This can't he, the Egyptian had to be thinking. "Say again. Who is calling?"
"Roger. this is Tigertail 603. I advise you are directed to land immediately, proceed immediately to Sigonella, Sicily. You are being escorted by two interceptor aircraft. Vector 280 for Sigonella, Sicily Over."
"Repeat again," the Egyptian requested.
The E-2C complied: "You are to turn immediately to 280. Head 280 immediately."
The Egyptian had no choice. "Turning right, heading 280."
The F-14s had by then switched on their running lights, and the Egyptian had realized that they were only a few feet from each of his wingtips. "I'm saying you are too close. I'm following your orders. Don't be too close. Please."
"Okay, we'll move away a little bit," the Hawkeye answered (he was actually a hundred miles off). And the F-14s edged away a little. It was time for a change anyway, since the F-14s were too short-ranged to escort the 737 all the way to Sigonella. Soon, these E-14s were replaced by three others, who were to take the Egyptian airliner to Sicily.
AT Sigonella, Bill Spearman was in his office in gym shorts. He'd been playing racquetball when he got word that I needed to talk to him.
"Bill, it's coming," I told him. "You arc the only one that's going to know about it, and you're going to make it happen. We are coming to your location with an Egyptian 737 with the terrorists aboard, followed immediately by my two C-141 s. Get hold of my people that I left there and tell them that I want the 737 to clear the runway immediately, for I will be landing blacked out seconds behind it. Tell them to block and hold that 737 and don't let anybody off or on. When I get there I'll take charge. Also, Bill, I want you to make sure that we are granted permission to land and that the Italians don't try to block us."
Spearman then went to brief the Italian base commander, Colonel Annicchiarici. As it happened, this was Annicchiarici's last day on the job. The next day, a lot of Italian brass would be on hand for his change-of-command ceremony, including an army three-star. Annicchiarici was not especially pleased at the going-away present that we had dropped on his lap; but it thankfully didn't take him long to realize that his friend Bill Spearman had been as much in the dark about it as he was.
"Beel, if you were in uniform, I would have known that you knew about this all along," Annicchiarici told him when he learned about the Egypt Air plane, "but since you are in your shorts, I believe that you didn't know anything about it either."
At about midnight, Italian Prime Minister Craxi received a telephone call from the White House, informing him, in his words "that U.S. military aircraft had intercepted an Egyptian civil aircraft which the U.S. government believed with a reasonable degree of certainty to be carrying the four Palestinians responsible for the hijacking of the Achille Lauro. The U.S. President asked the Italian government for its consent to proceed with the landing of the civil and U.S. military aircraft at Sigonella." They were hoping that the Italians would not want the hijackers and would get themselves off the hook by agreeing to let the Americans take them.
And in fact, Craxi was not pleased to learn that he was on the hook. He wanted the whole terrorist situation as far from Italy as possible.
Craxi didn't know what to do. So he decided to punt. The Egypt Air 737 would be allowed to land at Sigonella base.
Shortly after midnight, my pilot informed me that if things continued to go as planned, we'd be on the ground at Sigonella in about an hour.
I called the Pentagon to give an update and to verify that my mission was to take the terrorists off the plane, place them in chains, and fly them back to the United States to stand trial. (I never could figure out the "bring them back in chains" part. In the first place, I didn't have any chains except for "cargo tie-down chains" on the C-141, and I had already decided that I would put the terrorists on the plane with Captain "Bob" and his two SEAL platoons. 1 couldn't think of anything more secure than that.)
By this time the Chairman and the service chiefs had assembled in a small conference room in the National Military Command Center (NMCC) at the Pentagon and were listening to my radio traffic.
Vice Admiral Moreau answered my call.
"We should be on the ground at Sigonella in about an hour," I told him. "The SEAL detachment that I left behind at Sigonella will set the trap and hold the plane until 1 get to it."
"Your mission is as stated," Moreau replied. "And the Italian government has agreed that you can take the terrorists."
"Roger," I said. "Then we shouldn't be on the ground long. My goal is to have everything out of here before daylight."
Craxi's okay did not in fact make much of a difference — except later for official purposes. Admiral Crowe had already directed Jeremiah to bring Egypt Air 2842 into Sigonella whether the Italians liked it or not.
In any event, Craxi's approval did not reach Italian airport approach control at Sigonella, who wanted no part of what was going down. They refused the F-14s permission to land, and told them to go to a civilian airfield nearby.
The Navy squadron commander tried one more time, but directed the Egyptian to follow him in — permission or no. Together, they began their descent toward Sigonella. Approach control's answer was again no.
At this point, the commander used the old pilots' trick. He switched his transponder to emergency mode, declared a fuel emergency (though he had plenty of fuel left), and brought the Egyptian airliner into its final approach. The trouble was, the Egyptian was coming in too low.
The commander told the Egyptian to break off his approach, which he did. He then circled around to try again.
Meanwhile, in the Sigonella tower, a Navy lieutenant pushed the Italian controller out of the way, took the mike, and radioed the Egyptian permission to land.
Once the Egypt Air plane was safely on the runway, the F-14s took aerial photos of the plane and headed back to the carrier — their part of the operation now complete.
My team took over from there.
SIGONELLA
As the Egypt Air plane rolled down the main runway to a taxiway at the end, where it was directed to stop, the SEALs who had remained at Sigonella raced to meet it in pickup trucks and set up a perimeter around it.
Soon after that, my two C-141 s landed, with lights out, and stopped on the active runway where the Egypt Air had pulled off. Moments later, we added the men on the C-141 s to the SEALs already surrounding Egypt Air 2843.
On the way to Sigonella, Captain Bob and I had been in constant contact, planning and coordinating what his SEALs had to do in order to secure the Egyptian plane and take control of the terrorists.
One of the two team leaders, Lieutenant "Bo," was to assemble his assault team off the tarmac behind the 737, and be prepared to assault the plane on order, should a takedown become necessary.
Lieutenant "Randy" was to establish a security perimeter around the plane, but outside the security already being provided by the team we had previously dropped off in Sigonella.
Bob also placed his snipers in firing positions where they could see what was happening inside the plane,
By about 2:00 A.M., Friday, October 11, Bob and I had established our command post under the tail of the plane. When I looked, I could see lights on inside and a couple people walking around.
Bob and I went to the nose of the 737 and plugged into the intercom jack. I identified myself and asked the pilot who he had on board. IIe did not answer.
"If you don't cooperate, we'll find out one way or another," I told him.
That brought an answer. "I have my crew and an 'ambassador' on board," the pilot said, leaving open the possibility that there may be additional people on the plane.