The Maddox and the Moonbats

The USS Maddox was an Allen M. Sumner class destroyer that first saw action in the Pacific in November 1944. She was hit by a kamakaze on 21 January 1945 in which seven men were killed. The Maddox DD-731 also deployed during the Korean War were one of her duties was escorting the battleship USS Missouri. My step-father served aboard the Maddox for the duration of the Korean War. He told me that their standing orders were that if a torpedo was spotted heading for the Missouri they were supposed to intervene and take the hit.

The Maddox is most famous for being attacked by North Vietnamese Motor Torpedo Boats (MTBs) in the Gulf of Tonkin. This incident led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, more properly the Southeast Asia Resolution, where President Johnson was given authorization by Congress to go to war defending South Vietnam from Communist aggression:

North Vietnam's leaders, who knew from their own intelligence sources about the American connection to Operation 34A, were determined not to bend to U.S. pressure. Hanoi directed its navy, which had not been able to catch the fast PTFs, to attack the slower American destroyer. On the afternoon of 2 August, the Communists dispatched three Soviet-built P-4 motor torpedo boats against Maddox. Torpedoes launched from the P-4s missed their mark. Only one round from enemy deck guns hit the destroyer; it lodged in the ship's superstructure. The North Vietnamese naval vessels were not so fortunate. Shellfire from Maddox hit the attackers. Then F-8 Crusader jets dispatched from the aircraft carrier USS Ticonderoga (CVA 14) strafed all three P-4s and left one boat dead in the water and on fire.

This last Thursday Ehren Watada's father, Bob Watada, made some comments at Hilo's Palace Theater before the showing of the pro-Islamist victory film, Sir! No Sir!. Among other "anti-war" cliches and lies, Watada said this:

Speaking of the incident that propelled the United States into the Vietnam War, "I found it hard to believe that 12 fishing ships in the Gulf of Tonkin could fire a torpedo at Navy ships," Bob Watada said.

That's the left's definition of history: those kook conspiracy theories that confirm to their anti-American bigotry. The mayor of Hawaii County Harry Kim was also there, where he courageously came out against war, "I consider war the greatest failure of mankind." I understand next week Mayor Kim is going to take a strong public stand in opposition to drowning puppies.

Crossposted at The Dougout