A CLOSER LOOK AT A. JAY CRISTOL’S DISSERTATION by John E Borne

A CLOSER LOOK AT A. JAY CRISTOL’S DISSERTATION

by John E Borne

This paper is intended for all the LIBERTY crewmen, and also intended to be a refutation of claims by members of CAMERA and the partisans of Cristol such as SkipperAG and Mike Weeks.

Cristol’s dissertation was reviewed before, by me and others, but at that time we were concentrating on the omissions by Cristol and overlooked many other errors and problems. I am now leaving aside, for the most part, the problem of omissions and instead intend to show that Cristol’s work, praised by his backers as “rigorous research”, is on the contrary, careless, chaotic and poorly documented. This is so true in some instances that it is difficult to believe that his supporters have actually read his work.

To repeat my introduction so that there is no confusion among the readers: This is NOT a review of Cristol’s book. That review will come sometime in the future. This work which you are reading now is an analysis of his dissertation which will also probably point to errors and problems in the book. However the analysis is valuable in itself for pointing out important areas of controversy .

I hope at some future time to bring up various problems of partisanship and bigotry in relation to the LIBERTY issue. Some points made in CAMERA’s extended criticism are valid, but there is no time and space for these topics now.

A. STRANGE STORIES FROM CRISTOL. (There are some odd items in Cristol’s work not adequately covered: l. Was LIBERTY trying to deceive Israelis about its route? 2. Were 50 torpedoes fired?)

1. (p.317) Cristol states that the LIBERTY Deck Log shows changes in the speed and direction of the ship as it turned back toward Point Alpha. The LIBERTY’s maneuvers began at the time that the first Israeli overflight took place. “IT APPEARS THAT THE MANEUVERS MAY HAVE BEEN UNDERTAKEN TO DECEIVE THE PILOT INTO THINKING THAT THE SHIP HE WAS OBSERVING WAS HEADED TOWARD PORT SAID, EGYPT. ” (My capitalization for emphasis).

This is very odd writing. When Cristol says “it appears”, this is a card trick whereby his own opinion is presented as basic fact without any further investigation. It appears to whom? Why would the LIBERTY crew want to deceive the pilot, and why would they want him to think the ship was heading toward Port Said? Who says that they wanted to deceive the pilot? What would be the point? Cristol did not interview any crew member about this. We have nothing here but Cristol’s opinion disguised by the phrase “it appears”.

This is not just a tempest in a teapot. When an historian writes about an event, he should present his sources aside from his own beliefs. Also, his writing should not leave behind a number of questions to be answered, as is the case here. This is careless writing and poor history. We will see many examples of this sort of thing throughout Cristol’s dissertation.

(2) p.352, THE 50 TORPEDOES.

From p.352: “The torpedoes which the MTBs fired at the ship were German aerial 19″ torpedoes acquired by the Navy of Israel as part of their worldwide shopping effort. . .THEY LAUNCHED FIFTY OF THESE TORPEDOES. FORTY EIGHT MISSED. ONE HIT THE LIBERTY AND ONE CAME BACK AND HIT THE ISRAELI SHIP THAT HAD LAUNCHED IT.” (Capitalization mine for emphasis). From Cristol’s interview with Biny Telem, RADM, Navy of Israel. Retired on October 24, 1944. ADM Telem was chief of the Navy of Israel during the 1973 war.

Cristol conducts this interview with Telem exactly as he conducts interviews with other Israelis. He gives no clue as to whether or not he agrees with Telem.

What are we to make of all this? Do Skipper and the CAMERA writers agree with Telem? Is this an untold part of the story of the LIBERTY, now revealed at last? What is a piece of fantasy like this doing in a serious history? Cristol as usual gives no further information but leaves behind a cloud of questions.

B. THE AIR ATTACK

The testimony of the crewmen and that of the Israelis differ on many points concerning the air attack.

(1) Length of the attack; the Israelis claim the attack ended at 1412. The crewmen claim the attack continued until 1425.

(An interesting problem here, although it relates to CAMERA rather than to Cristol: CAMERA relies on the testimony of Chief Thompson to claim that the MTBs offered aid to the ship at 1440. However, Thompson also said that the air attack lasted until 1420 or 1430. Can CAMERA claim that Thompson is a reliable witness when he backs the Israeli claims but not when he backs the LIBERTY claims?)

(2) Israelis and Cristol claim that the Israeli planes orbited the ship looking for a flag, just before they attacked. The crewmen deny this.

(3) Dwight Porter was US Ambassador to Lebanon in June 1967. He says that he was shown transcripts, produced by NSA and translated into English, which recorded a dialogue between an Israeli pilot and his base at the beginning of the air attack. The pilot protests that the ship is American and he can see a flag; his superiors at the base order him to attack anyway.

The tapes were later destroyed. Porter told his story to the columnists Evans and Novak, who wrote a column on the matter. Cristol states (p.352, fn 48) that he (Cristol) had a telephone interview with Porter in which Porter’s information “directly contradicts” the Evans/Novak article, and that Cristol has an audio tape of this interview.

It seemed to me to be odd that Cristol had this tape but did not quote from it. I telephoned Porter myself and was told by him that he stands by his original story and has not changed it.

C. ATTACK OF THE MTBS AND OFFER OF HELP.

The MTB attack on the ship began at 1431 when the MTBs began their torpedo and strafing run. On this the Israelis and crewmen agree. The crewmen claim that the attack continued until 1515. The Israelis deny this but do not put forward a clear and definite time for the end of the attack, as they did with the air attack. Instead there are four different times to be considered as the time when the MTBs offered help. An investigation of this matter gives us some understanding of how these times and numbers are arranged, changed, and in some cases invented.

1. THE MYSTERY OF 1427.

“1427″ is the first time given for an offer of help. This time appears in the LIBERTY rough and smooth radio logs and is discussed by Cristol, p.427, fn 212. The number first appeared in a message from the US Defense Attaché in Tel Aviv to the White House, on June 8.

This wrong time was then written into the logs. The time is absurd because the torpedo strike was not until 1435, eight minutes later.

2. THE MYSTERY OF 1440.

“1440″ seemed for a time to be the time agreed upon as the time when help was offered. This is attested to under oath by the Captain, Chief Thompson, and the Naval Court Summary, and accepted by CAMERA and Cristol. In fact all offer elaborate documentation and background to this 1440 offer. Captain McGonagle: “The MTBs stopped dead in the water and milled around astern of the ship at a range of approximately 500 to 800 yards. One of the boats signaled by flashing light, in English ‘do you require assistance?’”. Chief communications technician Harold Thompson: “When they (MTBs) were about 500 yards off, the torpedo boat turned astern and came up on the stern of the starboard side and flashed ‘do you need help?’” Cristol, in his dissertation, agrees with this. He says that “soon after the torpedo boats completed their runs, they came back to within hailing distance of LIBERTY and an Israeli officer hailed LIBERTY in English. He asked LIBERTY if she wanted help. The offer was declined. It was now 1440…”.

When Ennes called this 1440 statement “baloney” and said that the offer of help did not come until 1640, he was strongly criticized by the CAMERA writers in their March 2002 letter.

The only trouble was that back in 1967, after the attack but before the Naval Court Hearing, in the LIBERTY Deck Log McGonagle himself changed the time of the first offer of aid from 1440 to 1503.

This had some comic results. First, those who had sworn to 1440 as the first offer of aid (under oath) quickly changed their minds (although they had criticized crewman Lloyd Painter for not standing by his under-oath testimony.)(Secondly, those who switched from 1440 to 1503 did not explain, or change their former testimony. So any reader of Cristol will find two places where the offer comes at 1440, and one (TIME LINE) where, without explanation, it then comes at 1503. Third, Chief Thompson never changed his testimony as far as I can learn; perhaps he still stands up for 1440. If so, CAMERA can arrange a debate between him and Cristol over the proper time. Fourth, Ennes was right on this particular point, so his critics can now apologize to him.

The attempt to unravel this problem of the time leads us to footnote 211, page 427 in Cristol’s work. Reading this footnote is somewhat like going backstage while a play is in progress and seeing the play from a new angle. The footnote discusses a wide range of possible times for the offer of help. When “1503″ is finally chosen, we wonder about the elaborate and specific background to the “1440″time. These detailed descriptions were apparently false and manufactured for the occasion.

(3) “1503″. This time seems to have been chosen by McGonagle not because anything actually happened at this time, but because it is a convenient time and allows the various bureaucracies to coordinate their records.

(4) “1640″. This is the time chosen in the IDF History much later (1982) as the time when the MTBs first offered help, and is probably the accurate time, since it is also the time stated by the crewmen. Of course the attack of the MTBs had stopped long before 1640.

I have gone into this issue at some length because CAMERA insisted, with a flourish of drums and trumpets, and much elaborate documentation, that 1440 was the chosen time; and then they later quickly dropped it.

D. RESCUE FLIGHTS; LAUNCHES AND RECALLS.

This topic seems to be mired in chaos and confusion. According to Cristol there were six flights launched toward LIBERTY, and all were recalled:

(1) Flight at 1450 from SARATOGA, recalled at 1455 and back on the carrier by 1500.

(2) At about 1516, according to Cristol, Martin ordered flights launched from both carriers (SARATOGA and AMERICA).

(3) At 1545, “second flight” from both carriers, recalled a few minutes later. (P. 207).

(4) At 1602, SARA deck log shows launch and recovery of aircraft.

(5) At about 1616, both carriers launched planes.

(6) 1630 Saratoga launches second “Ready group”. Recalled at l7l5 or slightly earlier.

More details on these flights:

(1) The flight at 1450 , recalled at 1455, is the most important and the most puzzling. According to Cristol, as soon as ADM Geis launched it he had second thoughts and after consultation with ADM Martin recalled the flight, “perhaps worried about starting World War III”. This is a strange comment. Why would the first flight be more likely than later flights to set off World War III? Also, the word “perhaps” above is a clue to the fact that Cristol apparently never discussed this with ADM Martin later.

There are problems here not yet resolved, or even clearly stated.

(a) If Geis, or Geis and Martin together, canceled the rescue flight on their own while the ship was under attack, this was an enormous responsibility and an act unprecedented in American naval history. On the other hand, if they did this in coordination with LBJ and McNamara, this is not recorded in the White House documents for June 8 and is a hidden history yet to be uncovered.

This is the point where the testimony of Captain Tully and LCDR Dave Lewis should be presented, to give the LIBERTY men’s argument on this subject. Instead Cristol does not mention them at this point and blurs their claims by silence.

(2) At about 1516, according to Cristol, Martin ordered flights launched from both carriers. The problem with this is that Captain Don Engen, commanding AMERICA, says that his carrier was in the midst of a training exercise and could not launch for an hour, or until 1550. (WINGS AND WARRIORS, P. 320). Therefore this launch from AMERICA was impossible.

(3) 1545 “second flight” from both carriers, recalled a few minutes later (p. 207, Cristol). No information on who launched it or why it was recalled.

)4) At 1602, as stated above, SARA deck log showed launch and recovery of aircraft. LIBERTY not mentioned in connection with this flight and Cristol provides no further information. (P. 79, Cristol).

(5) At about 1616, both carriers launched planes. This is 86 minutes from the original launching of 1450 and COULD be the flight after 90 minutes delay which Tully spoke about, except for the intervening flights listed above at 1516, 1545 and 1602. Cristol, p.56.

(6) At 1630, SARATOGA launches second “Ready group” as noted above. McNamara recalled this at about 1715 (from the White House Situation Room) just about when it would have reached the ship. Cristol says that Martin had already recalled the flight but he does not say when. Cristol, p. 411, TIME LINE.

The launching and recall of these numerous flights is very difficult to track. The flights are brought together in this summary, but are scattered among various pages in Cristol’s dissertation. It almost seems that the sky would have been full of planes. At one time around 1620 one flight of planes headed toward LIBERTY would have passed, going in the opposite direction, another flight heading home after being recalled.

The confusion about flights and recalls has barely begun with the above outline. There is still the problem of orders from the White House to cancel the flights. Cristol says (p. 207) that in 1967 the US did not have the technical ability to make a telephone call from the White House to a ship in the Mediterranean. He then contradicts himself by saying (p. 411) that McNamara sent an order to the fleet by telephone from the Situation Room in the White House.

The statements by Cristol and by McNamara at this point in our story are absolutely astonishing. Both men breezily contradict themselves without hesitation. First, as just noted above, Cristol says emphatically that telephone calls from the White House to ships in the Mediterranean were absolutely impossible. Almost immediately he forgets his own statement and tells of McNamara making such calls. Secondly, McNamara is recorded by Cristol as making these calls. (p. 55, Cristol: “Sec. McNamara sent a message to the Sixth Fleet to recall the naval aircraft en route to the LIBERTY”; p.411, Cristol: “Sec McNamara sends order to recall second “ready group” from the Situation Room of the White House”).

McNamara then says, astoundingly, in a personal interview with Cristol on 12/17/93, that “he never spoke on the telephone to anyone in the Sixth Fleet on that day (June 8 ) and specifically not to ADM Geis”. Cristol, p, 207, p. 243, fn 21.

If Cristol had wanted to prove McNamara to be a liar at this point, it would have been easy; there are McNamara’s own statements, and the testimony of Julian Hart (my book, p. 3l8). (Hart was a CPO in Morocco who patched McNamara’s call to Sixth Fleet through and overheard part of it. Cristol does not mention Hart).

But Cristol is entirely passive (or gullible?) and does not question McNamara’s statements that he (A) did and (B) did not make these calls.

This is the most astonishing thing about Cristol, illustrated here: he simply has no interest in pursuing leads, pointing out contradictions (except those of the LIBERTY men) or doing any of the investigative work which an historian is supposed to be doing. Far from being the “rigorous research” which his followers claim, his research is timid and hollow.

E. THE NAVAL COURT. (Cristol minimizes or omits important facts about the Naval Court. He also misrepresents the position of ADM Melvin Staring of JAG who was to review the record).

Cristol mentions the Naval Court along with the other US and Israeli investigations which, he claims, prove that the attack on the LIBERTY was accidental. It is true that the findings of the court support Cristol’s argument, but the complete record is more complicated. In looking at any government record we must consider its background, the later criticisms made of it (either officially or unofficially) and internal contradictions or internal evidence which does not support the findings

A fuller examination of the Court requires attention to: (1) ADM Kidd’s contacts with the crewmen before their testimony; (2) The atmosphere in the hearing; (3) The question of whether the findings were backed by evidence; (4) Written statements by the crew which were added to testimony; (5) The reception of the record of the Naval Court by the Judge Advocate General’s office in London.

(1) Cristol says (p.59) that Kidd came on board LIBERTY at Malta, and also says (p.86) that he came on board at sea on June 12, before it had reached Malta. This is a minor error, but more importantly he does not seem to know (and in my opinion does not want to know) about Kidd’s threats and intimidation toward the crewmen, testified to by a dozen crew members. The men were told to say nothing about the attack that was not exactly like the official record which was soon to be released. These threats to the men were of fines, demotion, imprisonment “and worse”. The men say that these threats were so intimidating that they were afraid to speak up in the court hearing. If Cristol knows of these matters, he has never mentioned them. If he does not know, then important evidence concerning the Naval Court is missing from his account.

(2) The atmosphere in the court was sometimes rebellious and some crewmen were forced to leave the room. Cristol says nothing of this.

(3) The crewmen complain that some findings were not supported by evidence. For instance, all men questioned on the matter said that the flag was standing out in the wind, but a finding said that the flag may have drooped. Even Cristol in his account notes this discrepancy

(4) At the end of the hearing, sixty-five men who had not been questioned by the court were told by Kidd that they could submit written statements on the attack. Cristol has never mentioned these statements.

(5) The reception of the court record by JAG in London shows the greatest gap between the official views of the incident and the views of the crewmen. The record went to the London headquarters of CINCUSNAVEUR. There it was assigned for review to ADM Melvin Staring, Navy Flag Officer for the Judge Advocate General. As it turned out, unknown to the crewmen until many years later, Staring would agree with much of their views.(Staring is now part of a newly formed Liberty Alliance which wants a full Congressional investigation of the attack.)

Staring began his review, but it quickly became apparent that the survey would be difficult and time consuming. Early review produced pages of notes and questions which Staring felt he must resolve or comment upon before passing the record on to Washington.

Staring later told how he had worked on the transcript for two days and nights when he received word from ADM McCain, commander of CINCUSNAVEUR, that the work must be completed at once. When Staring replied that this was impossible, he was told that he would be relieved of his assignment and that endorsement of the record would be completed elsewhere in the staff. He ceased work and delivered the record to McCain’s office. He therefore never completed his study and analysis.

Staring later saw a copy of the endorsement which CINCUSNAVEUR had signed and sent on to Washington. He says that those who had replaced him had not dealt with the numerous problems, questions and inconsistencies which he had found to be so prevalent in the record. Their work, in his opinion, was low caliber. Since Staring was the senior Navy lawyer on the CINCUSNAVEUR staff, he knew that his superiors in Washington would assume that he was responsible for the report. Considering his professional reputation and integrity to be at risk, he at once communicated personally and informally with the Judge Advocate General of the Navy, informing him of the facts and making it clear that he had neither prepared the endorsement of the Naval Court nor been given an opportunity to conduct a complete review.

The Naval Court record, then, failed to pass muster with the legal officer assigned to first review it. However, this Court record, minimizing the attack (in the view of the crewmen) remains as the “evidence” to which the defenders of the Johnson White House and the Israeli Government point in making their case and opposing the claims of the LIBERTY crew.

We should note how Cristol, as chief defender of the official history, deals with this record. He never contacted or interviewed ADM Staring on this matter, but instead claimed that Staring was a “perfectionist” who was disturbed by “typos” in the record and for this reason could not complete his review. (Cristol, p.87, p. 153 fn 3). Staring, who was concerned with substance and not typos, was irate over this falsehood and so should be all who read about the incident.

F. THE TWENTY KNOT RULE

Although Captain Ernest Castle later became a friend and advocate of Cristol, in June 1967 he mercilessly ridiculed the Israeli reports and claims. He was especially critical of the Israeli “Twenty Knot Rule” which was stated as part of the Ram Ron Report from Israel to the US on June l8. This rule states: “Israel doctrine allowed any unidentified ship moving faster than 20 knots to be considered as hostile”. (P. 79, my work). Castle noted that Israeli Col. Efrat who was reading the Ram Ron Report to Castle “could not help noticing my look of surprise and incredulity”. In forwarding the Report to Washington, Castle added his own evaluation: “The standing order to attack any ship moving at more than 20 knots is incomprehensible”.

Cristol says that under Israeli naval doctrine, any ship moving faster than 20 knots was presumed to be a warship; this is why the radar readings for the ship of 28 and 30 knots were so important. p. 315, Cristol, fn 14 on p. 348. However, in this footnote there is the statement “US naval doctrine at that time made the same conclusion”. There is no further documentation. It seems strange than a US naval attaché did not know of, and found “incomprehensible” a rule which was supposed to be part of US naval doctrine. It is also odd that Cristol does not cite any document.

It seems likely here that Cristol is bluffing to make a small point and he has no documents to back up his claim.

G. EL QESIR.

Israelis and supporters of Israel have argued ever since June 1967 that the Egyptian horse carrier El Qesir closely resembles LIBERTY and that the two ships could easily be mistaken for one another. This claim was made in the Bloch Report, the RAM Ron Report, the Yerushalmi Report, the IDF History, the ATLANTIC MONTHLY article and Cristol’s dissertation, as well as in the CIA Report of June 13, 1967. The idea that the two ships resembled one another was denied and ridiculed by most American commentators, including Col. Hoppe (retired from US Air Force Intelligence), Clark Clifford, Robert Salans of the US State Dept., and Robert K. Smith, Ernst Castle also in 1967 ridiculed this claim of resemblance.

One remarkable fact stands out in this debate. The commentators who deny that LIBERTY could have been mistaken for QESIR cite specific facts in their arguments: lengths, tonnage and silhouettes of the ships. The partisans of Israel are less specific and more vague in their claims.

One basic fact is this: In 35 years of debate, the partisans of Israel have never been able to bring themselves to state the length and tonnage of QESIR in their writings. The Egyptian ship is little more than half the length of LIBERTY: It is 275 feet long compared to LIBERTY’S 445 foot length. QESIR is one fourth the tonnage of LIBERTY. In scores of pages on the subject over 35 years, written by partisans of Israel, any reader will search in vain to find out these simple facts.

When there are no measurements given for QESIR, the reader might turn to pictures or silhouettes of the ships for a comparative view. He will find these in the IDF History and in Cristol, p. 282. He will also find that the picture of QESIR has been scaled up to represent it as being the same length as LIBERTY. When there are no stated measurements for QESIR, and there are only these faked pictures or silhouettes for comparison, the reader will be misled into a false acceptance of the resemblance of the two ships, which is what the Israeli spokesmen want. It is possible to cheat and lie with pictures as well as words, and this is a good example.

H. NARROWING THE FIELD OF INQUIRY.

There is, in Cristol’s account, constant narrowing of the legitimate field of inquiry.

1

(1) Cristol announces that he is going to confine himself as much as possible to documents created in June 1967. The crew were silenced during June 1967 and not able to make any kind of statement except with the approval of the Navy, so this is a kind of double whammy for the crew. They suffered in silent frustration as they saw both the Israeli and US governments make pronouncements about the attack. (In fact, the June 1967 restriction was a flexible one for Cristol; he abandoned it when he had an opportunity to speak, years later, to Israeli pilots and MTB crewmen.)

(2) This was not the end of Crystal’s restrictions. There were important documents from the June 1967 period, favorable to the crew’s views, which Cristol ignores.

(a) Walt Rostow wrote a memo to LBJ on the evening of June 8 stating that “Evron (No.2 man at the Israeli embassy in Washington) took the hint which I wove into conversation on other matters and apparently passed it along to Harmon (Israeli ambassador)”. If the President was sending a message to Israel concerning LIBERTY (as was the case here), why was it necessary to “hint” rather than to speak directly? Although Cristol spends much time in his Introduction telling how he intends to look in every corner and turn over every rock, etc., he has managed to restrain his curiosity in this case and has never mentioned this mystery. (See my dissertation, p. 47).

(b) Castle report to Kidd 6/15/67 describes how the US embassy in Tel Aviv interviewed an Israeli naval officer who took part in the attack on LIBERTY as a crew member of one of the MTBs, and this officer gave an account of the attack which contradicted official Israeli accounts. This officer said that the MTBs, on patrol, saw LIBERTY under attack from Israeli aircraft and rushed to join the attack. There was no reference in this story to QESIR, to radar readings on the MTBs, to signals between the ship and MTBs, or to the Israeli Navy calling in the Air Force. Here is a radically different story which cannot be reconciled with other Israeli stories. Here too Cristol has managed to curb his curiosity and has never mentioned this document. (My dissertation, p. 80).

(c} John Borne

This report comes from a website that has a “virus warning” whether real or not but may be found in the Bing search under “A. Jay Cristol”.