Tripoli served on three deployments to
Vietnamese waters during the
Vietnam War, participating in numerous operations.
First tour Except for a round-trip voyage to Okinawa early in September, the ship operated out of
US Naval Base Subic Bay, Republic of the
Philippines for the remainder of her deployment. Main propulsion plant problems, however, continued to plague her. On the return trip, the ship went dead in the water not far to the northwest of Subic Bay. went out and towed her into port. After repairs,
Tripoli, occupied her remaining time in the Far East with amphibious exercises in the Philippines. On 11 December 1967, relieved her as flagship of TG 76.4, and
Tripoli headed for home.
Tripoli arrived in San Diego on 23 December 1967 and remained there through the end of the year. On 22 May 1967,
Tripoli arrived in the combat zone off the coast of
South Vietnam and disembarked
HMH-463 and
VMO-6 at
Danang on the 23rd and 24th before joining TG 76.5, just then finishing up amphibious landing
Operation Belt Tight in the
I Corps zone just south of the
Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between North and South Vietnam. She headed for the Philippines on 25 May, arrived in Subic Bay on the 27th, and relieved as flagship of Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) Bravo VTG 76.5. In that capacity, she embarked not only the task group commander's staff but also the staff of the Commander, Special Landing Force (SLF) Bravo CTG 79.5, the
2nd Battalion, 3rd Marines, the men and aircraft of Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron
HMM-164, Surgical Evacuation Team Bravo, and Detachment Bravo of Tactical Squadron (TacRon) 11. On 8 June, she departed Subic Bay for an extended tour of duty in Vietnamese waters. During its 1967 deployment,
Tripoli participated in eight amphibious operations, all conducted along the coast of the I Corps. Her first operation, codenamed
Beacon Torch, began on 18 June when US Marines of SLF Bravo were flown into the vicinity of
Hoi An, located on the coast midway between the DMZ and the southern limit of I Corps tactical zone. Between 18 June and 2 July, the Marines operated ashore, initially engaging an enemy force of about 100 men. After an air strike broke the enemy resistance, the Marines concluded their mission with a
search and destroy sweep to wipe out the remnants of that force. All the while,
Tripoli remained offshore providing logistic support, medical evacuation services for casualties and a platform from which to launch air support missions by the embarked Marine attack squadron. On 2 July, she received the special landing force back on board and immediately headed north to the coast of
Quảng Trị Province to answer a call for assistance from Marine Corps units near
Con Thien, which had suffered heavily from bombardments by the
People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN). The ensuing
Operation Beaver Track pitted SLF Bravo against the PAVN troops to relieve the pressure on Marine Corps units based ashore with the
III Marine Amphibious Force (MAF). Simultaneously with Operation Beaver Track, SLF "Alfa", embarked on USS
Okinawa, went ashore to engage the same enemy force in
Operation Bear Claw. The two battalion landing teams joined III MAF Marines based ashore in a week-long struggle, followed by an eight-battalion search and destroy sweep. Throughout the 12 days of "Beaver Track/Bear Claw,"
Tripoli steamed offshore within easy helicopter range to provide logistical, medical, and ground support. The two landing forces were later credited with a third of the 1,100 PAVN casualties and with no small part in breaking up the PAVN attack. "Beaver Track/Bear Claw" ended on 14 July, and both battalion landing teams returned to their ships on the 7th. The respite from combat, however, proved brief. At dawn three days later,
Tripolis Marines stormed ashore in a combined waterborne-airborne amphibious assault on the exposed seaward flank of the
Viet Cong (VC) 806th Battalion near
Quảng Trị City. The VC avoided contact with the Marines by retiring hastily to the west, where they were badly mauled by South Vietnamese troops. BLT 2/3 re-embarked in
Tripoli on the 27th for another brief rest before the equally brief amphibious
Operation Kangaroo Kick, which commenced on 1 August.
Tripoli's Marines landed in Quảng Trị Province, north of Hue. Though the operation ended only three days later, the Marines did not re-embark for the voyage to Subic Bay. Instead, they changed operational control to III MAF, while
Tripoli and the rest of TG 76.5 spent two weeks at the Philippine naval base for upkeep.
Tripoli returned to the Vietnamese coast near
Huế on the 20th and backloaded SLF Bravo in time for the Marines to participate in
Operation Belt Drive. On 27 August, the battalion landing team once more went ashore, via both helicopter and landing craft, in Quang Tri Province. PAVN/VC resistance proved slight; and, after a three-day sweep of the
Hai Lang forest, the Marines reembarked in
Tripoli on 5 September. That same day, suffered a hit from enemy guns on
Cape Lay, North Vietnam.
Tripoli, located not far away, went to her assistance and evacuated 12 casualties by helicopter for treatment on board the ship. On the 17th, because her entire complement of
CH-46A Sea Knight helicopters had been grounded,
Tripoli launched the first all-boat landing from an LPH. In spite of swells high, a rain squall, 30- to winds, and visibility frequently less than , the boat landings for
Operation Fortress Sentry came off almost without a hitch. Ashore near the
Cua Viet River some south of the DMZ, the Marines moved inland, but encountered no enemy resistance until the 23d. Then, artillery and air support quickly extinguished the PAVN's will to fight, and the operation was terminated on the 25th. The Marines reembarked between 25 September and 27 September, and the task group headed back to Subic Bay for six days in port.
Tripoli returned to Vietnam at Danang early in October and loaded 39 defective CH-46A helicopters for transportation to
Okinawa, where their tail pylons were to be replaced. Shortly after she departed Danang on 7 October, her lookout spied an Air Force
F-105 Thunderchief, which crashed into the sea about ahead. One of her helicopters flew to the scene, rescued the pilot, and returned him to the ship for medical treatment. Not long thereafter, her lookouts caught sight of a second survivor of the crash. By the time her helicopter arrived on the scene, an Air Force chopper had already picked up the man.
Tripoli's helicopter assisted in the operation by taking on board the Air Force crewman who had jumped in to assist the survivor into the lift harness.
Tripoli returned from the
Ryukyus Islands (Japan) to Vietnamese waters at mid-month. On the 17th,
CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopters carried the battalion landing team to a point south of
Phu Bai Combat Base in
Thừa Thiên Province. The following day, the Marines changed operational control to III MAF ashore for a search and destroy sweep along
Route 1. Meanwhile,
Tripoli supplied logistic support until she cleared Vietnamese waters on 1 November, bound for Okinawa with another 18 defective CH-46A helicopters. After brief stops at Okinawa and Subic Bay, the ship returned to Danang on 10 November. After re-embarking SLF "Bravo," she prepared for her last amphibious operation of the deployment,
Operation Badger Hunt. On the 14th, the landing force was lifted some inland to the area near
An Hoa Combat Base in
Quảng Nam Province. After silencing sporadic enemy resistance near the landing site,
Tripoli's Marines joined elements of the shore-based 7th Marines in a successful search-and-destroy operation.
Tripoli supported the landing force through the end of the operation on the 27th, when the Marines returned to the ship. She entered Danang on the 29th and began transferring the Marines of the battalion landing team and their supporting elements to . The next day, 30 November,
Valley Forge relieved
Tripoli as flagship, TG 76.5; and
Tripoli got underway to return to the United States via Okinawa and
Yokosuka, Japan. She arrived in San Diego on 23 December 1967, and began post-deployment standdown.
Tripoli completed a restricted availability at
Long Beach between late January and the end of March 1968. During the first three weeks of April, she conducted a series of individual ship exercises and then rounded out the month with amphibious training. From 6 to 17 May, the ship conducted refresher training and then returned to San Diego to prepare for her second WestPac deployment. On 12 June 1968, the ship stood out of San Diego on her way to the Far East. She stopped briefly at
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii and at Okinawa before arriving at Subic Bay on 1 July. Between the 2nd and the 5th, she embarked the
2nd Battalion, 7th Marines,
HMM-265, Detachment Bravo of TacRon 13 and other supporting units of the ARG "Bravo." On the 6th, she departed Subic Bay and arrived the following day in the Vietnam combat zone.
Second tour Tripoli's second tour of duty closely followed the pattern of the first. During the next seven months, she patrolled the coast of South Vietnam near the I Corps tactical in a position to launch her landing contingent quickly whenever they were needed by Marine Corps, Army and South Vietnamese forces operating ashore. The first of her eight amphibious operations came the day after she arrived in the combat zone. Following preliminary naval bombardment,
Operation Eager Yankee opened with a combined airborne and waterborne assault. The Marines of SLF Bravo went ashore about east of Phu Bai Combat Base. They then wheeled right and pressed north toward a known VC haven. The VC avoided contact; and, on the 16th, the Marines joined shore-based forces in
Operation Houston IV. That operation ended on 22 July, and the battalion landing team returned to the ship the same day. While
Tripoli proceeded to the scene of a new operation, feverish preparations allowed her to send SLF Bravo ashore again just 17 hours after the completion of reembarkation. For
Operation Swift Play, the Marines rode helicopters ashore to an area about southwest of An Hoa, deep inland in Quảng Nam Province. The assault forces spotted several enemy formations, but no engagements resulted. The following day, BLT 2/7 transferred to the control of III MAF to conclude an operation designed to parry a major enemy thrust toward Danang. The landing force remained ashore operating under the commanding general, 1st Marine Division, in defense of Danang through the months of August, September and November. Meanwhile,
Tripoli steamed on station offshore providing logistics and medical support, departing Vietnamese waters twice between 22 July and 5 November. In mid-August, she steamed to Subic Bay for repairs; and, in early October, she voyaged via Subic Bay to
Kaohsiung,
Taiwan, for a liberty call. During all other periods, she remained off the Vietnamese coast providing support services to the Marines of BLT 2/7 operating ashore. On 5 November, the special landing force ended more than three months of combat duty ashore and re-embarked on
Tripoli. Five days later,
HMM-165's helicopters and
Tripoli's landing craft carried the Marines ashore once again. In
Operation Daring Endeavor, the Marines located, closed with and destroyed enemy fortifications and captured large quantities of rice. They concluded the action on the 17th and returned to the ship that same day. Three days later,
Tripoli launched her fourth landing, another combined waterborne and airborne operation directed at an area in Quảng Nam Province, just south of Danang. During
Operation Swift Move, initial opposition proved very light; and the landing force quickly transferred to the control of the 1st Marine Division for further action ashore in the continued defense of Danang against PAVN and Vietcong forces.
Tripoli continued support activities for the battalion landing team until 3 December when she offloaded what remained aboard of the Marines' equipment at Danang, in preparation for departing Vietnam for a liberty call in
Hong Kong. After a five-day visit, she continued on to Subic Bay for a two-week availability. On 27 December 1968, she headed back to Danang. On 1 January 1969, she embarked BLT
3rd Battalion, 26th Marines and
HMM-164 to reconstitute SLF "Bravo." During the remainder of her second tour of duty,
Tripoli participated in two more amphibious operations. The first of these,
Operation Bold Mariner, was hailed as the largest such maneuver since the Allied landings during
World War II. Aimed at the
Batangan Peninsula of
Quảng Ngãi Province, where the entire population was considered hostile, the operation sought to cordon off the peninsula and trap the 300 or so Vietcong operating there. Both special landing forces "Alfa" and "Bravo," joined South Vietnamese troops and soldiers of the US Army's
Americal Division in forming the cordon. Following a feint near
Mo Duc, the amphibious force headed for the real landing area. Navy guns softened the objective beaches, and the Marines went ashore on 13 January, many by helicopter. Marines from Company H,
2nd Battalion, 26th Marines went ashore in landing craft, M-Boats carried platoons and reinforced companies which landing on the beach forming the east side of the cordon. While the operation continued,
Tripoli remained offshore providing her Marines with the ever-needed logistical support and medical facilities. By 6 February, the soldiers and Marines ashore had thoroughly combed the peninsula for VC troops, so BLT 3/26 turned the mop-up operation over to the American and South Vietnamese soldiers and returned to the ship. The re-embarkation of the Marines was completed by 9 February, just in time for
Tripoli to launch her last amphibious operation of the deployment. The expected enemy
Tet 1969 offensive required South Vietnamese troops to be withdrawn from
Operation Taylor Common, then in progress near An Hoa in Quang Nam Province. SLF Bravo was to replace those troops in
Operation Defiant Measure. The landings began at 08:00 on the morning of 10 February, and the offloading of men and equipment continued for several days.
Tripoli remained in the area until the 16th. Operation Defiant Measure was concluded on that day, though the Marines remained ashore to continue Operation Taylor Common. HMM-164 was disembarked before
Tripoli began her voyage home. She departed Vietnam that same day, and arrived in Subic Bay on the 18th. There, she turned over her duties to USS
Valley Forge. On the 22nd, she got underway for badly needed repairs in Yokosuka, Japan, and before continuing on to the United States. She finally arrived back in San Diego on 19 March and began post-deployment standdown.
Tripoli remained on the west coast until November. After leave and upkeep, she began an availability period at the San Diego yard of the National Steel Company, which continued until 11 August. Following refresher training in September and amphibious training in October, she stood out of San Diego on 1 November to return to the Far East. After a brief stop at
Guam on the 15th for fuel, she continued on to Danang, South Vietnam, arriving five days later.
Third tour During
Tripoli's third deployment to the western Pacific, the combat operations along the Vietnamese coast, which had characterized her first two deployments were totally absent. Instead, she conducted a series of amphibious training exercises and a series of "Keystone" operations redeploying Marine Corps units. Her first mission,
Operation Keystone Cardinal, began on 20 November 1969 when she loaded the Marines and equipment of BLT
3rd Battalion, 4th Marines for transportation to Okinawa. At Okinawa between 24 November and 2 December, she disembarked BLT 3/4 and embarked BLT 2/9,
HMM-165, and supporting units to constitute SLP "Alfa." On 2 December, she departed Okinawa bound for the Philippines. She conducted upkeep at Subic Bay between 5 December and 12 December and two amphibious exercises at
Zambales on the 13th and 14th.
Tripoli returned to Vietnamese waters on the 17th and cruised the area without incident until the 25th, when she headed back to Subic Bay. In the Philippines, minor repairs and more amphibious exercises occupied her until 6 January 1970. She made a six-day cruise to Vietnam and then returned to the Philippines on the 12th for more training. On the 25th, she disembarked SLF "Alfa" at Subic Bay in preparation for a voyage to Vietnam to pick up homeward-bound marines. She entered Danang on 31 January and began embarking personnel from HQ, III MAF, 1st Marine Air Wing, 1st Marine Division, and III MAF Logistics Command. Later that evening, she got underway for home. After a non-stop voyage of 17 days, the ship arrived in San Diego on 16 February. She moved to Long Beach on the 23d to replace a cracked screw and departed that port on the 27th to return to the western Pacific reaching Subic Bay on 15 March.
Tripoli operated in the Philippines and at Okinawa conducting amphibious exercises in preparation for an exercise with units of
South Korean forces. She arrived in Korean waters on 18 April and, two days later, began
Operation Golden Dragon. The combined American-South Korean amphibious exercise lasted until the 25th.
Tripoli returned to Okinawa on the 27th. She briefly operated off Danang at the end of the first week in May and then visited Hong Kong for a week in mid-month. Late in May, she returned via Subic Bay to Okinawa to disembark SLF "Alfa" and then moved to Danang, where she disembarked ComPhibRon 9 and his staff and took on cargo for the voyage home.
Tripoli got underway on 7 June 1970 and reached San Diego on the 24th.
Tripoli spent the next 15 months on the west coast. Following post-deployment' upkeep and local operations, she conducted carrier qualifications in the southern California operation area in August and an amphibious exercise off Camp Pendleton. For the remainder of 1970, the ship occupied herself with individual ship's exercises and upkeep in preparation for an overhaul, which began on 1 February 1971. She left
Hunters Point on 1 June, fully revitalized, and returned to San Diego on the 3rd to prepare for refresher training, which took place in late June and early July. Amphibious refresher training filled the latter half of July. She made two brief training cruises during the first week in August: one with NROTC midshipmen embarked and the other with Marine Corps reservists on board. Local operations and preparations for her fourth WestPac deployment occupied the rest of August and the entire month of September. On 1 October,
Tripoli stood out of San Diego bound for the Far East. After stops at Pearl Harbor and Okinawa, she arrived in Subic Bay on the 28th. The ship conducted amphibious training operations in the Philippines and made port visits to such places as
Keelung and
Kaohsiung in Taiwan and Sasebo, Japan. During her return from Sasebo to Subic Bay, she received orders to deploy to the Indian Ocean with
TF-74, a special contingency task force built around in response to the
Indo-Pakistani War, which erupted on 3 December. The ship remained in the
Indian Ocean for the duration of the brief war. The fighting ended on 15 December; and, two days later, Pakistan officially accepted the loss of its eastern provinces, which became the independent nation,
Bangladesh.
Tripoli remained with TF 74 in the Indian Ocean and the
Bay of Bengal until early 1972. She returned to Subic Bay on 14 January and resumed training operations punctuated by visits to
Singapore, Hong Kong and
Kobe, Japan. She began operations in Vietnamese waters at the beginning of April, operating on
Yankee Station to provide search-and-rescue and medical evacuation services. She departed the combat zone twice, once for upkeep at Subic Bay and later to exchange battalion landing teams at Okinawa. At the end of June, she resumed flight operations in connection with troop movements. However, instead of carrying embarked Marines inland for amphibious landings, her helicopters moved South Vietnamese troops from point to point ashore. On 29 June,
Tripoli-assigned helicopters helped to transport 1,400 Vietnamese Marines from
Tam My to the vicinity of Quang Tri City during the
allied counteroffensive to recapture areas of the I Corps tactical zone, which had been overrun by PAVN during the
Easter Offensive. As this operation, codenamed "Lam Son 72" progressed,
Tripoli remained off shore, evacuating casualties and waiting should the reserves be required. That necessity came shortly before noon on 11 July, when her helicopters helped to insert the reserve Vietnamese Marines battalion, picking them up near Route 553 and landing them behind enemy lines, about north-northwest of Quang Tri City. On the 20th,
Tripoli departed Vietnamese waters bound for the Philippines where heavy monsoons had caused extensive flooding. She reached Subic Bay on 23 July and conducted relief operations until 4 August, at which time she set course for the United States.
Tripoli arrived at San Diego on 20 August and, remained there until 10 October. After a six-day amphibious exercise near
Hunter Liggett Point,
Tripoli returned to home port, where she stayed through the end of the year. During the first two months of 1973, she operated out of San Diego and prepared to deploy to the Far East once more.
Tripoli stood out of San Diego on 6 March for her fifth deployment to the western Pacific. Steaming via Pearl Harbor, where she made a three-week stop for repairs to her high-pressure turbine, she arrived in Subic Bay on 17 April. The ship remained there and, when not plagued by material casualties to her main propulsion plant, conducted training preparatory to
Operation End Sweep, the removal of American mines from North Vietnamese waters. Though scheduled to sail for Haiphong on 16 June, she was delayed by more problems in her propulsion plant. Nevertheless, early the next morning,
Tripoli headed for North Vietnam and arrived at Haiphong on the 19th. The clearing of US mines in North Vietnamese waters, particularly Haiphong, was the last remaining precondition to the release of the US prisoners of war. That morning, the commander of TF 78, Rear Admiral Brian McCauley, embarked on the
Tripoli and began negotiations with North Vietnamese representatives over the conduct of Operation End Sweep. McCauley spent his childhood in China and spoke fluent Chinese as the son of Commodore Cleaveland McCauley, who was military attache to China in the 1920s, and the negotiations were conducted in Chinese. Meanwhile,
Tripoli's embarked air group began providing logistics support and inter-ship transportation services. takes off from
Tripoli in 1974. Major issues in the negotiations were resolved by 28 June, and minesweeping operations began early that morning. Throughout the operation, the ship provided a platform for helicopters engaged both in minesweeping operations and for those providing logistics and transport services. Periodically, she retired from the area to replenish and to evade typhoons. Otherwise, she remained in the minesweeping area until 18 July when it departed North Vietnamese waters in company with and , bound for
Luzon. Four days after her arrival back in Subic Bay, the last American operation in Vietnamese territory ended, and the End Sweep task force was dissolved. Operations reverted to CTG 76.5/ARG "Bravo." That organization lasted only two days because on the 27th, the Commander, PhibRon 1, broke his flag on
Tripoli, and she became flagship for TG 76.4/ ARC "Alfa." ==Operational readiness, 1974–1979==