The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran (52 page)

American intelligence nearly missed the
Iran Ajr
. Spy satellites actually photographed mines sitting on the dock next to her and a sister ship on August 16, 1987, but this image somehow got lost and never made it out to Bernsen in the Gulf. Three days before she’d left Bandar Abbas, an intelligence advisory stated: “Do not estimate Iran will deploy mines during next week.” The first Ziegler knew of this impending attack was after the
Iran Ajr
had set sail; a string of intercepts started flowing into his small, secure facility on the
La Salle
, all from a ship calling itself a special mission unit and reporting back in flash messages to its headquarters every hour. Ziegler began tracking her movements, and when the ship stopped at the Revolutionary Guard–manned oil platform of Rostam and one communiqué mentioned an operation for eleven p.m. the next night, he went in to tell Bernsen. The Middle East Force commander ordered the USS
Jarrett
to investigate. The American frigate had three of the army Little Birds embarked.
⁵⁰

At ten p.m., the three small jelly bean–shaped helos took off from the fantail into a moonless night. Within forty minutes they had closed to within two hundred yards of the Iranian ship, carefully remaining upwind in order to minimize the chances of being heard. As the American pilots looked on, just before the magic hour of eleven o’clock, Farshchian ordered the ship’s navigation lights turned off. Ibrahimi had six Iranians pull back the heavy tarp covering the mines and oil drums. He began methodically fusing the
black spherical objects arranged on top of the flat open deck. With a stopwatch to set the mine intervals, he ordered the 253-pound explosive charge rolled down the small gangplank and into the ocean below. An army pilot watching them calmly reported that they were pushing “minelike objects” over the side.
⁵¹

Bernsen and his operations deputy had been listening in to the reports from their command center on the
La Salle
. Bernsen was actually across the room on a secure phone talking with Crist, who happened to be out in the Gulf of Oman meeting with Denny Brooks, as the new joint task force had formally stood up the day the
Iran Ajr
left port. When Bernsen heard “minelike object,” he told Grieve, “Take them under fire.”

An uncertain Grieve responded, “Sir, only minelike.”

“Bullshit!” Bernsen answered. “They’re mines!”
⁵²

Two Little Birds came in low and fast. While one strafed the deck with his minigun with nearly two thousand bullets, the other unleashed a hail of machine-gun fire and explosive rockets into the bridge and stern. One Iranian sailor who happened to be dumping trash caught the full force of one rocket in his face, cleaving off half his head, sending brains and bloody goo across the deck. A propane tank explosion killed another sailor near the engine.
⁵³
The two helicopters broke hard right, and then came back around for another strafing run, showering the bridge and deck with bullets and fléchette rockets filled with tiny darts. They returned to the
Jarrett
to quickly rearm, leaving the
Iran Ajr
on fire and dead in the water.

When the helicopters returned about fifteen minutes later, incredibly, they found the ship under way and Ibrahimi’s men pushing more mines over the side. The American helos came in again with two more strafing runs. One Iranian pushing a mine died instantly, while another was knocked overboard and disappeared into the black sea. The fusillade caught Farshchian: a bullet passed through his side and another blew off part of his hand; a fléchette ripped open his side, exposing his pelvic bone. An explosion knocked Ibrahimi to the metal deck, badly bruising his face. This time, the Iranians had had enough, and Lieutenant Fouladvand yelled, “Abandon ship!”

A dozen men jumped over the side, while ten more took to an inflatable life raft, bringing along the grievously wounded Farshchian. Others made their flight in an inflatable Zodiac speedboat. When one of the army helicopters approached and dropped down to a hover, an Ira-nian jumped up and made what the pilot later described as a “threatening gesture.” As the
helicopter flew alongside the boat, one of the army pilots pulled out a submachine gun from his holster, took aim, and blew the man away.
⁵⁴

Within thirty minutes, news of the firefight had arrived in the Pentagon. Crowe quickly held a short meeting with Weinberger, before heading to the maze of the National Military Command Center in a guarded area just down the hall from his second-floor office, where he spent the next eight hours monitoring the crisis. After informing the White House and key members of Congress, Weinberger authorized seizing the Iranian ship.

This order made National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and his deputy, Colin Powell, nervous. Powell spoke with Weinberger. “The president has been informed,” the army general said, “yet we do not want to risk American lives by seizing the ship. We want to keep it contained and get them to surrender.” Then he added, “But you can shoot if they offer resistance.” Neither Weinberger nor Crowe thought that directive made much sense, and it took nearly an hour before Carlucci finally informed Weinberger that the president had agreed they should seize the ship, but should avoid any unnecessary risk to U.S. personnel.
⁵⁵

L
ieutenant Commander Marc Thomas had been happily sleeping in his stateroom on the
Guadalcanal
when news of the firefight with the
Iran Ajr
interrupted his slumber around midnight. With his dark skin, Thomas could have easily been confused for an Arab rather than an elite Navy SEAL. His bright eyes, infectious smile, and easygoing demeanor made him popular with both senior officers and the fifteen men in his platoon. He had originally been a part of Gordon Keiser’s marine amphibious unit, which the marine colonel had successfully lobbied to keep on board the ship in Diego Garcia. Now Bernsen wanted the SEALs’ special skills to seize the stricken minelayer. Thomas rousted his men, and they donned their war-fighting kit and flew over to the
La Salle
. There Thomas found Bernsen’s staff hastily trying to put together a plan to seize the
Iran Ajr
and round up the Iranian sailors scattered about the mine-strewn water. Thomas proposed simultaneous assault fast-roping down onto the ship from helicopters while marines assaulted from rubber boats.
⁵⁶

But Bernsen had just spoken with Crowe. Reflecting the nervousness in Washington, the chairman passed on that Bernsen could seize the boat only if it looked as though there was no armed opposition on board. To avoid
running into mines and to be able to see any armed Iranians, Bernsen told Crowe and Crist that he would take the
Iran Ajr
the next morning, just after sunrise.
⁵⁷
The SEALs would use one of the
La Salle
’s logistics boats to storm the ship in broad daylight. Two U.S. Marine Cobra attack helicopters and Paul Evancoe’s patrol boats would provide backup in case they got in trouble.
⁵⁸

At first light on September 22, the
La Salle
flooded its well deck; then Thomas boarded the landing boat and puttered toward the drifting Iranian ship in the bright blue daylight. With the SEALs crouched around the gunwales, the coxswain pulled alongside with a metal clang, turning his engines hard to keep his boat pressed against the side of the Iranian ship. “One hand grenade could kill us all,” Thomas thought as he and his platoon scrambled up the side, moving swiftly to seize the bridge and engine room. They then methodically searched the ship, looking for saboteurs hiding in closets. But other than finding three bodies, the ship was empty.
⁵⁹

The SEALs discovered a treasure trove of intelligence. In their haste, the Iranians had tossed their radio crypto over the side, but had left reams of messages and decoded teletype. SEALs found the entire secret Ghadir mining plan to close the Strait of Hormuz; it was a remarkable bit of carelessness by the Iranian navy. They found a map detailing all of Iran’s covert mining operations. Reams of messages contained details of their oil platforms’ role in coordinating attacks and Iranian command and control procedures. The United States learned about Iranian eavesdropping on the radio bridge transmissions of the escorted tankers. One SEAL noticed a piece of paper sticking out of the foul-smelling toilet. He reluctantly stuck his gloved hand down and pulled it out, to discover an important codebook that some crewman had tried to hastily conceal.
⁶⁰

Among the documents, the Americans found poignant reminders of the humans they had just attacked. On one of the corpses, a marine Farsi interrogator found a photograph of a smiling ten-year-old boy—the same age as his own son.
⁶¹

As Thomas cleared the ship, Evancoe and Wikul’s two patrol boats suddenly appeared off the starboard side. In their haste to leave Bahrain, the boat with their only secure radio had run aground. They had no idea what frequency Thomas’s forces used, and they could not raise the
La Salle
. Undaunted, they pressed on, planning their own assault on the
Iran Ajr
, determined to kill anyone remaining, unaware that Thomas’s SEALs had already boarded.
⁶²

Evancoe spied a dark-skinned man carrying a rifle and immediately ordered all the guns trained on him. Thomas always thought Evancoe overly aggressive, and this action got his attention. “Okay, Paul, please don’t shoot me!”

Wikul commanded the lead boat and ordered his men to hold their fire pending his order. When he rounded the other side of the
Iran Ajr
, he saw the
La Salle
’s boat. “My heart almost came out of my mouth. I nearly shot my friend.”
⁶³

With disaster averted, Evancoe and Wikul turned their attention to picking up the survivors. Their two boats closed on a tented circular bright orange life raft. Unsure of what awaited them, Wikul pointed a shotgun at the Iranians and motioned for them to put their hands in the air. All immediately complied. One by one, each swam over to Wikul’s boat. The Americans bound them, covered their eyes with gray duct tape, and stacked them unceremoniously facedown on the abrasive nonskid deck. When a SEAL discovered a pistol on one, he punched him unconscious and tossed the weapon overboard.

One man remained inside the raft: Commander Farshchian. Wikul grabbed a pistol, swam over, and climbed onto the life raft bobbing nearby. Unsure of the Iranian’s intentions, Wikul started frisking him for a weapon and his finger inadvertently went inside a gaping wound in the Iranian’s side. Farshchian screamed out in agony. Reflexively, Wikul pressed his gun to Farshchian before realizing it had not been a precursor to the Iranian blowing himself up. As he transferred Farshchian over to the American boat, the Iranian looked at Wikul and said in perfect English, “I still have four of my men in the water; would you please rescue them?” Even Wikul was impressed. “It’s hard not to respect a guy who, despite his own wounds, his first words were for the welfare of his men.”
⁶⁴
The final tally: five Iranians dead and twenty-six captured, with several in the same bad shape as Farshchian.

The capture of the
Iran Ajr
was one of the biggest American intelligence coups in modern history. The invisible hand of God proved to be made out of Iranian flesh and spilled blood. That afternoon both Crist and Bernsen visited the Iranian vessel. They brought along photographers, and the next day newspapers around the globe carried front-page photographs of nine mines sitting on the
Iran Ajr
’s open deck.

Iran denied that the ship had been carrying mines. Speaking before the United Nations, President Ali Khamenei called the American charges a
“pack of lies,” and an Iranian spokesman said the ship had only carried foodstuffs.
⁶⁵

As the Iranian prisoners were being repatriated through Oman—all wearing newly provided USS
La Salle
T-shirts—Weinberger flew out to the Gulf and inspected the ship.
⁶⁶
There a gleeful secretary told the assembled reporters that the capture was “not just a smoking gun, but a blazing gun.” With the evidence obvious as to this ship’s real mission, and public commendations coming even from the Soviet Union, Weinberger smiled, pointed to the mines sitting on the deck, and said: “That’s the biggest load of groceries I’ve ever seen!”
⁶⁷

Weinberger ordered the
Iran Ajr
sunk. To make a point, a U.S. warship towed the minelayer well inside the Iranian-declared exclusion zone. Paul Evancoe rigged explosives and blew out the ship’s bottom. She quickly sank, leaving only an oil slick and a few of the oil drums that had unsuccessfully tried to hide her deadly cargo.
⁶⁸

The Iranians immediately halted all mining operations. Embarrassed and exposed, with the world condemning them, Ayatollah Khomeini agreed to draw back the invisible hand. But Iran had hardly caved to American pressure. In Tehran during the Friday prayers after the seizure of the
Iran Ajr
, President Ali Khamenei told the gathering that “we will respond to America’s wicked acts in the Persian Gulf.” The Iranians were about to turn up the burner and make the Gulf a great deal warmer for the Americans.

W
hen Admiral William Crowe read the top secret CIA memo, he immediately realized the magnitude of the crisis. The United States verged on the brink of war in the Middle East. Iran planned to conduct a massive naval attack on Saudi Arabia with the objective of crippling Saudi oil production, the late September 1987 report stated bluntly. Over the past month, American intelligence had reported an unusual congregation of small boats manned by fervent Revolutionary Guard sailors in the northern Persian Gulf, and recent satellite images confirmed boats being moved by truck from southern Iran.
¹
But Iran’s intentions eluded the Pentagon; analysts suspected it was only a military exercise. This new report, however, described in detail the numbers of Iranian boats and their targets in Saudi Arabia, and even predicted the time for the attack: within seventy-two hours. Crowe held the outline for Tehran’s entire war plan.