USS Cocopa (ATF-101)
 USS Cocopa (ATF-101), date and location unknown. |
|
| Career (United States) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | USS Cocopa |
| Builder: | Charleston Ship Building and Drydock Company, Charleston, SC |
| Launched: | 5 October 1943 |
| Sponsored by: | Miss Z. Williams |
| Commissioned: | 25 March 1944 |
| Decommissioned: | 30 September 1978 |
| Struck: | 30 September 1978 |
| Motto: | Service - Salvage - First and Finest |
| Honors and awards: |
1 battle star (Korean War); 5 campaign stars (Vietnam War) |
| Fate: | Sold to Mexico, 30 September 1978; recommissioned as ARM Seri (RE-03). |
| Status: | Serving with Mexican Navy as of 2009 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Abnaki class Fleet Ocean Tug |
| Displacement: | 1,240 long tons standard |
| Length: | 205 ft (62 m) |
| Beam: | 38.5 ft (11.7 m) |
| Draft: | 15.33 ft (4.67 m) |
| Propulsion: | Diesel-electric, single screw, 3,600shp |
| Speed: | 16.5 kn (19.0 mph; 30.6 km/h) |
| Complement: | 85 officers and men |
| Sensors and processing systems: |
Radar |
| Armament: | 1 × 3"/50 dual-purpose gun; 2 x twin 40mm antiaircraft guns; 2 x 20mm single antiaircraft guns |
USS Cocopa (ATF-101) was an Abnaki class fleet ocean tug that served on active duty with the U.S. Navy from 1944 to 1978, seeing action in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. After thirty-four years of service, she was sold to the Mexican Navy, where she continues in service to this day (2009).[1]
Contents |
[edit] World War II
Cocopa was named after an Arizona Indian tribe. She began her naval career with the Atlantic fleet during the waning months of World War II, making two passages across the Atlantic with barges in tow, followed by a third passage to Trinidad. Cocopa was next ordered to the Pacific theater, witnessing the final days of the war between July and August of that year. V-J day found the ship in Leyte, Philippines.[2]
In June 1951, Cocopa accepted what some writers have termed the last Japanese surrender from World War II, when LTC James B. Johnson accepted the capitulation of nineteen Japanese soldiers who had been living on the island of Anatahan, in the Northern Mariana Islands. The ship repatriated these men and their personal effects to Guam, from whence they were ultimately returned to Japan.[3] However, other Japanese holdouts continued to surrender over the next few decades, though in much smaller numbers.
[edit] Korean War
Following World War II, Cocopa shuttled between the Philippines, Shanghai, Okinawa and Hong Kong on occupation duty, before returning to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in January 1947 for an overhaul. Returning to Pacific ocean service, she saw action in the Korean War during the summer of 1953. During this period she served off both Korean coasts; in one operation, she towed the HMCS Huron, a Canadian destroyer that had run aground on the island of Pang Yang-Do, just off the North Korean coast well north of enemy-held Wonsan harbor. At the time of the armistice, she went to Wonsan to aid in the removal of a Marine garrison occupying a small islet at the harbor's mouth. During the Korean War, the USS Cocopa received one battle star for her service.[4]
[edit] Operation Castle
In March 1954, Cocopa was one of the ships tasked to support Operation Castle, a series of high-energy (high-yield) nuclear tests by Joint Task Force SEVEN (JTF-7) at Bikini Atoll. Official reports indicated that crewmembers suffered the highest doses (2.2 rem) of radiation endured by any of the navy ships present at this operation.[5]
[edit] Vietnam War
During the Vietnam War, Cocopa would see service in five campaigns: Advisory (1963), Vietnam Defense (1965), Counteroffensive Phase II (1967), Summer-Fall 1969, and Ceasefire (1972). In 1967, Cocopa hosted Detachment Charlie of Beach Jumpers Unit One, Team Twelve, operating as the "Yankee Station Special Surveillance Unit". This outfit consisted of one officer and five enlisted men, whose mission was to jam Soviet electronic intelligence trawlers monitoring U.S. operations in the Gulf of Tonkin. Team members utilized random wave jamming with noises (including bagpipe recordings) to counteract Russian SIGINT activities. Cocopa also assisted in towing, recovery and similar operations throughout her tours in Vietnam.[6]
[edit] Awards
Cocopa was awarded the appropriate service medals for World War II (including the American Campaign Medal, the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal and the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal), Korea and Vietnam. She was also awarded a battle star for her Korean service, and five campaign stars for her Vietnam service. She was also granted the Navy Occupation Service Medal, the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal, and the Republic of Korea War Service Medal.[7]
[edit]
In September 1978, the Cocopa was decommissioned and sold to Mexico under the Security Assistance Program, where she was recomissioned in the Mexican Navy as the ARM Seri (RE-03). As of 2009 the ship remains on active duty with that force.[8]
[edit] Sources
- USS Cocopa (ATF-101). Contains basic info on the Cocopa.
- Cocopa. Contains brief account of the ship's U.S. Naval service.
- The Last Surrender of World War II. Essay on the Japanese Anatahan holdouts; includes Cocopa's role in their repatriation.
- Task Force 77. Contains brief, detailed info on Cocopa's Korean War service.
- Official Damage Report of the Grounding of HMCS Huron. Describes role of the Cocopa (referred to in this report as "the tug") in towing the damaged Huron.
- Analysis of Radiation Exposure for Additional Naval Personnel at Operation CASTLE-Supplemental Report. Defense Nuclear Agency, Alexandra, VA. Details Cocopa's involvement in Operation CASTLE.
- U.S. Navy Beach Jumpers, section "The Vietnam War". Contains info on the Cocopa's role in SIGINT psyops activity in 1967.
[edit] References
- ^ "USS Cocopa (ATF-101) at NavSource.Org". NavSource.Org. 30 January 2009. http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/39/39101.htm. Retrieved 26 November 2009.
- ^ "The last surrender of World War II". CNMI. http://www.cnmi-guide.com/history/ww2/5/. Retrieved 27 November.
- ^ "The last surrender of World War II". CNMI. http://www.cnmi-guide.com/history/ww2/5/. Retrieved 26 November.
- ^ "Cocopa at the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships". Naval Historical Center. http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/c10/cocopa.htm. Retrieved 26 November.
- ^ "Analysis of Radiation Exposure for Additional Naval Personnel at Operation CASTLE-Supplemental Report". http://www.dtra.mil/documents/rd/DNATR89256.pdf. Retrieved 27 November.
- ^ "CUS Navy Beach Jumpers". Psywarrior.com. http://www.psywarrior.com/beach.html. Retrieved 26 November.
- ^ "Cocopa". http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/c10/cocopa.htm. Retrieved 27 November.
- ^ "USS Cocopa (ATF-101) at NavSource.Org". NavSource.Org. 30 January 2009. http://www.navsource.org/archives/09/39/39101.htm. Retrieved 27 November 2009.
[edit] External links
- USS Cocopa. Offers several photos from the Cocopa's service, circa 1952-78.
- Last Defenders of the Japanese Empire. Photo of Japanese soldiers on Anatahan surrendering to LTC J.B. Johnson of the Cocopa.
- USS Lipan. Contains a few photos of the Cocopa taken during operations off the Vietnamese coast, together with some of the Soviet trawlers it operated against.
- My Journey to Vietnam, by Steve Karoly. Personal account by a Cocopa cook of a stormy voyage to Vietnam in 1972.
- Towline, Summer 2007. Cover shows significantly-enlarged version of the Vietnam photo of the Cocopa, above.
