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USS Bluefish (SSN 675)

USS BLUEFISH was the 27^th STURGEON - class attack submarine. Both decommissioned and stricken from the Navy list on May 31, 1996, ex-USS BLUEFISH was assigned for disposal through the Nuclear-Powered Ship and Submarine Recycling Program at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard at Bremerton, Wash. The recycling process was completed on November 1, 2003.

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Crew List:

This section contains the names of sailors who served aboard USS BLUEFISH. It is no official listing but contains the names of sailors who submitted their information.

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USS BLUEFISH History:

USS BLUEFISH was the second United States Navy ship to bear the name Bluefish. The name already had a submarine-service association through USS BLUEFISH (SS 222), a World War II fleet submarine that had served in the Pacific war before the name was assigned to a nuclear-powered attack submarine of the STURGEON-class. Her construction contract was awarded to the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics at Groton, Connecticut, on July 15, 1966. Her keel was laid down at Groton on March 13, 1968. She was launched on January 10, 1970, sponsored by Mrs. David Packard, wife of the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and she was commissioned on January 8, 1971. Commander Richard A. Peterson was her first commanding officer. At the time of her commissioning, USS BLUEFISH was assigned to Submarine Squadron Six at Norfolk, Virginia.

USS BLUEFISH entered service at a time when the Atlantic and Mediterranean operating areas were central to American and NATO naval planning. Soviet submarine and surface activity had expanded during the 1960s, and the United States Navy relied heavily on nuclear-powered attack submarines for tracking, training, deterrence, and crisis support. The early career of a newly commissioned STURGEON-class submarine necessarily involved builder's trials, shakedown work, crew training, inspections, engineering certification, tactical training, and integration into Atlantic Fleet operating patterns.

In September 1973, USS BLUEFISH began a Mediterranean deployment with the United States Sixth Fleet. This deployment placed her in one of the most politically sensitive maritime theaters of the Cold War. On October 6, 1973, Egypt and Syria attacked Israel, beginning the Arab-Israeli War commonly known as the Yom Kippur War. The conflict increased tension across the eastern Mediterranean, where American and Soviet naval forces were both active and where the United States Sixth Fleet served as a visible instrument of crisis response, regional presence, and NATO support. USS BLUEFISH operated in this environment as an Atlantic Fleet nuclear attack submarine under Sixth Fleet requirements. After this deployment, USS BLUEFISH received the Battle Efficiency "E", recognizing overall ship performance and readiness during the period.

From March 17 to May 24, 1975, USS BLUEFISH conducted Arctic operations under the polar ice cap. This was one of the most demanding environments in which a nuclear-powered submarine could operate. Under-ice work required specialized navigation, careful use of sonar, knowledge of ice thickness and pressure ridges, reliable engineering systems, and crew proficiency in procedures that differed significantly from open-ocean operations. The Arctic had major Cold War significance because it offered concealed routes and operating areas for submarines, while also presenting extreme environmental challenges. During this deployment, USS BLUEFISH surfaced through the ice at the North Pole on May 4, 1975. Her Arctic deployment contributed to the Navy's continuing effort to develop and preserve the ability of attack submarines to operate effectively beneath polar ice, including the collection of environmental and bathymetric information and the practical evaluation of equipment and procedures in high-latitude waters.

After more than fifty-four months of operational service after commissioning, USS BLUEFISH entered her first overhaul in 1976. This was her first major overhaul following her initial period of operations. In the service life of a nuclear-powered attack submarine, such an overhaul was a major event. It provided time for inspection, maintenance, correction of material deficiencies, modernization where authorized, and restoration of the submarine for further deployed operations.

In 1977, USS BLUEFISH completed her second Mediterranean deployment. During that deployment, she visited Haifa, Israel, and became the first nuclear-powered submarine to visit that country. This port visit occurred only a few years after the 1973 Arab-Israeli War and during a period when the United States was deeply involved in Middle Eastern diplomacy and regional security. For the Sixth Fleet, the Mediterranean remained a theater where NATO commitments, Soviet naval presence, Middle Eastern instability, and access to the eastern Mediterranean overlapped. The Haifa visit therefore had significance beyond an ordinary port call, because it placed an American nuclear-powered attack submarine in an Israeli port during a period of continued regional sensitivity.

By the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s, USS BLUEFISH had built a substantial operational record. A later shipboard summary described her as having completed eight major deployments and numerous significant operations by that stage of her service. The same summary credited her with one Navy Unit Commendation, two Meritorious Unit Commendations, and the Atlantic Fleet Golden Anchor Award for fiscal year 1980.

In the early 1980s, USS BLUEFISH completed an extended six-month deployment to the Indian Ocean and, during that deployment cycle, completed the first circumnavigation of the globe by a STURGEON-class submarine. The Indian Ocean had become increasingly important to American naval planning after the Iranian Revolution, the Iran hostage crisis, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and growing concern over Persian Gulf oil routes and Soviet naval activity. In that environment, a STURGEON-class nuclear attack submarine could support undersea surveillance, anti-submarine warfare readiness, and broader fleet presence across a wide geographic area.

For the remainder of the 1980s, USS BLUEFISH remained part of the Atlantic Fleet submarine force and continued the normal attack-submarine cycle of upkeep, inspections, local operations, tactical training, readiness work, exercises, and deployments. The late Cold War context remained demanding. NATO still treated the North Atlantic as a central theater for sea-lane defense and submarine warfare, the Mediterranean remained an area of Soviet-American naval contact and regional crisis potential, and American attack submarines continued to support carrier forces, monitor opposing naval activity, and maintain proficiency in undersea warfare.

The early 1990s brought a major change in the strategic environment in which USS BLUEFISH served. The Cold War ended, the Soviet Union dissolved, and the United States Navy began reducing and reshaping parts of its force structure. Older STURGEON-class submarines gradually approached retirement as newer LOS ANGELES-class submarines and later designs carried forward the attack-submarine mission. USS BLUEFISH remained in service through this transition period. The missions of American attack submarines increasingly combined traditional anti-submarine warfare with regional-crisis support, intelligence-related tasks, joint-force training, and exercises with surface and aviation units.

USS BLUEFISH was decommissioned and struck from the Naval Vessel Register on May 31, 1996. Commander Richard C. West is recorded as her final commanding officer. Her decommissioning took place during the post-Cold War drawdown and modernization of the American submarine force. After decommissioning, USS BLUEFISH was assigned for disposal through the Nuclear-Powered Ship and Submarine Recycling Program at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. The recycling process was completed on November 1, 2003.

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