Learn about how on August 4, 1964, American radio operators mistranslated North Vietnamese radio traffic and concluded a new military operation was imminent. The USS Maddox and another destroyer, the USS Turner Joy, braced for a fresh attack. The attack was "probable but not certain," President Johnson was told, and since it had probably occured, the president authorized the first-ever bombing raid on installations in North Vietnam. On August 7, a joint session of Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.