DECEPTION

By Richard B. Christie

Synopsis: On a Saturday morning near Djibouti, some unknown terrorists attacked an American Navy Fuel Tanker as it passed by in the narrow part of the Red Sea. They fired upon it but were soon defeated by the Navy's superior return fire. 

Because it was a Navy ship that was attacked, there was a strong possibility that it wou

• Language: English
• Publisher: Writers Branding LLC
• Release date: Feb 29, 2024
• ISBN: 9781639458813

Richard B. Christie

For almost fifty years, Richard B. Christie owned and operated a technical engineering company. He performed specialized environmental testing and adjustments to both industrial-grade air conditioning and high-performance sterile air filtration systems used in hospitals, pharmaceutical facilities, and research laboratories; that included special areas where high-class clean rooms were required, such as surgeries, sterile manufacturing suites, and testing facilities. At home, most Winter weekends, he was an active volunteer member of the National Ski Patrol and a Certified Ski Patroller at a major Vermont Ski area. He was trained in remote mountain rescue procedures and advanced first aid.

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(de·cep·tion)

Deception is defined as intentionally misleading subjects or knowingly withholding full information, causing someone else to accept as true or valid what is, or might be, false or invalid.

People or investigators may be misled or obtain omitted information about an incident; or apply a false interpretation regarding what might have happened, thus causing the inclination, or practice of, misleading others through lies or trickery.

[[[-1-]]]

Washington, DC

Monday, 29 July 2019

It was a bright and sunny Monday morning in Washington, DC, with a delightful temperature of about 80 degrees Fahrenheit. In the parks, flowers bloomed, and trees provided shade for anyone looking for it. It gave everyone a very relaxed, pleasant, and somewhat quiet attitude.

Of course, the city traffic was as heavy and noisy as usual, and the people walking along needed to watch out for the others, who were walking or sitting with cell phones glued to their noses as they moved around and about in the city.

It was normal for most of the local people to keep doing their business or, at the same time, following everything shown on social media. However, those who were visitors to the city were generally fascinated with all the government buildings, monuments, and the various sights to see.

The Navy Special Investigation Unit (NSIU), located in the northwest part of the city, was unusually quiet for a Monday morning.

The Defense Department (DOD) usually, sometime over the weekend, forwards the current security instructions that need investigation and has them put into the Admiral’s Lockbox. When Admiral Harry Walker arrived, usually very early every Monday morning, as he entered his office, he would look to see if there was anything in it.

If there was something in it, depending upon the subject matter of the documents, it was usual for all the NSIU staff, currently in Washington, to sit in on a ten o’clock briefing meeting and discuss everything. But today’s briefing was to be delayed by an early morning phone call from Defense Secretary Collins’s office requesting that Admiral Walker meets with him at the DOD early, before nine o’clock. They didn’t say what it was all about but indicated it was important.

As Admiral Walker entered the office reception area, he was surprised to see Secretary Weiss of the State Department (DOS) standing by the entrance desk. When the Secretary turned around and saw the Admiral, he said: I had thought you might be here this morning, but although this is a DOD issue, we are also involved.

With that said, the Admiral smiled and indicated: I have no idea what this is about!

With that, a uniformed woman army sergeant from behind the entrance desk stepped up, saluted them, and guided them. They met Secretary Collins standing by the door when she escorted them to the conference room. As the three men entered the conference room and sat around the table, Secretary Collins said: We’ve had an incident in East Africa.

He explained that a ship was attacked in the Djibouti straights on Saturday morning as it was leaving the Gulf of Aden and heading north into the Red Sea; at about nine-fifteen AM local time. The report said a group of apparent terrorists, using three fair-sized, about thirty-foot-long open attack boats with approximately thirty men, attacked and fired upon a United States Navy Fuel Tanker ship, the Aquarius.

At that point, the waterway between Djibouti and Yemen was very narrow, only about 18 nautical miles, with several islands, and the USN Tanker moved slowly and carefully as it passed between the close land masses.

When the terrorists attacked it, they fired upon the ship’s bow and moved around to attack the bridge towards the rear. The Tanker was armed, albeit with small cannons and even some small rockets, but because of the fuel it carries, the Navy tends not to engage in any firefight unless there is no other option.

In this case, the attackers, using handheld rocket-propelled grenades, had blown off about twenty feet of the upper bow’s decking, missing the forwardmost fuel tank by only fifty feet. That was serious enough for the Navy Gunners to aim and fire upon them. They shot at two of the three attack boats and almost immediately sank them. The third boat quickly ran around the Tanker’s stern and, at full speed, escaped and headed to shore by the docks in the Port of Djibouti.

Secretary Weiss perked his ears up when he heard about attacking a Fuel Tanker near Djibouti and asked: This has a familiar sound to it. Didn’t we have a similar incident a while back?

The Admiral answered: "Well, yes, sir, in a way, it was similar, but the attack was by pirates from Somalia and was on a Greek commercial freighter. We sent a team there along with British and French teams as well. The pirates were caught, tried, and convicted and are currently in a Somalian prison.

It was unique because some pirates had fled into Djibouti before we could catch them; however, the French team had better relations with their government, so they went in, caught them, and brought them back to Somalia.

Secretary Collins said: "OK, the previous attack was minor and was handled by the three teams and the Somalian and Djibouti governments.

"This, however, is different. That freighter was transporting food and grains. Our ship was a United States Navy Fuel Tanker.

Turning to Secretary Weiss, he continued: After all the problems we experienced with the Russian Submarine incident a while back, I believe both you and I feel the same about this.

"We know that there is still a fair amount of concern internationally about America’s increased Fuel production capacity, and it may be another attempt to create a loss in our production abilities or to have an embarrassment from a large spill.

We don’t know.

Then turning towards the Admiral continued: "Since it was a loaded Military Navy Fuel Tanker, and your unit is Navy, we both decided to have your team look into this and see if you can find a reason for it; who did it, and how significant it may be.

The Admiral said: Yes sir, we can look into this, and uniquely, we have most of our staff here in Washington and currently available. Then turning towards Secretary Weiss, he asked: Because of where this occurred, we will most likely need to advise and cooperate with the British and French again; does that create any problems?"

Secretary Weiss answered: None that I can see, but because a US Navy Tanker was attacked, this investigation must be under the control of the DOD and Secretary Collins; but we must keep the DOS tightly in the loop.

With Secretary Collins nodding, the Admiral said: Understood, sir, we can do it that way.

Meanwhile, it was lunchtime back downtown, and the crowds were growing. Many government employees and associated staff would be exiting their offices and heading out to the many local restaurants.

As the lunch hour approached, Chief Petty Officer Paul DeNice got up from his desk and walked over to the office of Linda DeSanto to see if she wanted to go to lunch with him and a few others.

Paul, a Chief Petty Officer and an advanced trained navy seal at the NSIU had been in the Navy for more than twelve years, including two of those years, semi-active in the Navy Reserves.

He had lost his whole family in a plane crash while he was on assignment overseas and was at a loss with what he should do with his life. He wanted to reestablish his personal life, so he left the regular Navy and switched to the Navy Reserves. While on reserve duty, he took a civilian job and became a ski patroller at a major Vermont ski area; during his reserve off-duty times.

Linda, who was an ex-Vermont State Police Sargent, had come to the NSIU after her participation in a difficult murder investigation that took place in her home State. The investigation was about a murdered man whose body was discovered early in the morning on a ski trail at the mountain where Paul was, coincidentally, patrolling.

There were many clues to the murder, and the body’s identity was that of a United Nations investigator involved in an international search for a missing United Nations representative. The international details were enough for the DOS and DOD to assign the NSIU to head up the federal investigation portion.

Although personal, Paul’s NSIU investigative experience was enough for him to reactivate into the regular Navy at his old unit. When the local police learned of it, and Since the murder had occurred in Vermont, he worked closely with Linda, the assigned State Police investigator.

When they resolved the case, Admiral Walker offered Linda a job as a civilian contract investigator for the US Navy. She quickly accepted and has been at the NSIU for about a year and a half.

Linda and Paul worked together, over that time, on several very difficult cases. And, somehow, they have developed a unique and unusual ability to read each other’s minds about the cases they’ve worked on; and would frequently arrive at similar results.

Both are in their early thirties, and a personal and professional friendship developed when they first met and has been growing ever closer. A few weeks ago, together, they visited Linda’s parents, at their farm in Vermont, over the Fourth of July weekend.

Over the last year and a half, their friendship continued to develop and had even become a bit romantic, and it was there, while in Vermont, that Paul asked her to marry him. She agreed immediately and without hesitation. They are now trying to determine if and how much things might change by continuing to work together.

Everyone at the NSIU knows they have become engaged and accepted that there would likely be some changes. However, their combined involvement in many of the NSIU assignments was unlikely to be altered very much. They have spent more than ten years independently, each at detailed investigative work, both State and Federal, and both were very comfortable with that.

Paul had over twelve years in the Navy, and his pension was becoming substantial as a chief petty officer. He, therefore, should probably remain active at NSIU. Also, there is no reason for Linda to quit, although they both feel it might put a little undue strain on them if they both happened to be working on the same case.

At lunch that day, Paul and Linda, along with Chief Petty Officer Ira Jones, Petty Officer 1st Class Luigi Larenti, and Petty Officer 1st Class Antonio Romani, were soon joined by USN Commander Harold Jarrett (2nd in command at NSIU) and US Coast Guard Commander Connie Wall (head NSIU project coordinator). They sat somewhat quietly and wondered what the Monday DOD briefing would likely have in it. Of course, they couldn’t discuss it in the restaurant; security was always the primary issue.

So, to keep everyone happy and to play around with Paul and Linda a little bit, Harold asked: Linda, when you and Paul announced your engagement, you indicated that your wedding was going to be in Vermont in the middle of January. Is that still the plan?

Linda laughed and said: Yes, that is what we said; however, the only people in my family are my mother and father up at their dairy farm, and Paul’s family is all gone. With that in mind, we’ve discussed it and decided on two things; Number one, we would like to have a nice wedding with those close to us attending, and most of them are around here in the general Capital District. Two, it is usually very cold in Vermont; in January.

Paul laughed: So, we have been talking to a very helpful church pastor here in Washington and have agreed that the wedding would be best here early in November. Then with a smile and an additional chuckle, he added: "It is usually much warmer then, and perhaps with a little luck, most of our friends are more likely to be available.

The pastor checked his calendar, and it looks like we might be lucky and be able to schedule it for Saturday, November 2nd; that is, of course, if nothing outlandish, either with us, Linda’s parents, the NSIU, or even the church, occurs right about then. We shall see!

[[[-2-]]]

Washington, DC

Monday, Afternoon, 29 July 2019

The Monday morning briefing had, of course, not happened. However, it had just been postponed, and everyone had gone about the many other incidents and reports that seemed to be floating around the NSIU, all looking for answers.

As everyone was spread out, either in their offices, the coffee break room, the general file room, the small item research laboratory, and even the two conference rooms, it became necessary for both Navy yeomen; Petty Officers, 3rd Class, Jimmy Louis, and Susan Gordon, to spend almost twenty minutes, wandering around just to find them.

The news they spread was that the morning briefing meeting had now been rescheduled for two o’clock in the third-floor conference room in just a half hour.

At two o’clock, after everyone had migrated through the coffee break room, they found their way to the conference room and sat at the large round table. Almost everyone, those in Washington DC at least, was there on this bright Monday afternoon and busy with the many tasks available.

When the Admiral and Harold walked into the conference room, there was mild chatter around the table. When everyone noticed their entry, the appearance was enough to quiet everyone down.

As Harold began the weekly discussion by reading the DOD report, he smiled over at Paul and said: Well, Paul, I think this might be a very rare occasion; there is no comment in this report about the violence in Chicago. Can you remember the last time that occurred?

With a common look of disgust, Paul said: Wait, it is early; it may yet come!

Harold continued with a small chuckle: "There was a small problem at the San Diego Navy station Yesterday. A security leak appeared regarding the amount of raw fuel oil containerized into the land tanks. It seems that a special load of finished distilled fuel had been mistakenly placed into the raw fuel storage tanks, which should never happen.

"DOD wants us to look into this; because of the recent issue of the Russian submarine incident, they are very careful about watching anything involving the transfer or use of large quantities of fuel.

"Luigi, would you and maybe David; ‘(Petty Officer 1st Class David Likus)’ and Peter; ‘(Petty Officer 2nd Class Peter Dove)’ look into this? Maybe take a flight out there and see what you can learn.

Luigi answered: Aye, Sir, will do.

That is what I have, but Admiral, you said something has occurred that we must look into.

Sitting quietly and leaning back in his chair, the Admiral said: As you all know, I was called over to the DOD this morning to meet with Secretary Collins. When I entered the building, I was surprised to see Secretary Weiss from the DOS was also there. And together, we met with Sectary Collins, who potentially has a big problem developing.

He handed a paper from his briefcase to Harold, saying: Harold, please read this to everyone so we can discuss our options.

Harold said: Aye, Sir. He took the paper and read: "Saturday morning at 0915 AM, East Africa local time, while leaving the Gulf of Aden, a 380-foot-long Fuel Tanker, the US Navy Aquarius, was attacked by three fast thirty-foot open-concept fishing boats, with about thirty men, in total, aboard them.

When the boats attacked, they fired several hand-held rocket grenades upon the ship’s bow and then moved aft to attack the bridge towards the rear. Like all USN ships, the Tanker was armed, albeit with small cannons and even some small rockets.

"The immediate