“Over the years, skeptical members of Congress, historians and military analysts have wrestled with the question whether the Aug. 4 attack took place. To Navy Capt. James Stockdale (later Ross Perot’s vice presidential candidate), who flew an air-support mission over the Gulf of Tonkin that night and had “the best seat in the house,” it most assuredly did not, Sen. J. William Fulbright, who as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was the floor manager for the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, concluded on reflection that LBJ had badly misled him. And, over the years, Hanoi has consistently branded the entire affair as a “big lie” to support U.S. aggression in Southeast Asia.”
