During the invasion of the Philippines in 1944, the desperate Japanese sought some way to turn the advancing American tide in their favor.  The followers of the "warrior's code" -- Bushido -- brought out the concept of suicide as a tactic for use against the Americans.  At first, major elements of the military resisted, believing that it would only waste precious equipment and manpower.  However, initial successes overrode the naysayers and suicide attacks became an accepted tactic.  The tactic was known as "kamikaze" [or "divine wind" after the typhoon that saved Japan from invaders from China].

 

By the time the Okinawa Campaign started in 1945, both the Japanese Army and Navy were employing suicide tactics against the Americans on the ground, on the sea, and in the air.  For the Navy, the Okinawa Campaign saw more ships sunk, damaged, and more sailors killed, missing, and wounded than had happened in the entire Pacific War up to that time.  The U.S. Navy was traumatized by this experience and it led to a post-war effort called Project BUMBLE BEE.

 

Project BUMBLE BEE led to the first long range surface-to-air missiles being deployed by the USN.  Three missiles emerged from the program: (1) Talos -- an air-breathing ramjet missile with a range of 65+ miles; (2) Terrier -- a solid propellant missile and booster combination with a range of 40+ miles; and Tartar -- a missile with a combination solid propellant rocket motor and booster with a range of 20+ miles.  The Navy developed two different types of missiles in the Talos and Terrier fields; the first was designed to shoot down individual aircraft and had a conventional warhead, while the other was designed to shoot down massed formations of aricraft and had a "special weapons" warhead.  Tartar was the only one of the group that had a strictly conventional warhead.

 

The problem with these early systems was that they required a lot of space aboard ship.  Therefore, all-gun cruisers were considered for conversion because the Navy had a lot of them left over from WW2.  The first conversion efforts in the mid- to late-1950's resulted in the USS BOSTON (CAG-1) and USS CANBERRA (CAG-2) conversions of Baltimore-class cruisers.  They retained their two 8-inch turrets forward, but had the after guns replaced by two Terrier Mk 10 missile launchers.  The next batch of conversions got more ambitious -- six Cleveland class light cruisers (CLG-5 through CLG-8), one Oregon City class heavy cruiser (CG-10), and two Baltimore class conversions (CG-11 and CG-12).  Of these, CLG-3 through CLG-5 got a Talos launcher aft; CLG-6 through CLG-8 got a Terrier launcher aft; and CG-10 through CG-12 got Talos launchers fore and aft plus Tartar launchers, port and starboard.  As part of the conversions, most of the guns (all in the case of CG-10 through CG-12) were removed and the space was used for fleet flagship communications, an Admiral and his staff.  There was one exception: CGN-9, USS LONG BEACH.

 

USS LONG BEACH was built from the keel-up as missile cruiser and it could also do anti-submarine warfare.  She was nuclear powered by two Westinghouse C1W reactors that freed her from being tied to a tanker for the oil to power her.  LONG BEACH was 713' long, by 73' in the beam, and drew 26' of water, weighed-in at 16,650 tons, and carried 80 officers and 1,000 sailors.  She was powerfully armed with a Mk 8 twin rail Talos launcher aft; two twin rail Mk 10 Terrier launchers forward; carried two Mk 32 triple torpedo tubes for Mk 44 or Mk 46 ASW torpedos and a Mk 16 ASROC system between her superstructures.  Unlike the other missile cruisers, LONG BEACH had an AN/SQS-23 bow mounted sonar to target her ASW rockets or torpedoes.  There was only one problem with this armament scheme: the Navy forgot to give LONG BEACH any guns to defend herself with because these weren't cutting edge technology.  [To be fair, a similar near-sightedness also affected the aviation community whereby a whole group of fighters were armed with missiles only at the expense of guns -- the F-101 "Voodoo"; the F-102 "Delta Dagger" and F-106 "Delta Dart"; and F-4 "Phantom".  Unfortunately, a small war developed in which these fighters were severely hampered by their lack of guns to shoot down enemy MiG's.]

 

And so, five years after her commissioning, USS LONG BEACH prepared to get underway for the Vietnam War Zone to provide fleet air defense for the carrier strike groups operating on YANKEE STATION in the South China Sea.  That is, until she failed her final battle problem . . .

 

The battle problem involved a Blue vs. Orange force.  One of the ships assigned to the bad guys was an Asheville class gunboat.  Ashevilles were 165' by 24' in beam, drew 9.5' of water, weighed-in at 226 tons, and carried between 24 to 32 officers and sailors.  Ashevilles had two diesel engines for cruise and an LM-1500 gas turbine for high-speed sprints.  Armament consisted of one 3"/50 RF (rapid fire) single gun forward, a 40mm Bofors gun aft, and twin .50 machine guns on the 01 level on either side of the stack.  On paper the Asheville stood no chance against CGN-9, but the gunboaters decided to use deception.  They were able to get close enough to the Navy's only nuclear-powered missile cruiser to train their 3"/50, 40mm, and .50 caliber guns on the gunless cruiser. 

 

"Bang! Bang!! You're dead."

 

To say that the senior officers aboard CGN-9 were embarrassed they could not shoot back was an understatement.  CGN-9 was delayed in her deployment until she could return to the yards and be fitted with a pair of guns: two single 5"/38's dual-purpose mounts with a pair of Mk 56 fire control directors.  THEN, and only then, did USS LONG BEACH deploy for the war zone.