USS Berkeley
USS Berkeley (DDG-15) was a guided missile destroyer in the United States Navy. She was named for Major General Randolph C. Berkeley, USMC (1875–1960), a Medal of Honor recipient for actions during the U.S. occupation of Veracruz (1914). She was laid down by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation at Camden in New Jersey on 1 June 1960, launched on 29 July 1961 sponsored by Mrs. James B. Berkeley, Major General Berkeley's daughter-in-law; and commissioned on 15 December 1962 at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. Berkeley was decommissioned on 30 September 1992 at a ceremony in San Diego, California, and stricken from the Naval Vessel Register. She was turned over to the Hellenic Navy on 1 October, and recommissioned as the Greek destroyer Themistoklis (D221). The ship remained in Greek service until her decommissioning on 18 February 2002 and was sold for scrap in 2004. Service history 1960s After fitting out at Philadelphia, Berkeley set out for her assigned homeport of Long Beach, California, mooring there on 16 March 1963 after visits to Port Royal, South Carolina; Kingston, Jamaica; and Acapulco, Mexico. Designed primarily to provide long-range anti-aircraft cover for task forces at sea, Berkeley devoted the next six weeks testing her Tartar anti-aircraft missile system's proficiency in that role. The warship's crew also conducted gunnery, engineering, and communication systems trials. In early May, the guided-missile destroyer demonstrated her capabilities to President John F. Kennedy, knocking down two jet drone targets with two TARTAR missiles. At the end of a short visit to the Rose Festival at Portland, Oregon, in early June, Berkeley entered the San Francisco Naval Shipyard for a three-month availability. At the end of the repair period, she became a unit of Destroyer Division (DesDiv) 12 and spent the rest of the year engaged in local operations in the Long Beach area. The warship remained in southern California waters for the first 10 weeks of 1964, preparing for a Far East deployment. On 13 March, Berkeley stood out of Long Beach in company with the cruiser and 11 other destroyers bound for her first tour of duty with the 7th Fleet. After calling at Pearl Harbor, where the aircraft carrier joined company, the task group steamed to the East China Sea for a month of training. Detached on 18 April, Berkeley proceeded to Hong Kong, where she embarked Vice Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, and sailed on to Bangkok, Thailand, for the annual Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) conference. After rejoining her task group in late April, the guided missile destroyer spent the next two months screening the carriers and and participating in a SEATO landing exercise in the Philippines. After spending Independence Day in Sasebo, Japan, she put to sea with the Ticonderoga task group on 5 July for routine operations. This quickly changed, however, when the warships received orders diverting them to the South China Sea where they joined other Navy units off the South Vietnamese coast and in the Gulf of Tonkin. As part of President Lyndon