[2] Named in honor of USS Kearsarge, a sloop-of-war that gained fame hunting Confederate raiders during the American Civil War.

Hundreds of smaller sub-assemblies, containing piping, ventilation ducting and other hardware, as well as major machinery equipment, generators, and electrical panels were constructed.

Kearsarge's armament suite includes the NATO RIM-7 Sea Sparrow point defense system for anti-aircraft support, RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missiles, 25-mm chain guns and the Phalanx close-in weapon system to counter threats from low-flying aircraft and close-in small craft.

Kearsarge is capable of amphibious assault, advance force and special purpose operations, as well as non-combatant evacuation and other humanitarian missions.

Since her commissioning, she has performed these missions all over the world, including evacuating non-combatants from Freetown, Sierra Leone, on 31 May 1997 and rescuing Air Force Captain Scott O'Grady, whose F-16 aircraft had been shot down over Serb-controlled territory in Bosnia on 8 June 1995, while taking part of Operation Deny Fly.

These facilities allowed Kearsarge to serve a dual role during the 1999 NATO bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, as a platform for bombing missions against Yugoslav forces in Operation Allied Force, and as a treatment facility for Albanian refugees in Operation Shining Hope.

In August 2007, the ship visited the port of Valletta, Malta on the way to a six-month deployment to Iraq (5th Fleet AOR).

The ship deployed Sailors and Marines in a relief effort in Bangladesh following Cyclone Sidr and provided support for President George W. Bush's January 2008 visit to Israel.

[9] On 2 March 2011, Kearsarge, along with USS Ponce, traveled through the Suez Canal in response to the 2011 Libyan civil war.

Robert Gates had said days earlier that he ordered the two warships into the Mediterranean, along with an extra 400 Marines, in case they are needed to evacuate civilians or provide humanitarian relief.

[11] On 22 March, V-22 Ospreys from Kearsarge conducted a successful TRAP operation to recover the crew of a USAF F-15E Strike Eagle after it crashed in Libya due to a mechanical failure during a combat mission.

[16] In September 2017, Kearsarge was called upon to assist in search-and-rescue operations during Hurricane Maria, after contact was lost with a ship carrying four people that issued a distress signal while battling 20 ft (6.1 m) seas and 100 mph (160 km/h) winds off the coast of Vieques, Puerto Rico.

The amphibious nature of the combat operations of the present USS Kearsarge is represented by green and blue, alluding land and sea.