Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) did something on the floor of the House of Representatives yesterday that he said should have been done 59 years ago: honor the crew of the USS Liberty, the U.S. Navy signals intelligence ship that was attacked and nearly sunk by Israel on June 8, 1967. He did this after meeting with about a dozen of the surviving members of the crew. In his 5-minute speech, he described just a little bit of the story of what happened to them that day, how Israeli forces surveilled the ship prior to the attack, and then began the attack with French-made Mirage jets, followed by torpedo boats and then attack helicopters. The intent was to sink the ship and kill the entire crew.
The crew managed to get a signal out, and two U.S. aircraft carriers, the USS Saratoga and the USS America, launched planes in response, but the planes were recalled.
“And they sat there for 17 hours. 34 dead, 174 wounded out of 294 crew members. That’s over 70% casualty rate, unheard of,” Massie said. “The Israelis were intent on leaving no survivor. And what about our own military? Why did they not send anybody for 17 hours to help these men?”
“So what really happened? You know, the official reports say that it was a case of mistaken identity. But if you listen to Dean Rusk, former Secretary of State; Richard Helm, CIA director; Bobby Ray Inman, head of the NSA; Captain Ward Boston, who was the chief counsel of the Court of Inquiry.
