|
 It
is now five days since the tragic sinking of the Japanese training
trawler, Ehime Maru, by the U.S. submarine, Greeneville,
off the coast of Hawaii. On board the trawler were crew members
and students. Nine people, including four 17 year old students,
are still missing and almost certainly dead.
You
will recall that the US Navy initially claimed the sinking was
an unavoidable accident. The sub had been doing everything by
the book:
"The
Navy initially had said the submarine was within the 56-square-mile
training area designated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and marked on nautical charts to caution commercial
and recreational craft." (Washington
Post,
2-15-2001)
But
the Navy story has changed:
"On
Wednesday, the Navy acknowledged that the Greeneville
was about 3,000 yards east of a submarine test and trial area
when it surfaced underneath the Japanese vessel." (ibid)
Let Them
Drown
Initially
the Navy claimed the crew did all it could to aid the victims.
But the Captain of the stricken vessel disagreed:
"Hisao
Onishi, captain of the sunken trawler Ehime Maru, told
reporters that US sailors did little while he and others flailed
in the water.
"I could see several people on the [sub's] tower,"
he said. "They lowered a rope ladder ... but none of our
crew members were rescued by the submarine ... They were just
looking until the Coast Guard arrived."
Adm. Thomas Fargo, the Pacific Fleet commander, said 3- to 6-foot-high
waves stopped Greeneville sailors from leaving their
sub.
"Because of the swells, the crew was not able to open hatches
and take available survivors on board," he said.
But the 26 survivors reportedly said that despite the choppy
seas, no water entered their lifeboats.
It took more than 20 minutes before Coast Guard rescuers swooped
in shortly after the 2 p.m. (Hawaii time) collision. (Daily
News
(New York) February 12, 2001)
Why
did the crew do nothing while it took 20 minutes –
why 20 minutes? was there a delay before they were called? –
for the Coast Guard to get to the scene, from nearby Hawaii?
The
disaster was the fault of the submarine. The seas were warm. The
most extreme measures should have been taken – up to an including
risking sailors' lives (which would hardly have been necessary)
to at least try to rescue the victims. Nothing was done.
Why?
Because of racism? Cowardice? Arrogance – the idea that American
lives are too precious to risk even when criminal negligence –
or worse – causes a fatal accident?
Some
US media suggested the sinking was not a big issue in Japan:
But
this was not true:
"Japan's
Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori told the United States ambassador
in Tokyo that Japan does not believe the explanation offered
by the Navy for the sub's failure to rescue anyone immediately
after the accident.
'"The Japanese people have developed a deep distrust' in
the Navy's account, Mori was quoted by Kyodo News Agency as
telling Ambassador Thomas Foley.
"Japanese anger was spurred by the Navy's explanation that
the waves were too high for the sub to open its hatches and
attempt to rescue anyone. The fishing boat's captain said the
waves were not so high and did not even breach the life rafts."(St.
Petersburg Times February 13, 2001)
Not
An Ordinary Procedure
The
Navy claimed the sub was doing nothing out of the ordinary. Not
so, says a retired sub commander Jim Bush, interviewed
on the Lehrer NewsHour. According to Bush the sub was performing
a "rapid ascent", an emergency procedure employed only
when absolutely necessary.
CAPT.
JIM BUSH (Ret.): Well, a rapid ascent is a legitimate exercise
for a submarine to do on rare occasions. It's unlikely that
you would have to use a rapid ascent. However, if you're going
to do that in peacetime, you have to make sure that there's
absolutely no chance that you're going to hit a ship when you
surface....If you wanted to be really certain, you could surface
and use your radar to make sure that there were no ships in
the area. Having done this, you then go down to whatever depth
you want to practice your emergency surface from, and you surface
from down there. But before you practice that emergency surface,
you make absolutely certain that there is no possibility that
there would be a civilian ship in the area.
...If
you weren't absolutely certain that there was no ship there,
you would not practice an emergency surface.
JIM
LEHRER: Now, the sonar and the radar, those are back-ups, then,
to sight? Would you agree with that?
CAPT.
JIM BUSH (Ret.): Well, they're back-ups to sight, but radar
could be very significant, significantly useful to determine
whenever it's possible, even plausible, for a ship to be in
the area.
JIM
LEHRER: So, based on your experience, if the captain did everything
along the lines you outlined before, it's almost impossible
to have happened what happened over the weekend?
CAPT.
JIM BUSH (Ret.): That's exactly correct. If he had taken every
precaution possible, it was almost impossible for that to have
happened.
As
a Washington Post story shows, even the crew members –
and the invited guests(!) – make no claim that radar was
used before the ascent. They refer only to a periscope check.
The N.Y.
Daily News
made the common sense observation:
"More
baffling is how the submarine's sensitive navigation equipment
could have missed a 151-foot, 499-ton fishing trawler floating
directly above it. "
Fun in the
Sub
Initially
the Navy admitted there were civilians on board the sub at the
time of the accident but claimed they were only observing. That
sounds shaky to this writer. What are civilian observers doing
on a submarine war vessel?
But
that is nothing compared to the truth, or should I say, the part
of the truth that has emerged so far. First, the Navy claims the
sub was on a training mission, but wouldn't it make sense, during
a training mission, to use all the procedures called for under
navy regulations? This would include active radar; but active
radar was not employed.
According
to civilian VIP guests interviewed on NBC's "Today"
show, the rapid ascent was in fact carried out to entertain these
VIP civilians. Indeed one of the civilians, a certain John Hall,
was at the controls when the sub hit the fishing trawler.
"'I
was to the left in the control room, and I was asked by the
captain if I would like the opportunity to pull the levers that
start the procedure that's called the blowdown,' John Hall told
NBC's "Today" show.
'"I
said, 'Sure, I'd love to do that,'" he said.
"Hall
said the nearest crew member was 'right next to me, elbow to
elbow. I mean, what's important to know here is you don't do
anything on this vessel without someone either showing you how
to do it, telling you how to do it, or escorting you around.'"
This
is beyond belief.
Not
to Worry: Racist Monster In Charge
As
if to make the connection between Imperial U.S. arrogance on the
high seas and in Okinawa, it turns out that the civilian tour
of the Greeneville had been arranged by "a former commander of
U.S. military forces in the Pacific, retired
Adm. Richard Macke."
"[Commander]
Macke was forced to apply for early retirement in 1996 after
he suggested that three US servicemen who rented a car to allegedly
abduct and rape a 12-year-old girl in Okinawa, Japan, should
have hired a prostitute instead."
That's
the word from the Indispensable Nation, the example for the rest
of the world.
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