Highly Praised US Navy Historian Ignores 50+ Years of USS Liberty History

The US Naval Institute Press heaps praise on Naval Historian Robert J. Cressman:

“Naval historian Robert J. Cressman lives in Silver Spring, Maryland. His The Official Chronology of the United States Navy in World War II received a John Lyman Book Award (1999) and his body of work on U.S. naval aviation history was recognized by the Admiral Arthur W. Radford Award (2008).”

by Joe Meadors

The US Naval Institute Press has a history of publishing authors who write accounts of the USS Liberty attack without interviewing any USS Liberty survivors. They first did it when they published Jay Cristol’s screed, The Liberty Incident Revealed.  In the advertising for that book, The US Naval Institute Press claims that Cristol wrote it  “After . . . interviewing all then-living individuals directly involved in the incident.” There is no way to characterize that claim other than what it is. It is a lie. Jay Cristol didn’t interview a single USS Liberty survivor in the preparation of his doctoral thesis, his first book, The Liberty Incident, or his latest screed, The Liberty Incident Revealed. Now, another US Naval Institute Press author has written a history of the USS Liberty without interviewing a single USS Liberty survivor.  To add insult to injury, he has ignored all the evidence that has come to light in the 52 years since the attack. On June 12, 2017, Robert J. Cressman published the Official US Navy’s History of the USS Liberty (AGTR-5). Absent from the official US Navy history of the USS Liberty (AGTR-5) are the apparently mundane facts that the Israelis used unmarked aircraft, they jammed our radios on both US Navy tactical and international maritime distress frequencies, their torpedo boats deliberately machine-gunned serviceable life rafts we had dropped over the side in anticipation of abandoning ship, their torpedo boats slowly circled the torpedoed ship while firing from close range at USS Liberty crewmen who either were trapped topside or who ventured topside to help our wounded shipmates, and the immediate departure of the torpedo boats after they ceased hostilities only to return 90 minutes later in an obvious attempt to lay the groundwork to claim they were coming to our assistance. These facts are readably available to anyone writing a history of the USS Liberty. Why do authors who are held in such high regard by The Naval Institute Press ignore these facts?