Deep Secrets

By TED GUP

For three days last year, the Soviets fought to save the nuclear submarine that had been crippled by an explosion and fire. In the end, the struggle was lost; the crew was evacuated, and the 426-ft. Yankee I-class sub plunged 18,000 ft. to the bottom of the Atlantic some 600 miles east of Bermuda, taking with it as many as 16 SS-N-6 ballistic missiles, each tipped with two 500-kiloton nuclear warheads. But if the vessel is gone, it has not been forgotten. Since the sinking last Oct. 6, Soviet ships have watched over the site, "maintaining a nearly continuous presence," according to a Pentagon official. Sometimes a Soviet merchant ship keeps the vigil. At other times an AGI (intelligence-gathering vessel) watches over the spot where the sub went under. While the Pentagon says no ship has been on the site for about six weeks, the Soviets are monitoring the area by satellite.

The Soviets have good reason to be vigilant. In 1968 a Soviet submarine sank in the Pacific. Six years later the CIA sent a supersecret salvage platform ship, the Glomar Explorer, to the site; it succeeded in raising part of the ship, along with the bodies of 70 Soviet crewmen, from 3 miles down. But no missiles or codes are known to have been recovered. Today, says Navy Spokesman Lieut. Ken Ross, the Glomar Explorer is "being retained for Navy contingency use at the Maritime Administration site in Suisun Bay, Calif. If there's something that comes up and we determine that we need to use it, it's there, ready to go."

Experts say France, Britain, Japan and perhaps the Soviet Union could also reach the sub. "Down to 20,000 ft., nothing's sacred anymore," says Frank Busby, an expert in deep-sea operations. "You can't put these ((vessels)) down there and call them a memorial anymore because we can reach anything." But reaching the site may be the easy part. At those depths, pressures are 4 tons p.s.i., and deep-sea submersibles are unsuited for raising large objects. Even if the sub's hull is crushed and the missiles are lying in the open on the ocean floor, the task is daunting and extremely expensive.

The Soviets have no intention of relinquishing their claims to the sub, but neither do they plan to salvage it, according to Igor Bulay, press attache at the Soviet embassy in Washington. Nor does the U.S. Navy publicly profess any interest in the sub, noting that it was an older model and that the Soviets had ample time to strip it of encrypting devices. Under international law, the Navy says, the wreck belongs to the Soviets unless they expressly abandon it. Then again, the Navy is not likely to say otherwise, even if another salvage operation is in the offing.