The USS Kitty Hawk riot was a racial conflict between white and Black crewmen aboard the United States Navy aircraft carrier on the night of 12–13 October 1972, while positioned in the Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. In a retrospective article many years later, the Navy Times, called it "the worst shipboard riot in U.S. Navy history." When arrests were made, all 25 of those arrested were Black. A Black Navy official observed, "Anytime you have a so-called race riot and you lock up 25 blacks, that has to raise some questions." It also raised questions about more widespread problems as it took place during the same time period as two other serious racial incidents onboard the aircraft carrier and fleet oiler . And it led to a congressional investigation before the House Armed Services Committee, Special Subcommittee on Disciplinary Problems in the U.S. Navy, in late November and early December 1972.
Well before these events, Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt Jr., the Chief of Naval Operations, recognized "significant discrimination in the Navy." And, in their wake, he told the Congressional committee that these incidents '"are clearly due to failure of commands to implement' new racial programs 'with a whole heart.'" Addressing both the committee and the "Navy's entire command structure," he emphasized, "this issue of discrimination must be faced openly and fully." When Kitty Hawk returned to its home port in San Diego on November 28, 1972, a New York Times reporter asked debarking sailors what the trouble was aboard the ship, they yelled back a one word response: "racism".
Background
Racial conflicts increase in US military
By the early 1970s, racial conflicts were causing serious problems in the US Armed Forces. Colonel Robert D. Heinl, Jr. stated in a 1971 study in the Armed Forces Journal called “The Collapse of the Armed Forces”, that “Internally speaking, racial conflicts and drugs…are tearing the services apart today.” Historians of the Vietnam War have documented that non-white GIs were often given the dirtiest jobs and frequently sent to the front lines in combat situations. A task force reporting to the Secretary of Defense at the time, Melvin R. Laird, found that racial discrimination in the military was not confined to the military but was “also a problem of a racist society”. Historian Gerald Gill contended that by 1970 most Black soldiers thought the war was a mistake, “hypocritical in intent and racist and imperialist by design.” One soldier was quoted as saying that Black soldiers were sent on risky assignments by white officers "so that 'there would be one less nigger to worry about back home.'"
Racial problems in the US Navy
In 1972 the problems that Heinl and others were describing were about to explode in the Navy. As the ground war stalemated and Army grunts increasingly refused to fight or resisted the war in various other ways, the U.S. "turned increasingly to air bombardment", much of it launched from US Navy aircraft carriers. By 1972 there were more than twice as many aircraft carriers in the Gulf of Tonkin as previously, plus they were spending "a record number of days at sea with a grueling pace of flight operations". The Navy, if anything, was a less welcoming environment for Black sailors than the Army. As an article in The New York Times put it, “The Navy, with its tradition of Filipino waiters and Southern WASP leadership, never really was an alternative for America's young city blacks". Even though the Navy was under pressure to increase Black recruitment to meet the needs of the expanding air war, they were still a small minority on board the Kitty Hawk in late 1972. "Of a crew numbering 348 officers and 4,135 enlisted men, just five, or less than 1 percent were officers, and only 297 enlisted men were blackjust 7 percent of the enlisted crew." More, they "were typically assigned to the ship's most miserable jobs", often "the dreariest, most menial, and most unpopular jobs on board." What happened on the Kitty Hawk in October 1972, dramatically exposed the intersection of discontent over working and safety conditions, and racism.
Racial incidents on the Kitty Hawk
In June 1972, Captain Marland Townsend became the new commanding officer of the Kitty Hawk. In his first few weeks onboard, he presided over four "interracial disciplinary matters" that would play a significant role "in the shipboard upheaval that followed." In the first, two Black crewmen accused of assaulting a white sailor were brought before Townsend in a captain's mast. One was sentenced to three days in the brig on bread and water, while the other was sentenced to 30 days in the brig. The ship's mast proceedings were all taped and broadcast later for the crew, so everyone watching onboard saw the outcome and heard Townsend make "a statement to the effect that anyone who fights or commits assault on his ship can be expected to be dealt with very harshly and severely." Just three days later a white sailor was brought before Townsend accused of calling a new Black recruit a racial epithet and hitting him in the back with his fist. According to Congressional testimony from the ship's executive officer (XO), Commander Benjamin Cloud, who was of Black and Native American descent, the Black crewmembers felt this "would be a very interesting and good case" to test the Captain's words, because in "both cases, there was obviously an assault involved." And yet, they watched him dismiss all the charges against the white sailor. The Captain explained his reasoning in his Congressional testimony: "I excused the man with a warning.... What he did was a situation that occurred in anger...frustration more than anger. It was not deliberate, not a planned assault."
In a third incident a few weeks later, a white sailor faced captain's mast for throwing a can of scouring powder at, and then punching a Black sailor. Again Townsend ignored his promise of severe treatment by assigning the white sailor a small fine. The day after the crew learned of this minor punishment, a fourth incident occurred when two Black sailors retaliated against and punched the white sailor who had received the small fine, and also punched another white sailor in the compartment. The Black sailors said they were repaying the white sailor for the previous assault. During the confrontation, one of the Black sailors threw a shoe that hit two nearby white sailors. His case was first referred to a captain's mast, and then escalated by Townsend to a special court-martial, an unprecedented move for "the alleged offense of throwing a shoe." The Black sailor was worried about the outcome, which could have included confinement for up to one year, and opted to accept an undesirable discharge instead, which stripped him of all post-military GI benefits. "This outcome was unheard of given the nature of the charged offense." More, these four incidents and their disparate punishments flatly contradicted Townsend's promise to deal with all assaults "harshly and severely."
Racial incidents in Subic Bay
During two layovers in mid-September and early October 1972 at the Subic Bay Naval Base, in Olongapo, Philippines, two more racial incidents occurred. There were two main liberty areas in Olongapo, whose names reflected common racial relations at the time within the US Navy and US society as a wholethere was a mainly white section known as the "Strip", and a separate area frequented by Black GIs known as the "Jungle".
On September 13, several Black sailors reported being assaulted by Filipino locals at the instigation of a white sailor. The allegations against the white sailor were lodged by 5 Black sailors from the Kitty Hawk. The white sailor went before Townsend at a captain's mast, but received no punishment. When Townsend was questioned about this by the Congressional committee, he responded that the incident was "circulated by blacks" and that "[o]nly a few blacks made the charge".
Around midnight on October 9, a Black airman was returning to the Kitty Hawk when he claimed he was called a racial slur and thrown to the ground by two white sailors who continued to assault him. The two white sailors denied the assault, but two other white sailors from another ship gave statements to the Naval base security confirming the Black airman's story. They also noted that the Black sailor could not fight back because his arm was in a cast. The lead base investigator declined to take any action on the incident saying, "I didn't pursue the matter any further." When the Black sailor returned to the ship, he told other Black sailors about what happened, making them all "really unhappy". Captain Townsend conducted his own investigation into the incident, concluding that it was "black word against white word", despite the two white sailors from another ship who had corroborated the Black sailor's story. He also declined to take any action.
The riot
On October 12, Kitty Hawk began participating in Operation Linebacker off the coast of North Vietnam. The ship "had been at sea nearly nine months under some of the most demanding conditions that a carrier crew had faced since World War II." The renewal of combat operations intensified the pressure and work pace onboard, "racial tensions were approaching a fast boil", and more racial incidents began to occur. One of them started when several Black crewmen were greeting each other on the mess deck by giving dap and were told by a nearby crewman to cut it out. The Black crewmen continued and the situation escalated with more crewmembers gathering around and arguing. When a division officer entered the dining area he saw about 80 to 100 men, including about 25 Black men, "'having words' in a 'cross manner', but no fighting." Some Black petty officers arrived, and with some members of the human resources staff, were able to get the Black crewmen to go to the ship's human resources office where they were able to air "their grievances". They repeated their complaints about the incidents in the Philippines described above, complained about being discriminated against in ship assignments and promotions, and raised that they were increasingly being harassed for gathering in groups of three or more. As one Black sailor put it, "Twenty white sailors could sit at a table but four blacks could not." And, they wanted to know why it was only Black crewmen who were questioned after any interracial disturbance. These issues would loom large over the next 24 hours.
The aft mess deck and a pistol drawn