Recordings Back Israel Claim on Spy Ship

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=6&u=/ap/20030709/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_spy_ship_4

JERUSALEM - Newly declassified transcripts back up Israel's claim that its sinking of a U.S. spy ship during the 1967 Middle East war was an accident, a Florida judge who has been investigating the case for 16 years said Wednesday.

Israel has always maintained it thought the USS Liberty was an Egyptian military supply ship when it ordered its forces to attack on June 8, 1967, killing 34 American sailors and wounding 171. But critics charge Israel knew the ship was American. Questions about the case have long dogged U.S.-Israel relations.

Miami Judge A. Jay Cristol received transcripts of transmissions from two Israeli helicopter pilots, sent to check for survivors after the attack. The pilots referred to the ship as Egyptian and were surprised to discover it was flying an American flag.

The recordings, in Hebrew, were made by a U.S. spy plane hovering over the site.

Jim Ennes, a Liberty survivor and researcher, had this to tell me when I emailed him about the transcript:

All that shows is that the helos that came out after the
torpedo attack were unaware what to expect.

TWO American intell intercept flights were overhead taping
the attack, despite NSA denials. Those convinced the entire
NSA that the attack was deliberate.

Below is my reply to a friend who asked a similar question:

I understand your "idiot test" analysis, but I do hope you will look
further. The plain truth is that, despite the arguments sent by
spokesmen for Israel, most people who look carefully at this attack agree that it was deliberate. Moreover, the top minds in the American intelligence community agree that solid evidence is overwhelming that it was deliberate! I've attached a file listing some of those names. One really must look carefully when such leading lights as Dean Rusk, Marshall Carter, Richard Helms, Lou Tordella, Tom Moorer, Rufus Taylor, William Odom, Bobby Ray Inman, John Morrison, George Ball, Clark Clifford, Lucius Battle,
William Odom, Merlin Staring and others including even LBJs own press secretary George Christian all say almost with one voice that it was deliberate and that the evidence says so. Four former NSA directors agree that deliberateness of the attack was not a debatable issue; it wasagreed fact. None of these men are the sort to adopt wild or irresponsible
positions.

We survivors say the attack was deliberate because what we saw argues that it was: Prolonged, low-level pre-attack reconnaissance in which the recon pilots were heard telling their HQ that we were American; an extended close air attack with large colors flying throughout; selective jamming of the very frequencies we needed to call for help; torpedo boats that examined the ship and flag from 50 feet away and CONTINUED to fire from close range for another 40 minutes; machinegunning of our liferafts in the water. Then they lied about everything and claimed that they recognized us as American even while the torpedoes were in the water and never fired
again. Nonsense. They claim falsely that the boats called in the air attack because they miscalculated our speed from 32 miles away when in fact their maximum radar range was 16 miles and that they judged our speed at 30 knots when we were moving five knots. Nonsense. They claim we flew no flag. Nonsense. If it was a mistake, at least they could tell the truth. If they didn't know we were American, why did they jam American radio frequencies?

Yet the evidence goes far beyond those things; it is virtually
absolute. Recently I called Oliver Kirby, a former NSA Ops boss who
was called back to NSA in 1967 to look into the circumstances of the
attack. He has never before discussed this with anyone outside the
confines of the NSA complex, but the first words out of his mouth were, "I can tell you for an absolute certainty that they knew they were attacking an American ship." How did he know? He saw transcripts of Israeli communications during the attack. There was a Navy EC121 overhead (reported recently by Jim Bamford) and an Air Force C130 a few miles away. Both were recording communications. The Navy intake was merely recorded; the Air Force product was sent securely in real time via the CRITICOMM system to Air Force intelligence centers worldwide where it was seen by hundreds of people. Now many of those people are coming forward to describe what they saw. These are the same intercepts that were seen by
Oliver Kirby and other top analysts and officials at the National
Security Agency. These transcripts are the reason so many top intelligence officials are certain that this attack was no accident.

NSA now denies there were airplanes overhead during the attack or that the attack was intercepted or recorded. Those denials are contradicted by very credible people who were there, including the navigator of the EC121 who is talking to us.

NSA can deny that such intercepts exist because shortly after the
attack all such evidence of a deliberate attack was ordered destroyed. But fortunately for the historical record a great many people saw those things before they went into the burn bag, and many of those people are now speaking out.

You may not be aware that the Court of Inquiry was also falsified. The Court's own legal counsel, Captain Ward Boston, now says publicly in Navy Times and elsewhere that the court actually believed that the attack was deliberate but reported otherwise falsely because it was so ordered by Washington.

Why would Israel bite the American hand? We may never know. As Dean Rusk once said, it must have been ordered by someone fairly high up to be able to coordinate all the different forces involved. Richard Helms and Admiral Moorer have supposed that it was done to delay American knowledge of the pending Golan invasion. General Morrison agrees that it could have been to assure that we didn't learn of the executing of POWs then underway at El Arish. We may never know the real reason, but I do hope you will look carefully at the circumstances before allowing the improbability of
such an attack to convince you that it was really just a tragic accident.

what Israel thought at the time. The fact is, the incident was covered up by the US for years; not only did the crew and commanders not receive the usual honors, but they were practically treated as persona non grata by our government. The whole affair is an outrage from beginning to end.

Based on his readings of NSA intercepts, James Bamford wrote in Body of Secrets that Israel f'ed up at first but kept firing even after it realized the ship was ours. And yes, one Ariel Sharon was involved in this incident.

see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,533783,00.html

As the Liberty passed the desert town of El Arish, it was being closely watched. About 4,000ft above was an Israeli reconnaissance aircraft. At 6.05am, the observer on the plane reported back to Israeli naval headquarters: "What we could see were the letters written on that ship and we gave these letters to ground control," he said. The letters were "GTR-5" - the Liberty's identification. "GTR" stood for "General Technical Research" - a cover designation for the National Security Agency (NSA)'s fleet of spy ships.

was not sunk----mistake---hardly

or has done? Just asking.

years ago. No way can that ship be mistaken for a war ship.

More BS.

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