Harrison News Hearld Interview
Monday, 9 June 2003
Monday, 9 June 2003
Commander George Wallace, USN (Retired) spent twenty-two years aboard nuclear submarines. Wallace served on two of Admiral Rickover's "Forty One for Freedom", the USS John Adams (SSBN 620) and the USS Woodrow Wilson (SSBN 624), making nine 100-day deterrent patrols through the height of the Cold War. The Sturgeon-class nuclear submarine Spadefish (SSN 668), on which Wallace served as Executive Officer, served as the inspiration for his debut novel, Final Bearing, which he co-authored with Don Keith. As skipper of the 668 attack submarine USS Houston, Wallace invented the swimmer lock-out procedure for 668-class submarines used by Navy SEALs, and worked extensively with the SEAL community to develop SEAL/submarine tactics. Wallace responded to Bowsprit's questions from his home near Los Angeles, where he writes and lives with his wife, Penny.
Have you always been interested in the sea?
Yes. That probably sounds a little funny considering that I grew up on a farm in Ohio. But if you check the rosters of most of the Navy ships, you'll find a large percentage of the crews are farm boys from the Midwest.
How did you decide on a naval career?
Probably not until after I had served my first tour on a sub. I joined Navy ROTC in college at Ohio State with the intention of serving what I felt, and still feel, was my military obligation as a citizen. Then the plan was then work as an engineer in the civilian world. I found out that I really love driving ships at sea, and more important, working with the great guys on the boats. You won't find a tighter team or closer family than a sub crew out on a mission.
When did you set your goal to serve in and later command in the nuclear submarine service?
This was really a two-step decision. I decided to try for submarines when I was first commissioned. Later, when I found out that subs were the life for me was when I really set my sights on command.
What moved you to write nautical fiction?
I have spent a lot of time telling sea stories and explaining what it's like to serve on a sub. What sailor doesn't tell sea stories? I wanted to tell what it is like to serve on modern nuke boats and to give the reader an idea of what really goes on. The missions were much too highly classified to ever tell, so that left fiction. Along the same lines, I spent a great deal of the early 90s working with the SEAL teams in San Diego to develop SEAL-sub tactics. It was natural to make this a major element in our stories.
How did you select the US Navy role in South American drug interdiction for Final Bearing?
There were a number of events that led to this selection. Don, Robbie, and I were looking for a topical story where we could tell a good, exciting tale while describing some of the submarine and SEAL operations and capabilities that I was familiar with. We wanted it to be relevant, believable, and timely. When we started almost three years ago, we didn't have any idea just how timely this story would be. A quick review of the news over the last several weeks reads almost like Juan de Santiago at work.
When I was in command of Houston, one of my fellow Commanding Officers was sent down to patrol off of South America for anti-drug operations. Can't really tell you what or who. SUBPAC totally forgot he was out there. He had to send a message to remind them to order him home. That got me started down the path. A news story a few years ago about the Colombian Army finding a mini-sub in a warehouse eight thousand feet up in the Andes added the extra touch we needed. What would happen if the drug lords really got the boat in the water and tried to use it?
About the same time, the last Sturgeon class sub was decommissioned as a result of Clinton's slashing of the submarine fleet. These were great, highly capable boats that would do pretty much anything you asked them to do. Making the story a tribute to the last patrol for one of them just seemed natural.
How do you research Final Bearing?
Well, the submarining doesn't take a whole lot of research. I was the Executive Officer on Spadefish, the sub in Final Bearing, back in the 80s. The biggest problems there are what am I allowed to tell the reader without telling classified information and how do I tell the details of the operations, the how's and why's, without boring the reader in an overwhelming flood of information. A four-page dissertation explaining the operation of a Mark 48 ADCAP torpedo just doesn't flow well when the characters are trying to sink a ship. It's a fine balance between giving the reader enough information to keep the story engaging and overdoing it.
A lot of the location details, particularly regarding the Columbian and Peruvian Andes, were obtained using web searches. There is an amazing amount of information there. For instance, in the scene where the Spetsnaz swimmers try to steal plans from the Karlskrona Naval Base, information on Spetsnaz swimmer gear, Swedish patrol boat weapons, even a detailed chart of Karlskrona were all on the web.
The plot took a good bit of research, too. This was more along the lines of, we had a pretty good idea of where we wanted to story to go, but was it possible? For instance, getting De Fuka from Columbia to Hong Kong. It turns out from web searches that the only flights are either through the US or London. That information led to adding some interesting (I hope) details for the story that we wouldn't have thought of otherwise.
How did you and Don Keith connect as co-authors?
Actually we share an agent, Robbie Robison. Robbie is an old diesel boat sailor who seems to have a soft spot for other old submariners. He came up with the idea of Don and I teaming on a book. He introduced the two of us over the telephone. We actually didn't meet face-to-face until after we had finished Final Bearing and were almost finished with the sequel. Email and the Internet make it all possible.
The three of us seems to make a very good team. The connection is natural. On the writing, either Don or I would be very hard pressed to tell you who wrote what.
The typical flow is that we agree on a basic plot line, usually a two- to three-page synopsis of where we think the story is going. I'll write a chapter. Don will then fill in color and character development. We will go through a couple of iterations before we are happy with the chapter. Then on to the next. We have surprisingly little re-writing when the manuscript is finished. Every- thing is done on line. The first time the story sees paper is when we send it off to our publisher, TOR.
What can you tell us about Final Bearing without spoiling it for readers?
Well, I've kind of dropped several hints about the story already.
If you have read the news from Colombia over the last few months, you'd swear that Juan de Santiago was alive and back in business. Juan is the demented, brilliant revolutionary leader and narco-terrorist who is fighting to free his people and make himself wildly rich at the same time. His secret weapons are a highly addictive form of coke and a mini-sub to smuggle the stuff into the US.
Arrayed against him are a discredited DEA agent, an aging nuclear sub on her last mission before the scrap yard and a never-say-die SEAL team.
The plot stretches from the steamy mountain jungles of Colombia to Puget Sound and most of the water in between. I think I can safely say that if you ever rode the boats, you'll feel at home on Spadefish and SEAL friends have told me that they felt like they were diving through the clouds when they read the HALO jump scene.
What can you tell us about your next book?
I'm really excited about it.
We go up north, to the Barents and the Kola. The Russian Navy is staging a resurgence and attempting a coup against the ineffectual elected government.
At the same time we fold in a major computer attack on the stock market. After retiring from the Navy, I spent a great deal of time working on stock market technology. This is a "what-if" based on that experience.
Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?
If you like submarine stories, techno-thrillers, or just a good story, read Final Bearing. And, as my agent says, you'll do your part to keep an old submariner off welfare. I'm not sure if he is talking about me or him.
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