No. We have a Nancy Blankman, but that doesn’t sound like Jason Banks, and she’s a lieutenant, not a CPO. Somebody’s fucking with you—and me.”
“Jim, please have one of your people trace all outgoing calls this morning. I just texted you the number at NavOps that received the call.”
“I’m going to check the log personally, Scott. Something is wrong here, very wrong.”
Chapter 21
“Director Carlini, Jake Arnold here from the White House,” the president’s chief of staff said.
“Go ahead, Jake, good to hear from you, my friend.”
“Bill, President Blake read your memorandum yesterday with a lot of interest, to say the least. I’m referring to your Operation Shadow Warrior. Can you give me a rundown on this operation and tell me if it’s yielded any results?”
“We’ve communicated the basics to all military installations, including ships. Government facilities have been operating under the good old ‘see something, say something’ rubric ever since 9/11. In answer to your question about whether we’ve achieved anything so far, the answer is yes. We’re keeping precise statistics on our findings, under the watchful eye of super-spook Buster. So far, we’ve found 12 packages that have no explanation for being where they were, none of which contained any explosives. But that’s not necessarily good news. We think somebody is testing our defenses.”
“Bill, let’s face it, these are scary facts. The bombings of the Abraham Lincoln and the Sternberg were the result of ignorance—our ignorance. Nobody saw it coming. We need to consider the Sternberg as the worst-case scenario. The evidence is clear that the ship’s captain—the fucking captain—pulled it off by himself.”
“I’ll be honest with you Jake, and I think President Blake understands this, we have no idea how we can prevent an attack by a senior officer who’s been radicalized. The CIA and NCIS have been all over this case like fleas on a rat, and so far, we’ve come up with little. We have some solid facts. Captain Boylan, the CO of the Sternberg, was the man who shouted Alahu Akhbar over the radio just before the detonation. NCIS searched his house and found a copy of the Koran, along with some radical literature. He never attended a mosque, or at least we don’t know if he did. And even if he did, what would we have done about it? So even though we now know a few things about Boylan, nothing alerted us that he was up to some bad shit. Remember the days after 9/11. Endless commentators, from the president on down, told people that we must go on with our lives. We can’t have our existence controlled by some scumbags with weird ideas.”
“So, if I understand you, Bill, all we can do is try to cut down on the odds by vigilance and hope for the best.”
“I wish I could give you and President Blake something better, Jake, but that’s it. If you see something, say something—before it’s too late.”
Chapter 22
“You know you’re the prettiest fighter pilot I’ve ever met,” I said.
Meg walked up to me and put her hands on my chest. “I suppose you’re going to ask me for a kiss.”
“No, I want a salute.”
“Gimme a kiss, wiseass.”
“To change the subject, not that I want to, but I just got a security briefing that scares the hell out of me. This came right from NavOps. It seems that a chief petty officer from the submarine USS Michigan asked NavOps for the launch codes for the sub’s nukes. He said something about needing the codes for a routine test.”
“Oh, my God,” Meg said. “Could that possibly be true—needing the codes for routine testing? Who the hell is that guy?”
“That’s the worst part, hon. He gave his name as Jason Banks, CPO.”
“I’m sure they’re interrogating the man as we speak, no?”
“No. There is no such name in the United States Navy. He was obviously a spy of some sort, maybe even worse. He assumed that the duty officer at NavOps was dumb, but the NavOps guy was on his toes and called Naval Intelligence. That’s why his plan never got beyond the initial stage.”
“I don’t think this mysterious CPO expected to get very far. Harry, the guy was obviously testing the sub’s defenses and security. I’m sure NavOps has come to the same conclusion.”
“So, we’re moving beyond ‘see something, say something.’ The enemy doesn’t want to give us a chance to see something.”
“Do you want me to call a meeting with the department heads?”
“No, not just yet. I want to have a small meeting. Just you, Captain Marty, and me. Call Buster too.”
Captain Brinkman and Buster entered the flag bridge.
“Have a seat, guys. We have some hot shit to talk about as usual. For the time being, this is between you two, Meg, and me. I just got a top-secret communication from NavOps. It seems that somebody wanted to obtain the launch codes for a nuke, the USS Michigan.”
I explained the details of the mysterious CPO Jason Banks.
“I just got word of that about five minutes ago, admiral,” Buster said. “I was about to call you.”
“Meg thinks they’re trying our defenses. What do you guys think?”
“That’s exactly what they’re doing,” Buster said, “and I’m not surprised that Lieutenant Meg caught it so quickly. ISIS, al Qaeda, or whoever they are, see two parallel lines to this war. They continue to recruit homegrown psychopaths to kill themselves and innocent people. Those are the soft targets. But I’m still amazed that they’re also taking on the hardest of hard targets—the United States military.”
“Armed with this latest information, Mr. Super Spook, do you have any practical recommendations for us?” I said.
“The reason I love Ian Fleming’s novels is that James Bond always comes out the winner,” Buster said. “The bad guys may get close, but Agent 007 gets them in the end, not to mention the pretty girl. But James Bond is fiction. In real life the good guys sometimes get their asses handed to them, as I well know.”
“Admiral Fenton, Chief Warrant Officer Ciano is here to see you. He says it’s urgent.”
“Read any good books lately?” I said.
Chapter 23
“What’s up, Dennis?”
“Bad stuff, admiral. That’s why I asked to interrupt your meeting. This morning, within one hour, we found three sailors taking photos of sensitive places on the ship. If there’s one rule that is drilled into everybody’s head when they report aboard, it’s not to take pictures without specific authorization from me. One of them, a second-class petty officer named Warren Dingle, snapped 25 photos in the hangar deck, including a lot of close- up pictures of parked planes. He actually climbed up onto the wing of a F/A-18 and snapped ten shots of the cockpit. After we confiscated his cellphone we saw that he emailed all the photos to a computer that had an IP address somewhere in Yemen. My top IT guy is a whiz at figuring this stuff out. Two other sailors worked together. They were snapping photos in the reactor room. I repeat, the reactor room, a place that’s off-limits to anyone without a top-secret clearance, written authorization, and a need to know. And here’s something to set your teeth on edge: both guys taking photos in the reactor room were first class petty officers, in other words, career Navy men. When I asked them what the hell they were doing in the reactor room, they both said they were taking souvenir photos for their mothers. I guess their mothers are nuclear engineers. We have all three men in the brig. I figure that commander spook over here will want to have a chat with them,” he said, nodding to Buster.
“Do you have their service records, Dennis?”
“They’re right here, Buster. As you’ll see, they’re clean as a fresh breeze, but the story doesn’t end there. I confiscated the personal laptops of all three and turned my IT guys loose. I felt kind of creepy doing that without a warrant, but as the recent NavOps directive made clear, no naval personnel have a right to expect computer privacy while on a Navy installation or ship. So, here’s what my geeks found out in just a few minutes this morning. All three of these patriotic gentlemen spend a hell of
a lot of time on a few websites that are so radical it turns your stomach. The sites include such names as ‘Sword of Allah,’ ‘Death to the infidels,’ and ‘the Vengeance of Allah.’ I think you get the picture. It’s enough to raise an eyebrow, and it sure as hell raised both of mine. I don’t want to tell Buster here how to do his job, but I would recommend a full CIA background investigation of these men. All I have on these guys legally is the unauthorized taking of photographs. I know that Captain Brinkman or Admiral Fenton here can authorize me to hold these guys in the brig for an ongoing length of time pending investigation.”
“Consider it done, Dennis. Great work, as usual. I wanted you to be at this meeting, as you know, but your assistant politely asked us to buzz off because you were working on an urgent matter. Now we see what the urgency was all about. Before you got here we discussed a subject that has the government, especially the military, going crazy—testing our defenses. What you just reported puts an exclamation point on the matter. I’ll let Buster fill you in on some of the details.”
“Dennis, you just hit on the biggest threat our military has ever faced. I’m not exaggerating. We’re confronted with an enemy that has no face, an enemy that works in the shadows. That’s why we call our mission Operation Shadow Warrior. We thought we knew people we could trust, such as the captain of the USS Sternberg, or the career sailors you nabbed this morning taking photos. I haven’t had the combat experience of Admiral Fenton or Captain Brinkman, but I have been in a few gunfights. What we’re faced with goes beyond combat or a man with a gun. We can’t shoot a guy we can’t see, and that’s just what the enemy wants. All we can do is carry out our duties and keep our eyes and ears open. It just takes one scumbag to sink a ship, pardon my language, Meg. We can only take this one day at a time, or, to be more accurate, one minute at a time. As soon as we wrap up this meeting I’m going to take Dennis’s suggestion and order a full CIA background check on today’s photographers.”
***
After the meeting, Meg and I sat in my office sipping coffee.
“Something’s on your mind, baby. Talk to me about it.”
Meg knows how to read me, and I know how to read her. I have no problem with Meg reading my mind. Hell, I’ll even turn the pages for her.
“I like to think of myself as a guy who’s calm under pressure. After my brief encounter with Ray Spruance in 1942, I read up a lot on the guy. He was known as an admiral’s admiral, always calm, always analytical. Want a decision, give him the facts. Halsey, on the other hand, had a reputation for being occasionally impetuous. I like to think of myself like Spruance.”
“Harry, you sound like you’re prepping for a job interview. You don’t have to convince me that you’re a cool and calm leader. If somebody put a live hand grenade on your plate as you were eating, you would pick it up, calmly walk over to a window, and toss it outside. Hey, if you’re on edge with this terrorism crap, that means you’re a normal person. I mean, shit, we’re all upset. Who wouldn’t be when we don’t even know who the friggin enemy is?”
“You’re right as usual, hon, but I never thought about preparing for the stuff that’s been happening. The Ford is the biggest, baddest aircraft carrier in history. Those scumbags, as Buster likes to call them, are trying to make a point—that none of us are safe, including the largest prize of all, the Ford. I have a queasy feeling in my gut, and you know that I don’t listen to my gut but my brain. When was the last time you didn’t have to shake me as I was having a nightmare? This ship, not to mention the others in Strike Group 14, is my responsibility. My goddam nightmare is always the same. I walk out on deck and see a guy with a hood over his head laughing, just before a giant explosion.”
“But like you said, honey, don’t listen to your gut—or to your nightmares.”
“I just have this feeling that won’t go away. I think something’s coming our way, something we’ll never forget.”
Chapter 24
I always urge Meg to keep up her proficiency by taking regular training flights. I could have ordered her to do it, but that’s not the way Meg and I operate.
“Harry, be honest with me.”
“Am I ever anything but? What’s up, hon?”
“Now you promise to be honest?”
“Yes, of course. Shoot.”
“How do you feel when you’re coming in for a landing on a carrier deck?”
“I feel like every other pilot who’s ever landed on a carrier—scared out of my mind.”
“You’re not just saying that to make me feel good, are you?”
“No, I’m telling the truth. The way to get beyond the fear is to accept it, don’t try to make it go away. When your heart starts pounding, recognize that as normal not strange. Let me share with you what I call my Landing Fear Checklist. They should have taught you this at flight school. I actually have a written list, but I seldom consult it because it’s become natural. Here’s how it goes: sweaty palms, check; blurry vision, check; growling stomach, check; raspy voice, check; heart pounding, check; sweat under my goggles, check. Do you have any landing fear symptoms that I missed?”
“Yes, I cuss like a cab driver when I’m scared, but not into the mouthpiece, of course.”
“Great. Now add some other symptoms I may have missed. The whole idea of this checklist is to make it seem like a normal part of your pre-landing list. The game you play with your head is that all those symptoms are normal—that’s right, normal. They must be normal, otherwise you wouldn’t be checking them off on a list. It steals the drama out of landing on a carrier. I also remind myself that if I miss the meatball don’t have to worry about getting hurt—I’ll die immediately.”
“I think I’ll leave off that last part.”
“Another thing to keep in mind, hon.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ll be here waiting for you.”
***
My chat with Harry made me feel better, as usual. I went through my pre-take-off checklist with my plane captain, the guy who’s in charge of the aircraft when it’s not in flight. I didn’t bother with Harry’s Landing Fear Checklist as that would come later. Taking off is kind of fun, unlike landing.
A flight crewman hooked the launch bar on my F/A-18 F Super Hornet’s nose gear to the catapult shuttle. The catapult officer gave the launch signal to the operator sitting in his “cat house,” the control pod that's recessed into the flight deck. On a signal from one of the flight crew, I eased the throttle forward to full power, and then signaled that I was ready to launch. The catapult operator released a lever, causing a “holdback” to drop away, and I shot off the deck of the Ford like a rocket. The catapult on the Ford is the modern Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS), compared to the older steam catapult that had served for decades. In my carrier flight training, I was assigned to the USS George H. W. Bush, a Nimitz class carrier equipped with steam catapults. I find the EMALS a lot smoother and even more powerful than the steam catapults.
As I gained speed and altitude, I pulled alongside my fellow pilot, Lt. Frank Bellows. We waved to each other, a strange feeling when you’re flying over 1,100 miles an hour. Our mission was simple because this was a proficiency flight, meaning that its purpose was to keep us on our toes and avoid getting rusty. Lt. Bellows and I went through our maneuvers, using a checklist, of course. We went through speed drills, quick turn procedures, and climbing and diving movements. Our orders were to perform our drills within one hour, and then return to the ship. The plan was for me to land first. Okay, time to drag out Harry’s Landing Fear Checklist. Sweaty palms, check; blurry vision, check; growling stomach, check; raspy voice, check; heart pounding, check; sweat under my goggles, check; foul language, fucking check.
I began to communicate with the flight crew on deck, calling out the phrase Roger Ball as soon as I had the meatball properly in view.
“Roger Ball, Roger Ball, Roger Ball—Holy shit!”
I was about 1,000 feet from the stern of the Ford, w
hen my view of the meatball was replaced by a wall of fire. Instinctively I jammed the stick to the left and missed the burning Ford by a couple of hundred feet.
I banked right to circle around for a better look.
“I’m banking right, Frank,” I said to Lt. Bellows.
“Roger that, Meg. I’m on your tail. No way in hell can we land on the Ford. I’m putting in the coordinates for the airport on Guam.”
As we flew our first circle around the ship, I called the bridge.
“Lima Foxtrot (the Ford’s call-sign code), Lima Foxtrot, this is Lieutenant Meg Fenton on flight 207.”
“Read you, 207,” the flight officer said. “Recommend you set course for Guam. Obviously, you can’t land on the Ford.”
“May I speak to Admiral Fenton, please.”
“The admiral isn’t accessible, ma’am.”
“What the fuck do you mean he isn’t accessible?”
I was totally out of line, but I didn’t care. Harry—my Harry, was down there on that exploding ship.
“Don’t jump to conclusions, Meg. I’ll try to get ahold of him. I don’t believe he was anywhere near the explosion site, which seems to be limited to the aft flight deck. I recommend that you proceed to Guam.”
“I have plenty of fuel. I’m circling until I get word about Harry, I mean the admiral.”
“My fuel tanks are good to go too, Meg,” Lt. Bellows said. “I’m staying with you. Meanwhile, I’ll contact the airport in Guam.”
“Meg, it’s me,” came Harry’s voice over the radio. “I’m okay, which is more than I can say for a lot of our shipmates. Listen to the flight officer, hon. There’s nothing you can do here. Proceed to Guam, which is only 100 miles away. We’ll be bringing the Ford to Guam for repairs. We should be there in three hours.”
The Violent Sea Page 7