Iowa-class battleship

The Iowa-class battleships were designed in the late 1930s and the first was commissioned in 1943. The vessels served in the Pacific theater of the Second World War as carrier escorts and shore bombardment vessels. The Iowas went on to serve in the Korean War and then be recommissioned in the 1960s in conjunction with the Vietnam War and again in the 1980s, when they were refitted and armed with missiles and Phalanx CIWS. The Ships participated in the Gulf War of 1991, firing cruise missiles and their 16 inch guns at Iraqi positions, before being decomissioned in the 1990s. Currently, all four battleships are either floating museums, or awaiting conversion into such.