On June 8, 1967, US Navy intelligence ship USS Liberty was suddenly
and brutally attacked on the high seas in international waters by the
air and naval forces of Israel. The Israeli forces attacked with full
knowledge that this was an American ship and lied about it. Survivors
have been forbidden for 40 years to tell their story under oath to the
American public. The USS Liberty Memorial web site tells their story
and is dedicated to the memory of the 34 brave men who died.
The Attack
After surveilling USS Liberty for more than nine hours with almost
hourly aircraft overflights and radar tracking, the air and naval
forces of Israel attacked our ship in international waters without
warning. USS Liberty was identified as a US naval ship by Israeli
reconnaissance aircraft nine hours before the attack and continuously
tracked by Israeli radar and aircraft thereafter. Sailing in
international waters at less than five knots, with no offensive
armament, our ship was not a military threat to anyone.
The Israeli forces attacked without warning and without attempting to
contact us. Thirty four Americans were killed in the attack and
another 174 were wounded. The ship, a $40-million dollar
state-of-the-art signals intelligence platform, was later declared
unsalvageable and sold for scrap.
The Cover Up
Despite a near-universal consensus that the Israeli attack was made
with full knowledge that USS Liberty was a US Navy ship, the Johnson
administration began an immediate cover-up of this fact. Though
administration officers continued individually to characterize the
attack as deliberate, the Johnson administration never sought the
prosecution of the guilty parties or otherwise attempted to seek
justice for the victims. They concealed and altered evidence in their
effort to downplay the attack. Though they never formally accepted the
Israeli explanation that it was an accident, they never pressed for a
full investigation either. They simply allowed those responsible
literally to get away with murder.
In an ongoing effort to reveal the truth about the attack, the USS
Liberty Veterans Association has filed with the Secretary of the Army
in the manner prescribed by law a detailed, fully documented Report of
War Crimes describing the circumstances of the attack on our ship and
evidence that it was a crime under international law. In accordance
with international law and treaties, the United States is obligated to
investigate the allegations. So far, the United States has declined
even to acknowledge that the report has been filed. The full text of
the report can be found at
http://www.gtr5.com/evidence/warcrimes.pdf