(continued) ACROSS THE PACIFIC
From late 1943, APDs continued to operate throughout the war: from New Guinea’s Milne Bay to the Admiralty Islands, completing the encirclement of Rabaul from the west.
They also participated in the Marshall Islands operation and supported General MacArthur’s campaign along New Guinea’s north coast.
There followed the invasion of the Marianas and the western Carolines. PHILIPPINES
For the invasion of the Philippines, the four-stack APDs became the prime means of transport for underwater demolition teams (UDTs). Four were lost in this duty.
• Noa was rammed by Fullam and sank, fortunately without loss of life.
• After the Leyte landings, Ward was set on fire at Ormoc Bay by a kamikaze hit and scuttled by the new destroyer O’Brien, skippered by her own commanding officer from Pearl Harbor three years before.
• Moving north, at Luzon’s Lingayen Gulf, Brooks and Belknap were damaged by suiciders, towed away and decommissioned. IWO JIMA AND OKINAWA
Twenty-four dragons now remained. Eight participated in the Iwo Jima operation without damage as the first of 95 new destroyer escort-APDs began to appear. These were less than effective at first and, to the delight of the flush-decker crews, were told to come back only when they had adequate training. As their numbers grew, however, the oldtimers began to be sent home, some reverting to destroyer status..
As the Okinawa campaign loomed in 1945, Dent drew training duty on the west coast but the other 23 started arriving in March 1945. There, most escaped damage and some were released during the campaign with the following exceptions:
• On 2 April, Dickerson was damaged so badly by a suicide plane that she was towed out to sea and sunk.
• On 27 April, Rathburne was hit on the port bow at the waterline by a suicide plane, but made Kerama Retto, where repairs were made. Returning to San Diego, she was reclassified DD and undergoing conversion when the war ended. Decommissioned at Philadelphia Navy Yard, she was scrapped in 1946.
• On 25 May, Barry was hit by a suicide plane and abandoned, but reboarded and fires extinguished. Decommissioned 21 June, she was towed to sea by LSM 59, to be used as a decoy for kamikazes. The kamikazes did not wait, however, but sank both her and her escort.
• Greene ended the war at Okinawa but was one of more than 100 ships driven aground by a typhoon, 9 October 1945. She was found washed up “high and dry” but perfectly upright on a beach at nearby Kutaka Island, where she was stripped of all usable materials and abandoned; decommissioned 23 November 1945 and stricken 5 December. SUMMARY
The 32 Green Dragon APDs served as destroyers, convoy escorts, tugs, radar pickets, oilers, supply vessels and vehicles for landing infantry during amphibious landings. Collectively, they earned 181 battle stars and nine Navy Unit Commendations in the Mediterranean and Pacific theaters. Before conversion as APDs, eight of them also earned 21 battle stars and eleven Presidential Unit Citations for anti-submarine action in the Atlantic. BATTLE STARS EARNED IN THE
ATLANTIC AND MEDITERRANEAN THEATERS BATTLE STARS EARNED IN THE PACIFIC THEATER
References: Alden, Friedman, Roscoe, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Naval Historical Center, The Faned Green Dragons. | 
