HMS Sidon was salvaged and towed to Chesil Beach, where the bodies of the victims were recovered. Never returned to service, two years after the accident she was scuttled to serve as a target for Asdic. Her wreck lies 34m (111ft) below the surface in Lyme Bay.
USS LIBERTY
On 8 June 1967, during the Seven Day War between Israel and her Arab neighbours, the USS Liberty was attacked by Israeli jet fighters then struck by a torpedo. Liberty (AGTR-5) was a wartime ‘Victory’ type standard ship converted to an auxiliary technical research ship for the US Navy, and began deployment in this role in 1965. Her duties included electronic eavesdropping of radio and radar signals.
Before the war started, the USS Liberty was ordered to the north coast of Sinai to collect signal intelligence. When fighting broke out on 5 June 1967, a signal was sent to the Liberty ordering her to stay well clear of both the Egyptian and Israeli coasts, but due to lengthy message routing, the ship did not receive the warning in time. On 8 June Liberty, flying a large American flag, and with her hull marking GTR-5 clearly visible, was over-flown by several Israeli aircraft, ostensibly on anti-submarine patrols.
At 1124 Israeli High Command received a report that Arish was being shelled from the sea, and three torpedo boats were despatched to the area. Their commanding officer radioed that he was tracking an unidentified ship 14 miles off the coast, and that her speed was calculated at between 28 and 30 knots. Despite the fact that the Liberty was moving at around 5 knots at the time, and carried no armament larger than .50cal machine guns, she was identified as the attacking vessel.
Based on this, two Israeli Mirage fighters carried out an attack on the Liberty with 30mm cannon and rockets. The unprepared vessel was badly damaged, eight crewmen were killed and seventy-five wounded, including her captain. She radioed for help, and the aircraft carrier USS America launched eight aircraft. Because a strategic exercise had been underway, they were still armed with nuclear weapons, and as Vice Admiral Martin feared the attackers might be Russian, he recalled the aircraft in order to avoid a possible nuclear conflict.
Meanwhile, the three torpedo boats closed with the Liberty, still unsure of her identity. Crewmen manning two of her .50cal machine guns briefly opened fire and bracketed one of the torpedo boats, which returned the fire with cannon and machine guns, and launched five torpedoes. Liberty managed to avoid four but the fifth hit the ship on the starboard side just forward of the bridge, blowing a 40ft wide (12m) hole in the cargo hold which had been converted as the main intelligence-gathering station; twenty-five crewmen were killed and many wounded, but the ship remained afloat.
The Israeli boats continued to strafe the Liberty, until a life raft thrown overboard from the stricken ship was seen to bear US Navy markings. At this point the torpedo boats ceased fire. Eight aircraft launched from the USS Saratoga were recalled, and the Israelis offered help to the survivors, which was refused. The Liberty managed to leave the area under her own power and, escorted by several warships, she made for Malta, where temporary repairs enabled her to return to the United States. The cost of repairs to the old ship was considered prohibitive, and she was never repaired, being scrapped in 1973.
The Israeli government apologised to the United States for what it claimed was a case of mistaken identity. The USA conducted several inquiries into the attack, the final one in 1981. Despite the contrary findings of all the inquiries, conspiracy theories have long dogged the episode. In 2012 the matter flared up again, following the allegations made by a crew member of the US submarine Amberjack that it was his submarine which had fired the torpedo which struck the Liberty. Although at first sight a surprising allegation, it becomes possible when we now know that all US intelligence-gathering ships were accompanied by a submerged submarine. The submarine commander’s orders were that if it looked likely the intelligence-gathering equipment on board was in danger of being seized, then he was to torpedo and sink the ship. This theory, however, then raises the question of why a similar solution was not applied during the Pueblo incident the following year — perhaps because of the secret high-level outcry over the Liberty torpedoing.
INS KHUKRI
Although not a major naval battle, the encounter between the Pakistani navy submarine Hangor and the INS frigate Khukri was highly significant. It was the first time since the end of the Second World War that a submarine had torpedoed and sunk an enemy ship. Moreover, the small modern diesel-electric boat had taken on two specialised anti-submarine frigates and torpedoed one before either of the Indian vessels knew she was in the vicinity.
INS Khukri (F45) was one of three Type 14 antisubmarine frigates of the Royal Navy Blackwood class bought by the Indian navy. Laid down in 1955, she was commissioned in 1958. The Khukri was 310ft (94m) long and displaced 1200 tons. Her single-shaft geared steam turbine propelled her at up to 28 knots. The RN Blackwood class was an experiment to see if a ship half the size of a modern frigate, and suitable for mass production in time of war, could still be an efficient escort vessel. Because of their small size they were specialised, indeed over-specialised, in the anti-submarine role. Their only surface armament was three single 40mm Bofors. They did, however, carry a full sonar outfit and two Limbo antisubmarine mortars. The PNS Hangor (‘shark’) was a French-built diesel-electric submarine of the Daphné class. Launched in 1968, she commissioned in 1970. She was 57.75m long (189ft 6in), displaced 1038 tons submerged, could reach 15 knots underwater, and was armed with twelve 21in torpedo tubes (eight bow, four external stern).
During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, the two vessels would come into fatal contact. On the night of 2/3 December 1971 the Hangor radioed in a report of an Indian squadron off Bombay. The Indian navy intercepted the message, and despatched two anti-submarine frigates, Khukri and Kirpan, to search the area for the suspected submarine. On 9 December Hangor made sonar contact with the two frigates, and began stalking them. The Khukri and Kirpan remained unaware of the presence of the submarine, and carried out a slow-speed sonar search on a steady course. Hangor revealed her presence by firing her first torpedo at the Kirpan, but it was detected on the ship’s sonar and she evaded it at full speed. Her sister-ship then came in for an attack on the Hangor, but the submarine scored first, hitting Khukri, which sank in two minutes with heavy loss of life. Hangor avoided a depth-charge counter-attack by Kirpan, whose Limbo mortars had malfunctioned, and fired a third torpedo at the frigate. Kirpan again detected the approaching torpedo and exited the scene at full speed.