United States Seventh Fleet - Vietnam T-Shirt

Seventh Fleet represented the first official entrance of the United States into the Vietnam War, with the Gulf of Tonkin incident. Between 1950 and 1970, the U.S. Seventh Fleet was known by the tongue-in-cheek nickname "Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club" since most of the fleet's operations were conducted from the Tonkin Gulf at the time. On 12 February 1965, USS Salisbury Sound (AV-13) became the first U.S. Navy ship to conduct operations inside Vietnam coastal waters. Salisbury Sound set up a seadrome in Da Nang Bay and conducted seaplane patrols in support of Operation Flaming Dart, the bombing of North Vietnamese army camps. Operating primarily from Yankee Station off the north coast of Vietnam and the aptly-named Dixie Station off the south coast