After basic training , Carlos was relocated to San Diego , and assigned to a destroyer in the Pacific Fleet – the '' USS Cape Cod ( AD-43 ) '' . He won the California state ( amateur ) Middleweight Boxing Championship in 1983 . He had set a goal to qualify for the Junior Olympics in boxing , but he injured his shoulder in training , and was then deployed to the Middle East subsequent to the U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut on April 18 , 1983 . His ship was in the Strait of Hormuz when the US Marine barracks ( along with the French paratrooper barracks ) in Beirut were bombed on October 24 , 1983 . By 1984 , the '' Cape Cod '' was rotated out of the Persian Gulf . Ashenoff returned to San Diego , and received an honorable discharge
bombed
1983 Beirut barracks bombings
Konnan