In fact, the North Vietnamese were trying to avoid contact with U.S. forces on August 4, and they saw the departure of the Desoto patrol ships as a sign that they could proceed to recover their torpedo boats and tow them back to base. How the Gulf of Tonkin Incident Embroiled the US in the Vietnam Today, it is believed that this second attack did not occur and was merely reports from jittery radar and sonar operators, but at the time it was taken as evidence that Hanoi was raising the stakes against the United States. Maddox detected the torpedo boats on radar at a range of almost 20,000 yards and turned away at its top speed of 32 knots. The North also protested the South Vietnamese commando raid on Hon Me Island and claimed that the Desoto Mission ships had been involved in that raid. They are part and parcel of a continuing Communist drive to conquer South Vietnam. At the White House, administration officials panicked as the public spotlight illuminated their policy in Vietnam and threatened to reveal its covert roots. CIA Bulletin, 3 August 1964 (see Edward J. Marolda and Oscar P. Fitzgerald, 5. Seventh Fleet reduced it to 12 nautical miles. During May, Admiral U. S. G. Sharp, the Pacific Fleet Commander-in-Chief, had suggested that 34A raids could be coordinated "with the operation of a shipboard radar to reduce the possibility of North Vietnamese radar detection of the delivery vehicle." (Hanoi remains muzzy on the second incident, Aug. 4, presumably since clearly it took place in international waters, the Vietnamese claim of "defensive reaction" is a bit wobbly.). "11 The SIGINT intercepts also detected that the North Vietnamese coastal radar stations were tracking Maddox and reporting its movements to the outbound torpedo boats. After the incident, Herrick was unsure that his ships had been attacked, reporting at 1:27 a.m. Washington time that "Freak weather effects on radar and overeager sonarmen may have accounted for many reports. In 1964 an Ohio woman took up the challenge that had led to Amelia Earharts disappearance. But, to me, the more pernicious deception was this idea that American ships were sailing innocently in the Gulf of Tonkin and were attacked without provocation, he continues. The North Vietnamese believed that, although they had lost one boat, they had deterred an attack on their coast. There was no way to get a commando team ashore to plant demolition charges; they would have do what damage they could with the boats guns.3 The Johnson Administration initially limited its response to a terse diplomatic note to Hanoi, the first-ever U.S. diplomatic note to that government. Within days, Hanoi lodged a complaint with the International Control Commission (ICC), which had been established in 1954 to oversee the provisions of the Geneva Accords. Office of the Historian Media reporting on the NSA reports assessments sparked a brief rehash of the old arguments about the Gulf of Tonkin. Gulf of Tonkin - National Security Agency The captain of Maddox, Commander Herbert L. Ogier Jr., ordered his ship to battle stations shortly after 1500 hours. Despite Morses doubts, Senate reaction fell in behind the Johnson team, and the question of secret operations was overtaken by the issue of punishing Hanoi for its blatant attack on a U.S. warship in international waters. 2, pp. On the night of 4 August, both ships reported renewed attacks by North Vietnamese patrol boats. It also outlined the Maddoxs path along the coast on 2 August and the 34A attacks on Vinh Son the following day. Heavy machine-gun bullets riddled PTF-6, tearing away part of the port bow and wounding four South Vietnamese crewmen, including Lieutenant Son. Although the total intelligence picture of North Vietnams actions and communications indicates that the North Vietnamese did in fact order the first attack, it remains unclear whether Maddox was the originally intended target. . Approved on Aug. 10, 1964, the Southeast Asia (Gulf of Tonkin) Resolution, gave Johnson the power to use military force in the region without requiring a declaration of war. For the maritime war specialist, it is of course invaluable. JCS, "34A Chronology of Events," (see Marolda and Fitzgerald, p. 424); Porter, Vietnam: The Definitive Documentation (Stanfordville, NY: 1979), vol. With that report, after nearly four decades, the NSA officially reversed its verdict on the events of August 4, 1964, that had led that night to President Lyndon Johnsons televised message to the nation: The initial attack on the destroyer Maddox, on August 2, was repeated today by a number of hostile vessels attacking two U.S. destroyers with torpedoes. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident famously gave the Johnson Administration the justification they needed to escalate the Vietnam War. It set a very terrible precedent, which is that he would go on to escalate further, not with any striking confidence that his objectives will be achieved, but only with the assurance that, unless he embarked on these massive military escalations, America would fail in Vietnam and he might well be labeled the only president in American history to lose a war.. In an effort to increase pressure on North Vietnam, several Norwegian-built fast patrol boats (PTFs) were covertly purchased and transferred to South Vietnam. The Geneva Conference in 1954 was intended to settle outstanding issues following the end of hostilities between France and the Viet Minh at the end of the First Indochina War. By late July 1964, SOG had four Nasty-class patrol boats, designated PTF-3, PTF-4, PTF-5, PTF-6 (PTFfast patrol boat). Gulf of Tonkin & the Vietnam War. The series of mistakes that led to the August 4 misreporting began on August 3 when the Phu Bai station interpreted Haiphongs efforts to determine the status of its forces as an order to assemble for further offensive operations. Vietnam is a very watery country. . After suggesting a "complete evaluation" of the affair before taking further action, he radioed requesting a "thorough reconnaissance in daylight by aircraft." After the Tonkin Gulf incident, the State Department cabled Seaborn, instructing him to tell the North Vietnamese that "neither the Maddox or any other destroyer was in any way associated with any attack on the DRV [Democratic Republic of Vietnam, or North Vietnam] islands." The World is a public radio program that crosses borders and time zones to bring home the stories that matter. Unable to catch the fast South Vietnamese PTFs, the government in Hanoi elected to strike instead at USS Maddox. These warning shots were fired and the P-4s launched a torpedo attack. In the meantime, aboard Turner Joy, Captain Herrick ordered an immediate review of the nights actions. That initial error shaped all the subsequent assessments about North Vietnamese intentions, as U.S. SIGINT monitored and reported the Norths tracking of the two American destroyers. ", "No," replied McCone. The North Vietnamese didnt buy the distinction; they attacked the USS Maddox. McNamara took advantage of Morses imprecision and concentrated on the senators connection between 34A and Desoto, squirming away from the issue of U.S. involvement in covert missions by claiming that the Maddox "was not informed of, was not aware [of], had no evidence of, and so far as I know today had no knowledge of any possible South Vietnamese actions in connection with the two islands Senator Morse referred to." The United States denied involvement. Operation Fast and Furious 10 And, of course, McNamara himself knew about the "South Vietnamese actions in connection with the two islands," but his cautiously worded answer got him out of admitting it. One 12.7mm machine bullet hit Maddox before the boats broke off and started to withdraw. Scattered small-arms sent tracers toward the commandos, but no one was hurt. The Gulf of Tonkin act became more controversial as opposition to the war mounted. The secondary mission of the Gulf of Tonkin patrols was to assert American freedom of navigation in international waters. Soon came a second more sinister interpretation -- that the incident was a conspiracy not only provoked by the Johnson administration but one in fact "scenarioed." 10. The U.S. ships were supposed to remain well outside North Vietnams claimed five nautical mile territorial limit. President Johnson ordered a halt to all 34A operations "to avoid sending confusing signals associated with recent events in the Gulf of Tonkin." Moving in closer, the crew could see their targeta communications towersilhouetted in the moonlight. Formerly an analyst with the Washington-based Asian Studies Center, Mr. Conboy is vice president of Lippo Group, a large financial services institution in Jakarta, Indonesia. Surprised by the North Vietnamese response, Johnson decided that the United States could not back away from the challenge and directed his commanders in the Pacific to continue with the Desoto missions. Aircraft from Ticonderoga arrived on-scene at 1528 hours and fired on the boats. The first critic report from Phu Bai reached Washington at about 0740 hours, Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). Here's why he couldn't walk away. Subscribe to LBJ's War onApple Podcasts. President Johnson himself apparently questioned the sailorsu0019 report of an attack. Air action is now in execution against gunboats and certain supporting facilities in North Vietnam which have been used in these hostile operations., The next day, the president addressed Congress, seeking the power to to take all necessary measures in support of freedom and in defense of peace in Southeast Asia.. Joseph C. Goulden, Truth Is the First Casualty: The Gulf of Tonkin AffairIllusion and Reality (Chicago: Rand McNally & Co., 1969), p. 80. Based on this, they launched the political process that led to the wars escalation. Few areas of the world have been as hotly contested as the India-Pakistan border. In this case, perception was much more important than reality.10. no isolated event. On 3 August, the CIA confirmed that "Hanois naval units have displayed increasing sensitivity to U.S. and South Vietnamese naval activity in the Gulf of Tonkin during the past several months. The "nada notion" -- that nothing happened and the Gulf of Tonkin Incident was the product of inexperienced sonarmen and the overworked imagination of young deck-watch officers -- can no longer be sustained. WebMany historians now agree that the Gulf of Tonkin incident, in which many believed North Vietnamese ships had attacked American naval forces, may not have occurred in the way it was described at the time. Both of these messages reached Washington shortly after 1400 hours EDT. During a meeting at the White House on the evening of 4 August, President Johnson asked McCone, "Do they want a war by attacking our ships in the middle of the Gulf of Tonkin? The stage was set. Cookies collect information about your preferences and your devices and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. Naval Institute. The commander also added the requirement of collecting photographic intelligence of ships and aircraft encountered, as well as weather and hydrographic information. American aircraft flying over the scene during the "attack" failed to spot any North Vietnamese boats. This is not the place to establish the final truth on the Gulf of Tonkin matter and certainly I am not the person to render the ultimate judgment. AIDS Brotherhood Symbology The Illuminati Flame . To have a Tonkin Gulf conspiracy means that the several hundred National Security Agency and naval communications cited have been doctored. Tonkin Gulf Unlike much else that followed, this incident is undisputed, although no one from the US government ever admitted publicly that the attack was likely provoked by its covert actions. Operations Security (OPSEC) concerns and related communications restrictions prevented Maddox and its operational commanders up to the Seventh Fleet from knowing of the commando raid. To subscribe to Vietnam Magazine, click here! Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in Vietnam, 3 August 1964. Neither ships crew knew about the North Vietnamese salvage operation. Forty-five minutes after beginning their attack, the commandos withdrew. Defense Secretary McNamara called the president about the second Phu Bai critic report at approximately 0940 that morning. A brief account of the raids is in MACVSOG 1964 Command History, Annex A, 14 January 1965, pp. Herrick requested aerial reconnaissance for the next morning to search for the wreckage of the torpedo boats he thought he had sunk. Efforts to communicate with the torpedo boats failed, probably because of language and communications equipment incompatibility. This volume deals only with the former. Taking evasive action, they fired on numerous radar targets. No actual visual sightings by Maddox.". At 1505, when the torpedo boats had closed within 10,000 yards, in accordance with Captain Herricks orders and as allowed under international law at that time, Maddox fired three warning shots. THIS SECOND volume of the U.S. Navy's multivolume history of the Vietnam War is bound in the same familiar rich blue buckram that has styled official Navy histories since the Civil War and hence resembles its predecessors. Conspiracy FACT #8: The Gulf of Tonkin Incident - YouTube For the Navys official account stating that both incidents occurred and that 34A and Desoto were "entirely distinct," see Marolda and Fitzgerald, pp. No one was hurt and little damage wasdone in the attack, but intercepted cables suggested a second attack might be imminent. Ogier then opened fire at 1508 hours, when the boats were only six minutes from torpedo range. Seeking to follow the established policy of containment, Johnson and his Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, began increasing military aid to South Vietnam. 4. Badly damaged, the boat limped home. Moments later, one of the crewmen spotted a North Vietnamese Swatow patrol boat bearing down on them. The Pyramid and All-Seeing Eye . For the maritime part of the covert operation, Nasty-class fast patrol boats were purchased quietly from Norway to lend the illusion that the United States was not involved in the operations. This time, however, President Johnson reacted much more skeptically and ultimately decided to take no retaliatory action. After the war, Hanoi officials not only acknowledged the event but deemed it important enough to designate its date, Aug. 2, as the Vietnamese Navy's Anniversary Day, "the day our heroic naval forces went out and chased away Maddox and Turner Joy." Gulf of Tonkin - Wikipedia CIA Director John McCone was convinced that Hanoi was reacting to the raids when it attacked the Maddox. The Gulf of Tonkin incident: the false flag operation that started the Vietnam war. Something Isnt Working Refresh the page to try again. Something Isnt Working When the enemy boats closed to less than 10,000 yards, the destroyer fired three shots across the bow of the lead vessel. Or purchase a subscription for unlimited access to real news you can count on. And it didnt take much detective work to figure out where the commandos were stationed. Both boats opened fire, scoring hits on the tower, then moved on to other buildings nearby. The Gulf of Tonkin incident led to the expansion of the Vietnam War that resulted in a lot of American The intelligence community, including its SIGINT component, responded with a regional buildup to support the increase in U.S. operational forces. Send the First Troops to Vietnam? The most comprehensive and authoritative history site on the Internet. $22. As Communist communications activity was rising rapidly, American senior leaders were increasing support to the South Vietnamese government. The three torpedo boats continued through the American barrage and launched their torpedoes at 1516. What will be of interest to the general reader is the treatment of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. The boats followed at their maximum speed of 44 knots, continuing the chase for more than 20 minutes. PTF-3 and PTF-6 broke off and streaked south for safety; they were back in port before 1200. These secret intelligence-gathering missions and sabotage operations had begun under the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1961, but in January 1964, the program was transferred to the Defense Department under the control of a cover organization called the Studies and Observations Group (SOG). . This was the first of several carefully worded official statements aimed at separating 34A and Desoto and leaving the impression that the United States was not involved in the covert operations.9 With that false foundation in their minds, the on-scene naval analysts saw the evidence around them as confirmation of the attack they had been warned about. The only solution was to get rid of the evidence. Three days later, she rendezvoused with a tanker just east of the DMZ before beginning her intelligence- gathering mission up the North Vietnamese coast. Hisfirst ship was USS Glennon (DD-840), a FRAM I destroyer, thesame class as Maddox. The basic story line of the Gulf of Tonkin incident is as follows: At approximately 1430 hours Vietnam time on August 2, 1964, USS Maddox (DD-731) detected three North Vietnamese torpedo boats approaching at high speed. Around midday on Aug. 4, Adm. Grant Sharp, the top navy commander in the Pacific, made a call to the Joint Chiefs, and it was clear there were significant doubts about this second incident. He has written numerous articles on Vietnam War-era special operations and is the author of two books on the war: Trial by Fire: The 1972 Easter Offensive, Americas Last Vietnam Battle (Hippocrene Books, 1994), and Ashes to Ashes: The Phoenix Program and the Vietnam War (Lexington Books, 1990). Both sides, however, spent August 3 reviewing their contingency plans and analyzing lessons learned from the incident. WebLyndon Johnson signed the Tonkin Gulf resolution on August 10, 1964. The NSA report is revealing. The Maddox fired againthis time to killhitting the second North Vietnamese boat just as it launched two torpedoes. "I think we are kidding the world if you try to give the impression that when the South Vietnamese naval boats bombarded two islands a short distance off the coast of North Vietnam we were not implicated," he scornfully told McNamara during the hearings.16 Suddenly, North Vietnamese guns opened fire from the shore. "5, In reality there was little actual coordination between 34A and Desoto. Non-subscribers can read five free Naval History articles per month. In the subsequent exchange of fire, neither American nor North Vietnamese ships inflicted significant damage. Whether they produced battlefield images of the dead or daguerreotype portraits of common soldiers, []. Hanoi at the time denied all, leading to a third interpretation that remains alive today as what might be called the Stockdale thesis. Interview, authors with James Hawes, 31 March 1996. The ships gunners used the standard 5 mil offset to avoid hitting the boats. The U.S. in-theater SIGINT assets were limited, as was the number of Vietnamese linguists. At the time, the Navy relied heavily on Naval Support Group Activity (NSGA), San Miguel, Philippines, for SIGINT support, augmented by seaborne SIGINT elements called Direct Support Units (DSUs). He spoke out against banning girls education. It is difficult to imagine that the North Vietnamese could come to any other conclusion than that the 34A and Desoto missions were all part of the same operation. Our response, for the present, will be limited and fitting. Codenamed Desoto, they were special U.S. Navy patrols designed to eavesdrop on enemy shore-based communicationsspecifically China, North Korea, and now North Vietnam. Captain Herrick had been ordered to be clear of the patrol area by nightfall, so he turned due east at approximately 1600. Nigerians await election results in competitive race. Listen to McNamara's conversation with Johnson. When you visit the site, Dotdash Meredith and its partners may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. Sign up for The Top of the World, delivered to your inbox every weekday morning. Media Manipulation. He then requested the passage of a resolution "expressing the unity and determination of the United States in supporting freedom and in protecting peace in Southeast Asia." At about the same time, there were other "secret" missions going on. If there had been any doubt before about whose hand was behind the raids, surely there was none now. In August 1964, Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf resolutionor Southeast Asia Resolution, as it is officially knownthe congressional decree that gave President Lyndon Johnson a broad mandate to wage war in Vietnam. In 2005 documents were released proving that Johnson had fabricated the Gulf of Tonkin incident in order to justify attacking North Vietnam. WHAT REALLY HAPPENED IN THE GULF OF TONKIN? In the first few days of August 1964, a series of events off the coast of North Vietnam and decisions made in Washington, D.C., set the United States on a course that would largely define the next decade and weigh heavily on American foreign policy to this day. Approved on Aug. 10, 1964, the Southeast Asia (Gulf of Tonkin) Resolution, gave Johnson the power to use military force in the region without requiring a declaration And who is going to believe that? . On 7 August, the Senate passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, allowing the administration greater latitude in expanding the war by a vote of 88 to 2. Most uncertainty has long centered on the alleged second attack of August 4. Haiphong again repeated the recall order after the attack. And so, in the course of a single day, and operating on imperfect information,Johnson changedthe trajectory of the Vietnam War. The battle was over in 22 minutes. When the boats reached that point, Maddox fired three warning shots, but the torpedo boats continued inbound at high speed. At 2000 hours local time, Maddox reported it had two surface and three aerial contacts on radar. The rounds set some of the buildings ablaze, keeping the defenders off balance. https://www.historynet.com/case-closed-the-gulf-of-tonkin-incident/, Jerrie Mock: Record-Breaking American Female Pilot, When 21 Sikh Soldiers Fought the Odds Against 10,000 Pashtun Warriors, Few Red Tails Remain: Tuskegee Airman Dies at 96. As such, its personnel in Vietnam were the envy of their Army counterparts in the bush since, as it was commonly put, sailors sleep between clean sheets at night (the grunts were also envious of the Air Force, where you fight sitting down). In 1996 Edward Moises book Tonkin Gulf and the Escalation of the Vietnam War presented the first publicly released concrete evidence that the SIGINT reporting confirmed the August 2 attack, but not the alleged second attack of August 4. I would not suggest that he learned from the Gulf of Tonkin incident so much as that he got from it exactly what he wanted, which was an enormous bump in approval ratings 30 percent overnight, says historian Chris Oppe. Cruising twenty-eight miles offshore in international waters, Maddox was approached by the North Vietnamese. 1, Vietnam 1964 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992), p. 611. Gulf of Tonkin Resolution - Definition, Cause & Significance This was granted, and four F-8 Crusaders were vectored towards Maddox's position. Subsequent SIGINT reporting and faulty analysis that day further reinforced earlier false impressions. U.S. soldiers recall Cam Ranh as a sprawling logistic center for materiel bolstering the war effort, but in the summer of 1964 it was only a junk force training base near a village of farmers and fishermen. Congress supported the resolution with Summary Notes of the 538th Meeting of the NSC, 4 August 1964, 6:15-6:40 p.m., Foreign Relations of the United States 1964-1968, vol. Changing course in time to evade the torpedoes, the Maddox again was attacked, this time by a boat that fired another torpedo and 14.5-mm machine guns. Conspiracy You can find out more about our use, change your default settings, and withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future by visiting Cookies Settings, which can also be found in the footer of the site. In turn, that means a minimum of several hundred persons were party to a plot that has remained watertight in sieve-like Washington for two decades. The attack is a signal to us that the North Vietnamese have the will and determination to continue the war." 11. Although McNamara did not know it at the time, part of his statement was not true; Captain Herrick, the Desoto patrol commander, did know about the 34A raids, something that his ships logs later made clear. The tug departed Haiphong at approximately 0100 hours on August 4, while the undamaged torpedo boat, T-146, was ordered to stay with the crippled boats and maintain an alert for enemy forces. At about 0600, the two U.S. destroyers resumed the Desoto patrol. Because the North Vietnamese had fewer than 50 Swatows, most of them up north near the important industrial port of Haiphong, the movement south of one-third of its fleet was strong evidence that 34A and the Desoto patrols were concerning Hanoi. After 15 minutes of maneuvering, the F-8s arrived and strafed the North Vietnamese boats, damaging two and leaving the third dead in the water. The departure of the North Vietnamese salvage tug en route to the damaged craft was reported to the American ships as a submarine chaser, not a serious threat but certainly more so than an unarmed seagoing tug. The fig leaf of plausible denial served McNamara in this case, but it was scant cover. He has written numerous articles on Vietnam War-era special operations and is the author of two books on the war: Formerly an analyst with the Washington-based Asian Studies Center, Mr. Conboy is vice president of Lippo Group, a large financial services institution in Jakarta, Indonesia. By late July 1964, SOG had four Nasty-class patrol boats, designated. Subscribe to receive our weekly newsletter with top stories from master historians. WebCongress repealed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution before the United States' withdrawal from Vietnam in 1973. At Hon Nieu, the attack was a complete surprise. The NSA report exposes translation and analytical errors made by the American SIGINT analystserrors that convinced the naval task force and national authorities that the North had ordered a second attack on August 4, and thus led Maddoxs crew to interpret its radar contacts and other information as confirmation that the ship was again under attack. Both orders were repeated, but only the latter was relayed to the torpedo boats before the attack was launched. Although North Vietnamese General Vo Nguyen Giap admitted in a 1984 discussion with Robert S. McNamara that the first attack was deliberate, he denied that a second attack had ever taken place. Declassified NSA documents show that US intelligence members concealed relevant reports from Congress to push the narrative of a second attack. The United States Military had three SIGINT stations in the Philippines, one for each of the services, but their combined coverage was less than half of all potential North Vietnamese communications. Returning fire, Maddox scored hits on the P-4s while being struck by a single 14.5-millimeter machine gun bullet. 302-303. Neither the United States nor State of Vietnam signed anything at the 1954 Geneva Conference. McNamara and the JCS believed that this intercept decisively provided the smoking gun of the second attack, and so the president reported to the American people and Congress.
How Much Does A 200000 Annuity Pay Per Month?, 18th Volksgrenadier Division, Articles G