Posted on 10/23/2003 1:35:15 PM PDT by hanuman
Cover-Up Alleged in Probe of USS Liberty Wed Oct 22, 8:47 PM ET
By JENNIFER C. KERR, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - A former Navy attorney who helped lead the military investigation of the 1967 Israeli attack on the USS Liberty that killed 34 American servicemen says former President Lyndon Johnson and his defense secretary, Robert McNamara, ordered that the inquiry conclude the incident was an accident.
In a signed affidavit released at a Capitol Hill news conference, retired Capt. Ward Boston said Johnson and McNamara told those heading the Navy's inquiry to "conclude that the attack was a case of 'mistaken identity' despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary."
Boston was senior legal counsel to the Navy's original 1967 review of the attack. He said in the sworn statement that he stayed silent for years because he's a military man, and "when orders come ... I follow them."
He said he felt compelled to "share the truth" following the publication of a recent book, "The Liberty Incident," which concluded the attack was unintentional.
The USS Liberty was an electronic intelligence-gathering ship that was cruising international waters off the Egyptian coast on June 8, 1967. Israeli planes and torpedo boats opened fire on the Liberty at what became known as the outbreak of the Israeli-Egyptian Six-Day War.
In addition to the 34 Americans killed, more than 170 were wounded.
Israel has long maintained that the attack was a case of mistaken identity, an explanation that the Johnson administration did not formally challenge. Israel claimed its forces thought the ship was an Egyptian vessel and apologized to the United States.
After the attack, a Navy court of inquiry concluded there was insufficient information to make a judgment about why Israel attacked the ship, stopping short of assigning blame or determining whether it was an accident.
It was "one of the classic all-American cover-ups," said Ret. Adm. Thomas Moorer, a former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman who spent a year investigating the attack as part of an independent panel he formed with other former military officials. The panel also included a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, James Akins.
"Why would our government put Israel's interests ahead of our own?" Moorer asked from his wheelchair at the news conference. He was chief of naval operations at the time of the attack.
Moorer, who has long held that the attack was a deliberate act, wants Congress to investigate.
Israeli Embassy spokesman Mark Regev disputed any notion that Israel knowingly went after American sailors.
"I can say unequivocally that the Liberty tragedy was a terrible accident, that the Israeli pilots involved believed they were attacking an enemy ship," Regev said. "This was in the middle of a war. This is something that we are not proud of."
Calls to the Navy seeking comment were not immediately returned.
In Boston's statement, he does not say why Johnson would have ordered a cover-up. Attempts were made to reach Boston at his home in Coronado, Calif., but he did not return calls seeking comment.
Moorer's panel suggested several possible reasons Israel might have wanted to attack a U.S. ship. Among them: Israel intended to sink the ship and blame Egypt because it might have brought the United States into the 1967 war.
Look, I was just asking. There was no need on your part to over react. In fact, bro, chill out.
But instead of punishing the attackers, Israel honors them in a museum. Told of the display, retired Air Force Major General John Morrison, NSA deputy director for operations at the time, commented, "I am offended by that." And retired Army Lieutenant General William Odom, NSA director from 1985 to 1988, and also unaware of the display, remarked, "I am astonished that Israel should put glory on the people who killed my SigInt-ers [signals intelligence personnel]."10 The Liberty's blood-stained flag is exhibited at the National Cryptologic Museum in Fort Meade, Maryland.the ref:
10 # Cristol, "The Liberty Incident," Ph.D. diss., University of Miami, 1997, p. 331, photo and caption. The wheel and bell of MTB-203, which launched the fatal torpedo, are displayed in Haifa's Clandestine Immigration and Naval Museum. Interview, MGen. John Morrison, USAF (Ret.), 3 March 2003. Interview, former NSA Director LGen. William Odom, USA (Ret.), 26 March 2003. back to article # Cristol, Incident, pp. 55, 58.Looks like it's the torpedo boat's stuff that is displayed.
No such exhibit. Maybe they burned the lifeboat remains to bake the blood of Gentile children into the matzoh eaten at the Seder meal.
Per Cristol:
Mr. Walsh states (p. 59) that Air Force Major General Morrison (Ret.) was offended and Army Lieutenant General Odom (Ret.) was astonished when told of a display in a museum honoring the attackers of the Liberty. I would likewise be offended and astonished if I learned of such a display. Rear Admiral Zeev Almog (Ret.), a former Chief of the Israel Navy and Rear Admiral Nir Maor (Ret.), the present curator of the Israel Navy Museum at Haifa, were offended and astonished upon reading Walsh's claim because it is false. There is not now, nor has there ever been, a display in the Israel Navy Museum "honoring the attackers" of the Liberty or even mentioning the tragic incident. On display in the museum is the bell and helm of a torpedo boat which participated in the attack. It is there because it was the last Israeli Navy motor torpedo boat to be decommissioned, along with numerous other bells and helms of other decommissioned Israel Navy ships. It is marked only with a small plaque in both Hebrew and English which simply reads "Bell and helm of motor torpedo boat 203". I included a picture of the helm and plaque in my dissertation. Mr. Walsh has not produced one shred of evidence to support his false claim.
Per Ennes and Meadors:
According to the Israelis, the ship flew no flag, operated in a war zone where she had no legitimate business, attempted to escape when spotted, and brought the attack on herself by her suspicious and unfriendly behavior. By this account, the Israeli aircraft circled three times at low level looking for identification and attacked only after finding none. The Israeli torpedomen launched torpedoes only after the ship "arrogantly" refused to identify herself. The attack occurred, say the Israelis, because the ship's behavior and appearance convinced them that she was a hostile Egyptian vessel.
Firing stopped immediately, they claim, when the ship finally hoisted her American flag.
Survivors call the Israeli story contrived and untrue. The ship was clearly identified by standard markings and a bright, clean, oversize American flag, they say.
Crewmen and an American intercept station in Germany heard Israeli reconnaissance pilots reporting to their headquarters by radio that this was an American ship. The Israeli war room that ordered the attack tracked the ship on a chart by name. The Israelis, survivors say, attacked deliberately and pursued the attack long after examining the ship and American flag at very close range.
According to survivors, the Israelis used sophisticated equipment to jam U.S. Navy radio frequencies used by the ship to call for help--frequencies they could not have known without knowing they were American. The ship's signalman flashed "USS LIBERTY - U S NAVY SHIP" at the approaching torpedo boats until his lamp was shot out, but the torpedomen ignored the signals.
After disabling the ship with a torpedo, the Israelis ignored the ship's hull number, the oversize American flag, and the ship's name in English on her stern. For another 40 minutes they continued to fire upon firefighters and litter carriers from very close range.
Finally, the boatmen drew closer and methodically machine-gunned the ship's empty liferafts waiting in the water for survivors.
Then they took a deflated liferaft aboard, with its large "U. S. NAVY" markings, and returned toward their base - still supposedly unaware that they had been killing Americans.
Even if it were possible to have misidentified the ship initially, these men insist, the Israelis could not possibly have continued to attack from close range over such an extended period without recognizing their target as American.
And if it was an accident, survivors say, the Israelis should at least be able to tell a story that can be verified. But the Israelis keep changing their story, and no Israeli version agrees with the eyewitness reports of American survivors.
At least now, since Cristol went there and tipped the Israelis off to hide the evidence better, per his own statement in #104 above.
I was through Haifa in 1973, but didn't have anything much to do with the Israeli Navy. But I've got a pal who grew up in the town, who lived on Allenby Street near the museum as a kid through the 1960s and early '70s. If it was there in that timeframe, he'll know, even if it's since been removed.
-archy-/-
They're quoted by posters, not actually posting.
2)) who are the people willing to accept these statements?
Any time you see a poster citing a senior NSA personage's statements "proof" that the attack was deliberate, there's one of the guys in question.
The key here is to understand that the NSA lied about what the ship was doing.
Normally, the NSA says nothing about what SIGINT assets do. This wasn't a normal situation.
At some point, some Congresscritter asked the NSA "Y'all mind explaining what prompted you to have an unarmed SIGINT platform right off of the coast of two countries at war?"
Somebody at the NSA panicked. I say this because the NSA could always say "National security" and get off scot-free...unless that Congresscritter issued a subpoena.
So the NSA told a lie. This was during the late 1970s. Nobody expected the USSR to collapse in 1991.
The lie was this: the NSA stated that the Liberty was listening to radio chatter associated with Egyptian Air Force Tu-16 Badgers. The mission, allegedly, was to determine if the planes were being flown by Egyptians or by Russians.
At this point, they were OK. But some genius added on some extra detail, and that proved fatal 15 years later.
The legend went thusly: the Liberty was actually intercepting signals from airborne Badger bombers that proved they were flown by Russians.
Great legend. Until the USSR imploded, nobody questioned the statement--hell, nobody COULD question the statement.
And then...
One fact came out of the Russian Air Force archives: those Badger bombers were not flying on the day in question--the Russians had evacuated them west to Alexandria on Day One of the war, and kept them grounded for the duration.
No flights, no radio chatter, and the claimed reason for the Liberty being where it was is shown to be false.
And then the NSA types associated with the program--the ones who'd lied to Congress--started getting extremely vehement in their claims that the attack was deliberate.
Wasn't overreacting, just engaging in some sarcasm. Chill yourself.
Clear enough for you?
Is this a false statement?
Just asking.
Again, this could well be a case of mistaken identity, but why not get the facts out there, and put this issue to rest, once and for all?
Since I've read neither, and it appears you do, just wonder where your opinions come from. And why did you post that to archy? Is that where his sources come from? Just wondering...
Is this a false statement?
Seeing as how there is some controversy about the exact nature of the exhibit, and that the more lurid descriptions of said exhibit are root-sourced back to outfits like the Wahabbist Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs, a Saudi mouthpiece that routinely publishes stuff from holocaust deniers and the like...
It probably is.
Again, this could well be a case of mistaken identity, but why not get the facts out there, and put this issue to rest, once and for all?
I would actually welcome that.
Unfortunately, the NSA folks most likely would NOT, because the issue of their previous false statements to Congress will come up.
I wouldn't mind putting everyone up on the stand.
But many of the people who bray the loudest for an investigation would be the first to invoke the Fifth if there ever was one.
No flights, no radio chatter, and the claimed reason for the Liberty being where it was is shown to be false.
And then the NSA types associated with the program--the ones who'd lied to Congress--started getting extremely vehement in their claims that the attack was deliberate.
Si then what was the mission of the FRONTLET 615 submarine, presumably USS Amberjack but very possibly including others that day?
We have been reliably informed by people who were directly involved that a US submarine operated near our ship on June 8, 1967, at about the time of the attack. This may have been USS Amberjack as reported to us by several Amberjack crewmen but denied by others. It could also have been any of several other US submarines that were operating in the area.Moments after the attack, several Liberty crewmen reported seeing a periscope very close to the ship. Then the periscope vanished as quickly as it had appeared. A few weeks later, Liberty survivor Joe Lentini was approached by another sailor in the cafeteria of Portsmouth Naval Hospital in Virginia. Lentini was in uniform and on crutches. His ship's name, "USS LIBERTY," was embroidered on his shoulder.
A declassified Top Secret "Memorandum for the Record" from the sensitive "303 Committee" reveals that the United States authorized a US Submarine to conduct a clandestine operation code named "Frontlet 615" to be conducted at about the time of the attack on our ship. This operation is described in a handwritten note on the released document as involving a US submarine within UAR (Egyptian) territorial waters.
The "303 Committee" was a small group within the National Security Council whose responsibility was to seek approval from appropriate authorities of sensitive intelligence operations.
Individuals who worked with some submarine operations in 1967 have told us that one submarine that was near the Liberty at the time of the attack operated under a code name "Project Cyanide".
FOIA requests for information about "Project Cyanide," "Frontlet 615," or even about the mysterious "303 Committee" itself have all been fruitless except for the release by the LBJ Library of the single memo from the "303 committee" which specifically authorized "Frontlet 615".
We believe that somewhere US government files, probably files related to these intelligence operations, reveal long withheld records that could support our recollections of the timing, duration and circumstances of the attack.
We believe that some of those files may contain periscope photography, sound recording, or other material recorded during the attack.
If you were involved with or have any information about "Frontlet 615" or "Project Cyanide" or if you know where we might find such information, please email Mr. Schmucker at richncva@juno.com or call him collect at 402 242-2161.
"Were you there?" the sailor asked, seemingly astonished. When Lentini confirmed that he was, the man continued. "We were there," he said. "Our submarine. We saw the whole thing. We took pictures. Then we sent an officer back to the Pentagon to deliver them."
Lentini was so stunned by this news that he neglected to get the man's name or the name of the submarine. When he looked for the man again later, he was nowhere to be found.
Further Confirmation
I asked my Liberty shipmate, then-Lieutenant Jim O'Connor, what he knew about a submarine operating near us. Jim's job in the Liberty would have made him among the most likely people to know such things. Before the attack I had seen him plotting what looked to me like a submarine track on a chart.
Jim looked stunned. "I don't know how you learned about that," he said. "Yes, there was a submarine near us. If you ever quote me I'll swear you are lying." From then until he died 25 years later of Lou Gehrig's disease, Jim never mentioned the submarine again. When I asked him about it, he denied the earlier conversation.
During the next few years three other naval officers in key positions to know about such things all told me, "Yes, there was a submarine with you. There were three. They spent most of the war on the bottom, then they got out in a hurry."
Recently one of Liberty's intercept operators, Charles Rowley, told me that just before the attack he had intercepted a very strange, very short radio signal that he had forwarded to Washington. Instead of acknowledging his effort, Washington promptly ordered him to destroy any copies of that signal and to ignore any like it that he heard in the future. He felt he was being scolded for doing his job.
Rowley concluded that he had picked up a submarine signal and asked some other technicians about it. These men mentioned "Project Cyanide" but were unable or unwilling to say more. He concluded that "Cyanide" and the strange track on the chart all were associated with a compartmented submarine project to which only a very few people were privy. Most of those men died in the attack.
Frontlet 615
For the next several years, "Cyanide" and the mystery submarine remained elusive. One Liberty survivor mentioned a submarine to a free-lance reporter who wrote a book about it. Nearly everything he wrote was based on guesswork and was wrong. The book did nothing to advance the story.
Then in 1988 the Lyndon Johnson Library declassified and released an intriguing, highly sensitive document with the rare "Eyes Only" security caveat. This "Memorandum for the Record" dated 10 April 1967 reported a briefing of the "303 Committee" by General Ralph D. Steakley. Members present were Walt Rostow, Foy Kohler, Cyrus Vance and Admiral Rufus Taylor.
According to the memo, General Steakley "briefed the committee on a sensitive DOD project known as FRONTLET 615," which is identified in a handwritten note on the original memorandum as "submarine within U.A.R. waters."* After considering alternatives, "the proposal was approved by the committee principals."
This memorandum was filed in the LBJ Library's USS Liberty archive. Why there? Obviously it has something to do with the Liberty. Could this have been the submarine we have heard about since 1967?
Survivors filed further Freedom of Information Act requests with the Library, Navy, Department of Defense, National Security Council, National Security Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, Joint Chiefs of Staff and elsewhere seeking more information. We sent copies of the declassified memo to support our request. In every case we were told that there is no record within the government of Cyanide or Frontlet 615 or of any submarines operating near the Liberty in 1967.
When we called General Steakley, he told us that his job for nine years with the Joint Chiefs of Staff was to win approval of such projects from the appropriate authorities. He was rarely involved in the projects themselves. He could remember nothing about Frontlet 615.
Breakthrough
In February 1997, we were contacted by a man who, like the first visitor in the cafeteria, told us, "I was there. We watched the attack through the periscope and took pictures." He added, "News reports said Liberty was under attack for only five minutes, but that attack lasted more than an hour."
This person identified himself as a relatively senior member of the crew of the submarine, but he was unwilling to give his name or to talk to us except through a third party, as he feared punishment for telling the story. He did, however, give us the name of the submarine: USS Amberjack SS522, a Guppy (snorkel)-equipped diesel boat built in 1945. He also told us that Amberjack's mission was reconnaissance within U.A.R. waters. Apparently Amberjack was the Frontlet 615 submarine.
This source gained credibility when we obtained Amberjack's official ship's history from the Department of Defense. Amberjack was indeed in the area during the Six-Day War, just as he said.
Further searches of Navy-oriented Web sites on the Internet quickly turned up four more Amberjack crewmen from the "Med Cruise" of June 1967. Some of these were Amberjack's most senior enlisted men. All four of these men, contacted by telephone, readily told us that they were very close to USS Liberty when we came under attack. Amberjack was so close, they said, and the sound of gunfire, missiles and the torpedo explosion so loud, that some of the crew thought Amberjack was under depth charge attack.
These men, all career submariners and all fairly senior at the time, had not seen or talked to one another for many years. Yet they all told the same story. They were very close to or "almost directly under" Liberty when the ship came under attack. Amberjack was specially fitted for periscope photography and was fully capable of photographing the attack, they said, although none of these four was certain that pictures were taken.
All four men told us that Amberjack proceeded from the Gaza Strip to a brief stop at Souda Bay, Crete, where the ship was kept at anchorage and the crew was not allowed ashore. Next, Amberjack went to Malta, where she tied up near the Liberty. All four men told us that Amberjack was only one of five submarines in the Gaza Strip area. Others were USS Trutta SS421, USS Requin SS481, and French and Italian submarines. Any of those might also have photographed or recorded the attack.
Amberjack Skipper Denies Everything Next we located Amberjack's 1967 skipper, August Hubal. By coincidence, Hubal was an Annapolis classmate of Liberty's Executive Officer, Phil Armstrong, who died in the attack. Hubal's room at the Naval Academy was directly across the hall from that of Liberty's Research Operations Department Head, David Lewis. Hubal knew both men well. Now a retired Navy captain, Hubal denies everything. Interviewed by telephone, he insists that his ship was nowhere near Liberty. Amberjack was at least 100 miles away, he says. When we told Captain Hubal that several senior members of his crew, including a periscope photographer, have told us they were within sight of the attack, he shrugged that off. "They must be mistaken," he says, apparently still muffled by ancient security restrictions.
Why Is This Important?
These stories matter because they can resolve at last the differences between Israeli and American versions of what happened.
For 30 years Israel and its supporters have denounced survivors as liars and anti-Semites for reporting what happened to their ship. Members of Congress are unwilling even to listen to their stories. These men seek justice.
Recent White House executive orders call for the declassification of virtually every record more than 30 years old. Amberjack photography and other such reports fall in that category.
If the submarine photography can be found, it should show that the ship's flag was clearly visible to the attacking fighters and torpedo boats. Pictures also should show that the Israelis continued to fire from close range with the flag and other markings in clear view long after the torpedo explosion that they claim ended the attack. Pictures may reveal the methodical machine-gunning of Liberty's life rafts in the water. Other Amberjack records, reports and sound recordings should show the duration of the attack and other details denied by the attackers.
Liberty survivors will continue their quest for these records. We believe they exist and we think they can be found.
With those files and photographs declassified, Israel never again will be able to pretend that the survivors of the Liberty attack are lying.
*At that time Egypt was formally known as "The United Arab Republic."
-archy-/-
You appear to have a good understanding of what transpired during this horable accident. I respect that. But can't a way be found to address archy's claims?
The Amberjack was supposed to be in UAR waters. The Liberty wasn't.
Which one is it?
Nah, you meant Joooos: that's the only difference you, like BUchanan and Sobran can find.
It's because of conservatives like you --- who eat their own --- that the liberals win in this country.
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