North Vietnam's General Giap suggested that the DESOTO patrol had been sent into the gulf to provoke North Vietnam into giving the U.S. an excuse for escalation of the war. Various government officials and men aboard "Maddox" have suggested similar theories. American politicians and strategists had been planning provocative actions against North Vietnam for some time. U.S. Undersecretary of State George Ball told a British journalist after the war that "at that time ... many people ... were looking for any excuse to initiate bombing". George Ball stated that the mission of the destroyer warship involved in the Gulf of Tonkin incident "was primarily for provocation."