The Liberty Incident Revealed

by A. Jay Cristol

  A few pages later in the same newsletter the following appeared:

  What happened to the Nightline Story?

  The story scheduled for Ted Koppel’s Nightline was to have run on Monday evening, June 7. Unfortunately, Israel invaded Lebanon only hours before that story was to run. The invasion was considered a bigger news story, and so the Liberty story was bumped. Liberty, in other words, was shot down by Israel again.44

  The USS “Liberty” Newsletter of March 1983 wrote that the Nightline tape of the Liberty story, which cost more than $100,000 to produce, “had mysteriously disappeared without a trace.”45

  On January 12 and 13, 2004, the U.S. Department of State held a conference in Loy Henderson Auditorium under the auspices of the historian of the State Department titled “The United States, the Middle East, and the 1967 Arab-Israeli War,” in conjunction with the release of volume XIX of the Foreign Relations of the United States. The conference consisted of seven panels and was carried live on C-SPAN.46

  This author was invited to participate on the first panel, “War, Intelligence and the USS Liberty.” The moderator was Dr. Marc Susser, Historian, U.S. Department of State; this author participated along with Dr. David Robarge, Central Intelligence Agency History Staff; and Dr. David Hatch, Technical Director, Center for Cryptologic Studies (National Security Agency).47

  Following the panel presentation this author was approached by Brooke Runnette, whose business card stated “Producer, ABC News, Nightline.” Ms. Runnette stated an interest in doing a Nightline program about the Liberty incident. Time marched on until November 11, 2004, when an e-mail was received from Brooke E. Runnette stating, “Dear Judge Cristol, it’s been nearly a year since we met at the State Department in January, but I haven’t forgotten about the USS Liberty piece I was interested in doing for Nightline, and now that the election is over with, I have a correspondent on board, and some real forward momentum!”48

  Numerous e-mails and telephone conversations followed, and finally, on January 31, 2005, an on-camera interview of about two hours was completed at my office. The correspondent was David Marish; his interview was straightforward and highly professional. Throughout he remained impartial and focused on getting factual answers to his questions.

  Following the interview, and off camera, we had a long discussion during which it appeared to this author that David Marish had become fascinated with a series of conspiracy tales told by three persons claiming they had heard transmissions of the Israeli pilots (interesting, since the pilots spoke Hebrew and the three storytellers did not) or that they had received transcripts of Israeli pilots/controllers transmissions on or about June 8, 1967. On that day the three individuals—who I will call the “Three Blind Mice,” since they were operating in the blind and only reporting decades-old memories without any supporting documents—were located in:

  1.Offutt Air Force Base, near Omaha, Nebraska: Mouse Number One stated, “On the day of the attack [June 8], I read yellow teletype sheets . . . from a variety of sources including the NSA.”

  2.All Source Reconnaissance Center at Iraklion Air Station, Crete: Mouse Number Two stated he received “direct intelligence” from the air force EC-121 aircraft.

  3.Da Nang, Vietnam—Mouse Number Three stated that he received rough transcripts on June 8 and smooth transcripts the next day. Then came a message to destroy all transcripts. Later this individual claimed that after discharge from the Air Force he worked for the NSA and that while working in NSA headquarters he saw an NSA report proving the attack deliberate. (Responding to a Freedom of Information Act request, the NSA confirmed that this individual never worked for that agency.)

  This author was concerned about what kind of Nightline program would result if the program included the stories of the three individuals who remembered receiving top-secret information in June 1967, while they were in Omaha, Crete, and Da Nang, respectively.

  Following the interview and meeting with David Marish, Brooke E. Runnette took maternity leave and had a baby girl. Time went by and communication with Ms. Runnette could not be reestablished. On November 22, 2005, Ted Koppel retired from Nightline. Soon thereafter it was reported that Koppel had declined an offer of a job with Al-Jazeera but that David Marish had accepted a position there as a correspondent.49 Nothing has been heard from Nightline since early 2005.

  The network television treatment of the Liberty story has been a substantial disappointment to James Ennes and some members of the Liberty Veterans Association. Ennes is convinced that the power of Israel has been able to subvert the television industry against his version of events.50

  Some members of the Liberty Veterans Association are generally dissatisfied with the TV coverage of their story, as indicated by the following statement: “In recent weeks we have heard from 60 Minutes, Good Morning America, Nightline, and Larry King. All have considered and then apparently rejected the possibility of doing live interviews with survivors. American television, it seems, does not want to tell the Liberty story without filters, censorship, and unrebutted Israeli excuses” (emphasis added).51

  The statements suggest that Israel controls American (and probably British) TV media and has successfully prevented the true story of the Liberty incident from being told. Another analysis might suggest that American and British television are free and independent and not willing to release as fact a version of a story that cannot be verified by normal standards of TV journalism. In Israel, which like the United States and Britain enjoys a free and independent media, it has been stated that what absolutely proves that there is no secret connected with the Liberty incident is the fact that the alleged secret was not leaked to, or discovered by, the media within thirty-six hours of the tragic event.

  Chapter 15

  RED HERRINGS AND MYTHS

  Few relevant facts are in dispute regarding the Liberty incident. The Liberty arrived near the Sinai coast on June 8, 1967, as a result of outdated orders. New orders directing the ship not to approach her original assigned position had been mistakenly dispatched elsewhere. She was attacked by the Israel Air Force and Israel Navy. Thirty-four U.S. crew members died, and another 171 were wounded. There were acts of heroism on board the Liberty. There were numerous blunders by both Israel and the United States. The major debate is not about the individual events that took place but about whether the Israeli attackers knew they were attacking a U.S. ship or, in a tragic mistake, identified their target as an enemy ship.

  A very important question must be considered before reaching a final conclusion. If Israel attacked a ship known to be American, what was the motive for the attack? Various motives attributed to the Israelis for attacking a ship known to be a U.S. ship have already been discussed. No Israeli has stated or testified that the attack was other than a tragic case of mistaken identity. When considering the issue of motive, one must remember that in 1967 the state of Israel stood alone against its Arab enemies, without a single friendly nation in the world supporting her in any way—except the United States! Assuming that Israel did not want the Liberty positioned where she was for any reason, is it reasonable that Israel would commit an act of war against the only nation in the world offering any support? On this point, Ambassador Ephraim Evron was quoted as saying, “I’ll take up the challenge of the Liberty with your permission. Why would Israel do such a terrible thing? We may be crazy, but we are not fools.”1

  Furthermore, if eliminating the Liberty was so important to Israel, is it not reasonable to assume that a military force that four days earlier had destroyed all the air forces of the Arab confrontational states within one day and hundreds of Egyptian tanks in the Sinai and that had routed the Jordan Legion in the West Bank and Jerusalem could not have easily sank an old tub of a ship, lacking any armor and armed with four inadequate machine guns?

  An analysis of the air and naval attacks demonstrates that they were neither well planned nor effective. Kursa Flight was not armed to attack a ship. The primary standard weapon for attacking a
ship was in 1967, as it had been during World War II, the five-hundred-pound conventional iron bomb. In the battle of Midway during World War II, in ten minutes the U.S. Navy sank three heavily armored Japanese aircraft carriers and seriously damaged a fourth using such bombs.2 Kursa was armed with 30 mm cannons and a couple of air-to-air missiles.3 Although Kursa’s gunfire was accurate and started multiple fires on the Liberty, the ship continued under way and was in no danger of sinking. The attack by Royal Flight, armed with 30 mm cannon and napalm canisters, also lacked the capability to sink the ship. If it was intended to sink the ship, that could have accomplished easily by sending aircraft armed with five-hundred-pound iron bombs, as requested by Royal Flight leader. The air attack terminated without dropping any ship-sinking bombs on the Liberty. The two flights of the attacking aircraft were assigned to other missions, for which they were properly armed. Kursa had been returning from combat air patrol over the Suez Canal, and Royal had been diverted from armor and infantry interdiction over the Sinai desert.

  It is also undisputed that when the Israeli motor torpedo boats caught up with the Liberty, they did not attack. They stopped and tried to communicate with her by means of a flashing light. Why did they stop and try to communicate if they already knew the identity of the ship and their mission was to attack and sink her? They were faster than the Liberty, and the ship’s ability to maneuver was extremely limited by the shallow water to the south. The three MTBs had all the time necessary to bracket the ship, one MTB to one side and two on the other, without concern for shallow water, and to launch all their torpedoes in a pattern that would have ensured the destruction of the Liberty. Instead they performed an uncoordinated attack in which 80 percent of their torpedoes missed and one was not even launched.

  There is disagreement as to what signals each side flashed and when, as well as what each side received or thought it received. Nevertheless, there is no dispute that as the MTBs were signaling, Liberty responded by commencing firing at them. Under such circumstances, the MTBs were entitled, even under the most stringent rules of engagement, to return fire. If this was a carefully preplanned attack as alleged, why was it not better coordinated so that more than one of the five torpedoes launched hit the target? It is frequently claimed that the torpedo strike in the National Security Agency compartment of the Liberty was a precise, intentional act to put the NSA capability on the ship out of action. A number of persons who do not accept the fact that the attack was a tragic mistake in identification remain convinced that that particular hit was an intentional part of the overall plan to sink the ship. If the plan was to sink the ship, why the need to separately target the NSA compartment? Also, if the Israelis were so accurate with their torpedoes that they could precisely hit the NSA compartment, why did they not sink the Liberty altogether, and why how did they manage to miss the ship entirely with four of the five torpedoes they launched?

  The nearest U.S. aircraft was stationed more than an hour’s flight away, and the nearest U.S. ship was almost a day’s steaming away. How is it, then, that under such conditions the military force that had just destroyed billions of dollars’ worth of sophisticated enemy hardware was unable to accomplish the destruction of a ship? Any analysis of these facts must conclude that if Israel had really wanted to sink the Liberty, it would have done just that. The underlying logic of the argument against Israel is that if it was capable of such infallible planning, the same logic must be applied to the execution of the plan. On the other hand, if the plan was so poorly executed, maybe the planning was not that sinister either.

  Various doubters of the tragic-mistake explanation have presented a number of ideas that can only be classified as red herrings. Even if any of these stories, which are summarized below, are true, they have no bearing on the issue of whether the attack was a case of mistaken identity as opposed to an attack on a ship known to be American.

  There is a dispute over whether Israel inquired of the United States prior to the attack whether any U.S. ships were in the area. In his memoirs, Itzhak Rabin states that such an inquiry was made. Capt. Ernest Castle, the U.S. naval attaché in Tel Aviv in 1967, reported that no such inquiry was made to him prior to the attack. (There has been no accounting of other Israelis who may have inquired of U.S. military or diplomatic personnel, either formally or informally.) But this begs a question: Why would Israel have made such an inquiry? No U.S. Navy ship had made a port call in Israel since November 1963. The war was between Israel and the Arabs. Why would anyone contemplate a U.S. ship sailing close to the combat zone without advising a friendly country (if not all parties concerned) about the ship’s presence? This is especially puzzling in light of the U.S. public pronouncement at the UN Security Council just days before that no U.S. ships or planes were within hundreds of miles of the combat zone.

  But assuming no inquiry was made by anyone in Israel, it would seem that this tends to prove a mistake occurred more than it proves otherwise. The idea that Israelis had no idea that a U.S. ship was in the area and never inquired about that possibility would tend to support rather than controvert the explanation that the Liberty was mistaken for an enemy.

  Did Egypt declare the waters off Sinai a combat zone closed to neutral traffic days prior to the attack? The initial Israeli explanation said yes.4 But let us assume Egypt did not. The NSA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff knew that the area was well within a combat zone and were concerned for the safety of the Liberty. They sent numerous misdirected messages trying to keep her from entering the area. The Liberty knew of the war, and the shore explosions visible to the Liberty’s crew members made her aware of fighting was going on within eyesight. Whether Egypt did or did not declare the area a combat zone has nothing to do with proving that the attack was not a mistake.

  Another dispute concerns whether or not the Israeli aircraft fired rockets or missiles at the Liberty. The evidence, supported by the tests performed by the U.S. Navy laboratories, seems to establish that they did not. If they did, what does the firing or nonfiring of rockets or missiles show about the intent of the attackers?

  Some of the Liberty crewmen claim that a great deal of surveillance by aircraft took place prior to the attack. Therefore, they argue, the Israelis knew the identity of the ship before the attack. The Israelis admit that the early-morning reconnaissance Nord 2501 flight identified the Liberty and that reports were made about a ship off El Arish by aircraft passing near throughout the morning. The Israelis claim that all of these aircraft except the early-morning naval reconnaissance were on combat-related missions against Egyptian military targets. Some aircraft reported a ship near El Arish, and some apparently had no interest in the Liberty whatsoever—they never even bothered to report about her. Israel never denied identifying the ship early in the morning. No data can be found that indicates that any other position report on the Liberty ever reached naval or other headquarters. The thought that such evidence, if it ever existed, was destroyed does not make sense either, because in such a case all evidence, including the morning sighting, would have been destroyed.

  There are several conflicting stories about how many launches of aircraft were made by the Sixth Fleet in an attempt to defend the Liberty while it was under attack. Whether a launch of aircraft to protect the Liberty was made and recalled and then a second launch made or only one, what bearing do these disputes about U.S. naval flight operations, entirely within the control of U.S. Navy commanders, have on the Israelis in regard to whether they knew they were attacking a U.S. ship?

  Some conspiracy theorists claim that the Liberty and her crew were betrayed by coconspirators President Lyndon Johnson; Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara; the Chief of Naval Operations, David McDonald; the Commander in Chief, U.S. Naval Forces Europe, John McCain; Commander Sixth Fleet, William Martin; and the president of the U.S. Navy court of inquiry, Adm. Isaac Kidd. The claims actually insinuate treason. If we are to believe that this distinguished group, or even several of members of it, were acting in concert against the
national interest of the United States in order to confer some benefit on Israel in connection with the attack on the Liberty by participating in a conspiracy or a cover-up, several questions need to be answered.

  First, any one of the alleged conspirators (with the exception of Admiral Kidd, who arrived on the scene several days after the event) could have issued an order early on that would have prevented the Liberty from entering the combat zone. If the conspirators did not want the Liberty there, why did they send her there in the first place?

  Second, if one believes that President Johnson and Secretary McNamara had some political motive for the alleged conspiracy, is it really believable that Admiral McDonald, Admiral McCain, Admiral Martin, and Admiral Kidd, or any of these distinguished officers, would betray his country and conspire against a U.S. Navy ship and its crew? The suggestion that these officers were involved in such a conspiracy is ludicrous.

  Third, why would the president of the United States, the secretary of defense, the commander of the Sixth Fleet, or any of them, betray a U.S. Navy ship and its crew by lying about the availability of air cover to defend a U.S. ship or by denying it available air cover when the U.S. ship was actually under attack?

  These red herrings have no bearing on the issue of whether the Israeli forces that attacked the Liberty were aware before or during the attack that it was a U.S. ship. Some of the claims may be interesting, but none of them is relevant to the question under review. In addition to the red herrings, however, there are a number of myths that have been repeated and repeated until they have developed lives of their own. They are, however, absolutely without substance.