Almost from the start of the Cold War in 1945 the United States employed surface ships and submarines with special equipment and personnel embarked to collect intelligence against the Soviet Union and China. It subsequently expanded its activities to look at Third World nations that were Soviet or Chinese allies or left-leaning neutral states.
But following the experiences of the Soviet Union led U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) and Navy officials to consider specialized ships for intelligence collection.
Specialized spy ships were initiated in the 1950s, when the Soviet Union employed modified trawlers to collect intelligence in overseas areas and to observe Western naval operations. Although often depicted in the Western press as "disguised," these ships were readily identifiable: All were Soviet Navy manned and were fitted with extensive electronic antennas, and some were armed. Soviet fishing craft as well as merchant ships undoubtedly collected intelligence as opportunities permitted, sometimes with intelligence officers embarked, but most Soviet intelligence ships—designated AGIs by Western intelligence—were built on trawler hulls. Their large, insulated cargo holds were readily adaptable to electronic equipment bays and crew berthing spaces. Trawler hulls also provided long endurance, had good seakeeping qualities, and were in series production.
The later and larger Soviet (now Russian) AGIs were designed specifically for intelligence collection. The large ships of the Primor'ye (3,700 tons, 278 feet) and Bal'zam (5,400 tons, 346 feet) classes were capable of onboard intelligence processing as well as collection, thus accelerating the delivery of intelligence data to fleet and regional commanders. The larger Soviet AGIs have light antiaircraft guns, and many have been observed with shoulder-fired antiaircraft missile launchers.
By the late 1990s—just before the demise of the Soviet regime—some 60 AGIs were being operated by the Soviet Navy. Those AGIs normally kept watch off the U.S. strategic submarine base at Holy Loch, Scotland, and off the southeastern coast of the United States, enabling surveillance of submarine bases at Charleston, South Carolina, and Kings Bay, Georgia, and the missile activity off Cape Canaveral, Florida. The AGIs also operated in important international waterways, such as the Strait of Gibraltar, the Sicilian Straits, and the Strait of Hormuz. They regularly kept watch on U.S. Navy and other NATO fleet exercises. During the Vietnam War, a Soviet AGI off Guam and another operating near U.S. carriers in the Gulf of Tonkin are believed to have provided some warning of U.S. air strikes to the North Vietnamese.
The first specialized U.S. intelligence ships were acquired to compensate for the lack of electronic listening posts in South America and Africa. Those were World War II-era cargo ships converted after 1960, when the National Security Agency was authorized to acquire electronic intelligence (ELINT) collection ships to target Third World countries.
The first NSA conversion was the Pvt. Jose F. Valdez (T-AG-169). The former cargo ship, extensively modified for the ELINT role, deployed in November 1961, operating for the next ten years off the coasts of Africa under the "cover" of an extended hydrographic survey cruise. She was followed by two other NSA-sponsored conversions, the James E. Robinson (T-AG-170) and Sgt. Joseph E. Muller (T-AG-171). Those ships were operated by civilian merchant crews and NSA technicians.
Simultaneously, the U.S. Navy entered into a new level of intelligence collection in collaboration with NSA. A series of wartime cargo ships was converted and Navy manned; their special ELINT spaces operated by Navy and Marine Corps technicians from the Naval Security Group who would collect against both NSA and Navy targets. The first Navy-operated ship was the Oxford (AG-159), built as a cargo ship in 1945. According to the Navy, she was placed in commission on 8 July 1961 to conduct research "in the reception of electromagnetic propagations. Equipped with the latest antenna systems and measuring devices, she is a highly sophisticated and mobile station that can steam to various parts of the world to participate in the Navy's comprehensive program of research and development projects in communications."
During the fall of 1962 the Oxford operated in the Caribbean, intercepting radio communications from Cuba as the Soviet Union moved troops and weapons onto the island. Details of the Oxford intercepts have not been revealed, but during the Cuban Missile Crisis, on 10 October, NSA—which operated an array of communications intercept stations around Cuba, including the Oxford—reported that the Cuban air defense system appeared to be completed. "They had just begun passing radar tracking from radar stations to higher headquarters and to defensive fighter bases using Soviet procedures. Their system, with Russians in advisory positions at every point, was ready for business," according to an NSA history.
The Oxford subsequently was redesignated AGTR-1. Four similar conversions of large cargo ships followed: the Georgetown (AGTR-2), Jamestown (AGTR-3), Belmont (AGTR-4), and Liberty (AGTR-5). The ships were manned by Navy personnel but operated under the aegis of NSA with some civilian specialists on board. They were easily recognized as intelligence ships because of their operations, antenna arrays, and comments in naval reference books about them. The ships carried a minimal armament of machine guns and small arms.
The Georgetown operated primarily off South America; the Jamestown operated off Africa, in the Caribbean, and in the South China Sea; the Belmont remained in the Caribbean (supporting the U.S. troop landing in the Dominican Republic); and the Liberty also was operated off of Africa.
The Navy, the Department of Defense, and NSA subsequently decided to develop a fleet of smaller cargo or even trawler-type ships for the ELINT role. These ships were intended to operate closer to target areas than the larger AGTR conversions. The initial units were three small (176-foot) cargo ships converted in the mid-1960s, the first being the Banner (AGER-1).
The Banner, operating out of Yokosuka, Japan, began ELINT collection against Soviet Siberia, North Korea, and China in 1967 under the code name Clickbeetle. On occasion the ship was harassed by Soviet naval ships.
She was followed to the Far East in late 1967 by her sister ship, the Pueblo (AGER-2), with a third ship, the Palm Beach (AGER-3), also being placed in commission for ELINT operations in another area. Like the AGTRs, these ships carried a minimal armament of machine guns and small arms. Additional AGER conversions were planned.
The Liberty was sent to the eastern Mediterranean before the outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East in June 1967 to intercept and record Arab communications. When the war began, U.S. authorities ordered her away from the coast of Sinai, where she was operating at the time. These messages never reached the ship. Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats, misidentifying the ship, attacked her. In the attack 34 crewmen were killed, 171 were wounded, and the ship was severely damaged. Through the gallant efforts of her crew the ship stayed afloat.
Seven months later, the Pueblo—on her first mission—steamed out of Sasebo, Japan, on the morning of 11 January 1968, heading northeast toward the Sea of Japan. She was to spy on naval activities off North Korean ports, record samples of electronic signals, and keep any Soviet naval ships in the area under electronic surveillance.
On 23 January, the Pueblo was approached by a North Korean gunboat, which soon was joined by four torpedo boats. Outgunned, the Pueblo, whose machine guns were under canvas covers that were frozen and in exposed positions, was forced to surrender and taken into the port of Wonsan.
The ship's 28 intelligence specialists had neither the facilities nor the training for anything but haphazard attempts at destroying the cryptographic equipment and key list materials. On board were 50 concussion grenades (which had been designed, not to destroy equipment, but to be dropped in the water against hostile swimmers); a few fire axes; some sledgehammers; and two antiquated paper shredders, each of which would take 15 minutes to destroy an eight-inch stack of paper.
At 2:05 the Pueblo radioed: "DESTROYING ALL KEYLISTS AND AS MUCH ELEC [electronic] EQUIP AS POSSIBLE." At 2:18, mention was made of some cryptographic machines. And, at 2:30, "DESTRUCTION OF PUBS HAVE BEEN INEFFECTIVE. SUSPECT SEVERAL WILL BE COMPROMISED." At 2:32 p.m. the Pueblo was boarded by North Korean troops. She stopped transmitting.
Of the more than 400 classified documents in the ship, an unknown number had been destroyed, and some of the electronic intercept, communications, and cryptographic gear had been smashed. Many documents had not been destroyed. Some Pueblo sailors later recalled seeing one or two canvas mattress covers stuffed with secret documents still on board—it had been intended to weight them and to throw them overboard. Scores of classified documents littered the ship's passageways. Also surviving were some diagrams and manuals for repairing the machines that were smashed.
The Pueblo entered Wonsan under her own power. Soviet and Chinese intelligence specialists were climbing through the ship within days of her being brought into port. The Americans were taken ashore, some having been wounded by North Korean gunfire. One sailor died. The 82 survivors were interrogated, beaten, and forced to write confessions. The Americans were released 11 months later following a U.S. government apology and admission that the ship was in North Korean waters.
The Pueblo, which had become a Korean tourist attraction, remained moored in Wonsan harbor until October 1999, when Korean sailors took her around the southern end of South Korea to an anchorage near Pyongyang. In October 2002, the ship was moved again, this time to Nampo, to coincide with the arrival of a U.S. envoy. North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il apparently had planned to return the ship to the United States as a goodwill gesture to President George W. Bush, but worsening relations have delayed the Pueblo's return indefinitely.
Following the attack on the Liberty and the capture of the Pueblo, the remaining U.S. intelligence ships were discarded. The spy role was taken over by Navy submarines, surface warships, aircraft, and satellites.
Strangely, however, there reportedly was one additional specialized intelligence ship in the U.S. Navy. The former landing craft repair ship Sphinx (ARL-24, ex-LST 963) was the last of several score LSTs converted to various types of repair and support ships to be operated by the U.S. Navy. Originally completed in 1944, she was in service from 1944 to 1947, 1950 to 1956, and again from 1967 to 1971 as an ARL.
The Sphinx was recommissioned in 1985 for employment as an intelligence ship to operate off Central America to intercept radio and radar emissions from Marxist Nicaragua. The ship was decommissioned and stricken on 19 June 1989, again ending an era in the U.S. Navy.