Submarine! (37 page)

So
Batfish
tracks the target, gets his course and speed entirely by radar without ever having seen him, and finally submerges dead ahead of him, several miles away. Once again Fyfe uses the stunt of leaving his radar antennae out of water, so that the all-important information on the target's movements will continue to be available to his fire control party and the intricate instruments they operate. Only this time he keeps his stern toward the target and moves slowly away from him, turning as he does so, with the result that the doomed Jap passes directly across his stern at the desired range, and three torpedoes are on their way to meet him. This is really a deliberate shot.

It also is slightly longer in range than the two previous attacks
, and there is a longer wait in
Batfish's
conning tower after the fish are finally sent on their way.

The skipper is watching through the periscope. He can now clearly see the long, low shape of the enemy, his odd-shaped bridge, and his peculiar undulating deckline. He is not a bad-looking ship, Fyfe must admit to himself, and most of these big Jap boats are pretty fast—at least as fast as our own. Not much is known about how they handle under water, however, and, like all United States submariners, Fyfe will reserve his judgment on that score. Our experience with big boats is that you pay for size with submerged maneuverability, and that the well-established theory about efficiency varying with the size of the vessel does not apply to submarines. The Nip is painted black, which makes him just a little easier to see against the gray night, and on the side of his bridge can quite plainly be seen a white rectangle with a dark disk in the center.

On he comes, ominous and a bit pathetic, entirely unaware of the three messengers of doom speeding his way. Fyfe, in the meantime, is a bit anxious. Without taking his eyes from the periscope, he calls out, “How long since the first one?”

Clark Sprinkle answers obliquely, “About fifteen seconds to go, Captain.”

“Fifteen seconds! Damn!”

But the torpedoes run true and as intended, and Fyfe's impatience finally is brought to an end. “A hit!” he shouts, “a beautiful hit!” And so it is: a single hit which produces a brilliant orange explosion right in the center of the stricken ship.

Simultaneously, a wide diffusion of pips is noted on the radar screen, indicating that the target has blown apart. Then all the pips die away. The whole catastrophe has been silent; no sound whatsoever has reached the eager listeners in
Batfish
. A moment later, however, the noise of the explosion with its terrifying aftermath crackles over the sound gear into the headsets of the operators, and, indeed, comes right through the pressure hull, so that no man in the crew need have it described to him.

The loud WHAM of the warhead going off is followed instantly, and almost as though it were a single explosion, by a much louder and more prolonged WHRROOOM. This undoubtedly must be the enemy's magazines going up—and there exists a strong probability that he is carrying an extra-heavy load, possibly intended for the beleaguered Japs in the Philippines.

One of the three stop watches is stopped with the first hit, and there is no doubt that this was the first torpedo, running the calculated range at exactly the calculated speed. But there are no further hits, despite the care with which the other fish had been launched on their way. This occasions no disappointment, however, since there is simply nothing left for the last two fish to hit.

As for
Batfish
, Jake Fyfe had her fully on the surface again within three minutes after the torpedo hit. Though he strongly doubted that there could possibly be any survivors of the terrific explosion he had witnessed, he was determined, as before, to give them a chance for their lives. It was nearly dawn, and no good came from use of the searchlight, which Fyfe had ordered turned on and played upon the water, so the decision was made to wait until daylight, in hopes that Jap planes patrolling the area would somehow not be immediately in evidence.

Parenthetically, one cannot help comparing
Batfish's
repeated magnanimous attempts to succor the victims of her attacks with the treatment meted out in similar circumstances by the Japanese. There is one instance on record in which most of the crew of an American submarine were picked up by a Japanese destroyer; one man was injured, and was promptly thrown overboard. Another had swallowed so much salt water that he was retching heavily, and would also have gone overboard had he not fought clear of his saviors and joined the remainder of the group of survivors. In the case of
Tang
, the pitifully small number of survivors were mercilessly beaten and clubbed about the head and body. By contrast,
Batfish
deliberately exposed herself by turning on a searchlight to assist in locating survivors of her night's handiwork
, and then voluntarily remained on the surface in these enemy waters until long after daybreak, in hopes of possibly finding one or two. Since her position was well within enemy aircraft patrols, the unofficial rules by which most United States submarines guided their actions required that she be submerged during daylight.

Several of our submarines were enabled to rescue enemy survivors in some manner or other, after either they or someone else had torpedoed them. In more than one instance American sailors or officers had to go overboard after survivors and force them to accept their hospitality. In no case was such a prisoner badly treated after rescue; most of them gained weight during their sojourn on board, and were so well treated that instructions had finally to be issued to treat them with greater severity in order not to “spoil” them.

With the dawn
Batfish
sighted much oil, bits of wood and paper, debris of various kinds, all newly in the water and quite evidently from the sunken submarine. No Japanese were seen, however—dead or alive. It appeared that once again there was to be nothing tangible to reward Jake Fyfe for his brilliant achievement, but finally a small wooden box recovered from the water was found to contain the Jap navigator's workbook and navigational instruments. Evidently he had just brought it topside, perhaps preparatory to taking a sight or two despite the not-too-favorable weather, but had not yet opened it.

Because the Japanese use Arabic numerals for navigational purposes, there was no difficulty in reading the workbook. Apparently the Jap departed Nagoya for Formosa, and had left there for Luzon—where he never arrived.

Batfish
left her area for Guam three days later, and on February 21 she moored alongside the submarine tender
Apollo
in Apra Harbor, Guam.

To say that Jake Fyfe was received with open arms by the submarine brethren is putting it mildly. Though no public announcement of his magnificent feat could be made, owing to the well-laid policy of cloaking our submarine activities
in anonymity, it instantly became known and broadcast throughout the submarine force. Here was another patrol nearly on a par with Sam Dealey's famous five-destroyers cruise. Here was additional proof that the spirit of the submarine force, so beautifully exemplified by Dealey and O'Kane and Morton, was still going strong, and that those who came after had not lost the touch of their predecessors.

There was, however, an even more important and far-reaching effect. To a nation like the United States, with its far-flung merchant marine, the submarine is perhaps the greatest menace to successful prosecution of war. That is to say, if and when we should get into another war our backs will immediately be up against the wall if the powers arrayed against us have a powerful submarine force. Witness what the Germans did to Great Britain in two world wars, and to us in World War II. In both instances the Allies won, but only by the narrowest of margins.

However, born of the imminence of defeat, a new type of submarine was developed in the closing days of World War II by the Germans. True, they did not invent anything extraordinary, but they put together several known but unused ideas to develop the high-speed snorkel submarine, and it may safely be said that this vessel has revolutionized previous concepts of anti-submarine warfare. It is virtually immune to the countermeasures we used so successfully against German and Japanese submersibles, and its efficiency in attack is trebled.

Fortunately, our military leaders have not neglected the challenge laid down by the fast submarine, A tremendous amount of thought has gone into the problem of how to get enemy subs before they can wreak their threatened damage upon our commerce—our lifeblood, so to speak. And every time the discussion in the halls of the Navy Department or the Pentagon—or even in the White House—has waxed long and earnestly, someone is sure to come up with a reference to Jake Fyfe and the fact that
Batfish
sank three enemy
submarines within the space of four days with no damage and very little danger to herself.
Why not set a submarine to kill a submarine?

The idea has grown until now, seven years after Fyfe's exploit, something is being done about it. It is obvious that the submarine will enjoy, in relation to another submersible, those same advantages which all subs always have had. That is, surprise, the ability of concealment, and so on. With one difference: since the hunt is to take place in the natural environment of the submarine,
either one may become the hunter and either the hunted
. Prior detection will assume much greater importance than ever before—if that is possible. There is no question but that it will still be a nerve-racking occupation.

1. In accordance with a dispatch from the Bureau of Naval Personnel dated 16 May 1944, which cannot be quoted herein, when directed by the Commanding Officer, U.S.S. TRIGGER, you will consider yourself detached from duty on board the U.S.S. TRIGGER, and from such other duties as may have been assigned you; will report to the Commandant Fourteenth Naval District for first available government transportation, including air, to a port on the West Coast of the United States. Upon arrival, proceed and report to the Commandant, Navy Yard, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, for temporary duty in connection with the fitting out of the U.S.S. TIRANTE (SS 420), and for duty on board that vessel when commissioned . . .

There was a lot more to my orders, including the fact that the Secretary of the Navy had determined this employment on shore duty was “required by the public interests,” and in early June, 1944, wearing brand-new lieutenant commander's stripes, and accompanied by my bride of one month, I arrived in Portsmouth.

Memories of the
Trigger
were strong. Only a few weeks earlier, as I was packing shortly before midnight to catch an early-morning plane for San Francisco, one by one members of her crew had come forward to say good-by. And as I had walked alone down the dock, I looked back at her, lying low and gray in the dim moonlight, splotched with rust and peeled-off paint, and knew she was no longer mine.

Now I had a new ship, as yet uncompleted, and a new skipper, and there was everything to do all over again.
Tirante
was to have the latest devices, the strongest hull American engineering skill could devise, the most powerful engines, and an enlarged torpedo-carrying capacity. She would be an improved instrument for the art of underwater warfare, and should be able to outdo anything old
Trigger
had done. Yet I wondered whether she would possess that same flair, that same capacity for finding action and bringing it to a successful conclusion.

There was only one answer to this, and many were the discussions with the new skipper—himself in his first command—as to how to imbue our new ship with the fighting spirit and derring-do we wanted. I came to admire George Street more and more as time went on, for he seemed to combine the qualities of thorough preparation with a certain amount of respect for the ideas of others, and, when convinced, an intelligently directed follow-through.

It took about eight months from the time
Tirante's
keel was laid until we broke her commission pennant on November 6, 1944—about three months from the time her crew arrived—and nearly another month passed before we had her at sea.

Our first step was to practice with the equipment and learn its uses, starting with the easiest operations and building up
to the more intricate ones—all in the safe confines of the navy yard. Drill after drill we forced ourselves to perform alongside the dock, and before we took
Tirante
out for her first dive we were confident that every piece of gear operated as designed, and that every man knew his job.