Liberty Central and USS Liberty Remembrance Day

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Liberty means Freedom

By Eileen Fleming

UPDATED 5/5/16: Around 10 AM EST Corporate office for Orlando Sentinel left a phone message that the ad must be edited to NOT mention Israel– which is on the bottom line in red. Art Support has been notified and this story TBC once AD complies and goes live

USS Liberty Remembrance Day on this June 8 marks 49 years since Israel attacked America’s premier spy ship as it navigated in international waters during The Six Day War, killing 34 and wounding 174 out of the 294 man crew.

Admiral Moorer, General Raymond Davis, Rear Admiral Staring, Ambassador James Akins and other high ranking US officials have come forth stating Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty was deliberate.

Admiral Moorer and his distinguished colleagues also called for every June 8th to be known as “USS Liberty Remembrance Day, in order to commemorate the Liberty’s heroic crew.”

Richard Schmucker, never set foot aboard the USS LIBERTY, but survivors and supporters knew Rich as LIBERTY CENTRAL, because in the days before personal computers, Rich amassed every printed mention of the USS LIBERTY.

USS Liberty survivor Ronald Kukall, reports that Rich Schmucker has moved into a nursing home in Auburn, Nebraska and the LIBERTY archives are housed at the Cold War Museum in Virginia.

In a 2008 telephone interview, Schmucker informed this reporter:

From 1963 until 1969, I was a CT, a Communications Technician stationed at the Naval base in Wahiawa, Hawaii. CT’s are apart of the intelligence community and our work was classified.

I never heard a word about what happened on June 8, 1967 in the Mediterranean until I was in a library in Auburn, Nebraska in 1979 and came across Jim Ennis’s book, ASSAULT ON THE LIBERTY.

I checked it out and after reading it, I became so dang angry because I hadn’t heard anything about it while in the Navy, or in the newspapers or on TV, so I began doing research.

Through the years I have obtained over two hundred pounds of documents and I have stuff the crew never even knew about.

What I read opened more doors and I was led to contact Russians, Egyptians, Israelis and others and my phone bill was higher than a kite.

I got the USA documents using the Freedom of Information Act and most of the time I got what I asked for, but sometimes, I was completely ignored.

I signed a secrecy agreement when I entered the Navy and I think one of the reasons our government has ignored me was because they didn’t want to give me any credibility.

Once I received a package from Paris, France. Two hours after opening it up, I landed in the hospital because it had some kind of poison in it.

Apparently somebody in France didn’t like me because I was asking questions about the USS LIBERTY.

I have gotten a couple of phone threats, but it’s the one’s who won’t talk to you, you have to worry about.

It’s not the Jewish people or the Jewish religion I have a problem with. It’s the governments of America and Israel that colluded in the cover-up that I have a problem with…

I too have a problem with Governments that collude in deceptions and in disrespecting the USS LIBERTY veterans, so I have assumed responsibility for Liberty Central II, a grassroots effort to establish every June 8 to be known as USS Liberty Remembrance Day.

On Thursday, Liberty Central II’s first mainstream media advertisement premiers in the Orlando Sentinel.