Greeneville officers' lives, careers will never be same

The three men at the center of it all were rising stars in their careers as submariners.

Commander’s defense fund Friends of Scott Waddle, the former USS Greeneville skipper, have set up a fund for his legal defense. Donors can e-mail defendwaddlefund@aol.com or send contributions to: Cmdr. Scott Waddle Defense Fund, P.O. Box 40660, Santa Barbara, CA 93140, PAC 0660.

Until this.

Now, the charismatic skipper, his fellow U.S. Naval Academy alumnus and a young officer on his first submarine assignment are forever linked to the tragedy that sank the Ehime Maru.

Scott Waddle, 41, has been removed from command of the USS Greeneville, which collided with a Japanese fishing vessel two weeks ago and left nine Japanese students, teachers and crewmen missing and presumed dead. He was reassigned to a desk job at the U.S. Pacific Fleet’s Submarine Force headquarters at Pearl Harbor the next day.

His lieutenant commander, a 38-year-old Northeasterner named Gerald K. Pfeifer, and a junior-grade lieutenant, Michael J. Coen, a 26-year-old Florida man two years out of submarine officer basic training, are the subjects of a formal court of inquiry, the Navy’s highest-level administrative hearing, to determine what went wrong.

The rarely used court of inquiry, set for March 5, could lead to courts-martial, depending on what the Navy court recommends to the Pacific Fleet commander.

Even if the Greeneville’s officers are exonerated, none of them could have expected to be part of such an infamous incident.

Sympathy, irony

"They are fine officers. They are well-trained. They are trained extensively. They are qualified on their watch," said John D. Peters, a former submarine commander and friend of Waddle. "When you have an accident, you look and say, ‘Well, they’re very, very good. But they didn’t do enough.’ "

Peters, skipper of the USS John Adams from 1972 to 1977, is sympathetic. Any seaman remembers the tension that goes along with accidents and near-misses, he said.

What’s ironic, Peters said, is that Waddle and his crew are under scrutiny by the Japanese — whose navy the Greeneville worked with in rescue training in 1999, the year Waddle, a 19-year naval veteran, assumed command.

In the deep-sea rescue exercise with the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force, the navies joined forces to practice using a U.S. mini-submarine to rescue sailors from a Japanese submarine. The Avalon, a miniature submarine developed to retrieve people from underwater shipwrecks, was attached to the top of the Greeneville while the Japanese crew rested the JDS Hayashio submarine on the ocean floor, pretended to be disabled, and let the Greeneville crew rescue 24 people.

Feb. 9’s real-life shipwreck proved to divide the same nations.

"It’s like running into your brother," Peters said. "It’s ironic, and it’s a terrible accident."

Attorney at helm

Waddle, the son of a retired Air Force colonel and stepson of a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, and his family in Austin, Texas, are waiting until after the investigation to talk to the news media. Pfeifer and Coen also have declined requests for interviews.

Waddle has hired private attorney Charles Gittins, a Virginia lawyer and former Marine Corps aviator, for the hearing. Gittins has represented such high-profile clients as Gene McKinney, a former sergeant major of the Army who was cleared of charges involving sexual harassment of six military women, including groping and pressuring them for sex, but was convicted of obstruction of justice for coaching one of them on what to say to investigators.

"Scott is unable to speak out in his own behalf on the advice of counsel," said Dr. Jeane Mounce, a friend since 1973. "Let me tell you, this tragedy has pierced his heart and soul. He is devastated with the loss of life. For a man who has always been open and outgoing, this inability to defend his honor and his integrity is a tremendous burden. His friends and family share his agony."

Distinguished record

Waddle’s resume alone speaks much of his experience. He has been assigned to submarines since 1983 and has risen through the ranks from his days on the USS Alabama to the USS Kentucky, USS San Francisco and advanced officer training along the way.

"Being a retired submarine officer myself, I don’t think you get to that position without being a respectable individual," said Paul Ferguson, a submarine veteran in Hawai‘i who knows him.

Others who know Waddle say he was destined for bigger things.

In an evaluation in August, Navy Capt. David McCall called him an "outstanding mentor" and "inspirational leader" who had won awards and kept morale high.

"Commander Waddle is performing flawlessly as commanding officer, and I know no other officer with his proven potential to serve in a major command," McCall wrote. "He is most strongly recommended for immediate promotion to captain."

Waddle also was the kind of leader who inspired his crewmen, said Jerry Hofwolt, executive director of the USS Bowfin Submarine Museum and Park, near the USS Arizona Memorial Museum.

Hofwolt, who was in the Navy for 30 years and retired as a captain, found instant camaraderie with Waddle when they met in 1993 at Pearl Harbor. The two submariners discovered they both spoke Italian.

"Waddle has a bubbling personality. He’s very approachable," Hofwolt said. "He is a ‘glass half-full’ guy, not a ‘glass half-empty’ guy."

Negative, positive chat

On the Internet, former submariners typing away in chat rooms look at Waddle’s next glass as a half-empty one: "I have known many submariners and captains, they are some of the finest human beings that I have ever met," one wrote. "But they are humans and they do make mistakes, this guy’s career is over."

For Waddle’s longtime friends who attended Forrest Sherman High School in Naples, Italy, with him, news of the accident has had the same impact as a funeral announcement.

"Hey Wildcats," says a post on his high school alumni Internet message board. "One of our own needs your thoughts and prayers. Commander Scott Waddle, FSHS class of ’77, is CO of the USS Greeneville, the sub involved in the accident with the Japanese fishing boat off Pearl Harbor last week. Please pray for the families of the young men who died and also for Scott and his crew and their families."

Where some in anonymous chat rooms are quick to criticize the ousted skipper, his longtime friends are quick to defend him.

"Please do keep Scott Waddle and his family, crew members and their families and those who lost their lives and families in your thoughts," wrote Bethe Mounce-Blasienz, class of 1975. "This is a tough time for all involved. My heart is saddened to hear of this incident, but when the facts are known, I believe all will be well."

Louis Ludwick, who remembers Waddle from high school as a well-rounded National Honor Society student, the lead in the school musical and football player who dated a cheerleader, said it’s not surprising Waddle has had such a successful career in the Navy.

"Scott was a great person to be around. He had lots of fun, but also had a serious side," Ludwick said. "I know he’s devastated by the loss of life in the accident. I have confidence in his judgment, and I am sure that when all the facts are known, it will be demonstrated that he had no fault in the accident through any direct personal carelessness. Accountability as commanding officer for the errors of others and for pure bad luck is another matter, and I hope that the difference is clear to all. Scott is among ‘the best of the best,’ and he has earned a full and fair hearing."

Outpouring of support

The next man in line on the USS Greeneville, Pfeifer, who served tours on the submarines USS Batfish and USS Nevada before coming to the Greeneville, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy five years after Waddle. And he, too, has friends sticking up for him.

"I can say that I have the highest regard for Jerry in every aspect of his life," said Dave Going, a Seattle man who served with Pfeifer on the Nevada in the late 1980s and considers him a good friend. "And if my son grows up to have the qualities I know Jerry to possess, I'll be one proud father indeed."

Coen, 26, the junior-grade lieutenant, had the misfortune of being assigned as the officer of the deck the day the Greeneville collided with the Ehime Maru.

The Greeneville was his first assignment since finishing submarine officer basic training in February 1999. He is nearly four years out of college at Florida State University and facing a Navy hearing no one wants to face in their entire careers.

For those who served on the Greeneville, there is a sense that Coen’s situation could have been any of them. The shock waves are still reverberating.

"Greeneville was one of the best submarines in Pearl Harbor when I was on board," said Juan Lorendo, who now lives in San Antonio. "I never thought something would happen to the Greeneville like this."

On Internet chat rooms, discussion lingers on what should happen to the submarine’s top brass.

"In situations like this, Jack, the good guys usually take the blame," says one post on a chat room for retired military from someone named Dave LaCourse, who describes himself as a "pirate and bottom dweller." "I'm afraid that the CO’s career is kaput, regardless of the outcome of the investigation. You do not lose a man-of-war or get it involved in any kind of a collision without suffering some repercussions. Too bad, too."

Advertiser military reporter Mike Gordon contributed to this report.

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