Gulf of Tonkin incident

Shocking faked prelude to the Vietnam War

- by John Hamer

The Gulf of Tonkin is a body of water that lies off the coast of North Vietnam. This was the staging area of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, which included the American destroyers the Maddox, C. Turner Joy and the aircraft carrier USS Ticonderoga. It was also the site that would eventually lead to full scale U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

Throughout the engagement, Maddox and Turner Joy fired 249 5-inch shells, including 24 star shells, and 123 3-inch rounds. The two destroyers also dropped 4 or 5 depth charges, one of which failed to detonate, against boats following in their wakes. The entire engagement lasted about four hours.

'American Planes Hit North Vietnam after Second Attack on Our Destroyers; Move Taken to Halt New Aggression,' announced the Washington Post on August 5, 1964. That same day, the front page of the New York Times reported: 'President Johnson has ordered retaliatory action against gunboats and "certain supporting facilities in North Vietnam" after renewed attacks against American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.'

But there was no second attack by North Vietnam and no 'renewed attacks against American destroyers', either. By reporting these fairy tales as absolute truths, American journalism opened the floodgates for the bloody Vietnam War. The official story was that, in what was to become known as 'The Gulf of Tonkin Incident', the alleged catalyst for the Vietnam War, North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an 'unprovoked attack against a U.S. destroyer on routine patrol' on August 2, and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a deliberate attack on U.S. ships two days later.