Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty – The full story
For seven minutes the three Mirages made furious, crisscross runs, hitting the Liberty with everything they had. The first rockets fired toppled several of the ship’s antennae. After the Mirages and for about another 20 minutes, the air attack was continued by several Mystere fighters. They were slower than the Mirages and therefore more efficient for staffing and dropping canisters of napalm. (Napalm is a highly inflammable petroleum jelly. In Vietnam I witnessed American ground forces using it in flame-throwers to burn entire villages. It can reduce a human body to a handful of black pulp). The fact that the Israelis resorted to use of napalm for their attack on the Liberty is on its own proof enough that Dayan wanted there to be no survivors to tell the tale.
When the first attack was over the Liberty had 621 holes in its sides and decks, including over 100 rocket holes six to eight inches wide: and not counting the shrapnel damage. As author Richard Smith wrote, Israeli pilots with the greatest ease could “butcher a large, slow moving and defenceless target like the Liberty,” and the Mirages’ ordnance, designed to penetrate the armour of tanks, “punched through the Liberty’s 22 year-old shell-plating like a hammer against an old block of cheese.”
Within a minute or so of the start of the attack Captain McGonagle had ordered a report be made to the Chief of Naval Operations. It was an order he gave more in hope than expectation of it being executed – because he was aware that the ship’s transmission facilities had been the first priority for the attacking planes. But… At 1410 hours, five minutes after the attack started, the Liberty’s Chief Radioman, Wayne Smith, did succeed in transmitting an open-channel “Mayday” distress call for assistance. He was subsequently to tell the Navy Board of Inquiry that as soon as the attack started, the participating planes and/or shore-based units were jamming the Liberty’s radios. He recalled that five of the ship’s six shore circuits were very quickly jammed and that whoever was doing it “went searching” for the last circuit. It was on this last circuit that Smith was able to transmit the call for assistance. Because it was an open-channel transmission, the Israelis obviously heard it. The question then waiting for an answer was – would any of the warships of the American Sixth Fleet hear it and, if they did, how would they respond?
Correction – would they be allowed by President Johnson to respond?
Phase two of the attack was executed by three Israeli motor torpedo boats (MTBs). The Liberty’s crew were fighting the fires caused by the air attack when the MTBs announced their arrival by opening up with their 0.20-mm and 0.40-mm guns. Their main task was to sink the Liberty. For that purpose – could there have been any other? – they fired three torpedoes. One struck the communications room dead centre in Number 3 hold, killing in an instant 25 of the 34 men who died in the entire attack. The 25, including the “Major”, were entombed in the flooded wreckage.
Ten years later, the consequences of the combined air and sea attacks were summarised by one of the surviving crew members, Joseph C. Lentini of Maryland, in a letter to the editor of the Washington Star. It was published on 4 October 1977. Lentini wrote: “In less than 39 minutes a fine ship was reduced to a bullet-ridden, napalm scorched and helpless floating graveyard. In those 39 minutes boys brought up in the peaceful aftermath of a horrendous world war experienced their first, and for some their last, trial of fire.”
The Liberty was now listing nine degrees and the MTBs were circling slowly, directing their canon fire at the ship’s bridge and any activity that could be seen on the deck and, also, at the ship’s waterline in an apparent effort to explode its boilers.
What happened next was yet more evidence that Dayan wanted no survivors.
The order “Prepare to abandon ship!” was followed, naturally, by the lowering of the first lifeboats. As they touched the water the Israeli MTBs moved closer and shot them to pieces. Among the Liberty crewmen who witnessed this was Petty Officer Charles Rowley. He also observed the concentration of machine-gun fire on the life-boats still stored on deck. After the attack he carefully photographed the shredded boats, thinking that one day his pictures would help to tell a story. When eventually he told it to Stephen Green, Rowley said, “They didn’t want anybody to live.”
At 1505 or thereabouts (a time to remember) the MTBs suddenly broke off their attack and departed at high-speed in a “V” formation. They went to a distance of about five miles to await further orders.
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