Back on top of the gate, Lieutenant Rougeau, lying flat, felt the tug, pulled the tape as taut as possible, and using a tiny pinpoint flashlight, read the distance… Twelve feet exactly, Brian, that's the number.
CPO O'Riordan kicked downward again in the now pitch-black water, breathing steadily, until his fingers brushed against the second hinge, some twenty-five feet deeper. He pushed the tape into the same center groove and tugged three times.
Thirty-seven feet, Brian, that's the number.
Again, Chief O'Riordan kicked deep, pushing down toward the bottom of the giant chamber, groping in the silent dark for the third hinge. He tried to judge twenty-five feet but in this pitch black it was near impossible and he just kept kicking down, sliding his fingers along the girder until he found what he was looking for.
When he did so, he pulled the now heavy tape, more than sixty feet of it, through the water until he could push the end into the groove. Three more tugs and the starboard hinges were well and truly located.
Sixty-two feet, Brian, that's the number.
The next part was trickier, because while they were nearly sure the opposite hinges would be identically placed, SEALs do not actually do nearly sure.
They had agreed upon procedures. Chris O'Riordan did not wish to surface from more than sixty feet down and then have to kick down again. Instead, he hung on to the tape measure and set off across the bottom of the lock, kicking hard, and brushing the gates with the fingers of his right hand. Up above, Patrick Rougeau walked the tape across the top of the gates, back to the nearside, as if he was taking a willful pet seal for a walk, which, of course, in a sense, he was.
They both reached the jetty at the same time, and now they reversed the procedure. Chris slowly climbed the 60-odd feet toward the surface, in the dark, jerking the tape measure to confirm the hinge positions. They were identical, 62, 37, and 12 feet.
Then, still well below the surface, he turned his back on the gates, and kicked out into the lake, rounded the jetty, and swam quietly back to the beach where the others were waiting. He took off the wet suit, Draeger, and flippers, drank some water, and took his turn resting in the boat, while the two junior seamen took up their MP5s and made their way up to the roof above the jetty where the Lieutenant and Brian Ingram awaited them.
It was exactly 2:38 and nothing happened until shortly before four o'clock, when a four-man patrol, obviously soldiers, shouldering weapons, strolled across the walkway of the upper gates and passed directly beneath them.
They were Chinese, chuckling and smoking, paying little attention to anything. The SEALs watched them through the glasses, saw them reach the end of the chamber, and then turn around and stroll back the way they had come. It would have been the work of moments to remove all four of them from the face of the earth. But the SEALs wanted no sound.
They waited until five o'clock, when dawn began to break and returned to the Zodiac under the bushes, climbed in, completed their notes, and radioed their findings back to their little beachhead. They would take turns on watch until dark, calling in any movement whatsoever in the lock complex.
It was already plain the Chinese had no intention of opening the Canal at least until later on Monday, presumably while they put last-minute concealment touches to the disappearing submarine over on Trinidad Bay.
6 A.M., Monday, April 4, 2008
09.071 N, 81.50' W, Speed 10
USS Eisenhower
Lieutenant Commander Peavey watched the young SEALs manhandle six big reels of three-quarter-inch-thick, unbreakable, black parachute cord. He was running mathematical calculations in his head, working on the theory that each bomb was three feet long, and he thus wanted eighteen inches above and below center-hinge. Therefore, it would be twelve feet less eighteen inches from meat hook to the top of the gate — ten feet six inches, then thirty-five feet six inches, then sixty feet six inches.
"We need six lengths, two of thirteen feet six inches, two of thirty-eight feet six inches, and two of sixty-three feet six inches — mark them all with tape exactly three feet from the end of each line… That's for lashing… Splice the meat hooks at the other end…. Take six inches for the splice… Same length as those hooks… that way we'll be accurate… Tape the splice point hard."
His instructions were precise, and Mich Stetter, from Indiana, the NCO in charge of this area of the operation, the SEAL who would lower the bombs into place from the lock gates, watched every movement of his team as they prepared to destroy the Panama Canal. Normal SEAL procedures — slow, careful, no mistakes, a lot of checking, and even more double-checking.
The bomb satchels each had a metallic ring, top and bottom, and Mich wanted a trial run with regular parachute cord, black but thinner than the meat-hook lines, giving the men a chance to lash the satchels together in groups of six.
Each group must include one of the six satchels with the thick, bright red band around it, the ones containing the arming devices.
This deadly package would total 180 kilograms of high explosives — that's more than four hundred pounds, but they always measure explosives in kilograms. It would then be further wrapped tight in detcord, the stuff that burns at five miles a second, before being placed in a waterproof black bag, attached to the meat hook and lowered from the top of the gate, coming to rest right in the middle of the giant hinge.
When it blew, it would certainly be the most spectacular use of detcord since Major Ray Kerman liberated Islam's political prisoners on the other side of the world three years ago, almost to the day. It was hard to believe the two incidents would be so closely interconnected. And thus far, only Arnold Morgan, George Morris, and Jimmy Ramshawe knew precisely how and why.
Meanwhile, the SEALs aboard the aircraft carrier practiced and practiced heaving the heavy satchels across the room and placing them in groups. Every one of them realized the next time they tried this it would be pitch dark in a confined space, and they would then have to haul each completed sack up to the lock using straps and handles. Bill Peavey considered it far too dangerous to assemble the bomb on top of the lock gate.
"It's always gonna be easier to assemble the sacks somewhere secluded, where we have time to get it right, then carry them to the walkway, hook 'em up and drop 'em straight in. Anyone gets in our way, they die."
All morning they practiced lashing, dragging and heaving, getting the satchels in the waterproof sacks, working by feel, trying to do it with their eyes shut, just in case there was no moon tonight. The youngest seamen would lift the satchels off the ground while the explosives men steered them into place. One seaman in each group would lash them together.
Lt. Patrick Rougeau would personally take charge of the detcord and detonating. Right now, Mich Stetter was cutting thin, black electrical cord into approximate lengths of 64 feet, 39 feet, and 14 feet. It was not possible to be accurate, but it couldn't be too short, Mich was allowing a couple of feet to connect to the arming device inside the red-banded satchels, and to the tiny float and whip-thin aerial that would bob silently on the surface, waiting for the electronic impulse that would detonate all six bombs simultaneously, with stupendous force against the gates to the Gatún Lake.
They had a late breakfast at one o'clock in the afternoon, slept until half past five, and had their last food before departure at six — roast chicken, salad, and baked potatoes.
Just as they sat down in the private SEAL dining area, the message came in from the destroyer USS Roosevelt, whose Commanding Officer Capt. Butch Howarth was still furious with the controllers of the canal. His message was simple.
Chinese reopened Panama Canal 141730APR08… Gave immediate priority to three Chinese ships in the holding area… First, the Luhu Class Type 052 destroyer Qingdao, then two freighters around 20,000 tons. Roosevelt still awaiting clearance. Howarth.
Bill Peavey was immediately alerted, and someone brought his dinner to the Comms Room while he drafted a signal into the beach where the recce party's guards were manning the bi
g machine gun and the radio. Chinese reopened canal 1730… Luhu Class destroyer Qingdao entered first… ETA Gatún Lock midnight… Stay alert… We arrive 2100. Peavey.
Up on the flight deck, the Sea Stallions were revved up, loaded and ready for takeoff. Lieutenant Commander Peavey led his team out onto the hot, windy area high on the port side of the carrier.
One by one, the SEALs boarded, each man's face blackened with camouflage cream, each of them carrying his personal weapon, the MP5 machine gun, combat knife, and binoculars. Some of them with hand grenades, all of them with small maps, charts, and diagrams of the locks.
Two Petty Officers, the Texan Joe Little, and Tony McQuade from Georgia, sat with checklists detailing the number of gasoline cans, compressed air cylinders, paddles, the heavy reels of detcord, the ready-cut bomb lines, the satchels, the bags, the radios, the water canisters. The SEALs were to leave no trace of their existence. Every last piece of equipment had to be accounted for, both on the inward journey and the return. There was no food. This was to be a ten hour round-trip operation, door to door. Max.
They took off at half past eight, following the route of the recce team, fifty miles into the Panamanian coastline, down the river, and into the landing space on the narrow beach. Lt. Comdr. Peavey was silent for the whole journey, turning over in his mind the split-second timing they would now require, because that top chamber had to be empty when the gates blew, and that meant the first ship had to be completely out of it, and into the channel heading for the second lock, when the bombs were detonated. Not too far, because with the heavy exiting traffic building up in the lake, the Chinese keepers would be refilling that chamber very fast.
The moment the first Sikorsky landed, the three SEALs manning the little beachhead rushed forward to help unload the inflatables, fill them with air, and gas them up in the shallows. One Zodiac was, of course, still there, ready to go. All of them had been fitted with twelve-gallon plastic tanks to give them a six-hour running time, ample for the stealthy four-mile round-trip to the lock gates.
Everything was unloaded and the empty gas cans were stowed aboard the lead Sikorsky, which took off immediately after the second one landed. And still there was no sign of any patrol craft, nor indeed any indication that the Control Room up at the lock even knew there had been a landing.
In total silence, the twenty-eight SEALs pushed out into the black waters, huddled in the three boats. They kicked over the engines and began the short run up to the lock, past the great wall of the Gatún Dam, which was precisely where their luck ran out.
Up ahead, they could hear the unmistakable sound of a powerful boat, about a half mile north, traveling directly toward them, its red and green port and starboard lights easily visible in the clear tropical night.
The Zodiacs carried no lights and their tactics were well rehearsed. All motors were cut and two of the inflatables peeled off, one left, one right heading back south. The lead boat carried on, four SEALs paddling straight toward the oncoming patrol, the rest flat down in the boat, all fingers on the trigger.
"Ahoy," yelled Peavey, as a big searchlight settled on his boat. “No es culpa suya!" Which he hoped meant "please help" in Spanish. "Incapaz, indefenso," he added.
By now they could see the armed four-man crew up on the rail looking down in plain and obvious alarm. But not for long. Petty Officer Joe Little, from out of nowhere, blew all four of them away with a savage burst of machine-gun fire that riddled a grotesque pattern into the forehead of every one of them.
Tony McQuade boarded the ship, headed for the cockpit, and blew away the radio. By which time Lieutenant Commander Peavey was on board, stripped to the waist, boots off. He set the autopilot on 284, shoved Tony over the side back into the Zodiac, tossed his own machine gun in right after him, and headed back to the Control Room.
He rammed the throttles wide open, sending the patrol boat straight for the dam wall at thirty unwavering knots. Then he jumped for his life into the lake, starboard side, and waited for the Zodiac to come pick him up.
Wet pants, dead Chinese, and a wrecked boat, all in the first twenty minutes.
"Jesus Christ," said Bill, as they hauled him out of the water.
One minute later, they all heard the dull crump of the patrol boat obliterating itself on the dam wall, the wreckage sliding down to the very deepest part of the lake, more or less as the CO had planned.
"Onward," he said quietly. "We got work to do."
Five minutes later, they were up level with their landing beach, paddling in, the other two Zodiacs now right behind them, two more SEALs standing in the shallows, ready to help them into the shadow of the towering Gatún Locks jetty.
By now Lieutenant Rougeau was positioned close to the top of the steel ladder with Chris O'Riordan, ready to help haul in the satchels, as the SEAL assault group made the climb from the beach, the explosives strapped to their backs.
One by one, they made the killer ascent, each man with close to seventy pounds on his back, as well as his light machine gun and ammunition clips fitted across his chest. The trouble was it was impossible for two men to carry the load. The task had to be achieved one by one, and there was no question of assembling the bombs and then maneuvering them somehow through the water.
The explosives had to be dropped in from the top of the gates, no ifs, ands, or buts. And the SEALs had to get it up there from the beach. Failure, as ever, was unthinkable.
Their only recourse was for CPO O'Riordan to drop a heavy line with a meat hook, which could grab the metal clasp in the satchel and take some of the weight up the final steps. This was an option Lieutenant Commander Peavey laid out before they started. No one took it. Each man fought his way up that ladder, carrying his huge burden all alone. None of them became U.S. Navy SEALs by accident.
The last man reached the top at 11:20 p.m. Time was running out. Patrick Rougeau steered them to a place in deep shadow where they split into their allotted groups. Two teams of six men took over the tying operation, lashing the satchels together in groups of six.
Two more teams descended the ladder and dragged two of the Zodiacs down the beach and back into the water, ready to round the jetty and provide protection for the men working on the high gates. Bill Peavey assessed that any danger or challenge would come from the lake rather than the somewhat slothful shore patrol up on the lock complex.
The two teams assigned to shore protection split to either side of the jetty, one group back up on the roof where Lieutenant Rougeau had started, the other on the far side of the lock, lying flat, looking back toward the Control Room. The men working close to the walkway were now covered by withering machine-gun fire, if necessary. But everyone hoped it would not be.
By 11:40, the six bombs were ready, packed in their waterproof bags, the devices armed, the detcord wrapped hard and tight. Patrick Rougeau personally set the electronic wires, one end connected inside the red-banded satchel, the other end to the little floating radio aerial.
By now they could see the lights from the Chinese destroyer advancing; across the lake, probably two miles away and making around six knots. And now the bomb teams faced the most difficult and delicate part of their operation. And they were short of time.
Lieutenant Commander Peavey grabbed the big handle on the first bag, and with three more SEALs on the other corners, they heaved it onto the walkway, half dragging, half carrying it the 110 feet across the lock where Lieutenant Rougeau awaited with the meat-hook line. Swiftly he inserted the hook, and Mich Stetter pushed the bag under the iron handrail.
They all took the weight as it slipped down eight feet and then became light as it submerged into the water on the lakeside. Slowly they lowered it, feeling it bump down against the girder. As it reached its correct depth, some sixty feet below, Lieutenant Rougeau checked the marker tape was hard against the edge of the gate, and he lashed the remaining three feet to the base of the end strut. He used a bowline knot and cut the surplus line off. When the motorized handrail we
nt down, when they opened the gates, that strut would slide through the line and the rail itself would hide it.
Twice more, they repeated the exercise, dragging the huge weight across the lock, and lowering it into the water, fastening it off with the bowline, and feeling it swing gently against the giant hinges.
On the nearside of the gates, CPO O'Riordan was doing the same. But his men did not have that backbreaking journey across the lock, and it was as well that Bill Peavey, one of the strongest men in the U.S. Navy, was among the muscle present on that dark and treacherous night.
By midnight, the SEALs had moved into position, Lieutenant Rougeau back on the roof of the original building, accompanied by three bodyguards, four MP5s and powerful night binoculars. Lt. Commander Peavey was heading back out into the lake in one of the Zodiacs and everyone else was clearing up and preparing for the getaway.
The Commanding Officer was accompanied by Chief O'Riordan, who was now speaking to Patrick Rougeau on the radio. They headed out into the lake more than a quarter of a mile from the gates but still well within the range of the deadly transmitter that would flash its electronic signal simultaneously to the six bobbing little aerials outside the lock gates.
The plan was simple. Lieutenant Rougeau would give them clearance to detonate when the Chinese destroyer was safely through the exit gates from the upper chamber, almost thirty feet lower, and being hauled along to the second chamber by the automatic locomotives. In various forms, these iron horses have done the task for generations, like an old-fashioned car wash used to drag vehicles through the soapsuds.
The men on the lake would then wait six minutes for the SEALs to make their escape off the roof, back to the beach, and the last boat, at which point they would send in the fatal signal.
West of the destroyer's approach path, the SEALs watched from the Zodiacs, as it steamed slowly toward the lock gates. They could not see them slowly open, outward into the lake, powered by no fewer than ninety-two electric motors, but they saw the great 470-foot-long hull of the warship slide between the jetties, at which point Chief O'Riordan knew the bombs would have eased back into the wide recesses in the walls.
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