To the vast majority of people in the United States who may know, and have taken advantage of the program, the acronym HARP (Homeowner’s Affordable Refinance Program) is just that, initiated and administered under the auspices of the federal government.
However, to a small, and very rapidly dwindling group of select people, HARP was the acronym for Honeywell Advanced Research Program(s), a broad cover for a series of ‘black programs’ conducted under highly classified contracts with certain agencies of the federal government in the 1970s. Honeywell’s effort was conducted by personnel of the Marine Systems Center in Seattle, Washington, with assistance from the Training and Control Systems Center in West Covina, California (near NOTS Pasadena).
In another actual “Forest Gump” type experience this author had reasonable knowledge of one of those programs, and the unique opportunity to actually work on one of the other programs. The first program went under the cover name Project “Jennifer” (the real project name now known to be “Azorian”). It was conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency, the Summa Corporation, Lockheed Missile and Space Systems Corp., Sun Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co., and several other civilian contractors (including Honeywell MSC) , in the early to mid 1970’s. Employing the purpose built ‘Glomar Explorer’ and associated barge, it involved raising the sunken Soviet Navy Golf II Class SSG missile submarine K-129 (a portion thereof) from a depth of more than 3 miles off the floor of the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii.
If the reader is interested, the author has previously related another "Forest Gump" moment, related to naval intelligence in blog post: https://arnhemjim.blogspot.com/2018/06/a-forrest-gump-type-moment-in-naval.html
Still have and treasure, one of the manganese nodules “mined” by the Glomar Explorer, as a memento from its cover story, and given to me by the late C. Richard Abbey, Honeywell HARP Program Manager, and dear friend.
One of the, if not the main, contribution to the program made by Honeywell, was the engineering design, manufacture, installation, operation, and logistical support of a long baseline dynamic station-keeping system. The system employed a single acoustic transmitter/receiver on ship hull's bottom and an array of acoustic transponders on the ocean bottom.This was in turn, computer integrated with the bow and stern thrusters of the ship, providing continuous position accuracy of the ship over a bottom target, which could be maintained within a real time CEP of less than ten feet. This to a depth of nearly 17,000 feet (3.2 miles) where the submarine lay, within a limited range of sea states. The Project Engineer for this system was Hal Clark. Honeywell was also contracted to support the design and development of the giant claw's optical and acoustic sensor suite.
For comparative purposes:
Glomar Explorer
Displacement: 50,500 long tons
Length (overall): 619 ft (189 m)
Beam: 116 ft (35 m)
Draft: 38 ft
Iowa Class Battleship
Displacement: 47,825 long tons
Length (overall): 860 ft (262.1 m)
Beam:108 ft 2 in (33.0 m)
Draft: 37 ft 2 in (Full load)
The following three images show the Glomar Explorer, and the concept of its operation:
The principal reason for the ship's length and broad beam was to accommodate what was called the "moon bay", a massive interior cavern sized to house the entire capture claw with its payload, the submarine.
Although less than a great photograph, it shows participants in the formal signing ceremony for Summa Corporation's acceptance of the HGE (Hughes Glomar Explorer) from Global Marine on 21 July 1974. Dick Abbey is in front kneeliing (in white Shirt).The event took place on board the ship in international waters in order to avoid taxes, and more importantly the notoriety and recorded record of same.
For those readers who might want to read in detail about Project Azorian the following three books are highly recommended:
N. Polmar and M. White, Project AZORIAN The CIA and the Raising of the K-129, Annapolis, MD, Naval Institute Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-59114-690-2
Sharp, D.H., THE CIA’S GREATEST COVERT OPERATION Inside the Daring Mission to Recover a Nuclear-Armed Soviet Sub, Lawrence, KS, University Press of Kansas, 2012, ISBN 978-0-7006-1834-7
J. Dean, The Taking of the K-129 How the CIA Used Howard Hughes to Steal a Russian Sub in the Most Daring Covert Operation in History, NY, DUTTON, 2017, ISBN 97811101984437
There is also an excellent DVD titled AZORIAN The Raising of the K-129, ISBN 978-1-60883-379-5 produced by Michael White.
The second program that the author was privileged to actually work on was Project "IVY BELLS" under contract with the U.S. Navy and the Central Intelligence Agency. I often comment, and only partially in jest, that if in that time frame the United States and the Soviet Union had come into open conflict, that I would have indirectly contributed to insuring that then Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union (equivalent to US Chief of Naval Operations) Sergei Gorshkov, and his staff, would have had the figurative equivalent of a garrote of piano-wire around their lower organs, resulting in having "sung like the Vienna Boys’ Choir".
The author was involved in conducting the mission and operations analyses, preparatory to the actual operations by the USS Halibut (SSGN-587), USS Parche (SSN-683), USS Richard B. Russell (SSN-687) and USS Seawolf (SSN-575), in the deploying of, and data recovery from a series of “Beasts” on the floor of the Sea of Okhotsk.
This author wishes to express both full acknowledgment and gratitude to the website Covert Shores; http://www.hisutton.com/ and its author H.I. Sutton, for the use of the following two images. For any reader who is interested in the subject, I cannot recommend a finer and more current website. Both images can be enlarged to a limited degree in order that the legends are more legible.
Suffices to say that the program was highly compartmented on an extremely tight “need to know” basis. Will never forget one of our program reviews conducted in our “sciff” (SCIF - Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility) in Seattle, that the reviewing CIA agents (first names only, and I’m not sure those were real)) told Dick Abbey that I needed to be briefed into the next level of the program. He took me aside, and without any paper record he verbally said one word, ‘Petropavlosk’.That was it, and our meeting continued. The Soviet Navy’s communication cables were laid on the ocean floor of the Sea of Okhotsk and linked Soviet Pacific Naval HQ in Vladivostok with their major fleet naval base in Petropavlovsk.
The “Beast(s)” were appropriately nick-named. The author was never made privy to its actual name/nomenclature, and possibly for security purposes it never had one, other than a alphanumeric. Designed and constructed at AT&T Bell Labs it was 20 ft. long and weighed 6 tons. It had a plutonium 238 nuclear power source. It used the principle of electrical induction to record the clear (open un-coded) Russian language message traffic being transmitted without needing to physically penetrate the cable’s protective casing, thus technically in compliance with the provisions of International law.
Given Dick Abbey’s knowledge of electronics and acoustical engineering, I’m certain that he had made a significant hands-on contribution to the design effort. Certainly much more than just a token observer's role.
As a momentary complete segue, among his other talents was the fact that he was an expert long range rifle shot, having trained and served during the Korean war as a Marine with the MOS 8541(now 0317) of a designated Scout Sniper. He continued to compete in amateur matches well into his retirement. One of his favorite rifles was the U.S. Rifle, Springfield, Cal. .30-06, Model 1903A3. It had been his rifle in Korea. A gentleman of many and diverse talents.
With full attribution and expressed gratitude to Wikipedia the following excerpt is cited:
"The Okhotsk cable tapping operation continued for ten years, involving routine trips by three different specially equipped submarines to collect old pods and lay new ones; sometimes, more than one pod at a time. New targets were added in 1979. That summer, a newly converted submarine called USS Parche travelled from San Francisco under the North Pole to the Barents Sea, and laid a new cable tap near Murmansk. Its crew received a presidential citation for their achievement.
(Editorial note: I spent a very challenging, but rewarding, assignment with my family in Seattle for the entire summer of 1979, during one of the nicest summers the city had experienced.)
This operation was compromised by Ronald Pelton, a disgruntled 44-year-old veteran of the NSA, who was fluent in Russian. At the time, Pelton was $65,000 ($202,000 today) in debt, and had filed for personal bankruptcy just three months before he resigned. With only a few hundred dollars in the bank, Pelton walked into the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C. in January 1980, and offered to sell what he knew to the KGB for money.
No documents were passed from Pelton to the Soviets, as he had an extremely good memory: he reportedly received $35,000 from the KGB for the intelligence he provided from 1980 to 1983, and for the intelligence on the Operation Ivy Bells, the KGB gave him $5,000. The Soviets did not immediately take any action on this information; however, in 1981, surveillance satellites showed Soviet warships, including a salvage vessel, anchored over the site of the tap in the Sea of Okhotsk. USS Parche (SSN-683) was dispatched to recover the device, but the American divers were unable to find it and it was concluded that the Soviets had taken it. In July 1985, Vitaly Yurchenko, a KGB colonel who was Pelton's initial contact in Washington, D.C., defected to the United States and provided the information that eventually led to Pelton's arrest.
As of 1999, the recording device captured by the Soviets was on public display at the Great Patriotic War museum in Moscow (former KGB Headquarters, Lubyanka Prison)."
In the opinion of the author the treacherous and traitorous actions of Ronald Pelton rank equivalent to those of John Anthony Walker, Jr. from the other previously mentioned blog page.
The following images are of Russian origin.
U.S. Navy Saturation Diving Gear Mk 11 Mod 0 and associated equipment, used by personnel in "Ivy Bells" operations deploying the pods and retrieving recorded data. Believe it or not General Electric doesn't just make lightbulbs.
