| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"JS" |
| Date: |
14 Nov 2007 12:29:01 PM |
| Object: |
Remembering the USS Liberty |
Remembering the USS Liberty
"It was God that kept us afloat."
by Eileen Fleming / November 7th, 2007
In 1967, Lt. Commander David Ed Lewis was the officer in charge of 195 men
out of the total crew of 294 on the USS Liberty. After we spoke for over an
hour on the phone on November 3, 2007, 76 year old spry Dave was off to pull
out his frozen garden harvested berries and begin making elderberry jelly.
Dave is the fifth USS Liberty Veteran thus far to speak to me about that day
in infamy on June 8, forty years ago when Israel tried and failed to take an
American spy ship down as she sailed in international waters flying the
American flag.
Although I couldn't see Dave, I heard his grief and heartbreak as he said,
"Twenty-eight of the thirty-four that were murdered that day worked for me.
I also still feel personally responsible for the loss of my Communication
Officer and Communication Chief. Just before the Liberty sailed they both
brought me their retirement papers. They both had all their time in and I
asked if one of them would do me a favor in the interest of continuity and
go on one last assignment. They both replied, 'For you Commander, we'll both
go!'"
"Not only did they die, their families also paid a price. One widow went
over the edge and the state took her kids away."
I responded, "This is an area I have been wondering about. The trauma all of
you veterans experienced and how it has played out. I am aware of broken
marriages, bad backs, addictions and I have barely scratched the surface
here. I wonder about the lives of all you guys and your families who have
all been traumatized and irrevocably altered, not just because of the
unmerited violence done to you, but mostly because of our government's
cover-up."
Dave replied, "Some of my men were threatened with being put in a mental
institution if they spoke out. None of us had any contact with the other
until the first reunion of the LIBERTY twenty years after the attack.
Everybody was assigned to different duty stations to keep us apart."
I joked, "Sounds like apartheid!" But upon reflection I understand, more
precisely, that what was implemented was the standard operating procedure of
all empires to divide and conquer.
Dave recalled, "That morning I saw a couple of the Israeli overflights, we
waved at each other. We all felt safe as they were friends. I was back in my
general quarter's station two levels down when I heard the thud-thud-thud of
the rockets overhead, but they never penetrated the bowels of the ship.
"It was such a well planned accident. They took out just about every antenna
we had. All of them were knocked out except for one that never worked right.
It was also the first satellite communications in the U.S.A. It leaked
hydrochloric fluid but when it worked right, it bounced off the moon."
According to Peter Hounam's research in Operation Cyanide, "All the aerials
were destroyed save one that had been malfunctioning, and was thus turned
off and 'cold'. This turned out to be a godsend. A signalman thought he
could get it going, and wired up the only transmitter still working.
Miraculously, it began to load up with current and a sense of relief spread
through the radio room."1
The Liberty's transmissions were jammed by the attacking planes "with the
specific intention of preventing the ship communicating with the outside
world. [and the] international distress frequency, used for Mayday messages,
was also jammed."2
Ten minutes after the attack began the Liberty was miraculously able to
communicate their distress and received a reply from the USS Saratoga. The
shipmates breathed a sigh of relief thinking that the Sixth Fleet was on the
way to their rescue and that the Pentagon also now knew of their dire need
for immediate assistance.
No help arrived from their brothers in arms until the next day, but about
fifteen minutes after the jets attacked Israeli torpedo boats came bearing
down on the American spy ship.
Dave informed me," The torpedo explosion happened less than ten feet from
where I stood and blew out the bulkhead and covered me with twenty years of
navy paint. All the troops within twenty feet of me were killed instantly.
The bulkhead [wall] protected me as a shield from the blast. I shouldn't
have even survived. I was on the second level down and the compartment was
sealed. Seamen Shnell broke regulations and saved my life. It's against
regulations to break water tight integrity, but he took the risk of sinking
the ship to check for survivors.
"I would have loved to have seen the carnage as devastating as it was, but
the last thing I heard was the call to stand by for torpedo attacks on the
starboard side. The next thing I knew I was sitting on the deck up against a
bulkhead. My eyes were seared shut with burnt paint and not until the next
morning when I was helicopter lifted out, all wrapped up from head to toe so
tightly that a coreman couldn't tell my head from my feet and he sat on my
head the entire ten minute flight. I was cyanotic when they unwrapped me, I
nearly suffocated.
"The Dr. stood me up against a wall to lance my eyes open and told me don't
move, just keep your eyes on the scalpel so he didn't blind me. Then they
took me straight away to Rear Admiral General Geiss who had been waiting
just for me.
"Rear Admiral Lawrence Geiss was in charge of the USS Saratoga and USS
America. He swore me to secrecy until his death, which happened about
nineteen years later.
"What he told me I kept secret until I learned of his death at the first
reunion and twenty year anniversary of the veterans of the USS Liberty.
"He told me that as soon as he got the word of our distress he launched
aircraft and notified D.C. Immediately he heard from McNamara to recall the
aircraft.
"He said he assumed it was because some idiots in Washington thought that he
was launching nuclear weaponry. He reconfigured and then re-launched
aircraft without nuclear capabilities.
"Admiral Geiss notified Washington of this and once again the immediate
response that came from McNamara was the order to recall the aircraft.
"Admiral Geiss challenged the order and pleaded that people are dieing!
"LBJ was heard to say, 'I don't give a damn! I won't embarrass an ally."
"McNamara had been talking to Geiss on an unsecured but plain language
telephone, the Automatic Digital Network; Autodin.
"President Eisenhower had once gotten so upset when it took three days once
to receive critical information and he established the CRITTICOM system.
This enabled all critical intelligence to be delivered to the White House
within two minutes and CRITTICOM is how Geiss and McNamara exchanged
information."
According to an October 4, 2007 article by Israeli journalist, Yossi Melman,
a Haaretz Correspondent Oliver Kirby, the NSA's deputy director for
operations at the time of the attack on the Liberty, was quoted by the
Chicago Tribune confirming that the Israeli Air Force was well aware the
ship was the USS Liberty, and that the
U.S. National Security Agency was able to intercept Israeli Air Force
communications according to which, at some stage, the pilots identified the
ship as American but were nonetheless instructed to push ahead with the
attack. According to the report, some of the transcripts and intelligence
information have disappeared, while the rest can be found in U.S. government
archives.
Oliver Kirby, the NSA's deputy director for operations at the time of the
Liberty attack, is quoted by the Tribune as confirming the existence of the
transcripts, saying he personally read them.
They said, "We've got him in the zero," Kirby was quoted as saying,
"whatever that meant - I guess the sights or something. And then one of them
said, 'Can you see the flag?' They said 'Yes, it's U.S, it's U.S.' They said
it several times, so there wasn't any doubt in anybody's mind that they knew
it."
Kirby told the newspaper that the transcripts were "something that's
bothered me all my life. I'm willing to swear on a stack of Bibles that we
knew they knew."
The report also states that then U.S. defense secretary Robert McNamara
ordered jets that had been dispatched to assist the Liberty turned around.
On June 8, 2007, this reporter attended the 27th annual American-Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee's Washington , D.C. Conference.
It was 86 year old, walker-bound Congressman Paul Findley, a moderate
Republican who blew my mind that day, when he addressed the luncheon crowd:
"I was here for the first convention 27 years ago and I still have a fire in
my belly for the civil and human rights of Arabs. It is time to speak openly
and honestly about Israel. But, in American politics, that is still
forbidden.
".Pity that we cannot seem to shed our fear of Israel. We are afraid to
speak out on Capitol Hill, for fear of losing the next election. They are
more like trained poodles jumping through hoops than leaders!
"Why this fear? How did we get here?
"Forty years ago to this day, June 8, 1967 the change occurred, the
floodgates opened and money poured into Israel as never before. When
President Johnson heard about the USS Liberty being attacked by Israel he
ordered the rescue fighter planes to return to the deck. The rescue mission
was aborted and the survivors have said they heard LBJ's voice tell Admiral
Giess, 'Get those planes back on deck. I don't care if the ship sinks, I
will not embarrass Israel .'
"LBJ also threatened to court martial anyone who reported what had happened.
Johnson accepted Israel's false claim of "mistaken identity" and he knew it
was a lie. That is when the change began and Israel learned they could get
away with murdering U.S.A. soldiers."
Warning from Past
President George Washington, in his Sept. 17, 1796 Farewell Address warned:
"The nation which indulges toward another. is in some degree a slave. a
passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of
evils."
1.. Operation Cyanide, by Peter Hounam, p. 28. #
2.. Operation Cyanide, by Peter Hounam, p. 29. #
Eileen Fleming is the author of Keep Hope Alive and Memoirs of a Nice Irish
American Girl's' Life in Occupied Territory and the producer of 30 Minutes
With Vanunu. Email her at ecumei@gmail.com. Read other articles by Eileen,
or visit Eileen's website.
http://eileen-fleming.dailykos.com/
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| User: "Einstein" |
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| Title: Re: Remembering the USS Liberty |
14 Nov 2007 12:36:12 PM |
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Ye have never heard of "Fog of War" have ye? While reductions have
occured in the fog of War, in all nations except 4... it occurs way to
commonly when they take to the field. Even those 4 still have it on
occassion, though instances are so down as to nearly not exist.
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| User: "Defendario" |
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| Title: Re: Remembering the USS Liberty |
14 Nov 2007 06:27:24 PM |
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Einstein wrote:
Ye have never heard of "Fog of War"
I've heard of deliberate murder under a false flag.
The jooz are past masters of that game.
Apologizing for killers makes you a stooge, an accessory after the fact.
How're things in Portland, *****?
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| User: "Don Ocean" |
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| Title: Re: Remembering the USS Liberty |
14 Nov 2007 11:31:59 PM |
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Defendario wrote:
Einstein wrote:
Ye have never heard of "Fog of War"
I've heard of deliberate murder under a false flag.
The jooz are past masters of that game.
Apologizing for killers makes you a stooge, an accessory after the fact.
How're things in Portland, *****?
4 of the USS Liberty Survivors live in Portland.. Give me that coksukers
address. I will pass it on to the lads. ;-p Of course it it be in the
Fog of whatever.
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| User: "Defendario" |
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| Title: Re: Remembering the USS Liberty |
15 Nov 2007 04:01:59 PM |
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Don Ocean wrote:
Defendario wrote:
Einstein wrote:
Ye have never heard of "Fog of War"
I've heard of deliberate murder under a false flag.
The jooz are past masters of that game.
Apologizing for killers makes you a stooge, an accessory after the fact.
How're things in Portland, *****?
4 of the USS Liberty Survivors live in Portland.. Give me that coksukers
address. I will pass it on to the lads. ;-p Of course it it be in the
Fog of whatever.
I was only using the NNTP posting host (from headers) and GeoBytes
locator service.
Good luck with finding this traitor.
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| User: "Don Ocean" |
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| Title: Re: Remembering the USS Liberty |
14 Nov 2007 11:29:41 PM |
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Einstein wrote:
Ye have never heard of "Fog of War" have ye? While reductions have
occured in the fog of War, in all nations except 4... it occurs way to
commonly when they take to the field. Even those 4 still have it on
occassion, though instances are so down as to nearly not exist.
Your obviously a fucking Idiot! You can kiss this old Sailors *****,
you scumbag punk!!
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