Posted on 07/05/2008 6:45:22 AM PDT by Fennie
Leading defense officials from the United States and Israel, meeting in Israel this week, raised the controversial attack on the U.S. ship USS Liberty, by Israel, in June 1967.
The attack has caused considerable controversy over the years despite both governments being reticent to publicly discuss the affair.
It is rare that defense officials from either side discuss the attack which killed 34 U.S. service personnel, and wounded 171 others. In talks this week however between the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Michael Mullen, and Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, together with other senior Israeli and American military officials, the subject was well and truly on the table.
According to a Haaretz newspaper report on Friday, quoting a source from the Israeli delegation, the Liberty attack was raised in talks regarding Iran, and U.S. operations in the Middle East. While it was stressed that the parties did not discuss operational coordination, it was agreed by both sides that the United States and Israel would want to avoid any sort of "mistaken confrontation" such as that which occurred when Israeli forces attacked the USS Liberty...
Yes we know the US State Department does Israel’s bidding and has done so since the 1930s (sarcasm on)
Have you ever read the NSA tapes of the conversations of the Israeli pilots that showed they did not realize they were attacking an American ship? Would it change your mind or are you like an OJ Simpson juror when presented with more evidence just says “see the conspiracy is growing”
New revelations in attack on American spy ship
For years the NSA had denied that tapes of the IAF transmissions even existed, but now that has changed. From the transcripts now available from the NSA and accounts of surviving U.S. intelligence officers who listened in on the IAF, it looks like the Israelis knew exactly what they were doing when they ordered the repeated attacks on the Liberty over a three hour period.
While the initial "first wave" air attacks MAY have been made by trigger-happy IAF warplanes who honestly did not know who they were shooting at, the evidence now strongly suggestz that once the Israeli commanders realized that the target had been the Liberty, they ordered the second wave attacks and finally the PT Boat attacks (complete with close range machine gunning of the Liberty's life rafts) to sink her and therefore destroy any evidence of their screw-up. They could always blame the Egyptians or even the Russians if they succeeded.
At any rate, Lyndon Johnson and his advisors had immediate access to the NSA recordings of the Israeli radio chatter, and that's why they never believed the Israeli excuses that it was all a big mistake.
Sorry, but the “false flag” has been a legitimate trick in naval combat for centuries.
Again - There was not supposed to be an American ship in the area. The Israelis checked before shooting. The US, through its Ambassador, denied any American presence in the area - what are the Israelis supposed to think?
"I can tell you for an absolute certainty (from intercepted communications) that the Israelis knew they were attacking an American ship." -- NSA Deputy Director Oliver Kirby
I was a CTI in the Navy. My duty station had a locked vault with classified books and documents. Surprisingly, one of the documents was a Congressional TS Report on the Attack on the USS Liberty. I read it.
As to the Ambassador? Not everyone, not every Ambassador, has a need to know.
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