NSA analysts from shore-based stations shared Herricks belief and transmitted an immediate warning to all major Pacific Theater commandsexcept to Herrick and Maddox. Efforts to communicate with the torpedo boats failed, probably because of language and communications equipment incompatibility. In response, the North Vietnamese built up their naval presence around the offshore islands. 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. Badly damaged, the boat limped home. After suggesting a "complete evaluation" of the affair before taking further action, he radioed requesting a "thorough reconnaissance in daylight by aircraft." The Gulf of Tonkin Incident and many more recent experiences only reinforce the need for intelligence analysts and decision makers to avoid relying exclusively on any single intelligence sourceeven SIGINTparticularly if other intelligence sources are available and the resulting decisions might cost lives. 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. This is another government conspiracy that's true. Seeking to follow the established policy of containment, Johnson and his Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, began increasing military aid to South Vietnam. Despite this tremendous uncertainty, by midafternoon, the discussion among Johnson and his advisers was no longer about whether to respondbut how. Vietnam is a very watery country. Within the year, U.S. bombers would strike North Vietnam, and U.S. ground units would land on South Vietnamese soil. "13 As far as the State Department was concerned, there was no need to "review" the operations. One of the great ironies of the Gulf of Tonkin incident for President Johnson is that it was for him, politically, a great success, he continues. At 2000 hours local time, Maddox reported it had two surface and three aerial contacts on radar. William Conrad Gibbons, The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War, Part II, 1961-1964, pp. Captain John J. Herrick, Commander Destroyer Division 192, embarked in the Maddox, concluded that there would be "possible hostile action." 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. Thats what all the country wants, because Goldwater's raising so much hell about how he's gonna blow 'em off the moon, and they say that we oughtn't to do anything that the national interest doesn't require. A brief account of the raids is in MACVSOG 1964 Command History, Annex A, 14 January 1965, pp. While I was in training, my motivation was to get these wings and I wear them today proudly, the airman recalled in 2015. Both South Vietnamese and U.S. maritime operators in Da Nang assumed that their raids were the cause of the mounting international crisis, and they never for a moment doubted that the North Vietnamese believed that the raids and the Desoto patrols were one and the same. Vietnam War: Gulf of Tonkin Incident - ThoughtCo Senate investigations in 1968 and 1975 did little to clarify the events or the evidence, lending further credence to the various conspiracy theories. 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. 8. Originally begun by the Central Intelligence Agency in 1961, 34A was a highly-classified program of covert operations against North Vietnam. Operation Fast and Furious 10 The Gulf of Tonkin incident was a brief confrontation between United States and North Vietnamese warships, off the coast of northern Vietnam in August 1964. These warning shots were fired and the P-4s launched a torpedo attack. The stakes were high because Hanoi had beefed up its southern coastal defenses by adding four new Swatow gunboats at Quang Khe, a naval base 75 miles north of the DMZ, and ten more just to the south at Dong Hoi. Gulf Of Tonkin The first such Desoto mission was conducted off the North Vietnamese coast in February 1964, followed by more through the spring. Aircraft from the Ticonderoga (CVA-14) appeared on the scene, strafing three torpedo boats and sinking the one that had been damaged in the battle with the Maddox. Background intelligence on North Vietnam, its radar networks and command-and-control systems was limited. There was more or less general acceptance of the Navy's initial account -- there was an unprovoked attack on Aug. 2 by three North Vietnamese patrol boats on an American warship, the destroyer USS Maddox in international waters. Two hours later the Phu Bai SIGINT station transmitted a critic report warning of possible [North Vietnamese] naval operations planned against the Desoto patrol. Twenty-five minutes later, Phu Bai sent a second critic report that said, imminent plans of [North Vietnamese] naval action possibly against Desoto Mission.. The stage was set. The battle was over in 22 minutes. Navy, Of course, none of this was known to Congress, which demanded an explanation for the goings-on in the Tonkin Gulf. The Desoto patrol continued with another destroyer, the Turner Joy (DD-951), coming along to ward off further trouble. This article by Capt. McNamara was ready to respond. Ships radar detected five patrol boats, which turned out to be P-4 torpedo boats and Swatows. The World is a public radio program that crosses borders and time zones to bring home the stories that matter. The North Vietnamese didnt buy the distinction; they attacked the USS Maddox. ThoughtCo. Hanoi at the time denied all, leading to a third interpretation that remains alive today as what might be called the Stockdale thesis. This is another government conspiracy that's true. The Gulf of Tonkin incident led to the expansion of the Vietnam War that resulted in a lot of American soldier casualties. WebCongress repealed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution before the United States' withdrawal from Vietnam in 1973. 302-303. In the subsequent exchange of fire, neither American nor North Vietnamese ships inflicted significant damage. HistoryNet.com is brought to you by HistoryNet LLC, the worlds largest publisher of history magazines. AND THERE is the fact of Vietnam's position today. Gulf of Tonkin incident, 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 Telegram from Embassy in Vietnam to Department of State, 7 August 1964, FRUS 1964, vol. But, interestingly, on Sept. 18, a similar incident occurred in the Gulf of Tonkin. This along with flawed signals intelligence from the National Security Agency led Johnson to order retaliatory airstrikes against North Vietnam. In November of 2001, the LBJ Presidential library and museum released tapes of phone conversations with the President and then Defense Conspiracy Senator Wayne Morse (D-OR) challenged the account, and argued that despite evidence that 34A missions and Desoto patrols were not operating in tandem, Hanoi could only have concluded that they were. Both sides, however, spent August 3 reviewing their contingency plans and analyzing lessons learned from the incident. 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. Johnsonasked for, and received, a resolution of war from the US Congress that led to further escalation in the conflict. (The recent NBC television movie In Love and War had Navy pilot James B. Stockdale flying over the scene at the time saying, "I see nothing"; now a retired vice admiral, Stockdale has reiterated the "phoney attack" charge in writings and public speaking.). Summary Notes of the 538th Meeting of the NSC, 4 August 1964, 6:15-6:40 p.m.. 13. While 34A and the Desoto patrols were independent operations, the latter benefited from the increased signals traffic generated by the attacks of the former. . 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. The Navys seaborne SIGINT effort in support of OPLAN-34, called Desoto Missions, played a key role in the events that ultimately led to the Gulf of Tonkin incident. He also requested air support. Vietnam War: Gulf of Tonkin Incident. 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. 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. Just after midnight on 31 July, PTF-2 and PTF-5, commanded by Lieutenant Huyet, arrived undetected at a position 800 yards northeast of the island. Heavy machine-gun bullets riddled PTF-6, tearing away part of the port bow and wounding four South Vietnamese crewmen, including Lieutenant Son. American SIGINT analysts assessed the North Vietnamese reporting as probable preparations for further military operations against the Desoto patrol. Conducted under the nationally approved Operations Plan, OPLAN-34A, the program required the intelligence community to provide detailed intelligence about the commando targets, the Norths coastal defenses and related surveillance systems. By then, the two American ships were approximately 80 nautical miles from the nearest North Vietnamese coastline and steaming southeast at 20 knots. As Communist communications activity was rising rapidly, American senior leaders were increasing support to the South Vietnamese government. The North Vietnamese believed that, although they had lost one boat, they had deterred an attack on their coast. 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. The North Vietnamese coastal radars also tracked and reported the positions of U.S. aircraft operating east of the ships, probably the combat air patrol the Seventh Fleet had ordered in support. (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.). 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. Hereafter referred to as FRUS, Vietnam 1964; Congressional Research Service, The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part II, 1961-1964 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1984), p. 287; Message CTG72.1 040140Z August 1964 (Marolda and Fitzgerald, p. 425). This was almost certainly a reaction to the recent 34A raids. The fig leaf of plausible denial served McNamara in this case, but it was scant cover. To increase the chances of success, SOG proposed increased raids along the coast, emphasizing offshore bombardment by the boats rather than inserting commandos. WebThe Gulf of Tonkin and the Vietnam War. But only a few minutes later, McNamara was back on the line with news of a second incident in the Gulf of Tonkin. Suffice to say here that the version as presented here by Marolda and Fitzgerald is highly credible and completely plausible, and I for one am persuaded of its correctness. Perhaps that is the most enduring lesson from Americas use of SIGINT in the Vietnam War in general and the Gulf of Tonkin Incident in particular. Like all intelligence, it must be analyzed and reported in context. The only opposition came from a few scattered machine guns on shore, but they did no damage. His assessment of the evidence now raised doubts in his mind about what really had happened. The maximum closure distance was originally established at 20 nautical miles, but the commander of the U.S. A distinction is made in these pages between the Aug. 2 "naval engagement" and the somewhat more ambiguous Aug. 4 "naval action," although Marolda and Fitzgerald make it clear they accept that the Aug. 4 action left one and possibly two North Vietnamese torpedo-firing boats sunk or dead in the water. During the afternoon of 3 August, another maritime team headed north from Da Nang. including the use of armed force" to assist South Vietnam (the resolution passed the House 416 to 0, and the Senate 88 to 2; in January 1971 President Nixon signed legislation that included its "repeal"). A National Security Agency report released in 2007 reveals unequivocally that the alleged Aug. 4, 1964, attack by North Vietnam on U.S. destroyers never actually happened. By late 1958 it was obvious that a major Communist buildup was underway in South Vietnam, but the American SIGINT community was ill-placed and ill-equipped to deal with it. 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. Did Johnson learn something from the first experience? The two boats headed northeast along the same route they had come, then turned south for the run back to South Vietnam. The Truth About Tonkin | Naval History Magazine - February 2008 To have a Tonkin Gulf conspiracy means that the several hundred National Security Agency and naval communications cited have been doctored. 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. Nigerians await election results in competitive race. The entirety of the original intercepts, however, were not examined and reanalyzed until after the war. 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. Two nearly identical episodes six weeks apart; two nearly opposite responses. Related:LBJ knew the Vietnam War was a disaster in the making. Milestones: 19611968 - Office of the Historian The Taliban silenced him. As is common with specialized histories -- what I call the "tunnels of Cu Chi" syndrome -- this book will tell most readers more about the U.S. Navy in Vietnam than they care to know. Listen to McNamara's conversation with Johnson. At 0354 on 2 August, the destroyer was just south of Hon Me Island. Unlike McNamara, Johnson, on the morning of Aug.4,1964, was in less of a hurry to respond to an attack. Gulf of Tonkin - National Security Agency Both of these messages reached Washington shortly after 1400 hours EDT. To have a Tonkin Gulf conspiracy means that the several hundred National Security Agency and naval communications cited have been doctored. 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. The conspiracy theory has been dying for several years, and this work will probably be a stake through its heart. We still seek no wider war.. On the afternoon of Aug. 2, three Soviet-built P-4 motor torpedo boats were dispatched to attack the destroyer. Suddenly, North Vietnamese guns opened fire from the shore. Senator Morse was one of the dissenters. People are human and make mistakes, particularly in the pressure of a crisis or physical threat to those they support. It was 20 minutes into the new day, 31 July, when PTF-3 and PTF-6, both under the command of Lieutenant Sonconsidered one of the best boat skippers in the covert fleetreached Hon Me and began their run at the shore. 5. Despite McNamaras nimble answers, North Vietnams insistence that there was a connection between 34A and the Desoto patrols was only natural. He is the author of Shadow War: The Secret War in Laos, as well as several short studies on special operations, including The War in Cambodia (Osprey Books, 1988), The War in Laos (Osprey Books, 1989), and Southeast Asian Special Forces (Osprey Books, 1990). In 2005 documents were released proving that Johnson had fabricated the Gulf of Tonkin incident in order to justify attacking North Vietnam. 3. The Science of Conspiracy Theories - Gulf of Tonkin conspiracy On July 31, 1964, the destroyer USS Maddox commenced a Desoto patrol off North Vietnam. https://www.thoughtco.com/vietnam-war-gulf-of-tonkin-incident-2361345 (accessed March 4, 2023). In response, the North Vietnamese boat launched a torpedo. Herricks concerns grew as the SIGINT intercepts indicated that the North Vietnamese were concentrating torpedo boats off Hon Me Island, 25 nautical miles to his southwest. North Vietnams immediate concern was to determine the exact position and status of its torpedo boats and other forces. That night and morning, while cruising in heavy weather, the ships received radar, radio, and sonar reports that signaled another North Vietnamese attack. 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. 1, p. 646. Reinforced by Turner Joy, Herrick returned to the area on Aug. 4. 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. Forty-eight hours earlier, on Aug. 2, two US destroyers on patrol in the Gulf of Tonkin the Maddox and the Turner Joy were attacked by North Vietnamese boats. The threat removed, Maddox retired from the area to rejoin friendly forces. We have no intention of yielding to pressure. The House passed the resolution unanimously.17 The Gulf of Tonkin Incident famously gave the Johnson Administration the justification they needed to escalate the Vietnam War. Aircraft from Ticonderoga arrived on-scene at 1528 hours and fired on the boats. The original radar contacts dropped off the scope at 2134, but the crews of Maddox and Turner Joy believed they detected two high-speed contacts closing on their position at 44 knots. 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 Despite the on-scene commanders efforts to correct their errors in the initial after-action reports, administration officials focused instead on the first SIGINT reports to the exclusion of all other evidence. Based on the intercepts, Captain John J. Herrick, the on-scene mission commander aboard nearby Turner Joy, decided to terminate Maddoxs Desoto patrol late on August 1, because he believed he had indications the ship was about to be attacked.. The Dollar Bill . But we sure ought to always leave the impression that if you shoot at us, you're going to get hit, Johnson said. The most comprehensive and authoritative history site on the Internet. A lesser-known fact is that Jim Morrisons father, Captain George Stephen Morrison, commanded the Carrier Division during the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. The Maddox fired againthis time to killhitting the second North Vietnamese boat just as it launched two torpedoes. The lack of success in SOGs missions during the first few months of 1964 made this proposal quite attractive. On the night of 4 August, both ships reported renewed attacks by North Vietnamese patrol boats. For some reason, however, the second Desoto Mission, to be conducted by Maddox, was not canceled, even though it was scheduled to start at the same time that a late July commando mission was being launched. Those early mistakes led U.S. destroyers to open fire on spurious radar contacts, misinterpret their own propeller noises as incoming torpedoes, and ultimately report an attack that never occurred. Launching on Aug. 5, Operation Pierce Arrow saw aircraft from USS Ticonderoga and USS Constellation strike oil facilities at Vinh and attack approximately 30 North Vietnamese vessels. 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. Gulf of Tonkin Conspiracy Theory 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 It took only a little imagination to see why the North Vietnamese might connect the two. WebThe Senate passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution with only two opposing votes, and the House of Representatives passed it unanimously. And who is going to believe that? Telegram from Embassy in Vietnam to Department of State, 7 August 1964. Our response, for the present, will be limited and fitting. Historians still argue about what exactly happened in the Gulf of Tonkin in August of 1964. The Vietnam War buff will find it fascinating for its wealth of detail carefully set down in understated prose (a welcome relief, I might add, from the hysterical tone that marks much Vietnam War writing). Those same reports were shown to the select congressional and senate committees that also investigated the incident. Speculation about administration motives surrounding the Tonkin Gulf incident itself and the subsequent withholding of key information will probably never cease, but the factual intelligence record that drove those decisions is now clear. :: Douglas Pike, director of the Indochina Studies Program at the University of California-Berkeley, is the author of the forthcoming "Vietnam and the U.S.S.R.: Anatomy of an Alliance.". Seventh Fleet reduced it to 12 nautical miles. What did and didnt happen in the Gulf of Tonkin on August 2 and 4 has long been in dispute, but the decisions that the Johnson Administration and Congress made based on an interpretation of those events were undeniably monumental. Captain Herrick had been ordered to be clear of the patrol area by nightfall, so he turned due east at approximately 1600. The truth about 'False Flags' from Nazi Germany to the Vietnam War 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). Both were perceived as threats, and both were in the same general area at about the same time. Gulf of Tonkin incident | Definition, Date, Summary, Significance The USS Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin is shown in 1963. The ships gunners used the standard 5 mil offset to avoid hitting the boats. Everything went smoothly until the early hours of 2 August, when intelligence picked up indications that the North Vietnamese Navy had moved additional Swatows into the vicinity of Hon Me and Hon Nieu Islands and ordered them to prepare for battle. Hickman, Kennedy. Then North Vietnams naval authorities either became confused or were seized by indecision. 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. CIA Director John McCone was convinced that Hanoi was reacting to the raids when it attacked the Maddox. One 12.7mm machine bullet hit Maddox before the boats broke off and started to withdraw. This time, however, President Johnson reacted much more skeptically and ultimately decided to take no retaliatory action. He spoke out against banning girls education. For additional reading, see the recently declassified NSA study by Robert J. Hanyok, Spartans in the Darkness: American SIGINT and the Indochina War, 1945-1975; and Tonkin Gulf and The Escalation of the Vietnam War, by Edward Moise. 12. Gulf of Tonkin incident Facts Conspiracy The only solution was to get rid of the evidence.

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