No Higher Honor (42 page)

20
.
  
Friedman,
U.S. Destroyers,
383.

21
.
  
The new frigate's propulsion system would be functionally half of Bath's four-turbine, two-shaft design for the DX—which the navy had forced Litton to use instead of the Mississippi yard's own proposal. (Snow,
Bath Iron Works,
512-13.)

22
.
  
Friedman,
U.S. Destroyers,
383. After this meeting, only two major changes were introduced to the PF 109 design. In November, Zumwalt decided that the frigates ought to carry two helicopters. This forced designers to push the landing pad back from just aft of amidships to the stern of the ship, and to double the size of the hangar. It also meant that the air intakes and exhaust for the gas turbines would funnel straight up between the two indoor helo parking spots, instead of wrapping around a single bay. And in April 1972, a fourth ship's service diesel generator was added to the machinery complement.

23
.
  
A smaller design award went to the West Coast Todd Shipyards, part of the navy's attempt to ensure that more than one yard could build the new ships. (Snow,
Bath Iron Works,
510.)

24
.
  
Interviews with the author, Erik Hansen, Ed Moll, and Bill Blakelott, 6 August 2002.

25
.
  
Snow,
Bath Iron Works,
514.

26
.
  
George Wilson, “Destroyer Built On Time, Under Budget,”
Washington Post,
5 December 1978.

27
.
  
Ibid.

28
.
  
The rare exceptions were mostly ships that introduced major design changes to the class, like the stern step added to accommodate the larger Seahawk, or LAMPS-3, helicopter.

29
.
  
Bath Iron Works called the nascent ship Hull 394, noting its place in the yard's “List of Ships.”

30
.
  
Interview, William Haggett with author, 5 August 2002.

31
.
  
Lt. Cdr. Bruce R. Linder, “FFG 7s: Square Pegs?”
Proceedings,
June 1983. Several other developments seemed to reduce the importance of the navy's purpose-built escort ship. The surface fleet eagerly anticipated the arrival of the long-range Tomahawk missile, which the FFG launcher could not handle. At the same time, it came to seem far-fetched that a Soviet invasion might be blunted with materiel convoyed in from the U.S. mainland.

32
.
  
Capt. Alan W. Swinger, Letter to the editor,
Proceedings,
August 1984.

33
.
  
Rinn, Letter to the editor,
Proceedings,
May 1984.

34
.
  
Launch booklet, FFG 58; “Changes in Ships' Status.”

35
.
  
The congressmen were Sen. George Mitchell (D) and Rep. John McKernan Jr. (R). Platform List, 8 December 1984.

36
.
  
Launch booklet, FFG 58.

CHAPTER 4

  
1
.
  
The title of a December 1988
Proceedings
article says it all: “Damage Control: Adopting an Unwanted Stepchild.” The author, Cdr. Joseph W. Glass, notes that the damage control assistant (DCA) was typically a junior officer with less than two years' experience. The program for the August 1988
graduation of DCA school shows one lieutenant and one lieutenant commander among the other twenty-nine ensigns and lieutenants junior grade.

  
2
.
  
Interview, Eric Sorensen with author, 29 November 2003.

  
3
.
  
Ibid.

  
4
.
  
At the time, Rinn was chief of staff of Destroyer Squadron 36, the Charleston, South Carolina–based group to which
Briscoe
belonged. But he held orders to command
Roberts
and was already putting together his precommissioning team.

  
5
.
  
The damage control training team was usually made up of hull technicians and damage controllers, along with other senior enlisted members.

  
6
.
  
Interview, Rinn; interview, Sorensen.

  
7
.
  
Pierside at home, the list of watertight fittings was relatively small. Once under way, however, the rules got more restrictive, and when the crew went to general quarters—what Hollywood movies generally call “battle stations”—they would button up just about everything they could.

  
8
.
  
Fire hose fittings included male-to-male, female-to-female, reducing couplings (to join hoses of different widths), wye couplings (a Y-shaped device to divide the water flowing from one hose into two or three others), and Siamese coupling (the reverse of a wye). A crew fighting a serious fire could produce some truly Byzantine arrangements. To rig just one eductor, you located a pair of fireplugs and attached two 1 1/2-inch hoses. The hoses attached with male-male adapters to a Siamese coupling, from which a single 2 1/2-inch hose connected to the eductor inlet with another male-male coupler. A 4-inch hose ran from the eductor to a jettison fitting in the hull, where it was connected by a final male-male coupler.

  
9
.
  
Sprinklers were fitted, for example, in the helicopter hangars, machinery rooms, and six of the ship's seven magazines. Lt. Eric Sorensen, USS
Samuel B. Roberts Damage Control Booklet
([unpublished], Bath, ME: 1985), 47.

10
.
  
Jeffrey L. Levinson, and Randy L. Edwards,
Missile Inbound: The Attack on the Stark in the Persian Gulf
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1997), 30.

11
.
  
Sorensen,
Damage Control Handbook,
56.

12
.
  
Interview, Sorensen.

13
.
  
NAVSEA, final report, October 1988, 6-37. The full list: access man, AFFF station operator, boundary man, chemical-biological-radiological internal/external survey team member, chemical-biological-radiological on-station monitor, closure detail member, conflagration station operator, crash and salvage crewman/rescueman, crash and salvage scene leader, desmoking team member, dewatering team member, electronic/electrical firefighter, fire extinguishing agency supply man, firefighting team member, investigator, isolation detail member, material decontamination team member, messenger, personnel decontamination team member, pipe patching team member, plotter, plugging team member, plugman, post-fire gas-free test assistant,
repair party electrician, repair party leader, sounding team member, sound-powered telephone talker, and stretcher bearer.

14
.
  
Sorensen,
Damage Control Handbook
, v–vi; “A Crew Saves Their Ship to Fight Again,”
Ships Safety Bulletin,
Naval Safety Center, June 1988.

15
.
  
E-mail, Tom Reinert to author, 24 February 2002.

CHAPTER 5

  
1
.
  
Preston, John. “The Gulf Story.” Unpublished memoir, ca. 1989.

  
2
.
  
Familygram, FFG 58 to crew families, ca. December 1985.

  
3
.
  
Document, “Samuel B. Roberts, FFG 58,” 11 November 1984.

  
4
.
  
E-mail, Reinert to author, 24 February 2002.

  
5
.
  
The new contract froze wages, created new bonuses, cut medical benefits, boosted life insurance, and created a two-tier wage scale that brought new employees up to parity after three years. (Kim Clark, “BIW Shipbuilders OK Contract,”
Portland Press Herald,
8 October 1985.)

  
6
.
  
Message, Commander, Fleet Training Center, Norfolk to Commander, Naval Surface Group 4, “Outstanding Performance of USS
Samuel B. Roberts
(FFG 58) Precommissioning Assignment,” 27 February 1986.

  
7
.
  
BIW delivered
Kauffman
on 13 February 1987, wrapping up a twelve-year
Perry
program that delivered two dozen frigates a total of four hundred weeks early and more than $200 million under budget. BIW had executed the frigate program while building ships to six other designs, performing naval repair work, and handling bits of other industrial production as well. (Snow,
Bath Iron Works,
541.)

  
8
.
  
Interview, Robert C. Bent with author, 16 June 2004.

  
9
.
  
Interview, Gordan Van Hook with author, 7 March 2004.

10
.
  
E-mail, Reinert to author, 24 February 2002.

11
.
  
E-mail, Richard Raymond to author, 2 December 2003.

12
.
  
Letter, Rear Adm. John D. Bulkeley to Vice Adm. Joseph Metcalf III, 19 February 1986.

13
.
  
Material Inspection and Receiving Report (FFG 58), 1 April 1988.

14
.
  
Program, FFG 58 commissioning ceremony, 12 April 1986.

15
.
  
E-mail, Mike Roberts to author, 7 February 2002.

16
.
  
Many of Rinn's invitees who couldn't make it had sent congratulatory notes; the letters had been pouring in for weeks from old friends, colleagues, and service dignitaries. Navy Secretary John Lehman and CNO Adm. James Watkins sent their regards, as did the president of Rinn's alma mater and the governors of Connecticut, Maine, and Rhode Island.

17
.
  
Message, USS
Samuel B. Roberts
to Chief, Navy Information, “Samuel B. Roberts FFG 58 Commissioning Principal Speaker,” 19 December 1985.

18
.
  
Oddly, there were men named Copeland, Carr, and two Robertses among the plank owners of FFG 58, just as there had been aboard DE 413.

19
.
  
Command History, USS
Samuel B. Roberts
(FFG 58), 1986.

20
.
  
Paul Downing and Tux Turkel, “Hero First to Board New Ship,”
Portland Press-Herald,
13 April 1986.

21
.
  
Lt. Jim Dryer, “Roberts Comes Home with Honors,”
Newport Navalog,
28 November 1986.

22
.
  
Interview, Dumas.

23
.
  
Swinger, “Getting a Handle on FFG 7 Shiphandling,”
Proceedings,
August 1982.

24
.
  
Rinn served aboard
Blakely
under Cdr. E. H. Wainwright Jr.

25
.
  
Interview, Rinn.

26
.
  
Ibid.

27
.
  
Interview, Preston with author, 2 February 2002; Preston, “The Gulf Story,” 18.

28
.
  
Dryer, “Roberts Comes Home with Honors.”

29
.
  
E-mail, Roberts to author, 7 February 2002.

30
.
  
Message, Commander, Naval Surface Group 4 to FFG 58, “OPPE Performance,” 1645Z 31 July 1986.

31
.
  
Visual message,
Stark
to
Roberts
(FFG 58), 1632Z 24 July 1986.

32
.
  
Message, Commander, Naval Surface Group 4 to Commander, Naval Surface Forces, Atlantic, “Battenburg Cup Award Nomination,” 0400Z 25 April 1988.

33
.
  
Message, Commander, Naval Surface Forces, Atlantic, to FFG 58, “Final Contract Trials,” 1256Z 10 November 1986.

34
.
  
This long-scheduled yard period—a post-shakedown availability, the navy called it—featured some light repairs to the ship and its equipment. There was also the new SQR-19 sonar array to be installed. Towed behind the ship, riding beneath the water's surface, isolated from the hull's vibrations, the underwater ears would sharpen the sonarmen's ability to find and track submarines.

35
.
  
Command History, USS
Samuel B. Roberts
(FFG 58), 1986.

CHAPTER 6

  
1
.
  
Dilip Hiro,
The Longest War: The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict
(London: Paladin, 1990), 2.

  
2
.
  
Capt. Thomas M. Daly, “The Enduring Gulf War,”
Proceedings,
May 1985.

  
3
.
  
The fighters were part of French arms sales that totaled $5.1 billion in 1980–1985. (Levinson and Edwards,
Missile Inbound,
7.)

  
4
.
  
Daly, “Enduring Gulf War.”

  
5
.
  
Ronald O'Rourke, “The Tanker War,”
Proceedings,
May 1989.

  
6
.
  
Hiro,
Longest War,
186.

  
7
.
  
Baghdad apologized immediately for the attack, which Iraqi officials called accidental, and eventually paid $27.3 million in restitution to the families of the dead sailors. But some Reagan administration officials could never shake
the suspicion that the attack had been one more deliberate attempt to draw more U.S. forces into the Gulf. (Elaine Sciolino,
The Outlaw State
(New York: John Wiley, 1991).