Into Enemy Waters: A World War II Story of the Demolition Divers Who Became the Navy SEALS

by Andrew Dubbins

Overview

A veteran US frogman recounts his experiences in World War II and the risky pre-invasion missions of the Underwater Demolition Teams.

?Into Enemy Waters is the story of World War II’s most elite and daring unit of warriors, the direct precursors to the Navy SEALs, told through the eyes of its last living member, ninety-five-year-old George Morgan.

Morgan was just a wiry, seventeen-year-old lifeguard from New Jersey when he joined the Navy’s new combat demolition unit, tasked to blow up enemy?coastal defenses ahead of landings by Allied forces. His first assignment: Omaha Beach on D-Day.

When he returned stateside, Morgan learned that his service was only beginning. Outfitted with swim trunks, a dive mask, and fins, he was sent to Hawaii and then on to deployments in the Pacific as a member of the elite and pioneering Underwater Demolition Teams. GIs called them “half fish, half nuts.” Today, we call them frogmen—and Navy SEALS.

Led by maverick Naval Reserve Officer Draper Kauffman, Morgan would spend the fierce final year of the war swimming up to enemy controlled beaches to gather intel and detonate underwater barriers. He’d have to master the sea, muster superhuman grit, and overcome the demons of Omaha Beach.

Moving closer to Japan, the enemy’s island defenses were growing more elaborate and its soldiers more fanatical. From the black sand beaches of Iwo Jima to the shark infested reefs of Okinawa, to the cold seas of Tokyo Bay, teenaged George Morgan was there before most, fighting for his life. And for all of us.

Perfect for fans of?Unbroken,?The Right Stuff, and?Band of Brothers.

Praise for Into Enemy Waters

“A compelling narrative full of World War II fireworks.” —Kirkus Reviews

“A rousing history. . . . Drawing on extensive interviews with Morgan, Dubbins creates a vivid and fast-moving narrative of courage and sacrifice under the most extreme conditions. WWII buffs will be thrilled.” —Publishers Weekly

“This well-researched book is both visceral and uplifting, telling of a time of great courage, integrity and camaraderie.” —Jill?Heinerth,?author of Into The Planet: My Life as a Cave Diver

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781635767759
Publisher:	Diversion Books
Publication date:	04/06/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	455
Sales rank:	359,697
File size:	7 MB

About the Author

Andrew Dubbins is an award-winning journalist and author, based in Los Angeles. His work has appeared in Alta, Los Angeles magazine, The Daily Beast, Slate, and other publications. He was named “Journalist of the Year” by the Los Angeles Press Club in 2021, and several of his narrative non-fiction stories have been optioned for film and TV.

Table of Contents

Prologue xiii

Part I The Atlantic

1 The Crash 3

2 Shadow of War 13

3 Bomb Disposal 19

4 The Lifeguard 31

5 Coastal Defenses 39

6 Fort Pierce 47

7 The Demolitioneers 53

8 Overlord 64

9 Rising Tide 70

Part II The Pacific

10 Amphibians 83

11 The Lagoon 90

12 Combat Swimmers 97

13 The Whale 108

14 Setting Sail 117

15 The Elite 121

16 The Floating City 130

Part III Into Enemy Waters

17 Sulphur Island 137

18 Falling Leaves 146

19 Black Sand 154

20 The Catchers 160

21 Blessman 168

22 The Flag 176

23 The Reef 185

24 Kamikaze 194

25 Pulling Teeth 203

26 Easter 208

27 Typhoon 217

28 Black Skies 224

29 R&R 233

Part IV The Last Island

30 The Big One 243

31 The Sword 250

32 Coronado 260

Epilogue 269

Acknowledgments 277

Sources 279

Index 313

About the Author 319

Editorial Reviews

07/04/2022

Journalist Dubbins delivers a rousing history of the U.S. Naval Combat Demolition Units focused on combat swimmer George Morgan and demolition school commander Draper Kauffman. A former lifeguard, Morgan joined the Navy at age 17 and was given a pair of swim fins and a diving mask (neither of which he had ever seen before) and told he was volunteering for naval combat demolition. After surviving the training program devised by Kauffman, Morgan was assigned to clear obstacles from the waters off Omaha Beach for the D-Day invasion. His unit went in with the first wave of Marines and suffered a 52% casualty rate. Afterwards, Morgan and Kauffman were sent to the Pacific, where Underwater Demolitions Teams destroyed mines and booby traps and conducted reconnaissance missions before invasions began. At Okinawa, Morgan helped map the approaches to the beach and detonate hundreds of wooden stakes that had been sharpened to deadly points and embedded in the coral. Wounded at Borneo, he was training for the invasion of the Japanese home islands when the war ended. Drawing on extensive interviews with Morgan, Dubbins creates a vivid and fast-moving narrative of courage and sacrifice under the most extreme conditions. WWII buffs will be thrilled. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

Exhaustively researched and written in a lively, gripping manner, this history deserves to be on the bookshelf of anyone who admires courage or who has donned a face mask and looked below the surface of any sea.”  

—Bing West, author of The Last Platoon, Marine combat Veteran, and former Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs

 

“A remarkably stirring narrative that transports readers into the gritty realities of surviving WWII. Andrew Dubbins’ Into Enemy Waters is more than just a great retelling of the history of early combat swimmers and Frogmen. This well-researched book is both visceral and uplifting, telling of a time of great courage, integrity and camaraderie. These are not your Hollywood Navy Seals. They are real men that sacrificed their youth and innocence for the greater good.”  

—Jill Heinerth, author of Into The Planet: My Life as a Cave Diver 

 

“The harrowing combat experiences of George Morgan and his pioneering comrades of the World War II U.S. Navy's combat demolition units come to life in this well-researched, intimate history. Andrew Dubbins tells their story with authoritative empathy and much verve.” 

—John C. McManus, Ph.D., Curators' Distinguished Professor of History, Missouri S&T, and author of Island Infernos: The U.S. Army's Pacific War Odyssey, 1944 

 

“Today’s SEALs are a highly effective, versatile, and lethal force, but they stand on the shoulders of these heroic WWII frogmen.  This book must be included in the canon of histories about our nation’s special operations forces.  Andrew Dubbins meticulously and faithfully takes the reader from Ft. Pierce to Omaha Beach to the bloody amphibious invasions of the Pacific to recount the story of the Navy’s fabled Underwater Demolition Teams.  May their memory never fade.”    

—Captain Michael V. Goshgarian, USN (ret.), Naval Special Warfare 1989-2016

 

“An authentic, vigorously reported and told story of the men in both the Atlantic and Pacific Theaters whose literally explosive exploits became the envy of and inspiration for the Navy SEALS. Thank goodness the 'demolition divers' are finally getting their due, and in such riveting detail.”  

—Tom Clavin, New York Times bestselling coauthor of Halsey’s Typhoon: The True Story of a Fighting Admiral, an Epic Storm and an Untold Rescue; and Lightning Down 

 

“This is a gripping, heart-racing, nail-biting masterpiece. It tells the story of George Morgan, his commander and fellow frogmen on an underwater demolition team that evolved into the Navy SEALS. Join them at Normandy, where, faces gray with fear, they swim through searing gunfire, shrieking shells and moaning men to blast apart Nazi barriers; then join them in the Pacific, where, during the bloodiest invasions of World War II, they map the ocean floor at Iwo Jima for U.S. warships and swim onto the shores of Japan itself. These are their personal stories, exhaustively reported by a master of elegantly layered styling, who has written a book about rare and breathtaking courage. It will hold you deeply into the night, and you will be glad that it did.”  

—Richard E. Meyer, senior editor at UCLA Blueprint magazine and two-time Pulitzer finalist 

 

“A superior piece of narrative military history, offering intimate profiles of the young men called upon to perform some of the most dangerous feats of World War Two that proved critical to pivotal battles on both fronts. Andrew Dubbins has succeeded in portraying a fully human portrait of these men, who were both vulnerable to the horror of war and somehow able to survive it.”   

—McKay Jenkins, author of The Last Ridge: The Epic Story of America’s First Mountain Soldiers and the Assault on Hitler’s Europe  

 

“Gripping and intensely moving, Into Enemy Waters is a timely reminder that war leaves none of its participants unaffected. Andrew Dubbins has honored the memory of those who gave their lives and announced himself as a major new talent in narrative nonfiction.”  

—Saul David, author of Crucible of Hell: The Heroism and Tragedy of Okinawa, 1945 

 

“A tale of breathtaking and breath-holding daring. This is D-Day and the Pacific Theater as you’ve never witnessed it before—through the eyes of the frogmen who reconnoitered the murky, mine-filled waters and hostile shores for allied landings. Into Enemy Waters reminds us of the meaning of true sacrifice and courage.”  

—Buddy Levy, award-winning and bestselling author of Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Polar Expedition and River of Darkness  

 

“This book is a rollicking tale of warfare from a different time, when America’s elite units were cobbled together on short notice and manned with skinny teenagers who had every reason to expect they would get killed in battle. It is a story of noble intentions but also terrible desperation. Andrew Dubbins elegantly weaves personal stories through the grand historical narrative, while offering a compelling backstory about the hardscrabble origins of a legendary special operations force.” 

—Graeme Smith, author of The Dogs Are Eating Them Now: Our War In Afghanistan  

 

“As their numbers decline, it is essential to preserve the memories of the veterans of WW II.  Andrew Dubbins has done this in this excellent book, describing the tragic horror of that war while writing of the daily acts of courage of those who served. From Normandy to Iwo Jima, his account of the courageous Underwater Demolition Teams, the famed US Navy ‘Frogmen,’ is powerful. But in Dubbins’ sensitive telling, it is also so very personal and human. A moving story well told.” 

—James Wright, President Emeritus of Dartmouth College, historian and Marine Corps veteran, and author of War and American Life: Reflections on Those Who Serve and Sacrifice

“Journalist Dubbins delivers a rousing history of the U.S. Naval Combat Demolition Units…He creates a vivid and fast-moving narrative of courage and sacrifice under the most extreme conditions. WWII buffs will be thrilled.”

—Publishers Weekly

“The carefully researched book takes readers into pivotal world events such as the landing on Omaha Beach, the bombing of Pearl harbor, and the atomic bomb’s first use. The narrative is gritty and personal and nothing like a Hollywood version of the Navy Seals. Readers will enjoy the visceral and detailed writing that illuminates the uncomfortable nature of war and the maturity of teenagers who ultimately saved the world from fascism.”

—DIVER magazine

From the Publisher

06/01/2022

The Underwater Demolition Teams (UDT), created in World War II, were special-purpose warriors (sometimes called frogmen) who preceded an amphibious landing and destroyed obstacles to the landing ships following behind them. This involved swimming up to a defended coast with just a box of explosives and a knife they were trained to use not as cutting fuses and detonation cords, not weapons. They trained hard for dangerous work and saved many infantry lives by preparing the beaches, usually while under enemy fire. Journalist Dubbins's narrative of the UDT focuses on one of the few remaining frogmen, George Morgan, a combat swimmer who survived swimming up to Omaha Beach, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa, among others. The development of the teams is related through the acts of Draper Kauffman, who organized, trained, and fielded UDT. There is some greatly simplified World War II history for context. There are extensive endnotes, mostly secondary sources and interviews with Morgan. This is an interesting, popular history of a combat unit that evolved into the modern Navy SEALs. VERDICT Suitable for public libraries and comprehensive World War II history collections.—Edwin Burgess

Library Journal

2022-05-31
A rare surviving World War II frogman tells his story.

Journalist Dubbins presents a text based on his interviews with George Morgan (b. 1927). During the war, his unit suffered more than 50% casualties clearing obstacles before the 1944 landing at Omaha Beach. Morgan belonged to the newly formed Underwater Demolition Team, led by the book’s other principal, Draper Kauffman. Son of an admiral and fiercely adventurous, Kauffman was denied a Navy commission due to poor vision. In 1940, he traveled to France as an ambulance driver during the German invasion. He was captured and released, whereupon he joined the Royal Navy and volunteered for its bomb disposal teams. A month before Pearl Harbor, he returned to Washington, D.C., to “launch the US Navy’s first-ever Bomb Disposal School.” In 1943, the Navy knew that Germany was constructing obstacles along the coastline. Searching for an explosives expert, Navy officials settled on Kauffman, ordering him to form an elite unit that would reconnoiter enemy beaches and demolish obstacles. Readers will enjoy the author’s descriptions of the fast-paced action that followed, as Kauffman, Morgan, and the rest of the team commandeered facilities, recruited men, and designed a brutal program featuring exhaustive conditioning and extensive training in weapons, explosives, and teamwork. That training regime was an important predecessor to what the SEALs would develop 20 years later. Dubbins fills the book with energetic accounts of the unit’s operations, including the earliest, Normandy, which was very much a learning experience. The unit found greater success in later operations in the Pacific theater, where the Japanese built few obstacles. Approaching in rubber boats and often under fire, Morgan and his comrades searched for mines, measured water depths, checked beach defenses, and labeled clear paths for landing boats to follow through reefs and shallows. As a result, America’s island landings became so efficient that the Japanese stopped defending beaches, preferring to retire inland to dig in and fight.

A compelling narrative full of World War II fireworks.

Kirkus Reviews