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That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
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Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
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-Caveat Lector-
Those "conspiracy theorists" at FAIR expose something they call a "lie"
launching the Vietnam War. What's the criteria/guidelines with regards to
exposing these things? Do we have to allow a 30 year window to go by and
wait for millions to die in a "war" before we start looking into things?
30-Year Anniversary: Tonkin Gulf Lie Launched Vietnam War
http://www.fair.org/media-beat/940727.html
Media Beat, July 27, 1994
30-Year Anniversary: Tonkin Gulf Lie Launched Vietnam War
By Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon
Thirty years ago, it all seemed very clear.
"American Planes Hit North Vietnam After Second Attack on Our Destroyers;
Move Taken to Halt New Aggression", announced a Washington Post headline on
Aug. 5, 1964.
That same day, the front page of the New York Times reported: "President
Johnson has ordered retaliatory action against gunboats and 'certain
supporting facilities in North Vietnam' after renewed attacks against
American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin."
But there was no "second attack" by North Vietnam -- no "renewed attacks
against American destroyers." By reporting official claims as absolute
truths, American journalism opened the floodgates for the bloody Vietnam
War.
A pattern took hold: continuous government lies passed on by pliant mass
media...leading to over 50,000 American deaths and millions of Vietnamese
casualties.
The official story was that North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an
"unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the
Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with
a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later.
The truth was very different.
Rather than being on a routine patrol Aug. 2, the U.S. destroyer Maddox was
actually engaged in aggressive intelligence-gathering maneuvers -- in sync
with coordinated attacks on North Vietnam by the South Vietnamese navy and
the Laotian air force.
"The day before, two attacks on North Vietnam...had taken place," writes
scholar Daniel C. Hallin. Those assaults were "part of a campaign of
increasing military pressure on the North that the United States had been
pursuing since early 1964."
On the night of Aug. 4, the Pentagon proclaimed that a second attack by
North Vietnamese PT boats had occurred earlier that day in the Tonkin Gulf
-- a report cited by President Johnson as he went on national TV that
evening to announce a momentous escalation in the war: air strikes against
North Vietnam.
But Johnson ordered U.S. bombers to "retaliate" for a North Vietnamese
torpedo attack that never happened.
Prior to the U.S. air strikes, top officials in Washington had reason to
doubt that any Aug. 4 attack by North Vietnam had occurred. Cables from the
U.S. task force commander in the Tonkin Gulf, Captain John J. Herrick,
referred to "freak weather effects," "almost total darkness" and an
"overeager sonarman" who "was hearing ship's own propeller beat."
One of the Navy pilots flying overhead that night was squadron commander
James Stockdale, who gained fame later as a POW and then Ross Perot's vice
presidential candidate. "I had the best seat in the house to watch that
event," recalled Stockdale a few years ago, "and our destroyers were just
shooting at phantom targets -- there were no PT boats there.... There was
nothing there but black water and American fire power."
In 1965, Lyndon Johnson commented: "For all I know, our Navy was shooting at
whales out there."
But Johnson's deceitful speech of Aug. 4, 1964, won accolades from editorial
writers. The president, proclaimed the New York Times, "went to the American
people last night with the somber facts." The Los Angeles Times urged
Americans to "face the fact that the Communists, by their attack on American
vessels in international waters, have themselves escalated the hostilities."
An exhaustive new book, The War Within: America's Battle Over Vietnam,
begins with a dramatic account of the Tonkin Gulf incidents. In an
interview, author Tom Wells told us that American media "described the air
strikes that Johnson launched in response as merely `tit for tat´ -- when in
reality they reflected plans the administration had already drawn up for
gradually increasing its overt military pressure against the North."
Why such inaccurate news coverage? Wells points to the media's "almost
exclusive reliance on U.S. government officials as sources of information"
-- as well as "reluctance to question official pronouncements on 'national
security issues.'"
Daniel Hallin's classic book The "Uncensored War" observes that journalists
had "a great deal of information available which contradicted the official
account [of Tonkin Gulf events]; it simply wasn't used. The day before the
first incident, Hanoi had protested the attacks on its territory by Laotian
aircraft and South Vietnamese gunboats."
What's more, "It was generally known...that `covert´ operations against
North Vietnam, carried out by South Vietnamese forces with U.S. support and
direction, had been going on for some time."
In the absence of independent journalism, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution --
the closest thing there ever was to a declaration of war against North
Vietnam -- sailed through Congress on Aug. 7. (Two courageous senators,
Wayne Morse of Oregon and Ernest Gruening of Alaska, provided the only "no"
votes.) The resolution authorized the president "to take all necessary
measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States
and to prevent further aggression."
The rest is tragic history.
Nearly three decades later, during the Gulf War, columnist Sydney Schanberg
warned journalists not to forget "our unquestioning chorus of agreeability
when Lyndon Johnson bamboozled us with his fabrication of the Gulf of Tonkin
incident."
Schanberg blamed not only the press but also "the apparent amnesia of the
wider American public."
And he added: "We Americans are the ultimate innocents. We are forever
desperate to believe that this time the government is telling us the truth."
Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon are syndicated columnists and the authors of
Adventures in Medialand: Behind the News, Beyond the Pundits (Common Courage
Press).
See also:
The Enduring Spirit of a Dissident Senator (Sept. 16, 1999)
Retractions of Reporting Are Quite Selective (July 9, 1998)
More FAIR info on military issues...
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DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
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