gulf of tonkin conspiracy

It is not NSA's intention to prove or The tug departed Haiphong at approximately 0100 hours on August 4, while the undamaged torpedo boat, T-146, was ordered to stay with the crippled boats and maintain an alert for enemy forces. At about 0600, the two U.S. destroyers resumed the Desoto patrol. By then, the two American ships were approximately 80 nautical miles from the nearest North Vietnamese coastline and steaming southeast at 20 knots. PTF-1 and PTF-5 raced toward shore. While there was some doubt in Washington regarding the second attack, those aboard Maddox and Turner Joy were convinced that it had occurred. By then, early news accounts had already solidified some opinions, and the Johnson Administration had decided to launch retaliatory strikes. That night, on national television, Johnson addressedthe American people, saying,Renewed hostile actions against United States ships on the high seas in the Gulf of Tonkin have today required me to take action and reply. When you visit the site, Dotdash Meredith and its partners may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. McNamara insisted that the evidence clearly indicated there was an attack on August 4, and he continued to maintain so in his book In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons From Vietnam. CIA Bulletin, 3 August 1964 (see Edward J. Marolda and Oscar P. Fitzgerald, The United States Navy and the Vietnam Conflict: From Military Assistance to Combat, 1959-1965 [Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1986], p. 422). But on 7 January, the Seventh Fleet eased the restriction, allowing the destroyers to approach to within four milesstill one mile beyond North Vietnamese territorial waters as recognized by the United States. We have no intention of yielding to pressure. The U.S. ships were supposed to remain well outside North Vietnams claimed five nautical mile territorial limit. 17. The Commander-in-Chief, Pacific, Admiral Harry D. Felt, agreed and suggested that a U.S. Navy ship could be used to vector 34A boats to their targets.6. Along with other American warships, Maddox was steaming in international waters some 28 nautical miles off North Vietnams coast, gathering information on that countrys coastal radars. All missed, probably because the North Vietnamese had fired too soon. $22. He is the author of. At each point, the ship would stop and circle, picking up electronic signals before moving on. During a meeting at the White House on the evening of 4 August, President Johnson asked McCone, "Do they want a war by attacking our ships in the middle of the Gulf of Tonkin? He headed seaward hoping to avoid a confrontation until daybreak, then returned to the coast at 1045, this time north of Hon Me. Until the ICC investigation blew over a week later, the commandos camped on a small pier. Around midday on Aug. 4, Adm. Grant Sharp, the top navy commander in the Pacific, made a call to the Joint Chiefs, and it was clear there were significant doubts about this second incident. WebMany historians now agree that the Gulf of Tonkin incident, in which many believed North Vietnamese ships had attacked American naval forces, may not have occurred in the way it was described at the time. Subscribe to LBJ's War onApple Podcasts. Mr. Andrad is a Vietnam War historian with the U.S. Army Center of Military History, where he is writing a book on combat operations from 1969 through 1973. When the enemy boats closed to less than 10,000 yards, the destroyer fired three shots across the bow of the lead vessel. Tonkin Gulf Resolution (1964) | National Archives Aircraft from Ticonderoga arrived on-scene at 1528 hours and fired on the boats. Then they boarded their boats and headed back to Da Nang.12 Subscribe now and never hit a limit. Heavy machine-gun bullets riddled PTF-6, tearing away part of the port bow and wounding four South Vietnamese crewmen, including Lieutenant Son. Gulf of Tonkin incident - Wikipedia Typically, the missions were carried out by a destroyer specially outfitted with sensitive eavesdropping equipment. . This time the U.S. ships detected electronic signals and acoustic indications of a likely second North Vietnamese naval attack, and they requested U.S. air support. The boats followed at their maximum speed of 44 knots, continuing the chase for more than 20 minutes. This along with flawed signals intelligence from the National Security Agency led Johnson to order retaliatory airstrikes against North Vietnam. Cookies collect information about your preferences and your devices and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. Our response, for the present, will be limited and fitting. As it turns out, Adm. Sharp failed to read to the Joint Chiefs the last line of the cable, whichread: Suggest a complete evaluation before any further actions.. Seeking to follow the established policy of containment, Johnson and his Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, began increasing military aid to South Vietnam. The Tonkin Gulf Incident in the past two decades has been treated by at least three full-scale studies, dealt with at length by Congressional committees and extensively referenced in general histories, presidential memoirs and textbooks on the U.S. legislative function. The report covers all aspects of the efforts of the various American SIGINT agencies from the early postWorld War II years through the evacuation of Saigon. Neither ships crew knew about the North Vietnamese salvage operation. Senate investigations in 1968 and 1975 did little to clarify the events or the evidence, lending further credence to the various conspiracy theories. Today, it is believed that this second attack did not occur and was merely reports from jittery radar and sonar operators, but at the time it was taken as evidence that Hanoi was raising the stakes against the United States. Then North Vietnams naval authorities either became confused or were seized by indecision. The threat removed, Maddox retired from the area to rejoin friendly forces. SOG took the mounting war of words very seriously and assumed the worstthat an investigation would expose its operations against the North. This article is based on the PRI podcast, LBJ's War, hosted by David Brown. At 2000 hours local time, Maddox reported it had two surface and three aerial contacts on radar. The Geneva Conference in 1954 was intended to settle outstanding issues following the end of hostilities between France and the Viet Minh at the end of the First Indochina War. The string of intelligence mistakes, mistranslations, misinterpretations and faulty decision making that occurred in the Tonkin Gulf in 1964 reveals how easily analysts and officials can jump to the wrong conclusions and lead a nation into war. It authorized the president to "prevent further aggression . Just after midnight on 4 August, PTF-6 turned for home, pursued by an enemy Swatow. 8. The House passed the resolution unanimously.17 There remains some disagreement among historians about the second (Aug. 4) incident, which involved the Maddox and another destroyer, the USS Turner Joy. 302-303. Both men believed an attack on the American ships was imminent. To the northwest, though they could not see it in the blackness, was Hon Me; to the southwest lay Hon Nieu. Originally begun by the Central Intelligence Agency in 1961, 34A was a highly-classified program of covert operations against North Vietnam. The Secret Side of the Tonkin Gulf Incident, 2. ", "No," replied McCone. "I think we are kidding the world if you try to give the impression that when the South Vietnamese naval boats bombarded two islands a short distance off the coast of North Vietnam we were not implicated," he scornfully told McNamara during the hearings.16 After the incident, Herrick was unsure that his ships had been attacked, reporting at 1:27 a.m. Washington time that "Freak weather effects on radar and overeager sonarmen may have accounted for many reports. What did and didnt happen in the Gulf of Tonkin on August 2 and 4 has long been in dispute, but the decisions that the Johnson Administration and Congress made based on an interpretation of those events were undeniably monumental. The contacts were to the northeast of the ship, putting them about 100 nautical miles from North Vietnam but very close to Chinas Hainan Island. The World is a public radio program that crosses borders and time zones to bring home the stories that matter. For the rest of the war they would be truly secretand in the end they were a dismal failure. Any escalation in the bombing of the North risked provoking the Russians or, more likely, the Chinese. They never intended to attack U.S. forces, and were not even within 100 nautical miles of the U.S. destroyers position at the time of the purported second engagement.. This was the only time covert operations against the North came close to being discussed in public. They arrived on station overhead by 2100 hours. Vaccines. Two hours later the Phu Bai SIGINT station transmitted a critic report warning of possible [North Vietnamese] naval operations planned against the Desoto patrol. Twenty-five minutes later, Phu Bai sent a second critic report that said, imminent plans of [North Vietnamese] naval action possibly against Desoto Mission.. At the time, the Navy relied heavily on Naval Support Group Activity (NSGA), San Miguel, Philippines, for SIGINT support, augmented by seaborne SIGINT elements called Direct Support Units (DSUs). Message, COMUSMACV 291233Z July 1964, CP 291345Z July 1964. The NSA report is revealing. It was 20 minutes into the new day, 31 July, when PTF-3 and PTF-6, both under the command of Lieutenant Sonconsidered one of the best boat skippers in the covert fleetreached Hon Me and began their run at the shore. We have ample forces to respond not only to these attacks on these destroyers but also to retaliate, should you wish to do so, against targets on the land, he toldthe president. PTF-6 took up station at the mouth of the Ron River, lit up the sky with illumination rounds, and fired at the security post. Alerted to the threat, Herrick requested air support from the carrier USS Ticonderoga. In response, the North Vietnamese boat launched a torpedo. At 0354 on 2 August, the destroyer was just south of Hon Me Island. Both boats opened fire, scoring hits on the tower, then moved on to other buildings nearby. 10. Meanwhile, by late August 3, the North Vietnamese had learned the condition of their torpedo boats and ordered a salvage tug to recover the damaged craft. Holding their vector despite the gunfire, the boats rushed in, pouring 20-mm and 40-mm fire and 57-mm recoilless rifle rounds into their target. The North Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs made all this clear in September when it published a "Memorandum Regarding the U.S. War Acts Against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam in the First Days of August 1964." As is common with specialized histories -- what I call the "tunnels of Cu Chi" syndrome -- this book will tell most readers more about the U.S. Navy in Vietnam than they care to know. Americas Vietnam War had begun in earnest. On 6 August, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara told a joint session of the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services Committees that the North Vietnamese attack on the Maddox was ". 1. . Ticonderoga ordered four A-1H Skyraiders into the air to support the ships. Related:LBJ knew the Vietnam War was a disaster in the making. The Johnson administration had made the first of several secret diplomatic attempts during the summer of 1964 to convince the North Vietnamese to stop its war on South Vietnam, using the chief Canadian delegate to the ICC, J. Blair Seaborn, to pass the message along to Hanoi. The Gulf of Tonkin incident - Vietnam War McNamara was ready to respond. Interview, authors with James Hawes, 31 March 1996. . Conducted under the nationally approved Operations Plan, OPLAN-34A, the program required the intelligence community to provide detailed intelligence about the commando targets, the Norths coastal defenses and related surveillance systems. Conspiracy FACT #8: The Gulf of Tonkin Incident - YouTube The lack of success in SOGs missions during the first few months of 1964 made this proposal quite attractive. Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in Vietnam, 3 August 1964, FRUS, Vietnam, 1964, p. 603. Few areas of the world have been as hotly contested as the India-Pakistan border. Fluoride.