On August 2nd, 1964, US destroyer Maddox was fired on by a North Vietnamese torpedoes boats. Two days later, on August 4th, USS Maddox and another destroyer reported to have been fired on again by North Vietnamese boats. The next President Johnson formed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and Congress approved. This gave him the power to take “all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression.” Later it would be found that the second Gulf of Tonkin incident never happened, and President Johnson misled Congress to support US involvement in the Vietnam War.
All of this showed that President Johnson basically lied in order to gain authority for more US involvement in the war. This led to distrust because it told soldiers and civilians that we are fighting in Vietnam over a lie. That our Government is willing to lie to join the war.
In 1965, President Johnson commented privately: "For all I know, our navy was shooting at whales out there."
In 1967, former naval officer asserted "I maintain that President Johnson, Secretary McNamara and the Joint Chiefs of Staff gave false information to Congress in their report about US destroyers being attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin." White continued his whistleblowing activities in the 1968 documentary In the Year of the Pig. White soon arrived in Washington to meet with Senator Fulbright to discuss his concerns, particularly the faulty sonar reports.
In 1981, Captain Herrick and journalist Robert Scheer re-examined Herrick's ship's log and determined that the first torpedo report from August 4, which Herrick had maintained had occurred—the "apparent ambush"—was in fact unfounded.
Although information obtained well after the fact supported Captain Herrick's statements about the inaccuracy of the later torpedo reports as well as the 1981 Herrick and Scheer conclusion about the inaccuracy of the first, indicating that there was no North Vietnamese attack that night,
at the time U.S. authorities and all of the Maddox crew stated that they were convinced that an attack had taken place.