by Unknown
Chapter Eight
Captain Horatio Lee was the A-Team Commander, his XO was Chief Warrant Officer 3 Anthony Peccadillo, and the Team Sergeant was Master Sergeant Owen Fernandez. All of them had been with the team for years and loved what they did and when the event happened it was a no brainer for everyone on the team to stay with it and follow Colonel Clayton. They all wanted this mission badly they enjoyed their time at Huachuca the last time they were here, pre-event, and they figured they would be able to hit it off again. They all found it hard to believe that the Officers, NCO’s and lower enlisted would have abandoned the country at the Fort.
Nevertheless, their orders were to find out and determine the nature of the mission here. They broke down into three man teams. One team would stay with the hide where they had a pretty good view of most of main post; they would record daily operations, troops, and vehicles as well as anything out of the ordinary. Another three man team would dress as 11th Signal Soldiers and do their best to blend in with them. The purpose was to basically wonder around the Signal area and observe, if they were approached and questioned why they were any place they would back off and retreat back to the hide.
The other three man team dressed as Soldiers from the 304th MI Battalion and pretty much did the same thing the ones who infiltrated the 11th Signal. To be fair all them were in ACU’s the only difference were the unit patches. One of the encouraging sights they all observed was reveille and the raising of the Stars and Strips over the post that morning. The SF Soldiers had no problems infiltrating the areas assigned to them and were readily accepted as long as they stayed away from certain areas where they might encounter certain Officers and NCO’s that would question why they were here and by all means they avoided any Sergeant Majors who would definitely stop them and ask them a bunch of questions.
They were able to engage many of the Soldiers in small talk and as far as they could tell no one suspected a thing, everything that they had been able to ascertain looked like they were still on the side of the United States. Other observations that were made was that many of the vehicles they had were looked perfectly fine and upon asking some questions they found that the Fort was low on fuel and was trying to conserve as much as possible.
They also observed that not many people from town were let on post they were sealed off from the rest of the world. They ran patrols but only on post and not many of them and kept things fairly local. There also wasn’t much in family activities going on and it was hard to tell if kids were even in schools. It was a different world from Camp Parks and Fort Irwin. They were sure they were missing the bigger picture somehow, for several days they observed, took pictures and notes. They had twenty-four hours left on the mission and Captain Lee had to make a decision whether or not to reveal themselves to the post Commander or the Intelligence Center Commander who significantly out ranked the post Commander or head to the exfil site Sierra Vista Airport.
Once everyone was back at the hide that evening they discussed the pros and cons of revealing themselves. Everyone gave a thumb’s up and that as far as the Captain was concerned was good enough. They would all change back into their own uniforms and in the morning form up, place their Green Berets on their heads and March right onto main post. From there they would head straight to General Utero’s office and let the sparks fly.
At 0545 the twelve Green Berets formed up and marched to the garrison’s flag pole. They stunned the guard detail that was there to raise the flag over the post. The SF Team came to attention in front of the pole. As reveille played and the flag was raised they all saluted the flag, held their salutes until the flag was completely raised. Captain Lee called “Order Arms” and they dropped their salutes. Then Captain Lee continued to march the heavily armed A-Team right through main post, what vehicles there were came to a complete stop, Soldiers running unit PT stopped in their tracks and people that were in their offices came out to see what was going on.
Where the hell did they come from? Which was the most common phrase of the day. They arrived at the headquarters building for the Intelligence Center, they halted, executed a right face with Captain Lee at the Center of the formation all of them facing the building and there they stood, no one moving a muscle.
By now anyone who was in the HQ building was looking out the windows at the twelve SF Soldiers standing there at attention waiting for what? The General had just arrived and was getting his coffee when he was told of the Soldiers out front. His first thoughts were, “what now?” but then he realized there were no Special Forces Soldiers stationed here and like everyone else on post by now wondered where the hell they came from.
The General along with his Sergeant Major (Kirkland) stepped out of the building, the General still holding onto his coffee mug, sipping it, “What can I do for you Captain?” asked the General.
Captain Lee saluted, “Sir! I’m Captain Lee with the 19th Special Forces Group of out Camp Parks.”
The General returned the salute and hearing Camp Parks caught his attention, Captain Lee asked, “Sir is there some place we can speak privately?”
The General was eyeing the Captain and wondered what the hell he was up to, “Certainly Captain, why don’t you and your men step in to my office.”
The Captain did an about face and called, “At ease, fall out, follow me.”
The General turned and went back into the building, Captain Lee and the SF Soldiers followed while Sergeant Major Kirkland stood outside still giving the senior enlisted Soldiers the old stink eye.
Only the General, Captain Lee, Chief Peccadillo and the Sergeant Major entered the General’s office. Once everyone was seated the General looked directly at the Captain, “Alright Captain enlighten me. Why is a Special Forces A-Team spying on us here? And how the hell did you get here?”
Captain Lee looked at the General and Sergeant Major, “Sir our mission was to determine the true nature of the units at the Fort, whether or not they were still loyal to the United States. General Watkins and Colonel Clayton really don’t trust anyone. In fact our first interaction with Fort Irwin was done in the same manner. Anyway, once we determined what was going on here I was given the latitude to either head straight to our extraction point and return to Camp Parks or to make contact with the Commanders here. I obviously chose to make contact.”
The General couldn’t really fault General Watkins logic if he had the means to check out Camp Parks and Fort Irwin to make sure they were telling the truth he would have. “Alright,” said the General. “So you have determined we are on the up-and-up with regards to our loyalty to the country. Again, how did you get here?”
“Sir we HALO’d in from a C-47.” responded the Captain. “Our extraction would have been by the same bird either at Sierra Vista Airport or the Forts Airstrip. I had latitude to pick which one, I made contact with the bird earlier this morning and it’s waiting for us at the Forts airstrip which has now been secured by a platoon of Marines.”
The Sergeant Major was caught off guard by this, “Seriously? You expect us to believe this bull shit story?”
Captain Lee looked over at the Sergeant Major, “Yeah.”
Chief Peccadillo said, “Sir y’all can go with us out to the airfield and see for yourself if you like. You can obviously go out there without us but that would be a mistake. The Marines will fight and die in place and destroy the C-47 without us.”
The General waved off the Chief, “There’s no need for that Chief were not looking for trouble. But I would like to take a look, just to make sure, right?”
Captain Lee replied, “Of course Sir, I’m also under orders to ask you and the Garrison Commander and anyone else you see fit to accompany us back to Camp Parks to meet with General Watkins and his staff for two days and once done you will be returned to the Fort.”
The General considered it for a moment, he had known General Watkins for many years and he didn’t sense any type of deception from him. Besides he really did want to see what was going on there, “C
aptain Lee that would be fine. Sergeant Major please advise Colonel Harkins to meet us at the airfield in 30 minutes for a two day trip. Let him know we are going to San Francisco for a meeting.”
“Yes Sir.” replied the Sergeant Major and he left the office.
“Captain why don’t you and your men hit the mess hall for some chow and meet back here in say twenty minutes and we’ll head out to the airfield.”
Captain Lee and Chief Peccadillo stood, came to attention, and saluted, the General returned the salute, they then did an about face and marched out of the office. Once out they gathered up the rest of the team and headed over to the mess hall.
As they headed across the street to chow there were all sorts of stares from the Soldiers on post, it was very unusual to see Special Forces Soldiers and the obvious question is where did they come from? The post Commanders had kept a tight lid on the communication between Camp Parks/Fort Irwin to themselves but the cat had been sort of let out of the bag when people say a C-47 aircraft circling main post early this morning looked to be landing at the posts airfield. People hurried over to the airfield to watch what was going on, there wasn’t much entertainment and this was as good as it gets. They watched as the Marines quickly departed the aircraft taking u positions around the field. The field was not under any guard as far as the Garrison Commander knew there were no more flyable aircraft so why guard it.
The Marines became an uncomfortable spectacle themselves it was understandable the Soldiers and civilians on post were starved for information from the outside world. Everything on post had also become routine and everyone was just trying to survive. Then literally out of the blue everyone’s life on post had just changed, how no one was quite sure yet.
Captain Lee and his men quickly grabbed some chow and headed back to the HQ building, out front were several Humvees waiting for them to give them a ride to the airfield. They all loaded up and got the show on the road.
About a hundred yards from the airfield Captain Lee asked to halt all of the vehicles and let him out and for all of them to hold fast. He would head onto the airfield on his own to calm down any jittery Marines. Everyone thought that it was a pretty good idea no one wanted to be shot at this early in the morning. Captain Lee moved towards the Marines, he pulled out his radio and spoke into it as he got closer there was no action by any of the Marines and they let him pass. Then a few moments later the Captain returned to the road that ran in front of the airfield and waved in the vehicles.
All of the vehicles rolled into the airfield area both the General and Colonel were astounded to see a vintage C-47 sitting there right before them and it flew too. The Marines were ordered to pull back onto the plane and prepare for departure. Sergeant Major Kirkland who wasn’t going was all doom and gloom regarding the Generals trip, for all he knew it could be a trap, but as the General told him to what purpose? The Sergeant Major had no answer for that.
With everyone aboard the plane taxied down the runway and headed off north towards the Bay
Area the flight was a bit over and hour or so depending on the winds.
Chapter Nine
As the C-47 circled over Camp Parks and made its approach General Utero and Colonel Harkins were amazed at what they saw it looked to be a fully functional town and military installation. It was amazing it looked like life hadn’t changed a lot for all of these people although they did notice that there wasn’t much vehicle traffic, but there was a lot of people moving on foot, bike and horseback.
Once they left the airport at the Camp and were on their way to meet with General Watkins and Colonel Clayton they were amazed, they saw kids playing baseball and softball. Stores selling fresh produce, all sorts of things. There was a tremendous amount of hustling around the Camp by the Soldiers, Marines and Airmen but there was no Navy. They had armored vehicles of all sorts and they worked…my God what they could do with that and the planes they saw at the airfield. It looked like they had done so much in the last eleven months since the event. Whereas at Fort Huachuca moral was at an all-time low and they had no real mission.
They arrived at Camp Parks HQ and General Watkins and Colonel Clayton were out front waiting to meet them.
“Hey Ted you old goat!” said General Utero.
General Watkins smiled and hugged his old friend, “How are you doing Bob?”
“It’s really good to see you Ted, it’s really good.” responded General Utero.
“It’s really good to see you too Bob.”
General Watkins introduced Colonel Clayton to General Utero, “It’s nice to finally meet you Colonel your reputation precedes you. I have been in the Intel Community a long time and I have been following your career for quite some time.”
“Thank you Sir, it’s very nice of you to say.” said Colonel Clayton.
Colonel Harkins was introduced all around and then General Watkins had them all follow him into the conference room for the morning briefing.
Lieutenant Colonel March would be conducting the briefing; he was introduced as Colonel Claytons XO and brilliant planning Officer, the last part Colonel March added himself. Everyone took their respective seats and for the next four hours Major General Utero and Colonel Harkins were floored by what they heard and excited about the prospects for Fort Huachuca and its surrounding communities.
“You really have a B-29 that fly’s?” asked General Utero.
“Yes Sir it’s out at Oakland Air Force base and is fully operational right now it flies between Travis and Oakland every few days. We also have ordinance for it which as you can imagine can do a great deal of damage.” Colonel March looking serious as he answered.
Colonel Clayton turned to face General Utero and Colonel Harkins, “Do you have any word from San Diego? What about Davis-Monthan in Tucson that place should be an aircraft gold mine.”
“I’m sorry nothing from either place.” said Colonel Harkins. “With that said though we are picking up chatter about Camp Grayling in Michigan that there are US Forces there.”
Colonel Clayton nodded, General Watkins jumped in, “Bob what can we do for the Fort?”
Both Colonel Harkins and General Utero’s head were swimming what couldn’t they do for them he wondered. “We need to get the families straightened out, kids back in school and other activities to start with. We could sure use some Engineers to help with shoring up everything around post. We obviously need to start thinking about the overall community at large but I’m afraid our personnel aren’t trained for that right now as much as we have been trying. We need fuel and food, we need aircraft which after I spoke with you over the radio I immediately sent folks to Sierra Vista Airport to see what there was, and I was told we have some serious possibilities there. We need to find out what ‘s going on in Tucson and Davis-Monthan.”
“Well sounds like quite a list and I think we can help you with most of it if not all.” said General Watkins.
Colonel Marched hesitantly broke into the conversation, “I’m really sorry to bring this up but it’s sort of the 800 pound gorilla in the room, what’s the new chain-of-command?”
Everyone stopped and looked around the room then General Utero spoke up, “General Watkins out ranks me by time in service and time in rank easily he’s also a combat Commander and I’m not I think that he remains the responsible Officer for all DoD matters.”
General Watkins replied, “Thanks Bob for your support. In that case I’m sorry to say Colonel Clayton you are no longer my XO that now falls to General Utero. Everyone will still carry out all duties with their current commands.”
“Sounds good Bob. When do we get started?” asked General Utero.
“Colonel Clayton do you think Mel will be up to doing the same thing for Fort Huachuca that she did for here and Irwin?” General Watkins asked.
“I’m sure she will be more than happy to help Sir.”
General Watkins went onto explain Mel’s role at Camp Parks and what she was able to accomplish here and then she took her talents t
o Fort Irwin and was able to successfully repeat it all there. He went all to tell them give her everything she needs and that’s not a request General Watkins told them and she will get your family services all straightened out.
“Colonel March get in touch with the Marines I want a company at Fort Huachuca yesterday. There orders are to begin civilian outreach operations into the local community and I want two A-Teams with them. Colonel Clayton I want you there too for a bit, you’re the one responsible for everything that has happened here, I need your perspective what can we do realistically. I want you to find out what’s going on in Tucson and the Air Force Base.”
“Sir,” Colonel Clayton said. “What assets can I bring along?”
Chapter Ten
“What are you wanting Colonel?” asked General Watkins.
“Sir I have no clue what we’re going to encounter in Tucson. My suggestion would be let’s do what has been working, drop an A-Team onto the base and see what’s going on. We will have the Company of Marines ready to go if the shit hits the fan and they can be flown up to Davis-Monthan in thirty minutes. Once we establish what’s going on at the base we can secure it and use it as a base of operations to run ops from into Tucson. Right now the Fort is seventy miles away for it and that’s a lot of distance to cover if we have to secure the city. We also need to establish railway transportation. I don’t know if we can go around Tucson or not and what other towns we may have to go through to do it. There’s a good chance we might be taking on a good part of Arizona.”
“Understood Colonel.” said General Watkins. “Let’s break it out into smaller pieces and deal with them as they come up for now. Get an A-Team into Davis-Monthan ASAP and let’s see what’s going on there, have the Marines standing by with the C-47 if the shit starts to go downhill for them. Let’s start there.”