Here's what happened, ya land lubbers. We steamed from Thailand (we had anchored at Pattaya Beach for R&R, then stood off at Satahip for operations), on our way to Subic. From one flesh pot to the other.
The official word was that Vietnam was claiming territory greater than that which was internationally recognized, so we were to transit, in international waters, but within the area that they said was theirs, just to assert international sovereignty or whatever.
The truth was that we were crossing into their waters, even into the area that we recognized was their territory, dig?
The story told to the crew was that we were trying to get them to fire off their radar etc so we could to ECW and gather intel on their frequencies etc.
The truth was that we wanted to provoke them into attacking us (the desron) so we could paint them as bad guys.
Fine. Don't believe me. Here, read the news:
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/06/23/wo...china-sea.html