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Heroes Vindicated! Establishment Finally Admits Truth About USS Liberty The suppressed story of a brutal attack on a U.S. surveillance ship by Israeli jetfighters and torpedo boats aired on the History Channel to the ap plause of survivors. Exclusive to American Free Press By Christopher Bollyn The horrific details of the assault on the American surveillance ship, USS Liberty, in which 34 sailors were killed and 171 injured, was the subject of a recent History Channel program, Cover Up: Attack On The USS Liberty. The program presented an un flinch ing account of the "sneak attack" by un marked Israeli jets and torpedo boats on the Liberty during the 1967 Israeli-Arab war. The History Channel program, which was applauded by survivors of the attack as "excellent," was jointly produced with CBS News as part of History Channel's "History Under cover" ser ies. The year of the attack, Liberty Lob by was the only national voice of consequence to report on this attack by "our strategic ally." The assault on Liberty began in broad daylight, shortly after lunch on June 8, with an air assault by "at least 12 jets" that dropped napalm and left 870 rocket and cannon holes in the intelligence vessel. Petty Officer Phil Tourney, who was on the ship at the time, told American Free Press that the initial attack was meant to "soften us up" and "prepare the ship to be sunk" by an imminent torpedo boat attack. During the attack, the Israeli jets jammed the ship's radar and knocked out the communications antennae. The pilots targeted the lifeboats and watertight doors so as to ensure that the torpedo attack sank the vessel, with "all hands lost," according to Tourney. Only one SOS message reached the 6th Fleet's Saratoga, which launched aircraft to defend the Liberty. However, for some unknown reason these planes were called back by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and the defenseless Liberty was left to fend for herself. Experts have speculated that the attack was intended to prevent the government from knowing about the imminent Israeli move to conquer the Golan Heights of Syria, or the massacre of more than 1,000 captured Egyptian soldiers in El Arish, within eyesight of sailors on the Liberty. According to eyewitnesses and film footage, the initial air attack lasted about 30 minutes, during which time the vessel was clearly flying an oversized American flag. According to survivors, the ship had been overflown by 13 Israeli reconnaissance sorties during the morning. The air assault was followed by an attack by three Israeli torpedo boats that fired 5 torpedoes. Any one of the torpedoes would have sent Liberty to the bottom had it not been for the action of Petty Officer Francis Brown, from Troy, New York, who took the helm, and under the command of the badly wounded captain, maneuvered the ship to avoid 4 of the 5 torpedoes. One torpedo hit the ship leaving a 40-foot hole, but fortunately struck an I-beam, which prevented it from sinking the ship. Tourney said that Brown "deserves the Congressional Medal of Honor" for his heroic action that saved hundreds of lives. "Francis didn't flinch," Tourney said. "The bridge was full of blood; it was pure hell up there-I was fighting the napalm fire. A 50-calibre round went right through the back of his neck. He died with his hands on the wheel. "They tried to murder us all," Tourney said, "and send the ship to the bottom." Israel has always maintained that the attack was an accident despite a great deal of evidence to the contrary, including testimony from two of the Israeli pilots involved in the air assault, that the attack was intentional. The spokesman for the Israeli Em bassy, Mark Regev, told American Free Press that there is "no evidence" that the attack was intentional. Fifteen years after the incident, the senior Israeli lead pilot, named Amon Even-Tov, approached Liberty survivors and former Congressman Paul N. (Pete) McCloskey about his role in the attack, according to James M. Ennes Jr., author of Assault on the Liberty. Even-Tov told McCloskey that he had immediately recognized the Li berty as an American vessel and radioed that information to his headquarters, but was told to ignore the American flag and continue his attack. He refused to do so and returned to base, where he was arrested. Later, a dual-national American-Israeli major told the survivors that he was in an Israeli war room where he heard Even-Tov's radio report. The attacking pilots (two of whom are reportedly dual-national Americans) and everyone in the Israeli war room knew that they were attacking an American ship, the major said. He later recanted the statement after receiving threatening phone calls from Israel. "The Israelis definitely identified the ship as American and friendly," Tourney said. "Our radios picked that up." Radio monitors as far away as Spain, Germany, and the U.S. Embassy in Le banon picked up this transmission, which then-U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dwight Porter has confirmed. Unfortun ately, the U.S. government has shown no interest in hearing these first-person accounts. The pilot's protests about the vessel being an American ship were also picked up by a National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance plane flying high overhead during the attack, according to James Bamford, author of a recent book on the NSA, Body of Secrets. A forthcoming film, Loss of Liberty, produced by Tito Howard, is expected to be completed by mid-September and will be noticed in AFP. It focuses on the undisclosed dirty details of the attack on the Liberty. H ================================= Mid-life is when you go to the doctor and you realize you are now so old you have to pay someone to look at you naked! |
