The Blankenship Solution

A tiny fishing village nestles in a cove resting on a narrow strait dividing Hokkaido, Japan and Sakhalin Island, The Soviet Union. The strait serves as the only conduit between the Sea of Japan, to the West, and the Sea of Okhotsk, to the East and is fourteen miles wide at the village which lies at the foot of a steep limestone cliff. The cornice at the top of the cliff offers a spectacular view of both the water and Russia. It is the Northern most point in Japan.

It is Summer and the Cold War is as hot as ever. Khrushchev has ousted Bulganin as Russian Premier while remaining Communist Party Boss and immediately promises to bury the United States. Richard Nixon is spat on in South America, Cuba is a mess and the Chinese are preparing to shell Quemoy and Matzu Islands, just off the coast of Taiwan, at the behest of Khrushchev.

Every Summer, since God knows when, the Soviet Eastern Fleet pulls up anchor, leaves its moorings, bursts out of the ice usually present in Vladivostock harbor and heads North to the Sea of Okhotsk to conduct war games. In order to reach their destination the ships must pass through this narrow strait.

Four years earlier the brain trusts at Langley, Virginia, decided two things. One they didnt know a thing about the size or capability of the Vladivostock Fleet and two they could remedy this ignorance by photographing the Flotilla as it passed through the narrow channel. The job was given to Naval Intelligence, and crack teams of radio intercept and direction finding equipment operators were sent to the site for three consecutive Summers. They were to locate and track the Fleet to the Strait at which time a team of civilian experts would photograph the Soviet ships in all their glory. Our people were aware, they would certainly pass through at night and in a thunderstorm if that could be arranged, so they were equipped with State of the Art infra-red cameras with 1000 MM lenses. In three years these incredibly complex and expensive efforts yielded absolutely nothing!

The story opens with our hero, Frank Throckmorton, giving the reader a detailed tour of the village. Throck, as he is called by his mates, takes us through the backbone of the local economy, the Crab Cannery. We witness the entire process, from the boat to the six ounce cans. We are introduced to Jakes Sake house, the only bar in town and visit the general store and laundry. We learn a great deal about the cliff, the obsolete artillery gun placements and the tunnel on the cornice and the bunker, above it all, making not only a great year-round playground for the local children but a wonderful venue for a bunch of intelligence types trying to spy on the Russian Navy.

We meet the spy guys early on. They live and work in the large bunker above the tunnel. They are civilian and older than Throcks people. They wear 45 caliber pistols and are nasty and arrogant. They act mysteriously, have their own jeep and dont like Throcks people at all.

We flash back several months to the top-secret Intelligence Facility back at Chitose. We learn that our heroes serve two masters. Captain Moffet, Regular Army Infantry, commands the base where they live, sleep, eat and play poker. Moffet has no knowledge of what they do at the heavily guarded operations center a short bus trip away and he doesnt hide his resentment. Colonel Robert Blankenship commands the operations center and although Moffet has described these trick-two people as gambling, womanizing drunks, Blankenship knows they are the best at what they do.

Blankenship is very young to be a Bird Colonel and is considered a G-2 wunderkind back at the Pentagon who is destined to become a General very soon. The three consecutive failures of Naval Intelligence to profile the Vladivostock Fleet has not gone un-noticed. It doesnt take long before the problem is turned over to B