They did not attempt to blame Egypt. In fact, the Navy misidentified the ship as Egyptian. The transcripts of the pilots repeatedly showed them misidentifying the ship until one of the pilots basically called out that an Egyptian ship would never have Latin numerals on it, and couldn't have been Arab. You should read the pilot's transcripts. They immediately tried to apologize and offer assistance to the Liberty. Assistance which the Liberty, correctly, declined.
The Liberty was an intelligence ship that was spying on Israeli troop movements because the Israelis had hidden the war preparation from the Americans. The Navy lied to Israel about the position of the ship, and the Israeli Navy claimed that they had been shelled by an Egyptian cruiser in the vicinity of where the Liberty ended up being.
So, yes, it was reckless incompetence where the pilots even asked "Is it American" because they knew that the American navy was in the region and they didn't want to hit it, but the Navy had misidentified it and was rushing to sink it.
Still can't take away anything from the unquestionably heroic efforts for the crew to keep the ship afloat. Really impossible shit.
Just because they didn't end up blaming it on Egypt doesn't mean that wasn't the original plan. People have a tendency to assume that because something didn't happen that it wasn't intended to happen, or because something would require it to be a bad plan or poorly executed that it would have never been the plan at all. No, sometimes mistakes are made. It happens. Just because some otherwise capable entity botches something doesn't mean they didn't do it.
Proud US Navy tradition is their fire control, but reading the accounts of the crew is fucking harrowing. The ship had no armor, was dodging torpedoes, and was being ripped to shreds by 30 mmm cannon fire. They weren't returning fire, but it wouldn't have helped if they did. Fire control guys getting dismembered by those canon rounds while trying to put-out fires. The captain was severely wounded and the bridge nearly destroyed from one one the strafes. The ship was absolutely ravaged, and yet it still managed to avoid and out maneuver many of the torpedoes, even while crew were being machine gunned from the Israeli Navy boats.
There can be no doubt that the ship and crew of the USS Liberty acted in accordance with the highest traditions of the United States Navy, and was one of the finest, toughest, gutsiest defensive actions since the USS Laffey.
Yeah, fire control picked up from the British (without the "rate of fire at any cost" they developed) combined with damage control we more or less invented on our own is what has historically made US warships such a pain in the ass to deal with because they refuse to die and have accurate fire when they send it.
The whole Liberty incident is one of those things that I do hold against Israel, but not to the extent some of the other Groyper and other EthnoNat types do. After all, it was a very different situation to modern Israel (even if I agree with you that Israel is a real ally with its own interest instead of the "actually vassals" our other "allies" are nowadays), and even when it happened the US government (who didnt want to admit they had a spy ship in the area) effectively responded with "You are going to admit that was an accident, I am going to forget this ever happened, and you are going to accept that or else I am going to have to get real proportional around here."
They should have gotten their shit together. Honestly, I think they were just in a kind of "get some, kill kill kill" brain mode. The entire Israeli military went maximum effort for a continuous 72 hours it seemed like. That's good! But get your head out of your ass. The transcription I read came from a book covering the incident, and it mentioned that the pilots went on, like, 14 sorties after this incident, and it was the 3rd of the day. That's absolutely frenetic, but you've still got to positively identify your targets.
TBH, I'd be way more pissed off than Johnson was, who basically did fuck all. 34 dead and 137 wounded? Oh yeah. I'm not saying to need to cause casualties, but perhaps if the little cub Liberty gets smacked around, maybe Mama Bear "Sixth Fleet" should make a few runways magically disappear.
They did not attempt to blame Egypt. In fact, the Navy misidentified the ship as Egyptian. The transcripts of the pilots repeatedly showed them misidentifying the ship until one of the pilots basically called out that an Egyptian ship would never have Latin numerals on it, and couldn't have been Arab. You should read the pilot's transcripts. They immediately tried to apologize and offer assistance to the Liberty. Assistance which the Liberty, correctly, declined.
The Liberty was an intelligence ship that was spying on Israeli troop movements because the Israelis had hidden the war preparation from the Americans. The Navy lied to Israel about the position of the ship, and the Israeli Navy claimed that they had been shelled by an Egyptian cruiser in the vicinity of where the Liberty ended up being.
So, yes, it was reckless incompetence where the pilots even asked "Is it American" because they knew that the American navy was in the region and they didn't want to hit it, but the Navy had misidentified it and was rushing to sink it.
Still can't take away anything from the unquestionably heroic efforts for the crew to keep the ship afloat. Really impossible shit.
Just because they didn't end up blaming it on Egypt doesn't mean that wasn't the original plan. People have a tendency to assume that because something didn't happen that it wasn't intended to happen, or because something would require it to be a bad plan or poorly executed that it would have never been the plan at all. No, sometimes mistakes are made. It happens. Just because some otherwise capable entity botches something doesn't mean they didn't do it.
There doesn't seem to have been an original plan, that's what I'm trying to tell you. The Air Force transcripts show stupidity.
"We refuse to let the ship die, and will bitchslap Poseidon if we have to in order to keep her afloat."
As is US Naval tradition. To the point that losing the keel of the ship can be just a minor inconvenience.
Proud US Navy tradition is their fire control, but reading the accounts of the crew is fucking harrowing. The ship had no armor, was dodging torpedoes, and was being ripped to shreds by 30 mmm cannon fire. They weren't returning fire, but it wouldn't have helped if they did. Fire control guys getting dismembered by those canon rounds while trying to put-out fires. The captain was severely wounded and the bridge nearly destroyed from one one the strafes. The ship was absolutely ravaged, and yet it still managed to avoid and out maneuver many of the torpedoes, even while crew were being machine gunned from the Israeli Navy boats.
There can be no doubt that the ship and crew of the USS Liberty acted in accordance with the highest traditions of the United States Navy, and was one of the finest, toughest, gutsiest defensive actions since the USS Laffey.
Yeah, fire control picked up from the British (without the "rate of fire at any cost" they developed) combined with damage control we more or less invented on our own is what has historically made US warships such a pain in the ass to deal with because they refuse to die and have accurate fire when they send it.
The whole Liberty incident is one of those things that I do hold against Israel, but not to the extent some of the other Groyper and other EthnoNat types do. After all, it was a very different situation to modern Israel (even if I agree with you that Israel is a real ally with its own interest instead of the "actually vassals" our other "allies" are nowadays), and even when it happened the US government (who didnt want to admit they had a spy ship in the area) effectively responded with "You are going to admit that was an accident, I am going to forget this ever happened, and you are going to accept that or else I am going to have to get real proportional around here."
They should have gotten their shit together. Honestly, I think they were just in a kind of "get some, kill kill kill" brain mode. The entire Israeli military went maximum effort for a continuous 72 hours it seemed like. That's good! But get your head out of your ass. The transcription I read came from a book covering the incident, and it mentioned that the pilots went on, like, 14 sorties after this incident, and it was the 3rd of the day. That's absolutely frenetic, but you've still got to positively identify your targets.
TBH, I'd be way more pissed off than Johnson was, who basically did fuck all. 34 dead and 137 wounded? Oh yeah. I'm not saying to need to cause casualties, but perhaps if the little cub Liberty gets smacked around, maybe Mama Bear "Sixth Fleet" should make a few runways magically disappear.
DONT TOUCH THE BOATS