Liberty / The U.S.S. Liberty (point / counter-point about 6 Day War event)

Hour Eleven ^ | 20 December 2003 | Pieter J. Friedrich

[Lando Lincoln]

"Liberty"

Posted: 2003-12-19
Thirty-six years ago, the Israelis attacked a U.S. Navy ship sailing near the Sinai Peninsula. 34 American sailors were killed, and 172 others were wounded. The Israelis said the attack was a tragic mistake, and the U.S. government's official ruling was that the attack was an accident. Yet all the evidence says the attack was deliberate. First, a little bit of background. In 1967, the USS Liberty was a lightly armed National Security Agency intelligence ship in charge of gathering information and keeping an eye on Egyptian and Israeli actions during the Six-Day War. One could call the Liberty a spy ship except for the fact that the ship sailed under U.S. colors in international waters. On June 8th, the fourth day of the Six-Day War, the Liberty was attacked by Israeli fighter planes (Mirage IIICs and Dassault Mysteres) and motor torpedo boats. The assault lasted 75 minutes. During that time, the fighter planes withdrew after supposedly realizing the Liberty was an American ship, and motor torpedo boats then moved in to attack. The official position of the Israeli government is that the attack was a tragic case of mistaken identity - the Israelis mistook the USS Liberty for the El Quseir, a heavily armed Egyptian horse carrier. The week-long official U.S. Naval investigation also ruled the attack accidental and accepted a $13 million indemnity from the Israeli government. The reasons to disbelieve the official explanations of the Israeli and U.S. governments are as follows: 1. Early in the morning of June 8th the Israelis positively identified the Liberty as an American ship. This article says: "Throughout the morning, the ship sailed on, with reconnaissance repeated at approximately 30-minute intervals. At one point, an Israeli air force Noratlas Nord 2501 circled the ship and headed back towards the Sinai. 'It had a big Star of David on it and it was flying just a little bit above our mast,' recalled crew member Larry Weaver. 'I was actually able to wave to the co-pilot. He waved back and actually smiled at me - I could see him that well. There's no question about it. They had seen the ship's markings and the American flag. They could damn near see my rank. The underway flag was definitely flying, especially when you're that close to a war zone.'" 2. The Israeli excuse that the Liberty was mistaken for the aforementioned El Quseir is highly suspicious. The El Quseir was a horse carrier and was a quarter the size of the USS Liberty. Also, while the El Quseir would have been armed with offensive weapons capable of bombarding the shore from 15 miles away and would have been traveling at high speed (20 knots or faster), the Liberty was a converted cargo ship armed only with four .50 caliber machine guns and traveling at approximately five knots. And at all times during that day, the Liberty remained a neutral ship in international waters. According to this FAQ, "Israel says its pilots and torpedo boat commanders confused the USS Libertywith the El Quseir, an Egyptian ship allegedly firing upon its forces in the Sinai. But there was no Egyptian naval bombardment that day..." 3. The attacking planes targeted the Liberty's radio transmitting towers. This site says: "As evidence of how thorough and deliberate the planning of the attack was, when the crew attempts to radio for help, it is discovered that the Israelis have put a rocket at the base of every radio transmitting tower, a result that could not have happened by accident. One tower is successfully jury-rigged to allow transmissions, but each time they try to establish voice contact with Sixth Fleet, they find the frequency blocked by 'a buzz-saw-like sound' that stops only for the few seconds before each new barrage of rockets strikes the Liberty. Apparently the attacking jets are jamming the Liberty's radio frequencies but are unable to keep the jamming 'on' while their rockets are in flight. The Liberty's two radiomen are reduced to waiting for those few seconds of 'clear' (non-jammed) air-time to transmit to Sixth Fleet. 4. Captain Ward Boston, USN, JAG (Ret.) was one of the men in charge of investigating the attack on the Liberty. In a sworn affidavit which he released a little over a month ago he claims he was ordered by President Johnson and his Secretary of Defense to cover up the clear deliberate nature of the attack. After thirty-six years of silence, Captain Boston decided to speak out about the truth because of "recent attempts to rewrite history." Captain Boston says: "The evidence was clear. Both Admiral Kidd and I believed with certainty that this attack, which killed 34 American sailors and injured 172 others, was a deliberate effort to sink an American ship and murder its entire crew. I am certain that the Israeli pilots that undertook the attack, as well as their superiors who had ordered the attack, were aware that the ship was American. "I saw the flag, which had visibly identified the ship as American, riddled with bullet holes, and heard testimony that made it clear that the Israelis intended there be no survivors. Not only did the Israelis attack the ship with napalm, gunfire, and missiles, Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned three lifeboats that had been launched in an attempt by the crew to save the most seriously wounded – a war crime." According to this article, "David Lewis of Lemington, Vt., was on the Liberty when it was attacked. In an interview, he said Israel had to know it was targeting an American ship. He said a U.S. flag was flying that day and Israel shot it full of holes. The sailors on the ship, he said, quickly hoisted another American flag, a much bigger one, to show Israel it was a U.S. vessel. "'No trained individual could be that inept,' said Lewis of the Israeli forces." The flag that was flying was 5' by 8'...when it was shot down it was replaced by a 7' by 13' flag that flew for the duration of the attack. All of the attacking Israeli pilots claimed they did not see the brightly colored flag which flew 100 feet above the Liberty's bridge. One of the pilots did, however, say that he distinctly remembered seeing a .50 caliber gray-painted machine gun on the ship's deck. 5. Every survivor of the attack, Johnson's Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Admiral Thomas Moorer (who became chief of naval operations), and several diplomats declared the attack to be deliberate. It seems that the only people at the time who claimed the attack was accidental were the Israelis and the Naval Court of Inquiry. This site says, "The ship’s survivors were afraid to speak out in the early years because of threats of 'court martial, prison or worse' if they did not remain silent. However, as time passed, they have stepped forward to say the attack was deliberate." 6. Many people firmly believe the U.S. government covered up the deliberate nature of the attack. Captain Boston says that, "I know from personal conversations I had with Admiral Kidd that President Lyndon Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara ordered him to conclude that the attack was a case of 'mistaken identity' despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary." Joe Meador, a sailor on the Liberty and Vice President of the USS Liberty Veterans Association, has said, "Washington directed that the Court conclude that the attack was a tragic accident, despite the fact that the Court determined that it was deliberate. So the Court of Inquiry was a sham. "Of the ten US investigations cited, only the fraudulent US Navy Court of Inquiry bothered to interview survivors. The others either did not look into deliberateness at all -- examining peripheral issues such as the adequacy of communications and of command and control -- or were merely reports to their bosses which summarized the results of the fraudulent Court of Inquiry Report. So nine of those ten investigations were poisoned fruit of the poisoned tree, which was the first investigation." Though it's not certain, I do believe that the attack on the Liberty was very probably deliberate. But why would Israel attack one of our ships? One possibility is that Israel hoped to attack and sink the Liberty and then blame the attack on Egypt. The reasoning behind such a move might have been that the U.S., ever an interventionist nation, would hopefully then join in the Six-Day War as an ally of Israel. This possibility is backed up by the fact that the attacking aircraft were unmarked. (As Josh Matthews says, "Entangling alliances are so much fun. Nothing like trying to bring your friendly neighborhood superpower in to fight a war for you.") Another possibility is that, on June 8th, with the Liberty 13 miles off shore, the Israelis executed up to 1,000 unarmed Egyptian POWs. The POWs were executed because the Israelis lacked adequate prison space...yet execution of unarmed prisoners, no matter the reason, is a war crime. It's possible the Israelis feared that the Liberty might learn of this slaughter and report it to the United States. Thirty-six years later, why does it matter to the average American what really happened with the attack on the USS Liberty? There are a few reasons. 1. The U.S. has sent $91 billion in aid to Israel since 1949. If the attack was deliberate, then the U.S. has been funding an enemy nation. 2. If the attack was deliberate, then it was an act of war, which would make the cover-up further evidence of the hypocritical foreign policy of the United States. Also, it would confirm my claim that every nation or ruler that has been capable of posing a real threat to the United States has ended up being fawned upon by the U.S. government. 3. If one accepts the notion that Saddam Hussein's murder of Iraqi revolutionaries 15 years ago was evidence that he was a threat to the U.S. today then it would only make sense that the nation that perpetrated a direct act of war on the U.S. 36 years ago continues to be a threat to our country today. While neither the former nor the latter notion is entirely unreasonable, what makes more sense is that the attack is evidence that just as Israel is a threat today, so it was also 36 years ago. As Jon Luker says, "Being a constant skeptic of our government's veracity is certainly not comfortable, but it's becoming more and more apparent that such a stance is a necessary evil."		----------------------- The USS Liberty The Israeli attack on the USS Liberty was a grievous error, largely attributable to the fact that it occurred in the midst of the confusion of a full-scale war in 1967. Ten official United States investigations and three official Israeli inquiries have all conclusively established the attack was a tragic mistake. On June 8, 1967, the fourth day of the Six-Day War, the Israeli high command received reports that Israeli troops in El Arish were being fired upon from the sea, presumably by an Egyptian vessel, as they had a day before. The United States had announced that it had no naval forces within hundreds of miles of the battle front on the floor of the United Nations a few days earlier; however, the USS Liberty, an American intelligence ship assigned to monitor the fighting, arrived in the area, 14 miles off the Sinai coast, as a result of a series of United States communication failures, whereby messages directing the ship not to approach within 100 miles were not received by the Liberty. The Israelis mistakenly thought this was the ship doing the shelling and war planes and torpedo boats attacked, killing 34 members of the Liberty's crew and wounding 171. Numerous mistakes were made by both the United States and Israel. For example, the Liberty was first reported — incorrectly, as it turned out — to be cruising at 30 knots (it was later recalculated to be 28 knots). Under Israeli (and U.S.) naval doctrine at the time, a ship proceeding at that speed was presumed to be a warship. The sea was calm and the U.S. Navy Court of Inquiry found that the Liberty's flag was very likely drooped and not discernible; moreover, members of the crew, including the Captain, Commander William McGonagle, testified that the flag was knocked down after the first or second assault. According to Israeli Chief of Staff Yitzhak Rabin's memoirs, there were standing orders to attack any unidentified vessel near the shore.1 The day fighting began, Israel had asked that American ships be removed from its coast or that it be notified of the precise location of U.S. vessels.2 The Sixth Fleet was moved because President Johnson feared being drawn into a confrontation with the Soviet Union. He also ordered that no aircraft be sent near Sinai. A CIA report on the incident issued June 13, 1967, also found that an overzealous pilot could mistake the Liberty for an Egyptian ship, the El Quseir. After the air raid, Israeli torpedo boats identified the Liberty as an Egyptian naval vessel. When the Liberty began shooting at the Israelis, they responded with the torpedo attack, which killed 28 of the sailors. Initially, the Israelis were terrified that they had attacked a Soviet ship and might have provoked the Soviets to join the fighting.3 Once the Israelis were sure what had happened, they reported the incident to the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv and offered to provide a helicopter for the Americans to fly out to the ship and any help they required to evacuate the injured and salvage the ship. The offer was accepted and a U.S. naval attaché was flown to the Liberty. Many of the survivors of the Liberty remain bitter, and are convinced the attack was deliberate as they make clear on their web site. In 1991, columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak trumpeted their discovery of an American who said he had been in the Israeli war room when the decision was made to knowingly attack the American ship.4 In fact, that individual, Seth Mintz, wrote a letter to the Washington Post on November 9, 1991, in which he said he was misquoted by Evans and Novak and that the attack, was, in fact, a "case of mistaken identity." Moreover, the man who Mintz originally said had been with him, a Gen. Benni Matti, does not exist. Also, contrary to claims that an Israeli pilot identified the ship as American on a radio tape, no one has ever produced this tape. In fact, the official Israeli Air Force tape clearly established that no such identification of the ship was made by the Israeli pilots prior to the attack. It also indicates that once the pilots became concerned about the identity of the ship, by virtue of reading its hull number, they terminated the attack. The tapes do not contain any statement suggesting the pilots saw a U.S. flag before the attack.5 Critics claimed the Israeli tape was doctored, but the National Security Agency of the United States released formerly top secret transcripts in July 2003 that confirmed the Israeli version. A U.S. spy plane was sent to the area as soon as the NSA learned of the attack on the Liberty and recorded the conversations of two Israeli Air Force helicopter pilots, which took place between 2:30 and 3:37 p.m. on June 8. The orders radioed to the pilots by their supervisor at the Hatzor base instructing them to search for Egyptian survivors from the "Egyptian warship" that had just been bombed were also recorded by the NSA. "Pay attention. The ship is now identified as Egyptian," the pilots were informed. Nine minutes later, Hatzor told the pilots the ship was believed to be an Egyptian cargo ship. At 3:07, the pilots were first told the ship might not be Egyptian and were instructed to search for survivors and inform the base immediately the nationality of the first person they rescued. It was not until 3:12 that one of the pilots reported that he saw an American flag flying over the ship at which point he was instructed to verify if it was indeed a U.S. vessel.6 In October 2003, the first Israeli pilot to reach the ship broke his 36-year silence on the attack. Brig.-Gen. Yiftah Spector, a triple ace, who shot down 15 enemy aircraft and took part in the 1981 raid on the Iraqi nuclear reactor, said he had been told an Egyptian ship was off the Gaza coast. "This ship positively did not have any symbol or flag that I could see. What I was concerned with was that it was not one of ours. I looked for the symbol of our navy, which was a large white cross on its deck. This was not there, so it wasn't one of ours." The Jerusalem Post obtained a recording of Spector's radio transmission in which he said, "I can't identify it, but in any case it's a military ship."7 Spector's plane was not armed with bombs or, he said, he would have sunk the Liberty. Instead he fired 30mm armor piercing rounds that led the American survivors to believe they had been under rocket attack. His first pass ignited a fire, which caused the ship to billow black smoke that Spector thought was a ruse to conceal the ship. Spector acknowledged in the Post interview that he made a mistake, and said he admitted it when called to testify in an inquiry by a U.S. senator. "I'm sorry for the mistake," he said. "Years later my mates dropped flowers on the site where the ship was attacked." None of Israel's accusers can explain why Israel would deliberately attack an American ship at a time when the United States was Israel's only friend and supporter in the world. Confusion in a long line of communications, which occurred in a tense atmosphere on both the American and Israeli sides (five messages from the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the ship to remain at least 25 miles — the last four said 100 miles — off the Egyptian coast arrived after the attack was over) is a more probable explanation. Accidents caused by “friendly fire” are common in wartime. In 1988, the U.S. Navy mistakenly downed an Iranian passenger plane, killing 290 civilians. During the Gulf War, 35 of the 148 Americans who died in battle were killed by “friendly fire.” In April 1994, two U.S. Black Hawk helicopters with large U.S. flags painted on each side were shot down by U.S. Air Force F-15s on a clear day in the “no fly” zone of Iraq, killing 26 people. In April 2002, an American F-16 dropped a bomb that killed four Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan. In fact, the day before the Liberty was attacked, Israeli pilots accidentally bombed one of their own armored columns.8 Retired Admiral, Shlomo Erell, who was Chief of the Navy in Israel in June 1967, told the Associated Press (June 5, 1977): “No one would ever have dreamt that an American ship would be there. Even the United States didn't know where its ship was. We were advised by the proper authorities that there was no American ship within 100 miles.” Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara told Congress on July 26, 1967: “It was the conclusion of the investigatory body, headed by an admiral of the Navy in whom we have great confidence, that the attack was not intentional.” In 1987, McNamara repeated his belief that the attack was a mistake, telling a caller on the “Larry King Show” that he had seen nothing in the 20 years since to change his mind that there had been no “cover­up.”8 Israel apologized for the tragedy and paid nearly $13 million in humanitarian reparations to the United States and to the families of the victims in amounts established by the U.S. State Department. The matter was officially closed between the two governments by an exchange of diplomatic notes on December 17, 1987. Notes 1For the most comprehensive analysis, see A. Jay Cristol, The Liberty Incident. (Washington, D.C.: Brassey's Inc., 2002);Yitzhak Rabin, The Rabin Memoirs, (CA: University of California Press, 1996), pp. 108-109. 2Rabin, p. 110. 3Dan Kurzman, Soldier of Peace: The Life of Yitzhak Rabin, (NY: HarperCollins, 1998), pp. 224-227; Rabin, p. 108-109. 4Washington Post, (November 6, 1991). 5Hirsh Goodman, “Messrs. Errors and No Facts,” Jerusalem Report (November 21, 1991). 6Nathan Guttman, "Memos show Liberty attack was an error," Ha'aretz, (July 9, 2003). 7"Pilot who bombed 'Liberty' talks to 'Post," Jerusalem Post (October 10, 2003). 8Hirsh Goodman and Ze'ev Schiff, “The Attack on the Liberty,” Atlantic Monthly, (September 1984). 9“The Larry King Show” (radio), (February 5, 1987).

[Lando Lincoln]

I am not familiar enough about this event to comment on it. Anyone?

Lando

[Lando Lincoln]

I am one of the biggest supporters of Israel around. But, I am curious about this event. Any take on it?

All the best,

Lando

[Thane_Banquo]

The crewmember's claim that he could wave at a pilot in a jet and see him wave back and smile is particularly hilarious. Right, like you could see him smile as he's zooming past you at 400 mph.

Sure. I was born yesterday.

[MEG33]

If you do a search,there is an ongoing battle about this on FR.

[zarf]

"How many times do we have to suffer this crap"

[Catspaw]

Lando, you may want to check out some of the links in this article. Some lead to ultra-leftist sources, including on that says to check Al Jazeera as a resource.

[Lando Lincoln]

Will do MEG33.....I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about such events. This one - well I must have had a algebra exam to worry about, I guess.

Lando

[MEG33]

Algebra is much more important,believe me.Good Luck!God rest the Liberty sailors.

[Samwise]

http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-vetscor/977970/posts

Here's a Foxhole thread for you.

[Glenn]

"How many times do we have to suffer this crap"

As long as there is tinfoil in the world.

[Catspaw]

According to this FAQ, "Israel says its pilots and torpedo boat commanders confused the USS Libertywith the El Quseir, an Egyptian ship allegedly firing upon its forces in the Sinai. But there was no Egyptian naval bombardment that day..."

This link leads to this website:

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/history/lib_qa.html

Their tribute page to Rachel Corrie:

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/about_us/rachelsletters.html

And this page:

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/about_us/our_story.html

 

Sorry, the page you requested was not found.

While our website is still under construction, we recommend that you visit the Independent of London, Ha'aretz Daily,or Al-Jazeera. All three of these international news sources provide more accurate depictions of the current situation in Israel/Palestine, although they still do not provide all the information that American readers need to know.

[Lando Lincoln]

Yeesh....you are right......For what it is worth, I have been up all nite with a killer headache - now, I finally can look at a monitor to satisfy my "news" fix.

To all....if I have plowed up old ground....well, it is fresh to me. And, again - I am a huge supporter of Israel.

Lando

[Catspaw]

Sorry about your headache....I get nasty sinus headaches from time to time, so I can sympathize.

A number of the links in the article lead back to FR and I haven't checked them out (but given the other threads, there's a raging debate about this), so I just checked out a couple of them. The tipoff on the one link was the Rachel Corrie memorial page. It's a pro-Palestinian site.

[Lando Lincoln]

Amen....thanks to all for the graciousness of your responses. I have to smile..... I thought I was making a really "cool" point/counter-point post. Take it for what it is (besides, it's kind of a slow morning anyway).

God bless the Liberty souls.

Lando

[milan]

Did you read the link that was provided about the 6 day war?

It is the most biased piece against Israel I have ever read: "As stated above, Jordan unlike Israel never wanted the war to take place. Much pressure has been put, however, by Jordanians who wanted to stop the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians, for Jordan to join the warfare."

That is just one piece of it. The entire encyclopedia article is biased.

[Lando Lincoln]

I think it is well established that I did not. FRiends Catspaw and MEG33 already have helped me out. It is clear that the article is bent.

yonif....I did not adequately follow all references. Comment if you like, but it is clear there is a bias in the article against Israel. All the best,

Lando

[AppyPappy]

Here comes the Liberty again.

[nuconvert]

You opened up a can of worms.

"just as Israel is a threat today,"....big tip-off to bias.

Like your graphic

[Lando Lincoln]

Oh well....some topics will not go away, I guess. In this case, for some reason, I stumbled into it. Some topics are more satisfying to re-open (Billary, and the like).

All the best,

Lando

[Lando Lincoln]

Well, what the heck.....I'm gonna let that circle go round and round and jump off this thread. But, it is safe to say..."Lando did it!!!"

(Thanks for the graphic comment - I've had tons of compliments!)

Lando