Over 80 years ago, a Japanese submarine attacked and sank the US Navy ship USS Juneau. Now, a Japanese torpedo sent another American vessel bearing that same name to the ocean floor, but under very different circumstances.
During a recent exercise, the US and its Pacific allies and partners conducted a live-fire sinking of the decommissioned Austin-class amphibious transport dock USS Juneau. The Navy said that the live-fire sinking was part of a larger effort to practice coordinated warfighting with American allies and partners across air, sea, land, space, and cyber.
The recent live-fire event, called a SINKEX, was part of Valiant Shield 2026, a large-scale exercise that brought the US, Japan, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand together to test weapons and train together in a more realistic environment.
A Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force submarine struck the decommissioned USS Juneau with a torpedo. Before the exercise, crews removed hazardous materials and pollutants from the ship. Officials also surveyed the sinking site, which was more than 200 nautical miles offshore in the Mariana Islands Range Complex.
USS Juneau (LPD-10) entered service in 1969 and participated in the Vietnam War and operations in the Middle East, transporting troops into combat. The Navy decommissioned the ship in 2008. Named after the capital of Alaska, the vessel was an amphibious warfare ship designed to move forces to land in conflicts.
The amphibious transport vessel was the third US Navy ship to be named Juneau. The second was a Juneau-class light cruiser commissioned in 1946 and active in the Korean War. The first USS Juneau was an Atlanta-class light cruiser.
USS Juneau (CL-52) was commissioned in 1942 and fought in some of World War II‘s deadliest naval battles. During the Guadalcanal campaign in November 1942, a torpedo from Japanese submarine I-26 struck the Juneau and sank it. The ship had previously been crippled by a torpedo fired from the Japanese destroyer Amatsukaze.
A total of 687 people were killed in action, including five brothers from Iowa who became symbols of wartime sacrifice after their ship was lost in combat. Only 10 crew members survived the attack. A research crew discovered the wreck of USS Juneau in March 2018 off the coast of the Solomon Islands.
The recent live-fire exercise bore certain echoes of history but also served as a reminder of how far US-Japanese relations have come over the past eight decades since the end of World War II. Emerging threats in the Pacific region have only strengthened those ties.
“This SINKEX provided an outstanding opportunity for our joint team to integrate capabilities across domains, honing the lethal precision and coordination essential for high-end maritime operations in the Pacific theater,” said Rear Adm. Eric Anduze, commander of Carrier Strike Group 5 and Task Force 70, in a press statement.
Live-fire strikes on real, decommissioned vessels are a regular part of naval training and give troops a realistic understanding of how systems work on actual targets compared to simulated environments.
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