Disinformation in the Persian Gulf Discredits US Navy 44 Years After Gulf of Tonkin

By Tracy Dove, Ph.D
Editor, The Russia News Service

January 11, 2008

Ever since Iran presented itself as a qualified target in the War on Terrorism, the Bush Administration has orchestrated a silent campaign to draw lines in the sand and tempt the Islamic Republic to cross it. Speculation is running high that the Bush Administration in its final year has nothing to lose but its approval rating and may goad the Iranians into a military confrontation. Evidence of this strategy surfaced this week when the US Navy nearly wiped out an Iranian patrol boat group over a "threatening message". While the Iranians have come to their own defense with video footage of the exchange, other nations in the trajectory of American foreign policy haven't been so lucky. This escalation in the Persian Gulf reminds us of a similar naval incident in 1964 that gave President Johnson the starting point for a confrontation that would later be known as the Vietnam War.

Now that the hand wringing has abated, it turns out that either the US Navy exaggerated, or was simply exposed as the instigator in an act of military brinkmanship with the Iranian navy this weekend. In either case, the tacticians were clearly shortsighted of what might become of the incident if additional evidence were introduced. In a recently released video by the Iranian government, the footage reveals a normal exchange of communication between the patrol boat commanding officer and the US war ships in the area. This counters the Navy's recording of an unidentified voice threatening to "blow up the ships in 5 minutes". Despite the new audio-visual component the defense Department is defending its decision to label the confrontation an "international incident".

Expert speakers of Farsi- the language of Iran- now say that the recorded threat that the US released probably did not come from an Iranian, because the speaker had an accent. Further, on bridge-to-bridge communications it is impossible to isolate from where the radio signal is coming, so no smoking gun could be found. But premeditated action is justified in the afterworld of 9/11; in the build up to the Iraq War, the United States was accused of using exaggerated claims of imminent danger from Iraq to build support for the war. In the wake of the invasion, no weapons were found, but the political goal of removing Saddam Hussein was achieved. Analysts now agree that this was the original motive of the Bush Administration.

The issues of international waters are many, and they make a good gray area from which to operate if antagonizing your enemy into striking first is the objective. In the early months of 1964, the US Navy had already been operating covert missions along the North Vietnamese coast in support of South Vietnamese troops. On the nights of August 2 and 4, it was reported that North Vietnamese patrol boats had fired on two US naval ships, the Maddox and Turner Joy, which, if true, amounted to an attack on the United States in international waters. But the truth was buried under the political agenda of the Johnson Administration to knock a leg out from under Soviet expansion in the Third World. History has revealed that the first attack by the North Vietnamese did indeed occur, but that it was aggravated by the maneuvers of the US naval warships in the area. The second attack never even happened; thousands of pounds of ammunition were expelled into the empty seas, and shortly after this President Johnson appeared on national television to appeal for chaos and over-reaction. The Congress was quick to tow the party line and issued the famous "Gulf of Tonkin Resolution" which allowed Johnson to wage war for the rest of his term in office without ever declaring it.

The Gulf of Tonkin is widely held to be one of the greatest misuses of the US Navy in achieving foreign policy aims. Americans are quick to come to the defense of the armed forces whenever they are attacked, and Johnson's antics depleted the moral trust that the country had in its military. The incident this weekend in the Persian Gulf could have easily turned into a similar catalyst for another undeclared war, but luckily the cheap audio-visual technology of the 21st century prevented this from happening. The Iranians were careful to equip their patrol boats with cameras to record the incident from another angle; even if the "threatening words" were produced from that captain in the video, the David and Goliath imagery was hard to contest. The United States looked very secure in its nuclear armada, and the Iranian guards- however sinister they may be- looked like they were holding on to the edges of the boats for dear life.

In 1988, the US Navy shot down an Iranian passenger plane and killed all 290 people on board. The captain of the boat was not court-martialed for negligence- he was given a medal. Provocative actions in international waters occur at regular intervals, but the Persian Gulf is the current venue of fashion for the pounding of war drums. The United States must maintain- or rather, return to- the policy of never striking first in a conflict. The Pentagon should learn from the failures of Tonkin, not repeat them.

Tracy Dove, editor of The Russia News Service, is a Professor of History and Dean of Summer Programs for the Lessing Institute. He also teaches history at the Anglo-American College in Prague.

See all previous articles by Tracy Dove here.