(USS Ranger (CV-61) bow the morning after the collision in the Straits of Malacca. US Navy image).
OK- so out of left field comes this request to talk about the whole Nick Danger thing. It was the first book I ever inadvertently wrote, and it was a long time ago, more than 35 years as the crow flies. The original publication was in the stapled pages of the influential Midway Multiplex, which arguably was the best newsletter ever published in the general vicinity of 20° N latitude and 65° E longitude, a location better known as GONZO Station.
You can look that up on Wiki if you want. They claim the acronym stands for “Gulf of Oman Naval Zone of Operations.” That is complete horseshit. I was there and I know. It stood for high octane cocktails and freedom we didn’t have and Dr. Hunter S. Thompson’s school of journalism. Dean and I thought it up. There is another citation, this one from the prestigious Proceedings of the Naval Institute in the 1980s: “The term GONZO station was thought up by a bored LTJG who didn’t want to be there.”
Screw them.
Here is the general situation report, and how it came to become the first cinema noir detective novel created on a moving warship, and some other interesting and dubious ‘firsts’ of Naval Aviation:
“USS Midway (CV-41) relieved USS Constellation, CV-64 as the Indian Ocean contingency carrier on April 16, 1979. Midway and her escort ships continued a significant American naval presence in the oil-producing region of the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf. She conducted naval exercises with the RAN off Perth, and made a port visit there and later in Mombasa, Kenya. On November 18, she arrived in the northern part of the Arabian Sea in connection with the continuing hostage crisis in Iran. Militant followers of the Ayatollah Khomeini, who had come to power following the overthrow of the Shah, seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on November 4 and held 63 U.S. citizens hostage.”
Here is how it all came to happen. On 21 February 1979, USS Ranger (CV-61) deployed for her 14th WestPac cruise, tentatively scheduled to cross the Indian Ocean to present a show of force during the pissing contest between North and South Yemen, which also was associated with the heebie-jeebies being felt in Riyhad, Saudi Arabia, over the unsettling matter of the Fall of the Pahlavi Dynasty in Iran, and the rise of the Shia theocracy. Ma Midway had just returned from that ambiguous mission, and we were still working on our third or fourth hangover back in our Overseas Family Residence Program (OFRP) home-port of Yokosuka, Japan.
Ranger never made it to the I.O. On 5 April 1979, she collided with the Liberian-flagged tanker MV Fortune just southeast of Singapore while entering the Straits of Malacca. While the large oil tanker was severely damaged, Ranger endured a significant gash in her bow, rendering two fuel tanks unusable. For safety of navigation issues, she turned back to Subic Bay, for temporary repairs and then to Yokosuka, for full repair.
Midway was the only spare carrier laying around the western Pacific, and despite our recent return from the Indian Ocean, the National Command Authority ordered us back to sea to meet the naval presence mission.
You can imagine the general state of moral. It was a mixture of profound depression for the married folks, and exasperation among the bachelor sailors. But we considered ourselves to be the U.S. Navy’s Foreign Legion, and inconvenience comes with the territory. We got underway, and proceeded south along the coast of the PC and turned west for the long turquois swells of the Indian Ocean. We were in a hurry, since we were late.
I went up to the signal bridge when we went abeam Singapore and tried to see the Raffles Hotel’s Long Bar, but no dice. We kept moving.
Now, the thing to remember about ships at sea in the old days is that you are completely out of touch except for the rare mail call provided by the Carrier Onboard Delivery (COD) airplanes. No TV, no radio, no nothing. The Midway Multiplex was a couple pages of AP news articles copied down in Main Communications and assembled by one of the Journalism Mates (JOs) in the Public Affairs shop. Kind of thin gruel, but that is why I digested a paperback book a day as brain candy.
We had a marvelous port visit in Perth, West Australia, the consequences of which were probably as destructive to many relationships as having the Ranger crew and Air Wing making an extended port visit with the OFRP families back in Yoko. We departed to transit north and west toward Mombasa, Kenya, a port we had visited just a few months before. That would have been the second or third of November. On the 4th the world changed and it has not worked its way through the full consequences of that event yet.
We altered course and made flank speed toward the Northern Arabian sea on the Admiral’s initiative. CINCPAC conferred with the Joint Staff back in Washington, and we were directed to return to a bearing that would take us to Africa while the grown ups figured out what we were going to do. This was the Carter Administration, after all.
So after a very bizarre port call- very subdued, for a change- we got underway to do just what we had been planning on doing. Going to north to get close and personal with the hostage takers.
I would characterize the mood as being one of apprehension, braggadocio, resentment and excitement. I knew that the Multiplex was not going to get us very far in answering questions or providing diversion on what was likely to be either a war cruise, or more likely, a very long and very boring exercise in drilling holes in the North Arabian Sea.
There was only one thing to do, and I decided I was just the boy to do it. I would right a daily story tinged with irony, sort of in the tone pioneered by the comedy group The Firesign Theater, whose surreal humor had fueled many nights running amok in college. They had created a character named “Nick Danger,” a lummox version of a noir private eye. I decided to appropriate him for the protagonist of the daily episode. I was going to regret that, once I realized what I had gotten myself into, but you don’t know what you don’t know, right?
This is the very first one, as I took IBM Selectric typewriter in hand, headed northwest across the swell toward the North Arabian Sea:
“THE ADVENTURES OF NICK DANGER, PRIVATE DICK”
I PARKED THE PACKARD ON THE PIER, CLOSE TO THE BIG GREY BOAT. The hand brake clicked into place.
I lit up a Lucky Strike and looked over the situation. My sources had told me the Fat Man was aboard this ship. I had to find him if I was to unravel the mystery of the Great Rat of Sumatra. Lives hung in the balance. So did my expense account money. I pitched the cigarette butt out the window and got out of the car.
The wind was blowing in off the steel grey waters of the little harbor. A giant white mountain loomed up the south. Looked like an inverted ice cream cone. The hairs stood up on the back of my neck. I had the uneasy feeling I wasn’t in LA any more.
I snapped the brim of my hat down low over my baby blues. I checked the Luger in the worn leather holster under my baggy, blue suit coat. I was ready for action … or danger … or whatever. I was Vic Socotra, Private Dick.
I ambled down the pier and looked at the little workers busy loading boxes onto pallets. Lot of Japanese in this part of West California. I sidled up to one of them and lit up a smoke.
“I’m looking for the Fat Man,” I said, and produced the worn picture from my wallet. “You seen him around here lately?” I gave him my very best leer.
He looked up at me. “Nani?” he said.
“Listen, Bub, don’t give me the runaround. I’m a tough fella and I get results.”
The little guy didn’t seem to see where I was coming from. I pitched my cigarette butt away and got ready to rough him up a little. He seemed to look up over my shoulder, at something looming.
I should have known better. Something that felt as big as a crane hit me in the back of the head. I went out like a light.
The Japanese worker looked down at the prone Yankee. Crazy gaijiin.
“Gomen asai, bakka gaijiin.” Sorry, Crazy Westerner. He waved to the crane operator. Even the Yankees ought to know better than to stand under the crane arm …
TOMORROW: THE EXCITING ADVENTURES OF NICK DANGER
CONTINUE WITH “SAPS AT SEA . ” STAY TUNED.
COPYRIGHT 1980 AND 2015 VIC SOCOTRA
WWW.VICSOCOTRA.COM
TWITER: @Jayare303