The False Flag event that failed because of the courageous crew of the USS Liberty

Official secrecy in 1967 led to endless war in the Middle East, but, at last, the truth can set us free.

No time now for reading this?
Click on the headline to open in a new tab or window, for later convenient perusal.

Hello Free Thinkers and Truth Seekers,

All of us can readily detect propaganda in historical incidents from the distant past. Current propaganda, not so much.

Learning from past false flag events can help us see how we are being manipulated in the present. Here are just 2 examples:

Pearl Harbor
Enough time has passed so that now it’s common knowledge that FDR had been warned a number of times, by various sources, that the American fleet in Pearl Harbor would be a target, and yet he didn’t pass that intel on to the Naval leadership in Hawaii. When the Japanese struck, FDR finally had a good reason to immediately declare war against Japan, and therefore also against Germany and Italy.

9/11
This second example is still fresh in the national memory, but each passing year reveals more details showing how the Twin Towers attack could have been a False Flag event, rather than simply a sad disaster which clever propaganda could exploit to make war. “A 2020 survey by the University of Maryland’s Program for Public Consultation found that 27% of Americans believed that the 9/11 attacks were ‘orchestrated’ or ‘allowed to happen’ by the U.S. government or other powerful entities.”

And now, prepare to be sad about the intentional murder of 34 service men and the wounding of 171 of the USS Liberty’s crew, and to be:
• Shocked that Israel attacked their ally’s ship that day
• Grateful that surviving crew members are courageously telling us what really happened
• Relieved that LBJ’s war crime will finally be exposed

Watch here or read the transcript below:

4.5 million views in 5 days, posted 12-11-24

[Using the rough transcript provided by YouTube, yours truly put in punctuation, identified who said what, cleaned up the spelling of names and places, and removed all the uhs and repeated words, as well as cutting many of the ands and sos.]

Transcript

Candace Owens: All right, you guys, I'll get right into this. A couple of weeks ago I received a letter that changed my life, certainly changed the course of my life in politics and I am going to read you that letter now and let you know that the author of it is sitting across from me. It reads:

“My name is Philip Tourney. I am 77 years old today. On June 8^th, 1967, I was just 20 years old when the gallant crew of the USS Liberty was savagely attacked. Our American flag was proudly flying on our ship in the Mediterranean Sea that day. The designation “AGTR5” was clearly painted on the bow port and starboard sides. “USS Liberty” was written in English on her stern. When we arrived on June 7^th, we were overflown by Israeli reconnaissance aircraft. And the same activity was repeated on the morning of June 8^th. We were positively identified as American and friendly by the IDF [Israel Defense Forces].

“We had requested a destroyer escort long before we entered the Mediterranean but we were denied twice. Our captain assured us that we were clearly marked as American and we therefore had nothing to fear. We were alone 12½ miles off the coast of the Sanai Peninsula, always in international waters. The Israeli reconnaissance aircraft were clearly marked with the Star of David. We therefore felt secure, seeing a flying box car and other smaller recon propeller aircraft taking good care of us.

“The attack began at 2:00 on a beautiful bright sunny day by French-made Mirage and Mystère jets painted black with no markings. We had no clue who was attacking us but assumed it was an Arab state. During the first pass by, the jets took out all but one of our transmitting antennas, as well as every watertight door above the waterline. The air attack lasted about 25 minutes, killing and maiming our firefighters and any sailor who moved.

“Our radio man took one antenna offline so it wasn't transmitting and wasn't hit. He ran a long wire to it and the SOS went out to the Sixth Fleet it was even picked up as far away as Vietnam. “Rockstar, Rockstar, under attack by an unknown jet aircraft. Help us, help us.”

“Captain Tully, skipper of the USS Saratoga, sent jets to come to our aid. Before the jets hit the horizon, they were recalled by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. Captain Enyan, of the USS America, relaunched more aircraft to aid us. They were also recalled, this time by Lynden Baines Johnson himself said, quote “I don't care about a few dead sailors. I will not embarrass my ally, Israel. Return to base immediately” end quote.

“How did he know who was attacking us if we did not?! We were set up by our own government to let a foreign government have their way with us. The IDF even dropped napalm on the bridge of our ship. How low they would go we would soon find out. Three motor torpedo boats headed our way and one torpedo hit our starboard side we saw the star of David on the boats. They were there to sink us.

The attack continued for another hour and a half. Attacking jet aircraft destroyed all but three of our life rafts, which we had put overboard. We were going to place our most seriously wounded in them so that they would have a chance at life. But the IDF would have none of that. They shot two of them out of the water and took one aboard their boats as a trophy of the kill. They continued shooting and killing my mates.

“They left and we thought that it was over, but it wasn't. IDF helicopters were sent with troops armed and ready to board our ship and finish us off. Then they just left. I guess the gig was up when the mighty IDF could not sink our defenseless ship.

“When it was all done, there were over 821 rocket and cannon holes, and over 5,000 armor-piercing bullets riddling the ship. Napalm was burning us up and a 40 x 40-foot torpedo hole was in her side, causing the ship to list badly to our starboard side.

“We then waited 17 hours for help. I guess they hoped that we would sink that night. Help was only 40 minutes away from us, but they left us out alone to die. When the USS America and the USS Davis arrived to help us, they took our wounded to care for them. Their wounds were so horrific, words cannot explain.

“Admiral Kidd boarded our ship a few days later and the cover up immediately began. We were ordered to never speak of the attack to anyone, not even with one another. Penalties would be fines, imprisonment, or worse, and we all knew that “worse” meant death. We have been treated like garbage for the last 57 years.

“Congress has been bought and paid for with the exception, over the years, of a few brave lawmakers. Their names are Representatives Pete McCloskey, Paul Findley and Jim Traficant. As the courageous Representative Thomas Massie has noted all Republican members of Congress except for him have AIPAC handlers. We can assume this is also true [5:01] of nearly all Democrats.

“We are the most decorated ship in naval history for a single engagement. I believe God saved us that day to allow us to communicate the truth of this attack to leaders like you. We give all power to Jesus Christ. We are just his servants that horrible day and now.

“The USS Liberty survivors are the biggest whistleblowers this country has ever seen. We have been smeared as antisemitic Jew haters and Nazis. Our only sin is that we survived. We didn't kill anyone. Israel did all the murdering that day. And the US government did all the covering up. I'm asking you to help us save America by telling others the facts about the slaughter of my mates. We are begging you to support us.

“Respectfully, Phil Tourney, the president of the USS Liberty Veterans Association”

Candace: It's great honor to have you here today, thank you Phil.

Phil: This is a great honor for me to be here, and represent the gallant crew of the USS Liberty that have been treated so badly, as I said in the letter, for 57 years.

Candace: So I just want to start at the beginning. When did you sign up to be in the United States military?

Phil: I joined the Navy at 17 years old, in San Diego California, that’s where I went to boot camp. I did two tours Vietnam before I got aboard the USS Liberty, and I did three tours with her including her last, so that was my naval career. I got out the Navy and I wasn't working at the time. I thought I'd never go back in because why would I go back into a place where people are going to try to kill me?

But I wasn't working, I had baby, so I went back in and I got aboard the USS Maddox, DZ731, which was in the Tonkin Gulf, which was another false flag.

Candace: Just as a question, for most people just being in the Vietnam War, that was traumatizing enough, obviously. So you came back and you decided that you were still going to serve the country. When exactly did you find out that you were going to be aboard the USS Liberty?

Phil: I found out when I got orders to go to the east coast from the west coast. I was on an ammunition ship, the USS Makia AE22. I said, ‘Well, great, I'm going away to the east coast and I always wanted to go there anyway, so I ended up on the Liberty.

When I got aboard the Liberty they said it was a ship that mapped the bottom of the ocean, and I said ‘Wow how could that be when all the antennas are going straight up?’ But I was a dumb kid, I believed anything they told me until a few months after that, and I said, ‘No, this ain't right. We're a spy ship.’

Candace: Okay, so they initially … they don't even tell you the truth about why you're there… and they're like, “You're just here to map the bottom of the ocean.”

Phil: Yes, that's what they told me. But there were two different crews aboard that ship; there were 200 spies – CIA and NSA spies – and I was in ship's company, engineering, and there were a hundred of us, boatswains mates, cooks, to run the ship. Our only job, Candace, was to make sure that the communication technicians got where they had to go…

Candace: How long had you been aboard, before you went, ‘I don't really think that we're here to map the bottom of the ocean?’ Did they tell you, ‘Hey I'm actually in the CIA’ or ‘I'm in the NSA’?

Phil: No they didn't they didn't talk to us, and we didn't talk to them. We weren't allowed to, it was two different crews. We figured it out pretty quick what was going on. It was so secret, so very, very secret.

Candace: Just wondering how the setup was, were you sharing a room with four or five people? How does that work on the ship?

Phil: Well I was in a bunk room with about 70 men, that was Engineering. And up forward was the Boatswains mates. The spies were in the back of the ship.

Candace: So what's a typical day?

Phil: A typical day was: get up, take a shower, go to chow, go to work, stand your watches, and when we were out at sea, we'd sunbathe a lot, cuz we were always off the coast of Africa and we were doing a reconnaissance there up and down the coast, 4 or 5 miles an hour, all the time…. We’d go to different ports – Luanda, Angola, Abidjan, you name it, [10:05] all the ports on the west coast.

Candace: So it’s beautiful.

Phil: Oh my, was it ever. Great pineapples, everything was great. I love those people, they were good to us.

Candace: And you're also thinking, ‘This is very low risk, I'm being sent out here, it's a beautiful weather we're sunbathing, things are looking up.’

Phil: Yeah things were great, it was good duty. But on the last cruise, we were headed to Africa again just like we always did, we stopped in Abidjan – this was in June, we’d just gotten there, we got emergency orders to get everybody back aboard ship ASAP and we took off. We had no idea where we going. But the Six Day War was going on, we didn't know it.

Candace: At this point, just to be clear, how long had you been aboard the USS Liberty?

Phil: A little over two and a half years on the Liberty…. We headed to Spain, we picked up three Marines, they were linguists, and a civilian, Alan Blue– he was killed by the way– he was another linguist but he worked directly for the NSA.

Candace: You're in Spain now and then where do you go?

Phil: We head into the Mediterranean, go through the Rock of Gibraltar. All the ships were going this way, we’re the only one going that way.

Candace: And still not nobody's informing you about the Six Day War?

Phil: Yeah, we did find out that we were going into a war zone.

Candace: Prepare for anything?

Phil: We were prepared because Captain McGonagle trained all the time for different situations– chemical drills, fire, all kinds of different stuff.

Candace: And what's the general mood as you guys are heading towards there, the conversation between you and your shipmates?

Phil: Apprehension. In fact, we had the Star of Davids all over the ship, hoping that Israel would win because they were our best buddies in the whole wide world. Come to find out they weren't…. We got there on the 7^th and the Israelis started overflying us then, taking pictures of us. Same thing happened on the June the 8^th a flying box car, which is a two-engine plane, the doors were open you can see the cameraman taking pictures of us, so they're that close, they're that low. You could see the pilots, we would wave at them, they'd wave at us, very friendly, they would dip their wings like everything's great. We felt good because our best friends were there and we had no worries. I mean none at all, because they were going to protect us. But it ended up they didn't.

Candace: You had described in your letter saying that you had the American flag displayed. Can you describe for me … where it was displayed and also how large the flag was.

Phil: It was on the mast. The flag was brand new, it was a 5x8 flag, very visible. It was 12 knots going over across the deck you could see the flag and in fact the Israelis identified us as American and friendly.

Candace: How do you know that?

Phil: [Duh, besides the waving and wing dips?] We knew it because of the intercept we picked up and they admitted it themselves, we were on their war table, they identified us as American, but when they changed the watch, they forgot to tell the other Watch Commander that we were there. They took us off their war table, so we no longer existed.

Candace: When you say they ‘took [15:04] you off the war table’ I'm not familiar with that lingo. What does that mean?

Phil: … They have like different ships literally set up on a table … and they took us off. So we were gone to them … but they knew exactly what they were doing. When they overflew us, they took the pictures of all the ship, they know exactly what to hit and when to hit it. And, I might add, I think, and most my shipmates believe, that this attack was planned a year in advance.

Candace: A year in advance. What makes you say that?

Phil: Well, there was another spy ship in the area, the SS Valdes, it was a civilian-manned ship but it was owned by the Navy. It could have done the same thing that that we were doing, but they took him out of the area. Sinking the USS Liberty is a hell of a lot sexier than sinking the Valdes.

Candace: Why is that?

Phil: Well it's all American sailors and marines. They wanted this at the bottom, so they could blame it on the Arab states and bring us into World War III.

Candace: Now it's the morning of the 8^th and, like you said, on the 7^th they took pictures, they positively identified you, were able to hear this over the radio? Did they still have, at that moment, the CIA and NSA agents on board?

Phil: Yes

Candace: So we're talking about a pretty big sacrifice they were willing to make…. Total number of people?

Phil: 294 souls.

Candace: 294 souls… Take me through what happened on June 8^th.

Phil: We get up at 0600 and we take a shower, go to chow, and go to work. We had a damage control drill just before the attack, say about 1:00. I was in damage control, I was assistant on-scene leader in damage control, and I was in an impregnated suit which is a suit for washing down the ship of chemicals. It was very, very hot that day, I mean 100 degrees on the deck, or more, and I thought I was going to pass out…. Finally it was over with and I went and stowed my gear. The sound-powered head phones weren't working on the starboard gun mount… and I went to the IC shop and I got a friend of mine, David Skolak, he was an IC man [Interior Communications Electrician Fireman] and his job was to take care of the IC system there for sound-powered phones and the IC System intercoms on the ship, and he came up and the Gunner's mate was up there also, they were manning the guns, we were in a Condition 3, just in case, cuz we could see the bombs going off and everything on the Sinai, so we thought this is really not a good place to be.

Just as soon as I left that gun mount, about 30 seconds after I left it and I got back to my workstation, all hell broke loose. The attack began. I remember, “All hands get to your general quarter station, we're under attack, we're under attack.” And I got to my GQ station, which is in the front part of the ship and those two men that I just left there … were dead. They were blown to bits. Anything that moved aboard that ship was shot at. As in the letter, they took out all of our antennas within 3 seconds, our four 50-caliber machine guns were gone, every watertight door was hit, and this went on for 25 minutes, dropping napalm on us. I mean 25 minutes of that, you can't imagine every second was like an hour there was nowhere to hide, nowhere to run, and you got you got people [20:02] severely blown up, wounded badly, and it continued and continued for 25-30 minutes.

And then there was a lull. We saw the torpedo boats coming and we thought the Star of David, oh good, because these were unmarked aircraft, we didn't know who was attacking us, we thought it was the Arabs. When we saw … the Star of David, we thought ‘Oh man, here's our best friends coming to help us. No, they come to sink us.

Candace: When you talk about them dropping napalm, and they did this immediately… For people that are not aware, what is the purpose of that, and how does the body react to napalm, the chemical agent.

Phil: It can burn you severely and it can explode your lungs, very, very hot. I tried to go up and put it out with CO2 but I couldn't do it– they shot up all our fire hoses too. We had no way to fight fires with water at all.

Candace: They shot them all up instantly in that first 25 minutes. They took out everything– the antennas, the fire hoses so you couldn't put out fires, and during those 25 minutes what were you doing specifically?

Phil: I was getting people off deck, taking them to a triage in the mess decks, the whole mess deck was full of people laying on the tables, on the floor. It was a sea of broken and bloodied men. It continued like that … for the entire attack. Then the torpedo boats got up to us. You know they fired five torpedoes at us.

Candace: All the antennas are taken out, 25 minutes has passed, and they're obviously assuming that you can't communicate your distress. You indicated in your letter, was it before the torpedoes, that fortunately somebody had taken one of those offline?

Phil: Terry Halbardier is a third class radioman, he strung a long wire to the only antenna– he took that antenna off line because the it wasn't working … they didn’t hit it because they were using heat-seeking missiles to hit all the antennas because when they're tuning they throw off heat– thank God, I mean there's reasons all this happened. He got hooked up, and sent “Rockstar, Rockstar.” Like I said, it went to Vietnam. The Sixth Fleet picked it up, they automatically sent aircraft from the Saratoga and Captain Tully and before they even hit the horizon, McNamara says ‘Bring those aircraft back, do not help Liberty. Turn around.’

Candace: So our Secretary of Defense. This attack could, in theory, since he was able to get that message out … could have been over, how long after it started?

Phil: Almost immediately. In fact, they could have saved 25 brave American lives, all spies that got killed when the torpedo hit, if they had just let those planes come help us. But that wasn't the deal. We were set up by our own government to die.

Candace: So Robert McNamara, who in interviews thereafter says he doesn't remember a single thing that happened that day, that's what he told the Chicago Tribune … he calls them back. Then what happened?

Phil: Then Tully reconfigured their aircraft and they sent aircraft again because they went to a different command, they wanted their prerogative to go to a different higher–

Candace: Cuz they're thinking, ‘What do you mean pull us back?’

Phil: Then LBJ gets on the phone and his exact words were, “I don't give a GD if all those sailors die, I'm not going to embarrass my ally Israel.” … How did he know that if we didn't know it?

Candace: So they then have the president of the United States – this guy, Captain Tully, is trying to do the right thing. … he gets called back by the Secretary of Defense. He's thinking, ‘I'm going to go over his head because this is crazy,’ and now the president of the United States is saying, ‘I don't care, I don't give a GD if they [25:00] die I am not going to embarrass our friend and ally Israel.’ So he knew.

Phil: He knew…. They destroyed Captain Tully's career too, they fired him for doing that. He was a World War II fighter pilot, very, very highly decorated, good man. In fact, he come to one of our reunions and broke down like a baby and cried said, “I'm sorry I couldn't help you, they wouldn't let me.” He took that to his grave. He was a broken man.

Candace: I can't even imagine what he went through. Having to follow orders when the orders were so demonic.… So he gets called back again, this time it's from the president of the United States, and now you are seeing torpedo boats with the Star of David. Now you guys know and you're thinking, ‘Amazing we're about to get saved.… We know who these guys are. We don't know who's attacking us but we know these are our friends.’ When did you notice, ‘Wait a second something's not right’?

Phil: When the old man said, “Prepare for torpedo hit at starboard side.” I saw two torpedoes go aft. Where the other two went, I don't know but I know where one of them went. It hit in their communication space and killed 25 brave young men and that's one of the reasons I'm here today, to be their voice because we're not going to let them die in vain. There are only so many survivors left, they’re dying out. It's our duty as Americans and patriots to take care of them and make sure they didn’t die in vain. And you know, all presidents and all Congress, including Donald Trump, have not done anything for us. They're beholden to the Zionist State AIPAC. Donald Trump's a new president again.

I call on Donald Trump to help us. We gave our lives and our blood for this country at the hands of Zionist Israel – does he stand with Israel? Or does he stand with the United States fighting men that were slaughtered that day by the Zionist State and covered up, saying it was mistaken identity? I call on you, President Trump, to give the USS Liberty the same courtesy we deserve or any fighting man that was killed that day. But we don't get it because Israel did it. It's fine as long as Israel did it. Everybody it's fine. It was a mistaken identity.

It wasn't. Admiral Moorer had the Moorer Report. It's a very, very detailed report. He's the longest serving Admiral in the United States Navy. He served as the European commander and the Pacific commander and two times as chairman of Joint Chiefs. He says, “I'll never believe it was a mistaken identity.” He called he called on Congress over and over to have an investigation. Congress says there already has been an investigation.

There never has been. There's been a board of inquiry by Admiral Isaac Kidd and his underling, JAG officer Ward Boston. They completed that investigation in seven days. It should have taken a year. They never even talked to Israel, they took Israel's word instead of ours.

Candace: So you're watching, you're on this boat, you see this torpedo hit. That torpedo instantly kills 25 servicemen. You escape, fortunately. What is going on in your mind?

Phil: Well I think Jesus Christ would know a lot about betrayal. We were betrayed. That's one of the reasons I'm here is because Jesus Christ didn't want us to die that day he wanted us – well I'll put it this way: God saved us from God's chosen people. [30:00] We had three life rafts left … We were going to put our most seriously wounded in them so they'd have a chance of life. They shot two out of the water and took one aboard their boat is a trophy of the kill, it's in Haifa somewhere.

Candace: They take one on board as a trophy, you are now realizing that you cannot help the wounded. Torpedoes are hitting you. What happens next?

Phil: Well when the torpedo hit, we did what we could do for damage control … they continued and continued until finally they just quit and we thought it was over. But it wasn't. They sent over troop-carry helicopters with marines in them to board our ship, scuttle the ship and kill us all. I was on the main deck when they when they were coming over.

Candace: What is your condition at that moment?

Phil: I was on the main deck still trying to get people off the main deck and then they got there and this marine he had his foot on the skid. I thought they were going to come down in a rope or ladder or whatever and I just gave him the finger and he gave it right back to me and just smiled. This is an IDF soldier… smiling a great big smile then they just they just took off, the gig was up. I mean they confess ‘mistaken identity’— ‘we thought it was the Al Jazeera.’ There was a horse transport and enemy ship. That's what they said, that was their excuse and they got by with it because of a crooked government then and now.

Candace: I just can't even imagine this. You’re watching your mates die, bleeding from torpedoes and napalm and you make eye contact with this guy thinking he's going to board the ship. You give him the finger and he gives you the finger back and smiles at you and then they leave.

Phil: They leave and we were left there for 17 hours.

Candace: This is the part that is so shocking to me because the president United States knows that you're under attack, the Secretary of Defense knows that you're under attack, you know that, as you said, Captain Tully tried twice to help save you, they know you're under attack and you're telling me that they went away for 17 hours. Take me through what you guys did, how many people at that moment were injured, dying, what was happening on that ship for the next 17 hours?

Phil: Well, two thirds of the crew was either dead or wounded. Doc Keiffer, we had one doc aboard the ship, he had been shot in the abdomen and both of his knees were shot up. He operated for 17 hours on people. I helped him in one operation, a guy by the name of Gary Blanchard, he was hit bad. He says, “Take my socks off, my feet are hot, hot, hot. So I rubbed these feet, to try to get some circulation. I went over to the side and looked at him and he says, “Do you think I'm going to die?” I said, “Yeah I think you are.” Doc cut him open and he was dead. That went on all night. Put a few stitches and … put him over to the side, and just kept on doing it.

Candace: What were some of the last words? Cuz I'm sure as you said many people died, what did they say. What were the conversations that you recall?

Phil: You know, Candace, I really didn't recall a whole lot about that, I guess I just blocked it out. I do know that Lieutenant Commander Armstrong, he died in the mess decks, he was hit up bad too, but I remember he was a heavy smoker, l lit him a couple cigarettes and then I left, and [when] I came back he was dead. So the conversation was just helping people. Everybody who was able-bodied helped them… a lot of them were walking wounded, and all they all they did was … help their fellow shipmates. Bravest crew I've ever seen in my life.

I mean we guys came [35:02] together like none other. We had nothing to fight back with but our will and our wits, with God's beautiful hand on us. In fact, when that ship got torpedoed it was like the hand of God was holding us up, because it was going like that [his hand motions to convey the ship], ready to roll over. It just stopped. Unbelievable.

Candace: And you're just 20 years old, that's just unbelievable. So 17 hours later, 2/3 of the crew is dead. What happens? What ship did you see first? What was going through your mind?

Phil: Well the first thing we saw was, several days later, when Admiral Kidd got there and we told him everything, what happened, and ‘Why didn't you come help us?’ and this and that, and he took off his stars … he had four or five of us in sick bay at the time.… He said “I'm just like your dad, please tell me everything you saw.”

We told him about the machine gunning of the life rafts, of all the people, the helicopters, everything that went on. And then he put his stars back on. He says– he got beet red– and he got right my face, he says, “I'm telling you, you better never talk about this again to anybody. I'll make sure you end up in prison, fined or worse. You know what worse means?”

I said, “Yes sir, I do.” He did that to everybody. In fact they split up everybody, they took them to different bases. There was one fellow, his name is Mickey Lamay— he’s still got 50 pieces of shrapnel in him right now— they took him to Bremerhaven, Germany, for metal repair. He was in a room with a bunch of other people… they took him out of that bed, he got his own room, and he was interrogated by an officer who says, “Your name is no longer Lamay, it's Smith. You know nothing about the USS Liberty. Don't ever talk about it.”

Candace: So you survive living hell, you watch your mates die, you wait 17 hours and you're thinking, ‘Okay, at least now it's over and instead you guys get reprimanded, and you're told essentially we'll kill you—

Phil: “Yes, absolutely. In fact, I didn't talk about it until about 42-43 years ago. I met my second wife there was an article in the paper by a person by the name of Stan White, he was a Master Chief, and I felt like the whole world had just come off my shoulders, because he was talking— if he was talking, I'm gonna start talking, and I haven't shut up since.

Candace: Wow, this is just unbelievable. Unbelievable. So, you're all ordered into silence and how long … before you started speaking, how many years was that?

Phil: Well, 18 years after the fact.

Candace: So you actually you stayed silent on this.

Phil: I didn't even tell my wife Lisa that I was ever in the military. I even forgot what happened, that's how far back I pushed it. Like I say, when I read that article, man I said, ‘Now I'm on it.’ And the whole thing is, when your own government betrays you, and still betrays you, and every Congressman betrays you, “What you saw you really didn't see, what you heard you really didn't hear,” that's pretty bad. They're calling us liars, Nazis, and Jew haters. Our own Congress. I'd like to tell you what, I'd like to call out Charlie Kirk and Ben Shapiro with this ‘conspiracy theory’ stuff, “If you think it's a conspiracy, debate me live on TV. I'd be glad to debate you and my shipmates will be there too, if you want them. Debate us. If you think it's conspiracy theory…. I don't think you got the courage, I think you're cowards.”

Video clip: “Can I explain the USS Liberty incident? Sure the USS Liberty incident is very frequently used by antisemites who suggest that Israel deliberately targets American ships and then pays no penalty. So both American Naval records, [40:01] and Israeli Air Force records suggest, that there was a case of mistaken identity wherein USS Liberty was in the Mediterranean in a place they were not supposed to be, Israel thought that it was an Egyptian ship and shot it. That's the actual full story. Now, there are a bunch of conspiracy theories, on actually both sides of this, there's a conspiracy theory on the American side that suggests that Israel, for no reason that can be discerned, decided to shoot up an American ship to accomplish— no one really can explain what— and then on the other side there is a theory, that I've not seen a lot of support for, that the USS Liberty was being used as a transmission vessel to send Israeli military locations to the Egyptians during the ‘67 war, and Israel knew that and shot it. Again, I think the evidence is lacking on both of those things, and there have been multiple Naval investigations of the USS Liberty incident, they all come down on the same side, which is that this is a mistaken case of Allied quote unquote Friendly Fire.”

[40:55] Video clip of Candace speaking about Hallow's Advent Prayer 25 Challenge….

[42:04] Candace: I can't even imagine living through something like that and then being gaslit and told that you're liars, or that you're conspiracy theorists, or that, as your letter said, that you're Nazis or that you're Jew haters, when you went out there thinking you might be out there defending the state of Israel, only to recognize that your country betrayed you, presumably, to stage a false flag attack.

Phil: There was a submarine, the Russians were there too, if our ship goes down, Israel was going to get nuked by Russia. That's a fact, it's on a tape by the people there. There were also the USS Andrew Jackson there, and the USS Amberjack— our submarines— and they didn't come help us. I heard they filmed it from the Amberjack [SS-219, Gato-class submarine], they probably got the film right now. We’ve got a FOIA request right now, a federal judge in Washington, she's going to decide if we can get the records or not, in a few days. This has been gone for two or three years trying to get, well it's been 57 years total, but working it for the 41, 42, 43 years collectively, with the rest of the crew, we've been trying to get this done.

This is the closest we've ever come to getting something. But they don't want their records out. The CIA is blocking it right now, they said they do not want to let that out, it's matter of National Security. If it's so easy to explain, how could it be National Security? If it's so cut and dry that they thought it was a mistake— there's no mistake and we can prove it—

Candace: How many survivors are still alive?

Phil: Oh I don't know, probably 50 out of a 294…. They just didn't attack our ship... all of America. It was an act of war and war crimes. They didn't want to investigate it.

Candace: I want to speak a bit about Lynden Baines Johnson because there is a picture that seems to be emerging and so I'll ask questions because there are other big events from around that time period that are similarly classified in a way that doesn't really make sense. Lynden Baines Johnson— the nation did not vote for him to be president of the United States, obviously— JFK was assassinated [45:00] and it is a fact that, prior to his assassination, he was adamant that he wanted AIPAC, which I think was going by a different name at that time, to register as a foreign agent and that they had ignored his demand… and then, when he was shot, a couple of months later, [AIPAC] no longer had to register as a foreign agent.

It is also a fact that leading up to his death he was having fights… arguments with the prime minister of Israel, at that time Ben Gurion, which, again, they have not declassified any of those conversations, so we don't know what it was that they were arguing about. But I would imagine Lynden Baines Johnson would have known. that he [JFK] had this sort of contentious relationship, obviously, with them trying to implement AIPAC and not wanting it to be registered as a foreign agent.

And, obviously, him having arguments as a number two guy, you would think that he would know this. And before Muamar Gaddafi, the president of Libya, was murdered by us arming insurgents, he gave a speech in front of the UN where he demanded that they investigate the killing of JFK, and he said ‘Everybody knows that he was trying to stop their nuclear armament.’ He spoke about the nuclear reactor and he had heavily suggested in that speech in the UN, that that was perhaps could have been the reason that he was arguing with the prime minister. Of course we'll never know. It's quite shocking to know that information, to realize that JFK got killed, and to also know that the person who allegedly shot him— Lee Harvey Oswald— said he didn't shoot him, didn't kill him, and then he was shot by a guy named Jacob Rubenstein, who Muamar Gaddafi alleges was also an Israeli national, maybe he had dual citizenship, I'm not sure because, again, we don't have the files.

I'm just speaking about what has been said in the public sphere. It's kind of shocking that Lyndon Baines Johnson would be such an ally to Israel, so much so that he would tell people, “I don't care if American sailors die, I'm not going to embarrass Israel.” Which means he didn't inherit JFK's frustration with the nation.

Phil: He did not. If you remember, LBJ says [to Israel], ‘You had a friend in JFK, but I'm going to be a much better friend ….

Candace: I don't know if you ever read this article, this really shocked me. This was published in the Jerusalem Post in 2008. The article is entitled “A friend indeed.” I'll just read a bit of it:

“A few weeks ago the Associated Press reported the newly released tapes from US president Lyndon Johnson's White House office which showed LBJ's quote “personal and often emotional connection to Israel.” The news agency pointed out that during the Johnson presidency the United States became Israel's chief diplomatic ally and primary arms supplier. But the news report does little to reveal the full historical extent of Johnson's actions on behalf of the Jewish people in the state of Israel. Most students of the Arab-Israeli conflict can identify Johnson as the president during the 1967 war, but few know about LBJ's actions to rescue hundreds of endangered Jews during the Holocaust, actions that could have thrown him out of Congress and into jail. Indeed, the title of Righteous Gentile is certainly appropriate in the case of the Texan, whose centennial year is being commemorated this year.”

It then goes on and speaks about how, while serving as a young Congressman, he arranged for visas to be supplied to Jews that were in Warsaw and oversaw the apparently illegal immigration of hundreds of Jews through the Port of Galveston, Texas. A key resource for uncovering LBJ's pro-Jewish activity is the unpublished 1989 doctoral thesis by a student named Lewis Gamalock, a University of Texas student, and he speaks about LBJ's foreign affairs background in this piece, and they were able to confirm, through other historians and interviews with his wife and family members and political associates, that the research was accurate. It says, quote:

“Research into Johnson's personal history indicates that he inherited his concern for the Jewish people from his family, his aunt Jessie Johnson Hatcher, a major influence on LBJ, was a member of the Zionist Organization of America. According to Gamalock, Aunt Jessie had nurtured LBJ's commitment to befriending [50:05] Jews for 50 years. As a boy, he watched his politically active grandfather Big Sam and father Little Sam, seek clemency for Leo Frank… the Jewish victim of blood libel.”

He actually murdered a young Catholic girl during Passover in 1913, I'll have to fact check that. But they present him as a victim of a blood libel [an antisemitic canard which falsely accuses Jews of murdering Christians in order to use their blood in the performance of religious rituals]. Johnson later told friends that Lyndon's family hid in their cellar while his father and uncle stood guard with shotguns on their porch in the case of the KKK attacks. They say that he often cited Leo Frank's lynching…. but it's interesting because I don't think people knew this, that LBJ was Jewish, that his aunt was involved in the Zionist organization, and also that he pressured the administration, apparently, to have tighter ties with AIPAC. We can probably trace when we are speaking about AIPAC the marriage I would say between the United States government and AIPAC we can attribute that to Lyndon Baines Johnson. How does it make you feel to know that actually you know he was in fact more loyal to Israel [than to the US]?

Phil: Absolutely, much more loyal. In fact on June the 8th when our ship got hit, in his bed was Irgun [a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948] agent Matilda Krim.

Candace: It even says that “Johnson raised substantial sums for arms for the Jewish underground fighters in Palestine.” He was doing all of this illegally. He armed the Jewish underground of quote unquote “Freedom Fighters” and did all of this alongside his closest advisers, who were strong pro-Israel advocates Benjamin Cohen (who 30 years earlier was the liaison between the Supreme Court Justice Lewis Brandeis and Heim Whitesman) and Abe Fortas, the legendary Washington insider.

How did we go from a president who wanted to stop this to a president that was involved in the underground and was pushing our government to get more involved with Israel? …Certainly, I think it's fair for people to wonder what it is that is classified, and that they're so afraid to release to the public about JFK's remarkably suspicious death.

Phil: Yes his death was not by lone gunman. In my belief… that Oswald got killed by Rubenstein. Oswald says, “I'm nothing but a patsy.” He was a patsy, there's so much to be said for that and the USS Liberty is covered up just as deep. It all goes right back to Israel. Is our country really America First or is it Israel First?

Candace: Are we an occupied nation?

Phil: I think we're an occupied nation… Look at all the wars. Let's just go back to the Iraq war and the Afghanistan war— they were fought all for the greater good of Israel. That's my belief, and it's a lot of other people's belief too. They sacrificed men … it's a war machine, like Eisenhower warned of military industrial complex and he was absolutely right. I remember that because I was a kid then.

Candace: I think it's difficult for me and why I say that this has been such a turning point, it's difficult for me to take seriously, now, any of the politicians who declare themselves to be America First. I mean, just to be clear, Congress passed through, in the blink of an eye, legislation to ensure that people would learn about October 7^th [the Nova Music Festival attacked by Hamas] in school…. Yet I went through school, I graduated college, I have two degrees, and I had never learned about the USS Liberty in its entire context, until I received your letter.

Phil: Yup, it was covered up and it's not in the history books, which it should be. It's a very important part of history. Something very interesting, back in the 80s I did a speaking deal with the old Spotlight newspaper and the two older gentlemen [55:00] they were entrepreneurs in Grafton, Wisconsin. They read it and they sent me a letter and said ‘We're building a new library and we were going to call it the Grove Library. Now we want to call it the USS Liberty Memorial Library and the whole Milwaukee area everybody around there, the Jewish population says, ’No, no, no, no, you cannot do that because it's anti-Semitic to bring up USS Liberty.’ And the Grove brothers said, ‘The heck with you guys.’ They've already put a million bucks up, and they said, ‘We'll just take our money out.’ Then the town said, ‘No, we'll name it the USS Liberty Memorial Library.’ …. We had to have – get this – SWAT teams on the roofs, bomb sniffing dogs, because we were all threatened, they were going to get us right there for dedicating to the survivors, that's when Pete McCloskey, former Congressman, was there, he spoke at their dedication, as did others.

Candace: So you told me that you have been threatened by the Mossad. Can you tell me more about that?

Phil: Yes. I was in California with my wife, we were going out to visit my son. He was graduating from BUD-SEAL school [Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S)] and we were in a restaurant, at the bar getting a drink waiting to get our table, and this guy come up and got on the right side of me. He said, ‘You were on the Liberty.’ I said, ‘Yeah how'd you know that?’ He said, ‘I know a lot,' and he had a big watch and he put it right up front of my face. I said, ‘Get that out of my face, man.’ What is it— a camera or a speaking device or was it going to squirt me with something? I don't know. Then he said, ‘Listen, I know everything about you. I'm a Mossad agent and the best thing for you to do is just shut up.’

My wife heard that, she come over me and, boy, she gave him sh*t.... And then security had to take us up to our room and make sure everything was okay and I went down the next morning and the guy’s pretext, he told everybody he was a doctor. He'd been there a couple days before, but he was waiting on me and my wife…. How he found out we were there, I don't know. It could be they traced us somehow, credit card or who knows.

Candace: That's just incredible.

Phil: It is.

Candace: They have a remarkable ability to be on the ground when big events take place. Like it was confirmed that the Mossad was on the ground the day that JFK got shot. It has been confirmed that they were on the ground recording, at least according to ABC News, who investigated this the day that 9/11 took place, which you could say was, obviously, the beginning of us being involved in these never-ending wars in the Middle East. And, obviously, the USS Liberty. They got caught executing another false flag at the exact same time, the Levon Affair, in which they were going to murder Americans in order to drag us into war with Egypt, I don't know if that was before or after the USS Liberty, but … you can't say that Israel is not involved in false flags because the Levon Affair proves that they are….

King David Hotel … proves that you survived what you believe to be a false flag attack and yet we have people in America who get on stage and refer to them as our greatest friend and ally. How does that make you feel, to … hear people say they're our greatest friend and ally. And, by the way, I want to be clear, I count myself among those people. For the first six years of my career, I genuinely had no idea.

Phil: Most people don't. It makes me furious… They're not our best friend, they're not our ally. They got more money when they murdered my shipmates than they ever got in their entire existence. The Israelis said they paid $6 million. They didn't pay $6 million to our ship. Our own government did. The ship alone was worth $40 million and they settled for $6 million. [1:00:03] The most seriously wounded got some, and they very well should have. And, of course, the dead. Most of the crew got 200 bucks and an order to shut up. I was ordered to sign that where I could never sue Israel or the United States which I signed, gladly.

Candace: You signed it because you were ordered to sign it. Which means you could never pursue Israel or the United States for what you survived.

Phil: Yep. That was under duress and I don't think it's worth the paper it's written on…. But that's what they did to us and they continue to do it. They can't wait till we're dead. We're all dying out, we're getting older. I'm 78 and I got guys that are 85, close to the 90. Some of them can't even get out of their house much anymore…. We lost three or four in the last year, cancer and things like that. But we're not, I'm not going to give up till my dying breath. I'm going to be here speaking the truth, and we plan on trying to get together a speaking tour around the country for survivors to speak to the public and tell them about our government and the Israeli government.

As far as I'm concerned, Candace, they set us up. Israel was the Hit Man, now our government paid them to hit us and then, when we didn't sink, they tell us that it was mistaken identity— us, the survivors— that they thought we were somebody else. They shot two of our flags down and we put up another one, 7 by 13, they say they didn't see that one either. 7 by 13— that's a big flag! They call it Holiday Colors. And that's what we flew into Malta, a thousand miles away. We went from that torpedo hit, a thousand miles away, with a 40 by 40-foot torpedo hole in the ship.

Candace: What I can tell you is that this has completely changed a lot for me. First and foremost, I just want to apologize to you. I'm genuinely embarrassed at my ignorance and it's confounding for me that I thought that I was on the side of the party of truth and America First, and Patriots, and caring about our veterans. I'm realizing now that so many of these people are cowards. They know the truth, they lie to people as they're coming up in this movement, and they are completely occupied. There are some that are brave, obviously, Thomas Massie. But I do want to offer to you that I promise you, as long as you live, I will hold a candle for the USS Liberty, you forever have a platform if I have a platform.…

I almost feel ashamed of myself that I thought to myself this year, ‘Oh my gosh, I'm getting so attacked by the Zionist media because I had a heart over the Palestinian children that were dying.’ I realized I had to survive digital attacks. What you survived is unbelievable. First and foremost, I know that you have an organization, so I want to pledge to you that, personally, my family will donate $40,000 every year to your organization, and I'm asking if every single person who is watching this right now— and this will be in the millions— if every single person gives a dollar [she’s looking into the camera], just $1, we can keep their organization going, we can give them what they need to speak about this, and we can show them that, despite the fact that we may all be existing under a government that is occupied, this is not who we are. As Americans, or people worldwide, because we have an audience all over the world, who is similarly starting to wonder how many of our nations are occupied by lobbying from Zionists.

Can you tell my audience a bit about your organization.

Phil: Yes. Our organization is veterans and like-minded people, family members. You can go to USSLibertyVeterans.org. This is a brand new site we put up. It's very technical. I don't know a whole lot about it, it takes a lot people a lot smarter than me. But they got people doing it and you can donate there. You can go through, look at pictures, you can read articles, the Moorer Report.

I was just thinking about Ward Boston, the JAG [Judge Advocate General] with Admiral Kidd. I should have brought this up earlier. There was a man named A. Jay Cristol who’s [1:05:03] a bankruptcy judge and he wrote a book The Liberty Incident. He's Jewish, and he lied about it. Then Ward Boston signed a declaration saying ‘We were ordered by our government to lie. We knew it was a no mistaken identity, it was a deliberate attack to sink that ship,’ and he felt bad about it. He says, ‘I was a military man and I followed orders.’ But that brought him out, and he just couldn't do it anymore and soon after that he died.

Candace: Yeah, I can't imagine being ordered…

Phil: Well, absolutely…. From the Medal of Honor, Navy Cross, Silver Stars, Bronze Stars— 208 Purple Hearts, Combat Action Ribbon and the Presidential Unit Citation. Nobody knows about it.

Candace: Yeah, what do the objects [i.e. the medals] mean if they keep you a secret and call you Nazis for trying to speak out? It means nothing… if you don't have a government that truly honors and respects you.

Phil: Yes and I honor all veterans. They go in … to serve the country. In fact when I put on the uniform the first time I was the proudest man in the world … to serve my country. To be abandoned for all these years, abandoned right now. I'm asking you now, President Trump, don't abandon the crew of the USS Liberty. Please. I see your picture there [Candace, her husband, and Trump] with beautiful Candace … who is that other man?

Candace: That's my husband.

Phil: Oh, your husband George. But President Trump, please help us. Don't abandon us. This is an act that should be brought out [into the open]. The truth should be told, sir. Please help us.

Candace: I'll tell you I have never ever had an inkling to run for president of the United States despite people insisting on it. But hearing what happened to you, if I ever do run, it will be to honor you guys in the way that you should be honored, and to give the middle finger right back.

Phil: I hope you do! My daughter said that yesterday, ‘Tell her I want her to run for president— Candace for president.’

Candace: If I did, it would be to honor the memory of the USS Liberty, and I would say it every day when I was on stage, because what happened to you is despicable. It is abhorrent that we have men that are raising money pretending to be America First that are more concerned with getting invited to … fancy dinners pedaling lines that they don't actually mean in their heart. The worst thing is that they say that they're the party of God … and yet they commit themselves not to a higher power, they commit themselves to politicians, they commit themselves to lobbyists, they commit themselves to money, and to the people that partook in this lie. I hope and know that all of them are burning in hell and to every person that's watching this that is going to continue to lie to call you conspiracy theorists, to call you a Nazi, those people too will either repent or they will burn in hell. I truly believe that.

Phil: I do too. Two weeks ago I was in a church, a Zionist church, that had an Israeli flag and a American flag hanging side by side. I was asked to speak there by Pastor Jason Neely, and he says we don't condone everything Israel does and the truth has got to be told and the people in the church were very receptive, a lot of them are weeping. Another good pastor, Pastor Chuck Baldwin, out of Kalispell, Montana, he's on our side and … he teaches what's really in the Bible, not what they want you to believe.

Candace: Well, obviously, the Zionists funded the Scofield Bible – it's a whole another episode that I've got to get into to teach people real history. Other than going to your website and supporting you is there anything else that we can do, and that we can send our audience to?

Phil: Well we need their hopes and their prayers. If they would go there, and your generous donation, my God I almost fell on the floor.

Candace: I promise, you will have that annually from my family, even if we fall on hard times we will pick up side jobs, and we will make that donation every single year, until the last veteran of the USS Liberty is no longer here, you will have that donation.

Phil: God bless you, Candace.

Candace: God bless you. And I know that right now Christ is with us. Christ is King and the truth is powerful enough.

Phil: It is and I want to thank you again for getting me on the map and I certainly appreciate it. If there are any other people that you can figure out that I, or any of my other mates, could go to, I'd walk there if I had to.

Candace: We'll host you every year, I promise you we'll get other people on the show. [To the audience] Thank you so much for joining us. I'm sure your mind has been equally as blown as mine has been. I'm sure you are equal parts sad and equal parts frustrated and angry, disappointed… in our government. But I really think that things are going to change. So thank you so much for listening to the story. And Phil thank you so much for joining us.

Phil: Thank you for the invite, and, again, God bless you Candace, you're a wonderful woman. [Music]