Front Burner

by Kirk S. Lippold

  As respectfully as possible, I told him the FBI would handle the remains with the greatest care and dignity. They had already assumed custody of the remains until forensic analysis and identification could be completed. A key point many people still did not understand was that pieces of the bombers had also been found during the recovery process and the last thing anyone wanted was their loved ones commingled with those murderous terrorists.

  Given this reaction by my chain of command, I had to assume it also represented the views of the Navy’s senior leadership. I thought it was time to put forward a bold proposal: I wanted to visit the families of the seventeen sailors killed in the attack. Several days later, while still at the shipyard in Pascagoula, I broached it with Admiral Foley’s staff. Following the release of the command investigation report to the public, I would personally contact each of the families of the seventeen sailors killed in the attack and if they were willing to host me, visit each of them in person.

  I viewed this as a paramount duty as commanding officer of USS Cole when it was attacked. Those sailors had died on my watch, and their families deserved the right to sit down with me and ask the hard questions: Why was USS Cole in Aden in the first place? Why didn’t the Navy refuel the ship at sea or at another port? Why didn’t you follow all of the security measures you said you were going to follow? These families had the right to hear answers directly from me, not just read about my decisions and those in my chain of command in some antiseptic, detached investigation that could not begin to address the depths of grief and anger they felt over the loss of their loved ones. It was absolutely the right thing to do.

  The Navy, however, thought otherwise. No, absolutely not, was the answer from Admiral Foley’s staff. It was inappropriate for a commanding officer to contact the families. The Navy, through the Casualty Assistance Calls Officer assigned to each family, would handle any questions of this nature that might arise after release of the command investigation report. It was the wrong answer and I was not about to let it go. Given the recent “revelation” about recovered remains on the ship, it was best to just let the issue die down for a few days and to approach it again during my next visit to Norfolk. I was not about to give this up.

  The ship, meanwhile, was ready to be floated off M/V Blue Marlin. A Naval Academy classmate, Commander Stephen Metz, was assigned to the Navy’s Supervisor of Shipbuilding Conversion and Repair, Pascagoula, at Ingalls Shipbuilding, as the Destroyer Project Officer for the Aegis destroyers being built there. Exceptionally capable, he had been tapped to oversee the reconstruction of Cole and was personally involved in every aspect of its planned repair. While in transit to the shipyard, he had been provided with very accurate measurements of the size of the blast hole and the extent of damage radiating away from it, and had overseen the construction of a large, forty-ton, two-section, sixty-by-eighty-foot reinforced patch to weld to the side of the ship and cover the hole. It took days of welding and adjusting, but by December 23, the patch was securely in place.

  The Navy, in coordination with Ingalls Shipbuilding, had dredged out the center of the harbor area just off the basin where new ships were constructed and launched. Cole needed a launching in reverse. Early on the morning of Christmas Eve, M/V Blue Marlin gracefully maneuvered away from the pier and firmly anchored herself over the middle of the dredged area. The water depth gave the ship the room to ballast down and allow Cole to gently refloat off the docking blocks and support beams that had held her in place during the long transit back to the United States. Throughout the entire process, teams of shipyard workers patrolled the engine rooms and spaces below the waterline to ensure the ship remained watertight and its structural integrity held fast.

  Once Cole was floating on her own above the keel blocks, M/V Blue Marlin took in the lines holding her in position and, seconds later, several tugs attached lines to the ship and gently towed her across the basin back to a pier where she would stay for the next eight days. The remainder of the year would be spent making preparations for the weapons offload at the Pascagoula Naval Station and transition to the Ingalls Shipbuilding reconstruction area. It was almost 2100 before the evolution was complete, but USS Cole was back afloat again.

  Once Cole was secure and a watch established for its security, it was time to get on the road. That night and through Christmas Day, it was a long drive to Norfolk and straight back to work for me. Although it was a holiday period for most of the Navy, many people at Naval Surface Forces Atlantic Fleet and the Bureau of Personnel worked right through it to chart the future of the crew. Once again, I broached with the admiral’s staff the subject of visiting the families and was again rebuffed, but they were beginning to see that perhaps there might be some merit in my request. Not wanting to overplay my hand, I left things where they were for the moment and drove back down to Pascagoula and the ship in preparation for the weapons offload.

  On January 2, Cole was towed from the pier at Ingalls Shipbuilding, across the bay to the Pascagoula Naval Station. In coordination with the combat system officer, Lieutenant Commander Anthony Delatorre, Lieutenant Joe Gagliano, the weapons officer, drafted a detailed and comprehensive offload plan putting together a fully qualified weapons onload/ offload team that flew down from Norfolk for the project. Numerous support personnel from the Naval Weapons Station at Yorktown, Virginia, helped complete the offload inventory and equipment checks. Although none of the ammunition appeared to be damaged by the explosion, all of it had sat in the magazines for weeks under the hot sun in Aden and during the transit back to the United States. All missiles, torpedoes, and five-inch gun rounds were individually inspected prior to being moved. Early on January 3, the offload began, and with unparalleled speed and efficiency the entire offload of every round of ammunition along with all weapons was completed by late that same day. The next two days were spent cleaning up the magazines and surrounding areas in preparation for entering the shipyard.

  Several days later, the ship was towed back across the harbor to Ingalls Shipbuilding as final preparations were completed to float the ship onto a dry dock for movement onto the land facility for deconstruction and rebuild. Taking advantage of the tides, Cole was eased out of her pierside berth and slowly towed into place over the middle of the dry dock. Once positioned exactly in place with mooring lines extending from the wing walls of the dock, water was slowly pumped out. Just like M/V Blue Marlin, which had departed a few days after Cole was floated off, the dry dock pumped water out of its ballast tanks and slowly the keel blocks rose to meet the bottom of the ship.

  Within a few hours, Cole was lifted completely out of the water again. With the ship resting comfortably on the keel blocks, the dry dock with Cole in the center was towed to a docking area next to the land facility. For the next six days, the shipyard prepared the ship for the move back onto land and into the building yard, using a marine railway transfer system. Initially resting on keel blocks, the ship was slowly raised up with wedges pounded under the keel to provide room for a series of small, electrically powered railway cars. With blocking material on top of each car, specifically designed to uniformly distribute the weight of the ship, the wedge material was slowly removed and the ship then rested on the railway cars.

  The dry dock used at Ingalls Shipbuilding could have the wing walls removed in sections and using proper ballasting, the rail section in the dry dock could be exactly aligned with the rail sections that lead up to the land facility where Cole would be rebuilt. It was a tremendous engineering feat. A new ship is usually driven off the land facility and floated for the first time weighing in at about 60 percent of its final operational tonnage. Cole, even with all the weapons offloaded, would test the imbedded rail system to its limits.

  On January 14, Cole began the slow journey from the deck of the dry dock. At first, the hum of the electric motors was almost imperceptible, and then slowly one could hear the power being uniformly and steadily increased to the individual motors. There was only a slight hesitation, and th
en with a low grinding rumble, the ship started to move. It was hundreds of feet before Cole would be in position and the journey was expected to take hours; nonetheless, the ship was still my responsibility and I stayed to watch the entire event.

  Standing with me was one of the senior shipyard supervisors, Lewellyn “Sparky” Butler. He had been handpicked to lead the workers who would soon rebuild Cole. Slowly, the ship cleared the edge of the dry dock and was solidly driven up onto the concrete pads and rail lines leading up the ever so slight incline. With the ship moving less than one foot per minute, this was going to take some time. Just making small talk as the railcars slowly ground their way further into the yard, Sparky commented that on such occasions it was sometimes customary to take a penny, place it on a rail, and let the electric cars flatten it. Almost any kid that lived near railroad tracks had done the same thing with a passing train.

  I reached into my pocket and discovered I was carrying no change whatsoever. Sparky just laughed, dug into his pockets, and pulled a penny out for me. As I bent down to put it on the rail, I noticed the year—1981, the year I graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy. The car wheel slowly hit the edge of the penny and began, inexorably, to crush it. The symbolism of the moment was not lost on me, but I continued to hope for the best.

  By the end of the day, the ship was in position, and soon became a beehive of activity as scaffolding and workers descended to start the repairs in earnest.

  It was during this same time that Admiral Natter, commander in chief of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, forwarded his endorsement of the command investigation to Admiral Clark, the chief of naval operations. Shortly thereafter, on January 17, he, along with Admiral Foley and FBI Director Louis Freeh, was going to meet with the families in Norfolk to discuss the status of the command and criminal investigations. Now, Admiral Foley’s staff contacted me and said they wanted to take me up on my offer to meet with the families. They proposed that when everybody was gathered at the base auditorium for the meeting, I could stand up and take questions. But this seemed like a setup to me. The command investigation was not yet finished, and the Navy leadership had yet to render judgment on my actions and accountability. This was the wrong venue and the wrong time, and I declined to do it. All along, my proposal was to meet with the families after, not before, the command investigation was complete. I thought it was imperative for my visit with each family to take place in their home or some other place of their choosing, where they would feel comfortable and I would be an outsider invited in. My vision for the visits had also evolved in the few short weeks since I had first proposed it. I felt it would also be important for the command master chief, Master Chief Parlier, to be at my side during the visits, since he represented the enlisted members of the crew in Cole’s leadership team, and that the casualty assistance calls officer personally assigned to each family should also be in attendance. Intuitively, I knew the families had formed a special bond with these people as the Navy’s representatives to them. Admiral Foley reluctantly agreed that the Norfolk meeting might not be the best venue for me to appear before the families. I was told to remain in Pascagoula.

  But before the January 17 visit in Norfolk, Admiral Natter wanted to come to the shipyard to better acquaint himself with the ship and with the damage it had suffered in the attack, and I took him and a small entourage around Cole on the tour route I had followed for the other distinguished visitors in Aden. The admiral asked a number of questions about the events and decisions leading up to the attack as well as our actions in its immediate aftermath. As the tour ended after well over an hour on board, we walked toward the back of the ship and the flight deck. At the same back passageway in the ship where only three months earlier the crew had tirelessly worked to save their shipmates from dying, Admiral Natter requested a moment alone with me.

  As we walked away from the group, he asked me what I wanted to do next. I could not help but smile and told him that decision would depend on the outcome of the command investigation, which would determine whether or not I had a career left in the Navy to even worry about a next assignment. He very directly told me not to worry about the investigation; I would be fine at the end and could live with its conclusions. After a few minutes of discussion, we agreed that an assignment to the Joint Chiefs of Staff was exactly the career move needed to keep me on track in the Navy, and he even offered to intercede if the Bureau of Personnel did not support my request. This was the first indication of how the investigation might render its judgment of my actions and accountability. Finally, there might actually be light at the end of this nightmare tunnel.

  Back in Norfolk, the admirals’ January 17 meeting with the families did not go well. It was an emotional and pointed gathering, and many of those present were filled with anger, feeling that they had not been given the truth about what had led up to the attack and its aftermath. Some family members were quite vocal in their demands for accountability and blame to be affixed to someone in the chain of command for even allowing USS Cole to be in Aden.

  The day after the meeting, I flew back into Norfolk to await the release of the command investigation, and learned that the Navy had finally agreed to allow me, unfettered, to contact each of the families directly and to arrange a private visit with any that wanted one.

  Since Cole’s detachment offices did not have television, I stayed at home the afternoon of January 19, waiting for the press conference with the secretary of defense to start. With the command investigation finally released to the public, I listened intently to the chief of naval operations and the secretary of the Navy explain their findings as part of the investigative process. The press was still asking questions as each of the networks shifted to other news. The attack on USS Cole was becoming history.

  But I still had work to do. I drove back into the ship’s detachment offices to meet with a chaplain and go through the list of family members to start making calls. It took a week to reach them all. Seventeen sailors did not mean just seventeen calls. I contacted thirty-one separate family members, many late in the evening from home, the only time their work schedules made it possible for us to talk. During each call I expressed my condolences and quietly offered to contact them again in a week to arrange a visit.

  In the end, every family but one agreed to host me in their homes. Knowing that emotions would run very raw, I asked them to agree to a few considerations.

  I wanted to meet with immediate family only—husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers and sisters, and guardians. I asked that the command master chief and the casualty assistance calls officer be allowed to attend with me, and that no media be invited—these were to be private meetings between the families and me.

  When the command master chief and I set out on the road to visit each of the families, there were twenty-nine family groups on the schedule over four weeks. Each visit was scheduled for two hours but could be adjusted depending on the circumstances and requirements of each family.

  In some homes, I was welcomed with open arms and embraced by a family who appeared grateful and appreciative of my efforts to save the ship and lead the crew out of danger after the attack. Other families greeted me with outright hostility and anger. As I had predicted, the decision to go to the families’ homes, where they felt comfortable and in their element and I was the outsider and guest, encouraged them to hold nothing back.

  After the introductions and the invitation to my visiting group to sit down, every family cut right to the point with numerous questions about what had happened and why. The vast majority of questions pertained to why the Navy had USS Cole refuel in Aden. Many turned to Master Chief Parlier and wanted to know what the crew thought, or if they had any insight into why this had happened.

  During each visit with the families, these questions typically lasted well over an hour. It was very important to be consistent and diligent in the answers. These families had suffered an unimaginable loss of their son, daughter, wife, or husband. They deserved th
e truth, no matter how painful or difficult to hear. I spoke from my heart, as did Master Chief Parlier. If I did not know an exact answer, the casualty assistance officer took a note to get it later. At the end of an often trying and emotional hour, the questions became less pointed and a subtle shift in the tone of the conversation took place. The families wanted to know about the life their sailor had lived aboard Cole.

  This was always the most heart-wrenching part of the visit. I was fortunate enough to have been in command of Cole for fifteen months before the attack. I knew every sailor on the ship. Even the new sailors that had reported aboard during the deployment met personally with me and I had tracked their integration into the ship’s company and routine. In doing this, I was blessed by being able to interact in some small way with each of them during their time on board. With every sailor who had died, I was able to share a story about them with their families and make them come to life again in our eyes, for a brief instant. More often than not, everyone listening interrupted these stories with tears and expressions of overwhelming loss. From small boat rides, to lasagna preparation, to expressive language in following a checklist, to approval of a request chit to attend a school, each account was a delicate memory of a life lost in a senseless attack. With each story, the families also shared their own memories, and in most visits I was afforded the privilege of a lifetime as the families shared their sailor with me.

  Often with tears running down my cheeks, I turned the pages of a life captured in family photo albums, wedding albums, and montages created by friends and given to the family. In some cases, pictures were taken down from the mantle and handed to me as if to forever impress on me that while I was in command of Cole, their loved one had been killed. This was a burden no one could share with me; I had to bear it alone. The images of those sailors will remain with me forever. I will always feel honored and privileged to have known each of them, to have served as their captain, and to have been allowed to visit with each of those families.