“The Lonely Bull”: Author interview with Lloyd M. Bucher.
Double-fingered whistle: Schumacher, op. cit., 58.
Great Naked Art Heist: Details of the temporary theft of the painting are drawn from Bucher, op. cit. 105, and Ed Brandt, The Last Voyage of USS Pueblo (W. W. Norton & Co., New York, 1969), 18.
“The captain of all captains”: Armbrister, op. cit., 154.
Dropped out of Princeton: Langenberg, op. cit.
A shy academic: Biographical details of Steve Harris are drawn from Schumacher, op. cit., 56, and Armbrister, op. cit., 107.
“Wish you were dead”: Langenberg, op. cit.
Lost electrical steering: Mitchell B. Lerner, The Pueblo Incident: A Spy Ship and the Failure of American Foreign Policy (University Press of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, 2002), 40.
“Contingency plans … are written and approved”: Bucher, op. cit., 113.
Despite his pique: Edward R. Murphy Jr. and Curt Gentry, Second in Command (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1971), 72.
“Boosted morale about 600 percent”: Armbrister, op. cit., 162.
Plunged into the frigid ocean: Murphy, op. cit., 15–16.
Murphy sipped a ginger ale: Bucher, op. cit., 37.
Pass on the mincemeat: Murphy, op. cit., 73.
They were laughing: Bucher, op. cit., 121.
CHAPTER 2: DON’T START A WAR OUT THERE, CAPTAIN
“Put together like a plate of hash”: Trevor Armbrister, A Matter of Accountability: The True Story of the Pueblo Affair (Coward-McCann Inc., New York, 1970), 86.
Destroyer steaming at 30 knots: Armbrister, ibid., 122.
“All kinds of signals”: Author interview with Dick Fredlund.
24 hours to lock on: Lloyd M. Bucher and Mark Rascovich, Bucher: My Story (Doubleday & Co., Inc., Garden City, New York, 1970), 129.
“Boom-yakle-yakle”: F. Carl Schumacher Jr. and George C. Wilson, Bridge of No Return: The Ordeal of the U.S.S. Pueblo (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., New York, 1971), 51.
Angry and embarrassed: Author interview with Lloyd M. Bucher.
Landed an agent: Bucher, ibid.
“I admired them”: Bucher, op. cit.
Zech couldn’t reverse his decision: Armbrister, op. cit., 105.
Stack the excess: Edward R. Murphy Jr. and Curt Gentry, Second in Command (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1971), 78.
Electronic warfare policy: NA, RG 526, Records of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, box 13, folder: US6500, USS Pueblo, Feb 1–7, 1968.
At least a dozen code machines: NA, RG 526, Records of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, box 13, folder: US6500, USS Pueblo, Jan 1–25, 1968.
Told him to shape up: Armbrister, op. cit., 177.
No time to replace them: Ed Brandt, The Last Voyage of USS Pueblo (W. W. Norton & Co., New York, 1969), 21.
A presail briefing: Details of the briefing are drawn from Bucher, Bucher: My Story, op. cit., 138; Murphy, op. cit. 95; and Armbrister, op. cit., 203.
“You’re not going out there to start a war”: Bucher, op. cit., 140.
CHAPTER 3: ALONG A DREAD COAST
“Sir, but I’ve got to puke”: Lloyd M. Bucher and Mark Rascovich, Bucher: My Story (Doubleday & Co., Inc., Garden City, New York, 1970), 46.
It wasn’t his fault: Edward R. Murphy Jr. and Curt Gentry, Second in Command (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1971), 110.
“Jesus Christ, mister!”: Bucher, op. cit., 149.
Terse language: The text of the sailing order can be found in Bucher, op. cit., 420–22.
That delighted the quartermaster: Author interview with Charles Law.
“A sailor first and foremost”: “Bremerton—An Anecdote,” online essay by Stu Russell, http://www.usspueblo.org/Background/Bremerton/Bremerton-P1.html.
Movies were shown: The list of film titles is from NA, RG 526, Records of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, box 12, folder: Pueblo #2.
“What the hell’s going on up there?”: F. Carl Schumacher Jr. and George C. Wilson, Bridge of No Return: The Ordeal of the U.S.S. Pueblo (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., New York, 1971), 77.
Black mountains: “Colder and Getting Colder—An Anecdote,” online essay by Stu Russell, http://www.usspueblo.org/Pueblo_Incident/This_is_Not_Real/Cold_colder.html.
Crosshatch the navigation charts: Trevor Armbrister, A Matter of Accountability: The True Story of the Pueblo Affair (Coward-McCann Inc., New York, 1970), 24.
“Unproductive”: Schumacher, op. cit., 72.
“Eat our livers”: Stu Russell, op. cit.
Slipped past soldiers from the U.S. 2nd Infantry Division: LBJ, NSF, National Security Council Histories, Pueblo Crisis 1968, Vol. 14, Telegrams to Seoul, tabs 20–22, box 33.
A suspicious Seoul policeman: Daniel P. Bolger, “Scenes from an Unfinished War: Low-Intensity Conflict in Korea, 1966–1969” (Leavenworth Papers No. 19, Combat Studies Institute, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, 1991), 63.
“Extreme tension”: Korea Times newspaper, Seoul, South Korea, Jan. 26, 1968.
Decided to concentrate on the Blue House: LBJ, NSF, National Security Council Histories, Pueblo Crisis 1968, Vol. 15, Telegrams to Seoul, tabs 9–17, box 34.
Only two were believed to have made it home: Joseph S. Bermudez, North Korean Special Forces (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Md., 1998), 85.
CHAPTER 4: SOS SOS SOS
“Balmy winters”: Lloyd M. Bucher and Mark Rascovich, Bucher: My Story (Doubleday & Co., Inc., Garden City, New York, 1970), 46.
Unbeknown to the captain: The flight of the C-130 reconnaissance plane was described to the author by a former crewman who asked to remain anonymous because he’d signed a lifetime Air Force secrecy pledge.
“We have approached the target”: Transcripts of this and subsequent radio messages from the North Korean gunboats are contained in LBJ, NSF, Country File, “Korea, Pueblo Incident, Vol. I, Part A (thru Jan.),” box 257.
A searching look: Bucher, op. cit., 182.
“I’ll be goddamned”: Bucher, op. cit., 184.
“For God’s sake, stop!”: Edward R. Murphy Jr. and Curt Gentry, Second in Command (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1971), 131.
“SOS. SOS. SOS. SOS….”: Inq, 671.