). The buoy system and SOSUS were coordinated with the Naval Anti-Submarine Warfare office to detect movement and respond to Soviet submarines when they left international waters. At the time Prowfish identified its target, the U.S. believed all Soviet submarines and their locations in the Gulf had been identified. Soviet submarine and surface ship activity had been monitored closely due to increased tensions with Cuba and the build up of Soviet military aid and missile installation activity.
Silent Sanction: A Novel Page 15
