USS Reuben James in the Panama Canal in happier times, 19-N-10982. National Archives Identifier 496085338
Some 85 years ago this week, just after 0530 on 31 October 1941, the “Red Devil” boat, German Type VIIC submarine U-552, Kptlt. Erich Topp, commanding, was less than a week out of St. Nazaire, France, on her sixth war patrol. By that point in the war, Topp, 27, had already sunk 18 enemy ships. He had just joined five other boats of Wolfpack Stosstrupp, combing the North Atlantic for convoys.
And he found one off Iceland.
Stumbling across slow-moving (8-knot) Allied Convoy HX-156, with 43 ships, Topp fired two torpedoes that punched into the port side of an enemy destroyer.
A lookout on the escort commander’s ship, USS Tarbell (DD 142), reported that there had been a large flash followed by a deep explosion on the port quarter of the convoy in the direction of Reuben James. Immediately, all escort vessels were called by radio. Everyone answered with the exception of James.
At the time of Topp’s attack, HX-156, sailing from Halifax for Liverpool, was being shepherded by the American tin cans, USS Benson, Hilary P. Jones, and Niblack, along with the aforementioned Reuben James and Tarbell as CTU 4.1.3 under CDR R.E. Webb, with a scheduled handover to British escorts on 1 November.
The U.S. Navy, on FDR’s orders, had only just begun escorting Allied convoys from Canada to a Mid-Ocean Meeting Point south of Iceland (around 58° North and near 35° West) the previous month, with the first being HX-150 which sailed from Halifax on 16 September 1941, with U.S. Navy destroyers USS Dallas, Eberle, Ellis, Ericsson and Upshur replacing Canadian coastal escorts HMCS Algoma, Annapolis and Brandon the next day, then handing over to HMS Arrowhead, Badsworth, Blankney, Camella, Celadine, Churchill and Honeysuckle on the 25th, the convoy arriving in Liverpool unscathed on the 30th.
The follow-on HX-151, 152, 153, and 154 all followed the same template.
HX-156 almost made it without a hitch as well.
The thing is, almost isn’t good enough when torpedoes are concerned.
James, suffering from magazine explosions, broke in two. The forward section sank immediately with all hands while the stern remained afloat for five minutes. When the stern sank, at least two unsecured depth charges exploded, killing some survivors in the water. Niblack picked up 36 men (one of whom later died of wounds), and Jones found ten more.
Among those lost were James’s skipper, Texas-born LCDR Heywood Lane Edwards (USNA ’26)— who wrestled in the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam– along with the destroyer’s entire wardroom. Of the 159 souls aboard, 113 perished outright.
The senior-most survivor was the only member of the Goat Locker to make it, the injured Chief Machinist’s Mate (AA), William H. Bergstresser, 35.
Bergstresser told the NYT about his ship’s loss when the crew returned to Brooklyn, something the country allowed because it was still under peacetime rules.
James was the first American warship lost in WWII, lost in the shuffle when Pearl Harbor hit six weeks later.
Ultimately, 86 American “tin cans,” counting both DDs and DEs, were lost in the conflict.
James’s slayer, U-552, almost survived the war, scuttled at Wilhelmshaven three days before Dönitz surrendered what was left of the Third Reich.
As for Topp, after September 1942 he spent the rest of his Kriegsmarine career in a series of training assignments, passing on his experience. By that time, he had sunk 36 ships for nearly 200,000 tons across 12 patrols. He escaped the fate that caught 583 fellow U-boat skippers and survived the war.
He surrendered to the British in Norway in May 1945, later joined the West German Navy, and retired as a rear admiral in December 1969. He retired with the Großes Verdienstkreuz, adding it to his wartime Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords.
He later became an industrial consultant for, among others, the submarine maker Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft, where he had some input on the Type 209. He died on dry land the day after Christmas 2005, aged 91.
The ATF announced Friday that it has paused NFA restrictions and regulations on silencers (suppressors) and short-barreled firearms nationwide.
In the aftermath of a Texas federal court ruling and sweeping legislative changes brought about in the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” the ATF has issued official guidance halting the enforcement of traditional National Firearms Act (NFA) transfer, registration, and tax-stamp requirements for short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, suppressors, and “any other weapons.”
After U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche declined to appeal Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF, the Department of Justice exercised its enforcement discretion and applied this relief nationally to all gun owners rather than limiting it strictly to the lawsuit’s plaintiffs.
“The direction from the President, Congress, and the courts is clear,” said ATF Director Rob Cekada in a statement. “ATF is now following suit with our enforcement posture while continuing to ensure we remain focused where we are needed the most: combatting violent crime in American communities.”
While the pause in federal enforcement of NFA provisions is at the executive, or White House, level, it could be turned back “on” with very little notice, leaving Congress to make a more lasting fix. However, if thousands of devices are released in the coming months, it may be a “closing the barn door after the horses left” moment to try to revert to the pre-Silencer Shop Foundation ruling status quo.
Moreover, and this is important, dozens of states have their own local restrictions on suppressors and short-barreled firearms, so the pitfalls can remain real for millions of Americans.
Machine guns and destructive devices remain fully subject to NFA regulations and their $200 tax stamps.
Further, Gun Control Act of 1968 standards – including Form 4473 background checks via licensed dealers, interstate transport approval via Form 20, and all applicable state or local regulations – remain fully in effect.
Fact: Tri-Lug Barrels are the oldest, easiest, and one of the best ways to quickly mount a suppressor.
However, the attachment style is also limited in what it can do and, sadly, is overlooked.
Where did Tri-Lug or 3-Lug come from?
In Oberndorf, Germany, in the early 1960s, Helmut Baureuter, Manfred Guhring, Tilo Moller, and Georg Seidl cooked up probably the most mature sub gun of the 20th Century– the Heckler & Koch MP5. Recycling a roller-locked action first used on legendary machine guns in WWII and carried over to the G3 7.62 NATO battle rifle, it proved durable enough to become legendary.
It also had a funky, albeit innovative, barrel accessory mounting system on the muzzle: three equal-sized (roughly 0.310-inch) raised external lugs, spaced equally about 120 degrees apart center-to-center around the outside of the barrel, and ramped towards the muzzle.
These lugs were not an afterthought, welded, screwed, or pinned in, but something machined directly from, or forged with, the same piece of steel as the barrel.
Tri-lug, as seen on a Springfield Armory Kuna (male) and SilencerCo Spectre 9 and 36M (female). (Photos unless noted: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Even back in 1966, when the HK MP5, developed from the HK54, was introduced with its slimline handguard and straight waffle-pattern 9mm magazines, it had a tri-lug barrel.
Talk about a blast from the past…
The tri-lug barrel endured through the Cold War and into the GWOT era and is still seen on classically styled MP5s and other SMG/PCCs.
Seen above with casual SF types in an Afghanistani aloha snackbar joint in 2003. (Photo: National Archives, magnification by Guns.com staff).
The funny thing was that the tri-lug barrel wasn’t meant for attaching a suppressor. The lugs were originally for affixing accessories (Zubehör) such as a flash-hider (Feuerdampfer), a blank firing adapter (Manoverpatronengerat), and a sleeve for a 22mm cup-style tear gas grenade launcher (Granatfuhrung) fired with a blank round.
Thus:
Via an early HK MP5 manual.
Over the years, the accessories fell away while the MP5’s use with suppressors skyrocketed, especially after N (Navy) model MP5s entered the market in 1986, which included both a threaded barrel and tri-lug.
By 1988, inventor Timothy Bixler, with AWC Suppressors (Dr. Phil Dater’s old company) and Knights Armament, took out a patent (US4893426A) for a rotating collar utilizing Tri-Lug, and the rest is history.
How to use Tri-Lug
First off, Tri-Lug is a left-on (clockwise), right-off (counter-clockwise) kind of thing. Remember, “Left gets tight, right takes flight.”
Align, press down, turn to the left, release. Reverse to take off
Align the lugs, push in to depress the spring of the mount, twist about a quarter turn to the left until it passes the detents and stops, release the spring by letting go, boom. You are locked in. Reverse it to remove. Easy on, easy off, but still rock solid while in use.
Example:
Plus, with the Tri-Lug, you don’t have to worry about the suppressor backing off or loosening under rapid fire as you do with more common threaded-barrel models.
Tips:
You can’t attach the can to the muzzle by twisting in the wrong direction, as the geometry won’t work, so don’t freak out about that.
Also, new mounts and/or new barrels will likely be super tight, and the spring stout, so be sure to lube up and work them in on a safe firearm before heading to the range and trying it for the first time. Nobody gets confidence from the guy tugging on his can in the corner.
Not HK-only anymore
Besides assorted Heckler & Koch MP5/SP5 models and the myriad of clones such as the Century/MKE AP5 and SDS MAC-5, you have offerings from PSA like the AR-V and variants of the B&T APC9, GHM9, and SPC9 that sport in-spec Tri-Lug direct from the factory. Plus, you can get adapters from folks like SilencerCo that convert standard threaded muzzles to Tri-Lug.
SilencerCo’s Tri-Lug male muzzle adapter. As long as you are 1/2x28TPI, you are good to go. Other companies such as Angstadt, Griffin, and Rugged also make such adapters.
As far as making your suppressor Tri-Lug ready, there are adapters for that as well from Banish, Dead Air, SilencerCo, and others, so that’s not a problem.
SilencerCo’s Alpha Tri-lug coupler.
A new model to the market introduced earlier in the month is a dedicated Tri-Lug barrel version of the Kuna, a dependable roller-action that is fast becoming one of the most popular large-format 9mm pistols on the market.
The new Tri-Lug barrel Kuna, right, compared to the standard model.
The Springfield Kuna Tri-Lug in its natural environment, with a SilencerCo Spectre 9 attached.
MSRP for the unbraced model is set at $1,179, and the FSA-braced model’s MSRP is set at $1,330. Low-capacity 10-round options will also be available for those unfortunates living in restrictive states.
So, is Tri-Lug Perfect?
No.
As the design doesn’t support boosters (Nielsen devices), Tri-lug is tied to its original platform type: pistol caliber SMGs, PCCs, and large format pistols with fixed barrels. While primarily a 9mm offering, you also see Tri-Lug adapters for .45ACP (reverse to .578×28, 5/8×24, 9/16×24, and M16x1 LH threads), but that is about it. Plus, since the mounts are spring-based, they can wear out with extensive use, requiring new springs at some point in the distant future.
Still, for those classic MP5 styles and new offerings from folks like B&T and Springfield, the old standard can be a king when it comes to quick-detach.
While hanging out at an industry event in Idaho, we came across a fairly rare and very quiet German-made rimfire rifle and just had to shoot it.
Attending SilencerCo’s Summer Camp at the Day Mountain Ranch outside of Preston (oddly enough, the small town where Napoleon Dynamite was filmed), we had a chance to get some trigger time on some amazing platforms, most of them shooting out to extended ranges. Like starting at 200 yards and punching well out to 1,300.
I mean, with these hills, you aren’t running many 15-yard flat ranges. (All photos: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
One exception to that was a station that had some great little rimfire guns that attendees used offhand on spinner and groundhog plates at like 25 yards, squinting into the morning sun.
There was this great Volquartsen-enhanced Ruger 22/45, complete with an everlasting SilencerCo Sparrow can.
Then there was this Sparrowed FN 502 MRD with a matching Steiner MPS and TLR-7A.
But the real gem was a Heckler Koch HK270…
What is the HK270?
Travel with us back to the late 1970s. Back to when HK was the global powerhouse when it came to 7.62 NATO battle rifles, with its Gewehr 3 (G3) being standard not only in the West German Bundeswehr but in more than 50 other militaries around the globe. The G3’s little brother, the 9mm but still roller-locked MP5, was almost as popular with the black balaclava gang worldwide.
So why not market a rimfire blow-back action sporting rifle with a G3-style turret “castle” style rear sight that could be used for training, small game hunting, and sporting purposes?
Boom. That gives you the HK270.
SilencerCo’s engineers kept the gun as original as possible, save for threading the barrel to accept a modular Switchback suppressor.
Some 70 years ago this month, in July 1956, the UGM-27 Polaris SLBM was spitballed at a symposium, starting a compressed four-year development cycle overseen by RADM William “Red” Raborn for the Navy’s side of it, and Kluge, the lucky sock monkey adopted by Lockheed’s technicians– and Kluge was there for every test launch!
Rear Admiral William “Red” Raborn, who led the development of the Polaris missile, smiles with good luck charm Kluge on his shoulder. (NHHC L38-72.03.03)
“Kluge,” the Lockheed Technicians’ lucky monkey who has been on all the test firings of the Polaris Missile in the last two years, oversees the Missile Control Center. “Kluge” is a term meaning jury-rigged, July 1960.
Polaris replaced the Regulus I (RGM-6) and Regulus II nuclear (W5 6-120 kT warhead) cruise missile systems in the U.S. Navy’s submarine-launched strategic deterrent role. It also superseded a planned naval derivative of the US Army’s Jupiter intermediate-range ballistic missile and would remain in service with 41 assorted SSBNs (the “41 for Freedom” submarines) across five classes until augmented by the Poseidon (C3) missile starting in 1972 and fully replaced in 1981.
The first of the 41 for Freedom submarines was USS George Washington (SSBN-598), which made history by successfully launching the first Polaris A1 missile from a submerged position on 20 June 1960.
A total of 1,409 Polaris missiles were manufactured, including X models and A1, A2, and A3 production models.
Something recently seen at NRAAM that I just got around to sharing with you guys. A new suppressor from Inland Manufacturing, the guys who make assorted M1 Carbines and GI 1911s in Ohio.
They basically made a modern Maxim (as in Hiram Percy Maxim) 1910 suppressor.
Thus:
Compared to the new Inland 1910:
The Inland 1910 is an offset or nonconcentric suppressor; the hole is not in the middle, which allows the use of irons without the suppressor being in the way.
It’s a bit in its own class because the fully serviceable monocore stays on the gun when you take the outer jacket off, which eliminates the chance of a change in impact from the on and off process. This is perfect for lever guns/ most rimfires, and anyone wanting to use a non-scoped rifle
We’ve been running into YHM cans for over 20 years, making them one of the oldest in the relatively young suppressor business, but the company actually goes back much further
The family behind Massachusetts-based Yankee Hill Machine, which has become a leader in the U.S. firearms-suppressor category, will be celebrating the company’s Diamond Jubilee throughout 2026.
I’ve known the Graham family for years and have stopped in at their booths at SHOT, NRA, CanCon, etc for well over a decade.
The company was founded in an old garage by U.S. Army veteran James H. Graham and Wallace Judd during the Korean War in early 1951. Based in a part of Northampton known locally as “Yankee Hill,” the shop’s name was an obvious one.
For its first decade they were focused on turning out nuts and bolts and custom machining projects, then during Vietnam moved into military procurement, making cleaning rods and related products for the Army’s new M-16 rifles in 1967. By that time, YHM was based in an old 19th century brock mill.
After 1984, when James J. Graham, the founder’s son, took over, things really started to change.
1985 – First Computerized Numerical Control (CNC) machines arrive at YHM
1990 – First YHM-designed firearm accessories made and sold to industry partners (sights, muzzle devices, barrels, etc.)
First YHM products are offered for retail sale under the YHM name.
2002 – First YHM website goes live
2002 – YHM attends first SHOT Show
2005 – First YHM-made suppressors are offered on the national market
2007-06 – YHM suppressor line rapidly expands; first national distribution partners join
2008 – First YHM-branded firearm is offered
2006 – YHM team attends first NRA Show
2012 – YHM expands suppressor manufacturing
2013 – Christopher and Kevin Graham become co-owners of YHM
2017 – YHM moves into steel building complex in Easthampton, MA
2018 – YHM is completely CNC-focused for all machining operations
2022 – The YHM Turbo 3 becomes the first company suppressor to be officially rated Gold as part of the National Tactical Officers Association “Member Tested and Recommended” program.
2024 – Chris Graham becomes sole president/owner of YHM 2025
YHM introduces the VICTRA-12, the company’s first shotgun suppressor
We’ll be hanging out with YHM off and on through the upcoming year to help celebrate their 75th.
Here we see Katrín Gunnarsdóttir, the Icelandic minister of foreign affairs, visiting the 688i class hunter killer USS Newport News (SSN-750), while the boat is tied up remote Grundartangi, last week.
Those are some comfortable-looking shoes (USN image)
Newport News was escorted in by the Icelandic Coast Guard cutter Tyr (ICG image)
And assisted by Faxaflóahafnir-owned tugs. Faxaflóahafnir is a government (municipal) owned ports enterprise. (USN image)
(USN image)
Faxaflóahafnir operates Grundartangi as an industrial port some 45 minutes north of Reykjavik by car, while the nearest town, Hvalfjarðarsveit, has a population of about 600.
While it seems like such a small deal, it is big for Iceland, which has notoriously been hands-off when it comes to warships, even those of NATO allies, calling in the country’s ports.
As we’ve previously covered, the country has played host to at least a half dozen Amerian subs since April 2023– including one of SUBRON 12’s Block III Virginia-class hunter-killers, USS Delaware (SSN 791)-– in the waters of Eyjafjordur for partial resupply and crew swaps, becoming sort of a new Holy Loch North. However, this is the first time an SSN has been tied up.
The Navy made sure to note this latest visit as “historic,” and Adm. Stuart B. Munsch, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa and a career submariner himself, came aboard to pin on new Dolphins on the crew that earned them this deployment.
“Iceland’s support and strategic location are critical to collective defense in the North Atlantic,” said Munsch. “Our submariners stand the watch where few can, providing unmatched undersea dominance and ensuring our nations remain secure and free.”
Meanwhile, Newport News, commissioned in 1989, is one of the oldest boats still active in SUBLANT’s inventory and is slated to begin standing down in FY26. The Icelandic government was quick to note that she “ber ekki kjarnavopn” (does not carry nuclear weapons).
Considered one of the founding fathers of the modern American suppressor industry, Dr. Philip H. Dater, MD, has quietly passed.
The New York-born Dater, a radiologist and Vietnam-era U.S. Air Force veteran, started designing suppressors in the 1950s, later “dabbling off-hours in his hospital’s machine shop.” He founded Automatic Weapons Company, or AWC, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the mid-1970s to pursue his designs before leaving to co-found Gemini Technologies, now Gemtech, in the 1990s.
As noted by Gemtech, “Dr. Dater merged his passion for guns and his knowledge of ultrasound to create solutions that would silence skeptics and improve the overall shooting experience.”
Even after stepping away from manufacturing suppressors, Dater penned numerous technical papers in firearms journals and magazines. He continued to patent new designs, consult with industry partners, and hold classes on suppressor history and development well into his 80s.
I remember hanging out with Mark Serbu— no slouch when it comes to being a “mad scientist” in the gun space– who told me at the time that Doc. Dater was the smartest man in the gun industry.
Dater’s death was first noted by JK Armament last week, who described him as “the most influential innovator in the world of firearm silencers since Maxim.”
If you have a few, sit in on Jk’s interview with Dr. Dater last year. It is worth your time.
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Warship Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024: One Busy Bug
Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. 80-G-684905
Above we see the Balao-class fleet submarine USS Bugara (SS-331), in her gun-less Fleet Snorkel configuration, off Oahu on the 14th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Commissioned some 80 years ago this week on 15 November 1944, you wouldn’t think she’d even have a chance to get in the Big Show before the war ended.
You’d be very wrong about that.
The Balaos
A member of the 180+-ship Balao class, she was one of the most mature U.S. Navy diesel designs of the World War Two era, constructed with knowledge gained from the earlier Gato class. U.S. subs, unlike those of many navies of the day, were “fleet” boats, capable of unsupported operations in deep water far from home. The Balao class was deeper diving (400 ft. test depth) than the Gato class (300 feet) due to the use of high-yield strength steel in the pressure hull.
Able to range 11,000 nautical miles on their reliable diesel engines, they could undertake 75-day patrols that could span the immensity of the Pacific. Carrying 24 (often unreliable) Mk14 Torpedoes, these subs often sank anything short of a 5,000-ton Maru or warship by surfacing and using their deck guns. They also served as the firetrucks of the fleet, rescuing downed naval aviators from right under the noses of Japanese warships.
Some 311 feet long overall, they were all-welded construction to facilitate rapid building. Best yet, they could be made for the bargain price of about $7 million in 1944 dollars (just $100 million when adjusted for today’s inflation) and completed from keel laying to commissioning in about nine months.
An amazing 121 Balaos were completed through five yards at the same time, with the following pennant numbers completed by each:
Cramp: SS-292, 293, 295-303, 425, 426 (12 boats)
Electric Boat: 308-313, 315, 317-331, 332-352 (42)
Manitowoc on the Great Lakes: 362-368, 370, 372-378 (15)
Mare Island on the West Coast: 304, 305, 307, 411-416 (9)
Portsmouth Navy Yard: 285-288, 291, 381-410, 417-424 (43)
Our subject was the first (and only) U.S. warship named for the common label for the Rainbow surfperch (Hypsurus caryi), a multicolored little guy found along the coast of California. Laid down on 21 October 1943 at Groton, Connecticut by the Electric Boat Co, she was launched on 2 July 1944, and sponsored by Mrs. Anna A. Perry, the wife of Annapolis All-American football legend Capt. Lyman Spencer “Pop” Perry (USNA ’19), who at the time was serving as a Commodore of training operations on the West Coast.
80-G-448203
Commissioned at the U.S. Submarine Base, New London, on 15 November 1944, Bugara’s plankowner skipper was T/CDR Arnold Frederic Schade (USNA ’33). He was the youngest submarine commander in the Navy for a time and started the war on the training boat USS R-12 (SS 89), then was XO on the famed USS Growler (SS 215) when his commander in February 1943, CDR Howard Walter Gilmore, earned the MOH the hardest way.
In all, the 32-year-old Schade was the veteran of eight previous war patrols, including the last two as Growler’s skipper. He already had a Navy Cross and Silver Star on his jacket for sinking a trio of Japanese destroyer leaders on the 4th of July 1942 and for five other ships on the second patrol.
Bugara’s crew was one of veterans, no surprise as the Navy had been at war for three hard years when it was formed. Of the sub’s nine officers that made up her wardroom and seven chiefs in her goat locker, they counted no less than 73 war patrols among them, including one LT (j.g) with the unintentionally ironic last name of “Sinks” who had nine patrols on his own.
After abbreviated shakedowns and post-delivery maintenance, Bugara left New London for the Pacific via Panama on Christmas Day 1944. After all, there was a war on.
First Patrol
This overhead view of the Bugara (SS-331) was taken during torpedo practice firings off Panama Bay in January 1945 while heading to the Pacific. The torpedo retrieving davits are rigged, which are used for hauling the practice torpedo out of the water. Note at this point she only has one 5″/25, forward, as well as a twin 40mm Bofors aft. USN Archive photo # 19-N-76588.
Bugara cleared Pearl Harbor on 21 February 1945 on her 1st War Patrol and steamed directly to recently secured Saipan, ordered to patrol north of Luzon, Philippines in support of the Iwo Jima campaign.
A snooze fest with Japanese shipping already largely sanitized from the area, she fought off a typhoon and had to crash dive for several enemy aircraft while on the surface. In fact, she encountered far more fellow Allied submarines on patrol– American (USS Perch, Besugo, Blueback, Tuna, Tigrone, Puffer, Spot, Sea Fox, Hake, and Pargo), British (HMS P-248) and Dutch (Hr.Ms. K-14)– than she did anything else.
Disappointingly, the only Japanese vessels she spotted that were large enough to warrant a torpedo were marked as hospital ships. The only “action” her crew saw was in destroying a floating mine via gunfire.
It was essentially a qualifying cruise, with 29 of the 36 crewmembers who lacked their “Dolphins” earning them while underway.
On 21 April 1945, Bugara ended her inaugural patrol at the big Allied sub base at Fremantle, Australia after steaming 13,724 miles in 59 days.
Award of a Combat Insignia was not authorized for the patrol by COMSUBPAC.
Schade noted, “Morale of all hands is high despite the lack of combat opportunity.”
Second Patrol
After a three-week turnaround that included installing a second 5″/25 on her aft deck– the so-called gunboat submarine configuration— and director antennae for her APR, on 16 May 1945 Bugara sailed out of Fremantle for her 2nd War Patrol, ordered to hunt in the South China Sea off Hainan and serve as a floating “Log Joint” lifeguard station for aircrews downed at sea during the Okinawa campaign.
As on her first patrol, Bugara met or operated with other Allied subs on just about every day she was underway, and only a few local native craft– Chinese junks from which she would barter cigarettes for fresh fish– were spotted. Likewise, while on her first patrol, she often had to cope with Japanese aircraft, they too were scarce and instead, she typically logged voice contacts with passing four-engine Navy PB4Y Privateers.
On 20 June 1945, Bugara ended her monotonous 36-day patrol at recently liberated Subic Bay, where, in a twist of fate, she tied up next to the new Fulton-class sub tender USS Howard W. Gilmore (AS-16), named after Schade’s old boss on Growler.
Bugara logged zero enemy contacts despite the fact she steamed 10,118 miles across the Western Pacific, waters that the Empire had owned just a year prior.
Award of a Combat Insignia was not authorized for the patrol by COMSUBPAC.
Such boring late-war patrols often drove eager submarine skippers to think out of the box to find a fight.
For instance, in April 1945, USS Bluegill under LCDR Eric Barr landed some Australian Commandos followed by a short party of his own on the deserted low-lying reef of Pratas, some 160 miles southeast of Hong Kong, and “captured it.”
57 Sunk!
Shifting operations further south where the Japanese may still have some naval and merchant assets and with the new Loran navigation system installed, on 14 July 1945 Bugara departed Subic Bay to begin her 3rd War Patrol, ordered to the relative backwater of the Gulf of Siam where the Japanese had been unabated since early 1942.
The 29-day patrol report makes absolutely great reading and I cannot recommend it strongly enough.
On the night of 23 July, she put a “Commando Party ashore north of Lem Chong Pra– armed to the teeth with demolition equipment,” but had to take them back off the next morning just before dawn “highly embarrassed as the jungle had been so thick they couldn’t get off the beach.”
While a six torpedo spread against a small Japanese convoy on the early morning of 20 July yielded no hits– all of the fish running deeper than their settings– she had much better luck with her guns. In fact, while a normal load of “fish” was 24 torpedoes, Bugara had instead left Subic with just 12 (apparently worthless) torpedoes but with a full 240 rounds for her 5-inchers including 60 rounds of VT, stowing four racks full of ammo in her torpedo room instead.
In all, she made contact with 62 small surface vessels and, after finding them to be under Japanese control, sent at least 57 to the bottom in a series of one-sided gun actions over the fortnight between 24 July and 7 August, many in the dark.
From her War Patrol report:
She even ran into a batch of canoe-borne Malay pirates while in mid-attack on a Chinese schooner and performed actions worthy of the days of Stephen Decatur and Edward Preble.
In all, she fired 201 rounds of 5-inch, 291 of 40mm, and 400 of 20mm, finding in fact that the VT fuzed shells were not ideal as they were fired typically too close (within 600 yards on average) to arm.
Realizing that many of the crews on these wooden coasters and schooners were natives working under threat of death, Bugara’s crew went to great lengths to save them, even though on one occasion she had to submerge when a strange aircraft approached and left her rescues bobbing in the Gulf of Siam for a few minutes until she surfaced again after it had passed. Keep in mind that during this period she was working in typically just 10 fathoms (60 feet) of water, almost bottoming when completely submerged.
This also allowed her to glean some good old-fashioned HUMINT, with one particularly friendly Chinese who spoke pidgin English kept aboard for a couple of weeks as a translator. Schade included it with a wish list of items should he be sent back to the area:
On 17 August 1945, Bugara ended her final patrol of WWII at Fremantle, two days after Japan announced its unconditional surrender. Bugara and her crew were finally awarded the Submarine Combat Insignia for a patrol.
Few late-war subs could beat her record of “bunny bashing” in gun actions. The only one I can think of was Bill Hazzard in USS Blenny (SS-324) which bagged 62 mischievous Japanese vessels.
Bugara’s 3rd Patrol was the subject of at least one patch by her crew, emblazoned with a “57” on a hapless skull.
Bugara’s WWII patches. NHHC 2017.001.020 and NHHC 2017.001.021.
Sent with SubRon 5 to Subic Bay in September, she patrolled local waters there into mid-November when her squadron was ordered to clear Japanese-held islands in the South China Sea. This included Bugara sending large and heavily armed landing forces ashore at Tizard Bank and Itu Aba, where all they found were destroyed weather and radio stations.
Arriving back at San Diego in February 1946, three months later, she was back in Pearl Harbor, SubRon 5’s next home port.
There, as part of Operation Road’s End, on 28 May 1946, Bugara successfully sank her only Japanese ship via torpedo– the captured Type AM (I-13-class) submarine I-14in a test of the new Mark 10-3 exploder– which worked.
A huge aircraft-carrying submarine (the largest submarines ever built until U.S. Poseidon SSBNs of the 1960s), I-14 was sent to the bottom in deep water off Barber’s Point at deliberately unrecorded locations along with four other captured enemy boats (I-400, I-401, I-201, and I-203) to keep their technology out of Soviet hands.
I-14 and I-400 alongside USS Proteus (AS-19), in Japanese home waters, after WWII. Note: the crew of deck and another sub (unidentified) along in the background. NH 50387
These boats, had the war gone on long enough, were part of a Japanese plan to wage biological warfare against cities in Southern California, in retaliation for the U.S. firebombing of Japanese cities, or alternatively an attack on the Panama Canal– keep that in mind the next time someone says the A-Bombs didn’t have to be dropped.
To prove to Stalin that these went to Davy Jones, the Navy filmed the sinking of all these big I boats– in beautiful color.
Bugara received three battle stars for her service in World War II, one for taking part in the Iwo Jima campaign (12-16 March 1945), one for Okinawa (17 March to 4 April 1945, and one for her third patrol (14 July 45 – 17 Aug 45) as well as an Occupation Service clasp for July- August 1948 when she returned to the area on a West Pac patrol.
Korea
Stationed at Pearl Harbor when the Norks crossed the 38th Parallel into South Korea in June 1950, she was soon sent forward on a series of war patrols off the embattled peninsula that was broken up by a five-month Fleet Snorkel conversion at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard in late 1951 that saw her guns landed, a snorkel fitted along with better sensors, and a new, streamlined fairwater that covered her scopes installed.
Compare these two silhouttes.
Bugara received two Korean War battle stars during the conflict, logging four periods in theatre (5 Oct-28 Nov 50, 20 Jan-18 Jun 51, 20 Apr-4 Jun 54, and 14-27 Jul 54).
She also survived a crack-up during the conflict with the escort USS Whitehurst (DE-634) that left both vessels damaged but gratefully without any casualties, and each soon returned to work.
That’s not going to buff out
By August 1955, she was transferred to San Diego as part of SubRon 3.
USS Bugara (SS-331), May 1956. Shown while operating off San Diego. 80-G-696504
Same as above. 80-G-696503
USS Bugara (SS-331) off Oahu, Territory of Hawaii, December 7, 1955. 80-G-684904
She would fall into a decade of drills training evolutions, shipyard availabilities, and regular WestPac deployments and SEATO exercises where she would typically interact with the growing Japanese, Filipino, Australian, and Taiwanese fleets.
USS Bugara with an S-2 Tracker overhead, likely in an ASW exercise. Submarine Forces Museum
She also got a bit of payback against tin cans for her Whitehurst damage.
In April 1958 while using a practice torpedo against USS Yarnall (DD-541), which was set to run at 30 or 40 feet, it actually ran at 10 and smacked the Fletcher class destroyer on the port bow.
Yarnall’s skipper radioed, “We’ve been hit and are taking on water.”
Bugara’s skipper offered assistance.
Yarnall’s captain replied, “You can go to hell!”
Then came…
Vietnam
During the U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia, no less than 60 different submarines were operational off Vietnam at some time between 1964 and 1975, many staying long enough to earn campaign stars. Most, 42, were old “smoke boats,” such as Bugara, including many of her sisters. Eighteen others were modern SSNs which were utilized more sparingly.
Vietnam War. June 1969. Sailors aboard the guided missile frigate USS Brooke (DEG 1) watch as the Gato-class submarine USS Bluegill (AGSS 242) travels on the surface. Official U.S. Navy photo (K-74080)
In 1968, at the request of COMNAVFORV RADM Kenneth L. Veth, the Seventh Fleet deployed a submarine just off the coast of Sihanoukville (Kampong Saom) Cambodia to monitor shipping traffic. COMNAVFORV and 7th Fleet later pioneered tracking inbound gun-carrying trawlers passing through the strait between the Chinese mainland and Hainan with submarines working with over-the-horizon P-3s. The result was the ability to track a trawler’s passage, sight unseen, with the final act being an interception by surface assets and destruction. Sculpin in one known 1972 incident, tracked a Chinese trawler from its homeport across some 2,500 miles to the Southern coasts of South Vietnam, where it was sent to the bottom by the RVN Navy.
Communications intelligence personnel on board the submarine intercepted a message from the trawler that made clear the enemy was unaware of the submarine trailing her until the last hours of the mission. During the passage from Hainan, the submarine’s sonarmen became intimately familiar with the trawler’s distinctive shaft and propeller sounds. Periscope photographs of the white-colored trawler confirmed their analysis.
They also performed submerged lifeguard duty for downed aviators between Hanoi and Haiphong and the carriers on Yankee Station.
A U.S. Navy Sikorsky SH-3A Sea King from Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron 2 (HS-2) “Golden Falcons” sits on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Hornet (CVS-12) for a deployment to the Western Pacific and Vietnam from 12 August 1965 to 23 March 1966. In the background is the Fleet Snorkel Balao-class submarine USS Segundo (SS-398).
Others, such as Perch and Tunny, would carry out commando raids near shore. Submarines carried UDT 11 and UDT 12 frogmen to their dangerous missions in Operations Starlite, Jackstay, Dagger Thrust, Blue Marlin, and scores of other amphibious operations during the war.
Some, such as USS Salmon (SSR-573), would lay mines off North Vietnamese harbors.
They also served as an OPFOR “tame wolf” for the carriers’ escorts, embarked SH-2/3s, and land-based P-3 Orions to keep their ASW skills sharp should a Russki boat come poking too close.
A U.S. Navy Sikorsky SH-3A Sea King from Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron 8 (HS-8) “Eightballers” from USS Bennington (CVS-20) is seen flying over an unidentified Fleet Snorkel conversion submarine during the carrier’s deployment to the Western Pacific and Vietnam from 30 April to 9 November 1968.
Many of these submarines still have the exact details of their Vietnam service classified. They don’t call it the “Silent Service” for nothing.
Those who tallied up multiple Vietnam campaign stars included USS Grayback (8 stars), Razorback (5), Tunny (5), Barbel (4), Bluegill (4), Bonefish (4), Sea Fox (4), Swordfish (4), Tang (4), Salmon (3), Scamp (3), Tiru (3), Wahoo (3), Barb (2), Blueback (2), Bonefish (2), Carbonero (2), Pomfret (2), and Rasher (2).
Our girl Bugara beat out all but Grayback and received an Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal and seven campaign stars for her service during the Vietnam War.
Bugara was, by most accounts, the first submarine ordered into Vietnamese waters with a war face on since WWII, assigned to Task Force 77 for operations in the South China Sea as a result of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident in August 1964.
In 1965, Bugara passed her 6,000th dive on her 21st birthday.
Steaming cross-Pacific in 1966 allowed her the rare treat of “Tying the Knot” by doing surfaced and submerged 360-degree turns at both the Equator and the 180th meridian.
She appeared in several films and broadcasts highlighting the American Navy in Vietnam as she was one of the few subs to make port calls in Thailand (Bangkok, Ko Sumui, and Satahib) and Vietnam (DaNang) in addition to her regular WestPac calls at Subic Bay, Australia (Perth and Geraldton), Yokosuka, Hong Kong, and Taiwan (Kaohsiung and Keelung).
On 7 July 1967, she loaded and fired four exercise torpedoes. She also carried one war shot torpedo, serial #63813 which she would use on the 11th to send the stricken Buckley-class destroyer escort ex-USS Currier (DE-700) to the bottom in deep water off California.
ex-USS Currier (DE-700) SINKEX by USS Bugara, 1967. (Photo: Bugara Veterans’ Group)
Close up. (Photo: Bugara Veterans’ Group)
Currier, who had received two battle stars for WWII service and one for Korea, had been with the Fleet Sonar School since 1954 and was sent to mothballs for seven years before her SINKEX.
Part of Bugara’s 1968 enlisted crew with non-reg black berets of the type commonly available in Vietnamese markets, complete with embroidered Dolphin insignias. (Photo: Bugara Veteran’s Site)
With the ASW vendetta between The Bug and the 7th Fleet’s escorts continuing, in 1969 she was hit by a practice MK 44 torpedo shot by an American destroyer. The torpedo failed to shut down as it was expected to, causing a big hole in Bugara’s aft superstructure. While the exercise torp was never recovered, months later its transducer and nose of the torpedo were found in a space outside of the pressure hull below the aft torpedo tubes.
Her 12th and final post-Korea WestPac cruise was capped in August 1969 when she arrived home in San Diego. She logged her 7,000th dive later that year.
Despite a year-end yard period and battery renewal that would have bought Bugara another half-decade of service, the first week of January 1970 instead brought a flash from the CNO that the five remaining Fleet Snorkel boats (our girl plus USS Medregal, Segundo, Carbonero, and Sabalo), considered too obsolete to transfer overseas much less to keep in service, were to be prepped for use as mobile targets for Mk. 48 torpedo service weapon tests.
Bugara (SS-331) possibly off San Diego, 11 June 1970. Note the four-man MK 7 Mod 6 swimmer delivery vehicle (SDV) on her pressure hull. Photo courtesy of Cole Smith and atlanticfleetsales.smugmug.com. Via Navsource
Bugara in the end cheated to torpedo its meal and made her final dive on her own terms.
Decommissioned and Stuck from the Naval Register on 1 October 1970, ex-Bugara was slated to be expended in a SINKEX off the Washington coast.
However, in the tow from Mare Island to her death ground, our girl sank in a towing accident in the Strait of Juan de Fuca about 4 miles NW of Cape Flattery on 1 June 1971, with no injuries or lives lost. The next day, the Navy sent an NRF reserve ship out from Tacoma, USS Uhlmann (DD-687), to find the sunken hulk with sonar, and later DevGroupOne sent out an early deep-diving robot to film Bugara upright on the ocean floor.
In all, she stacked up a full dozen battle/campaign stars– three for WWII, two for Korea, and seven in Vietnam. In addition to the 57 “little boys” she sent to the bottom in 1945 in gun actions, she also deep-sixed a big Japanese I boat postwar and a tin can that was past its prime. All in all, not a bad run in 26 years.
Epilogue
Little remains of Bugara on dry land. Her WWII Jolly Roger-style battle flag has faded into history and I believe her bell was still aboard when she sank.
She rests 800 feet below the surface of what is now the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary.
In September 2008 ex-USS Bugara was surveyed by NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer as part of that oceanographic vessel’s shakedown cruise in a test of her state-of-the-art multibeam sonar system (Survey ID EX0801).
In 2017, she was surveyed as part of a larger expedition by NautilusLive.
She had a fairly active veteran’s group that, from what I can tell, had their last reunion in 2017 and has been offline for the past several years (archived here). They still maintain a group of images on Flickr, heavy on those released by NautilusLive.
She had 16 skippers between 1944 and 1970, the most noteworthy of which was Arnold Schade. Once he left Bugara in February 1946 he went on to other submarine commands, including SUBCOMLANT, a role in which he advised President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis. As Commander Middle East Force in 1963-64, he earned the Legion of Merit and later pinned a Gold Star to his Distinguished Service Medal. VADM Schade retired in 1971 after 38 years of service– ironically the same year as Bugara.
Schade passed at the age of 91 in San Diego and is buried at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Section CBEE, Row 2, Site 121.
She also had the deepest-dived Navy man in history as part of her wardroom during the Cold War. Bugara’s XO in 1962-63 was LCDR Don Walsh. Two years before being piped aboard the sub, he and Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard, while aboard the bathyscaphe Trieste (DSV-1), made the record maximum descent in the Challenger Deep, dropping into the darkness to 35,813 feet.
The world’s record descent, man’s deepest dive, had taken nine hours.
Krupp Sphere to Bathyscaph Trieste, 1960. Jacques Piccard center left and Lieutenant Don Walsh stand next to the sphere alongside an unidentified naval officer and civilian. National Museum of the U.S. Navy Photograph. NMUSN-4764
Ships are more than steel and wood And heart of burning coal, For those who sail upon them know That some ships have a soul.
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