Mutiny: The True Events That Inspired The Hunt For Red October (24 page)

A couple of the officers who’d voted to go along with the mutiny get to their feet and stand beside Sablin as if the
zampolit’s
rank or power might protect them.

Gindin wants to ask again what has happened to the captain, but the vastness of the chasm that has opened before him and the shock of Firsov’s betrayal strike him speechless for those few moments.

One of the officers opens the door. Metal chains have been stretched across the corridor to the left and the right, blocking them from returning to their duty stations or from going up on deck. The only path for them is through an open door directly across the hall and down a companionway to the next deck below. It occurs to Gindin, and probably the others, that they are being herded like sheep. Or, more darkly, like lambs to the slaughter.

Gindin’s fear spikes, yet he doesn’t call out in alarm. Nor does anyone speak, because a stocky enlisted man holding a large Makarov is standing in the corridor just beyond the chain to the left. He is scowling, and he looks as if he means business. Sablin has promised the enlisted men the moon. He is the one officer they can trust. They will do anything for him, even kill the other officers if it comes to that. Gindin and the others read something of that from the young man’s expression.

The first officers through the door into the corridor pull up short when they are confronted by the sailor with the gun and try to turn back, creating a logjam.

Gindin spins around, but Shein has stepped out of the projector closet and he, too, is holding a big Makarov pistol in his meaty hand, and he, too, looks as if he means business. There will be no turning back. They have no other choice than to cross the hall and take the companionway stairs down to the lower deck, though what awaits them below is anyone’s guess, but Gindin is truly afraid for his life now. Not only from the authorities when word of the mutiny gets out but also from his
zampolit
and his armed crewmen.

Gindin makes a last, mute appeal to his roommate, but Firsov looks
away. He cannot meet Gindin eye to eye. Vladimir is embarrassed, and Gindin believes that is a positive sign.

He turns back again to follow the other officers out of the midshipmen’s dining hall, and he feels a faint glimmer of hope that Firsov will come to his senses at some point and stop this madness from going any further.

It’s up to Firsov now.

Across the corridor they climb down the steep, vertical stairs about three and half meters to where another enlisted man with a pistol is waiting for them at an open door into one of the sonar parts compartments.

The situation is bizarre. No one says a word at first; no one is objecting; no one is giving orders. The officers climb down the stairs and one by one soundlessly enter the compartment.

When everyone is inside, the sailor looks in at them with utter contempt in his eyes. “Sit down,” he tells them. “Keep your mouths shut and no one will get hurt.”

Suddenly the situation is filled with high melodrama, like the American cowboy movies that the theaters sometimes show.

The sailor slams the door and dogs the latches, locking them in.

One of the officers bangs an open palm against the bulkhead. “Hey!” he shouts at the top of his lungs. “We’re in here; let us out!”

“Shut your mouth!” the sailor just outside the door shouts back. “No noise!”

“In one instant everything had been turned upside down,” Gindin says. “We were in the position of taking orders from an enlisted man with a gun. We had to obey his instructions. There was nothing else for us to do.”

Sablin’s wife, Nina, has gotten the letter about the mutiny that her husband posted four days earlier at Baltiysk, but she’s not told anyone in authority about it. So far as Moscow is concerned, nothing has happened yet, nor is anything about to happen. It’s just another day after a holiday in the Soviet Union. Tomorrow morning everyone will get back to work. Yesterday, when Seaman Shein was ashore on liberty after the parade he sent letters to his sister and best friend back home telling them what he was about to do. His biggest worry was that Sablin was actually a spy and intended to defect to the West. Probably to Sweden. In that case they would be doomed. There would be no way out of it for any of them. Shein wanted to explain that he believed the
zampolit
was a man of his word, who merely wanted to send a message to the Russian people about their rotten government. In return for helping him, all the sailors were promised an early out from the navy. No one wanted to be a traitor. All of them loved the Soviet Union; so Shein maintained. But all of them wanted to get out of the military and go home. Was that so terrible?

And no one was really afraid of the KGB’s retaliation after this thing was finished, if they didn’t think about it too hard. Sablin was the
zampolit;
his word was practically the same as a promise from the Communist Party itself.

In the West the workers have to accept the fact that there will be rich people and that there will be poor people, Sablin tells Shein and the other enlisted men. It’s a fact of life that cannot be denied. But in a socialist system all that is supposed to be different. There cannot be rich people and poor people. We’re all alike! We must all be equal!

Communism is the highest form of civilization.

“So, what has gone wrong in Mother Russia?” Sablin asks rhetorically. “There is a clear contradiction between the words and the deeds in the Soviet Union. Everyone knows this in his heart of hearts. It is up to us to talk openly about the issues. Force Moscow to listen to the hearts and minds of our people.”

“What is the use of all this stupid window dressing?” Shein asks Sablin at one point. Shein’s comment is typical of the cynicism throughout the country. “When we go to war, who are we supposed to defend with all this fancy talk?”

None of Sablin’s enlisted crew think much about the consequences of their support of the
zampolit.
They’re going home soon, and that’s all that counts.

Even most of the midshipmen seemed sanguine. The crew thought highly of Captain Third Rank Sablin, according to Viktor Borodai. But the captain had warned Sablin more than once about getting too close to the enlisted crew. A warning that he never heeded.

For Seaman Shein it started one evening when Sablin called him into the dining room where the political lectures were given. The enlisted man had no idea what the
zampolit
wanted with him, but orders were orders.

“I have a question for you, Sasha,” Sablin says.

Shein nods uncertainly. He’s never been talked to like this by an
officer. He doesn’t know what to say or how to act. This is new territory for a kid from Togliatti.

“How would you like to work for the KGB?”

It’s like a hot poker has been stuck up his ass. He’s disappointed and pissed off. After everything the
zampolit
has taught them about honor and equality and the true meaning of Communism, now he’s recruiting his crew to be spies, informers for the KGB.

Shein turns on his heel and starts toward the door. He may get in trouble for walking out on an officer, but he doesn’t have to stand there taking that kind of shit.

“Wait, Sasha!” Sablin cries. “You have to calm down! I was just making a little test. I don’t want you to be angry with me.”

Shein turns back. He’s confused. What’s he supposed to do? What in heaven’s name can Sablin want with him?

“I want you to sit down now,” Sablin says, his voice lower. “I want to talk to you. This is serious stuff.”

Sablin had an agenda from the start, and nothing in heaven or on earth would stop him. He meant to take his message to the people.

“Moscow has betrayed the October Revolution, so it’s time now for another revolution. All it will take is a bold stroke and positive leadership and the workers will rise up again. They will be with us, Sasha. I need you to be with me!”

That was three days ago, and this evening the first seeds of Sablin’s revolution are beginning to sprout.

Once the officers and midshipmen who had voted with the black pieces are safely locked up below, Sablin sends Shein down to the forward port compartment to stand guard over Potulniy in case the captain figures out a way to escape.

Next Sablin gets on the 1MC and calls a muster of all the crew on the quarterdeck for ten minutes after eight. This will be the moment of truth. A few officers and a handful of midshipmen cannot operate the
Storozhevoy
without the help of most of the crew. If he has the enlisted men behind him, Sablin knows that he has a real shot at doing
this thing, actually disconnecting from the mooring in the morning and getting under way up to Leningrad, where he can broadcast his message of the new revolution directly to the people.

Most of the crew has already returned from liberty ashore. Those in the dining room watching the movie and those in their quarters or already up on deck having a smoke are the first to pull on their winter coats and form up on the aft deck. The others, either on duty or, like Shein, armed and guarding someone, have already been recruited by Sablin. They are his core supporters.

Now it is up to him to convince the bulk of the crew that what he is asking of them is not only necessary but also right and just and that they will have a real chance of succeeding.

The evening is turning surreal in more than one way. A fairly thick fog has formed so that the shore is mostly lost, but the quarterdeck is bathed in a strong white light from the spreaders, and straight overhead the stars are visible, as is a full moon. It’s as if the
Storozhevoy
and his crew have been transported to a distant universe and for all practical purposes are utterly alone.

Sablin hesitates at a midship hatch before going out on deck and heading aft to confront the crew. He is wearing his black winter coat, with officer’s shoulder boards, and a standard-issue Makarov pistol in a belt holster. His heart was racing earlier in the midshipmen’s dining hall when he was talking to the officers, but he’s calmed down now. In any event, the die has been cast and there’s no way of reversing the clock.

He’s about to step outside when he becomes aware that something is going on belowdecks. He can plainly hear that someone is shouting. It sounds like Potulniy.

Sablin turns and races downstairs as fast as his feet will carry him.

“Sablin is a traitor!” Potulniy shouts. His voice is faint, coming all the way forward near the bow of the ship, but the message is clear nevertheless. There’s trouble.

Coming around a corner, Sablin yanks the pistol out and plays with
the safety catch. He’s not much of a shot, but he does know how to fire the weapon.

He pulls up short. Shein is standing at the end of the short corridor in front of the hatch to the sonar compartment where the captain is being held prisoner. The seaman has a dazed, frightened look on his broad peasant’s face. He looks like a deer suddenly caught in the headlights of an onrushing truck.

“Sablin is a traitor!” Potulniy shouts again.

Standing in front of Shein are three of the warrant officers who voted with white backgammon pieces: Gomenchuk, Kalinichev, and Borodai.

“What’s going on?” Sablin demands. “The crew has assembled up on deck. They’re waiting for me!”

“I tried to stop them, but they wouldn’t listen,” Shein stammers.

“Stop who?” Sablin shouts.

“Valery, is that you?” Potulniy cries. “Let me out of here. Don’t be a fool.” It’s more than obvious that the captain is hopping mad, and the warrant officers are clearly distressed. They didn’t count on this complication.

“A couple of sailors down here heard the captain and they tried to be heroes and rescue him,” Borodai explains. “We stopped them.”

But there is no one else in the corridor. “Where are they?” Sablin wants to know. He’s getting shaky again. “Have you locked them away?”

Borodai shakes his head. “There was no reason for it. They won’t cause any trouble now.”

“They’ll tell the rest of the crew!”

“Comrade
zampolit,
isn’t that exactly what you intend to do on deck?” Borodai asks politely. “By now just about everybody aboard knows that something is going on. So maybe you should get up there and explain the situation.”

Sablin’s heart is racing. He is torn with indecision, even though he knows what has to be done. “Shoot the next man who tries to release the captain,” he gives the order to Shein. “Do you understand me?”

Shein nods that he understands.

Sablin gives the warrant officers a bleak look, then turns on his heel and, holstering his pistol, races back up to the assembled crew on the quarterdeck.

On deck, in the shadows just around the corner from where the men are assembled, Sablin stops a moment to compose himself. The message he’s going to tell these boys is the same one he told the officers an hour ago. Only this time he’ll use easier words, simpler sentences, more clear-cut concepts, and above all a flair for the dramatic and an appeal to their patriotism.

There’s probably not a boy among them, not even among the cynics, the self-proclaimed tough guys, who doesn’t get misty when the idea of defending the Rodina is presented to them. These boys have the black Russian soil beneath their fingernails and the sad Russian songs in their souls; they will jump at the chance to come to the Motherland’s rescue against all enemies—Americans or Moscow bureaucrats.

When Sablin steps out into the light, someone calls the crew to attention, and they snap to.

When Sablin takes his position at the head of the formation he does not guess that word of the mutiny has already spread like wildfire among the crew. Shein and the few other enlisted men Sablin has taken into his confidence have convinced the others that once this necessary business is over they can all go home.

Zampolit Sablin has given his solemn promise.

He hesitates for a moment, mustering the correct words. This is a singular moment in time. He actually feels the long history of the Russian navy stretching back four hundred years. He is becoming an important part of that history.