Waddle and dad AUSTIN, Texas >> Three months after the birth of his son Scott in 1959, Dan Waddle was flying his U.S. Air Force F-101 Voodoo when it "started to come apart" around him as he flew one morning over northern Japan.
share similar past
Retired colonel tells of his
1959 plane crash in Japan which
narrowly avoided any loss
of human lifeSearch for missing
Japanese is called offBy Bruce Hight
Cox News ServiceTo avoid killing anyone below, he pointed the disintegrating jet toward the Pacific Ocean. But he knew that if he parachuted into the frigid waters he couldn't survive.
So Waddle figured he'd eject just as the jet crossed the beach. That way, he hoped, winds would carry him back over land as the jet splashed harmlessly in the Pacific.
The first part worked: he ejected and drifted toward land.
The other part didn't. The pilotless F-101 suddenly turned 180 degrees and dived toward the earth -- at a school.
"It hit in the school yard, blew up and didn't hurt anyone," Waddle said last week, still marveling at his good fortune and that of the children and teachers in the school.
Waddle, now a retired colonel living in Austin, recounted that story during a telephone call from his son, Cmdr. Scott Waddle, on the day after the USS Greeneville, which the son commanded, accidentally rammed and sank a Japanese fishing boat. Nine people aboard the Japanese vessel were lost at sea, including four teen-age students, two teachers and three crew members; 26 others survived."The only difference between you and me," Waddle told his 41-year-old son, "is luck."
The Feb. 9 ramming of the Ehime Maru also sank the younger Waddle's promising Navy career, as well as making him the focus of an international incident and of a high-level military investigation that eventually could put him in prison.
A combat veteran and former squadron commander, the senior Waddle doesn't come across as a man easily rattled or given to outbursts.
But on one subject Waddle's face will suddenly tighten into anguish and drop into his hands, his voice rising in astonished dread: the fate of his son Scott.
"He's okay," Waddle said last week of his only son. "He's a very, very strong man. I'm emotional -- I'm much more emotional than him."
Waddle looks up in apology, his hands rubbing his tears away from his eyes.
"I guess it's because they're after my boy."
Scott Waddle should know Wednesday what action, if any, a Navy Court of Inquiry that investigated the accident will recommend be taken against him and two of his subordinate officers.
Waddle had 16 civilian "distinguished visitors" aboard, including eight from the Houston area, for a day cruise promoting the Navy when he demonstrated an "emergency main ballast blow," a maneuver that sends a submarine shooting for the surface.
Somehow, however, Waddle failed to detect the presence of the Japanese fishing boat and hit it as he surfaced.
What has struck many in the aftermath of the accident was the willingness of Waddle, 41, to take responsibility and apologize to the Japanese.
At the Court of Inquiry, disregarding the advice of his lawyer and setting aside his right not to testify, Waddle took the stand, admitting that "mistakes were made" and telling the court that, "as commanding officer, I am solely responsible for this truly tragic accident, and for the rest of my life I will have to live with the horrible consequences."
During the Court of Inquiry Waddle was criticized for not conducting a thorough periscope search before surfacing and failing to take his most experienced sonar crewmen with him. Also, one crew member admitted that he failed to speak up in not telling Waddle that a ship was about 4,000 yards away.
Waddle denied that he acted recklessly or disregarded safety concerns.
Still, Waddle himself has said publicly that his once bright Navy career is over. The question now is what action the Navy will take against him.
One possibility is a letter of reprimand and forced retirement, possibly stripped of his retirement benefits.
But it could get worse: he could be charged with the military equivalent of felony crimes -- hazarding a vessel, dereliction of duty, even negligent homicide -- and subjected to a court martial. If that happened, and Waddle were found guilty, he could be imprisoned and stripped of all pay and benefits.
Whatever the court recommends, the decision on what to do next will be made by Admiral Thomas Fargo, commander-in-chief of the Pacific Fleet.
Professor Scott Silliman, executive director of the Center on Law Ethics and National Security at Duke University Law School, said the Navy has had enough embarrassments in recent months -- the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole and the loss of the Navy reconnaissance plane in China, to name two -- that it might feel the need to crack down on somebody.
Waddle accepted blame for the collision, Silliman said, "but blame is not the same thing as criminal responsibility."
The father fears that the Navy will scapegoat his son to placate Japanese anger, and he has little trust in Navy justice.
To help get his son's side of the story out, Waddle has appeared on national television, spoken to national magazines and made two live appearances on Japanese television shows. He fears that the fact a Japanese admiral served on the Court of Inquiry as an observer could tip the scales against his son.
This sort of thing isn't supposed to happen to these kind of people.
Much has been reported about how Scott Waddle was widely regarded as an up-and-coming officer, a former Eagle Scout, church acolyte and 1981 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. He had the smarts, energy and charm to rise to command of a submarine with every reason to think he would soon make captain -- maybe, given a few breaks, even admiral.
In March 1999, when his son took command of the Greeneville, Dan Waddle proudly gave his son his own "eagles," the silver uniform insignia of an Air Force colonel and a Navy captain, which are equivalent ranks.
"Four years from now, I'll be out here pinning these on you," Waddle told his son.
'DAD, WHY DID GOD LET THIS HAPPEN?'
Waddle learned of his son's accident on a Friday night, when he got a telephone call from his daughter in Houston.
When his son called him from Hawaii the day after the Feb. 9 collision, Waddle recalled, "The first thing he said to me was, 'Dad, why did God let this happen?'
"And I'm a Christian. I'm a big, strong Christian and I'm proud of it. And I said, 'Scott, I've learned something in this world.' I said God didn't let that happen. I said God is good, good is God, if it's not good, it's not of God. God didn't have anything to do with it."
The son told the father that he knew right away what had happened: "He raised the periscope, he looked around, he saw this boat with the bottom cut out of it, sinking, right then -- and he saw people jumping overboard and all he could do was pray. He said, "Let them all get out. God, get out. Get in the rafts.' He can see all this!
"He said, 'Dad my heart was ripped out, just ripped out of me.' "
He asked his son if he should go to Hawaii immediately, but the son said to wait. So Waddle waited, arriving in Hawaii in time to sit through the Court of Inquiry.
Somehow, family life went on. When court let out on some days they would hustle out to watch Scott Waddle's 13-year-old daughter, Ashley, play basketball. Friends and neighbors brought over meals.
But at one point, the two men alone, the son pulled out those eagles, the silver eagles of a Navy captain and Air Force colonel.
"He gave them back to me," the father remembers, his voice wavering.
"He said, 'Well, Dad, guess I won't need this.
"Jesus, this kid."
UWAJIMA, Japan >> The families of nine Japanese missing from a Japanese ship that sank in February off Hawaii signaled their intent yesterday to end the U.S. Navy search for the nine, Ehime Gov. Moriyuki Kato said. Search for missing
Japanese is called offKyodo News Service
He said the families conveyed to him their intention after the U.S. Navy told the prefectural government in western Japan that it wants to hold a briefing on the U.S. compensation system.
But it is not known when the U.S. Navy will end its search for the nine, including four high school students. The nine were lost at sea after their ship, the Ehime Maru, was struck by the nuclear submarine Greeneville and sank Feb. 9.
If the Japanese families settle the case out of court, all procedures have to be completed within two years of the collision, Ehime prefectural government officials said. If the families file a lawsuit, they have to do so in Hawaii within two years.
