FOIA: Summary of DRV Naval Communications Revealing Pre-Planned Attacks on USS Maddox

relea00131.pdf
Summary of DRV Naval Communications Revealing Pre-Planned Attacks on USS Maddox
This document is a summary of the attacks on the USS ships in the Gulf of Tonkin in August 1964. Much has been blanked out. It contains a number of reports between the 1st and 7th of August 1964.
Document date: 1964-08-07
Department: NSA Headquarters, Ft. Meade, MD (DIRNSDA)
Author: SIGINT
Document type: Report
pages: 13


Archivist's Notes: This report discusses DRV Naval communications between 1-5 August 1964. It also discusses the attacks on the US fleet patrolling international waters. It also offers irrefutable evidence that this was a planned attack and the aggressive intent was known at 16:27 ZULU on 01 August 1964. The initial attack took place on 02 August 1964 at 08:02 ZULU.




[edit on 3/17/2008 by JacKatMtn]

This document is a summary of intercepted communications from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) during the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. The intent of the report is to show that the attacks on the US Destroyers were intentional and pre-planned. DRV communications dated Aug.1st, 1964 show the intent to engage with the “enemy”, but do not name the US directly, so the report includes another communication were they were tracking US ships at this time and conclude they are referring to the US.

Other separately released Situation Reports were also included in the summary up until Aug. 8th. They describe communications from the DRV on damage inflicted to the enemy including shooting down planes during an air strike by the US. The fourth report described an attempt to fire on US ships to provoke them into territorial waters.

After the sixth page, the remaining pages were either censored or left blank.

This report was probably offered as evidence when the US Government was investigating the attacks and considering a response. The result of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident lead to a resolution by the same name, which gave President Lyndon Johnson authority to provide military support for ally countries in the area and ultimately led to the Vietnam War.

Related FOIA Document:
FOIA: DRV attack on US Ships in Gulf of Tonkin; 2 - 4 August 1964
FOIA: Gulf of Tonkin Situation Report No. 2
FOIA: Gulf of Tonkin Situation Report No. 3
FOIA: Gulf of Tonkin Situation Report No. 4 - 9 August 1964

Here are a few other links to related reports.

Related FOIA Documents:
FOIA: DRV attack on US Ships in Gulf of Tonkin; 2 - 4 August 1964
FOIA: SIGINT Reflections of DRV Attacks on USS Maddox - 08/08/1964

Other Readiness Reports:
FOIA: SIGINT Readiness Bravo, Lantern Report Number 1
FOIA: 2/G11/VHN/R07-64 SIGINT Readiness Bravo Report Nr 2
FOIA: 2/G11/VHN/R08-64 SIGINT Readiness Bravo Lantern Report Nr 3
FOIA: 2/G11/VHN/R28-64 SIGINT Readiness Bravo Lantern Report Nr. 4
FOIA: 2/G11/VHN/R09-64 SIGINT Readiness Bravo Lantern Report Nr 5