It was the Third Arab-Israeli War.
Israel was fighting a war on multiple fronts against namely Egypt, Syria and Jordan.
The Arab coalition were also supported by troops from Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Lebanon.
This conflict became known as the Six-Day War as the conflict ended in 6 days
with an Israeli victory.
A U.S navy ship USS Liberty, hull number GTR 5 was about 13 nautical miles or 24 kilometers
off the coast of the Sinai peninsula.
Officially, USS Liberty was an auxiliary technical research ship.
Unofficially, the crew onboard USS Liberty comprises personnel from the U.S Navy,
U.S Marine Corps and the NSA.
USS Liberty was a ship that specializes in SIGINT operations.
Liberty was a state-of-the-art intelligence-gathering vessel of the time and what we did is
we were a listening ship.
My name is Lloyd Painter, I was a research officer.
We could send—we could receive any signal that was out there, low band, high band, anything,
intercepting it, recording it.
I'm Jim Kavanagh, I was a communication technician aboard the USS Liberty and
I intercepted Morse code.
We're spies, I mean we're intercepting messages from embassies, military bases, police, anything
and everything that we could get.
At the start of the war on 5th June, General Yitzhak Rabin had informed Commander Ernest
Carl Castle that Israel would defend its coast including sinking unidentified ships, asking
the U.S to keep its ships away from Israel's shore.
Israeli Central Coastal Command received the sighting report about an unidentified destroyer
west of Gaza.
USS Liberty was spotted by an Israeli aircraft.
Israeli Supreme Command received the report that Arish was being bombarded from the sea.
Another report came in, saying that 2 ships were approaching the Arish coast.
Division 914 received orders to patrol the area.
General Yitzhak Rabin was concerned that an Egyptian amphibious landing could outflank
Israeli forces.
He gave his standing order to sink any unidentified ships in the area.
The torpedo boats led by Commander Moshe Oren reported a target moving west at a speed of
30 knots.
At that time, only warships could be sailing over the speed of 20 knots.
Thinking it was an Egyptian destroyer fleeing after shelling Arish, the torpedo boats gave
chase but could not catch up to it.
Commander Oren requested air support to intercept the ship.
2 Israeli Mirage III had arrived at the location and spotted USS Liberty.
Upon receiving clearance to attack, the Israeli Mirage IIIs attacked the ship with their cannons
and rockets.
Shortly after, another 2 Israeli fighter-bombers arrived and dropped napalm bombs.
USS Liberty tried to radio the US 6th Fleet for help.
We tried to communicate with the 6th Fleet and we could not get a signal across.
Israeli pilots noticed the ship wasn't fighting back.
They tried to identify the ship but mistakenly identified her.
As the 3 Israeli torpedo boats arrived at the location, they attempted to contact USS
Liberty via radio and naval flags, signaling the ship to "identify yourself".
USS Liberty responded with an Aldis lamp, a response similar to Egyptian destroyer
Ibrahim el Awal.
Seeing the torpedo boats in battle formation, USS Liberty Captain William McGonagle
ordered to fire their machine guns at the torpedo boats.
Coming under fire, the Israeli torpedo boats returned fire and launched 5 torpedoes.
USS Liberty Captain William McGonagle eventually managed to send a distress message out.
As the torpedo boats closed in, they finally established the ship's identity via
the hull number.
Meanwhile, the US 6th fleet had received USS Liberty's distress message
and launched 8 aircraft.
The aircraft were subsequently recalled and an apology was issued.
There were many discussions as to whether the attack was deliberate or not.
USS Liberty crew pointed out that they hoisted the American flag and the hull number was
clearly visible.
But Israeli jets were flying as high as 3000 feet and at high speed.
Egyptian warships were also known to disguise their identity by replacing Arabic letters
with Western markings.
The crew believed their communications were jammed by the Israelis,
but it is possible that USS Liberty's antenna was damaged during the attack.