After completion of recruit training, Mr. Hayden was sent to Bainbridge, Maryland to train as a radio operator, and from there he was assigned to his first ship, a destroyer, the USS Charles S. Sperry. He served onboard the Sperry for three years. He was a member of its crew when the ship helped to enforce the Naval blockade of Cuba during the 1962 missile crisis. He later served aboard the USS Borie, the USS Josephus Daniels, and Commander Amphibious Squadron Seven Staff.
In addition to duty at sea, Mr. Hayden served an in-country Vietnam tour as a machine gunner aboard the gunboats of Coastal-River Squadron Three in the Mekong Delta. He completed the Army's Airborne Course and Navy SCUBA training, and was a designated Navy SCUBA Diver and Parachutist. During his Naval career, he was a recipient of numerous awards, including the Legion of Merit, Navy Commendation Medal, Navy Achievement Medal, Combat Action Ribbon, Vietnam Presidential Unit Citation, and Vietnam Gallantry Cross. He is also a licensed pilot, having logged over 4,000 flight hours; and holds an Airline Transport Pilot rating.
Mr. Hayden believes in every life there comes a defining moment, a moment with such profound impact that it changes the direction of thought forever. For him, the moment came the day he entered the Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training facility at Little Creek, Virginia. A program considered by many to be the most physically and mentally demanding military training program in the world. Following the tragic death of his mother, Mr. Hayden left BUD/S. However, BUD/S never left him. The lessons he learned about perseverance, determination, dealing with adversity, and most of all, facing oneself, remain a part of him today.
The value of those lessons became evident when he volunteered to become a double agent for the Naval Investigative Service (NIS), and to operate against the KGB.
In 1981, while assigned to the Naval Air Engineering Center in Lakehurst, New Jersey, Mr. Hayden was approached to volunteer for duty as a double agent. For the next 18 months he served in a support role for agents of the NIS who were involved in counter-intelligence and counter-terrorist operations. Two of those operations were especially memorable; one targeted against the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in New York City, and the other against a communist front bookstore in Philadelphia.
In 1982 he was transferred to Naples, Italy and the operation known as "Sackett Land" began. The operation resulted in the defection of Vitaly Yurchenko, the highest ranking KGB officer ever to defect to the United States. This story later became a feature article in the November 2000 issue of GQ Magazine.
While stationed in California, Mr. Hayden graduated from Grossmont College, with a degree in Political Science. In 1986 he was appointed Force Master Chief for the Naval Telecommunications Command and assigned to Washington, DC. He retired from the Navy in 1988. Mr. Hayden then worked as a law enforcement officer in Northern Arizona, where he was assigned to an FBI multi-agency task force. He retired from Arizona in 2001 and now lives in Las Vegas, Nevada.