The Gulf of Tonkin incident was a sham, like the sinking of the USS Maine, the Zimmerman Telegraph, and the "surprise" attack on Pearl Harbour.
Quote:
In 2005, it was revealed in an official NSA declassified report[2] that the USS Maddox first fired warning shots on the August 2 incident and that there may not have been North Vietnamese boats at the August 4 incident. The report saidt is not simply that there is a different story as to what happened; it is that no attack happened that night. [...] In truth, Hanoi's navy was engaged in nothing that night but the salvage of two of the boats damaged on 2 August.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_Incident
The Maddox was actually spying for the CIA in North Vietnamese waters, so any attack would not have been unprovoked.