Wanderlust on October 21, 2007 at 4:49 AM

I only know the story because it was a significant part of my step-fathers, shall we say death bed confession. It wasn’t so much a death bed confession as it was an angry rant against the US Government.

He was down right furious at the US Navy because so many of his fellow sailors had died aboard the USS Liberty and their families were never told the truth about the incident. He was also pretty pissed off at those of his fellow crew members who were blaming the Israeli’s claiming that Israel had knowingly and intentionally attacked them.

To clarify a little, my Step-father was not an officer he was an enlisted man. His rating was a Radioman second class at the time. His specialty was electronic intelligence. Like the majority of his fellow intelligence officer peers on the USS Liberty he isn’t listed in the official ships crew manifest.

This is what he was really ranting about. More guys actually died on the USS Liberty then the US Navy admitted to, because quite of few of those that died were not officially on board. When the Navy told their families that they were dead they lied to the families about where and when and how they died.

He understood why it was done at the time, but was still very angry that 30 years later the Navy had not corrected the deception and he didn’t believe they ever would. He believed that the families of his friends who had died on the USS Liberty deserved to know the truth about how and where and when their loved ones had really died.

As he put it, his bests friends family deserved to know that their son did not die in a drunken car crash in Morocco in 1968, but at his post serving his country on board USS Liberty in 1967.

The USS Liberty was trailing a Soviet submarine, the Soviet Sub was using an Egyptian freighter as a spy ship. Thats why the Israeli’s mistook the USS Liberty for that Egyptian freighter. That and the fact that the USS Liberty had intentionally misreported its position and was intentionally not flying its flag.

doriangrey on October 21, 2007 at 1:05 PM

Bradky on October 21, 2007 at 1:24 PM

Nice straw man Bradky, the difference is that my step-father was not making anything remotely like an extraordinary claim. He was there and was part of the intelligence gathering team hence in the loop about what actually happened.

You accuse his shipmates of being racists with no proof and that is patently unfair.

Bullshit, its well documented…..

• The disturbing statements of a leading Liberty crewman

James Ennes, one of the leading conspiracy proponents among the former Liberty crewmen, who was interviewed extensively by the History Channel, has made extreme statements that border on the anti-semitic in e-mail discussions on Prodigy. For example, in a message dated June 8, 1992 referring to Israeli Jews, Mr. Ennes stated:

… Consider their dilemma: For generations they wanted their own country as a haven from racists. Finally they got it. Gradually they learned that their “leaders” obtained the new country by murdering and frightening away the original owners. Gradually they learned that the new leaders were actually the worst kind of self- centered, amoralistic murderers – worse than the people they sought to flee from.

This was too much of a moral dilemma for many of them. Some drew silent. Others turned against the people who betrayed them and now led their new country. Others pretended that all was well and that the new country was surrounded by extremists and that this condition justified every kind of brutal excess.[sic] And over the years they have instilled this narrow view in their children who now accept it as religious dogma. It is a very sad situation indeed.

Of course, the people that Jews fled from were first and foremost the Nazis, so Mr. Ennes is saying that Israel’s leaders are “amoralistic murderers” who are “worse” than the Nazis.

In another message dated July 22, 1992, Mr. Ennes stated:

… the fact is Israel would have no enemies if they did not constantly raid their neighbors, steal their land, take their water and kill their children.

Mr. Ennes’s statements are nonsense copied directly from his apparent good friends in the pro-Arab propaganda industry. Clearly, if before the attack on the Liberty Mr. Ennes was not an extreme anti-Israel partisan, he has become one since. His allegations concerning the Liberty must be viewed in that unpleasant context.

Will the History Channel disclose to viewers Mr. Ennes’s fanatical anti-Israel agenda? Will they disclose similar anti-Israel partisanship by certain other Liberty crewmen, who have perhaps been led astray by Mr. Ennes?

doriangrey on October 21, 2007 at 2:44 PM