Tag Archives: USS George Washington

Mind your helm… 10

Submarine • Tags: , , ,

My first patrol on the USS George Washington was a blur in many ways.

Being a new guy, I spent most of it completing my non-qual duty of mess cooking. I distinctly remember the hatches being shut for the last time, the diving alarm and the feeling of helplessness as the boat dove beneath the water for the first time with me on inside.

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Of course there were over a hundred other guys but at that particular moment, I was not aware of anyone else. The sounds of the boat adjusting to the sea pressure were all around me and the angle was not as severe as I thought it would be. I am not sure about other submariners, but those are moments that stay with me and sometimes come back even when I don’t request them.

Diving%20alarm%20actuator

I never really questioned where we were going or how long it would take. The Chief had told us to make sure we had enough cigarettes and geedunk (as well as clothes) to last at least 70 days. Never having been on a boat before I brought too many of the wrong things and not enough of the right ones. It didn’t matter much though since once you are on the mission, you don’t get a do-over and you learn to adapt to overcome your mistakes.

The second patrol was a bit more exciting for me since I was qualified and got to spend my turn as the helmsman/planesman. I can hear a few old boomer sailors chuckling right now as they have their own memories of punching holes in the water very low and slow with no particular hurry. While that is true in the whole once you are on station, there can be many interesting moments all along the way both to and from the area you will call home for the majority of the run.

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I got a chance to drive a 380 foot submersible ship through the water with only a diving officer and an OOD to keep me from going too far off course. 6000 tons of metal and machinery were subject to the movements of my hands and arms. Not bad for a nineteen year old kid. It was certainly the biggest and baddest thing I had driven up to that point. Over the course of the next few months we would practice all kinds of drills involving angles and dangles, rapid excursions, emergency power drills, manual operation of the planes and so on. It was a great adventure.

One question that often gets asked when you talk about life on the boats is “How did you know where you were going?”. My answer is almost exactly the same each time. As a helmsman on a nuclear submarine, does it matter? Don’t get me wrong. I followed the little round gyro repeater faithfully and tried to keep my heading as close to the one ordered by the OOD as I could. Even in storms and undersea currents, you wanted to make sure you kept your heading squared away as much as possible. It was a matter of pride.

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But it was only a repeater after all. The signal came from another piece of equipment and you took it as a matter of faith that the piece of equipment ran as designed and you really were heading in the direction it said you were. Most of the time, it worked. At the time, I didn’t have a clue how. Here is a brief explanation though:

… the SSBN needed to be able to pinpoint, with extreme accuracy, her position at every moment in order to be able to accurately target her missiles. As a result, the 598 boats were among the first ships to carry a full Ships’ Inertial Navigation System or SINS – a set of gyroscopes on a stabilized platform which allowed the submarine to accurately record her accelerations in all dimensions and hence construct her position. While gyrocompasses had been in use for many years, this was the first time a ship was able to keep a positional log based purely on the mathematical integration of vector changes.

Sins of the father

Well, alrighty then.

I wish we had one or two of those for our country right about now. I feel like I just woke up during the mid-watch and the whole control room was sound asleep. I look up at the little compass repeater and realize we are about 90 degrees off course. How long were we out? Who knows this? Are we in trouble? Am I in trouble???

Pretty much.

The non-quals have taken over the ship. You no longer need skill or knowledge to advance, just as long as everybody advances (or declines) together. Since it wouldn’t be fair to reward the hard runners, why should they bother to excel? Average is the new normal and as long as the lowest achiever never feels bad about themselves, no one will get hurt.

There will need to be a few changes though. Since everyone is now equal, no one will have to scrub the decks anymore. The dirt will probably start building up but at least we will feel good about ourselves. Mess cooking will no longer be allowed since that sort of demeaning activity is also banned. The scullery will stack up pretty quickly but hey, Seaman Schmucatelly will not have to endure the long hours scrubbing other people’s dirty dishes.

Watchstanding will be a bit hard also. We used to do 18 hour days (6 on, 6 off, 6 in the rack if you were lucky). Since we want to hold everyone in highest esteem, there will be no wake up calls. Also, if you really don’t feel like standing a watch, why should you? The Captain gets to sleep in doesn’t he? Why shouldn’t you? Its not a serious problem anyway since the boat would probably never get to sea. All that nasty business of line handling will suddenly be beneath even the lowest seaman.

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Everyone will be issued dolphins on their first day aboard. Each month, a lottery would be conducted to see which medal would be issued to all hands. It would be unfair for any one sailor to be given an award without understanding the feelings of the others. Within a short while, there would be no more need for those expensive submarines. If they never go to sea, why keep putting more money into them. Just issue every sailor a check and send them home.

The Chinese, Russians, Iranians, Muslim Brotherhood, North Koreans and all of the rest of the world will be very happy. They are probably ecstatic that the USS America is completely lost at sea. No gyrocompass. No Leadership… just a bunch of sailors on liberty waiting for the shore patrol to show up and put an end to the fun.

Mister Mac

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FBM Blue and Gold – The Beginning Reply

Submarine, Underwater Technology, US Navy • Tags: , , , ,

Thanks to shipmate Tim Lutes  STS2(SS)  USS George Washington SSBN 598 for finding this little gem and posting it on FB.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=HGrDJSHmXZU#!

I sailed on the GW when she was about twelve years od and had clear memories about how old she was (at least every time something broke).

598 1973 Pearl Harbor

At different points in my four patrols we suffered a failure of the fairwater planes in a typhoon, the rudder ram during a high speed run, fire in the machinery room (O2 Generator), and others that I still wake up to at night sometimes.

Watching the small clip took me right back to being a helmsman staring at the grey panel and very old fashioned depth and speed indicators. What a far cry from my last boomer tour which was on the USS Ohio in the eighties. Both were examples of man’s ability to create rapid advancements in the face of danger.

Ohio bow shot

 

Could we do it again?

I keep hearing whispers about unmanned submarines that can be deployed for much longer periods of time. As an old submariner, I wonder if our technology has advanced far enough to actually replace the sailor that react to the unforgiving nature of the deep blue sea?

 

But then again, I’m getting old. I can hardly imagine what my Grandfather Mac’s reaction would have been to see a ship that didn’t need coal to sail. Or one that operated greater than 400 feet below the water on a daily basis for months at a time.

 

John C MacPherson WW1       1911 battleship

Mister Mac

Bluejackets Manual, eighteenth edition, 1968 (Third Printing, September 1969) 3

American History, Submarine, US Navy • Tags: , , , , , , ,

I’m sure I have mentioned it before but I have a modest collection of Bluejackets Manuals dating back to the early 1900’s.

I started out with my Grandfather Parkin’s manuals from the Second World War. From that time, I have added them as I find them in old book stores, sea ports, and Army Navy stores. There is a very nice one in Palmyra PA if you happen to be driving through town but make sure you don’t park in the “Precious Puppies” parking lot out back. The lady that does the grooming will give you an honest to goodness stink eye.

Today I picked up one that I did not have before, the Eighteenth Edition.

This particular version was one of the light blue hardbacks, large print on page numbering and in remarkably good shape. Most of the manuals I find from places like today have pages that are a bit browned from being stored in a basement somewhere. They ended up in his store after someone passed away or maybe just on a wholesale house cleaning. After all, unless your day to day life involves tying knots or small boat handling, the BJM probably doesn’t have much value for you.

I like the submarine sections of the BJM through the years.

You can really get a feel for submarine development by reading the sections that discuss current and future trends. In 1968, nuclear submarines were the main topic.

“The fleet ballistic missile and nuclear propulsion have given the submarine a new place in the defense of the United States. To help discourage an attempted sneak attack on the country, our FBM submarines are kept constantly on station beneath the sea, ready to answer such an attack with an immediate and devastating counterpunch. Our attack submarines are designed to find and destroy enemy subs or surface ships which might launch missiles against us.”

The memory of the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor was engrained in the Navy’s and the country’s DNA.

The generation of leaders in 1968 in many cases were the young Ensigns and Seamen so sneak attacks were a very real threat. With the advent of the Soviet missile fleet, this threat was very real. In many senses of the word, we were still at war.

The Navy was gearing up for the conflict it hoped to never fight.

“By 1970 the Navy expects to have a fleet of of 100 nuclear powered submarines, 41 of which will be armed with Polaris ballistic missiles. However there are still a large number of conventionally powered “fleet types” in the active Navy”

Mention is made of the Barbel class boats as the last conventionally powered submarines added to the fleet at large. The Nautilus is mentioned as the first nuclear powered boat followed by the four ships of the Skate Class and six of the Skipjack class. The last of the Skipjack Class was of course the USS Scorpion. She was launched on 19 December 1959, sponsored by Mrs. Elizabeth S. Morrison (daughter of the last commander of the World War II-era USS Scorpion, which had been lost with all hands in 1944), and commissioned on 29 July 1960, Commander Norman B. Bessac in command.

The article goes on to report “the largest group of SSNs will eventually be the ships of the Permit (SSN 594) Class, the first of which were completed in 1962. These ships are armed with both torpedoes and SUBROC, an antisubmarine missile which can be fired from a torpedo tube, take to the air in a ballistic trajectory and return to the water miles away to become a submarine hunting torpedo.”

The Scorpion was engaged in submarine warfare development activities in the Atlantic when she was lost.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Scorpion_(SSN-589)

Most boat sailors who know the back stories know that the original Scorpion hull was used for the rapid development of the USS George Washington SSBN 598. The name Scorpion was shifted to the hull which became the boat all of us commemorate each May.

The Eighteenth Edition of the BJM that I have was actually printed in September of 1969. There is no mention of the Scorpion’s loss.  While the mix of submarines by the early seventies is covered in great detail in the Nineteenth Edition (mine in boot camp), there is still no mention of the loss of the Scorpion. Maybe they didn’t want to scare us.

The Nineteenth BJM does have an interesting take on submariners though;

“Submarine duty is different than anything else in the Navy; it requires a special temperament which not all possess.”

From my humble experience, I would have to agree.

The Silent Service

The USS Thresher’s loss finally shows up for the first time in the Naval History section in the twentieth edition of the Blue Jacket’s manual. That was the edition published in 1978 which glowingly talked about the Los Angeles Class and Ohio class boats. Fifteen years. Still no mention of the Scorpion.

The latest version of the BJM in my collection is from my nephew EM1/SS. The Scorpion is still not listed in the historical section of the book. I had never even thought about it until today. That’s kind of sad. Maybe someone who has a more current one can check and see if she has shown up yet.

Did you ever forget something after it was too late to do anything about it? Mine is the sound of my Dad’s voice telling me to be a good person. I can hear the words, but I can’t reproduce the sound no matter how hard I try. I also can’t remember what the Scorpion plaque in the forward escape truck looks like on the George Washington. As an A-ganger doing PM’s, I surely must have seen it. But for the life of me, I can’t remember it.

I hope the lost souls of that boat and their families know that even though the Navy’s Blue Jackets Manual doesn’t remember them, most of us still do. God Rest their souls.

Mister Mac

By the way, if for some reason I am mistaken about the BJM not mentioning the loss, I will issue a formal apology. Maybe I just got the only copies of the 18th to the 22nd Editions that cover the years 1969 – 2000 that didn’t mention them.

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother 18

Submarine, US Navy • Tags: , , , ,

I don’t believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers. It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage. Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at. ~Maya Angelou

If you are lucky in life, you get to have a real brother. This is no reflection on my actual siblings that I grew up with, but with the exception of my Brother Little Mac, I didn’t find out what “brother” really meant till later in life. (Little Mac is the guy trying to escape in the picture bellow. We spent nearly four years together on the USS San Francisco SSN 711) Don’t get me wrong, I would still honor all of the “family” obligations. We come from a very long line family connections dating back to the family’s arrival in the US.

MacPhersons 1960's 2nd

Brotherhood means a lot more to me now. A brother is someone who calls or writes an email without you sending one first. He is the one who laughs at your corny jokes but pokes you for them from time to time. During those difficult times in your life, a brother never feels awkward about reaching out to you and keeping your spirits up. They give you the seat of honor at their house, look forward to sharing a special drink that you only have on special occasions, and never fail to let you know that they love you (even when you don’t feel like someone worth loving.)

A sibling is someone who remembers every stupid thing you ever did growing up and brings it up at the annual family gathering. A brother only remembers the cool stuff you did and is proud of those days. A sibling is still concerned about the birth order and how much of a leader they should be as they get older. A brother remembers that all of us are equal in God’s eyes and respects you for your rightful place. A sibling will show up at your bedside when you are sick because he should, a brother does it because he really wants to be there.

Brothers in bunk beds

Like most people, I have learned this in stages. As a kid, I slept in a bedroom with my three siblings. We had bunk beds which made it easy for me to transition to boot camp when I graduated from High School. We were just far enough apart in age not to be in the same schools at the same time. Our “shared” experiences were limited to some family events and some church things. I do remember there seemed to be a lot of fighting.

Grandmas Staircase

All of us had our own experiences growing up except for the time I ran away from home and Little Mac followed. I yelled at him for a while to go home but he decided to follow me anyway. I can’t remember how old we were but I do remember he was not in school yet. The end result was that we made it about thirteen miles before giving up and calling home. Mom was madder then heck and I think she broke her wooden spoon on my back side. Recognizing the futility of trying to run away before I could actually drive or earn a living delayed my actual escape until the Navy.

Brothers in boot camp

Bob Boot Camp Team         scan0002

My first real taste of brotherhood was in boot camp. You suddenly find yourself in a very strange environment and they strip away all of the things that made you comfortable. In a short period of time though, you find that in your shared experience, you learn to depend on each other. By graduation, you feel like all of you combined could beat the entire enemy fleet with no effort. Youth, ego, and the introduction to your first real sets of brothers gives you a feeling of being bulletproof. It doesn’t last long.

Brothers on boats

SSBN 598 A gang

A school and sub school are not as focused on making new brothers. Even the ones who you went to boot camp with drift to other schools and the camaraderie goes on a hiatus. When you get to the boat, you are a non-qual nub. Reporting on board the George-fish, I found out that there are few things more worthless than a non-qual. Fortunately for me, I was not the only new guy so I had a lot of people who I would grow to be brothers with. We forged our friendships and became brothers by sharing our misery, sharing our hard and very long days, and sharing our victories.

January 21, 1961 is the date that marks the completion of the first ballistic missile patrol. She spent 66 days at sea submerged and accomplished her mission. She would continue to do so 54 more times. I will go to my grave believing that the work her crews did helped to prevent the world from spiraling out of control. It also forged a lot of brotherhood through the years. The link will take you to some rare footage of the GW…

http://ia600407.us.archive.org/30/items/1960-11-17_Nuclear_Navy/1960-11-17_Nuclear_Navy_512kb.mp4

I had many other opportunities to find and make “brothers” along the way. I will forever be indebted to their help and comradeship as we all made our way through the years.

Brothers in life

Although not as common, it is still possible to develop a brotherhood with people you meet along the way. I have been blessed to have those brothers in my life. The thing is I don’t need to name the ones who fit that role because they are reading this and smiling. I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am to each of you for enriching my life. I hope you can say the same.

Brothers

Mister Mac

One other thing I discovered… a brother reads your blog even though he is very busy and actually tells you he laughed at the places he was supposed to. God Bless you Brother

Update: There have been a lot of my Brothers who have joined (or sadly may have passed) since the first time I blogged this.

I am eternally grateful for your friendship, love, and help during one of the most difficult years in my life.

You will never know how much that made all the difference.

For the hundreds of “brothers” and “sisters” who took the time to remember to say Happy Birthday, be assured, I will never forget. For those who are actual “family” who did not, I will try not to remember. It’s the least I can do in return for the least you did.

USS George Washington SSBN 598 Reply

Submarine, US Navy • Tags: , ,

When I requested a submarine for my first assignment after sub school , I wanted to be on a Diesel Boat first, a fast attack second, and a Boomer third preferably a 640 class.

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That is probably why I received orders to the USS George Washington (SSBN 598B).

 

The trip to the boat took a while since she was in the process of transiting to Pearl Harbor but I was scheduled to go to Auxiliary Package Course in Charleston SC where she had just completed a shipyard period.

The school lasted through the spring of 1973 and upon graduation I flew through Travis AFB on my way to Pearl. I learned a little bit about the military rank structure that trip as I found myself being bumped off of the Mac flight I was assigned to. Interestingly enough, an Airman later told me it was because an Air Force General was taking his family on vacation and they did not have enough seats on the plane.

Being young and not as experienced as I would later become, I had no idea what to do next. I just remembered all of the lectures about missing ship’s movement in boot camp and knew that I was in deep trouble. It took three days for them to find me another seat but by the time I arrived, it was too late to catch the crew flight to Guam. Lucky me. I would spend the next few months in transient personnel units working on a barracks rehabilitation project on Sub Base Pearl.

Copy of HI 5

While waiting there, I had a lot of time on my hands and wrote letters. Very few of those letters survive (probably a good thing) but one written in 1973 was probably meant for my Dad. I found it in an old shoebox that had other memento’s in it and found it to be pretty interesting. Keep in mind that I wrote it before I had ever been on board the George fish for my first patrol.

Pioneers

A new breed of men range the oceans as zealously as their brave forefathers. Always ready, just as the minutemen of the early American times and just as bold as the early sailors who dared to try and overcome the vast unknowns of the oceans. The men who serve in solitude amidst the flashing lights and muffled sounds of machinery. They work and live in confined spaces beneath millions of tons of the matter which covers the majority of the face of the earth. But their purpose goes deeper that a military institution. Besides being a deterrent to nuclear holocausts and safeguarding our borders, these men also untap scientific resources by each patrol they make. They prove man’s adaptability to live beneath the seas in this day where space for living seems to grow less and less.

And the hardest thing is the isolation which they must face. Living separated from their loved ones with little communications and knowing two things; they can never tell where they have been, nor can they say that if they go down that they will ever come back again. These Pioneers, the Men of the “Silent Service”

Over the next twenty plus years, I would get a chance to see if any of that was true on five boats. I’ll save that for another day.

In the meantime, its time once again to remember the Boomer that started it all for the US Navy, my qual boat which was commissioned on December 30th 1959. I was five years old and did not attend. I was present at the Decom ceremony in Bremerton in January 1985. I have to admit it was a very sad day.

 

Washington Facts from the Navy’s website:

USS George Washington – Design & Construction:

Laid down on November 1, 1958 as USS Scorpion (SSN-589), USS George Washington was the world’s first ballistic missile submarine. Originally intended as a Skipjack-class fast attack submarine, orders were issued in December 1958 to convert Scorpion and USS Sculpin into vessels capable of carrying newly-developed fleet ballistic missiles. To accommodate this request, the keel of Scorpion was cut in two at Electric Boat in Groton, CT and a 130-foot missile compartment inserted between the control room and the nuclear reactor spaces.

With this alteration, work moved forward to complete the vessel under the new designation USS George Washington (SSBN-598). The former name was given to a new attack submarine which would be lost under suspicious circumstances in 1968. Sponsored by Mrs. Robert B. Anderson, George Washington entered the water on June 9, 1959. As with future ballistic missile submarines, George Washington possessed two crews, Blue and Gold, which rotated to ensure that the vessel could stay sea with few interruptions. Under this system, its first two captains were Commander James B. Osborn (Blue) and Commander John L. From, Jr. (Gold).

GW ssbn598_2

Making History:

Commissioned on December 30, 1959, George Washington departed Groton the following June under the guidance of Osborn. Arriving at Cape Canaveral, FL, the submarine embarked two Polaris missiles and program head Rear Admiral William Raborn. Putting to sea, George Washington conducted the first successful tests of the Polaris missile on July 20. Swapping crews, these tests were repeated on July 30 under the supervision of the Gold crew. Having tested the new weapon system, George Washington put into Charleston, SC where it was given a full complement of sixteen Polaris missiles.

Awarded: December 31, 1957

Keel laid: November 1, 1958

Launched: June 9, 1959

Commissioned: December 30, 1959

Decommissioned: January 24, 1985

Builder: Electric Boat Co., Groton, Conn.

Propulsion system: one S5W nuclear reactor

Propellers: one

Length: 381.6 feet (116.3 meters)

Beam: 33.1 feet (10.1 meters)

Draft: 28.9 feet (8.8 meters)

Displacement: approx. 6,700 tons submerged

Speed:
Surfaced: 15 knots
Submerged: 20 knots

Armament: 16 vertical tubes for Polaris missiles, six 21" torpedo tubes

Crew: 12 Officers and 128 Enlisted (two crews)

A Nuclear Deterrent:

After receiving a Navy Unit Commendation and embarking the Blue crew, George Washington departed port on November 15, 1960, for the world’s first nuclear deterrent patrol. Slipping beneath the waves, the submarine did not surface for 66 days until arriving at New London in January to change crews. Leaving port, George Washington conducted another deterrent patrol which ended when the vessel arrived at Holy Loch, Scotland in April. Based at that port, George Washington conducted routine patrols until returning to Groton in 1964 for refueling.

During its initial deployment, George Washington sailed approximately 100,000 miles before putting in for a refit. Remaining at Groton into 1965, the submarine’s systems were upgraded to utilize the new Polaris A3. Leaving port, George Washington was transferred to the US Pacific Fleet and assigned to Pearl Harbor. Known as the "Georgefish," the submarine conducted nuclear deterrent patrols in the Pacific for the next decade and a half as part of the US Navy’s growing ballistic missile submarine force.

598 1973 Pearl Harbor

My Trusty Old .45 2

Holy Loch, Leadership, Preparedness, Submarine, US Navy • Tags: , , , , , ,

As a kid growing up, one of my favorite shows was a realistic World War 2 action series called “Combat!”.

Sergeant Saunders (Vic Morrow) was my hero and his adventures with Kirby, Little John, Cage and Lieutenant Hanley and Doc. The series ran form 1962 to 1967 which is pretty remarkable since the actual war in Europe lasted less than a year. Interestingly enough, the platoon never actually made it out of France in the whole five years.

CombatDVD

The part that I really loved about the show was the weapons. You could get a real sense of the war from the scenes where the platoon fought harsh battles with overwhelming forces of Germans. Week after week, you could see the ability and limitations of those guns. From the Thompson to the M1 Garand, each weapon played its role. But none seemed more important than the trusty old .45 that Saunders and Hanley both carried.

45

That weapon was a sign of authority and normally only carried by higher ranking folks. It was a significant weapon since it was at the ready if you ever blew through your whole supply of ammunition (easy enough to do when you are surrounded by dangerous enemies). It was the last ditch weapon besides the combat knife they all carried but it was the one I wanted the most. Apparently based on the proliferation of anniversary replicas of the 1911 A1 45 caliber semi-automatic pistol this year, I really believe I was not the only one who felt that way.

We would play combat in the neighborhood and I always managed to have a replica tucked into my waistband (made of plastic and mostly green colored). I think I can only remember having a holster once or twice but it didn’t matter. Along with my other weapons, that 45 gave me a feeling of confidence that I would be able to kill or capture anything that came down the Cemetery Hill behind our house. Those were great years since just like Combat, when someone was shot the camera always managed to be looking the other way. You may see dead guys lying around but you rarely saw any blood shooting out of them.

Just as all childhood games come to a close, so did our time in combat. The players gradually drifted away to do other things and eventually there were not enough guys to mount a decent campaign. It was a shame since that was about the time that war toys hit their peak. Johnny Seven OMA (one man army) Thompson subs made of real wood and metal, and all manner of die cast pot metal rifles and accessories.

Johnny seven secret_sam_ad_dr10

Then in a few short years, they were all gone, victims of an increasingly gun wary populace. Some blame could be attributed to a series of high profile assassinations and some blame could be given to the escalating war in Viet Nam. In any case, it didn’t matter to me because in the following years I discovered that girls had better things to offer

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My attraction to actual guns was frustrated by the fact that despite a long military heritage, we had no weapons in the house. Okay, an old Spencer Repeater from the civil war was present but you certainly wouldn’t fire it. My Mom and Dad refused to even entertain the purchase of a .22 so I had to live a life of complete firearms celibacy.

July 4th weekend 2009 017

All that pent up frustration finally led to the only action I knew would get me closer to my goal. That is why at the age of 17 I convinced my folks to let me sign up for the Navy as a Gunners Mate designee. I was destined to ride into combat on a PBR somewhere in Southeast Asia and no one was going to stop me.

MM Rate Book

Except maybe a classification clerk in Boot Camp who changed my field to Machinist Mate designee. I don’t know what that person’s name was but I do remember feeling cheated at the time. What little I knew of Machinist Mates I read in my trusty Bluejackets manual and there was hardly even a mention of a weapon. Not only that but all of our weapons training in Boot Camp was cancelled meaning I was to graduate to the fleet with NO WEAPONS TRAINING at all. But a contract is a contract and I followed the path that I was sent on.

After another year of school and temporary assignments, I finally found myself on the crew of the USS George Washington. The most amazing thing then happened. I was assigned to assist the Petty Officer of the Deck in guarding the topside of the ship.

To do this, they issued me my very first .45.

Now mind you, I had still not shot a weapon (even in training) but the need was there and in the darkness of the evening, my Petty Officer showed me the actual workings of the weapon. Well, relative darkness since we were tied up to the Proteus and those powerful security lights were starkly bright in some places.

Proteus early 70s

I am not sure who we were guarding the boat against. If any swimmers had appeared they would have been easily spotted by the watches on the Tender or by us. I was prepared to draw my weapon and insert the clip as I had been shown, draw back the slide and proceed to empty the first magazine. Yes, that’s right, I was standing topside watch with a gun I had never fired that was not loaded. I never once feared that I would flinch in my duty or fail to remember the exact sequence of actions to put bullets on targets.

45 2

Two things happened during the next upkeep period that forever changed my views about my role as a combat character. The first was my first trip to the firing range. We were issued stock .45’s which had probably actually been built in 1911 and were so loose, they rattled as you handled them. As anyone who routinely shoots can attest to, the guns we had would challenge the most magnificent and experienced marksman. The fact that I have small hands did not aid in my aim either. I did a pitiful qualification round (actually more of a familiarization round).

The day was not a complete waste however since we were allowed to have one magazine each on the ship’s Thompson. Yes, that’s right, another one of my dreams come true. I doubt I hit anything at the Marine range that day in Guam but our visit was cut short when one of my shipmates underestimated the climb rate of a Thompson being fired full auto. The Marine Sergeant was not impressed at all with the holes that suddenly appeared in the tin roof of the dugout where we were firing. Especially since he was standing on top of the roof a few yards away. We were asked to leave.

thompson

The second thing that happened was on my last night as a Topside Petty Officer. As you may recall, the Proteus had those magnificently bright security lights on top shining down on our boat. It was a mid watch and we had just settled down into a routine of drinking coffee and imagining what it would be like to sleep an entire night without being woken up for any reason. Liberty had just expired on the tender and we could see shadows of people moving about the decks above us. Our own crew was also returning from Andy’s Hut and you could tell there was a dust up by the torn shirts and sailors helping the less fortunate down the brow.

Apparently earlier that evening, there was indeed an altercation between our boys and some tender folks. I don’t know who the winner was, I just remember the OOD from the tender coming down the brow and informing me that he expected all of our guys to stay on board for the night and sleep it off. We both saluted him and said the obligatory Aye Aye sirs and we all went about our business.

Sometime after 0100, it happened. From somewhere behind those powerful bright security lights, objects started flying towards the submarine. I cannot recall all of what was thrown but do remember having the presence of mind to remember my training (or what there was of it).

1. Is your life in danger?

2. Is the life of anyone under your charge in danger?

3. Is the ship or its weapons in danger?

4. if yes to any of the three, don’t be a damn fool, call away a security violation and lock and load.

Finally, a chance to prove I would take a bullet if I had to. I was shaking so bad that I dropped the first clip. I quickly recovered and with a flourish that would make Vic Morrow proud, I locked and loaded my first round. What I did not take into account however was that the tender guys, upon hearing security violation and seeing the two of us aimlessly pointing our 45s at the upper lights, would react with their own team which consisted of a lot of Marines with M-16s, shotguns and M-14s. At that point I realized we were probably outgunned.

We were all frozen in time for a few minutes trying to sort out what to do next when the Duty officer came up from down below with his .45. There were some heated words between the two ships but it became apparent that this was nothing more than some drunks trying to exact the last word. We all stood down and I was anxiously waiting for my heart to restart. The next day, a debrief was held and to the Captain’s credit, he gave us some slack. The ship would leave for patrol the next day and we all had a few months to get past the event. I qualified below decks watch and was never again to stand topside watch on the GW.

I carried a .45 a number of other times in my later career. This time, I made sure that I had more than enough practice and always viewed the duty with a lot more respect. The last time I carried it was during the first Gulf War. I had recently been promoted to CWO2 and was at my first duty station as an officer.

The night the attack in the Gulf started all of the officers were recalled to the command and issued .45s with two clips. We were instructed to keep them with us at all times and be ready. To this very day, I am not sure who thought Holy Loch Scotland was in imminent danger from either Scuds or the Republican Guard, but by jiminy, we were ready to repel boarders on the Los Alamos.  Fortunately our role only lasted for a few days and the weapons were returned to wherever they came from.

Holy Loch 1989

Some lessons about the .45 I will take to my grave:

  • Its better to have one and not need one than the opposite.

  • Even the best gun in the world is almost useless if it isn’t loaded and handled by someone who is trained

  • If you are going to carry it, be prepared to use it. If you pull it, make sure you mean to fire it.

  • A .45, like any other weapon, is useless if you think the guy aiming his gun at you won’t pull the trigger. You might as well just hand him your weapon and bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.

As I watched the news about the Iranian terrorists who were attempting to attack us, I thought a lot about the people leading us.

God, I hope they don’t issue them any .45’s.

Mister Mac

 

one last thing just for fun:

Preparedness finally

Don’t I wish!!!!!