USS Kauffman

Commissioned in 1987, the Kauffman honors Rear Admiral Draper Laurence Kauffman, the founder of the Navy's Underwater Demolition Teams—the direct forebears of today's Navy SEALs. Kauffman built the combat swimmer program nearly from scratch and trained the men who cleared beaches before every major Pacific amphibious landing in World War II. The Kauffman was one of the last Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigates to serve in the U.S. Navy, decommissioned in 2015.