W E B Griffin - Corp 09 - Under Fire
Page 60
"They all look like square tin cans," Peters said.
"Marvelous!" Jennings said.
"Then we'll have to have three of each."
"You don't happen to have the one that's broke?" Peters asked.
"No."
"When do you need them?"
"Now."
"I've got two SCR-300s here, about to go back to Japan for depot-level maintenance. I can take the transformers out of them, if that would help?"
"How would we know if they're any good?"
"We don't," Peters said. "But as a general rule of thumb,
if they haven't lost their oil, they run forever."
"That's what Sergeant Worley said, Captain," Jennings said. "He said it was the last thing he expected to fail."
"Are they hard to get out?"
"Unfasten a couple of screws, unsolder a couple of con-nections...."
"Give Sergeant Jennings a soldering iron and a screw-driver, and he can get started while I report in."
"If you'd like, I've got a pretty good sergeant who could take these out and put them in yours," Peters said.
"Mine is a long way away," McCoy said. "But thanks anyway."
"You know what you're looking for, Sergeant?"
"Yes, sir."
"They're out in back, I'll show you."
[SEVEN]
K-l USAF AIRFIELD
PUSAN, KOREA
0325 10 AUGUST 1950
The Transient Officers' Quarters at K-l was a dirt-floored U.S. Army squad tent. The tent was furnished with six folding wooden cots and one lightbulb.
Lieutenant (j.g.) Preston Haywood, USNR, hadn't planned to spend the night in Pusan, but he'd had a couple of red lights on the panel of his Avenger and by the time he'd gotten the Air Force mechanics to clear them, it had been too late to take the COD aircraft back to the USS Sicily.
Night landings on aircraft carriers are understandably more dangerous than daylight landings, and unless there was a good reason to make them, they were discouraged. In Lieutenant Haywood's judgment-discretion being the better part of valor-carrying half a dozen mail bags out to the Sicily was not a good enough reason to make a night landing on her.
After making sure that Aviation Motor Machinist's Mate 3rd Class Jos‚ Garcia, his crew chief, would have a place to sleep and be able to get something to eat, Haywood had taken advantage of the situation and gone to the K-l O Club, thinking, if nothing else, he could probably have a beer there. There was, of course, no beer, or any other kind of alcohol, aboard the Sicily.
He had four bottles of Asahi beer in the K-l O Club. And he had occasion to muse again that the Air Force didn't feed as well as the Navy. Supper had been two tough pork chops, mashed potatoes, and mushy green beans.
There being absolutely nothing else to do at K-l, when he'd finished his fourth beer, he'd gone to bed, which is to say he'd gone to the tent, stripped to his underwear, and lay down on the folding wooden cot, sharing it-there being nothing else he could find to do with his khakis and flight suit.
Haywood sat up abruptly when the bare lightbulb sud-denly turned on.
Two men had entered the Transient Officers Quarters. One he recognized as the Marine liaison officer. The other was a strange apparition, a white man wearing what looked like black pajamas, and with a Garand rifle slung from his shoulder. He was carrying, as was the Marine liaison offi-cer, a cardboard carton.
"Haywood, right?" the Marine liaison officer asked.
"Yes, sir."
"Haywood, this is Captain McCoy," the Marine liaison officer said.
"Yes, sir?" Haywood asked, wondering if he should try to get dressed.
"I need a ride out to the Badoeng Strait," the white man in the black pajamas said. "As soon as possible."
"Sir, I'm from the Sicily."
"Captain Overton told me," McCoy said. "I want to get there before the Marines fly their first flight of the morn-ing."
"Sir, I'm not sure I can do that," Haywood said. "For one thing..."
"You can do it," McCoy said. He handed Haywood a sheet of paper. "There's my authority."
Lieutenant Haywood's only previous experience with the Central Intelligence Agency had been watching it por-trayed in a movie, but he realized he was holding in his hand an order issued by the Director of the CIA-who was a rear admiral, USN. He knew there were no flag officers aboard Sicily, and he was almost positive there weren't any aboard Badoeng Strait either.
"Yes, sir," Lieutenant Haywood said. "Sir, I'll have to ask permission to land on Badoeng Strait."
"Hypothetically speaking, Mr. Haywood," McCoy said. "What would happen if you called Badoeng Strait and said you had an emergency and needed to land?"
"They'd give me permission, of course, sir."
"Okay, that's what we'll do."
"You don't want me to ask permission, sir?"
"They're liable to say `no,'" McCoy said. "Get dressed, Mr. Haywood, please."
[EIGHT]
THE USS BADOENG STRAIT
35 DEGREES 24 MINUTES NORTH IATITUDE,
129 DEGREES 65 MINUTES EAST LONGITUDE
THE SEA OF JAPAN
0420 10 AUGUST 1950
Lieutenant Haywood was wrong about there being no flag officers aboard Badoeng Strait. The Badoeng Strait was flying the red, single-starred flag of a Marine brigadier general.
Brigadier General Thomas A. Cushman, Assistant Com-mander, First Marine Air Wing, had flown aboard late the previous afternoon, piloting himself in an Avenger he'd borrowed from USN Base Kobe.
General Cushman wanted to be with his men. The previ-ous evening, he had dined in the chief petty officer's mess, which also served the Marine master sergeants aboard. He had taken dessert in the enlisted mess, and finally, he'd had coffee with the Marine officers in the Pilot's Ready Room and in the wardroom.
He had spent the night-although he had at first de-clined the offer-in the cabin of the Badoeng Strait's cap-tain. The captain, who had known General Cushman over the years, told him he preferred to use his sea cabin-a small cabin right off the bridge-anyway, and Cushman had accepted the offer.
Cushman had set his traveling alarm clock for 0400. The first Corsairs would be taking off at 0445, and he wanted to attend the briefing, and then see them off.
All the intelligence General Cushman had seen indi-cated that the North Koreans were aware that the longer they didn't succeed in pushing Eighth Army into the sea, the less the chance-American strength in the Pusan perimeter grew daily-that they would ever be able to do so.
Consequently, while perhaps not in desperation, but something close to it, they were attacking all the time, and on all fronts. The Marine Corsairs would have a busy day.
Cushman was surprised and pleased when he turned the lights on to see that someone had very quietly entered the cabin and left a silver coffee set on the captain's desk. He poured half a cup, then had a quick shower and shave, and wearing a freshly laundered and starched khaki uniform- courtesy of the captain's steward-left the captain's cabin and made his way to the bridge.
"Permission to come on the bridge, Captain?"
"Granted. Get a good night's sleep, General?"
"Very nice, and thank you for the coffee and your stew-ard's attention."
"My pleasure, sir. More coffee, sir?"
"Thank you," Cushman said, and one of the white caps on the bridge quickly handed him a china mug.
"Bridge, Air Ops," the loudspeaker blared.
"Go."
"We have a call from an Avenger declaring an emergency, and requesting immediate permission to land."
The captain and General Cushman looked at each other. The general's lower lip came out, expressing interest and surprise.
The captain pressed the lever on the communications device next to his chair.
"Inform the Avenger we are turning into the wind now," the captain said. Then he pushed the lever one stop farther, so that his voice would carry all over the ship.
"This is the captain
speaking. Make all preparations to recover an Avenger who has declared an emergency," he said. He let the lever go.
"Turn us into the wind," he ordered.
"Turning into the. wind, aye, aye, sir" the helmsman replied.
The Badoeng Strait began a sharp turn.
The captain steadied himself, then gestured courteously to General Cushman to precede him to an area aft of the bridge, from which they could see the approach and land-ing of the Avenger.
By the time the Badoeng Strait had turned into the wind and was sailing in a straight line, frantic activity on the flight deck had prepared the ship to recover an aircraft un-der emergency conditions.
General Cushman turned to the officer actually in charge of the recovery operation, saw that he wasn't at that mo-ment busy, and asked, "Did he say what's wrong with him?"
"No, sir, and I asked him three times."
"There he is," the captain said.
General Cushman looked aft and saw an Avenger mak-ing what looked like a perfectly normal approach to the carrier.
A minute later, having made a nice, clean landing-his hook caught the first cable-the Avenger was aboard the Badoeng Strait surrounded by firefighters in aluminum heat-resistant suits, other specialists; and even a tractor prepared to push the aircraft over the side if that became necessary.
The door in the fuselage opened, and someone dressed in what looked like black pajamas backed out of it.
"What the hell is that?" General Cushman asked.
"If it's who I think it is, it's someone who's going to spend the next twenty years in Portsmouth Naval Prison," the captain said.
The character in black pajamas reached into the fuselage and took one cardboard carton, and then another, and fi-nally a U.S. Rifle, Caliber.30 Ml, to the strap of which were attached two eight-round ammunition clips.
"Excuse me, General," the captain said. "I'll deal with this. I was going to have him brought here, but I don't want that sonofa-character to foul my bridge."
The captain started down a ladder toward the flight deck. General Cushman looked at the character in the black paja-mas long enough to confirm his first identification of him, then started down the ladder.
As he reached the flight deck, General Cushman almost literally bumped into Lieutenant Colonel William C. Dunn, USMCR, who was suited up for the morning's first sortie.
"Good morning, sir," Colonel Dunn said.
"Billy, is that your friend Captain McCoy?"
"Yes, sir, it is."
"What's going on?" Cushman asked.
"I have no idea, sir," Dunn said.
"Let's go find out," Cushman said. "The captain's talk-ing about twenty years in Portsmouth for him."
Captain Kenneth R. McCoy was standing at attention be-fore the captain of the USS Badoeng Strait-who had his balled fists resting on his hips and was speaking in a rather loud tone of voice-when General Cushman and Lieu-tenant Colonel Dunn walked up.
On seeing General Cushman, the captain broke off whatever he was saying in midsentence.
"Captain, may I suggest that we get off the flight deck?" General Cushman said, politely.
The captain looked at him for a long moment, then fi-nally found his voice.
"Yes, sir," he said. "I agree. If you'll follow me, please?"
The captain, the general, and the lieutenant colonel started to march off the deck. The lieutenant colonel* sens-ing that the captain was not in the parade, looked over his shoulder.
McCoy had picked up one of the cardboard cartons.
"Colonel, I can't carry both of these myself," McCoy said, indicating the second carton.
Lieutenant Colonel Dunn walked quickly back to Mc-Coy, picked up the second carton, and joined the parade.
The captain led the way up interior ladders to his cabin. The others followed him inside. The captain closed the door. McCoy and Dunn put the cartons on the deck.
"Captain," General Cushman said. "May I suggest that since we all are anxious to ask Captain McCoy about a number of things, we probably would be better off to hold our questions until Captain McCoy explains his presence aboard Badoeng Strait?"
"Yes, sir. That would probably be best."
"All right, McCoy," General Cushman said.
"Sir, I felt it necessary to get here before Colonel Dunn took off on the morning's missions," McCoy said. "The only way I could see to do that was to commandeer that Avenger."
"'Commandeer that Avenger'?" the captain parroted. "Who the hell are you to commander anything? Who gave you that authority?"
"I thought we'd agreed to hold our questions," General Cushman said, courteously. "But I think we all would like to hear that one answered."
McCoy handed General Cushman what he thought of as the White House orders.
Cushman read them, raised his eyebrow, and handed them to the captain.
"I've seen them, sir," the captain said.
"Well, that would seem to give you the authority, Mc-Coy," General Cushman said. "But it doesn't answer why you felt you had to come aboard the Badoeng Strait, and why you felt declaring an emergency when there was none was justified."
"Sir, I was afraid we would be denied permission to land."
"And your purpose? What's so important?"
"Those cartons, sir, contain parts for an SCR-300 radio. I have to get them to... where the radio is as soon as pos-sible. I was going to have Colonel Dunn deliver them, sir."
"Deliver them where?"
"Sir," McCoy said, uncomfortably, "with all possible re-spect, I must inform you and the captain that what I am about to tell you is classified Top Secret/White House and cannot be divulged to anyone else without General Picker-ing's specific permission."
"Not even to General Craig?" Cushman asked.
"General Craig is in on this, sir," McCoy said. "But he's one of the very few."
"But the very few include Colonel Dunn?"
"The colonel knows some of this, sir."
"But not, presumably, General of the Army Douglas MacArthur?" the captain asked, coldly sarcastic. "The Supreme Commander?"
"As far as I know, no, sir," McCoy said.
The captain opened his mouth, but Cushman spoke be-fore he could.
"I acknowledge the classification," Cushman said. "Go on."
"Sir, there are islands in the Flying Fish Channel leading to Inchon...," McCoy began.
"Let me get this straight," Cushman said. "You have installed a handful of Marines on this island'- What's the name?"
"Tokchok-kundo, sir."
"And from which you intend to launch an operation to take..."
`Taemuui-do and Yonghung-do, sir."
"And General MacArthur is unaware of this operation?" the captain asked, incredulously.
"I don't believe he is aware, sir."
"Who besides the people you've mentioned knows about this?" Cushman said.
"Just General Howe, sir."
"Who is he?" the captain demanded.
"An Army two-star, sir. He's on the same sort of mission for the President as General Pickering."
`To your knowledge, is the President aware of this oper-ation?" Cushman asked.
`To my knowledge, no, sir. But I'd bet he is."
"Why do you say that?" Cushman asked.
"Because both General Pickering and General Howe are on orders to tell the President anything they think he might like to know, sir."
"We've gone off at a tangent," Cushman said. "Picking up my original question where I think I left it: You have in-stalled your Marines on Tokchok-kundo-"
"And the South Korean national policemen, sir."
"And the South Korean national policemen, and after you got there, your radio was inoperable?"
"Yes, sir."
"And you want Colonel Dunn to airdrop whatever those things are in the cartons to your people?"
"Yes, sir."
"Can you do it, Billy?" Cushman asked.
"If I can find the island, yes, sir."
; "I can show you the island on the aerials, Colonel," Mc-Coy said. "The word I left for Zimmerman is that when a Corsair flies over, he will spread a yellow panel between two houses on a hillside."