{"id":15744,"date":"2025-11-10T11:19:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-10T18:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/memories-of-mayaguez-from-below-the-sea-to-the-high-desert\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:50:32","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:50:32","slug":"memories-of-mayaguez-from-below-the-sea-to-the-high-desert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/memories-of-mayaguez-from-below-the-sea-to-the-high-desert\/","title":{"rendered":"Memories of Mayaguez: From below the sea to the high desert"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Navy
Navy veteran Wes Soule stands in his office at Disabled American Veterans Chapter 44, housed at Project Outreach in Cortez. Behind him hangs a photo of the USS Thomas A. Edison (SSBN-610), the nuclear ballistic submarine on which he completed two three-month patrols in the late 1970s. (Benjamin Rubin\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Fifty years and five months ago, Wes Soule still remembers the tension at the Pentagon when his radio team received word of the hijacking. The Cambodian communist Khmer Rouge had boarded the SS Mayaguez, an American cargo ship.<\/p>\n

Soule was working on the fourth floor of the Pentagon in the Naval Operations Communications Center on May 12, 1975, when the Khmer Rouge \u2013 at one point supported by North Vietnam \u2013 attacked and boarded an American vessel anchored off the coast of Cambodia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey didn\u2019t know what was going on when they saw the invader ships coming up next to the Mayaguez,\u201d Soule said. \u201cOnce they boarded, the officers went to the radio shack and closed the door, then contacted us.\u201d<\/p>\n

For its place in history, the Mayaguez incident<\/a> has been called \u201cthe final tragedy of the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.\u201d Only weeks earlier, in April 1975, Saigon had fallen to North Vietnam as American personnel fled the country, while a U.S.-backed regime in Cambodia had succumbed to the Khmer Rouge, who later unleashed one of the most gruesome genocides in modern history.<\/p>\n

Soule stood in the communications center receiving second-by-second updates on the dire situation aboard the Mayaguez. Soule said the newspaper reports that followed differed significantly from what he witnessed, leaving him to question the U.S. government\u2019s transparency.<\/p>\n

At 72, Soule serves as adjutant for Disabled American Veterans at Project Outreach in Cortez, supporting fellow veterans among the estimated 2,400 to 3,000<\/a> in Montezuma County. Like many in the region, Soule contributed to American military history.<\/p>\n

Though he excelled in the Navy, Soule faced setbacks and instability after returning to civilian life \u2013 a journey marked by reinvention, resilience and ultimately, service to others.<\/p>\n

\u201cA \u2018can-do\u2019 Navy person\u201d<\/div>\n

Born and raised in the Denver area, William Edwin \u201cWes\u201d Soule briefly attended college in Pueblo, Colorado, before enlisting in the Navy in June 1974. By then, Congress had begun impeachment proceedings against President Richard Nixon, and U.S. combat troops had left Vietnam more than a year earlier.<\/p>\n

Soule\u2019s training began in Great Lakes, Illinois, then continued in Mississippi at Naval Air Station Meridian. He hoped for shore duty to continue college, he said.<\/p>\n

Instead, he was sent to the Pentagon, initially living at Fort Myer. He recalled seeing civilian protesters still vocal against U.S. involvement in Vietnam.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just doing my job,\u201d he said. \u201cI wasn\u2019t sophisticated enough to realize I should have gone and joined with them and argued against the war.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soule quickly became busy typing telecommunications memos for the Navy and excelled, as his performance evaluations later showed.<\/p>\n

\u201cPetty Officer SOULE is an outstanding example of a \u2018can-do\u2019 Navy person who does more than his contemporaries in every assigned task,\u201d reads an evaluation from 1977.<\/p>\n

That year, he also participated as military support staff in the inauguration of President Jimmy Carter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t have enough seniority to actually get even close to the swearing in at the Capitol building,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

But he did see Carter during the new president\u2019s inaugural parade. Among the many aged-brown documents he still has from his military days is a certificate for his participation.<\/p>\n

\"A
A photo of a young Wes Soule in Navy uniform hangs in his office at Disabled American Veterans Chapter 44 in Cortez\u2019s Project Outreach. Above it is a relic from his time at the Pentagon\u2019s Naval Operations Communications Center. (Benjamin Rubin\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

While in Washington, he also had fun \u2013 plenty of it. A young buck among older career officers, Soule said he flirted with and later dated multiple secretaries he met in the Pentagon\u2019s food court. He also enjoyed nightlife, museums and performances.<\/p>\n

Soon enough, he yearned for a change.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe joy went out of the honeymoon of being in Washington after about three and a half years.\u201d<\/p>\n

He tried to convince a detailer \u2013 a military official who assigns service members \u2013 to put him on a surface ship.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter trying everything possible for a couple of months, one day I went over to the detailer\u2019s desk and I said \u2018well, how about if I volunteer for the submarines?\u2019 Well, that was an immediate ticket.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aboard the Thomas A. Edison<\/div>\n

Soule was sent to Naval Submarine School in Groton, Connecticut, then ordered to Pearl Harbor. For the first few months, he had little to do.<\/p>\n

He was flown to Guam after four months and lived on a floating barge with his crew before going below sea.<\/p>\n

His submarine, hosting about 140 Navy personnel, was named the Thomas A. Edison SSBN-610. That acronym stands for \u201cSubmarine Service Ballistic Nuclear.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were in that general vicinity of Guam, ready to fire a missile at China if we needed to,\u201d said Soule.<\/p>\n

During the Cold War, crew members aboard the Edison stayed busy with tasks ranging from operating diesel engines to welding in a nuclear environment. Soule focused on clerical duties, supporting the mission from below deck.<\/p>\n

The tight space of submarine life still left room for friendship and plenty of joking around.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would not want somebody on the submarine to know what bothers you or rubs you the wrong way. Because as soon as they found out, they would pepper you with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a submariner, that takes a special breed to live under confined quarters for a prolonged period,\u201d said David Nuttle, a local DAV member and a past CIA official active in Vietnam<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The men even played a prank on the Edison\u2019s commanding officer by removing the door to his personal stateroom and hiding it, Soule said.<\/p>\n

In all, Soule completed two three-month patrols.<\/p>\n

Finding DAV Chapter 44 in Cortez<\/div>\n

After his Navy service, Soule took on a range of jobs and moved around for decades before settling in Cortez.<\/p>\n

He tried electrician school. That wasn\u2019t the right fit, he said. He later enrolled at the University of Colorado Boulder and graduated with a bachelor\u2019s degree in political science, but struggled academically to finish.<\/p>\n

The years went by. Other jobs took him to Arizona. A relationship fell apart, and he wound up homeless for some time, he said. At other points, he moved to Colorado Springs and Denver. Back in Boulder, he worked for the county\u2019s elections office.<\/p>\n

Soule\u2019s brother invited him to live on his property in Mancos, but that didn\u2019t work out.<\/p>\n

By then, Soule was living with his nephew. The two found a spot in one of Cortez\u2019s mobile home parks and settled. They arrived in August 2019 and have stayed since.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when he learned of Disabled American Veterans Chapter 44 in Cortez.<\/p>\n

\u201cI found the DAV when I barely had enough money to cover my rent and my food,\u201d he said. \u201cThey paid my rent a couple of months.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Soule
Soule sits outside his Cortez mobile home, where he has lived with his nephew since 2019. (Benjamin Rubin\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The DAV sits within a larger network of nonprofits and social service outlets that help people in Montezuma County, Soule said. The building offers a unique place for local veterans to connect.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5231 and the American Legion Ute Mountain Post 75, each offering community and support for service members. Along with the county\u2019s Veteran Services office, they form a tight-knit nexus for veterans.<\/p>\n

Soule said he would\u2019ve moved back to Denver years ago if not for the DAV.<\/p>\n

He said the DAV does everything from suicide prevention to aiding someone whose home burned down. The chapter operates a food bank, helps pay for medical care and administers money through the Colorado Veterans Trust Fund<\/a> overseen by the state.<\/p>\n

A couple of years ago, he signed up as the adjutant.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s good about Wes, the way he handles business, he\u2019s got a different outlook on a lot of things than I do,\u201d said Air Force veteran Ron Terry, who started as the DAV\u2019s commander about seven years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s real empathetic to people,\u201d Terry said, calling Soule\u2019s approach to helping veterans \u201cout of the box.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy nature is to help others,\u201d Soule said. \u201cWe don\u2019t really spend much time asking, \u2018why do you need help?\u2019 It\u2019s \u2018what can we do to help you?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

veteran and DAV adjutant Wes Soule reflects on a 50-year-old hijacking incident, Jimmy Carter\u2019s inauguration, submarine life and return to civilian life<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29,185],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-15744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-serving-veterans"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15744"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19820,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15744\/revisions\/19820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15744"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=15744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}