“Captain-Navigator…right now we’re at position 21.16N 112.315E…thirty miles due south of the target beach.”
Commander Wheaton said quietly, “Okay, guys, this is it…just about as far as we can go. You wouldn’t want to get back here for breakfast on Sunday morning and find us stuck in the mud, eh?”
The ship was now silent with anticipation. Anyone within range was watching the massive Olaf Davidson, who stood quietly below the hatch to the flooding compartment through which he would exit the ship. His face blackened, the veteran SEAL commander was holding his left forearm with his right hand, as if trying to take confidence from his enormous strength.
Finally he disappeared up through the hatch, followed by his three colleagues, and those working below the casing could hear the muffled bumps as they wrestled the ASDV away from the dock, out into the vastness of the South China Sea.
With Olaf’s SEAL team back on board, the engines of the ASDV finally kicked into life and it moved forward, its course steady on three-six-zero, making a fast 18 knots through the warm, sandy water, 50 feet below the surface, leaving hardly any wake in the rainswept, desolate seascape.
The eight SEALs could speak to each other if they wished, but no one said anything. Their talking was done, their plans perfectly memorized. Their training had taught them that noise, any form of noise, is magnified under the water. And the silence was all-enveloping as each man dealt with the pressure in his own way.
Up front, the CO and navigator could see nothing. The entire journey was made on instruments, and it drew to its conclusion precisely where they knew it would, 120 minutes later, a little over a half mile off the southern peninsula of Xiachuan Dao.
The CO spoke tersely. “This is about it, guys, sounder’s showing we have around ten feet under the keel, but it’ll shelve up quite rapidly. Time to go.”
Unlike most previous SEAL delivery vehicles, which flood up completely for the swimmers to exit, this new advanced version allowed pairs of SEALs to clip on their Draeger breathing gear, and enter a small compartment that then floods. Then they just drop straight through and exit feet-first under the keel, same way they came in, leaving the rest of the submarine dry.
At this point the first pair leaves, wasting no time around the submarine, and using their precious air strictly for the swim-in. And now Lieutenant Commander Bennett dropped through the hatch, his huge flippers on, his attack board held tight in both hands. Right behind him came young Buster Townsend, on his first mission, and as he swam forward, he reached out for his leader both mentally and physically.
Buster was afraid, here in this deep water with, for all he knew, several thousand Chinese lying in wait for him on the beach. But he had been trained for this, or something very like it, for years, and he knew what to do, and he placed his right hand on the broad left shoulder of his leader, and together the two Americans kicked hard toward the prisoners of Admiral Zhang Yushu.
Rusty quickly found his course, due north as planned, and he and Buster got their kicks synchronized…KICK…one…two…three…four…KICK…one…two…three…four. Each one took them 10 feet closer, and they would need 300 kicks, one every five seconds, a 25-minute swim.
It sounds simple, but it is only simple to those who have hammered their bodies into shape on the anvil of U.S. Navy SEAL training and discipline. And now, as Rusty and Buster knifed their way through the water, they were both asking big questions of their bodies, and they were both getting all the right answers.
On a swim like this, SEALs reckon to feel tiredness late in the second mile. This short-haul run thus counted as little more than a sustained sprint, and when Rusty suddenly noticed his attack board grounding in sand, he knew it was over, and he was not surprised to see Lieutenant Dan Conway and Rattlesnake Davies pop up right behind them. Chief McCarthy and Paul Merloni came next, with Bill and John almost level.
It was nearly eight in the evening now, and the beach was in a shadowy twilight, the sun having set to the west beyond a heavily wooded headland. Rusty was glad of the last of the light, because it confirmed what they had been told: they were in a wide, gently curving bay, and the place was deserted, save for the jail complex six miles to the northeast.
From the land it would be impossible to spot anything on the dark water. There was no moon, and the rain clouds still hung over the entire area. Rusty sat in the shallows up to his neck in water and motioned for the others to join him. “I think we’ll stay here for ten more minutes,” he said. “Just until it gets really dark…if we make a run for it now up that wide, white beach we’d stand out like a dog’s balls, if there happened to be anyone around. I’d rather play it dead safe.”
Everyone agreed, and they sat silently in the warm water until they could no longer see even the beach. They never saw the Zodiac either, never even heard it as Olaf Davidson and his crew slipped the craft across the bay, with short, beautifully timed strokes, the paddles hitting the water as one, almost noiselessly, tirelessly. This quartet would have put a Harvard crew four to shame.
“Watch where you’re going, you crazy fucker,” said Rusty softly as the rubber boat almost bumped Buster in the back of the head.
“Jesus,” said Catfish. “What the hell are you guys doing, sunbathing?”
The SEALs stifled their laughter as the crew stepped out into the shallows, and they all pulled the boat in, spinning it expertly around, the engine raised, landing it stern-first. Even in mild shore waves these boats immediately ship water over the stern if they spend even a few seconds in the shallows. The trick is to get the bow around to face the ocean.
This particular boat was moved with extreme speed, six SEALs on either side, using the specially fitted handles, positioned so that eight men could put all their strength into lifting and dragging the heavy end. They had it out of the water, up the beach and into the trees inside 90 seconds.
It was very dark the moment they left the white sand, and it was beginning to rain again. Rusty was not crazy about the first spot they chose because it afforded no cover or protection from the seaward side. In short, if anyone arrived on the beach, the SEALs could be seen.
Rusty took a short walk in company with Dan Conway, and 40 yards to the east they found an outcrop of rocks, around five feet high, running right back into the trees for 30 feet. “That’s for us,” said the recon team leader. “We’ll get the boat in behind there, under a waterproof shelter, and we’re golden…the watchmen can cover the beach and the landward approach with the machine gun — the guys can sleep in the boat…because no intruder could see anything.”
For the next 30 minutes the SEALs got themselves thoroughly organized. The boat was camouflaged and covered with the waterproof shelter, which they rigged up about three feet above the hull. They took some palm branches and carefully brushed out their tracks in the sand, then used them to hide the boat even more thoroughly. They rigged up the radio in case of emergency, and fitted the ammunition belt to the machine gun.
When the exercise was complete the entire thing was virtually invisible. And when Rusty Bennett was finally satisfied with the safety of the position, he and his seven teammates prepared to leave.
They removed their wet suits and climbed into their light jungle combat gear, brown T-shirts with green and brown camouflage shirt and trousers, and long soft lace-up boots. Each man then applied light and dark green greasepaint to their faces, with the occasional splotch of brown. Rusty Bennett never wore a hat, preferring his dark green headband, which he called his “drive-on rag.” When they were all fitted out they made a final weapons check: the pistol, the MP-5 automatic, the ammunition, the fighting knife. And then they shouldered up their packs, including two trench shovels, and very formally shook hands with the four men who were staying behind.