Editing USS New Jersey (BB-62) (section)

==Late Cold War==
[[File:An RGM-84 Harpoon missile is launched from the battleship USS NEW JERSEY (BB-62) at the Pacific Missile Test Center Range - DPLA - b28979a7e54e449e3bda1cc188bf9239.jpeg|thumb|right|New Jersey launches a Harpoon missile. 1983.]]
[[File:New Jersey Shoots.jpg|thumb|right|New Jersey fires all main guns simultaneously off the Aleutian Islands. 20 December 1986.]]
''New Jersey'' began her fourth career with recommissioning at Long Beach, California, on 28 December 1982. She was modernized, receiving an installation of 16 [[Harpoon missile]]s, with a range of about 60 miles, and 32 [[Tomahawk missile]]s, with a range of about 500 miles.

This was part of president Ronald Reagan's plan to create a 600-ship Navy, in support of his "peace through strength" strategy to end the [[Cold War]].

In 1983, a bloody civil war was raging in [[Lebanon]], and U.S. naval forces were offshore to protect U.S. interests and U.S. Marines who had landed in the war-torn country. On 19 September, after a period in which U.S. ships fired when U.S. position were attacked, USS Virginia (CGN 38) and USS John Rogers (DD 983) fired 338 rounds from their five-inch guns in support of Lebanese Army forces defending the strategically important village of Sug el Gharb in the Shouf Mountains east of [[Beirut]]. This signaled a shift in U.S. policy, and on 25 September, ''New Jersey'' took up station off Beirut.

On 28 November, the U.S. government announced that ''New Jersey'' would be retained off Beirut although her crew would be rotated. On 14 December, ''New Jersey'' fired 11 projectiles from her 16-inch guns at hostile positions inland of Beirut. These were the first 16-inch shells fired for effect anywhere in the world since ''New Jersey'' ended her time on the gunline in Vietnam in 1969.

On 8 February 1984, ''New Jersey'' fired almost 300 shells at [[Druze]] and [[Syria]]n positions in the Bekaa valley east of Beirut. Some 30 of these massive projectiles rained down on a Syrian command post, killing the general commanding Syrian forces in Lebanon and several other senior officers. This was the heaviest shore bombardment since the Korean War.

Reductions in budgets and the high-manning requirements of the battleship saw ''New Jersey'' decommissioned for the final time at the Naval Station Long Beach, California, on 8 February 1991 and then towed to Bremerton, Washington. On 12 September 1999, the ship was towed by the tug ''Sea Victory'' from Bremerton to Philadelphia where it arrived on 11 November.