U.S. agency confirms sinking of USS Liberty was accident

Haaretz ^ | 9/7/2003 | Nathan Guttman

[Courier]

U.S. agency confirms sinking of USS Liberty was accident

By Nathan Guttman, Haaretz Correspondent

WASHINGTON - New documents released this week by America's National Security Agency support Israel's version of a long-festering controversy between the two countries: Israel's sinking of an American spy ship, the USS Liberty, off the coast of Gaza during the 1967 Six-Day War.

Israel has always said it had no idea the ship was American, but conspiracy theorists and anti-Israel propagandists still claim Israel sank the ship in the full knowledge that it was American.

The documents, originally defined as top secret, were made public by Florida Judge Jay Cristol, who

has been investigating the Liberty incident for years and published a book on the subject last year. On Monday, the NSA gave him a transcript of conversations held by two Israeli Air Force helicopter pilots who were hovering over the Liberty as it was sinking, and these tapes confirm Israel's claim that the sinking of the ship, which killed 34 American servicemen and wounded 171, was a tragic error.

After the Liberty was bombed by both the Israel Air Force and the Israel Navy, the two helicopter pilots were summoned from their base to assess the damage and evaluate the possibility of rescuing the surviving crew members. An American spy plane, which had been sent to the area as soon as the NSA learned of the attack, recorded their conversations, which took place between 2:30 and 3:37 P.M. on June 8, the third day of the war.

The spy plane also recorded the orders radioed to the pilots by their supervisor at Hatzor Base, which instructed them to search for Egyptian survivors from the "Egyptian warship" that had just been bombed - thus supporting Israel's claim that it had believed the ship was Egyptian when it ordered it attacked. "Pay attention. The ship is now identified as Egyptian," the pilots were told.

Nine minutes later, Hatzor informed the pilots that it was not an Egyptian warship, but an Egyptian cargo ship. Only at 3:07 were the pilots first informed that the ship might not have been Egyptian at all: Hatzor told them that if they found Arabic-speaking survivors, they should be taken to El-Arish, but if they found English-speaking survivors, they should be taken to Lod. "Clarify by the first man that you bring up, what nationality he is, and report to me immediately," the supervisor instructed, according to the transcript. "It's important to know."

Then, at 3:12, one of the pilots informed Hatzor that he saw an American flag flying over the wounded ship. He was asked to investigate and determine whether it was really an American ship.

This is not the first time such transcripts have been made public: Israel gave its own recordings of the pilots' conversations to the British television station Thames in 1987. But conspiracy theorists charged that Israel had doctored the tapes before handing them over to the station in order to hide the fact that it sank the Liberty intentionally. No such imputation can be made about these new transcripts, as they were never in Israeli hands.

Israel has always said it attacked the Liberty, which America sent to the region to gather intelligence on the progress of the war, because it believed it was an Egyptian supply ship ferrying supplies to the Egyptian troops that Israel was then fighting. When it discovered the error, it immediately informed the Americans, apologized and paid compensation to the victims' families.

The incident was investigated by inquiry commissions in both Israel and the United States, and both concluded that it had, indeed, been a tragic error. Nevertheless, the controversy never died. In 1979, one of the survivors, James Ennes, published a book accusing Israel of bombing the American ship deliberately. Ennes claimed an Israeli spy plane had hovered over the ship all morning and had surely identified it as American, since the American flag was clearly visible.

A later book, written by James Bamford, charged that Israel sank the ship in order to keep America from learning of its plans to attack Syria, and further claimed that the NSA had tapes of conversations among Israeli pilots that not only confirmed this, but also proved that the tapes released by Israel had been doctored.

Another claim that appears frequently on the dozens of Internet sites devoted to the affair is that Israel sank the ship to conceal a mass murder of Egyptian soldiers on the Sinai peninsula.

In its letter to Cristol, the NSA stressed that, contrary to the claims that often appear in such books and Web sites - that the agency has tapes from both the Liberty and from a nearby American submarine that confirm Israel's guilt - the only tapes that exist were those made by the spy plane and given to Cristol this week.

"It's the last piece of intelligence that remained classified, and every rational person that will read it will understand that there is no truth in these conspiracy theories against Israel," Cristol said Tuesday. But he added: "Those who hate Israel, who hate Jews, and those who believe in conspiracy will not be convinced by anything."

Cristol, a former U.S. navy pilot and legal officer, began investigating the Liberty incident 14 years ago. Since publishing his book, which vindicates Israel, he has received threats and been accused of being an Israeli agent. "I take this lightly, but I am saddened to learn that there is this kind of hate toward Israel," he said.

[Poohbah]

Was the A1 Skyraider [probably A1-E or A1-H] versions circa 1967 *Silver Plate* capable for nuclear missions?

Yes.

[archy]

Also, the Israelis tried to RESCUE the crew after they identified the ship as American, but were told to "F*** Off" by the crew.

After the Israeli torpedo boats had machineguned the Liberty's medical corpmen and stretcher bearers, I'd hardly be surprised. They likely would have figured that the Israelis were coming in to kill some more of their wounded.

Of course, your article is all speculation and innuendo, while the NSA released the actual intercepts.

Guess which is more credible?

I'll be far more impressed when ALL of the NSA intercepts, from the EC-141 ELINT aircraft overflight, plus the Frontlet 615 *Project Cyanide* data and periscope photographs and film taken from SS552, the USS Amberjack are released, to include the transmissions from the Israeli Super-Mystere fighter-bombers, The Frelon attack helicopter, the Nord-Atlas plane that buzzed the Liberty at mast-height level, and the Motor Torpedo Boats that torpedooed the ship, shot up the life rafts, and killed the as many of the survivors/witnesses of the initial attack as they could. But it seems the *Friends of Israel* don't want the footage of more than an hour of repeated attacks turning up on American TV....

[aomagrat]

[archy]

"But IMHO the balance of the evidence still points to it being a deliberate attack with full knowledge that the ship was American."

Quote your evidence, please. I want a primary source reference.

One of the survivors of the Israeli attack is a FReeper. I e-mailed him an invite to this post and response thread. That's about as primary a source as it gets, considering the number of the witnesses who were killed.

-archy-/-

[adam_az]

Clever of you to lay the blame at the feet of the "friends of Israel" (who are these friends exactly?) when the US military had a largely unarmed ship in a combat zone, lied about it's presence there when asked, refused to set up a naval liason office to prevent such accidents, and then didn't defend a ship under attack. All of those f-ups are Israels fault how, exactly?

Not to mention that the NSA's official line is that what you are spouting from your blowhole is bilge... that the ship was misidentified and attacked accidentally.

There's lots of declassified sources that show this is true, yet you continue to harp that if yet more information were declassified, the "Real" story would come out?

Where do you get this stuff. rense.com?

[archy]

We killed Canadians. We screwed up badly.

We have killed our own. We screwed up really badly.

We did not kill as many of the witnesses as we could- as we have at other places, such as My Lai. And we did not promote those involved, and place the equipment used on honoured museum display.

[scotiamor]

Adam-AZ criticizes my adding Lyndon Johnson's guilt by stating: The jets were armed with NUCLEAR MISSILES, that's why they were ordered back! They were worried the Soviets were involved and didn't want to start a war. How much other incorrect information is your opinion based on?222 posted on 07/08/2003 10:40 PM PDT by adam_az

Then Adam-AZ writes They were F-104's, and were recalled by Vice Admiral Martin because the 104's were armed with NUCLEAR WEAPONS and sinced he was worried the attackers were Soviet, he didn't want to start a nuclear war.

To Adam-AZ: 1) The F-104 is too heavy to take off from a carrier - and you claim to be a watchdog on incorrect information?

2) F-4's, not armed with nuclear weapons, were scrambled off USS Saratoga to aid Liberty

3) Sec. Defense McNamara directly ordered their recall 4) this bullshit about nuclear weapons was likely a cover story added later when Johnson tried to bury the whole episode

5) If you don't think Johnson tried to hide this, look at the treatment of the returning sailors and the captain.

[Poohbah]

F-4's, not armed with nuclear weapons, were scrambled off USS Saratoga to aid Liberty

Actually, they DID have nukes. The alert birds on the carriers were all nuclear-armed back then--the carriers became SIOP assets once they got east of Malta.

[adam_az]

Go back and read the whole thread, genius.

For the record, I quoted a source which introduced a small typographical error while quoting a primary source. That's hardly a big mistake, compared to what you are doing which is idle speculation with no source.

Let's see. There's newly released tapes from the NSA which show what the NSA (who operated the sections of the Liberty containing sigint gear which even the captain wasn't allowed into) which are consistent with EVERY OTHER PIECE OF INFORMATION that has been publicly released, and you still think there's a conspiracy and coverup?

[archy]

Not to mention that the NSA's official line is that what you are spouting from your blowhole is bilge... that the ship was misidentified and attacked accidentally.

There's lots of declassified sources that show this is true, yet you continue to harp that if yet more information were declassified, the "Real" story would come out?

Where do you get this stuff. rense.com?

In 2002, retired Navy captain Ward Boston, one of the Navy's chief legal counsels reporting to Adm. Kidd, who conducted the Navy's inquiry, now says that the Navy inquiry was a sham and a fraud and both he and Adm. Kidd knew that the attack was not an accident but deliberate.

At the AFEI conference for Net Centric Operations 2003 on Wednesday, April 16, 2003 at Tysons Corner in Vienna, VA, Honorable John Stenbit, Assistant Secretary for Defense C3I, indicated that the Israelis made a very clear threat that if the US did not move the USS Liberty within 24 hours, they would sink it. His exact quote was: "The Israeli's told us 24 hours before that we had a ship called the Liberty, and if we didn't move it they would sink it. Unfortunately, the ship was not moved and by the time the message arrived the ship was taking on water." The agenda for the meeting can be found at http://www.afei.org/brochure/3af3/.

The attack has been a matter of controversy since 1967. Survivors and many key government officials including Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Moorer say the attack was no accident. Two Israeli officers have come forward to admit that the attack was no accident. Yet the Israeli government and its supporters insist it was a "tragic case of misidentification" and charge that survivors and their eyewitness supporters are lying.

[wideminded]

I quote the bottom of the web page:

"Within weeks of the calamity, Kirby, deputy director for operations/production, read U.S. signals intelligence (SigInt)-generated transcripts and "staff reports" at NSA's Fort Meade, Maryland, headquarters. They were of Israeli pilots' conversations, recorded during the attack. The intercepts made it "absolutely certain" they knew it was a U.S. ship, he said. Kirby's is the first public disclosure by a top-level NSA senior of deliberate intent based on personal analyses of SigInt material."

I quote from the article at the beginning of this thread:

"After the Liberty was bombed by both the Israel Air Force and the Israel Navy, the two helicopter pilots were summoned from their base to assess the damage and evaluate the possibility of rescuing the surviving crew members. An American spy plane, which had been sent to the area as soon as the NSA learned of the attack, recorded their conversations, which took place between 2:30 and 3:37 P.M. on June 8, the third day of the war."

The pieces of intelligence discussed in these two articles seem to cover two separate periods of time. It's not clear that both articles are referring to the same recordings.

[Courier]

Uh?

[Courier]

""The Israeli's told us 24 hours before that we had a ship called the Liberty, and if we didn't move it they would sink it."

And then they added

And that's not all, you are pissing us off so much that on 9/11/2001 we're also going to blow up the World Trade Center.

[wideminded]

There NSA tapes secretly eavesdropping on the Israelis prove in real time that the Israelis believed that they were attacking an Egyptian ship ...

See #331

[Courier]

I prefer Robert Ludlum, Jack Higgins, and Ken Follett.

For Non-fiction, I'll go with NSA tapes.

[archy]

Was the A1 Skyraider [probably A1-E or A1-H] versions circa 1967 *Silver Plate* capable for nuclear missions?

Yes.

Mark 17 Depth charge or Mark 44 or Mark 46/ Mark 50 homing torpedoes with 1KT W44 warheads, I'd presume? Or am I overlooking something more useful?

It does offer an interesting image of Slim Pickins piloting an A1 Spad rather than his B52 from Dr Strangelove, wearing a sailor's Dixie Cup cap instead of his Stetson. Well, boys, I reckon this is it - nuclear combat toe to toe with the Roosskies!

-archy-/-

[Poohbah]

Mark 17 Depth charge or Mark 44 or Mark 46/ Mark 50 homing torpedoes with 1KT W44 warheads, I'd presume? Or am I overlooking something more useful?

Mark 7 and Mark 43 free-fall bombs.

[archy]

The pieces of intelligence discussed in these two articles seem to cover two separate periods of time. It's not clear that both articles are referring to the same recordings.

Concur. The Israeli Nord 2501 Noratlas *flying boxcar*-type transport aircraft that buzzed the Liberty at near mast-height was identified by survivors as having an Israeli insignia on its side; the Mysterie fighters were said to be unmarked. I'm not certain about the Israeli *Super Frelon* helicopter, described as full of *armed men* possibly Israeli Marine commandos, nor of which aircraft were in contact with each other, with the torpedo boats, or to higher command. Similarly, the tapes and transcripts of the radio conversations between the Liberty and the two aircraft carrier forces should also be available.

There should be dozens of radio intercept tapes available....

-archy-/-

Photo #: USN 1123751

USS Liberty (AGTR-5)

An Israeli "Super Frelon" (French-built) helicopter circles the ship at the time she was attacked by Israeli forces off the Sinai Peninsula, 8 June 1967. Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

[Courier]

"There should be dozens of radio intercept tapes available...."

"Within an hour of learning that the Liberty had been torpedoed the Director, NSA, LTG Marshall S. Carter, USA, sent a message to all intercept sites requesting a special search of all communications that might reflect the attack or reaction. No communications were available. However, one of the airborne platforms, a U.S. Navy EC-121, had collected voice conversations between two Israeli helicopter pilots and the control tower at Hazor Airfield following the attack on the Liberty."

http://www.nsa.gov/docs/efoia/released/liberty.html

The NSA lied under Johnson and now thery are lying under Bush?

You guys are so vested in your beliefs that if Jesus returned to tell you it was a mistake, you wouldn't believe the lying Jew.

[archy]

Mark 17 Depth charge or Mark 44 or Mark 46/ Mark 50 homing torpedoes with 1KT W44 warheads, I'd presume? Or am I overlooking something more useful?

Mark 7 and Mark 43 free-fall bombs.

I'd expect that the 40KT yield W7 *Thor* wouldn't be used as an ASW weapon in close around a carrier group, with the lower yield 1KT depth charge and such a more likely payload for the Shyraiders, with the biger ordnance to be more likely delivered by the Phantoms, Skyhawks or Crusaders, likewise the 500 KT-1MT W43 package, though I'm no redshirt.

The only carrier cruise I was on was one without aircraft, as masts for the sails were sticking up through the deck, making air ops fairly impractical, so I make no claim for firsthand knowledge of Navy carrier loadout procedures. But it strikes me as logical for that time.