Why I Served: Ed Bechtel

In 1966, Ed Bechtel was kicked out of college. Soon, he found himself using his Morse Code knowledge in his role as a Communications Technician on the USS Liberty, an unarmed communications ship that was monitoring the Arab-Israeli conflict in international waters.

On June 8, 1967, unmarked aircraft attacked with cannons, rockets and napalm. Three motor torpedo boats flying the Star of David then fired five torpedoes, and one hit the ship, killing many sailors. Ed received a Purple Heart as a result.

Afterward, he served on the board of directors at the Liberty Veterans Association. He encourages listeners to find out more at USSLiberty.org


The following has been lightly edited for clarity.

Joe Kendrick: Could we start by getting you to state your name and what role you played in the military and where you were in the service?

Ed Bechtel: Sure. My name is Ed Bechtel and I joined the U.S. Navy in 1966. At the time I was 19 years old. And I The Navy found out that I knew Morse code, so they sent me to Pensacola, Florida to teach other sailors Morse code, who eventually were put on different locations to copy and intercept communications from opposing countries. That was the start of my four-year Navy career.

Kendrick: So you were on a boat?

Bechtel: Yeah, the boat I was on was the USS Liberty. After six months in Pensacola, I went to Norfolk, and the ship was just coming back from sea trials. And so the next day we set sail for Africa, which was normally the sailing area that we entered into up and down the coast and we pulled into the Ivory Coast Abidjan- well, yeah Ivory Coast, Abidjan and we were there for a couple days well while we were there we got orders to immediately depart, which we did overnight and go up to Rota, Spain to pick up some linguists and also some supplies. And from that point on, we headed to the Middle East.

Kendrick: You had a notable experience on the boat.

Bechtel: Yeah, it was more than notable. It was pretty intense, actually. We really didn't know. We knew that there was an issue in the Middle East between Israel and Egypt, but we didn't know what our role was to be. But when we got there, we started intercepting communications and keeping the 6th Fleet, which was north of us, about 500 miles, I think. And so we were sailing very slowly up and down the coast in international waters and just kind of monitoring things. We did ask for a destroyer escort because we knew we were in a troubled area and we thought it would be helpful to have some support while we were there, but we were denied that.

And the other thing was that we were a communication ship only. That was our sole purpose, and so there was really no armament on board as far as defense purposes go, or even attacking purposes, if you will. But we had 4, 50 caliber machine guns that were used to just repel boarders while we were in port and that sort of thing. But on June 8th of 1967, we were attacked by aircraft and motor torpedo boats. During the initial air attack, we weren't sure who the planes belonged to. They were blackened out. So we had no idea what was going on, but they came at us with cannons, rocket fire, and the last couple sorties had napalm bombs they dropped on us. We got tore up pretty bad, and we still obviously did not know who we were being attacked by. So we didn't think it was Israel because they were our ally. And the day before, June 7th, and actually the morning of June 8th, they did flyovers with boxcars and propeller kind of planes. And they were observing us in the area. So during the attack, we figured somebody else had to be somebody else, you know. So after the air attack subsided, three motor torpedo boats came into the area, and at that time we were on fire, we were trying to save ourselves, get the wounded down below decks and all that sort of thing. So there was a message throughout the ship to stand by for torpedo attack. Well, as those motor torpedo boats came nearer to us, they were flying the Star of David. And in any event, they fired 5 torpedoes at us. They were either bad shots or it was intentional, I don't know what, but only one of them hit us, which was bad enough. And that torpedo entered our communication spaces below the waterline, which was where all of our electronic intercepting equipment was. And that torpedo took out 25 sailors.

So at that point, we knew it was Israel that was doing this. And just by some miracle, we were able to get out an SOS. And that SOS was read throughout the six-fleet area. Morocco picked it up, and some other place, I think in the Atlantic area, picked it up as well. So now the the gig was up, we all knew it was Israel that attacked the USS Liberty. And so, raised a lot of flags, a lot of stories, a lot of conspiracies, but at any rate, the total impact on us was 34 dead sailors, 171 wounded, and our ship's complement was of was 294 people. So we had about a 70% casualty rate.

So anyway, and the interesting thing was that we were supposed to be getting help from the Sixth Fleet, but it never showed up. There were some planes launched off the aircraft carriers, USS America and the USS Saratoga, but they were recalled by our administration in DC. And so we never saw those planes. And we never heard of any more help on the way. So we were pretty much dead in the water for a while. And it was 17 hours later when the destroyers from the 6th Fleet, two of them, finally showed up, the USS Davis I'm not sure which one came first, but USS Davis and USS Massey showed up. And from that point on, we started getting some help, getting the dead and the wounded off the ship and taken to the aircraft carriers by helicopter. But it was a pretty harrowing experience.

Kendrick: What was it like for you afterward, after the military, how did you deal with all of that?

Bechtel: That's a very good question. And you can imagine that it was handled individually, I'll say, by everyone that was on that ship. And one of the things that happened was — I'll continue to answer your question — We sailed into Malta. It took us seven days with the help of the Sixth Fleet to work our way into Malta into a dry dock to get cleaned up and taken care of and removing the dead and equipment and so forth.

So it was during that time, even on board the ship after the attack, we had an admiral come on board. And in Malta, we had other officers and all of the ones I just mentioned made it very clear that none of us were supposed to ever talk about this incident at all, to our family, to the press, friends, nobody. And they said, You can be court-martialed, in prison, or whatever, but don't talk about it.

So that was, you can imagine the attack itself, how bad it was, but then to hold this inside for years. And it was only, probably, I'm going to say, 10 years ago that I finally started opening up and talking about it. So it was a little bit easier for me, if I can say this, that I was only on the ship. That was my first tour of duty coming out of Pensacola and getting on the ship in Norfolk. That was my very first tour of duty in the Navy. And I did not become close to a lot of sailors like some of my other shipmates who had been on previous tours and they were a little bit older and they were in different parts of the world and that sort of thing. They were more seasoned, okay? And to me it was like, you just did what you had to do to survive and without knowing a lot of who you were working with, who you were saving, what have you, okay?

And so, to further answer your question, like I mentioned a minute ago, about 10 years ago I finally started opening up. Talking to people. It was a tough thing and a lot of guys, a lot of guys have PTSD. In fact, there's an officer that I'm familiar with. He's from Seattle and he was the junior officer on board the ship. I know that now, but I didn't know that then. And he actually has just recently seeked help because of PTSD and he said that he is now a different person now that he can talk about it, but all those years he had problems. And that was just an example of the different kinds of things that people went through subsequent to this whole thing.

Kendrick: Why did you serve, Ed?

Bechtel: Well, I graduated from high school in 65 and I tried to go to college, Kent State Extension up in Ashtabula, Ohio, and I was just a young whippersnapper, so to speak, and I was working to pay my way, and I was a 19-year-old trying to have a good time and then trying to study, and it took me two semesters to get thrown out of Kent State. But justifiably so.

So I'm sitting there with a very bad number in terms of getting drafted. And I said, well, I'm really not in favor of this Vietnam thing. So maybe, just maybe, I can also serve, but in a different capacity. And I said, let's try the Navy.

Well, based on this story, that didn't work out so good. So at any rate, that's actually why I did join the Navy. And my family has some military background, too. My father was in the Army in World War II, and I have a cousin that's a few years older. He was on the USS Enterprise, and he was down in the Cuban crisis, you know, the Missile Crisis? Yeah.

And so I have all this knowledge of them and what they did. Well, let me give it a shot. And that was a good thing. After the USS Liberty, I went to Bremerhaven, Germany for two years. And then after that, my last tour was at the National Security Agency in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. And I said, you know what? I've got family and a company back in Ohio. I'm going to just go ask them for a job. My uncle was a plant manager and he said, yeah, I'll get you in. What you do after that is up to you. And it worked out really well. So I feel like I made all the right decisions.

Kendrick: Your story reminds me of my dad's because he joined the Navy and 1967 or 60 thereabouts. And he preemptively joined the Navy because of Vietnam. And he was in Navy intelligence.

Bechtel: Was he really?

Kendrick: Yeah.

Bechtel: Do you know what capacity or what his rate was?

Kendrick: I think he was an E5.

Bechtel: E5, yeah, okay. And my rate was a communications technician. It was a CT. I was in the R branch, which was radio intercepting, you know. But yeah, there were a lot of people in the security group during that period. And with the advent of technology and that sort of thing, all that stuff sort of went away over the years, subsequent to the Vietnam War and what have you. But I think all in total there were like 5 communication ships. that the Navy commissioned during that period. I think they were five. And that's all done now.

Kendrick: Has the story of the Liberty been told?

Bechtel: It has been told. It has been told. And there is a website. It's called the USSLiberty.org. And it gives a, it's not a bad website at all. It talks about the attack, talks about a lot of the sailors, interviews. There's a lot of podcasts that are being told more recently about the Liberty. In fact, one of the ones was done by Candace Owen. That interview with the president of the Liberty Veterans Association, which is a non-profit that I was actually on the board of for a couple of years, that interview in itself got 6 million views, in a very, very short period of time. Yeah.

Kendrick: On Veterans Day, Ed, do you have any message for veterans, but also perhaps for the general public?

Bechtel: Good question. Every time I run talk to somebody in the public about being in the service or they see my plate on my truck that says Purple Heart, they thank you for your service. And whenever I hear that, it makes me feel good. It really does. And so I would do the same thing to any veteran or any service member that I come across and say, Thanks for your service.

And it's a big deal to sign on the dotted line, sign on the bottom line, to put your life on that line to support your country. And I would say that any veteran, any military, retired active reserve or whatever, deserves that acknowledgement to be thanked for the service that they've done to their country.

Kendrick: You mentioned an organization that you were part of specifically about the USS Liberty.

Bechtel: Yes, it's a 501c3 that was created in December 12, 1983. Okay, and it exists today. We have annual reunions throughout. We change it, periodically like Norfolk, DC. We were in Colorado a couple years ago, Pensacola, Florida. You know, it's an annual thing and we try to get around so that the survivors and their families don't have so far to go every time there's a reunion, you know. And it lasts about 3 days and we have it on June 8th, 1960, or June 8th of any year to commemorate that infamous day in the Mediterranean. Okay.

It, and we've created a website, ussliberty.org, but yeah, it's the reason that it exists is because the survivors have always felt there was a cover-up. That's why we were told never to talk about it. Why did Israel do it? We don't know. There's conspiracy theories. I don't support conspiracy theories. But I was there that day, and I know a lot of the things that are come up for argument. Israel's big claim is that it was a mistaken identity of the ship. Well, if you know anything about Navy ships, they always carry the flag. Our flag was shot down twice during the attack. We put it back up for the third time. It was there. The bow of the ship has huge numbers on it, okay? And ours had GTR5 on the bow of the ship, and they're the size of a human being, they're six feet tall, okay?

The bow of the ship, across the bow, it has right under USS Liberty. So the day of the attack was just like it is today, where you and I are talking, okay? It was a beautiful sunny day, you know? And it was broad daylight during the attack. It was noon about, well, sometime between 12 noon, 12 o'clock and our time local that the attack took place. How could it have been a mistaken identity? Okay.

And so the USS Liberty Veterans Association has tried many different ways through political requests, organizational visits, what have you. We tried everything, the podcast, and we're trying to get the message out so that we can find why did that attack happen by an ally. We want to know. And until the last survivor, we will continue asking those questions, trying to get that. My personal belief is the answers. There's a lot of tapes, there's a lot of transcripts, there's a lot of information that's locked up, okay, as top secret classified, and they won't release it. So prove me wrong. I don't think it was a mistake.

Kendrick: Ed, thank you for your service.

Bechtel: Thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to have this interview and share the experience and hopefully enlighten a lot of people who didn't even know it happened. But it's a good read and I encourage, there's books out there, I encourage people who have any interest in the military's history to read anything they can about the USS Liberty. Thank you. Yeah.