wrote in message om...
(Issac Goldberg) wrote in message . com...
According to Captain Boston, he and Admiral Kidd were
ordered in advance of the inquiry to conclude it was an
accident by President Johnson and Secretary of Defense
McNamara. That is, the Court of Inquiry was a sham which
produced a whitewash.

And you believe that the admiral just rolled-over, played
dead, and did not protest.

You have a pretty low opinion of your Navy's commanders.

Capt Boston's own words:

"...Admiral Kidd told me, after returning from Washington, D.C. that
he had been ordered to sit down with two civilians from either the
White House or the Defense Department, and rewrite portions of the
court's findings. ..."

"...I have no reason to doubt the accuracy of that statement as I know
that the Court of Inquiry transcript that has been released to the
public is not the same one that I certified and sent off to
Washington. ..."

"... Finally, the testimony of Lt. Painter concerning the deliberate
machine gunning of the life rafts by the Israeli torpedo boat crews,
which I distinctly recall being given at the Court of Inquiry and
included in the original transcript, is now missing and has been
excised. ..."

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Boston's sworn statement that Lt. Painter testified to the MGing of
the liferafts, but his testimony was not included in the NCOI report
is especially interesting. Here is an excerpt from an article
critical of the Liberty crew, basically calling them liars. The
article authors go after Painter, saying he testified to one thing in
court, but now tells another story. But Boston's sworn whatever
confirms what Painter is saying, that what he testified to was not
included in the final NCOI report!

http://world.std.com/~camera/docs/alert/hchannel2.html

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• The producers present at face value Mr. Painter's charge that
Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned Liberty life rafts that had been
placed in the water, which if true could be a violation of the laws of
war:

PAINTER: I climbed the ladder and opened the hatch and looked out to
the sea, and what I saw was the Israeli torpedo boats machine gunning
our life rafts in the water as they floated behind our ship.

Once again Mr. Painter contradicts both his own sworn testimony before
the Court of Inquiry, and that of his Captain. The Court's opening
question to Lt. Painter, after name, rank and organization, was:

On 8 June 1967, at about 1400 hours, an incident occurred aboard the
USS Liberty in which the vessel was attacked. Would you please relate
to this Court of Inquiry what you recall concerning that incident?

Nowhere in his response did Lt. Painter mention anything about Israeli
attacks on life rafts in the water. On the contrary, he testified that
most of the life rafts had been damaged and set alight during the
prior jet attacks on the ship, and that his crew pushed many of these
burning life rafts overboard:

At this time [after the torpedo attack], the DC central passed the
word to prepare to abandon ship. We then filed out to our life rafts
which were no longer with us because they had been strafed and most of
them were burned, so we knocked most of them over the side... All
during this time in Repair Three, my men were fighting fires and
knocking burning life rafts, etc.

What possible reason could Lt. Painter have had for omitting in his
testimony the charge which he now makes, that Israel attacked the
Liberty's life boats after they were put in the water? Why does he now
fail to mention that in fact he and his crew pushed the life rafts
overboard?

Whatever the reason for the divergence between Mr. Painter's present
claims and his testimony, Captain McGonagle also never mentioned any
attack on life boats during his testimony. On the contrary, he
testified that after the torpedo attack some crewmen mistakenly put
life boats in the water, and that he ordered them to stop because the
ship was in no danger of sinking:

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