Aug. 5, 1964 - President Johnson asked Congress today to pass a joint resolution assuring him of full support “for all necessary action” he might have to take to protect the armed forces of the United States in Southeast Asia.
The President made his request a day after he told the nation over television of a second attack within three days on U.S. destroyers by North Vietnamese PT boats.
There was general support on Capitol Hill for the retaliatory action ordered by President Johnson and for the resolution. The principal dissenting note — and it was extremely bitter — was sounded by Senator Wayne Morse (D-Ore.) (pictured), who over the last five months has directed almost daily attacks on what he calls “McNamara’s war.”
As soon as the reading of the President’s message and proposed resolution was completed, Morse rose and said the resolution was tantamount to a “declaration of war” and “war should not be declared by resolution.”
The incident inspiring the resolution, Morse said, “is as much the doing of the United States as it is the doing of North Vietnam.”
He charged that “the role of the United States in South Vietnam” over the last 10 years “has been that of a provocateur, every bit as much as North Vietnam has been a provocateur.”
There has been mounting evidence for months, he said, that the Pentagon and State Department “were preparing to escalate the war into North Vietnam.”
He charged that before the attacks on the U.S. destroyers, “South Vietnamese naval vessels bombarded two North Vietnamese islands within three to five miles of the main coast of North Vietnam.”
According to newspaper reports, the Senator went on, U.S. naval vessels were patrolling the Gulf of Tonkin, “presumably some six to 11 miles off the shore of North Vietnam,” during the attack by the South Vietnamese vessels.
He noted that North Vietnam claims its waters extend 12 miles seaward from its coast, including the eastern shore of the coastal islands.
“Was the U.S. Navy standing guard while vessels of South Vietnam shelled North Vietnam?” he asked. “That is the clear implication of the incident.”
The Pentagon has said that during the first attack by the North Vietnamese boats, the U.S. destroyer was 20 to 30 miles offshore, and during the second attack the two destroyers were 50 to 60 miles offshore.
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