WRMEA: Cristol on The Liberty Incident / Cristol at MEI

A. Jay Cristol "loves" 13 investigation!

Here is a solid account of what kind of  “expertise”   ‘Top Gun Ahron’ brings to a discussion.   Exaggerations, hubris and arrogant, misrepresentative dishonesty and bullshit, his stock and trade.  Simply an agent for Israel.

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 2003, pages 70-72

Cristol on The Liberty Incident

At noon on Dec. 17, 2002, in the Washington Navy Yard Museum, Captain A. Jay Cristol USNR (ret) was introduced at the monthly naval history seminar to discuss his recent book, The Liberty Incident. The following day he also addressed the Middle East Institute in the national capital.

At both sessions Cristol made lengthy introductory remarks, explaining why he was uniquely qualified to write this book (his background as a Naval aviator, Navy and civil lawyer, and judge), the extent of his research, and the vast number of interviews he conducted in the United States and Israel.

At the Navy Yard, he pointed out that most great writings of warfare are written by non-combatants, and that his is a history, not a memoir. At MEI he noted that, like A Tale of Two Cities, most great histories are written after the events by writers who were not present as history unfolded.

Cristol also claimed that there are as many conspiracy theories about the Liberty incident as there are about the Kennedy assassination. While Cristol’s press release promised “Conclusive New Findings on the 1967 Israeli Attack of the USS Liberty,” in which 34 Americans were killed and 171 wounded during the Six-Day War, the only new finding in the book is Cristol’s conclusion that it was an “unfortunate accident.”

Using the Freedom of Information Act to access classified documents, Cristol examined the complete files of all 13 U.S. and Israeli official inquiries, made 16 trips to Israel and three to Egypt, and personally conducted over 500 interviews—including with (purportedly) the attacking Israeli aircraft pilots and torpedo boat commanders, as well as Robert McNamara, Clark Clifford, Dean Rusk, Admiral Isaac Kidd, and all of the admirals and generals on both sides.

After mentioning many other famous people he interviewed, Cristol discussed what he claimed were erroneous reports about the recall of aircraft launched from the USS America and Saratoga. LBJ and McNamara could not have recalled those flights sent to defend the Liberty, Cristol maintained,because “in 1967 the U.S. did not have the ability to make a secure radio-telephone link from Washington to a ship in the Mediterranean.” No one said they were “secure,” of course, and there are accounts from the captains of the America and Saratoga to confirm that the calls were indeed made.

(Those who are acquainted with Adm. Moorer know that he is just as sharp and critical as ever.)

Questioners during the question-and-answer period generally were critical of Cristol—with the exception of Norman Polmar, who was sitting on the front row next to Cristol’s wealthy wife, who owns a TV station in Miami. Polmar asked Cristol to describe how difficult it was for the Israeli jet pilots to aim their rockets and cannon fire at the Liberty.

Before Cristol could reply, however, this writer asked him what planes he had flown. It was then that the audience discovered that Cristol was a Turkey pilot. His description of himself as a “veteran Navy pilot” is slightly misleading. Cristol was not a jet pilot.  (He’s a pompous ‘naval aviator’ – jd)   Instead his two years of fleet experience was in TBMs (Turkeys) and AFs (Guardians), the slowest prop planes in the fleet, and his shore-based flight experience was in the T-28 prop trainer. Cristol claims to have flown the MIG-15, TA4, and F80 (I suspect those flights were all in the back seat), and as a reservist he flew transport aircraft.

“Cristol devotes an entire chapter of his book to the air and sea attack on the Liberty, and would have readers believe that he is knowledgeable about jet attack operations. The Israeli pilots, he argues, were flying so fast they really had little time to identify the Liberty target. In fact, however, Cristol has no competence to analyze or discuss jet attack tactics.”

Despite his promises, Cristol’s book proves nothing new. As Liberty survivor Joe Meadors, thanking Cristol, pointed out, however, it does give new legs to the 35-year-old controversy.

—Tom Schaaf Cdr USNA (ret) ’53 classmate of LCDR Philip Armstrong, Jr. killed in the first air attack on the USS Liberty. Schaaf was in the Strategic Plans Division in the Office of the CNO in 1967.

Cristol at MEI

Cristol’s talk at the Middle East Institute began with an introduction by retired Ambassador and MEI board member Richard Parker, who said he, for one, has never doubted that Israel’s attack was an accident.

For the MEI audience Cristol focused on diplomatic rather than military points, although he repeated many of his anecdotes from the previous day.

Why on earth, Cristol asked rhetorically, would Israel upset and distress the U.S., its one friend in the world, by attacking an American ship? The U.S. ship shouldn’t have been there, he argued, and blamed American miscommunications and Israeli miscalculations for the attack. As final proof, Cristol declared that “Seven U.S. presidents accept Israel’s claims that the attack was a tragic mistake.”

The former Turkey pilot then discussed the 10-year-old Evans and Novak interview with U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dwight Porter, who told the reporters he had received an intercept of Israeli radio transmissions during the attack which established the fact that the attack was intentional.

While researching his book, Cristol contacted Ambassador Porter, who granted him an interview and wrote him a letter (which Cristol briefly placed on the overhead projector) stating that he hadn’t told the reporters the intercept was made by or in the U.S. Embassy. By casting doubt on the issue of where the intercept message was made, Cristol purposefully tried to discount the entire Evans and Novak interview, never addressing the real issue: that the radio intercepts shown to Ambassador Porter had captured discussions between Israeli commanders who ordered the attack on an American ship and the Israeli pilots, who questioned their orders.

—Delinda C. Hanley

http://www.wrmea.com/archives/march03/0303070.html