Tom Clancy's Act of Valor (15 page)

“How the hell did you find Philly cheesesteak subs in Ethiopia—in Africa at all, for that matter?” Ray asked.

“Hey, you fellows have your secrets, I have mine.”

“William, old son,” Ray said, putting a hand solemnly on his shoulder. “You are something else. I’m going to se cm gStd">e that you’re mentioned in our dispatches.”

“Okay, thanks,” he replied, not sure whether Ray was kidding or not. “You guys have a safe trip.”

The two SEALs, each now armed with a grocery bag of chow, made their way to the two Super Stallions that were turning on the tarmac. Both SEALs, as directed by one of the crew chiefs, boarded the same bird—the lead helo. Both helos took off, heading southeast away from the city and then veering left to a northeasterly heading. They flew in loose formation for close to two hours approaching the Ethiopian-Somali border. The trailing helo turned away to a northerly heading for Djibouti and a clandestine refueling stop. The trail bird’s mission was over; it was there only for redundancy. With its tanks topped off, it could just make it back to the USS
Bataan
LHD-5, cruising an antipiracy station off the Horn of Africa at the eastern approaches to the Gulf of Aden. The lead helo, with the two SEALs, dropped to an altitude of five hundred feet to avoid the anemic Somali coastal radars near Berbera, skimmed over the western edge of that nation, and crossed unnoticed into the Gulf of Aden. The Super Stallion’s progress was carefully monitored by an Air Force E-3C Sentry airborne early-warning and control aircraft orbiting well out over the Gulf.

An hour into the flight, the two SEALs were eagerly devouring their Philly cheesesteaks, handing over their Gulfstream executive rations to a very grateful Marine Corps flight crew. Their hastily prepared box lunches from the
Bataan
were unpalatable by comparison. For all concerned, it would be a long flight, and by helicopter standards, a very long flight. The Super Stallion has a range of just over six-hundred nautical miles and a cruising speed of 170 knots. Some three hours after takeoff and eighty miles north of the Somali coast, the lead helicopter found the MC-130P Combat Shadow special-operations tanker. The Combat Shadow had launched out of Aden, Yemen, and had reached the rendezvous coordinates only minutes before the CH-53E’s arrival. After taking on a full measure of JP-4, the helo continued in an easterly direction, paralleling the coast of Somalia but well out to sea.

Another two hours of flying brought it to a position some fifty miles off the Somali coastline, just north of the city of Candala. The Super Stallion descended from a cruising altitude of nine thousand to fifteen hundred feet, and there it was, right where it was supposed to be—the USS
Michigan
. The pilot made a careful approach, following the wake of the big submarine until it was matching the sub’s ten knots, and hovered some fifty feet above the broad missile deck, behind the sail and just aft of the dry deck shelter—a bulbous metal lump clamped to the rear of the missile deck. It resembled a large propane tank.

“Thanks for the chow,” the crew chief yelled as he hooked Ray up. The heavily loaded SEAL was sitting in the door of the helo. “I don’t care what the bar girls in San Diego say about you guys, you swabbies are all right.”

“You’re welcome, Gyrene. Safe trip home.”

He tapped Ray on the helmet, and the SEAL swung out into the night and the noisy prop wash of the 53’s big seven-bladed main rotor. Because of the weight of their gear, the SEAL recon team would be winched to the deck rather than using the more expedit c mo
Michigan
’s deck crew, stepped lightly onto the metal deck of the submarine as if they were stepping down from a passenger bus. Once the two SEALs were aboard, the Super Stallion turned and continued east. It again mated with the loitering Combat Shadow, drank its fill, and continued on to the USS
Bataan,
which was steaming west to meet it. The crew of the helo had been in the air for close to eleven hours. Their only break had been two short ground refueling stops. Back at the air-sea rendezvous point, there was only empty ocean. Before the CH-53E was fifteen miles into the final leg of its journey, the
Michigan
had slipped beneath the waves.

The USS
Michigan
(SSGN-727) was originally commissioned as a fleet ballistic missile submarine and carried the most advanced versions of the Trident ICBM system. For more than two decades and sixty-six strategic deterrent patrols, this largest of U.S. submarines was converted to a new mission. The eighteen-thousand-ton
Michigan
was stripped of her ICBMs and refitted to carry cruise missiles and to support a variety of special-operations missions. During the cold war, the U.S. submarine force eschewed working with SEALs and Special Operations Forces in favor of their strategic mission of tracking Soviet-era submarines and nuclear retaliation, should the Russians and
their
ballistic submarines do the unthinkable. With the end of the cold war, the SEALs and SOF became the submariners’ new best friends. They took to these new duties with great gratitude, as the SOF requirements kept their boats in the water and underway. The submarine service took on this new role with their typical high degree of professionalism and attention to detail. After they boarded the submarine, A.J. and Ray were taken to a small compartment where they dumped their gear. A ship’s master-at-arms was stationed at the door. Moments later, an officer led them to the commanding officer’s quarters.

“Welcome to the
Michigan
, gentlemen. I’m Captain John Toohey. Happy to have you aboard.” The
Michigan
’s skipper was an affable Navy captain with an agreeable slouch and the chalky pallor of those who lived most of their working life underwater. His hair was boot-camp short, and he had kindly, highly intelligent eyes and a crooked nose over a push-broom mustache. As with the other members of the crew, he was dressed in dark blue, one-piece cotton overalls; as if they were blue-water counterparts to the SEALs desert camouflage utilities. Like the Marine Corps flight crew, Toohey was not briefed into the mission specifics of these two SEALs, but he did know it was a code-worded operation and therefore operationally significant. The
Michigan
spent much of its life boring holes in the ocean and conducting training exercises. Now they were to be a part of a classified mission. It was a break from the routine and a chance for a real-world tasking, if only in a support role. And they were prepared to play their role well. After A.J. and Ray introduced themselves to the captain, he bid them to sit at a small conference table over a chart of the coast of Somalia and the Horn of Africa. Joining them were two other blue-suits—the sub’s operations officer and the
Michigan
’s
COB, or chief of the boat, the senior enlisted leader.

“Here’s where we are,” the ops officer said, pointing to a location almost due north of the tip of the Horn, “and here is where you need to cross the coast. We can get the
Michigan
safely to a point here some twenty-three mi centto ales offshore, then it becomes a little too shallow for us. At this offshore location, the two of you will board a SEAL delivery vehicle for the rest of the trip. The SDV will get you to about a mile offshore, where it then shallows up for them. You’ll have to swim the rest of the way.”

The two SEALs studied the chart. “How soon will you be in position to launch the SDV?”

“We’re only about thirty miles from the launch site now, so we could easily be there in a few hours.” He paused to glance at his watch. “Since we have to wait until dark, or about twenty-one hundred this evening, we’ll just be idling here in the Gulf of Aden, avoiding surface traffic. This will give you about sixteen hours to prep your gear, run through the launch procedures, and maybe get in a few hours’ sleep.”

Ray looked at A.J., then the
Michigan
’s ops boss. “Easy day, sir.”

“We here on the
Michigan
,” Captain Toohey intervened, “fully understand our orders. We’ll get you to the launch coordinates, and we’ll get you on your way. I’ve not been read in to the specifics of your mission ashore but I know there are issues of national security and homeland security in play here. When this all gets resolved, I’d like to be able to tell my crew of the role they played in this, if security protocols allow for it.”

“Understood, sir. When this is over, we’ll do what we can to see that you’re included in the after-action reporting. No promises, but we’ll try.”

“I appreciate that. Thank you and good hunting.”

They discussed the mechanics of the
Michigan
’s role in the mission, and then the COB led them back to what had been the missile compartment of the submarine, where the massive silos once housed the Trident D-5 ICBMs and enough megatonnage to create a nuclear winter. In those strategic-deterrent times, the crew referred to these closely placed silos as Sherwood Forest. Now four of the silos housed advanced cruise missile sabots, poised in the ICBM silos like the cylinders of a revolver handgun. Other silos had been converted for storage and troop-support requirements for embarked special-operations personnel. Once they reached the SDV area, Ray and A.J. were greeted with a barrage of chiding.

“Well, for Christ’s sake—look what the COB dragged in.”

“All this trouble for
these two
?”

“I thought this was a big, secret, high-profile mission. And here they send in the second team. Go figure.”

There were six of them, SEALs from SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team One, stationed on Ford Island, in Hawaii. These SEALs specialized in the underwater launch and recovery operations associated with SEAL delivery vehicles—mini-submersibles that piggybacked on larger nuclear submarines like the
Michigan
and took SEALs into waters too shallow for the bigger boats. The boats carried by the
Michigan
for this mission were the Mk8 Mod 1 SDVs. These were “wet” submersibles, meaning that th cani a ney have seawater inside the SDV as well as outside. While this subjects the occupants to ambient conditions, the simplicity of a non-pressurized fiberglass hull makes the little craft both simple and reliable.

“You know, A.J., if I knew that we had to work with these turkeys, I wouldn’t have volunteered for this important and dangerous mission.”

“Yeah, well y’know, Ray, we didn’t exactly volunteer. We’re just here following orders.”

“Still, you’d think that we’d be given some better support than this bunch of misfits.”

The SDV Team One SEALs each in turn greeted their brothers from Team Seven with handshakes and hugs. Meetings between SEALs from sister Teams are often accompanied by a great deal of bantering and good-natured condescension. The COB watched all this with a grin and shook his head. With close to thirty years in the Navy under his keel, he knew all about submarines and submariners. These SEALs were a different lot. After a few minutes of greetings and grab-ass, the SDV officer in charge, a master chief petty officer, called for order. They then began to talk through the mechanics of the launch and the clandestine delivery of the two reconnaissance SEALs to a precise location on the coast of Somalia.

*  *  *

The USS
Makin Island
(LHD-8) was an updated, carbon copy of the
Bataan
and the
Bonhomme Richard
and the last of the eight
Wasp
-class amphibious warfare ships. Since the U.S. Navy no longer had the luxury of the huge base at Subic Bay in the Philippines, any military contingency in Southeast Asia of any size had to be addressed by an afloat presence. For this reason, the
Makin Island
, her diverse air group, her embarked Marine Expeditionary Unit of 1,400 Marines, and a SEAL task unit had been cruising the waters of the South China Sea off the island of Luzon. The SEALs and the Marines had detachments working with the Filipino military to counter Muslim secessionists in the southern archipelago in the Sulu Sea. So it was with some reluctance that the captain of the
Makin Island
recalled his disbursed SEAL elements and their combatant craft and put his ship on a course for Malaysia. After heading south for a full day with no reason given to the captain, and some harsh message traffic up his chain of command, he was granted limited code-word clearance, as it related to his ship’s orders. That evening the SEAL task unit commander and Senior Chief Otto Miller, charts in hand, knocked on the door of the captain’s sea cabin.

“Come in, gentlemen. My mess specialist has just brewed a fresh pot of coffee. I only hope you have some fresh perspective as to why my ship had to abandon its duties off the Philippines and is now making best speed for Malaysia.” Captain Evin McMasters, the skipper of the
Makin Island
, was easygoing, competent, and well liked by his crew. Yet it was all he could do to remain civil at having been kept in the dark while his embarked SEALs seemed to know a whole lot more than he did. When they were seated around the small conference table, the captain continued. “So, Commander,” he said, pushing two mugs of coffee across the table, “what the hell’s going on?”

Lieutenant Commander Todd Crandall was the embarked SEAL task unit comm caskidtander. In addition to a platoon and a half of SEALs, he had an Mk5 boat detachment and two 10 meter-RHIB (rigid-hull inflatable boat) detachments. The TU also carried the associated administrative, technical, and maintenance personnel to include Senior Chief Miller’s cadre of intelligence analysts. The TU commander was a short, serious former enlisted man, who had been a boatswain’s mate before he was a SEAL. He knew the blue-water Navy, and he knew Special Operations. Although he did not like the tone of the
Makin Island
’s
commanding officer, who was about his same age, he could well appreciate the man’s irritation at being kept in the dark.