Beach Jumpers - Service in Cold War, Vietnam

Service in Cold War, Vietnam

They were reactivated in 1951, in spite of the objections of those who questioned the worth of a deception unit in these more sophisticated times. A Beach Jumper unit was given a chance to prove its worth when an important training exercise was being planned. The Beach Jumpers knew that Fleet communications from the Force Commander to ships at sea were relayed through radio Washington. Pretending to be the Force Commander, they sent an official message, via Radio Washington, ordering every ship’s Commanding Officer to report aboard the flagship the next morning to discuss terminating the exercise. The next morning at least half of the ships’ Commanding officers were aboard the flagship in a state of mounting confusion and anger. There were no more doubts about the worth of the Beach Jumper program.

Through the late 1950s and into the early 1960s as the Cold War evolved into the "Counterinsurgency Era," Beach Jumper expertise in the area of manipulative and imitative deception and electronic warfare (EW) was employed in revolutionary new ways, both during scheduled fleet exercises and on actual operations. Additionally, they acquired a new secondary mission: "To plan and execute Psychological Operations in support of commands to which assigned."

Several Beach Jumper teams were active in the Vietnam War, responsible for tactical deception and for employing psychological operations (PSYOPS), which was also their unclassified cover activity. They operated from several naval platforms including the USS Iwo Jima (LPH-2) and USS Tripoli (LPH-10). Their primary mission was to assist and support the operating forces in the conduct of Tactical Cover and Deception. They conducted monitoring, tape preparation and Soviet Signal Intelligence SIGINT trawler jamming missions from destroyers. Some of the men became paratroopers, possibly to add credibility to the Beach Jumper cover name.

Other Beach Jumpers operated under the cover name "Yankee Station Special Surveillance Unit," aboard fleet tugs such as the USS Cocopa (ATF-101). Their mission was to deceive and jam Soviet Signal Intelligence (SIGINT) and Electronics Intelligence (ELINT) trawlers that were monitoring U.S. Naval operations in the Gulf of Tonkin. This group conducted counter SIGINT trawler activities which included random jamming with noises that even included bagpipe recordings.