Scorpion Down: Sunk by the Soviets, Buried by the Pentagon: The Untold Story of the USS Scorpion

I first came across information and pictures of the Scorpion in her final resting place while a graduate student in Engineering at the University of Wisconsin in the late 1960's. In a technical publication were pictures of the 'sail' and other parts as well as a description of the equipment involved in taking the photographs. I marveled at the results so far beneath the surface and in later years would come to read of the accident investigation and most probable cause for her demise.
When I read the title of this book in my public library and the attention gathering blurb, "Sunk by the Soviets, Buried by the Pentagon: The Untold Story of the USS Scorpion" I was certainly intrigued. While certainly not a novice to governmental intrigue and shortcomings, I also am a trained Root Cause Investigator of Nuclear Incidents, I need to see objective data and in the case of human observation and recollection, have long ago learned that this source is many times inaccurate and as time goes by increasingly so.
The author has invested a great deal of time and effort following and researching the fate of the Scorpion but I feel that the author has chosen to sensationalize those efforts in the quest for the Almighty dollar.
The author has taken the standard mantras that conspiracy theorists everywhere have learned to use.
1. Find each and any discrepancy you can and use that to negate the facts that result in the official conclusion.
2. Interview individuals years after the fact and find where their recollection differs from their official records of the account.
3. Submit a preponderance of material, much of which has no actual bearing on the subject at hand.
4. Prey on the fact that PT Barnum was correct, "There is a sucker born every minute.
In short, I found not one piece of credible evidence that the author has unearthed to justify the inflammatory sub-title.
This book is in my opinion a shoddy piece of what used to be termed 'yellow journalism' but is now termed 'investigative reporting'.
I certainly am not inured of learning the truth but this investigation(I use the term lightly) has not yield any truth.
I catalog the author with UFO theorists, Area 51 Pundits and adherents to the Loch Ness Monster.

There was a lot of background about submarines and the cold war that did not relate directly to this topic but I slugged through it just in case there was info to be had. In the end the author has not one single shread of evidence to prove his contention that a Soviet Echo class submarine sunk the Scorpion. He does show that the Navy was concerned about her safety a few days before she failed to show up at her home port and that they were taking steps to look for her and get ready to control a large search for her if she did fail to show up on time. This is in fact how things should be done. But holding off on an announcement that one of your subs has not reported in as expected is not the same as proving the Soviets sunk her.

The author grasps at straws to prove his point. As an example he says that his wife over heard three sailors talking and one of them, the apparent leader of the group said that the Scorpion was sunk by the Soviets and he appeared to know what he was talking about. We called such things "mess deck rumors". In another case he quotes a Russian admiral as saying "We don't talk about those events." Big deal. As a matter of fact Navies often don't talk about sensitive events. And finally - the author wants us to believe that Walker passed intel on the Scorpion to the Soviets on the Scorpions mission after she left the Med and was on her way home. Walker passed tons of info but it was in the form of decoder keys that were past their use period and scheduled for destruction. The Soviets used them to decode messages that they had previously recorded weeks and months before. Real time info was not passed according to the books on the subject.

Yes there are minor discrepancies between different statements made by different people over the years since this event occured. That is the nature of human speach and human perception and human memory. No accident is without them. But if his claim was not spectacualar no one including me would have read his book. I was disappointed.

I do not have an ax to grind on this issue, and I have nothing against Ed Offley personally, but his book has much more to say about the willing susceptibility of conspiracy buffs to nonsense than it does about the loss of USS Scorpion in 1968.

My point of view is from a 28-year Naval officer, retired Captain. I was not a submariner, but a surface warfare officer then a judge advocate. I served in the last decade of the Cold War and saw quite a bit of the Soviet Navy. I have also been involved with literally thousands of investigations, and had access to extremely sensitive material. From this point of view:

It would be impossible for a conspiracy of this magnitude to be kept quiet within the US Navy. In fact, in my experience the opposite is the case: way too much is talked about, especially by people who are really only re-telling stories heard on a sleepy midwatch. I heard the story about Scorpion being torpedoed by the Russians when I was still in OCS. It was nonsense then and remains nonsense now. Offley presents no compelling evidence to the contrary.

What does he present? A collection of sea stories from people unconnected to the actual events, with the exception of then-COMSUBLANT and CNO. The two admirals' sea stories are only remarkable in that they apparently contradict their 1968 testimony about when the Navy became concerned that Scorpion was missing - on May 22nd or May 27th? Another reviewer has intelligently commented about why the Navy leadership may not have acknowledged the earlier date - out of concern for protecting a classified operation and to deflect potential criticism over not informing the crew's families earlier. If the inconsistency in dates is factual, that explanation seems more logical and plausible than anything Offley points to. Moreover, another reviewer in this string of reviews points out that he was a crewman aboard USS Ray at the very moment COMSUBLANT states that he was onboard Ray and first suspected the Scorpion was missing. The reviewer points out that there was no three-star admiral on his boat, and that in fact the submarine was in the midst of its first deployment. I think I trust his unbiased memory, over a retired admiral in his eighties.

The actual and best bits of evidence about the Scorpion disaster are the photographs taken by Mizar in 1968 and Dr. Ballard in 1986. Experts have unanimously stated that the photos show pressure implosion, not explosion and flooding. Compare the photos of Scorpion with those of USS Thresher sunk a few years earlier and clearly a victim of flooding and hull collapse at great depth: there are remarkable similarities. That evidence is not helpful over what caused Scorpion to exceed crush depth, but it weighs very heavily - maybe conclusively - against the Russian torpedo theory.

One final point that has also been discussed in these reviews, but which I also feel argues strongly against Offley's thesis. The suggestion that an Echo II boat could have tailed Scorpion and sunk her in battle is just silly. That boat was much louder than Scorpion, much slower, much less maneuverable, and carried a far less tactically proficient captain and crew. The Echo subs were first generation nuclear-powered missile boats that trained, to the extent they trained at all, in anti-surface tactics. The Soviets had far better subs to send if they contemplated a suicidal attack on an American sub. It just makes no sense. An Echo II was only deadly to a submarine like Scorpion in the way any large, heavy obstacle would have been dangerous: a hazard to navigation.

The book itself is capably written, but does suffer from excess padding and repetition.

Several people have suggested it would have made a better novel than history. I would modify that: Scorpion Down is a sometimes interesting collection of sea stories, the kind told by Sailors to the gullible listeners of the world.

The sinking of the Scorpion has clearly explained by Engineer and Scientist John Craven who was originally in charge of locating her. The ultimate reason was attributed to a torpedo battery failure. This failure also occurred in a Naval Ordinance lab where catastrophic results
destroyed a laboratory. The lab issued a recall memo for these batteries however the Scorpion was already at sea. Many parties in the Navy refused to believe this explanation at the time, preferring to support a more colorful and sinister reason. So, Read Blind Man's Bluff !

The first 210 pages give a nice feel for submarine life and the stress of the cold war during my decade in submarines (1965 to 1975). There are lots of technical errors but mostly minor and do not much detract from the general narrative. They do however cast doubt on the overall accuracy of claims made, and on the premise of the book that the official Navy story is a lie and cover up. From pg. 210 on it is all conspiracy theory. "Soviets Sunk Scorpion" is right up there with "NASA faked the moon landings," "the Mafia assassinated Kennedy," "aliens are among us," and bigfoot/yeti/Nessie - easy to believe, impossible to disprove, but just not likely.
The author gives no treatment to other possible causes: battery explosion, internal torpedo explosion (Mk 37 hot run), limpet mine, major flooding casualty.
Still, a good read.

My work in a museum brings me in contact with many servicepeople,submariners included.Two things we talk about are the Mk XIV torpedo scandal and Scorpion.Many officers and sailors told me it was deliberately sunk.The author's case is built on anecdotal evidence and documentary evidence that is classified or since vanished.Its entirely possible,but a case of what you know versus what you can prove.I did appreciate the ancillary info concerning details of the search and other technical topics so gave it four stars.Also strongly recommend Blind Mans Bluff.

As an ex-nuclear submariner (most of the 70s) I had already heard most of the rumors about the loss of the Scorpion. The author did a great job assembling the known information and included the circumstantial information that has been floating around since the loss. However, until/unless the DOD declassifies all the files (which they likely will never do) the precise conditions related to the loss will never be known with certainty. Great read though from the standpoint of an old submariner.

Ed Offley presents a very strong circumstantial case for the Russians sinking of the Scorpion. He filled a lot of gaps in attempting to prove there was a search 4 days before May 27th. Given SOSUS had all of the capabilities it had in 1968, and a huge explosion did occur that could be tracked and triangulated several hundred miles away, would it not be reasonable for the Navy to look into it or at least upon hearing it try to make contact with the Scorpion? I think so.

For argument's sake, let's say the sinking was an accident and the Russians had nothing to do with it. What could be gained by covering up the search and rescue efforts? Absolutely nothing. But I do not believe for one second with SOSUS at their disposal that the Navy would not have looked into it especially when the direction pointed to where the Scorpion was operating.

Can anyone disprove the Compass Island research ship had the advanced sonar capabilities to find the Scorpion as quickly as Mr. Offley claims. Again, I think not. After reading about what the Compass Island was capable of, it seems very logical the Navy would use it to the fullest to try to find the Scorpion wreckage. Testimony of 3 sailors who worked aboard the Compass Island stated it was involved in the search late on May 24th which contradicts the Navy's claim of it being in port in the US until May 27th.

Another issue that caught my attention was Naval Intelligence going into all of the applicable SOSUS stations and seizing all of their tapes and records shortly after the sinking. Why would this have been necessary if the Scorpion sinking was a completely innocent accident?

I especially appreciated Mr. Offley drawing the connection between the Walker Spy Ring, the Pueblo, and the Scorpion. Again circumstantial - but when so much circumstantial evidence is built up on all sides of the puzzle, pretty soon it's like the Giant being tied down in Gulliver's Travels.

Another thought I have is that if Ed was incorrectly quoting so many sailors and officers who are or were in the US Navy, I would think he would get sued to the hilt and have more than a few court cases pending against him. It is not unreasonable for sailors who were actually at the scenes during the investigation so many years before to come forward and speak of things they saw such as was the case of the 3 who spoke of when the Compass Island left the US to join the search. One of these 3 actually just missed the boat because he had been at a drive in movie when the emergency call came in for he and his crew members to report to the Compass Island. He indicated to the author years later that he "never would have been at a drive in movie on a Monday night (meaning May 27th) when he only had a weekend pass."

In conclusion, I contend that if Scorpion was an accident with no Russian complicity, why are there still several items that remain classified? By declassifying every aspect, it should prove they had nothing to do with the sinking.

This was an excellent book and it could not have given the account in any greater detail given what Mr. Offley had to work with.

It is not unreasonable for sailors who were actually at the scenes during the investigation so many years before to come forward and speak of things they saw.

Mr Offley is a journalist. He has no expertise as a submariner or in any related discipline. The book is colorful repetition of rumor, and garbled pseudo-technical opinions, which do not check with the known facts.

Bruce Rule is the gold standard in these matters, buy his book instead. Challenging to the uninitiate, it isn't that hard to understand. It is nothing but expert analysis.

Offley's book is colorful scuttlebutt.

Excellent. My father was a sub piping designer for 30 years in Groton. I knew one crew member. Accurate book.