S.Amdt. 2955

1. Adds SEC. 1070. SENSE OF CONGRESS ON NAMING THE NEXT AIRCRAFT CARRIER AS U.S.S. AMERICA at the end of subtitle E of title X

   Adds a section

   Inserted: SEC. 1070. SENSE OF CONGRESS ON NAMING THE NEXT AIRCRAFT CARRIER AS U.S.S. AMERICA.

   Inserted: (a) Findings.--Congress makes the following findings:

   Inserted: (1) In the history of the United States, three Navy vessels have been named U.S.S. America.

   Inserted: (2) On November 9, 1776, the Continental Congress authorized the construction of three 74-gun ships of the line. One of the men-of-war, the first ship named America, was laid down in May 1777 in the shipyard of John Langdon on Rising Castle (now Badger) Island in the Piscataqua River between Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and Kittery, Maine.

   Inserted: (3) On June 26, 1781, Congress selected then-Captain John Paul Jones as the first commanding officer of the America. However, Congress decided on September 4, 1782, to present the ship to King Louis XVI of France to replace the French ship of the line Magnifique which had run aground and been destroyed on August 11, 1782, while attempting to enter Boston harbor. The ship transfer symbolized the appreciation of the United States for France's service to and sacrifices on behalf of the cause of the American patriots.

   Inserted: (4) The second America was originally the German civilian passenger transport Amerika, which was launched on April 20, 1905, at Belfast, Ireland, by the noted shipbuilding firm of Harland and Wolff, Ltd. Built for the Hamburg-America Line, the steamer entered transatlantic service in the autumn of 1905 when she departed Hamburg, Germany, on October 11, 1905, bound for the United States.

   Inserted: (5) The largest ship of her kind in the world, and easily one of the most luxurious passenger vessels to sail the seas, from 1905 to 1914, the Amerika plied the North Atlantic trade routes touching at Cherbourg, France, while steaming between Hamburg and New York, New York.

   Inserted: (6) During the summer of 1914, events in the Balkans triggered a conflict that soon spread through Europe, pitting nations against nations in the First World War. The eruption of fighting caught Amerika at Boston, where she was preparing to sail for home. Although due to leave port on August 1, 1914, the Amerika stayed at Boston lest she fall prey to the warships of the Royal Navy and remained there for almost three years during the period of United States neutrality.

   Inserted: (7) Meanwhile, the loss of life caused by German submarine operations turned opinion in the United States against the Central Powers and on February 1, 1917, the United States declared war. The Amerika remained inactive until seized by the United States Shipping Board (USSB), on July 25, 1917. The Amerika was earmarked by the Navy for service in the Cruiser-Transport Force as a troop transport, given the identification number 3006, and placed in commission on August 6, 1917.

   Inserted: (8) Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels promulgated General Order No. 320, changing the names of several ex-German ships on September 1, 1917. The Amerika became the America and went on to conduct multiple voyages transporting troops and supplies to and from Word War I operations in Europe. The completion of these trials proved to be a milestone in the reconditioning of former German ships, for the America was the last to be readied for service in the United States Navy.

   Inserted: (9) On September 26, 1919, the America was decommissioned in Hoboken, New Jersey, and transferred to the War Department. The ship went on to serve as USAT America, and was later renamed, possibly to avoid confusion with the liner America, as the Edmund B. Alexander, in keeping with the Army policy of naming its oceangoing transports for famous general officers. This name honored Edmund Brooke Alexander from the War with Mexico.

   Inserted: (10) The ship operated briefly between New Orleans, Louisiana, and the Panama Canal Zone and became a troop transport in World War II. The ship was sold to the Bethlehem Steel Co., of Baltimore, Maryland, on January 16, 1957, and was broken up a short time later.

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   Inserted: (11) The third America was the aircraft carrier designated CV-66 laid down on January 1, 1961 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Corporation. She was launched on February 1, 1964, and commissioned at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard on January 23, 1965.

   Inserted: (12) In the late 1960s, the carrier America conducted multiple Mediterranean deployments during such events as political crises in Greece and the Suez and countless encounters with Soviet navy vessels and assisted with the rescue and treatment of wounded from the incident involving the Liberty (AGTR-5).

   Inserted: (13) On May 30, 1968, the carrier America arrived at Yankee Station in the South China Sea, and the next morning, the first aircraft since commissioning to leave her deck in anger were launched against the enemy. The America served through four line periods, consisting of 112 days on Yankee Station off the Vietnam coast.

   Inserted: (14) On a subsequent deployment in 1970, the carrier America completed 100 days on Yankee Station. Through five line periods, the carrier conducted 10,600 aircraft sorties, completed 10,804 carrier landings, expended 11,190 tons of ordnance, moved 425,996 pounds of cargo, handled 6,890 packages and transferred 469,027 pounds of mail. This was accomplished without a single combat loss and only one major landing accident with, fortunately, no fatalities.

   Inserted: (15) On June 2, 1972, three days before the carrier America was to sail again on deployment, the Chief of Naval Operations visited the ship and explained the reason why her orders had been changed to send her to the Gulf of Tonkin instead of the Mediterranean. On October 6, 1972, bombs from the planes of the America dropped the Thanh Hoa Bridge, a major objective since the bombing of the North had begun years before. The America received five battle stars for her overall service in the Vietnam War.

   Inserted: (16) The carrier America logged her 100,000th landing on August 29, 1973. On May 6, 1981, the America was the first United States Navy carrier to steam through the Suez Canal since the U.S.S. Intrepid (CVA-11) made the passage shortly before the Arab-Israeli "Six-Day War" of 1967. The America was also the first supercarrier to transit the canal since it had been modified to permit passage of supertankers.

   Inserted: (17) On January 7, 1986, President Ronald Reagan ordered all American citizens out of Libya, and broke off all remaining ties between the United States and Libya. At the same time, President Reagan directed the dispatch of a second carrier battle group to the Mediterranean, and directed the Joint Chiefs of Staff to look into military operations against Libya.

   Inserted: (18) On April 5, 1986, two days after a bomb killed four Americans along with others onboard a Trans World Airways (TWA) flight en route from Rome, Italy, to Athens, Greece, another bomb exploded in the La Belle Discoteque in West Berlin, Germany, killing two members of the United States Armed Forces and a Turkish civilian. Another 222 people were wounded in the bombing, 78 Americans among them. Operation Eldorado Canyon commenced early on the afternoon of April 14, 1986, and the carrier America, operating off the Libyan coast, launched six A-6 Intruder strike aircraft and six A-7E Corsair II aircraft in strike support.

   Inserted: (19) Following Operation Desert Storm, the carrier America returned to the United States amid a heroes' welcome. The America participated in Operation Welcome Home and Fleet Week '91 in New York, New York, from June 6, 1991, through June 11, 1991, taking part in the largest victory parade since World War II. After an abbreviated in-port period and compressed work-ups, the America deployed to the North Atlantic for two months in support of North Star '91, then departed on December 2, 1991, for the Mediterranean and Arabian Gulf once again, her eighteenth major deployment. The America also became the first carrier to earn an unprecedented third campaign star on the Southwest Asia Service Medal.

   Inserted: (20) The carrier America departed Norfolk, Virginia, on August 28, 1995, for a routine 6-month deployment to the Mediterranean and to the Indian Ocean. This was the 20th and final deployment in the 30-year history of the America as the carrier participated in Operations Deny Flight and Deliberate Force from September 9, 1995, to September 30, 1995.

   Inserted: (21) America returned to the pier in Norfolk, Virginia, ending her Mediterranean Sea deployment on February 24, 1996. After more than three decades of proud and historic naval service, the America was decommissioned at Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia on August 9, 1996.

   Inserted: (22) Stricken from the Navy List on the day of her decommissioning, the carrier America was originally planned to be scrapped. However, the carrier was sunk in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 300 miles off the Virginia coast, on May 14, 2005, following a series of tests consisting of underwater and surface simulated attacks on the ship.

   Inserted: (23) In a letter to a coalition of veterans and former crewmembers of the America who offered to make the carrier a museum, the Vice Chief of Naval Operations explained that "America will make one final and vital contribution to our national defense, this time as a live-fire test and evaluation platform. America's legacy will serve as a footprint in the design of future carriers -- ships that will protect the sons, daughters, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of America veterans".

   Inserted: (b) Naming of Next Aircraft Carrier.--It is the sense of the Congress that the next nuclear-powered aircraft carrier of the Navy be named U.S.S. America.

   Original wording

   At the end of subtitle E of title X, add the following:

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As printed