KCY, FRD1. GA.
As the message came in, in the familiar five-character blocks of gibberish, he turned to the device that made crypto- graphic tape and began to type.
Without stopping his typing, Signalman Cahn called out to Sergeant Vincent J. Esposito, USMC, "Vince, you better go get the brass. I think they're in the mess. Whatever this is, it's Operational Immediate." Operational Immediate was the second-highest priority for message transmission.
Sergeant Esposito put down his coffee cup and walked quickly out of the radio room.
Less than two minutes later, Signalman Cahn reached for his key, tapped out,
KCY, FRD1, AKN UR OI. CLR.
CINCPAC Radio, Coastwatcher Radio acknowledges receipt of your operational Immediate transmission and is clearing the net at this time.
He waited for the reply, FRD I, KCY. CLR, and then took the strip of paper which had been fed out of his tape machine and fed it into the cryptographic machine. In a moment, the keys began to clatter:
FRD1, KCY.
KCY 6OCT34
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
FOLLOWING RECEIVED 0545 FROM BIRD FOR RELAY
START
PART ONE
PLAN BAKER RPT BAKER EXECUTED AS OF 0530 RPT 0530
PART TWO
EGGS AND CHICKS IN NEST RPT IN NEST
PART THREE
CONDITION TWO RPT TWO THIS IS NO RPT NO MISTAKE
END
By the time Cahn removed the decrypted message from the machine, Lieutenant Commander Eric Feldt, RAN, and Major Edward Banning, USMC, had come into the radio room. Banning had a large manila envelope in his hand.
Signalman Cahn handed the message to Commander Feldt.
He read it and handed it to Major Banning, who read it and handed it to Sergeant Esposito, who had been desperately trying to read it over Banning's shoulder.
"Christ, they couldn't get through the sodding surf or something else went wrong! Bloody hell!" Commander Feldt said.
"McCoy and Wallace are ashore," Banning said, "And Condition Two!" McCoy's orders were to assess the condition of the sand on the beach on a scale of One to Five: One meant it was Perfect and Five meant it was Extremely Hazardous.
Banning took a sheet of paper from the manila envelope. He had prepared a number of messages beforehand to cover all the contingencies he could think of. The message he was looking for had three spaces that he'd left blank. He wrote BAKER in one of them and 0530 06OCT42 and TWO in the others. Then he handed the sheet to Cahn.
"The sooner the better, Cahn," he said.
"Aye, aye, Sir." Cahn set the switch on the tape machine to CLEAR, then typed the message.
FOR CINCPAC RADIO
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
FROM OFFICER COMMANDING RAN COASTWATCHER ESTABLISHMENT
FOR RELAY TO COMMGENERAL 1ST MAR DIVISION
FOLLOWING FOR MAJOR HOMER DILLON USMC X PLAN BAKER SUCCESSFULLY EXECUTED AS OF 0530 06OCT42 X CONDITION TWO REPEAT TWO X EXECUTE PLAN VICTOR X ADVISE ONLY DELAYS AND REASONS THEREFORE X FELDT
He then moved switches on the encryption device to ENCRYPT, fed the tape to it, and waited for the message to appear.
Two minutes later, CINCPAC Radio acknowledged receipt of Coastwatcher Radio's encrypted Operational Immediate message. Four minutes after that, CINCPAC sent another message.
FRD1, KCY. FYI 1STMARDIV AKN UR OI.
Coastwatcher Radio, this is CINCPAC Radio. For Your Information, First Marine Division Radio has acknowledged receipt of your Operational Immediate.
KCY, FRD1. THANKS. FRD1 CLR.
"They've got it, Sir," Cahn reported.
"When do we net with Ferdinand Six?" Banning asked.
"Six-fifty, Sir," Cahn said after consulting his Signal Operating Instructions for 0001-2400 6 October 1942. "About ten minutes, Sir."
"Try them now," Commander Feldt ordered.
Cahn did so. There was no reply from Ferdinand Six. Neither was there a reply at the appointed hour.
"Keep trying," Feldt ordered.
At 120-second intervals, Cahn tapped out FRD6, FRD1.
FRD6, FRDI.
At 0710, twenty minutes late, FRD6 came on the air:
FRD1, FRD6. FRD1, FRD6.
"He's calling us, Commander," Cahn said. "Not responding to us. Maybe his reception is bad."