Warrior Soul: The Memoir of a Navy SEAL (21 page)

An hour before we made the rendezvous,
Fairfax County
had detected a small craft exiting the bay and turning east and south. Our Nicaraguan friends had finally made it out. Luckily for us, they’d had enough fun for one night.

Agas Tara went as planned. The marines landed, and the Seabees bulldozed. Across the border, the Nicaraguans fumed and accused the United States of trying to start a shooting war. An ironic turn of phrase.

Over the next couple of days, we had little to do but clean our gear and get ready to return to Little Creek. I spent some time wondering why a Sandinista patrol boat had been waiting for us. We all wondered. But there had been newspaper stories from the beginning, and the overflight by the Cuban airplane. The Nicaraguans had our amphibious ships on coastal radar. These seemed like reasons enough.

There was a better reason, but at the time none of us could know it. Chief Warrant Officer John A. Walker, Jr., and his pal, Senior Chief Radioman Jerry Whitworth, had supplied the Soviets with code keys to the U.S. Navy’s KWR-37, KW-7, KG-14, KY-8, and KL-47 cryptographic machines, as well as technical manuals that allowed the Russians to build their own copies. Ivan was reading our mail in real time.

Walker and his spy ring did much greater harm than just ratting out a few operations. Their espionage allowed the Russians to decipher almost every piece of coded traffic sent by the U.S. Navy from 1968 until 1986. At the time of Agas Tara, Mr. Walker was “working” in Norfolk, Virginia, and driving up to Washington on the weekends to make deliveries of codes to his KGB handlers. He wouldn’t be arrested until 1985.

The Nicaraguans were waiting because they knew we were coming. Our reconnaissance plan, the location of the beach-landing site, the composition of our team, even Susan, Katherine, and Avis, were all in coded traffic that was open to Russian penetration. The Sandinistas knew a five-man SEAL detachment would enter after the tide change and attempt to leave before dawn. They knew there would be no Honduran naval units in the bay. They knew we would be without support. The Sandinistas knew everything—except how to corner a boatload of SEALs. And how to work their boat in the surf.

If they had succeeded in killing a detachment of “American spies,” the timbre of relations between our countries might have gone from bad to bellicose. They might have started a real shooting war. But this isn’t the kind of stuff you think about after an op. History is made in the dark, someone said. And sometimes, history isn’t made.

Two days before Agas Tara ended, I was in Puerto Lempira’s disco with Stan, Tim, Bubba, and Dave. The merengue was loud, the beer was cold, and we watched a chicken walk across the pulsing dance floor.

“I got a message from the Team today,” I said between sips. “We got our orders.”

Fifth Platoon was scheduled to deploy after returning to Little Creek. Rumor had it we were going someplace tropical.

“Where we going, Mr. Pfarrer?”

“Back to Hondo?”

“Panama?”

“Betty Ford?”

“Better,” I said, trying to keep a straight face. “We’re going to Beirut.”

Log PT, Hell Week.

U.S. Navy

The O-course.

U.S. Navy

The only easy day was yesterday. Boat Crew Four, Hell Week, Class 114, May 1981. The author is under the middle of the boat, face in shadow.

Author’s collection

Bulletproof and invisible. Class 114’s graduation picture, September 1981. The author is in the last row, second from the right. Class 114 was one of the few classes to complete Hell Week without losing a single man. Twelve operators from this class would later go onto serve at SEAL Team Six.

U.S. Navy

A SEAL operator prepares for a water landing using an MT-1-X parachute. His descent is going a lot smoother than my last jump.

U.S. Navy

MH-53J Pave Low special operations helicopter.

U.S. Air Force

Trident C-4 missile is launched off the coast of Florida.

U.S. Navy

Combat rubber raiding craft insertion off Vieques Island, Puerto Rico. Dwight Light (in billed cap) and author (in jungle hat).

U.S. Navy

Fifth Platoon, SEAL Team Four conducts live fire exercises, Fort A. P. Hill, Virginia, November 1982. Point man lays down fire as his squad deploys. The smoke is from the detonation of a booby trap.

U.S. Navy