I got drafted with his name on some documents I autographed as I signed my life away. As a result, I get a feeling of impending doom every time I see or hear his name.
I got drafted with his name on some documents I autographed as I signed my life away. As a result, I get a feeling of impending doom every time I see or hear his name.
I think the term "manufactured" came about because the official report neglected to mention that the American ships were ordered to fire warning shots once the North Vietnamese boats came within torpedo range. Especially in a small, fast moving torpedo craft it's difficult to know if a shot off your bow is a warning shot or a bad shot. However, the actual attack definitely happened because there were casualties on both sides. Unless you wish to believe the CIA bought torpedo boats, drove them to the North Vietnamese shore, and actually attacked American ships.Well, McNamara said that the North Vietnamese denied it vehemently: "It never happened." This was in face-to-face conference with them. Certainly, that's not conclusive.
When they declassified documents from NSA and other parts of the national security apparatus following the '92 Records Act, it turned up a plan written be Lansdale pertaining to creation of a provocation against Cuba, justifying a second invasion with US troops instead of the Cuban exile brigade.
It detailed features that included phony radio calls/traffic, and blowing up a real American ship in Gitmo Bay with whatever real casualties occurred.
After Dealey Plaza, an associate of Lansdale -- Lucien Conein -- appeared in Vietnam under military cover: Lt. Col. Conein. That was the winter of '63 and '64. Eight weeks before the Gulf of Tonkin, Lansdale returned to Vietnam.
I think Oliver Stone and the historian Kuznick had found White House tapes of Johnson, insinuating that Gulf of Tonkin had been manufactured. You could argue that it meant "something else," but the history series for HBO appeared long after I saw the Operations Northwoods document myself. And I only wish I'd snagged a facsimile of it, even if it, too, can't be damningly conclusive.
I think the term "manufactured" came about because the official report neglected to mention that the American ships were ordered to fire warning shots once the North Vietnamese boats came within torpedo range. Especially in a small, fast moving torpedo craft it's difficult to know if a shot off your bow is a warning shot or a bad shot. However, the actual attack definitely happened because there were casualties on both sides. Unless you wish to believe the CIA bought torpedo boats, drove them to the North Vietnamese shore, and actually attacked American ships.
Also, the radar logs for the August 4 incident were analyzed with the conclusion that the ships were almost certainly firing at ghosts from waves before the incident was announced. Taken together, "manufactured" probably isn't too strong a term, but there definitely was an attack.
I think the term "manufactured" came about because the official report neglected to mention that the American ships were ordered to fire warning shots once the North Vietnamese boats came within torpedo range. Especially in a small, fast moving torpedo craft it's difficult to know if a shot off your bow is a warning shot or a bad shot. However, the actual attack definitely happened because there were casualties on both sides. Unless you wish to believe the CIA bought torpedo boats, drove them to the North Vietnamese shore, and actually attacked American ships.
Also, the radar logs for the August 4 incident were analyzed with the conclusion that the ships were almost certainly firing at ghosts from waves before the incident was announced. Taken together, "manufactured" probably isn't too strong a term, but there definitely was an attack.
NSA knew all along that the 4 Aug Gulf of Tonkin incident never happened. James Stockdale knew all along that there was nothing in the water there other than the American ships.The Gulf of Tonkin incidents of 2 to 4 August 1964 have come to loom over the subsequent American engagement in Indochina. The incidents, principally the second one of 4 August, led to the approval of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution by the u.s. Congress, which handed President Johnson the carte blanche charter he had wanted for future intervention in Southeast Asia...
Regarding the alleged 4 Aug incident the NSA says: James Stockdale, then a navy pilot at the scene, who had "the best seat in the house from which to detect boats," saw nothing. "No boats," he would later write, "no boat wakes, no ricochets off boats, no boat impacts, no torpedo wakes - nothing but black sea and American fire-power."
In maintaining the official version of the attack, the NSA made use of surprisingly few published SIGINT reports - fifteen in all. The research behind the new version which follows is based on the discovery of an enormous amount of never-before-used SIGINT material. This included 122 relevant SIGINT products, along with watch center notes, oral history interviews, and messages among the various SIGINT and military command centers involved in the Gulf of Tonkin incidents.
Naturally, this flood of new information changed dramatically the story of that night of 4/5 August. The most important element is that it is now known what the North Vietnamese Navy was doing that night. And with this information a nearly complete story finally can be told. (8//BI) Two startling findings emerged from the new research.
First, it is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night.
In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on 2 August.
The conclusion that would be drawn from a review of all SIGINT evidence would have been that the North Vietnamese not only did not attack, but were uncertain as to the location of the ships.
Newly Declassified National Security Agency Documents Show Analysts Made SIGINT fit the claim" of North Vietnamese Attack National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 132 -
NSA knew all along that the 4 Aug Gulf of Tonkin incident never happened. James Stockdale knew all along that there was nothing in the water there other than the American ships.
If you want, download the NSA's declassified history yourself directly from the National Security Archive. (PDF Format)
Johnson administration cherry picked the less than 10% of the intelligence that supported their desire to go to war and classified the rest.
What is it they say again?
Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it...
Uno
Did you return home to many years of waking up at 3AM in puddles of sweat, screaming at the top of your lungs and scaring your wife and kids?
I imagine are still several people like that around.
He was still Secretary of the Navy I believe when I was in, but that was post Nam.
I've read so many Kennedy assassination books that I don't believe any of them. If any author could make a compelling case, other people would get on board, because it would be huge. The only thing I believe is that Oswald was one of the (probably the only) shooters and that the powers that be staged the investigation to find exactly what they wanted, a lone nut. I've heard the tapes of Johnson recruiting a couple members of the Warren commission and telling them not only that they were doing it, but also that they were going to find Oswald acted alone.Here's where we can have a productive dialog even if it results in nothing conclusive either way.
My sources are L. Fletcher Prouty, "JFK: and the war in Vietnam" (published around '93 or '94 initially as a result of the Records Act), and Victor Marchetti, "CIA and the Cult of Intelligence" -- late '70s.
Prouty was the consultant portrayed as "Mr. X" in the Stone film, but he couldn't be assailed as "nutty" as his fellow consultant, Jim Garrison. He "rescued" various parties from eastern Europe when Berlin fell -- a long history. He answered to Lansdale in his CIA liaison post, retiring around '64 after his suspicions grew -- overhearing "stuff" in Lansdale's office. He then became a private-sector banker, died around 2001.
According to PRouty, around '54, there was CIA concern about the outcome of a Filipino presidential election. They wanted "their guy" -- congressman and military man named Magsaysay -- to win the election. And at that time, there was a "Hukbalahap" communist insurgency in the Philippines.
So Lansdale got together a contingent of Filipino army troops, flying them to Fort Huachuca. They were trained specifically for the subsequent operation in two groups. Lansdale had his operatives go around to primitive villages in the country side with a film projector and propaganda reels about "communists attacking." These people had never been exposed to any kind of cinema or TV.
Then, they'd schedule the contingent dressed as Hukbalahap, dressed with squibs in their clothing (they had to show blood later). They'd set fire to some dwellings, shoot off some blank rounds. Immediately, the second group in their regular Filipino uniforms would arrive, drive away the "Huks," and save the villagers -- picking up the "dead and bloodstained" bodies of the supposed Huks before driving away. Magsaysay won the election hands down. There was much mess hall levity among the two groups of troops the following day at breakfast.
So one has to ask -- given the Northwoods document that was declassified -- is such a thing a hole in the sieve of possibilities? As to whether it really occurred that way, I hadn't discovered anything more about it -- it wasn't essential to my main interest. Do you have any additional sources, if only for the details you've presented?
Prouty had identified Lansdale in the "Tramps photos" of Dealey Plaza after the shooting. Independent sources, like constable Seymour Weitzman, had identified "Bay of Pigs" CIA operative Bernard Barker (later, Watergate) as the "man with dirty fingernails" on the knoll. But the Tramps photo would leave much to be desired by those searching for conclusive identification.
It wouldn't otherwise matter, though. Lansdale had later deposited his papers and files at the Stanford U (his alma mater) library, just as Phillips' wife had left his papers with Library of Congress. In the boxes, Prouty found a hotel claim check of Lansdale's at the Fort Worth hotel where the President had slept before the fateful day. Lansdale's planner had him scheduled to be somewhere else that day -- hundreds of miles from Dallas.
I have a bizarre theory about this, not essential to my main explanation. Phillips had staged the assassination for an "audience" of former Operation Zapata or affiliated individuals, directed to be there but not knowing what was to happen.
He always wanted to be an actor and a playwright. A frustrated narcissist, mustered into CIA during 1950, when -- according to Helms -- there was an insufficient staff of shrinks to screen people during the great Stalinist scare.
But the question remains. Would a faked Gulf of Tonkin be possible? Keep in mind that Lansdale had banked his entire career on Vietnam. He was the prototype for Graham Greene's Pyle character in "the Quiet American," and Greene was a journalist in Saigon at the time they were building up the military mission during the '50s. So even "fiction" offers something about the perception of an author who knew the "real people."
PS The Marchetti book has a bizarre and unique history. He wasn't going to let CIA vet his publication (as a former careerist). The printer was compelled to redact many, many pages and passages. I think the legal case went all the way to the Supreme Court.
Agreed - that was my point. The aviators saw nothing; the eggheads analyzed the tapes and decided there was nothing, that the returns were merely echos of waves which looked like real returns. (Not at all uncommon for boats whose height is around the same as the waves'.) All this was known before the resolution was announced, but the second incident was still cast as an attack not only because two attacks are better than one, but also because if they admitted they were shooting at nothing the second night, opponents would leap on that and accuse them of also shooting at echos the first night, even though there were casualties on both sides. Same thing as Bush using the British report of Saddam trying to buy yellowcake uranium from Niger, even though we knew that story was a fake created by a French agent (to discredit the looming war which was going to play hell with France's booming business with Saddam) even before the Brits told us about it AND everyone knew Saddam already had over five hundred tons of yellowcake. More yellowcake would do him absolutely no good; he needed processing and delivery, not more raw materials he couldn't process. Bush neglected the other half of the equation though: using cleverly worded accusations you know are baseless may bolster your evidence in your initial presentation, but they also cast doubt on all your evidence once the truth comes out. Johnson was able to keep the lid on for his lifetime; Bush was not.Newly Declassified National Security Agency Documents Show Analysts Made SIGINT fit the claim" of North Vietnamese Attack National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 132 -
NSA knew all along that the 4 Aug Gulf of Tonkin incident never happened. James Stockdale knew all along that there was nothing in the water there other than the American ships.
If you want, download the NSA's declassified history yourself directly from the National Security Archive. (PDF Format)
Johnson administration cherry picked the less than 10% of the intelligence that supported their desire to go to war and classified the rest.
What is it they say again?
Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it...
Uno
I had a friend, whose memory I still hold in the highest regard, who once had a "bad night" during the '70s when I was coming to visit for Sunday brunch. His wife warned me at the door, but I didn't pay heed. Soon, I was up against a wall with a buck-knife at my throat, until he settled down a bit. Later, we would laugh about it, but I never fully understood what was going on until I visited the U of Virginia website below.
Here.
Read the whole story -- parts I and II. Do it before dinner, though.
http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Texts/Narrative/Adin_Down_Hill_01.html
http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Texts/Narrative/Adin_Down_Hill_02.html
As for McNamara, no . . . you should at least check the Wiki. After '68, he was President of the World Bank until the early '80s.
I've known several people in my past.
I actually had my Dad, a friend of his who was a LURP and rarely drank, and myself get pretty smashed one night shortly before I went to Marine boot camp long ago.
Was a pretty interesting evening, to say the least.
Did you return home to many years of waking up at 3AM in puddles of sweat, screaming at the top of your lungs and scaring your wife and kids?
LRRP . . .got that one . . .
So they told war stories, I think you're saying . . .
Did you get any sleep that night?
Actually, there was one.
Looks like someone slammed into a SUV and left the scene.
I went out and explained to the LEO's that showed up why I drug a bumper and some of the stuff to the side, a few people had run over it at 50 MPH in the road.
It had a license plate still attached, but might have been the SUV's.
Two firetrucks, an ambulance and about 7 marked cars out there atm.