Probably one of the most horrible and unanswered attacks on Americans during the Cold war was the Attack in international waters on the USS Liberty by Israeli forces on June 8, 1967, killing 34 Americans and the wounding another 175.

I used to visit the Hospital at St Albans Queens NYC after my release from the service to see how old friends were doing. Along about late June of 67, there were a few men from the USS Liberty that came to the wards, and even though they were told to be quiet by OUR Government, the stories were told of what happened that day in June when our ally tried to murder every man on-board that US Ship of the line.

They told me and others of the Israelis flying over their head on as many as three times that day, and that at all times the national flag was clear and displayed. What happened next, they can not understand.

A flight of warplanes were observed coming from landward, and they were ID'd as Israeli, a friendly power to the USA, and this was not so unusual as Israel was currently in the middle of a war with their Arab Neighbors and the ship was observing the war as it unfolded with sophisticated intelligence devices. But suddenly, and without warning, the war planes opened up on the American Ship, and took out the only gun positions that the ship had for defense on the first passes over the ship.

When the ship went to General quarters, there was no way to defend themselves as the aircraft straffed the decks of the American ship killing and wounding US Sailors and Marines on the deck.

Suddenly, a flotilla a gunboats appears on the scene, and the crafts sprayed the decks of the US ship as US Sailors came upon the decks to get wounded Sailors and Marines below deck to safety, killing more Sailors.

In one of the first passes at the ship by the attacking air craft they had taken out the communications tower, so the ship could not radio for help.

After the prolonged attack by the Israeli Gunboats, helicopters were seen approaching the ship, but by that time a Radioman had rigged a radio to operate and he had gotten off a message to the Med Fleet that they were under attack, and the Captain of the ship had organized the Ship's Company to repel boarders as the Commando Style Troops of Israel were ready to land their forces on the deck of the US ship and finish the job of killing the crew and sinking the ship that the Planes and the gunboats had not been able to accomplish, but the US Carrier in the Med had now launched warplanes to seek out the Israelis and to punish them.

What happened next was the shame of the Johnson Administration that no one ever talks about.

The helicopters seeing that resistance was organized and ready to do battle on-board the USS Liberty, turned back to Israel, and immediately after their lauch, the Admiralty Chief of the European Sector had ordered the planes to not, I repeat not, intercept the fleeing Isrealis and to return to their ship as the US ship lay helpless in the Med and at the mercy of our allies.

Water surface craft were dispatched to the US Ship, and it was towed to Spain where photos of hundreds of projectile holes (somewhere in the neighborhood of many hundreds) were photograghed, and the incident was covered up by the US Navy and the Johnson Administration, and to this day, not one Israeli Officer or enlistedman has been brought to a measure for what they did to a friendly power.

And, what happened to the US Sailors aboard the ship? Well! They were threatened with Court marshall if they ever talked about the incident, and the whole thing was quieted down in the press and nothing has happened in the matter to this day.

Currently, the Sailors and the Marines aboard the US Navy Ship are still trying to get their day in court over the matter!

Does that not suck a big one?

My fishing buddy is a retired Navy Master Chief and he talks about it often. Just about everytime we go out on a long fishing trip he brings up the subject.
That was awful and the Israelies should be held accountable for it.

I also have to wonder why the U.S. Navy would leave a ship alone with minor defenses on it without escorts. The same thing happened off the coast of North Korea. Also U.S. Navy P-3 intel aircraft would fly near China to listen for intel and be intercepted by China airforce migs. Not long ago on clipped a U.S. Navy plane causing it to land on a China Island. Why does the Navy do this without having escort ships or fighters.
Seems we got some stupid navy admirals doing the thinking.

I was there the next day as a member of the rescue crew from the USS Davis DD937. The USS Massey, another DD from DESRON 12, was with us.

Most of what you have put down is accurate but the ship wasn't towed anywhere. She made it to Malta on her own power at four knots with us providing guard and if needed, rescue. The ship took a torpedo from the Israelie PT boats that killed 24 men outright. 10 more died on deck and a total of 171 were wounded out of a crew of 298.

The tug Papago was with us after day two of the six day trip along with divers aboard.

You can find quite a bit of information on her and the attack at www.USSLIBERTY.org

We also had quite a discussion on the Navy forums with myself and a few guys from the America, who were also involved in the rescue later on, relating our experiences.

Here's the URL for that discussion

http://forums.military.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/7010097960001/m/7490036901001

Any questions ask away and I'll do my best to answer them or get a Liberty crewman here to answer them if I can.


Gerry

This message has been edited. Last edited by: GerryRM3,

quote:

I also have to wonder why the U.S. Navy would leave a ship alone with minor defenses on it without escorts. The same thing happened off the coast of North Korea.

The Liberty was instructed to move away from the area but the message was routed wrong and went to the Pacific theater of opperations so she stayed on her original course after leaving Gibralter. She asked for an escort but was turned down and the reasoning behind that was there were two carriers in the Med at the time not to far away.
The Pueblo was the other incident you talked about and she was performing the same duties as the Liberty except off Korea. Same result except worse. She got captured and her crew spent a year in North Korea under terrible conditions including torture. That happened about 11 months after the Liberty got hit I believe.

The Captain of the Liberty got the CMH and the Captain of the Pueblo got court martialed for surrendering his ship. My opinion on the later is he was a scape goat and didn't deserve what he got for following orders to push the limit of the territorial waters of North Korea.

quote:

Originally posted by GerryRM3:

quote:

I also have to wonder why the U.S. Navy would leave a ship alone with minor defenses on it without escorts. The same thing happened off the coast of North Korea.

The Liberty was instructed to move away from the area but the message was routed wrong and went to the Pacific theater of opperations so she stayed on her original course after leaving Gibralter. She asked for an escort but was turned down and the reasoning behind that was there were two carriers in the Med at the time not to far away.
The Pueblo was the other incident you talked about and she was performing the same duties as the Liberty except off Korea. Same result except worse. She got captured and her crew spent a year in North Korea under terrible conditions including torture. That happened about 11 months after the Liberty got hit I believe.

The Captain of the Liberty got the CMH and the Captain of the Pueblo got court martialed for surrendering his ship. My opinion on the later is he was a scape goat and didn't deserve what he got for following orders to push the limit of the territorial waters of North Korea.

What bakes my azz is that no one, absolutely no one, was made to stand the line on this incident, and the Sailors and Marines on board STILL have not had their day, as far as the Captain of the Pueblo goes, "Where was the Navy Ships and Aircraft that were supposed to be covering him?" Some Admiral's head should have rolled on that one, not the Skipper's!

I guess it is a lot like the USS Iowa's gun explosion, when you have someone to blame it on below the rank of the man that it should be pinned on, OH WELL!

This is a very sorry chapter in our History, and it should be looked at again and again, and no one should ever forget the Liberty!

You know, I never heard of this until early this year. The kind of thing to tick you off....

Posted by Joe:

quote:

What bakes my azz is that no one, absolutely no one, was made to stand the line on this incident,

Basically what we have now-a-days are leaders that only think one thing. "Cover your a$$".
Nothing but Proffesional Political Politations.
In and out of the military.

June 8th is the 41st aniversary of the assault on the Liberty. Those of us that went to her aid have not fogotten.

Key Figure in USS Liberty Inquiry Dies
June 16, 2008
Military.com|by Bryant Jordan
Retired Navy Capt. Ward Boston, who in 2002 broke 35 years of silence to say the US Navy Board of Inquiry long cited to clear Israel of wrongdoing in attacking a US Navy ship during the Six Day War was a sham, died June 11 in California. He was 84.

Emma Boston, his wife of 60 years, told Military.com that Boston had been sick for about six weeks before his death and had been hospitalized. She said he ultimately died of pneumonia, which he contracted in the hospital.

"He was sharp as a tack right up until they put him under sedation" because of his difficulty breathing, she said.

In 1967, Boston was a Navy lawyer and assigned as the legal adviser to the board, which was convened within days of the June 8 attack by Israeli air and naval forces on the USS Liberty, an American surveillance ship floating in international waters in the Mediterranean.

Israel claimed the attack was a case of mistaken identity, and that it believed the Navy ship was an Egyptian vessel. The report ultimately turned over by the board made no conclusions on culpability, though survivors have long maintained that the Israelis knew full well they were attacking an American ship.

In the years since, the three members of the board died, leaving only Boston as an inside witness to their work. In 2002 he at last began to talk about the investigation, saying the board's work was intended as a cover-up. Subsequently Boston drafted and signed a full statement, in which he said the final report was not the one he signed off on as the legal counsel. Handwritten corrections and his initials were absent from the board transcript released publicly, he said.

He also stated that the board president, Rear Adm. Isaac Kidd, told him that he had been ordered to re-write portions of the report when he brought it to Washington.

Boston's comments were welcomed by stunned Liberty survivors, who believed they would finally get the congressional hearings they sought for more than three decades.

Other credible sources had called the incident a deliberate attack on an American ship -- among them former Secretary of State Dean Rusk, former CIA Directors Richard Helms and Bobbie Inman, former National Security Agency Director Marshall Carter, and Rear Adm. Merlin Staring, who was legal counsel to board's appointing authority, Adm. John McCain.

But Ennes said Boston's first-hand knowledge of the board's work lent greater weight to his words.

"We … felt the lid had finally been lifted in 2002 when Captain Boston came forward to report the inner workings of the cover-up,” Jim Ennis, a Liberty survivor and author of the 1980 book Assault on the Liberty, told Military.com. "Finally, we thought, Congress would give us the investigation we have sought since 1967.”

But a statement from a witness to the board's work, said Ennes, "could not move a single member of Congress to look seriously at what survivors agree was a cover-up of the deliberate attack by Israel.” Thirty-four men were killed in the attack and more than 170 wounded. The board, told it had just one week to wrap up its work, interviewed about 15 survivors, and took no testimony from the more than 60 men hospitalized, Boston said.

Supporters of Israel argue that Israel would have no motivation to attack an American ship. Among explanations offered by those who believe the attack was deliberate is that Israel feared the U.S. spy ship would pick up radio signals indicating Israeli soldiers were executing captured and unarmed Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai, or because they feared the U.S. would react negatively if it knew that Israel launched its attack on the Golan Heights without having been attacked by Syria.


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