Tran Quoc Toan (HQ-06) (center) with her sister ships Tran Quang Khai (HQ-02) (pierside at left) and Tran Binh Trong (HQ-05) (right) |
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| Career (South Vietnam) | |
|---|---|
| Name: | RVNS Tran Quoc Toan (HQ-06) |
| Namesake: | Tran Quoc Toan (1267–1285), a general and prince of the Trần Dynasty |
| Builder: | Lake Washington Shipyard, Houghton, Washington |
| Laid down: | 23 August 1943 |
| Launched: | 13 May 1944 |
| Completed: | November 1944 |
| Acquired: | 21 December 1971 |
| Fate: | Fled to Philippines on collapse of South Vietnam April 1975 Formally transferred to Republic of the Philippines 5 April 1976 Cannibalized for spare parts and discarded in 1982 |
| Notes: | Served as U.S. Navy seaplane tender USS Cook Inlet (AVP-36) 1944-1946 Served as U.S. Coast Guard cutter USCGC Cook Inlet (WAVP-384), later WHEC-384, 1948-1971 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Tran Quang Khai-class frigate |
| Displacement: | 1,766 tons (standard) 2,800 tons (full load) |
| Length: | 310 ft 9 in (94.72 m) (overall); 300 ft 0 in (91.44 m) waterline |
| Beam: | 41 ft 1 in (12.52 m) |
| Draft: | 13 ft 5 in (4.09 m) |
| Installed power: | 6,080 horsepower (4.54 megawatts) |
| Propulsion: | 2 x Fairbanks Morse 38D diesel engines |
| Speed: | approximately 18 knots (maximum) |
| Complement: | approximately 200 |
| Armament: | 1 × 5-inch/38-caliber (127-millimeter) dual-purpose gun 1 or 2 x 81-millimeter mortars in some ships[1] Several machine guns |
RVNS Tran Quoc Toan[2](HQ-03)[3] was a South Vietnamese frigate of the Republic of Vietnam Navy in commission from 1971 to 1975. She and her six sister ships were the largest South Vietnamese naval ships of their time.
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Tran Quoc Toan was built in the United States as the United States Navy Barnegat-class seaplane tender USS Cook Inlet. She was laid down on 23 August 1943 by Lake Washington Shipyard at Houghton, Washington, launched on 13 May 1944, and commissioned into the U.S. Navy on 5 November 1944. She served in the Central Pacific during World War II and on occupation duty in Japan and Korea postwar. She was decommissioned in March 1946 and placed in reserve.
The U.S. Navy loaned Cook Inlet to the United States Coast Guard in 1948 and transferred her permanently to the Coast Guard in 1966. She was commissioned as the Coast Guard cutter USCGC Cook Inlet (WAVP-384) in 1949 and was redesignated a high endurance cutter and reclassified as WHEC-384 in 1966. Throughout her Coast Guard career of almost 23 years, she patrolled ocean stations in the North Atlantic, reporting weather data and conducting law-enforcement and search-and-rescue operations. She also served in the Vietnam War for several months in 1971.
After her antisubmarine warfare equipment had been removed, Cook Inlet was transferred to South Vietnam on 21 December 1971 and was commissioned into the Republic of Vietnam Navy as the frigate RVNS Tran Quoc Toan (HQ-03)[4] By mid-1972, six other former Casco-class cutters also were in South Vietnamese service. They were the largest warships in the South Vietnamese inventory, and their 5-inch (127-millimeter) guns were South Vietnam's largest naval guns. Tran Quoc Toan and her sisters fought alongside U.S. Navy ships during the final years of the Vietnam War, patrolling the South Vietnamese coast and providing gunfire support to South Vietnamese forces ashore.
When South Vietnam collapsed at the end of the Vietnam War in late April 1975, Tran Quoc Toan became a ship without a country. She fled to Subic Bay in the Philippines, packed with South Vietnamese refugees. On 22 May 1975 and 23 May 1975, a U.S. Coast Guard team inspected Tran Quoc Toan and five of her sister ships, which also had fled to the Philippines in April 1975. One of the inspectors noted: "These vessels brought in several hundred refugees and are generally rat-infested. They are in a filthy, deplorable condition. Below decks generally would compare with a garbage scow."[5]
The United States formally transferred Tran Quoc Toan to the Republic of the Philippines on 5 April 1976. She did not enter Philippine Navy service; instead she and her sister ship RVNS Tran Nhat Duat (HQ-03) were cannibalized for spare parts to allow the Philippines to keep four other sister ships in commission in the Philippine Navy.[6]
The former Tran Quoc Toan was discarded in 1982 and probably scrapped.[7]
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