Selected for transfer to theSoviet Navy inProject Hula – a secret program for the transfer of U.S. Navy ships to the Soviet Navy atCold Bay,Territory of Alaska, in anticipation of theSoviet Union joining thewar against Japan –Caution departed Eniwetok on 5 April 1945, bound for Portland, Oregon, where she underwent a pre-transferoverhaul. With her overhaul complete, she arrived at Cold Bay on 11 July 1945 to begin familiarization training of her new Soviet crew.[4]
Following the completion of training for her Soviet crew,Caution wasdecommissioned on 17 August 1945[1] at Cold Bay and transferred to the Soviet Union underLend-Lease immediately.[1] Also commissioned into the Soviet Navy immediately,[1] she was designated as atralshik ("minesweeper") and renamedT-284[2] in Soviet service. She soon departed Cold Bay bound forPetropavlovsk-Kamchatsky in the Soviet Union, where she served in theSoviet Far East.[4]
In February 1946, the United States began negotiations for the return of ships loaned to the Soviet Union for use during World War II, and on 8 May 1947,United States Secretary of the NavyJames V. Forrestal informed theUnited States Department of State that theUnited States Department of the Navy wanted 480 of the 585 combatant ships it had transferred to the Soviet Union for World War II use returned. Deteriorating relations between the two countries, as theCold War broke out, led to protracted negotiations over the ships. By the mid-1950s, the U.S. Navy found it too expensive to bring home ships that had become worthless to it anyway. Many ex-American ships were merely administratively "returned" to the United States and instead sold for scrap in the Soviet Union. In contrast, the U.S. Navy did not seriously pursue the return of others because it viewed them as no longer worth the recovery cost.[5] The Soviet Union never returnedCaution to the United States, although the U.S. Navy reclassified her as a "fleet minesweeper" (MSF) and redesignated herMSF-158 on 7 February 1955.
T-284 was scrapped in 1960.[3] Unaware of her fate, the U.S. Navy keptCaution on itsNaval Vessel Register until finally striking her on 1 January 1983.
Photo gallery of USSCaution at NavSource Naval History
^abcdefgTheDictionary of American Naval Fighting ShipsCaution article states that the U.S. Navy decommissionedCaution on 16 August 1945 and transferred her to the Soviet Navy, andNavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive Caution (MSF 158) ex-AM-158 ex-AMc-135 andhazegray.orgCaution repeat this. However, more recent research in Russell, Richard A.,Project Hula: Secret Soviet-American Cooperation in the War Against Japan, Washington, D.C.:Naval Historical Center, 1997,ISBN0-945274-35-1, p. 39, which includes access to Soviet-era records unavailable during theCold War, reports that the transfer date was 17 August 1945. As sources, Russell cites Department of the Navy,Ships Data: U.S. Naval Vessels Volume II, 1 January 1949, (NAVSHIPS 250-012), Washington, DC: Bureau of Ships, 1949; and Berezhnoi, S. S.,Flot SSSR: Korabli i suda lendliza: Spravochnik ("The Soviet Navy: Lend-Lease Ships and Vessels: A Reference"), St. Petersburg, Russia: Belen, 1994. According to Russell, Project Hula ships were decommissioned by the U.S. Navy simultaneously with their transfer to and commissioning by the Soviet Navy – see photo captions on p. 24 regarding the transfers of variouslarge infantry landing craft (LCI(L)s) and information on p. 27 about the transfer ofUSS Coronado (PF-38), which Russell says typified the transfer process – indicating thatCaution's U.S. Navy decommissioning, transfer, and Soviet Navy commissioning all occurred simultaneously in a single ceremony on 17 August 1945.
^abNavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive Caution (MSF 158) ex-AM-158 ex-AMc-135 andhazegray.orgCaution state thatCaution was namedT-598 in Soviet service, but more recent research in Russell, Richard A.,Project Hula: Secret Soviet-American Cooperation in the War Against Japan, Washington, D.C.:Naval Historical Center, 1997,ISBN0-945274-35-1, pp. 39-40, which includes access to Soviet-era records unavailable during theCold War, finds that the ship's Soviet name wasT-284, while anauxiliary motor minesweeper, the formerUSS YMS-273, also transferred in 1945, had the Soviet nameT-598. As sources, Russell cites Department of the Navy,Ships Data: U.S. Naval Vessels Volume II, 1 January 1949, (NAVSHIPS 250-012), Washington, DC: Bureau of Ships, 1949; and Berezhnoi, S. S.,Flot SSSR: Korabli i suda lendliza: Spravochnik ("The Soviet Navy: Lend-Lease Ships and Vessels: A Reference"), St. Petersburg, Russia: Belen, 1994.
^abNavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive Caution (MSF 158) ex-AM-158 ex-AMc-135 andhazegray.orgCaution state that the ship, which they identify asT-598, probably was scrapped in 1956, but more recent research in Russell, Richard A.,Project Hula: Secret Soviet-American Cooperation in the War Against Japan, Washington, D.C.:Naval Historical Center, 1997,ISBN0-945274-35-1, p. 39, reports that the ship's Soviet name wasT-284 and states thatT-284 was scrapped in 1960. As sources, Russell cites Department of the Navy,Ships Data: U.S. Naval Vessels Volume II, 1 January 1949, (NAVSHIPS 250-012), Washington, DC: Bureau of Ships, 1949; and Berezhnoi, S. S.,Flot SSSR: Korabli i suda lendliza: Spravochnik ("The Soviet Navy: Lend-Lease Ships and Vessels: A Reference"), St. Petersburg, Russia: Belen, 1994. Russell, p. 40., also states thatT-598 – a Soviet name previously attributed toCaution but now identified as belonging to the formerUSS YMS-273 – was stricken in 1956, and this confusion over the identity of the two ships may have led to the confusion over their fates.
^abRussell, Richard A.,Project Hula: Secret Soviet-American Cooperation in the War Against Japan, Washington, D.C.:Naval Historical Center, 1997,ISBN0-945274-35-1, p. 39.
^Russell, Richard A.,Project Hula: Secret Soviet-American Cooperation in the War Against Japan, Washington, D.C.:Naval Historical Center, 1997,ISBN0-945274-35-1, pp. 37-38, 39.
United States
Soviet Union
This article incorporates text from thepublic domainDictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be foundhere.
United States Navy
Soviet Navy
