“Flip, Beetle Van Wert.”
“Good morning, Admiral,” Wilson answered.
“Flip, I understand it’s oh-dark-thirty on a Saturday, but we have a national emergency. Are you aware of it?”
“No, sir.”
“Seven hours ago the Chinese slimed a cruiser in the South China Sea. About 300—ninety percent of the crew — are reported dead. Turn on the TV.” Wilson pointed at the TV with a vigorous motion. Mary nodded her understanding and grabbed the remote.
“Holy shit,” Wilson blurted, forgetting for a moment he was talking with the senior aviator in the Pacific Fleet.
“That’s what I said. USS Cape Esperance… know anyone aboard her?”
“Yes, sir, her CO, Ron Thompson. We went to command school together.” Van Wert didn’t answer for a long moment.
“Flip, I’m sorry, but it doesn’t appear that he survived.”
Wilson let it sink in. An Aegis cruiser attacked by the Chinese with a chemical agent in international waters with major loss of life. A brazen, mind-boggling act of war, up there with Pearl Harbor and 9-11. A friend and acquaintance — dead. Wilson knew, as the Commander of Carrier Air Wing Fifteen, the CAG, what Van Wert was going to tell him next.
“Flip, we are spinning up. I’m going to send you and your air wing to sea in three days aboard Hancock. She just arrived in San Diego last week after her homeport change from Norfolk. Since you returned from cruise three months ago, you are the ready air wing, but because your carrier is in the yards, we need to put you on Hanna.”
The television beamed images from a cable news station into the Wilson’s bedroom as Wilson listened to the admiral. Pictures of Cape Esperance and a map of the South China Sea were interspersed between shots of network talking heads. He read the crawl near the bottom of the screen: “U.S. NAVY WARSHIP ATTACKED OFF PHILIPPINES.”
Wilson processed the news and tasking. From a standing start his air wing of 1,900 sailors and his new carrier, the nuclear-powered Hancock, were going on what could become a combat cruise… against the Chinese!
“Flip, I’m calling you direct because Admiral Johnson is in Florida at his mother’s funeral, and he asked me to call you as a courtesy. Hanna goes to sea Tuesday with the tide, and he’ll be aboard as your Strike Group Commander. You’ll have two cruisers, four DDGs, a fast-attack sub and an auxiliary oiler. Another sub from Pearl will join en route.”
With Mary listening next to him and who-knew-who possibly monitoring the line, Wilson was conscious of the classified vector the call had taken. He became more and more astounded and incredulous as he watched the televised images.
“CAG, you’ve got about 72 hours to get your air wing ready, loaded aboard, and underway for WESTPAC. Tomorrow afternoon I want a video teleconference on your progress. Expect Admiral Johnson and the cruiser/destroyer COs to be on it. My staff will be in touch. Unless you have questions, I’m out here.”
“Yes, sir, Admiral, see you tomorrow.” Wilson heard the line go dead and turned to Mary. Her wide eyes conveyed a question she was afraid to ask.
“The Chinese attacked one of our cruisers in the South China Sea with a chemical weapon. Hundreds reported dead.”
“Oh, my gosh!” Mary gasped as her hand covered her lips, eyes darting between her husband and the television screen.
“We’re deploying Tuesday,” Wilson continued, still trying to wake up and grasp what had happened and what he must do to get his air wing ready. Where do I start?
“Derrick’s game Friday,” Mary said out loud, reminding both that once again Wilson was going to miss an important event in his son’s life. The Lemoore High Tigers football team was playing the Redwood High Rangers in Visalia on Friday for the District Championship. Derrick, a junior, was the starting free safety.
Wilson exhaled through his nostrils and grabbed his cell phone to call his Deputy CAG and squadron COs. Mary flipped through channels to check other cable news programs. Well-coiffed anchors on each program discussed the meaning of the incident around convivial tables or couches in their plush studios while speaking to military experts via telephone.
As Mary got up to make coffee, Wilson “passed the word” to his Carrier Air Wing Fifteen squadron Commanding Officers in time-honored military tradition. Although it was now only 5:30 am, they could not spare a minute of preparation, and bad news did not get better with age.
He punched in the cell number of his Deputy Wing Commander, Captain Mike “Weed” Hopper. Wilson was not surprised when he answered after one ring.
“Kemosabe.”
“Weed, you know why I’m calling?”
“Yep, just turned on the TV a few minutes ago. Wasn’t expecting to see this.”
“The Air Boss just called me. We get underway on Hanna in 72 hours. I’m calling the COs, so please call the staff. Leave canceled, need bounce periods on the pilots today and tomorrow. Call the base COs, too. We need parts and supplies big time. I’ll circle back with you in an hour.”
“Rog-o, Flip, we’ve got it.”
The task before them was monumental. Inform hundreds of sailors with thousands of plans for the weekend that their plans were canceled, leave is canceled, and they must come in to their squadron hangars right now to prep jets and stage supplies, pack files and folders from maintenance logbooks to admin personnel records to training jackets into cruise boxes, then load tool boxes, test gear, spare parts, charts, classified publications, extra flight suits, float-coats and cranials, jacks, oil and hydraulic pumps, bomb hoist units, hernia bars, canopy and intake covers….
The list was staggering for one squadron, and CVW-15 had nine from Super Hornets to Growlers to E-2D Hawkeyes to MH-60 Romeos and Sierras assigned to five different air stations from San Diego at the southwest corner of the United States to Whidbey Island, Washington at the northwest corner, a distance of over 1,000 miles.
This effort didn’t even count the need to qualify the pilots in field carrier landing practice day and night to get them ready for the real thing Tuesday and Wednesday, depending on when the ship got underway which no one knew for sure. And before the ship got underway, all the squadron gear to be loaded into cruise boxes and placed in semi-trailers had to make the 5-hour, 7-hour, or — in the case of Whidbey—20-hour drive to place the 18-wheelers pier-side to be unloaded and cargo then loaded into Hancock moored to the quay wall at North Island. And before that, the hundreds of squadron personnel from the three air stations outside San Diego had to be flown to North Island and embarked aboard. The complexity of this evolution boggled the mind, and it all had to result in a combat-capable team heading to war in three days.
Heading to war, Wilson thought between each terse three-minute call he made to his COs. With China, who had just demonstrated a willingness to use chemical and biological weapons in a surprise attack on a U.S. Navy cruiser, one of the most feared warships afloat. As the eastern horizon over the Sierra Nevada Mountains began to lighten on what would be a long Saturday morning in Lemoore, Wilson contemplated what was ahead.
When Mary handed Wilson his first cup of coffee, she let him know the kids were still asleep and would be for hours. Wilson took the cup with an appreciative smile and called one of his Rhino squadron skippers, Commander Kristin “Olive” Teel of Strike Fighter Squadron One-Five-Two, to deliver the historic and life-changing news.