USS Liberty

I found out about the USS Liberty in college. I think there was some low-budget paperback lying on top of what we'd euphemistically call "Right wing antiwar" literature. This is after Buchanan's 1992 run; that movement was mostly adhering to Ron Paul in those later years. Gottfried was another name on that list. You know the end of this rainbow.

Being a Zionist myself I am attuned to such dogwhistles. This story just won't go away so, here is Sacrificing Liberty, courtesy Brian Wright (and Unz). We'll keep in mind that Wright is one of those antivaxxers and, therefore, not a reliable source himself; but I do trust him just far enough to transcribe a movie.

What we're dealing with here is the afterclap of the 1955-65 decolonisation. It is hard to understand this decade, since it's a different country, but the way they did things was that the US was trying to take over Britannia's rule over the seas, which rule Britannia could no longer afford (for whatever reason), and that meant the US needed to present itself as the Torch Of Liberty. This started with the Suez Crisis in which the US supported Nasser's Egypt, against Israel. Twelve years on, Nasser was still an antisemitic bellicose idiot and, further, drifting to the commies. I assume US-Israel relations, in reaction, were getting a little better over this time.

In 1967, over what we've learnt to name the Six Day War, Israel overran the Sinai in the course of which, Nasser "lost" an army. Meanwhile President Johnson had ordered the USS Liberty, which had just about as much firepower as it needed to scare off a fleet of Somali fishermen, to... we are unsure what, exactly. To "monitor the situation" or something.

Israel's airforce and navy by this point had little more to fear from Nasser and, further, wasn't over-worried about Syria or Lebanon or Turkey or Libya or whatever else. They found the Liberty just floating out there. They strafed it. Almost sank it.

The reason this "accident" won't go away is because of those lousy inconvenient... survivors. They kept popping up over the decades to tell everyone who'd listen that the Israelis sure didn't act like they'd done an oopsie. The Israelis acted like they were there to sink the ship and to kill the lifeboats. Given all that: the question is, why. And why did Johnson and the elder admiral McCain cover it all up?

Pause for a moment and remember that this isn't just a problem for modern American / Israel relations aka "Zionism". It is also a problem for the antiZionists who are wanting the Israelis' motive. "Drrr them jooos are evil" might cut it in Stormfrontland but it won't cut it for the rest of us. The Israelis make an oopsie and tried to kill the witnesses...? The Israelis couldn't quite manage this, if true; the Coffee Coaster gives due respect to Terry Halbardier who ensured that the rest of the American navy knew that the attack was happening. And anyway a friendly-fire incident, more exactly a blue-on-green incident, wouldn't merit the waste of firepower for the coverup. How about "FAAALSE FLAAAG" - oh, just go away now.

Wright and, I think, the documentary propose that the Liberty had done its job too well - it monitored the fate of Nasser's lost army. There was some Africa Addio sh!t goin' down. The Israeli army didn't have the means to hold the sheer number of prisoners, and didn't trust that those prisoners weren't playing-possum to stage their real attack behind Israel's line. So the Israelis... didn't take prisoners. And the Liberty caught it on tape.

After the war, Nasser needed Egypt to stop fighting it, because he seemed to be short on troops all of a sudden. He settled on a narrative of a valiant Egyptian army fighting bravely to the last man. (Rameses II Usermaatre would be proud.) It got him through his last couple years of rule. Israel got away with murder. Johnson got away with his dumb decision to send a ship to the edge of a war zone without adequate support. Everyone was happy...

... except for those annoying survivors bleeding all over the place.