"Sir," he said carefully, "I don't think I expected I could have deliberately rammed the Kilo. The best I could do was hope to buy some time, to keep them from boarding the freighter. There was a chance they would give up, I suppose. There was also a chance that other Chinese naval units could have been nearby, or that the Kilo would actually take the Kuei Mei under fire.
"I put the helm hard over to make the Chinese sub skipper veer off. I suppose I was trying to ram him, but given the respective capabilities of our vessels, I had no expectation of the attempt actually succeeding."
"I see," Chaffee said. "What happened next?"
"The Kilo was veering off, as expected, turning to starboard well inside our starboard turn. She then appeared to shudder, as though she'd run aground or hit something. We didn't learn until later, of course, that she'd accidentally hit the submerged Pittsburgh.
"Anyway, she swung back to port. The Pittsburgh's conning tower struck the Kilo's after control surfaces and apparently jammed her rudder in a hard-left configuration. At that point we couldn't have avoided her if we'd tried. The Kuei Mei's bow struck the Kilo about halfway between her bow and her sail. We rode up over her forward deck partway, then slid back off. As we did so, the Kilo's forward port diving plane tore into the Kuei Mei's starboard hull forward, opening a gash into both the forward and after cargo holds, and she began sinking by the bow.
"At some point in there, we lost power in the engine room, which, of course, was still under Chinese control. I think they figured out something was wrong down there when we hit the sub, and cut the engine. By that time, I'd decided our mission was effectively concluded, and it was time to evade and escape."
"What led you to believe your mission objectives had been reached?"
"Sir? At that point, I wasn't entirely certain what our mission objectives were. Destroy the cargo? Sink the ship? Wait for the Coast Guard? We couldn't call for specific orders, but it felt as though the Kuei Mei was sinking. If she was, that would take care of the cargo."
Randall paged through a stack of typewritten sheets. "In your debriefing, you said that you ordered two of your men to return to the aft cargo hold to plant explosives. Correct?"
"Yes, sir."
"Why?"
"To make certain that the cargo was destroyed, even if I was mistaken about the extent of the damage to the ship."
"And why did you change your mind?"
"My men reported that the after hold was flooding. Entering the hold to place explosives would have presented an unacceptable — and unnecessary — risk to them and would not have materially affected the success of the operation. The fact that the hold was filling with water confirmed my earlier feeling that the ship was sinking. I told them to pull out and fall back to the port-side rendezvous point for E and E."
"And yet, a few minutes later," Chaffee went on, "you changed your mind again and returned to the hatch leading to the aft hold in order to drop explosives inside."
"Yes, sir."
"You seemed to be changing your mind a lot that morning. Why?"
"Two of my men reported that they were pinned down on the forward deck by enemy fire. I reasoned that the Chinese forces still aboard the ship knew they were under attack by a naval commando force and were attempting to organize an effective defense, possibly to hold us in place until reinforcements could arrive from the submarine alongside. There wasn't a lot we could do tactically to drive them off or to discourage their attack on the two missing men.
"I did believe it possible, however, that the Chinese crewmen still aboard the freighter knew that their cargo included explosives and munitions — ammunition for the assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades at the very least. If they thought the cargo was exploding — better yet, if I could make the cargo explode— they might become… discouraged and abandon ship."
"And that is, in fact, what happened, isn't it, Lieutenant?" Randall asked.
"I believe so, sir. When the explosives went off, I saw several of the crewmen jumping overboard in some haste. At the same time, though, we came under fire from a boarding party off the Chinese sub."
"And that's when Machinist's Mate Hanson was wounded?" Polowski asked.
"Yes, sir."
The three officers at the table began a low-voiced conversation among themselves then, which lasted several minutes. Morton let his gaze travel past the photographs on the wall to one of the windows. Outside, the gray buildings of the U.S. Navy Amphibious Base at Coronado squatted under a bright, California morning sun. A formation of dungaree-clad Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL trainees — BUD/S recruits — jogged past on their way to another round of calisthenics and indoctrination under the sharp-barked commands of their instructors. Four years ago Morton had been one of their number, jogging in the hot, California sunshine, bench-pressing creosote-soaked telephone poles with other BUD/S recruits, battling the cold Pacific, the mud, the bone-numbing exhaustion….
Had it been worth it?
"Very well, Lieutenant," Chaffee said at last. "We have no further questions at this time. Your report covers the remaining aspects of the operation — your withdrawal from the Kuei Mei, and your subsequent extraction by the USS Pittsburgh—in adequate detail. You may withdraw while the board considers its verdict."
There was something about that word, verdict, that chilled the blood. This wasn't a court-martial, true, and yet…
He stood. Since this was indoors and he was not covered, he did not salute, but he came to attention. "Aye aye, sir." Turning crisply, he strode toward the large, wooden double doors which were flanked by a silent pair of Marine guards and left the room.
The doors opened onto a broad passageway with high ceilings and an institutional green and white linoleum floor. Opposite was an office suite, busy with computer keyboards and sailors in whites, fronted by a reception desk and an arrangement of sofas, chairs, and low, bark-the-shins tables. A soda machine stood sentry on one wall.
Lieutenant Mark Halstead was leaning on the reception desk, chatting with the attractive civilian woman behind it in his most wolfishly charming manner. He looked up as Morton emerged from the inquiry room.
"Well, Jack? How'd it go?"
"Good as can be expected. I guess it all comes down now to whether they're looking for a sacrificial lamb."
"Try not to bleat too loudly, then." He grinned. "You know, I prefer the role of wolf. Silent and deadly."
"I hear you, swim buddy."
Mark Halstead was Morton's best friend. The son of a Vietnam-era SEAL — one of that war's three SEAL Medal of Honor recipients — Halstead had followed in his dad's swim-fin prints, joining the Navy and graduating BUD/S just in time to take part — a highly classified part — in Operation Desert Storm. He'd come home furious about the lack of decent intelligence support in that conflict, gone mustang, and become an officer. As a SEAL platoon commander, he'd been involved in several highly classified ops since then.
His current assignment at the China Lake Naval Weapons Testing Facility had scotched his chances for skippering Operation Buster, the Kuei Mei op, but he'd thrown his weight behind Morton, suggesting to a number of brass hats at NAVSPECWAR that Jack Morton was the man for the job.
And the deal had come through. Unfortunately, Morton wasn't entirely sure now that it had been a good thing.