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.
'Then come down off the plane,' I told him. 'And bring the ambassador with you.'
Before they opened the door, Bob told me that his snipers were reporting armed men in uniform. 'No sweat, boss,' he told me. 'They've got them in their sights.'
The door opened and the pilot, followed by the 'ambassador,' came down the ladder. They were both very nervous, particularly the 'ambassador.' They got even more nervous when they saw the SEAL shooters, all in black combat gear and equipped for business.
I was very suspicious of the 'ambassador.' Although he was dressed in a business suit, I figured him for a general officer, perhaps from the Egyptian Intelligence Service, who had been sent along to ensure that everything went right in Tunisia.
When I met him, the 'ambassador' produced an authentic-looking diplomatic passport and a letter claiming he was an authorized representative of the Egyptian government.
'My orders are to take the terrorists off the plane and fly them back to the U.S. to stand trial for killing Leon Klinghoffcr,' T told him.
This seemed to make him even more nervous, and he asked if anybody had an aspirin.
'We can handle that,' I said.
In the air on the way to Sigonella, I'd felt a headache coming on. By then it was October 11, and none of us had had more than a couple of hours sleep since October 7. When I'd asked our team doctor for a couple of aspirin, Darrel had stuffed what felt like a handfull of aspirin into my pocket.
I accommodated the ambassador with about half of what I had, and he gulped down several of them. He then asked for a cigarette, and one of my radio operators satisfied that request. At that point he wanted to make an urgent telephone call. I told him we would escort him over to base operations (Bill Spearman's operations center) and assist him with his call.
As he was escorted to the operations center, I sent one of my intelligence officers along with a couple of our people to tap the phone. They were to stay with him as long as necessary, and keep me posted on what they were hearing.
The person he needed to talk to so urgently, as it turned out, was Abdel Meguid, the Egyptian Foreign Minister, to whom he described the terrible situation he was in and asked for guidance.
'You'll just have to sort things out as best you can,' he was told, 'until a decision about what to do can be reached.'
He stayed on the phone most of the day with various people back in Egypt — remaining very concerned about the uncertainty of the predicament they were in. But he was even more worried about the consequences that could result from the high-level passengers they had on board (who weren't identified at this point, but it was clear he wasn't talking about the terrorists).
The intelligence information from his conversations was relayed to me, and proved very useful later.
Once we had the pilot and the ambassador off the plane, I decided to go aboard myself, accompanied by SEAL Lieutenant Commander 'Pat,' and see who was on it.
Inside, the plane had been configured in a VIP executive mode, with three 'working tables.' At one table on the far side of the plane sat the four terrorists, unarmed and easy to identify. Three of them appeared to be in their twenties, and one looked to be a little younger. Next to them at another table sat eight to ten members of Egypt's counterterrorist force (Force 777), all of them in uniform and all armed with automatic pistols. At another table on the right sat two men in civilian clothes — evidently big shots. One was very Arab in appearance and very tough- looking. The other was younger, redheaded and freckle-faced, and resembled no ethnic group in the region that was familiar to me. There also were the copilot, the navigator, and about four other crew members.
Although they were armed, I did not consider the 777 guards to be a threat. As it happened, we had trained the 777 Force a few years back, but we knew they had not kept up their proficiency, and now they found themselves at the mercy of those who had trained them — the best in the world. And they knew it.
After we had looked around, Pat and I left the plane.
Back at my command post beneath the tail of the plane, I was joined by Colonel 'Frank' and several members of the battle staff who would add their brains and experience to mine. Bob also positioned his executive officer, Commander 'Tom,' with 'Frank.' Those two were capable of handling anything.
Meanwhile, Bob was firmly in command of security. I told Frank to manage the door and keep an eye on
