The Gulf

by David Poyer

  As a junior officer, he’d just accepted it. Now he thought it might have been realistic when equipment was simple and the consequences of error small. Neither condition held in the modern Navy. Submariners had studied fatigue and tried to prevent it. The aviation community insisted on regular rest. Yet the surface fleet seemed to take pride in subjecting its men to conditions guaranteed to reduce their effectiveness. It wasn’t generally discussed—no one liked to appear weak or unenthusiastic—but fatigue-induced sickness, hallucinations, falling asleep standing up weren’t uncommon at sea. Granted, an error in the air could cause an accident faster than a momentary lapse at twenty or thirty knots. But dopiness or poor judgment on the bridge, at a weapons-control console, or in main control could kill a lot more people.

  Not that he had any alternative at the moment. The danger was real. They’d just have to stay alert. Shaker’s remedy—no cleaning, no administration—was feasible short-term, in a battle zone. Someday, though, someone would have to look at all the requirements laid on men at sea, demanded piecemeal by different authorities, but aggregating to a crushing load.

  He struggled with his eyelids through the morning. The sandstorm added to his anxiety and isolation. At 1000, he called Shaker and told him they’d be entering the Narrows in half an hour.

  The captain ordered GQ. As Stanko passed the word, Dan pulled on his gear and settled the steel bucket on his head.

  Shaker came up a few minutes later, yawning. “XO, you ready for a boat ride?”

  “Anytime, sir, but what do you mean?”

  “Just got a message from Nauman. He wants somebody on the lead merchie’s bridge. In case anything happens. I thought I’d put you over there.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’d send you by helo but the sand’s too thick to launch. Take one of our walkie-talkies. And today’s code page. I don’t think you’ll need anything else.”

  “Got it,” said Dan. “When do you want me to go?”

  “Soon as he gives us the word.”

  “Do I have time for a head call, maybe a shave?”

  “Go ahead. I’ll pass the word for you when we get the signal.”

  Dan got a radio, checked the batteries, and stuffed the code pamphlet in his back pocket. On second thought, he buttoned it in. He went below.

  He finished shaving, heard nothing over the 1MC, and decided coffee might help. He banged the wardroom door open, then stopped. On the TV screen, two women were engaged in noisy cunnilingus. The pilots were slouched on the sofa, stocking feet up, muzzle-deep in ice cream.

  He was instantly angry. “Haven’t you people got anything better to do?”

  The fat one, Schweinberg, muttered something shamefacedly.

  “Speak up,” Lenson snapped.

  “Uh, I said, we can’t fly till this sand clears up, sir.”

  “Then maybe I can suggest some things. This ship is a shit-house. And your people aren’t helping. For one, down in your hangar, they’re leaving cans all over—”

  “Hell with that,” said the black pilot suddenly.

  “What’s that?”

  “I said, the hell with that! They’re working twenty-hour days in that hangar. There’s no air conditioning. They drink Cokes to keep cool, to keep awake—so what! Lieutenant Schweinberg and I have been flying heavy hours this convoy, most of it at night. So there’s a sandstorm, we can’t fly, anyway—we take a break—so what! We’re doing our job aboard Van Zandt, XO. Maybe you ought to go jump in somebody else’s shit.”

  Dan bit back his first response. His sudden irrational anger frightened him. He delayed by drawing coffee. What had he been thinking on the bridge, about overwork. It was possible Hayes was right.

  On the other hand, no one was going to address him in that tone of voice. Ever.

  “Away the motor whaleboat,” said the 1MC just then.

  He said, trying not to snarl like an animal, “Mr. Hayes, I’m going over to Borinquen. I think, when I get back, you and I need to have a talk.” He turned, saying nothing more, and carried the cup up two ladders and out into the sand-laden air.

  Outside the heat was oppressive. The wind, coated with hot sand fine and sharp as powdered diamond, scorched and stung his face and hands. He shielded his eyes, letting the shamal take the paper cup. Two sailors were posting themselves on the 02 level, one donning headphones, the other shrugging himself into a Stinger harness. The latter swept the four-foot tube around, peering through the sight. A hollow clang came from forward; belts were going into the .50 machine guns.

  Dan found himself looking at the sealed end of the Stinger. Behind it was an encapsulated antiaircraft missile. “Hey, Lorton,” he said. “Watch where you’re pointing that thing.”

  The seaman lowered the weapon. He looked barely old enough to trust with a bikeload of Sunday papers. “Oh, sorry, XO.”

  “You know how to fire that?”

  “Just aim it, listen for the lock-on tone, then press this, that’s all I got to do. The ragheads on the other end got it easy, too. All they got to do is bend over and kiss their ass goodbye.”

  Dan wondered how he’d see what to shoot at, in a sandstorm, but didn’t say anything. Certainly their morale was good.

  BM2 Stanko came back, relieved from the bridge, and began shouting orders. Yellow grease peeled from the cables as the whaleboat swayed out over the sea. Dan stepped into it, reaching for a monkey line.

  “Lower away,” shouted the boatswain. The davit jerked, almost knocking them off their feet, and then they were descending. The gray walls of the frigate’s hull rose, stained with salt and rust—he’d have to get on Charaler about that, after this convoy—till the keel smacked into the water. Winokur, the boat engineer, tripped the hook and they were suddenly under way, plunging up and down in a confused chop, the gray sheer sides drawing away, melting like a ghost back into the abrasive fog.

  “What’s your heading?”

  “East by southeast,” shouted Stanko. “You got a radio, sir?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Ask ’em to track us. I can’t see diddley out here.”

  “Van Zandt, this is Van Zandt One. Heading”—Dan craned to see the compass—“one-four-oh magnetic.”

  “You’re headed fair, sir,” came McQueen’s voice back. “Only about a mile to go.”

  The diesel hammered. A sea came over the bow and spattered him. He licked his lips. Salt and sand, gritty and bitter and warm.

  Ten minutes later, something huge and black darkened the airborne desert to starboard. Stanko altered course toward it. They passed under the stern and found a jacob’s ladder rigged off her beam. Dan looked up at it. It seemed to go up forever.

  “Ready, sir?”

  “Yeah, take her in.” He thrust the radio into his belt and screwed his cap tight. The whaleboat neared, slowed, pitched up and down, and slammed violently into rusty steel. Stanko fired a stream of curses at the tanker, the storm, and the whaleboat as Dan crouched by the gunwale. He waited for the crest of a sea, then jumped.

  As the boat dropped away, he used his momentum to gain two more rungs. Behind him the motor roared. Good, Stanko was getting clear fast. It wouldn’t be hard to get crushed between the boat and the hull.

  The hull: Six inches from his eyes, it was black and rough, coated with paint so heavy it looked like tar. As the sea licked his boots and fell back, it bared the stinking foulness of barnacles, mineral encrustation, and seaweed that accumulated so quickly in warm seas. He lifted his left arm to climb, and hissed between his teeth at the sudden pain.

  Above his head, a steel cliff loomed, fifty feet straight up. At the very top, a tiny head looked down at him.

  He clamped his teeth on grit and began climbing. Christ, his arm … he couldn’t get it above his shoulder. So he used it to grip, pulling with his right, pushing with his legs. His boon-dockers slipped, the leather soles losing the treads, and he dangled, kicking high above the waves. But he got himself back on the rungs, and finally gained the r
ail. A mustached man gave him a hand. “Hello, Navy,” he said. “I’m Guterman, the master. Say, you all right?”

  “Yeah.” Dan rubbed his shoulder—the captain, in greasy coveralls? Then his hand stopped. Guterman was motioning him to a bicycle.

  He wobbled into motion—it had been a while—and followed him along a broad way. The deck was endless, black steel covered with piping, valves, risers. It stank of oil, and NO SMOKING signs were painted in red every few feet.

  “You’ve got a big one here.”

  “Four hundred thousand tons,” said Guterman.

  Another NO SMOKING sign, thirty feet high, frowned down from the superstructure. They reached it at last, parked the bikes in a rack, and took an elevator to the bridge.

  Borinquen’s pilothouse was like an empty barn after Van Zandt’s. Two men in slacks and short-sleeved shirts gave Dan half-salutes as he came in. Guterman introduced them as the second mate and the purser, then said to the younger one, “Bring her up to six.”

  The mate moved a control. Dan stared around. On a big surface scope, he could see the tracks and predicted movements of every ship from here to the coast of Saudi Arabia. Sure enough, there were only two men on the bridge. There didn’t even seem to be a helmsman. He couldn’t decide whether to be horrified or impressed.

  When they entered the Narrows the sea looked no different, but the fathometer showed shoaling. He kept going back to look at the radar. There was a group of boats to the south, maybe ten miles off. Fishermen, most likely, but that was the hell of it and the anxiety. They were navigating a body of water that 95 percent of the time was at peace. Trading, fishing, passenger traffic, pilgrimages to Mecca, it all went on as it had for millennia. Only occasionally, when their opponents chose, did it erupt into war. He kept his eyes on the pips, waiting for one to turn toward them and accelerate.

  They were halfway through the channel and he was standing on the centerline, admiring the computerized radar display and wondering when the Navy would get around to buying them, when the deck shuddered under him. He grabbed for the console. The shudder built to a whipping that went on and on, shaking books and pencils to the deck. The purser fell to his hands and knees; the second mate grabbed a rail.

  “What the hell was that?”

  “Don’t know. Better go to all stop.”

  “I just did,” said the mate.

  The shuddering died away. Guterman appeared from nowhere, like a summoned demon. “What did we hit?” he said. “What’s the depth?”

  The mate glanced at a readout. “It’s gone dead … but we had eleven meters under the keel, Captain. I don’t think it was bottom.”

  Dan went outside. Suddenly he was angry. From the tanker’s huge wing, he leaned out, sweeping the hull with his eyes. He could see the stern, but the bow faded out of visibility in the sand fog. He ran to the starboard side. There was nothing there, either—no smoke trails from missiles or rocket-propelled grenades, no small boats. Only the sullen sea, sliding by out of nothingness into vacancy.

  “Borinquen, this is U.S.S. Van Zandt.”

  He raised the radio. “Van Zandt, Borinquen; Lenson here.”

  “This is the Captain. What’s going on? We just heard a hell of an explosion over your way. Sonar says it blanked their display.”

  “I don’t know, sir. Something happened; we felt it on the bridge.”

  Just then, with horror, Dan remembered they were at all stop. He instantly clicked the transceiver to channel twelve. “All ships in convoy, this is S.S. Borinquen. We have gone to all stop. Suspect mine detonation. I say again, we have shut down our engines. All ships acknowledge.”

  The merchants answered one by one. He made sure they understood, then went back to ten. “Sorry, Captain, I had to get the word to the guys behind us. We’re heaving to till we figure out what it was. How do you hold our position?”

  “I hold you in the middle of the channel, Dan. Check it out and get back to me.”

  As soon as Shaker signed off, the commodore broke in. Dan gave him the situation quickly and promised more in a moment.

  In the pilothouse, the mate was studying a tank chart on the bulkhead. The master was on the phone. As Dan came up, he said, “We’re taking water in two of the starboard tanks. Midships.”

  “Empty?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any danger of fire?”

  “Shouldn’t be; they’re blanketed. We’ve got plenty of reserve buoyancy … hold on … yeah. Yeah. Okay.” The master hung up. “Engineer’s headed down to check.”

  “Do you think it was a mine?”

  “How could it be a mine? You guys swept here, didn’t you?” The sarcasm was clear. “What’s the story, Commander?”

  “I’ll let you know when I do. Can I use your bridge-to-bridge?”

  He called Commodore Nauman back first. “Sir, this is Lieutenant Commander Lenson from Van Zandt, on Borinquen. We think we’ve hit a mine. Was this part of the channel swept?”

  “Yes. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t more there now.”

  Nauman paused. Dan glanced at the master; Guterman was on the phone again. “I understand you’ve gone dead in the water. What’s the situation?”

  “We didn’t go DIW, sir, we shut down the engines. I don’t think we’ve sustained major damage. Two tanks flooding. No exterior damage visible from the bridge.”

  “Right. Okay, I’m going to reorient, put Gallery … no, I’ll put Charles Adams in front and launch Gallery’s helo for a visual search on the bow.”

  “Uh, with all due respect, sir, I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

  “What’s that, Mr. Nelson?”

  “Lenson, sir.” He thought quickly. “I’m not so sure it’s a good idea putting a destroyer in the van, sir. If one of us hits a mine, we’re screwed. We’re a hundredth the displacement of these tankers and our machinery’s a lot closer to the skin of the ship.”

  “So what are you suggesting?”

  “Leave Borinquen in the lead, sir. These guys can absorb mines better than we can. I’ll get up on the bow with a walkie-talkie. Have the escorts fall in astern.”

  Dan glanced toward Guterman; he didn’t look happy, but he nodded. “Ship’s master concurs with that, sir.”

  “What about the helo?”

  “Visibility’s terrible, sir. But that’s up to you.”

  “Okay, do it,” came the commodore’s voice. “Let me know when you resume speed.”

  “I’m ready,” said Guterman. “The tank’s sealed off and we’re pumping. I may counterflood later to stay on an even keel. Shall we start up six knots, see how she rides?”

  “Sounds good,” said Dan.

  * * *

  For the next two hours he stood at the bow, straining his eyes into the storm. The mate had given him a set of goggles. He was glad of that. The confectionery-fine sand filtered inside his uniform and turned to warm mud, gritted his teeth, drifted up in tiny dunes behind his boonies.

  Still, it wasn’t as bad as he’d seen it. Their worst sandstorm, on radar picket down south, had come in riding a sixty-knot wind. It had stripped Van Zandt’s port side down to bare metal, leaving Charaler undecided whether to celebrate or cry.

  The worst of this was the reduction of visibility. He could see perhaps half a mile, not far with 400,000 tons of poorly maneuverable steel behind him. Not only that, but when he thought about it, it was unlikely he’d see a mine. If it had already survived a sweeping, it was probably bottom-laid, and pretty sophisticated.

  But as it turned out, he saw only cardboard boxes, trash, and one drifting oil drum.

  At last the dun curtain thinned, then lifted, its gracefully curved skirts sweeping off to the south. Shortly thereafter, the master called him on the walkie-talkie. One of the ship’s officers was on his way forward to relieve him.

  He heard the pulse of approaching rotor blades as he pedaled back. Slowly, because the tires kept slipping on the sand, and because now that he wasn’t concentrating o
n the sea, he was very thirsty, hot, and tired.

  It was a Navy helicopter, but not 421, as he’d half-expected. It circled them and landed forward of the superstructure. When he got there, a quarter-mile later, two men were standing beside it as the rotors ticked around, talking with Guterman. As he set the kickstand, he suddenly recognized Jack Byrne, then the short man in the flight suit. He hastily brushed off his uniform.

  “Dan! Can we have a few words?”

  As he saluted a grim-looking Hart, a blonde woman in slacks joined them from inside the fuselage. The admiral introduced her as Blair Titus. Dan saluted her, too, wondering who she was. Press? Some visiting celebrity? It seemed discourteous to ask. She was good-looking, with a confident air. Maybe he was supposed to recognize her.

  Hart said, “She’s congressional, Dan. We can talk in front of her. Now, how about telling me about the mine damage.”

  “Well, Captain Guterman can give you more detail than I can, sir. Actually, we don’t know for sure if it was a mine.”

  “Here,” said Guterman. Dan turned to him, and before he could say anything, he found an ice-cold bottle of Heineken in his hand.

  While he was wondering what to do with it, what with Commander, Middle East Force looking at him, Hart snapped, “What do you mean?”

  “The damage is amidships. It seems to me a mine would explode near the bow.”

  “Only if it was a moored type,” said Byrne. His eyes were unreadable behind the sunglasses. “An influence type would go off nearer the screws.”

  “Yessir, but it wasn’t really near the screw, either.”

  Hart began questioning Guterman. Dan was wiping red grit and sweat from his forehead when the woman said, “Can I ask you a few things?”

  “Sure. What do you want to know?”

  “Are you in charge of this ship?”

  “No, no. This is a civilian vessel. That’s the master, Captain Guterman. I’m Dan Lenson, XO of Van Zandt, one of the frigates escorting the convoy.”