USS Maddox (DD-731)

s- and blame it on Castro so that we can use that as a justification to invade Cuba." Now, y- y- you know, it was only stopped because President Kennedy said, "No, I won't do that." But the Joint Chiefs of Staff wanted to do this in '62.

Two years later, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara claimed an August 4th attack on, on, uh, the USS Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin, uh, which by the way, the national, the NSA's own historians says never happened, claimed the, you know, this was an attack on an American ship.

He wanted the war.

McNamara got it.

The connection between these two operations would prove critical to understanding what followed.

On August 2nd, 1964, the USS Maddox was conducting a patrol in the Gulf of Tonkin when it found itself approached by three North Vietnamese torpedo boats.

The previous night, South Vietnamese commandos had launched attacks on installations on the islands of Hanmei and Han Niu.

From the North Vietnamese perspective, the presence of an American destroyer so close to their waters immediately after these raids wasn't coincidental.

But then there's the Bay of Tonkin, and the Bay of Tonkin is a really awkward example to bring up in this case, because we now know today from r- from records from the Pentagon, from statements that, uh, Defense, uh, Secretary McNamara made, um, now that he is allowed to say these things because of, um, been, uh, past the time in which the secrecy, uh, rules were applied.

So we know that there was a ship docked in the Bay of Tonkin, the USS Maddox.

I think this is in 1964.

It claimed to have received fire, and that was the basis for expanding the Vietnam War.

Well, the attacks that happened on U.S. forces, there was a small boat, a torpedo boat.

And one of the guys on the boat, the USS Maddox was inside the Vietnamese territory.

And one of the boats drove by and one of the guys shot a rifle at the U.S. asthmatics.

And maybe he nicked some paint off the side of it, but it was no noticeable damage.

Uh, for instance, in 1964, in this period I'm talking about, we've got maybe, I don't know, 10, 15,000 so-called advisors in Vietnam, but they're v- really, they're military guys.

And so, uh, Johnson is convinced that he has to go and make war, so they have this, they have this incident in 1964 where a US destroyer named Ma- the USS Maddox and a couple of v- North Vietnamese speed boats with, uh, with, uh, torpedoes supposedly attack this destroyer.

Johnson says that's an act of war.

Mm-hmm.

Well, most people, I don't know.

I think the Bigfoot thing, you know, is is like pretty unlikely or like I give you like other most psyops are easy to figure out, like the Gulf of Tonkin or something created the auspices around, you know, invading Vietnam where like I think it was like the first thing was like an attack on the USS Maddox and then.

There's like a second attack under LBJ.

And it was just like a weather event.

Gulf of Tonkin.

The USS Maddox is, is a, a ship of war, and it is stationed there.

And it is apparently fired upon by the North Vietnamese.

Except that never happened.

The president accomplished this by working with the CIA and other intelligence agencies to stage the Gulf of Tonkin incident, where it was reported that U.S. destroyers were attacked by the North Vietnamese.

What was true about the incident was that the USS Maddox was targeted by North Vietnamese torpedo boats on August second, nineteen sixty-four.

In this attack, there was no damage to the Maddox and no American sailor was hurt.

What was untrue was the second attack, which never happened.