“Three unaccounted for, sir,” Freund reported.
“Very well, Cob. Thank you.”
Three. Not bad, Cazanavette thought, considering what Freund had to go through to get them here. And some of them even looked like they were sober. As the crew mumbled in their seats, Cazanavette looked at his watch. It was 0714. He looked up in time to see the doors at the back of the theater open, letting in the bright sunlight.
“Attention on deck!” Cazanavette shouted. The crew at once came to their feet, the sober ones standing a little straighter than the others. The room was suddenly silent.
Tremain entered through the sunlit door and walked briskly down the aisle to the front of the auditorium. He glanced at the men briefly, trying to see how they looked without pretending to be bothered by their pathetic appearance. Their mood was obvious. Even though they were all obediently at attention, an air of resentment filled the room. Tremain could sense it. He could even feel it on his skin as he passed them. He had prepared himself for this during the walk over from the boat. He knew that he was going to have to be tough. And he also knew that this was only the beginning. Yet it had to start somewhere.
Tremain approached Cazanavette, who was waiting for him at the front. This was his first look at his new XO. He had already sized up his new XO’s capabilities by going through his service record the night before. Cazanavette presented himself just as he had expected him to appear. He stood at a slouched attention. His khaki shirt and trousers looked crumpled and unserviced, as did his loose black necktie. Tremain made a mental note for later. For now, he would keep silent.
“Ship’s company reporting as ordered, sir,” Cazanavette said. “Three unaccounted for.”
“Who are they, XO?” Tremain asked, unemotionally.
“I don’t …” Cazanavette paused, “I will find out, sir.”
“Please do, XO. And let me know who you select as mast investigating officer.” Tremain said it loud enough for the crew to hear.
“Aye, sir,” Cazanavette said hesitantly. He seemed astonished that Tremain would actually consider sending the missing men to Captain’s Mast, the navy’s form of trial with no jury.
“Thank you, XO,” Tremain said impassively. Then, facing the crew, he removed a folded piece of paper from his pocket and read it aloud: “ ‘From: Commander Submarines, Pacific Fleet. To: Lieutenant Commander Robert A. Tremain, USN. You are hereby ordered to proceed to Pearl Harbor Submarine Base and report to Commander, Submarine Division Seven for assignment as Commanding Officer, USS Mackerel (SS-244). These orders are effective immediately upon receipt. In keeping with the… so on and so forth… I congratulate you on receiving this command. Good hunting! Signed, Charles A. Lockwood, Rear Admiral, USN.’ ”
Tremain then folded the paper and placed it in his pocket.
“Seats, please.”
The crew immediately took their seats and Cazanavette took an empty seat in the front row.
Tremain placed his hands behind his back and began to pace on the stage, letting them all get a good look at him. They were all watching him intently, waiting for those first words from his mouth. The words that would define what kind of CO he would be.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” he said finally, with a small unemotional grin. “As you must have guessed by now, I am your new commanding officer. I arrived on board yesterday afternoon. I’m sure you were all quite shocked to hear that you had to come to the base today. Well, that’s understandable. You come in off patrol and are told to go on liberty, then, before you know it, that liberty is canceled. It can get kind of confusing. Now, I am going to clear up some of the confusion for you all. Leave and liberty is canceled until further notice from this moment on.”
This brought a loud rumble from the crew, which was quickly silenced when Chief Freund stood and shot them all an evil scowl.
Tremain paused, allowing what he had said to sink in. He waited for the mumbling to cease, then continued: “I am going to be straight with you, men. Your last patrol left something to be desired. And looking at Mackerel’s records, the patrol before that was also what I would call shabby. Up at division, they told me that this boat is the ship of bad luck. They told me that the crew I was getting was down-and-out. They told me how you had all been through a lot and that how maybe all you needed was a good rest to get you back up to par. Well, you might as well know that I don’t believe that. Not for a minute. The word ‘luck’ is simply another way for incompetents to excuse poor performance.
“Now I know that last patrol was tough. Tough by anyone’s standards. Sure you had some setbacks. You had a few things that did not go your way. Hell, you even lost two men. But it’s how a ship’s crew deals with these setbacks that separates the professionals from the amateurs in combat, and most often the winners from the losers.”
Tremain paused for a moment. Every eye was focused on him. He could not tell whether they were staring at him with hatred or curiosity, but at least he had their attention.
“I am glad to see that some of you brought your seabags today. That’s good. You’ll need them, because we’re getting underway this afternoon.”
This brought a sudden outburst of grumbles.
Tremain talked over their noise: “Stores and torpedo load will be carried out this morning and we get underway at 1530.”
Once again the Cob rose out of his chair to silence the men, and Tremain waited for their rebellious noise to cease.
“I have concluded that this crew has forgotten how to be submariners, so we are going to practice it all the way to our patrol zone. We are going to go back to basic submarining, gentlemen. I do not know where your problems lie and I do not have time to locate them. So we are going to go back and relearn those fundamental skills that make submariners lethal killers of the deep.”
“That’s bullshit—!” shouted a petty officer in the third row.
Chief Freund rose again to silence the crew, but he did not have to. They all fell silent when they saw the cold hard face that appeared on Tremain as he stared down the petty officer. Within seconds the man’s confident dissension was transformed as he slumped in his chair trying to avoid Tremain’s locked eyes. The man could see that Tremain’s face had no emotion in it. Not anger. Not hate. Just a simple stare that bridged the ether gap between them with an unmistakable message: “You are mine!”
Tremain continued: “Some of you probably feel like you deserve some time off, some time to yourselves to wallow in the misery of that last patrol, and, frankly, I don’t care. This is war, gentlemen. You are not here to enjoy the nightlife on Oahu. You are not here to feel sorry for yourselves or to spend your days on the beaches while your brethren are out there across the ocean fighting the enemy. Just take a look across the harbor if you need reminding. You’ll see the graves of the two thousand men that went before you. You are all here for one purpose. To destroy Japanese shipping! We are going back out there, and that is exactly what I intend for us to do. Any man that is not here to do that, any man that is not ready to do that, raise his hand.”
No one responded. Several were staring at the floor with shameful eyes. A few still had defiance in their faces.
“Now, you thought that last patrol was tough, it’s going to get a lot tougher. This boat is going to go in harm’s way, gentlemen. I won’t promise you anything but plenty of enemy ships to sink. Don’t worry, you’ll get your share of the fight. That is all. Mr. Cazanavette, torpedo load begins at 0740. Dismiss the crew.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
Tremaine hopped off the stage as the crew again came to attention, then he walked briskly back up the aisle and out the theater door. Stepping outside the building and into the sunlight, he stopped and took a deep breath. He wondered if the men had believed him. He wondered if he believed himself. Did his words hit home with any of them? It only took a few to get it started. It only took a few to change the command climate. A few well planted seeds could grow and germinate the rest.