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The TRUTH About the Evil jew Attack on the USS Liberty

jew censorship continues: the missing links from this original article

New SHOCKING video

The attack by Israel which killed or wounded 206 crewmen from the USS Liberty is in the same class as the attack by Japan on Pearl Harbor which killed 1,600.  No, it's in a class of its own--Israel is a putative ally whose criminal intentions are beyond description while Japan was simply defending itself from an oil blockade.  We have FAR more reasons to bomb Israel to oblivion than we ever had for nuking Japan

The very same race of jews who were behind this attack on an American warship and it's sailors are the ones who are in power now in Israel, who we are supposed to believe had nothing to do with a similar strategy to involve us in wars with Iraq and Afghanistan

This Vietnam Veteran and Officer, son of a US Army Officer in WWII, and grandson of a US Naval Officer in the First World War, hereby demands full disclosure and punishment of those responsible for this travesty of justice, that all foreign aid to Israel be repaid immediately, THAT EVERY ISRAELI INVOLVED IN THIS VILE INCIDENT BE EXECUTED IMMEDIATELY, and that all ties to this enemy foreign power called "Israel" (most of whose citizens are "Russians pretending to be jews") be PERMANENTLY severed

After 40 years, Naval chief counsel finally admits Israel purposely attacked USS Liberty and President Johnson ordered the cover-up...“What does it imply for our national security, not to mention our ability to honestly broker peace in the Middle East, when we cannot question Israel's actions - even when they kill Americans?”-- Ward Boston, former chief counsel to the Navy's Court of Inquiry into the attack on the U.S. Navy intelligence ship Liberty

Real News 24/7
Posting: February 9, 2004

A great American, in a final public statement made just weeks before
his death, urges that the truth finally be revealed about the attack
that killed 34 crew members and wounded 172 others aboard the USS
Liberty in 1967
US betrayal went hand-in-hand with Israel's attack on USS Liberty
during 1967 war

by Admiral Thomas Moorer (USN, Ret.)
(Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1970 to 1974)

Admiral Thomas H. Moorer (1912-2004, RIP)

On Thursday, February 5th, this great patriot passed away, just four
days shy of his 92nd birthday. It was also less than a month after
the following column of his appeared in the Houston Chronicle on
January 9, 2004 (it subsequently has disappeared, despite its obvious
importance--more about that at the bottom of this page). We posted
the column as a Latest News and Analysis feature on January 15th (the
Chronicle link will be changed to this page), but felt that Admiral
Moore's comments are of such great importance that they deserve to be
preserved in the form of a Featured Story, to be more readily seen
near the top of our homepage and so the title will later be
prominently displayed in our archives. After his column, we have
assembled numerous links concerning the USS Liberty and Admiral
Moorer. This page is meant to serve in some small way as a memorial
to them both.


"I've never seen a President -- I don't care who he is -- stand up to
[Israel] ... They always get what they want. The Israelis know what
is going on all the time. I got to the point where I wouldn't write
anything down. If the American people understood what a grip these
people have got on our government, they would rise up in arms."

—Admiral Moorer, 1984, quoted by Richard Curtiss in A Changing Image:
American Perceptions of the Arab-Israeli Dispute

After State Department officials and historians assembled in
Washington, D.C., last week to discuss the 1967 war in the Middle
East, I am compelled to speak out about one of U.S. history's most
shocking cover-ups. On June 8, 1967, Israel attacked our proud naval
ship -- the USS Liberty --killing 34 American servicemen and wounding
172.

Those men were then betrayed and left to die by our own government.
U.S. military rescue aircraft were recalled, not once, but twice,
through direct intervention by the Johnson administration.

Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara's (photo, right) cancellation of
the Navy's attempt to rescue the Liberty, which I personally
confirmed from the commanders of the aircraft carriers America and
Saratoga, was the most disgraceful act I witnessed in my entire
military career.

To add insult to injury, Congress, to this day, has failed to hold
formal hearings on Israel's attack on this American ship. No official
investigation of Israel's attack has ever permitted the testimony of
the surviving crew members.

A 1967 investigation by the Navy, upon which all other reports are
based, has now been fully discredited as a cover-up by its senior
attorney.

Capt. Ward Boston, in a sworn affidavit, recently revealed that the
court was ordered by the White House to cover up the incident and
find that Israel's attack was "a case of mistaken identity."

What our investigation uncovered
Some distinguished colleagues and I formed an independent commission
to investigate the attack on the USS Liberty. After an exhaustive
review of previous reports, naval and other military records,
including eyewitness testimony from survivors, we recently presented
our findings on Capitol Hill. They include:

Israeli reconnaissance aircraft closely studied the Liberty during an
eight-hour period prior to the attack, one flying within 200 feet of
the ship.

Weather reports confirm the day was clear with unlimited visibility.

The Liberty was a clearly marked American ship in international
waters, flying an American flag and carrying large U.S. Navy hull
letters and numbers on its bow.

Despite claims by Israeli intelligence that they confused the Liberty
with a small Egyptian transport, the Liberty was conspicuously
different from any vessel in the Egyptian navy. It was the most
sophisticated intelligence ship in the world in 1967. With its
massive radio antennae, including a large satellite dish, it looked
like a large lobster and was one of the most easily identifiable
ships afloat.

Israel attempted to prevent the Liberty's radio operators from
sending a call for help by jamming American emergency radio channels.

Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned lifeboats at close range that
had been lowered to rescue the most seriously wounded.

As a result, our commission concluded that:

There is compelling evidence that Israel's attack was a deliberate
attempt to destroy an American ship and kill her entire crew.

In attacking the USS Liberty, Israel committed acts of murder against
U.S. servicemen and an act of war against the United States.

The White House knowingly covered up the facts of this attack from
the American people.

The truth continues to be concealed to the present day in what can
only be termed a national disgrace. What was Israel's motive in
launching this attack? Congress must address this question with full
cooperation from the National Security Agency, the Central
Intelligence Agency and the military intelligence services.

The men of the USS Liberty represented the United States. They were
attacked for two hours, causing 70 percent of American casualties,
and the eventual loss of our best intelligence ship. These sailors
and Marines were entitled to our best defense. We gave them no
defense.

Did our government put Israel's interests ahead of our own? If so,
why? Does our government continue to subordinate American interests
to Israeli interests? These are important questions that should be
investigated by an independent, fully empowered commission of the
American government.

The American people deserve to know the truth about this attack. We
must finally shed some light on one of the blackest pages in American
naval history. It is a duty we owe not only to the brave men of the
USS Liberty, but to every man and woman who is asked to wear the
uniform of the United States.

Admiral Moorer was joined in the independent commission of inquiry by
Gen. Ray Davis (recently deceased); Rear Adm. Merlin Staring; former
Judge Advocate General of the Navy and Ambassador James Akins.

----------------------------------------------------------
----------

Related links

The USS Liberty

US Naval history--USS Liberty

US Naval photos of USS Liberty attack by Israeli forces, 8 June 1967

The USS Liberty--A perspective of one of the rescuers

Israeli attack on USS Liberty - Wikipedia

USS Liberty Memorial

USS Liberty

LBJ , Israel & the USS Liberty Massacre

The cover-up of the 1967 Israeli attack on the USS Liberty

Tempers flare on spy-ship sinking

State Department official calls attack an act of gross negligence

" Liberty " Smearing Backfires : Pro - Israeli Cristol overreaches

'The USS Liberty': America's Most Shameful Secret

The Attack on the USS Liberty

The USS Liberty Bombshell

USS Liberty--Israeli pilot speaks up

History News Network--USS Liberty: Historians Debate

The USS Liberty: still covered up after 35 years

USS Liberty: Did Israel commit one war crime to hide another?

Admiral Thomas Moorer

Navy obituary

Admiral Moorer Remembered by Military Colleagues

The passing of a military giant

Former Joint Chiefs of Staff Boss Dies

Adm. Thomas H. Moorer, 91, WWII hero, led Joint Chiefs

Adm. Moorer set standards in Navy

Moorer's Fight for the Panama Canal

Adm. Moorer's Last Warning

Bio from website of Alabama school named after him

Admirals Moorer and C.A. "Mark" Hill warn against national security
sellout

Operation Tailwind -Admiral Moorer Vindicated

----------------------------------------------------------

Real News 24/7: Admiral Moorer's comments were originally published
in the Houston Chronicle, 9 Jan 2004 as "Betrayal behind Israeli
attack on U.S. ship." The title used above comes from a Lebanese
publication, The Daily Star. Curiously (or, perhaps, not curiously),
the column's Chronicle link—
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/editorial/outlook/2345393—is
now dead, despite having gone up only a month ago. It is not even
found in the archive or as a link appended to his obituary, but has
been pitched into the Chronicle's memory hole (as in information
black hole). Did the powers-that-be at the Chronicle decide that this
was too hot to retain or were they forced to get rid of it by its
parent company, the Hearst Corporation? And what part did the
government and the pro-Israeli lobby have in its banishment? Whatever
the answers to these questions, important as they are, the fact
remains the same no matter that the same shameful act deprives
Americans of access to an important opinion they're unlikely to find
elsewhere. Fortunately, though, some websites were able to save this
before it vanished forever. We have posted it both as a tribute to
the memory of a true American hero and as an important document in
the fight to restore America's sovereignty.

See also http://www.ussliberty.org

By Ward Boston Jr.
June 8, 2007

Forty years ago this week, I was asked to investigate the heaviest attack on an American ship since World War II. As senior legal counsel to the Navy Court of Inquiry, it was my job to help uncover the truth regarding Israel's June 8, 1967, bombing of the Navy intelligence ship Liberty.

On that sunny, clear day 40 years ago, Israel's combined air and naval forces attacked the Liberty for two hours, inflicting 70 percent casualties. Thirty-four American sailors died, and 172 were injured. The Liberty remained afloat only by the crew's heroic efforts.

Israel claimed it was an accident. Yet I know from personal conversations with the late Adm. Isaac C. Kidd – president of the Court of Inquiry – that President Lyndon Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara ordered him to conclude that the attack was a case of “mistaken identity.”

The ensuing cover-up has haunted us for 40 years. What does it imply for our national security, not to mention our ability to honestly broker peace in the Middle East, when we cannot question Israel's actions – even when they kill Americans?

Today, survivors of Israel's cruel attack will gather in Washington, D.C., to honor their dead shipmates as well as the mothers, sisters, widows and children they left behind. They will continue to ask for a fair and impartial congressional inquiry that, for the first time, would allow the survivors themselves to testify publicly.

For decades, I have remained silent. I am a military man, and when orders come in from the secretary of defense and president of the United States, I follow them. However, attempts to rewrite history and concern for my country compel me to share the truth.

Adm. Kidd and I were given only one week to gather evidence for the Navy's official investigation, though we both estimated that a proper Court of Inquiry would take at least six months.

We boarded the crippled ship at sea and interviewed survivors. The evidence was clear. We both believed with certainty that this attack was a deliberate effort to sink an American ship and murder its entire crew.

I am certain the Israeli pilots and commanders who had ordered the attack knew the ship was American. I saw the bullet-riddled American flag that had been raised by the crew after their first flag had been shot down completely. I heard testimony that made it clear the Israelis intended there be no survivors.

Not only did they attack with napalm, gunfire and missiles, Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned at close range three life rafts that had been launched in an attempt to save the most seriously wounded.

I am outraged at the efforts of Israel's apologists to claim this attack was a case of “mistaken identity.”

Adm. Kidd told me that after receiving the president's cover-up orders, he was instructed to sit down with two civilians from either the White House or the Department of Defense and rewrite portions of the court's findings. He said, “Ward, they're not interested in the facts. It's a political matter, and we cannot talk about it.” We were to “put a lid on it” and caution everyone involved never to speak of it again.

I know that the Court of Inquiry transcript that has been released to the public is not the same one that I certified and sent to Washington. I know this because it was necessary, due to the exigencies of time, to hand-correct and initial a substantial number of pages. I have examined the released version of the transcript and did not see any pages that bore my hand corrections and initials. Also, the original did not have any deliberately blank pages, as the released version does. In addition, the testimony of Lt. Lloyd Painter concerning the deliberate machine-gunning of the life rafts by the Israeli torpedo boat crews, which I distinctly recall being given at the Court of Inquiry and including in the original transcript, is now missing.

I join the survivors in their call for an honest inquiry. Why is there no room to question Israel – even when it kills Americans – in the halls of Congress?

Let the survivors testify. Let me testify. Let former intelligence officers testify that they received real-time Hebrew translations of Israeli commanders instructing their pilots to sink “the American ship..”

Surely uncovering the truth about what happened to American servicemen in a bloody attack is more important than protecting Israel. And surely 40 years is long enough to wait.

 Ward Boston served as chief counsel to the Navy's Court of Inquiry into the attack on the U.S. Navy intelligence ship Liberty. He also served as a naval aviator in World War II on the carrier Yorktown and as an FBI agent prior to his assignment to the Navy's Judge Advocates General Corps. He is a graduate of the College of William and Mary School of Law and a resident of Coronado.

USS Liberty: Is the Truth Anti-Semitic? What's a few sailors, when it saves our Middle-East ally from potential "embarrassment."

Funny, how that "special relationship" the U.S. is supposed to have with Israel demands that, in the interests of good relations, a few American lives be thrown away every now and then. Well, if it's not exactly the U.S. throwing them away . . . then it's our president and Congress downplaying any public outcry about our "friend" doing it.

Witness the New York Times April 23 review of James Bamford's book, "Body of Secrets," about the June 1967 attack on the USS "Liberty," an electronic surveillance ship that was in the eastern Meditteranean about the time that Israel and Egypt had their little war. Israeli aircraft and gunboats attacked the unarmed vessel for a period of several hours, killing 34 sailors and wounding 171. Israel later claimed it was all a mistake and after a long stretch, paid nominal compesation to the families of those killed.

According to records Bamford discovered in his research on the book, unbeknownst to the Israelis, a U.S. spy plane was high overhead at the time, and recorded conversations among the Israeli air force pilots, one of whom said that he could clearly see a large American flag on the vessel, contradicting Israel's claims about the vessel's identity being obscure. The article naturally drew a lot of comments, most of them saying that the fact that the attack was deliberate has been long known to the U.S. defense and intelligence establishment, as well as to knowledgeable Israelis--it was only the governments of the two "allies," who wanted to hush up the truth.

Among the Middle-East experts who commented on the story, according to Salon's April 25 reprise of the Times story, were two former ambassadors, both of whom are involved in various Middle-East think tanks, and a fellow of the Institute of Policy Studies who heads their Middle-East project. All are basically agree that Bamford's version of the story is very plausible: The attack was not a mistake. It was deliberate--some think that it was ordered because Israel didn't want the Western Powers to know that it was not in danger of being overwhelmed by United Arab Republic (the short-lived union of Nasser's Egypt and Syria) troops but, rather, was winning at the time, but wanted to keep the information secret to keep Israel's supporters from pressuring her to agree to a cease-fire. One also raises the possibility that Israel's military had massacred a number of Egyptian captives in the Sinai desert and didn't want the Americans to find out about it by listening to military communications. In fact even many knowledgeable Israelis believed at the time that the attack was deliberate.

Not so for Mr. Thomas Neumann, executive director of the "Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs." (Kind of makes you wonder, why should American Jews have need such an institute--after all, there is no Lutheran or Catholic or Greek Orthodox or Muslim institute of national security? Who funds it, and which nation's security are they really concerned with?) And to Mr. Neumann, the best argument against facts or opinions he doesn't seem to like is the charge of anti-Semitism:

"James Bamford has attacked Israel before. It's not the first time. He did it in "The Puzzle Palace" and from what I understand -- though I have not personally read the book -- he hasn't come up with any new information. He has added to his anti-Semitic and anti-Israel (evidently the same in Mr. Neumann's mind) allegations. . . Bamford doesn't come to the table as a clean scholar. He comes to the table having made these kinds of charges against Israel in the past."

And you just don't do that in today's special-interest-focused, political-correctness-infested society.

State Dept plans conference on Israeli attack on U.S. ship


http://www.itszone.co.uk/zone0/viewforum.php?f=35

Last update - 02:56 07/01/2004
State Dept plans conference on Israeli attack on U.S. ship
By The Associated Press

The State Department will cast a spotlight next week on the 1967 Israeli
attack on the U.S. spy ship Liberty where 34 American servicemen were
killed.

Israeli, Arab, British and Canadian diplomats have been invited to
attend a conference Monday and Tuesday at the department's Henderson
auditorium.

A. Jay Cristol, a former U.S. bankruptcy court judge who has written
about the incident, will be a featured speaker.

The two-day conference involves the release of historical research on
the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. David Saterfield, a deputy assistant
secretary of state, will deliver the keynote address.

Critics of Israel have cited the attack on the Liberty in questioning
strong U.S. support of Israel and Israel's allegiance to the United
States.

Last October, a former U.S. Navy attorney who helped lead a military
investigation into the incident said in a signed affidavit that
then-President Lyndon Johnson and his defense secretary, Robert
McNamara, ordered that the inquiry conclude the incident was an
accident.

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 said he felt compelled to "share the truth" following the
publication of Cristol's book, "The Liberty Incident," which said the
attack was unintentional.

The USS Liberty was an electronic intelligence-gathering ship cruising
international waters off the Egyptian coast on June 8, 1967. Israeli
planes and torpedo boats opened fire on the Liberty in the midst of what
became known as the Israeli-Arab 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.

-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Toner [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, June 08, 2002 5:09 AM

http://www.ussliberty.com
From the June/July issue of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

    THE USS LIBERTY:  STILL COVERED UP AFTER 35 YEARS
               By James M. Ennes, Jr.

    June 8 marks 35 years since Israel attacked the USS
LIBERTY without warning in international waters, killing
34 Americans and wounding 172 more.  The Israelis lied
about it and persuaded our Congress to look the other
way, and they are still lying about it today.  But the
LIBERTY will not go away.  Every attempt to hide this
story seems to bring more attention.
    This past year brought a 60-minute documentary pro-
duced by CBS News Productions that was broadcast by The
History Channel on Aug. 9 -- much to the dismay and over
the heated objections of the Israeli Embassy and various spokesmen for
Israel who did all in their power to block it.
    CAMERA, a leading pro-Israel propaganda arm, produced
an extended and angry critique of the film, accusing
survivors and CBS News itself of producing a "propaganda-
laden bogus history" that is deliberately distorted and anti-Semitic.
    In a personal attack on this writer, CAMERA unearthed
a 1990 Internet newsgroup in which I made what they con-
sider a damning comment.  In response to a claim that
Israel was "surrounded by enemies," I replied that Israel
would have no enemies if it didn't steal its neighbors'
land and water and shoot its neighbors' children.  CAMERA
cited that remark as evidence of bias and anti-Semitism;
I would defend it even today as a truism that might well
be engraved in stone.
    The History Channel's report was aired as scheduled
and rebroadcast this past March 14.  Although CAMERA
urged The History Channel not to sell a video version,
it was made available anyway.  In fact, the video tem-
porarily sold out and was described by some retailers as
their best selling such product ever.  CAMERA, it seems, convinced only
the choir.
    Also this past year, author James Bamford released
BODY OF SECRETS, his second book on the National Security Agency, with a
chapter devoted to the LIBERTY.  Bamford received wide attention in book
reviews and on the talk show circuit because his book revealed
interviews with an airborne Navy radio intercept operator who listened
to the attack from overhead while it was happening.  This man confirmed
the crew's claims that the Israelis knew they were attacking an American
naval vessel.
    Further confirmation came a few weeks later, when an
Air Force intelligence analyst privately told us the same story.  Those
transcripts, we learned, were widely dis- tributed to intelligence
processing centers around the world.  The Israelis not only knew we were
American, but were deeply frustrated and angry when the LIBERTY did not
sink quickly, as they intended.
    Another intelligence analyst told us that, a few days
after the attack, a "consensus report" concluding that
the attack was deliberate was briefly circulated through-
out the intelligence community.  The report was then
cancelled and all copies were ordered collected and des- troyed.
    On June 10, London's BBC plans a worldwide release of
its new documentary called "Dead in the Water."  In it
the BBC reports that the LIBERTY attack almost led to a
U.S. nuclear strike on Egypt, which was briefly but mis- takenly thought
responsible for the attack.  The film, which includes interviews with
former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, former CIA chief Richard
Helms and others, reveals secret collaboration between Wash- ington and
Tel Aviv during the Six-Day War.
    A new book entitled OPERATION CYANIDE, by prize-winning British
investigative reporter Peter Hounam, researcher for the BBC film, will
be published to coincide with the release of the film.  Hounam argues
that carefully laid plans were made to sink the LIBERTY, and that the
U.S. was as much to blame as Israel for what happened.
    Meanwhile, independent film-maker Tito Howard has pro- duced in VHS
format the documentary "Loss of Liberty," which includes interviews with
several LIBERTY survivors and former U.S. Navy leaders.
    Undeterred by all this, bankruptcy Judge A. Jay Cristol
is about to release a commercial trade book version of his doctoral
thesis which seeks to make the case that the attack really was just a
tragic mistake.  The original thesis is a ponderous but seemingly
scholarly account that may well convince readers uninformed about the
attack.
    Survivors see it as a flawed work, packed with evasions
and misleading statements.  Cristol seems to accept at
face value all the arguments that support his case, while
he nitpicks, dismisses and ignores entirely the eyewitness reports of
survivors and other supporting evidence. Because he comes to the subject
as a federal judge and a reserve naval officer, however, he brings some
apparent credibility that probably will get him a ride on the talk show
circuits.
    Michael Oren, a senior fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem,
recently released a book entitled, SIX DAYS OF WAR, with a chapter
arguing that the LIBERTY attack was a tragic accident.  An Internet
search for "Michael Oren" will turn up the gist of his one-sided
argument.
    Even the venerable NAVY TIMES came out April 4 with an article
arguing Cristol's case that the attack was a tragic accident.  Its
author received an avalanche of e-mail, mostly challenging his
conclusions.  This writer submitted a rebuttal statement, which was
published in April as a guest column (see box).  Other rebuttals and
counter-rebuttals are in the works as we go to press.
    Through it all, despite the passage of 35 years, con- troversy
builds and interest in the subject continues to grow.  LIBERTY survivors
welcome the Cristols and Orens and misguided articles from Israel's
defenders, because every published attack causes even more people to
want to know what really happened to the USS LIBERTY.  The con- tinued
controversy caused ASSAULT ON THE LIBERTY to sell out months ago.  It is
being reprinted, and should be available soon.
    The award-winning LIBERTY Web site, http://www.ussliberty.com,
sometimes hosts more than 1,500 visitors a day as people search for
informtaion on the subject. Survivors are happy to oblige.

                  ======================

James Ennes retired from the Navy in 1978 as a lieutenant commander
after 27 years of enlisted and commissioned ser- vice.  He was a
lieutenant on the bridge of the USS LIBERTY on the day of the attack.
His book on the subject, ASSAULT ON THE LIBERTY (Random House, 1980), is
a "Notable Naval Book" selection of the U.S. Naval Institute and was
"editor's choice" when reviewed in THE WASHINGTON POST.

                 =======================


                     A SURVIVOR SPEAKS

    SURVIVORS OF ISRAEL'S 1967 attack on the USS LIBERTY that killed 34
Americans and wounded 172 find it very sad that some Americans can argue
endlessly that the attack on our ship was a tragic accident and not the
deliberate attack on a known- American ship that we experienced.
    We felt secure after 13 very low reconnaissance orbits by Israeli
aircraft, our supposed friends.  Our intercept oper- ators heard the
pilots reporting that we were American.
    I was relieved of the conn[ing tower] as the attacking jets
approached, and then was severely wounded by the first rocket salvo.  I
was lying in a stretcher in a starboard passageway when the torpedo
exploded.
    I recall the warning that torpedo boats were approaching, followed
by the explosion, the ship lifting away from the blast, then settling
back to starboard and the very real fear that it would continue to
settle until it rolled over and sank.
    Moments later the torpedo boats approached within 50 feet of the
ship.  One boat stopped alongside and trained a heavy machine gun on a
man who was standing alone on a hatch cover on the main deck screaming
obscenities and giving them the finger.  They did not fire.
    Then the boat moved to within 50 feet of the fantail where the ship
displayed her name in large letters in English and her hull numbers in
even larger letters.  The boatmen clearly examined those markings and
can hardly have failed to see other distinctive American markings and
the American flag that flew from the mast.
    The Israeli government claims it was at that point that they offered
help and that they never fired after the torpedo explosion.  But this is
not true.
    Survivors recall that the torpedo boats then circled the ship firing
at anything that moved.  Men on deck were fired upon as they tried to
help their wounded shipmates.  Fire- fighters saw their fire hoses
punctured by machine gun fire. At one point the boatmen concentrated
their fire near the waterline amidships, presumably seeking out the
boilers.
    Forty minutes after the torpedo explosion, the boats drew closer and
methodically machine-gunned three life rafts that we had just launched
in response to orders to prepare to abandon ship.
    The Israeli's excuse?  They claim they mistakenly plotted our speed
at 32 knots, marking us as a warship suitable for attack.  We were
moving only at five knots and were more than 30 miles away, double their
16 mile radar horizon.
    They claim the officers on two torpedo boats mistook the USS LIBERTY
for a 40-year-old out-of-service Egyptian horse transport.  Israeli
naval officers tell me that story is an embarrassment to them.  It
should be.  It is unbelievable.
    Yet despite these things a few Americans seem to accept
the preposterous claims that a tiny motor torpedo boat can
have a 30-mile radar horizon, or can miscalculate a target's speed by
500 percent, or can mistake a clearly marked 10,000 ton United States
ship a mile away for an ancient 2,640 ton Egyptian horse carrier, can
fail to recognize an oversize American flag from as close as 50 feet,
and can then con- tinue to fire on that target from close range for
another 40 minutes before suddenly recognizing us as American after
learning that Sixth Fleet jets were on the way.
    Survivors cannot accept that.
    The typical Israeli reaction is that we are liars or anti-Semites,
which of course we are not.  We are American sailors honestly reporting
an act of treachery at sea.
             -- James Ennes, LCDR, USN (retired), survivor

Israel's Attack On USS Liberty -
The Truth About America's 'Ally'
Exclusive Interview By Pravda.ru
Questions By Justin Cowgill
7-7-2

NavSource Online: Service Ship Photo Archive

AG-168 / AGTR-5 Liberty

Belmont Class Technical Research Ship: Laid down, 23 February 1945, as Simmons Victory, a Maritime Commission type (VC2-S-AP3) hull, under a Maritime Commission contract at Oregon Shipbuilding Corp., Portland, OR.; Launched, (date unknown); Delivered to the Maritime Commission, 4 May 1945; Chartered to Pacific Far East Line, San Francisco, CA.; Returned to the Maritime Administration in 1958 for lay up in the National Defense Reserve Fleet, Olympia, WA.; Acquired by the Navy, February 1963; Converted to a Miscellaneous Auxiliary, (Technical Research Ship) at Williamette Iron and Steel, Portland, OR.; Named Liberty (AG-168), 8 June 1963; Reclassified Technical Research Ship (AGTR-5), 1 April 1964; Commissioned USS Liberty (AGTR-5), 1 April 1964 at, Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Bremerton, WA; Attacked and damaged by Israeli forces, 8 June 1967, 34 killed, 171 wounded; Decommissioned, and Struck from the Naval Register, 28 June 1968; Laid up in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, Norfolk, Va.; Transferred to MARAD, December 1970 for disposal; Final disposition, sold for scrapping, 1973. Liberty was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation and Captain McGonagle, the commanding officer, received the Medal of Honor

Specifications: Displacement 7,725 t.(fl); Length 455'; Beam 60': Draft 23'; Speed 16 kts; Complement 358; Armament four .50 cal. machine guns; Propulsion, steam turbine, single shaft, 8.500shp.

A Memorial To Those Who Sail In Harms Way
The Attack on USS Liberty

The following summary is from the jacket of the book, Assault on the Liberty by James M. Ennes, Jr.; Random House, New York, 1979, ISBN 0-394-50512-3:

In June 1967, jet aircraft and motor torpedo boats of Israel brutally assaulted an American naval vessel, the USS LIBERTY, in international waters off the Sinai Peninsula in the Mediterranean Sea. The attack was preceded by more than six-hours of intense low-level surveillance by Israel photo-reconnaissance aircraft, which buzzed the intelligence ship thirteen times, sometimes flying as low as 200 feet directly overhead. The carefully orchestrated assault that followed was initiated by high-performance jet aircraft, and was followed up by slower and more maneuverable jets carrying napalm, and was finally turned over to lethal torpedo boats, which blasted a forty-foot hole in the ship's side.

The attack lasted more two hours-killing 34 Americans and wounding 171 others-and inflicted 821 rocket and machine-gun holes in the ship. And when the LIBERTY stubbornly remained afloat despite her damage, Israeli forces machine-gunned her life rafts and sent troop-carrying helicopters to finish the job. At this point, with Sixth Fleet rescue aircraft finally enroute, the government of Israel apologized and the attacking forces suddenly withdrew. Only then did the identity of the assailants become known.