White was featured in the August 2014 issue of Connecticut Magazine. Freak weather effects on radar and overeager sonarmen may have accounted for many reports. The first missions in the Tonkin Gulf began in February 1964. On August 1 and 2, flights of CIA-sponsored Laotian fighter-bombers (piloted by Thai mercenaries) attacked border outposts well within southwestern North Vietnam. On the morning of 4 August, U.S. intelligence intercepted a report indicating that the communists intended to conduct offensive maritime operations in the Gulf of Tonkin. The Gulf of Tonkin incident was a complex naval event in the Gulf of Tonkin, off the coast of Vietnam, that was presented to the U.S. Congress on August 5, 1964, as two unprovoked attacks by. 27. On the night of 30-31 July, the destroyer was on station in the Gulf of Tonkin when a 34A raid was launched against Hon Me Island. Gelb, Les and Gladstone, Brooke (January 12, 2018). Suggest complete evaluation before any further action taken.. actions. Instead, "only information that supported the claim that the communists had attacked the two destroyers was given to Johnson administration officials."[68]. On board the ship, Commander, Destroyer Division 192, Captain John J. Herrick ordered the vessel out to sea, hoping to avoid a confrontation. 19 Million Viewers Watched His Story Start To Finish 4 years ago Battlefield Heroes S1 E1 The First Battle of Vietnam | The Battle of la. [47] Time reported: "Through the darkness, from the West and south intruders boldly sped at least six of them they opened fire on the destroyers with automatic weapons, this time from as close as 2,000 yards. The Tonkin Gulf Resolution, essentially unchallenged by a Congress that believed it was an appropriate response to unprovoked, aggressive, and deliberate attacks on U.S. vessels on the high seas, would open the floodgates for direct American military involvement in Vietnam. [25], Daniel Ellsberg, who was on duty in the Pentagon the night of August 4, receiving messages from USSMaddox, reported that she was on a DESOTO mission near Northern Vietnamese territorial waters. Nearly 200 documents the National Security Agency (NSA) declassified and released in 2005 and 2006, however, have helped shed light on what transpired in the Gulf of Tonkin on 4 August. On the evening of August 4, the ships opened fire on radar returns that had been preceded by communications intercepts which US forces claimed meant an attack was imminent. In the early hours of the next day, Maddox communication technicians intercepted SIGINT reports of North Vietnamese vessels getting under way, possibly intent on attacking the destroyer. What should have stood out to the U.S. leadership collecting all the data of these attacks was that, with the exception of the battle report, no other SIGINT "chatter" was detected during the attacks on 4 August. Hanyok, "Skunks, Bogies, Silent Hounds," p. 24. The North Vietnamese Communist Party approved a "people's war" on the South at a session in January 1959,[17]:119120 and on July 28, North Vietnamese forces invaded Laos to maintain and upgrade the Ho Chi Minh trail, in support of insurgents in the south. Two of the torpedo boats had come as close as 5 nautical miles (9.3km; 5.8mi) and released one torpedo each, but neither one was effective, coming no closer than about 100 yards (91m) after Maddox evaded them. Schaperjahn confirmed White's assertions that Maddox's sonar reports were faulty and the Johnson administration knew it prior to going to Congress to request support for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. "21, Navy Captain John J. Herrick (left), pictured with Maddox skipper Commander Herbert L. Ogier on board the destroyer, kept his superiors informed during the alleged battle with North Vietnamese PT boats on 4 August. [28] Four USN F-8 Crusader jets launched from Ticonderoga and 15 minutes after Maddox had fired her initial warning shots, attacked the retiring P-4s,[5] claiming one was sunk and one heavily damaged. [citation needed], In 1962, the U.S. Navy began an electronic warfare support measures (intelligence gathering) program, conducted by destroyer patrols in the western Pacific, with the cover name DESOTO. What happens while the U.S.S Maddox is in the Tonkin Gulf? Today, there is considerable debate about the . The truth was very different. The third was left dead in the water and burning.7. In contrast to the clear conditions two days earlier, thunderstorms and rain squalls reduced visibility and increased wave heights to six feet. See LTCOL Delmar C. Lang's chronology of the SIGINT reports (14 Oct 1964) on National Security Agency homepage, http://www.nsa.gov/vietnam/. Lawrence, A. T. (2009). He reported later, "I had the best seat in the house to watch that event and our destroyers were just shooting at phantom targetsthere were no PT boats there . More than 40 years after the events, that all changed with the release of the nearly 200 documents related to the Gulf of Tonkin incident and transcripts from the Johnson Library. Corrections? "[50], According to Ray McGovern, CIA analyst from 1963 to 1990, the CIA, "not to mention President Lyndon Johnson, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara and National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy all knew full well that the evidence of any armed attack on the evening of Aug. 4, 1964, the so-called 'second' Tonkin Gulf incident, was highly dubious. The CO of the US force was George Morrison, father to Jim the Doors frontman. www.WhiteHouseTapes.org. . In 1963, three young Norwegian skippers traveled on a mission in South Vietnam. The papers, more than 140 of them classified top secret, include phone transcripts, oral-history interviews, signals intelligence (SIGINT) messages, and chronologies of the Tonkin events developed by Department of Defense and NSA officials. [49] On May 4, 1964, William Bundy had called for the U.S. to "drive the communists out of South Vietnam", even if that meant attacking both North Vietnam and communist China. Shortly before Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963, he had begun a limited withdrawal of 1,000 U.S. forces before the end of 1963. "[45] Morse's efforts were not immediately met with support, largely because he revealed no sources and was working with very limited information. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident - SlideServe Suggest complete evaluation before any further action taken. It consisted of a confrontation on August 2, 1964, when United States forces were carrying out covert operations close to North Vietnamese territorial waters and North Vietnamese forces responded. "Old men lie and young men die.". Gulf of Tonkin Incident The Gulf of Tonkin Incident , also known as the U.S.S. "[36] In response to requests for confirmation, at around 16:00 Washington time, Herrick cabled, "Details of action present a confusing picture although certain that the original ambush was bona fide. North Vietnamese general Phng Th Ti later claimed that Maddox had been tracked since July 31 and that she had attacked fishing boats on August 2 forcing the North Vietnamese Navy to "fight back". And what about the North Vietnamese battle report that seemed to provide irrefutable confirmation of the attack? [67], Reviewing the NSA's archives, Hanyok concluded that the August 4 incident began at Phu Bai Combat Base, where intelligence analysts mistakenly believed the destroyers would soon be attacked. The information was given the committee by McNamara. He thus characterized the attack as "unprovoked" since the ship had been in international waters. Aware of North Vietnamese intent from the earlier SIGINT message, Captain Herrick ordered gun crews to open fire if the fast-approaching trio closed to within 10,000 yards of the destroyer, and at about 1505 three 5-inch shots were fired across the bow of the closest boat. [5], Shortly before midnight, on August 4, Johnson interrupted national television to make an announcement in which he described an attack by North Vietnamese vessels on two U.S. Navy warships, Maddox and Turner Joy, and requested authority to undertake a military response. [56]:7 This triggered greater support among leadership for Mao Zedong's Third Front construction campaign to develop heavy industry and defense industry in China's interior where it would be more protected in the event of foreign invasion. 384", "John White's Letter to the New Haven Register, 1967", "New Tapes Indicate Johnson Doubted Attack in Tonkin Gulf", "Engineering in the CIA: ELINT, Stealth and the Beginnings of Information Warfare", The Gulf of Tonkin EventsFifty Years Later: A Footnote to the History of the Vietnam War [49], Robert J. Hanyok: His United States National Security Council study on Tonkin Gulf Deception, "Spartans in Darkness: American SIGINT and the Indochina War, 1945-1975", "Report reveals Vietnam War hoaxes, faked attacks", "August 4, 1964: Report on the Gulf of Tonkin Incident", The Gulf of Tonkin Incident, 40 Years Later; Flawed Intelligence and the Decision for War in Vietnam, National Security Archive at George Washington University, The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and the Escalation of the Vietnam War, US Navy Historical Site showing charts and photos of the incident (archived), Tonkin Gulf Intelligence "Skewed" According to Official History and Intercepts, Ronnie E. Ford "New Light on Gulf of Tonkin", Original Document: Tonkin Gulf Resolution, "Aboard the Maddox" LIFE Magazine Aug. 14, 1964, Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) Reports (R) and Translations (T) MarOct 1964, Related Command and Technical Messages, 226 Aug 1964, Transcript of Telephone Conversations, Gulf of Tonkin Transcripts, Formerly Classified Documents from 2 August 1964, Formerly Classified Documents Subsequent to 4 August 1964, U.S. Weather conditions were clear, and seas were calm. Reaction To Events in the Gulf of Tonkin, August 110, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident&oldid=1161879603, This page was last edited on 25 June 2023, at 15:51. McNamara asks Giap: What happened in Tonkin Gulf? She spent most of the next 42 years working as a copy editor and editor at Encyclopaedia Britannica. The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club Q&A - Osprey Publishing This would have been communicated back to the NSA along with evidence supporting such a conclusion, but in fact the evidence did not do that. There were a number of long-term and short-term reasons to explain why the. The Maddox, on patrol in the area but probably unaware of the raids that had taken place, observed torpedo boats sent out in pursuit of the South Vietnamese vessels and thus withdrew, but it returned on August 1. [28] Another P-4 received a direct hit from a five-inch shell from Maddox; its torpedo malfunctioned at launch. Lieutenant Commander Paterson is a foreign area officer and former history instructor at the U.S. TURNER JOY reports two torpedoes passed near her.14, McNamara phoned Sharp at 1608 Washington time to talk it over and asked, "Was there a possibility that there had been no attack?" Analyze the effects of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution passed under the Lyndon Johnson administration during the Vietnam War, Learn about some key points on the Gulf of Tonkin incident leading to the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, 1964, Pop Quiz: 19 Things to Know About the Vietnam War, https://www.britannica.com/event/Gulf-of-Tonkin-incident, U.S. Department of State - Office of the Historian - U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: The Gulf of Tonkin and Escalation, 1964, Alpha History - The Gulf of Tonkin incident, HistoryNet - Gulf of Tonkin Incident: Reappraisal 40 Years Later.