Sword Point by Harold Coyle Read Free Book Online Page A

at that end, Major Dixon moved to Beaumont to orchestrate the transfer of the unit’s equipment from rail to naval trans ports and tend to the billeting and messing of the men moving the equipment. The battalion commander had to stay loose, ready to go where he was required the most.
    Much of his time was consumed by meetings, planning sessions and briefings. At first he would religiously rush back to his staff and provide them with all the information that he had just been given. He stopped this practice, however, when it became apparent that plans and information provided by the division, which changed at every meeting, were only causing confusion within the battalion staff. He therefore decided to wait until a final plan was developed before issuing any type of order. Until then, only that information that was required to prepare and deploy the force was provided.
    Upon arrival at Beaumont, it became readily apparent that neither the port nor the Navy was ready to receive the 3rd of the 4th. If there was a plan for loading the lead elements from the 25th Armored Division onto the transports, it wasn’t evident on the dock next to the S.S.
    Cape Fear.
    The Cape Fear was part of the Ready Reserve Fleet. Civilian owned and operated, the Cape Fear, like other ships in the RRF , conducted normal commercial operations until activated for use as a military transport during war or emergencies. At the time of activation, ships of the RRF
    were required to report within a specified number of days, anywhere from five to fifteen, to designated ports, where they fell under the control of the
    Military Sealift Command. While the Navy routinely conducted readiness tests to determine whether ships could respond. The size and frequencies of the tests had always been limited. The speed with which the current crisis developed, and the size of the force requiring movement and the force designated for deployment, were placing on the transport system a demand that had been discussed but never practiced.
    As a result, there was a three-way debate on how to run operations.
    The
    Army, which owned the equipment being moved, had its ideas on how, when and what to load. There was the desire to keep unit integrity and place a balanced mix of equipment on all ships in the event that the Soviets intercepted the convoy and attacked it. It would do no good to arrive in the Persian Gulf with all the trucks of the division if the transports with the tanks on it sank.
    But loading ships in that manner is wasteful as far as space and time are concerned. As there were few ships in the RRF available to move the corps’s equipment and supplies, the Navy wanted to pack each ship as efficiently as possible. The bulk of the Navy’s true cargo-handling capability was either scattered around the world or in mothballs. Time would be required to assemble those ships or refit and man those in mothballs. Until then, every ship counted.
    The third party was the ships’ owners and their agents on the spot, the ships’ captains. While the theory of the RRF was fine in peacetime, a severe case of cold feet broke out when the plan began to be implemented for real. Some captains and ships’ crews went out of their way to accommodate the Navy and Army personnel. Others were openly hostile, one ship’s captain having to be threatened with arrest if he failed to comply with his contract. Most fell between the two extremes, doing what was required of them, but with great reluctance.
    As one seaman put it, “I ain’t in the Navy or the Army. I didn’t sign on to get my ass blown off and don’t intend to.” The number of
    “unaccounted-for personnel” increased daily. The captain and crew of the Cape Fear fell into this middle category.
    The Cape Fear itself was designed to allow vehicles to simply roll on and roll off without the use of cranes or hoists, hence the name RO-RO
    ship.
    She had a crew of thirty-four and a capacity of almost twelve thousand tons, or