Chivo departed New London 7 June 1945 for Key West where she trained and exercised briefly at the sound school and experimental torpedo range, before sailing on to Pearl Harbor in company with Requin and Redfish.

Growing tensions in Asia, provoked in part by French conflict with the Vietminh in Indochina and disagreements over the future of Korea, encouraged the Navy to conduct more realistic training for submariners.

As part of this general approach, Chivo began a three-month simulated war patrol in August 1947 which took her to Suva, Fiji Islands; Guam; and Japan; before she arrived back at San Diego in November.

During her transit there the boat's movement reports describe one of the hazards of sailing in the warm waters in the West Indies when Chivo "struck unidentified submerged object, possibly turtle."

The submarine provided training and services for Atlantic Fleet ships in intertype exercises until 30 October 1950 when she arrived at New London to begin an extensive Greater Underwater Propulsion Program (GUPPY 1-A) overhaul and modernization.

This regular training continued until 19 April 1952 when Chivo sailed for a short cruise with the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean, visiting Augusta, Sicily; Cannes and Marseille, France; and Naples, Italy; before returning home via the Azores in June.

Aside from a three-month overhaul at Philadelphia between January and May 1953, Chivo remained in the West Indies until October when the submarine transited the Panama Canal for a month of operations off the Pacific coast of Colombia.

On 4 October 1960 Chivo began her first out-of-area cruise in eight years, though she first sailed south to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, for a two-week amphibious exercise with the 2d Reconnaissance Company, Fleet Marine Force.

These included pretending to launch a ballistic missile at the United States, disrupting "blue force" amphibious convoys or attempting submerged transits against reconnaissance aircraft patrols.

On 4 January 1965 the submarine got underway for her second Mediterranean deployment, stopping at Lisbon, Portugal; and Rota, Spain; before beginning a series of exercises with North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces off Italy and Turkey.

These services ended when Argentine Naval personnel arrived at Charleston on 15 June to receive two weeks of underway training with Chivo's crew, focusing on diving, surfacing and snorkeling evolutions.

The British had put the emphasis on the four Argentine submarines, as well as on Argentina's sole aircraft carrier ARA Veinticinco de Mayo (V-2); the latter was detected navigating south of Gulf San Jorge.

The Argentine Navy knew about the satellite technology monitoring the mainland, and the submarine, which was not capable of submerging, had been towed by night toward Puerto Belgrano Naval Base, and there she was successfully camouflaged between two transports.

She was seen in the base together with two old World War II American destroyers, one modern Type 42, and the only aircraft carrier, in a day in which weather conditions made possible for the satellite to effectively distinguish them.