Vietnam
Most of 1964 was spent in ASW exercises in the Eastern Pacific. On 23 October, she sailed with Destroyer Division 213 for redeployment exercises in Hawaii. Exactly a month later, with four other destroyers, she got under way for the western Pacific screening Yorktown, arrived Yokosuka, Japan, 4 December and joined the 7th Fleet. In the spring she earned her first battle star for operating in the troubled waters off the coast of Indochina from 21 March to 28 April 1965.
After returning to the West Coast, she departed San Diego for the Far East 22 March 1966 and reached Da Nang 19 April and the same day took station a few miles south of Chu Lai. At the end of April she supported Operation Osage, and landed north of Da Nang. On 13 May she sailed for Sasebo and upkeep. Back in the war zone 6 June, she provided gunfire support and supported Operation Deckhouse 1 from 17 to 23 June. That day she retired toward Hong Kong. The destroyer returned to gunfire support duties off South Vietnam 16 August. From the 18th to the 23rd she supported the amphibious Ready Group and Special Landing Force in Operation "Deckhouse III." After visiting Guam and Japan, John W. Thomason headed home 9 September, reached San Diego on the 24th and operated off the West Coast into 1967.
John W. Thomason received seven battle stars for Korean service and three for Vietnam service.
Read more about this topic: USS John W. Thomason (DD-760)
Famous quotes containing the word vietnam:
“That’s just the trouble, Sam Houston—it’s always my move. And damnit, I sometimes can’t tell whether I’m making the right move or not. Now take this Vietnam mess. How in the hell can anyone know for sure what’s right and what’s wrong, Sam?”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
“Above all, Vietnam was a war that asked everything of a few and nothing of most in America.”
—Myra MacPherson, U.S. author. Long Time Passing: Vietnam and the Haunted Generation, epilogue (1984)
“Let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.”
—Richard M. Nixon (1913–1992)