Placed out of commission at the latter port on 24 April 1944, she underwent conversion for her new role as a combined barracks-stores-distilling ship by the Waterman Steamship Company; and was recommissioned at Mobile on 10 October 1944.

Three-quarters of an hour into the afternoon watch on 1 February, however, she received dispatch orders re-directing her to San Francisco, California, for reconversion to an "electronic repair and staff maintenance ship."

Underway for the Western Caroline Islands on 1 April, Basilan arrived at Ulithi Atoll on the 24th, reporting for duty with Service Squadron (ServRon) 10 and assignment to work in conjunction with Jason (ARH-1).

During her time in Leyte Gulf, again working with Jason, she also provided important services in conjunction with the modern repair ship Ajax (AR-6) and the veterans Vulcan (AR-5) and Prometheus (AR-3).

On 13 September, Basilan stood out of Leyte Gulf, bound for Jinsen (later Inchon), Korea, to participate in the occupation of that former Japanese territory, briefly retracing her course in response to warnings of two typhoons crossing her proposed course.

Basilan concluded her occupation work on 2 December, when she sailed from Shanghai, bound for Pearl Harbor, arriving at her destination on Christmas Day 1945.

Before stripping could be completed, however, on 22 February the ship received orders to report to Commandant, 14th Naval District, for berthing and eventual assignment to Joint Task Force (JTF) 1 being constituted to take part in the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll (Operation Crossroads).

Her name was stricken from the Naval Register on 28 May 1947, and the ship remained in the National Defense Reserve Fleet at Suisun Bay, California, until 12 June 1972 when she was sold to Zidell Explorations, Inc., for scrapping.