USS George C. Marshall (SSBN-654)
Pre-commissioning photograph of USS George C. Marshall (SSBN-654) underway off Newport News, Virginia, on 31 March 1966
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| History | |
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 United States
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| Namesake: | General of the Army George C. Marshall (1880-1959), U.S. Secretary of State (1947-1949) and U.S. Secretary of Defense (1950-1951) |
| Ordered: | 29 July 1963 |
| Builder: | Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, Newport News, Virginia |
| Laid down: | 2 March 1964 |
| Launched: | 21 May 1965 |
| Sponsored by: | Mrs. George C. Marshall |
| Commissioned: | 29 April 1966 |
| Decommissioned: | 24 September 1992 |
| Struck: | 24 September 1992 |
| Motto: |
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| Fate: | Scrapping via Ship and Submarine Recycling Program completed 28 February 1994 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Benjamin Franklin-class fleet ballistic missile submarine |
| Displacement: |
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| Length: | 425 ft (130 m) |
| Beam: | 33 ft (10 m) |
| Draft: | 31 ft (9.4 m) |
| Installed power: | S5W pressurized-water nuclear reactor |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | Over 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph) |
| Test depth: | 1,300 feet (400 m) |
| Complement: | Two crews (Blue Crew and Gold Crew) of 120 men each |
| Armament: |
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USS George C. Marshall (SSBN-654), a Benjamin Franklin-class ballistic missile submarine, was the only ship of the United States Navy to be named for General of the Army George C. Marshall (1880-1959), who served as U.S. Secretary of State from 1947 to 1949 and as U.S. Secretary of Defense from 1950 to 1951.
The contract to build George C. Marshall was awarded to Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company in Newport News, Virginia, on 29 July 1963 and her keel was laid down there on 2 March 1964. She was launched on 21 May 1965, sponsored by Mrs. George C. Marshall. At the launching ceremony, former U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson (1893–1971) eloquently described George C. Marshall's strategic deterrent role in the Cold War in this way: "... the waves set up by this launching will go to the furthest reaches of our foreign relations. The very existence of this ship, her power, her mission, her orders, her competence to execute them, will affect more computations, more decisions, than we can readily imagine. Far beyond the Pentagon, the State Department, and the White House, she will add a new factor, a new magnitude, to the correlation of forces by which the communists determine their decisions."
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