The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran (114 page)

40.
USS
Esteem
(MSO-438),
Command History, 1988
, Ships History Branch, Naval Historical Center, p. 1. One of the MSOs, the
Conquest
, ran into the escort ship while conducting a replenishment operation at sea, thereby delaying her arrival until repairs were made.

41.
The navy did not use the term “minefield.” The Iranians laid mine lines and not large dense fields such as Iraq would lay during Desert Storm. Instead the navy called it a “mine danger area,” as mines could be laid anywhere in a large geographical area. CTG 801.4 Message to USS
Conquest
, “Part II AGM MCM OPMEMO 1-5A (AG Minehunting Procedures)” (210701Z), March 1988, and “Arabian Gulf MCM OPMED 1-5A,” March 21, 1988, JTFME/MEF Operations Files, Operational Archives, Naval Historical Center, Series VI, Box 18.

42.
Van Belle interview.

43.
DeMasi interview.

44.
USS
Fearless
(MSO-442),
Command History, 1987
, Ships History Branch, Naval Historical Center, p. 3.

45.
Van Belle interview.

46.
Nerheim interview.

C
HAPTER 17
N
O
H
IGHER
H
ONOR

1.
Bernsen interview. In fact it took a direct order from Crowe to get the
Wimbrown
deployed near Farsi.

2.
Major General James Record, USAF, interview with author, November 28, 1995, and January 29, 1996.

3.
Bernsen interview.

4.
The chairman ordered his assistant, Vice Admiral Jonathan Howe, to the Gulf for a fact-finding mission. After meeting with both Bernsen and Brooks, he recommended to Crowe that Brooks be relieved and the two commands merged under one hat. As Bernsen was due to rotate out anyway, it made sense to have Less replace both men, a decision with which Crist agreed. Vice Admiral Jonathan Howe, USN (Ret.), interview with author, August 8, 1996.

5.
“Remarks by General George Crist at the Middle East Force Change of Command,” Manama, Bahrain, February 27, 1988.

6.
“JTFME/MEF Ops Officer Lessons Learned—Overarching,” February 1989, JTFME/MEF Operations Files, Operations Archives, Naval Historical Center, Series VI, Box 21, Folder 8. Less made a number of changes to streamline the command and control over the operation. He implemented a more formal composite warfare commander concept structure for navy forces in the Gulf, which was the navy’s standard way of operating a battle group. Under this system, Less delegated to specific commanders the control over certain functions, such as controlling air operations, surface ships (including the convoys), or countermine measures. Dyer interview.

7.
CENTCOM, “Persian Gulf Escort Matrix—As of 13 June 1989,” 1989. A recap of every escort convoy.

8.
Captain Paul Rinn, USN (Ret.), interview with author, February 1, 2004.

9.
Dyer interview.

10.
Bradley Peniston,
No Higher Honor: Saving the USS
Samuel B. Roberts
in the Persian Gulf
(Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2006), p. 91.

11.
Quoted in Chuck Mussi, “To See the Dawn: The Night-Long Battle to Save USS
Roberts
,”
All Hands
, August 1988, p. 4.

12.
Rather than use the main propellers, Rinn ordered the ship’s auxiliary propulsion units (APUs)—used to maneuver the ship in tight situations such as docking—lowered and set slightly off center and the rudder set hard left.

13.
Oddly, many of the crew including Rinn initially thought it was the Lamps helicopter that had crashed and caused the explosion; this idea was just as quickly dispelled as it became immediately apparent that it was a mine.

14.
This was the auxiliary machinery room 3 (AMR-3).

15.
Kenneth A. Heine, “This Is No Drill: Saving the ‘Sammy B.,’”
Surface Warfare Magazine
, July/August 1988.

16.
Michael Tilley, interview with author, June 1, 2005; Rinn interview.

17.
Tilley interview; Rinn interview.

18.
Briefing, “USS
Samuel B. Roberts
(FFG-58) Mining Incident, 14 April 1988 Timeline,” undated [hereafter referred to as
Samuel B. Roberts
Timeline briefing], provided to author by Captain Paul Rinn.

19.
The original
Samuel B. Roberts
(DE-413) was sunk off Samar in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, October 25, 1944, with a loss of ninety crew.

20.
Rinn interview.

21.
CENTCOM,
Command History, 1988
, pp. iii–72; USS
Trenton
,
Command History, 1988
, Ships History, Naval Historical Center, Enclosure 1, p. 3;
Samuel B. Roberts
Timeline briefing.

22.
Contingency Marine Air-Ground Task Force 2-88, “Command Chronology,” November 23, 1987–February 29, 1988, Historical Overview Section, Archives Section, Marine Corps Historical Center, p. 10; Outlaw interview.

23.
Samuel B. Roberts
Timeline briefing.

24.
Rinn interview; Mussi, “To See the Dawn,” p. 10.

25.
Rinn interview.

26.
Ibid.

27.
Captain Robert Canepa, USN (Ret.), interview with author, August 15, 2005.

28.
Rear Admiral Guy Zeller, USN (Ret.), interview with author, April 10, 1995.

29.
Zeller expressed some reservations against this action. “It ran too much risk of collateral damage,” he cautioned, especially to a civilian hospital that sat near the naval headquarters building in Bandar Abbas. Zeller added that the complications that would surround the loss of an aircraft and a resulting POW situation outweighed any military benefit. Taking note of Zeller’s concerns, Less nevertheless ordered him to come back with a list of targets for his aircraft. CENTCOM J-3, Joint Uniform Lessons Learned System (JULLS) Number 50343-51944, “Summary, Praying Mantis,” August 23, 1988, p. 2 [hereafter JULLS Report]; Zeller interview; Vice Admiral Anthony Less, USN (Ret.), interviews with author, November 28, 1994, July 6, 2005, November 14, 2006, June 21 2007.

30.
This was one of the first deployments of the senior, or “super,” CAG concept. Conceived by Secretary of the Navy John Lehman as part of a wide range of changes to naval air following the debacle with the air strike in Lebanon in 1983, it elevated the CAG commander to a senior O-6 command on par with the carrier’s captain, who would then serve as the advocate for strike warfare within the battle group command. To assist him, a senior commander/junior captain was assigned as the deputy CAG, whose primary role would be to oversee the execution of an attack mission. Rear Admiral Arthur (Bud) Langston, USN (Ret.), interview with author, July 12, 2005.

31.
Chronology, “Battle Group Foxtrot War at Sea Exercises,” undated [1988], provided to author by Captain James Engler, USN (Ret.); Langston interview.

32.
The second option he proposed was to bomb Abu Musa Island with eight attack aircraft while simultaneously shelling both Farsi Island and the Forouzan oil platform with naval gunfire. CAG-11 Chronology, “Operation Praying Mantis, 18 April 1988,” p. 1, provided to author by Captain Engler.

33.
Less’s own staff developed three courses of action for assaulting the platforms: 1) attack all three with naval gunfire only; 2) bombard all three, but board one with SEALs to look for intelligence while the marines provided support; or 3) attack two platforms simultaneously with marines taking one while the SEALs took another. Hans S. Pawlisch, “Operation Praying Mantis,”
VFW
, January 1989, p. 35. Dr. Pawlisch was the command historian at CENTCOM.

34.
Less interview.

35.
The other two ships were the USS
Merrill
and the USS
Lynde McCormick
.

36.
The frigates were the USS
Simpson
and USS
Bagley
.

37.
If the
Sabalan
could not be found, he would destroy a third Iranian oil platform, Rakhsh. There was no SAG A. The joint task force had a communications circuit called Alpha, which was used to pass administrative traffic. In the planning sessions officers expressed concern about naming one of the surface action groups SAG A, fearing it would cause confusion at the height of combat operations. Vice Admiral James B. Perkins III, USN (Ret.), interview with author, August 9, 2005.

38.
General George Crist, Persian Gulf Ops notebook, entry for April 16, 1988, in author’s possession; letter from General George Crist to Secretary of Defense Frank Carlucci, May 20, 1988, p. 2; Zeller interview; “Operation Praying Mantis,”
Surface Warfare
, November/December 1988, p. 17.

39.
Crist interview.

40.
Many have speculated whether the virtually simultaneous attacks by the United States and Iraq was really a coincidence. The July 13, 1992,
Newsweek
article by John Barry and Roger Charles speculated that the two nations conspired together, in a joint attack against Iran. However, General Crist firmly rejects these accusations, and says
that the Iraqi attack caught the United States “by surprise.” The material I have seen supports General Crist’s claim. Thus far there is no evidence that U.S. officials planned Praying Mantis before the
Samuel B. Roberts
struck the mine on April 14. As mentioned, discussions of a military strike on Iran did not commence in CENTCOM until forty-five minutes after the
Roberts
incident. By contrast, the Iraqis had planned their attack months in advance, carefully moving Revolutionary Guards and supplies at night so as to conceal their buildup from the Iranians. The United States had no way of knowing a U.S. vessel would strike a mine, thus providing an excuse for American military retaliation. It’s more likely the Iraqis chose the seventeenth to attack because it was the first day of Ramadan, rather than out of any decision taken in conjunction with Washington.

41.
Rick Francona,
Ally to Adversary: An Eyewitness Account of Iraq’s Fall from Grace
(Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1999), pp. 23–24.

C
HAPTER 18
G
OOD
-B
YE
, C
APTAIN
N
ASTY

1.
Persian Gulf Operations
, Series Title T-1, 2, 3 (89-0003), Tape 3.

2.
Case Concerning Oil Platforms
, Memorial, Submitted by Islamic Republic of Iran, Volume 1, June 8, 1993, p. 47.

3.
Persian Gulf Operations
, Series Title T-1, 2, 3 (89-0003), Tapes 1, 2; James B. Perkins III, “The Surface View: Operation Praying Mantis,”
U.S. Naval Institute
Proceedings
, May 1989, p. 68.

4.
Dunkelberger reported back, “Platform 1 is clear and Platform 2 is burning. Platform 2 is unusable; it is on fire.” Outlaw and Brinkley quickly directed the CH-46 to insert the one assault force to the adjacent southern platform numbered 3. Thomas Hastings, USMC, interview with author, June 22, 1995; Outlaw interview;
Persian Gulf Operations
, Series Title T-1, 2, 3 (89-0003), Tapes 1, 2.

5.
In all, the Cobras expended 15 TOW missiles, 140 2.75-inch rockets, and over 6,200 20-mm rounds.

6.
As the marine helicopters were on their final approach into Sassan, the
Samuel B. Roberts
’s Lamps helicopter suddenly detected an unknown patrol boat approaching at twenty-nine knots from the northwest. It was identified as a possible Boghammer, and concern grew as it closed to fourteen thousand yards and appeared to be armed with a Harpoon missile, possibly an Iranian missile boat. Fortunately, Perkins’s force held its fire, for a closer examination revealed it to be a UAE patrol boat apparently unaware of the U.S. military operations under way at Sassan. The emirate boat quickly complied with warnings to stay clear of the area. A short time later, the U.S. ships detected an unidentified aircraft closing from due west. Ignoring repeated warnings to stay clear, two marine Cobras were sent to intercept. They discovered the culprit was a news helicopter from Dubai sent out to cover the action, not realizing how close it came to becoming part of the story.

7.
While his senior Major Clyde Brinkley served as the overall raid force commander and embarked on board the UH-1 Huey command and control helicopter, Hastings would command the forces landing on Sassan. In Brinkley’s helicopter sat Captain Vernon Scoggin of 2nd Air Naval Gunfire Liaison Company. It fell to his eyes and wits to control the naval gun predatory fires. Colonel William M. Rakow, “Marines in the Gulf—1988,”
Marine Corps Gazette
, December 1988, p. 66.