In May of 1942, a young L. Ron Hubbard commanded the USS PC-815 submarine chaser patrolling the Northern Oregon waters when suddenly the sonar gear detected a bizarre return echo. Japanese submarines had triggered alarms three months prior on the coast of California, and the US Navy was already on high alert. For over 68 hours, PC-815, several other vessels, and air support vehicles engaged in a desperate hunt for intruders. Officer Hubbard would go on to drop dozens of depth charges and then dramatically claim that his crew sank an enemy submarine and damaged another one. The heroic story may have inspired an entire religion. Hubbard’s tale would become a creed of an irrefutable doctrine of heroism and honor within his Church of Scientology.There was just one problem, however. The vanquished Japanese submarines may have never existed at all…