Reed Irvine Editor
With the communist mop-up of Indochina virtually completed, South Korea is now under attack. Not a military attack, but a propaganda attack. As was the case in the Vietnam war, an important part of the propaganda barrage is directed at the American public. It is being transmitted through important segments of our news media.
South Korea has a strong military force and the people are intensely anti-communist, but they need the assurance of arms and supplies from the United States if they are to successfully resist an attack from the north. The best deterrent to such an attack is the presence of some 42,000 American troops on the border with North Korea. They provide concrete assurance that the United States will help defend South Korea, as it did 25 years ago.
The communist strategy, is to use propaganda to undermine the American commitment to the defense of South Korea. The themes are the same as those that were used so successfully to sap American support for South Vietnam. The government of South Korea is to be portrayed as repressive and corrupt, not too different from that of North Korea, and therefore unworthy of American support.
Here is an excellent example of this theme as expressed in The New York Times on June 22.
In 1950, South Korean President Syngman Rhee mocked democracy and ruled by intimidation. Today, President Park Chung Hee makes Rhee look the amateur in techniques of political suppression. Censorship, emergency decrees barring criticism of the regime, and imprisonment for political offenses are a way of life. The opposition to Park is large, growing and increasingly frustrated. It comprises university students, intellectuals and journalists, and the country's numerous and well-educated Christians. South Korea is internally explosive. Denied a legitimate means for redressing grievances and subject to forcible suppression, Park's opponents and victims could strike violently against the regime. (Gaddis Smith, New York Times Magazine, June 22, 1975, p. 15)
This has been a recurrent theme in The New York Times for almost a year. On August 2, 1974, The Times published South Korea Under Attack (Continued from page 1) a story on page 2 headliner: "Painful Korean Issue in U.S.: Seoul's Curbs on Dissenters Stir Opposition to Aid." The Times was able to quote two members of Congress who can generally be relied upon to criticize aid to any anticommunist govemment and Professor Edwin O. Reischauer of Harvard, a former U.S. ambassador to Japan. Reischauer. also a leading opponent of aid to Vietnam. recommended withdrawing some of our troops from Korea and cutting military aid to bring pressure on the Korean government to make political changes. If they did not respond, he favored withdrawing all troops and running the risk of seeing South Korea fall to the communists. (In an interview with AIM, Reischauer said this was still his recommendation, but he now favors delaying implementation for six months to a year to permit people to get over the shock of the Vietnam dentente before making our next retreat)..
The Times has, we believe, devoted more space to reporting on the state of civil liberties in South Korea than any other newspaper in this country. In the first three months of 1975, The Times carried 27 stories which discussed anti-government protests and restrictions on civil liberties in South Korea. That is over two a week. In the same period they did not print a single story about the state of civil liberties in North Korea.
Reading these stories, one is impressed by the fact that they are all about activities, or measures against activities, which would be virtually unthinkable in North Korea or any other communist country. For example, several of the stories concerned a newspaper, Dong-A Ilbo. which was subjected to official pressure because of its criticism of government policy. The readers were not reminded that under the North Korean regime, whose troops were poised thirty miles from the South Korean capital, this problem could never have arisen for the simple reason that the North Korean government runs all the newspapers and other media in its territory.
This is not the only sense in which The Times has neglected to put its reporting on the South Korean restrictive measures into proper context. On October 1, 1974, the North Korean dictator, Kim II Sung, made a speech declaring that the greatest task confronting North Korea was reunifying the country at the earliest possible date. He outlined three steps to be taken to achieve this. One was to actively support and encourage "the democratic movement" in the South, i.e., those in the South that were opposed to the Park Government. Another was "to increase solidarity with the international revolutionary forces," which means the solicitation of the help of communist governments and their supporters in other countries.
The Times might well review its own performance and ask whether it did not go beyond normal news reporting and become a part of the campaign to support and encourage those in the South that were opposed to the Park Government. Not only was the concentration on South Korea abnormal, but some of the stories run by The Times hardly qualified as genuine news.
For example, on February 3, 1975, The Times printed a story beadlined: "South Korean Army's Loyalty to Park Shows Signs of Cracking." This was based on such evidence as a statement made by a long-retired admiral living in Japan, and the sending of a couple of letters to the editor bv army personnel. With that kind of evidence, it would be easy to do a much bigger story claiming that the loyalty of the U.S. Army was showing signs of cracking. The Times should ask itself if this was news reporting or a psychological warfare gambit.
We are not suggesting that The Tintes or anyone else should ignore legitimate news of dissent and repression. But note the double standard applied by The Times.
After Yugoslavia had arrested scores of critics of the government, fired eight professors and expelled two Americans. here is how The Times sought to put all this in perspective:
"Despite the arrests and university dismissals, there is little organized dissent in Yugoslavia. Occasionally. incidents come to light involving anti-government guerrillas or terrorists... Ihey have found no perceptible backing among Yugoslavs. President Iito himself apparently remains respected everywhere, at least as a kind of father figure... But for the moment the nation seems little interested in the views of a handfill of obscure dissidents."
The Times has reported some of the activities of the Yugoslav dissidents, notably the protests of the writer. Mihailo Mihaikw. but as the above quote indicates, there was no effort to try to build this into a campaign.
The contrast is even more marked when we examine The Times' treatment of repression in North Korea. Here The Times is almost totally silent even though the repression is as total as in any country in the world. The author of the June 22 article quoted above did feel obliged to say a word about the nature of the regime that would like to take over the South. Here is what he said:
"The Pyongyang government imposes the strictest Communist discipline; the state, embodied in a cult of Kim, is all; and Kim, rigid and doctrinaire, employs a rhetoric resembling that of Stalin or Mao a generation ago."
That is all. Note that he speaks of "discipline", not total repression. He talks of the "cult of Kim" but not of the absurd deification of the dictator. If Park makes Syngman Rhee look amatemish, one would have to say that Kim makes Park look like Thomas Jefferson. He simply does not tolerate any dissidents and he certainly does not permit reporters for the American press to roam freely around his domain to ferret out his misdeeds.
Equating the South and the North
The propaganda objective of the communists is to persuade the American people, and key lawmakers, that there is no essential difference between Park Chung Hee of South Korea and Kim II Sung, the ruler of the North.
One tactic is to get people thinking of Park as a dictator, not as an elected president. Thus Charles Bartlett in his syndicated column of October 26, 1975, spoke of the dangers President Ford might encounter on his Far Eastern trip in these words: "Siberia, with Secretary General Brezhnev, will be safer than Seoul with the dictator, Chung Hee Park." The ruler of the U.S.S.R., who does not even hold an official state office, is referred to by his title. President Park, who has been elected to that office four times, is referred to as "dictator."
Another syndicated columnist, Clayton Fritchey, in his column of May 27, 1975, spoke of "Dictator Park" and the "tyrannical president, Gen. Park." He described North Korea as "a left-wing dictatorship" and South Korea as "a right-wing dictatorship." He said that when "attention is again focused on the brutal repressions of the undemocratic government of South Korea, Congress and the public will have to ask themselves if they want to risk another 500,000 casualties and another $150 billion in trying to salvage still another military government."
The Nation in a May 24, 1975 editorial said Park headed "an extremely unpopular dictatorial regime which has been under constant attack from its domestic opposition."
The Washington Post on June 22, said that if recently adopted measures were fully implemented, South Korea "will be on its way to becoming a mobilized society with striking similarities to the one it vows to oppose."
Columnists Evans and Novak, writing from the vantage point of Seoul, Korea, where they talked with both President Park and his political opponents, provided some perspective sadly missing from the output of many of their journalistic colleagues. On June 19, they wrote:
"The most important political development in this potential battleground for a shooting war is a deepening feeling by President Park Chung Hee's political opponents that much as they deplore his harsh security measures, the anti-Park campaign by American liberals poses a worse danger to South Korea.
"That feeling stems from widespread acceptance here of this axiom: internal disunity might induce North Korean dictator Kim II Sung to attack or the U.S. Congress to remove American forces... The right message is that united opposition to communism takes precedence over internal politics with a totality never approached in South Vietnam. Furthermore, one reason for restraint by Park's political foes is that his security measures, while probably excessive, fall short of thorough repression. Less than a democracy today, South Korea is not a true police state either. Thus it would be tragic irony if concern over Korean human rights triggered a war with ominous world implications."
Our news media, led by The New York Tintes, have magnified the opposition, downplayed the support of the Park government and neglected to impress upon the American public the constant danger posed by North Korea. We have discussed the concentration on the dissidents in The Times. We will note briefly the way in which The Times has downplayed support of President Park and the threat from the North.
On May 10, a crowd estimated at one million persons rallied in Seoul to express their opposition to communism and support of the government. Opposition leaders participated. Resolutions adopted by acclamation called on the U.S. to strengthen its commitment to defend South Korea. Activities detrimental to national unity in the face of the communist threat were condemned and President Park's call for stern measures was endorsed.
This was reported in The New York Times on May 13 in three inches on an inside page, at the tail end of a story saying that the opposition in Korea was supporting new security measures.
On June 7, another huge rally in Seoul was attended by over one million persons, including 1000 delegates from over 60 nations. Defense of South Korea against the communist threat was the major theme of the rally, with prominent religious leaders stressing the absence of religious and other freedoms in communist countries. Representatives of 17 religious groups spoke. This huge rally was totally ignored by the American news media. The Times, which had found so much space to report on the activities of a handful of religious dissidents, found no room to report this massive expression of the feelings of the Korean people. AIM learned of it from articles in The Rising Tide, the bi-monthly paper of the Freedom Leadership Foundation.
On March 21, two North Korean defectors held a press conference in Seoul to tell how they had helped build tunnels across the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea for use in an invasion of the South. They said many tunnels were under construction and that orders had been given for their completion before October 10, 1975, in order to prepare for a war to capture control of the South. A number of tunnels have been discovered by the South Koreans and sealed. Apparently mafiy others have not yet been found. This press conference was not reported by The New York Times.
THE STRANGE CASE OF KIM IL SUNG'S AD
While readers of The New York Times have not read many news stories from North Korea, they have not been completely denied information about the thoughts and accomplishments of Kim II Sung, the dictator who has ruled the county for the past thirty years. Kim is fond of buying full page ads in The Times, which he uses to keep the readers abreast of his speeches.
One of these ads appeared on May 31. 1975, with a large heading: "President Kim II Sung Talks on Korea's Reunification." The edition delivered in Washington gave no indication that this was a paid ad. It was merely signed: "Korean Information Office, Stockholm. Sweden." Ihe ads AIM has run in The Times have always had to be labeled "advertisement" at the top.
What is more important, we noted many statements in Kim's ad that were of questionable accuracy. Here are some quotes which we considered inaccurate:
"The people of all strata in South Korea are waging an increasingly dynamic struggle against fascism and for democracy, and the colonial military fascist rule of U.S. imperialism and its stooges is sinking into a serious crisis."
"U.S. imperialism and south Korea's ruling clique are intensifying their fascist repression of the south Korean people and further stepping up their preparation of war against the northern half of the Republic."
"The problem of whether there is peace or war in Korea now depends, in the last analysis, on the attitude of the United States, which actually holds all power in south Korea and lords it over there."
"The U.S. imperialists and the Japanese militarists seek the permanent division of Korea, the former to reduce south Korea to their permanent colony and military base and the latter to take hold of south Korea as their permanent commodity market."
We knew from our own experience that The Times insists on factual accuracy and good taste in ads that it accepts. AIM wrote to the Chairman and President of The Times, Mr. Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, to inquire whether the above statements and others like them were considered to he accurate and in good taste by The Times. We also noted that at the annual shareholders' meeting in April, Mr. Sulzherger had said that when The Times carried communist propaganda, it was always labeled. We asked about the fact that there was no indication that this was an ad paid for by the communist government of North Korea.
Mr. John D. Pomfret, Assistant to the Publisher, responded promptly to our letter, but he evaded the main issue. He said the word "advertisement" did appear above the ad, but it was "conceivable that it was omitted in an early edition." which it was.
Mr. Pomfret explained that Mr. Sulzberger's remark about labeling propaganda applied only to "sourcing our own news material." Paid ads, we infer, are exempt from that requirement.
Finally, Mr. Pomfret simply ducked the issue of accuracy and taste, saying that The Times prints "dozens of opinion ads with which we disagree." Mr. Pomfret did not say where The Times stood on the question of factual accuracy and good taste in such ads.
In response, AIM quoted an editorial published in The Times on June 16, 1972, which made it crystal clear that even opinion ads were required to remain within "the bounds of decency, good taste and the requirements of factual accuracy." The editorial said The Times would not knowingly publish an advertisement containing "a clear misstatement of fact or a distorted quotation." This editorial cited as a regrettable failure to live up to this policy an ad critical of Israel that had been published on June 6, 1972.
We also pointed out to Mr. Pomfret that he himself had written to AIM to say that he was under "no obligation to permit publication of an advertisement that I know contains inaccuracies." In another letter to AIM. dated April 25, 1974. Mr. Pomfret said that he would "not knowingy permit an advertiser to misstate the facts."
We pointed out that our experience in running ads in The Times had shown that they were very meticulous about the language used. For example, in one ad we wanted to say: "This is a report on the credibility, of Anthony Lewis." The Times refused to run the ad unless we changed that to read: We raise a question concerning the reports of Anthonv Lewis." We wanted to say: "Five days after the false report was front-page news in The Times. Lewis reluctantly conceded its falsity." The Times insisted on: "Five days after the disputed report was front-page news in The Times. Lewis reported the consensus that it was erroneous."
We concluded: "There is no question that Kim II Sung's language was tasteless and abrasive. Many of his statements are demonstrably factually inaccurate. I think it is perfectly valid to ask why The Times did not apply its long standing policy in this case. Why did you not insist on factual accuracy, as you said you should have done in the case of the June 6, 1972 ad... ? Why did you not insist on tempering the immoderate language... ? Does Kim II Sung rate special treatment? If so, why?"
Mr. Porefret acknowledged the letter but said he saw no point in carrying on the correspondence since our preconceptions were clear and he had no hope of changing them.
We have informed Mr. Sulzberger that we think The Times has an obligation to reconcile its June 16, 1972 policy statement with its May 31, 1975 Kim II Sung ad.
Unable to reconcile the announced policy of The Times with the Kim II Sung ad, Mr. Sulzberger has informed us that he considers the Pomfret reply satisfactory. This is incredible. We think The Times should restate its policy as outlined in its June 16, 1972 editorial, reaffirming its dedication to accuracy and good taste in advertising. We think that it should also admit, as it did in the 1972 editorial, that it sometimes slips and that the acceptance of the Kim II Sung ad was inconsistent with its declared policies. In the 1972 editorial, The Times admitted that it had made a mistake in accepting an ad that made inaccurate statements about Israel. Can it do less than make such an admission about an ad that contains outrageously false statements about America?
Give Mr. Sulzberger the benefit of your opinion in this matter. His address is: Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, The New York Times, 229 West 43rd Street, New York, N.Y. 10036
"CBS News has learned that a rare form of cancer, mesothelioma, has been found in a man in Duluth, Minnesota. Now, this form of cancer is associated with exposure to asbestos. For several years, you know, controversy has raged in Minnesota over the Reserve Mining Co. of Duluth pumping waste into Lake Superior, waste containing asbestos."
That is how Dan Rather began a report on the CBS Evening News on March 15, 1975. He went on to say that there were claims that Duluth's drinking water was dangerously contaminated with asbestos and that this could lead to an increase in the cancer rate. He then discussed a suit against Reserve Mining to halt the dumping of waste into the lake. He concluded: "Doctors who told CBS News about the new asbestos-related stomach cancer case in Duluth emphasized that it may or may not prove to be a factor in the final outcome of the dispute, but the fact that a case of asbestos-related cancer now has been reported in a man living in a city where mining wastes with asbestos in them are poured into the water supply seems certain to touch off more controversy."
CBS Caught with Its Facts Down
On March 19, The Duluth Herald carried a story saying that a medical advisory committee on the city's asbestos water "puzzle" had emphatically refuted the CBS report. The paper said: "The committee issued a statement noting the individual was not a resident of any community using Lake Superior water for drinking purposes and, further, 'that the correct diagnosis was unrelated to mesothelioma.'"
A complainant who had tried without success to get CBS to make a correction brought the matter to the attention of AIM. On April 4, we wrote to Richard Salant, President of CBS News, asking if they disputed the accuracy of the Duluth Herald story. If not would they correct the erroneous Dan Rather report?
On April 8, CBS informed us that they were checking the story, promising to make a correction if there had been an error.
Over two months later, three months after the initial broadcast, after some additional prodding on our part, we received a letter from CBS informing us that the following statement had been broadcast by Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News on June 14, 1975.
"Three months ago on this broadcast, we reported that a man in Duluth, Minnesota had contracted a rare form of asbestos-related cancer called mesothelioma. And it was suggested that this could be a new factor in the drinking water controversy between environmentalists and the Reserve Mining Co., which has been dumping large amounts of asbestos fibers into Lake Superior since 1956. That cancer report, insofar as can be proved, was inaccurate. Our sources, medical experts, now say they cannot document any case of mesothelioma in the area."
Congratulations, Mr. Salant. But why did it take three months to report what the Duluth Herald found out on March 19?
MORE COMPLAINTS AGAINST CBS: THE CANAL AND CUBA
AIM has complained to CBS about a misleading broadcast on the controversy over the Panama Canal. On May 25, CBS broadcast a segment on "Sixty Minutes" titled, "Whose Canal Is It?"
Here is how CBS capsulized the history of the Canal.
"To understand the present difficulties the United States is having with Panama over the Canal, you have to go back to 1903 and perhaps that classic example of international chicanery. Then Panama was part of Colombia, and a canal had already been started across the isthmus by a French company. That canal was a disaster... The United States watched with interest as the project was abandoned.
"In 1903, a revolution broke out-Panamanians seeking independence. The U.S. was quick to support the rebels and within three days it recognized the new state. It was a master stroke of diplomacy (or of something) by Teddy Roosevelt, for, within two weeks, he had pressured an agreement with Panama giving the United States a ten-milewide strip of Panama forever."
Bringing us down to the present day and the arrangements with Panama, CBS said: "The Panama Canal Co., the government agency that runs the Canal and the ten-mile wide Canal Zone that surrounds it, receives $120 million a year in tolls. The tiny country of Panama, which this Zone cuts in two, receives around $2 million a year. And therein lies the problem."
The clear implication of this is that the United States has cheated Panama from beginning to end, and that, presumably, provides a clue to the answer to the question, "Whose Canal Is It?"
What CBS neglected to tell its audience was that the Panamanians had grown impatient with Colombia's footdragging over signing a treaty with the U.S. to open the way for building the canal. They revolted and declared their independence in order to conclude the treaty, obtain the $10 million payment offered by the U.S., and insure that the canal would be built through Panama rather than Nicaragua, which was also anxious to get it.
Far from pressuring Panama or cheating it, the U.S. helped bring the country into existence and assured its independence. If any country, had a grievance, it was Colombia, and the U.S. subsequently paid it $25 million to satisfy any claim that it had to the area.
Not only did the U.S. pay both Panama and Colombia for the Canal Zone, but we also paid $160 million to acquire clear title to all the land and waterways involved. According to James Hartley of Columbus, ind., who brought this matter to our attention, this was about twice what we paid for all other land acquisitions from 1781 until 1867, including Alaska and the Louisiana Purchase. Our total investment in the Canal Zone now comes to $5.5 billion.
Not only did CBS neglect to mention any of these facts, so relevant to the question of ownership of the Canal, but it also inexcusably blew smoke in the eyes of its viewers in discussing the gross receipts from tolls in the same breath as the annual payment to Panama.
The implication of the contrast between the $120 million in toll receipts and the $2 million payment to Panama is that the U.S. is cleaning up and leaving little Panama only a few crumbs from a highly profitable operation. CBS, of course, knows very well that the $120 million does not represent a net profit to the U.S. Operating the Canal and maintaining it is expensive. The Panama Canal Co. has actually incurred an operating deficit in the past three fiscal years.
We have pointed these facts out to CBS. We have also called to their attention the interesting fact that Panamanian citizens earn $65.5 million annually in wages paid by the Panama Canal Co. and that the country's per capita gross national product is nearly $1000 a year. This is almost double the GNP of Nicaragua. the country that did not get the canal.
We charged that CBS not only failed to provide the elementary facts that provide the answer to the question it posed about ownership of the canal, but it omitted most of the important arguments of those who believe that the U.S. must retain sovereignty over the Canal Zone.
At the CBS annual shareholders' meeting, Mr. William S. Paley, Chairman of CBS, said that CBS News tries to give both sides of important issues so that the public will be better prepared to decide for themselves. That was clearly not done in this ease, and we have asked CBS what they plan to do to correct the record and right the imbalance.
The answer we have received is that CBS News believes it treated the conflicting views with fairness and balance. They have not explained how such inaccurate and distorted information can help the public make sound decisions.
Contested Castro Quote As we related in the May AIM Report, we were not able to get the top management of CBS to admit that the American people had been misled by Dan Rather when he told them last October that Fidel Castro was now interested in trade and conciliation rather than in supporting subversion in other countries.
We are convinced that CBS News deliberately edited out a statement by Castro, which they had on tape, saying that he supported revolutionaries in other countries all he could, as long as they were fighting. We think it was omitted because it would have clashed with the theme that Castro is now benign and that it is foolish to continue the trade embargo against Cuba.
We have decided to ask a third party to judge the matter, and so we referred the case to the National News Council. This will be an interesting test case, since Richard S. Salant, President of CBS News, served on the committee that recommended the establishment of the National News Council.
CBS NEWS SHOWS UP THE NEW YORK TIMES
AIM has criticized The New York Times severely for its failure to report adequately on the murder of innocent people by the communists in Vietnam and Cambodia. (See AIM Report of April, 1975). We alerted the National News Council to this criticism, and they took the matter up as a formal complaint.
They informed us of their decision on June 17. It cleared The Times, even though the paper had offered no defense for its failure to report the atrocities that we described. The News Council's finding was based on the claim that reports of atrocities by the American Embassy in Saigon and by the AP were not based on first hand information. They said: "In dealing with a highly inflammatory situation, such as the bloodbath allegations, there would seem to be good cause for withholding publication of any second-hand accounts, particularly if there was any expectation that reliable first-person accounts might be forthcoming. The news blackout in South Vietnam and the total communication ban which still exists in Cambodia have made it almost impossible to acquire reliable information or confirmations. Those stories which did trickle in to the Western press were unconfirmed and of doubtful origin."
We do not know how the National News Council arrived at the conclusion that it was difficult to confirm accounts of atrocities that occurred before the communists took control of all Vietnam. We have appealed their finding CBS News submitting to them as evidence a transcript of a CBS Evening News broadcast on April 18, 1975.
CBS News, on April 17, reported some of the atrocities that had been described in cables from the American embassy in Saigon. CBS indicated that they would make their own efforts to check out these stories. The following night they had a report from Peter Collins in Saigon. Mr. Collins had simply gone to a refugee camp near Saigon where there were many people who had escaped from areas under communist control. Mr. Collins said: "At Vungtau in nearby refugee camps it is easy to find people who have either heard or seen widespread killings by North Vietnamese or Viet Cong troops." He proceeded to show three individuals who had first-hand knowledge of such killing.
Peter Collins had no trouble finding eyewitnesses. Did The Times really try? AIM has commended CBS News for taking the trouble to check out these stories and reporting the results on the air.
Having helped bring about the communist triumph in Indochina, some of the media seem to be reluctant to report on the unhappy consequences. This is particularly true of The New York Times, which confidently predicted on the eve of Cambodia's collapse that life in Indochina would be better for most people once the Americans were gone.
On June 19, the AP put on its wire a story saying that famine was ravaging Cambodia and that the new rulers of South Vietnam had publicly admitted that hunger was a problem in Saigon. Saigon in a radio broadcast said: "The problem of starvation in Saigon... which ns prevamng now, is one of the most cruel consequences caused by the neocolonial economic policy of the American imperialists and their lackeys." The AlP noted that our policy had been one of shipping hundreds of thousands of tons of grain to both Vietnam and Cambodia.
The story stated that relief officials and Western diplomats in Bangkok estimate that more than one million Cambodians, an eighth of the population, may die of starvation or related diseases in the next 18 months. The London Daily Telegraph was quoted as saying that Cambodians were eating jungle berries, roots and all available animals. Cholera was said to have reached epidemic proportions. The report also said that many of the Cambodians driven from the cities when the Khmer Rouge took over had died of hunger or thirst on the long treks into the country. Refugees had reported that anyone running away or caught hiding in the jungle was shot on the spot by the Khmer Rouge.
We could not find any trace of this shocking story in the city edition of The Times on June 19. The Washington Post carried an abbreviated version in a story bearing the headline: "U.S. Speeds Up Thai Exit." A careful reader might have noticed that above that was a small head reading: "Famine Reported in Saigon, Cambodia." In his June 23 column, Jack Anderson described what was happening in Cambodia as the worst case of genocide since Hitler. While larger numbers were killed in China by the communists, nothing like the cruel evacuation of the Cambodian cities and towns has been known in modern times. But our news media are strangely silent about this tragic, cruel crime.
SOLZHENITSYN SAYS WE HAVE LOST WORLD WAR III
An important statement by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the outspoken Russian author now living in exile, on the meaning of our defeat in Indochina has been virtually ignored by the American press.
It was published in Le Monde on May 31 and reported by the British wire service, Reuters. Recognizing it as a powerful statement by one of the giants of our time, we made our own translation and sent it to the AP, The Times, and The Washington Post, asking whether they had reported it. The AP admitted frankly that they had ignored it, saying they had reported many other statements by Solzhenitsyn. The Post has not responded. The Times informed us they were going to print their own translation on June 22, which they did. National Reriew also ran it in the June 20 issue.
The only news story we have seen on this is a transcript of a broadcast by Philip C. Clarke on the Washington Report of the Air over the Mutual Broadcasting Network. Here is Phil Clarke's report:
The Third World War already has taken place, writes Solzhenitsyn, and the West has been defeated. "It ended," he said, "this year with the Communist sweep in Indochina... Two or three more decades of so called 'peaceful coexistence' as glorious as the last and the very concept of the West will vanish from the face of the earth."
Listing the loss of China, North Korea, Cuba, North Vietnam, South Vietnam and Cambodia, Solzhenitsyn continued, "Laos is about to go, Thailand,
South Korea and Israel are threatened. Portugal is rushing irretrivably down the same abyss. Finland and Austria are awaiting their fate with resignation. powerless to defend themselves and clearly unable to expect outside help." "It would be." he mid. "impossible to enumerate all the little African and Arab countries that have become puppets of Communism." Referring to the reaction of Western nations to the 1973 Middle East War, Solzhenitsyn noted. "When valiant Israel defended itself to the death with flawless solidarity, Europe capitulated, country after country, before the threat of a curb on Sunday afternoon driving." Solzhenitsyn also forecast a fight for tire defense of the United States itself. And he says. "Those young people who refused to bear tile trials and anguish of the distant war in Vietnam will not have had time to pass into the reserves before they fall... in the defense of America."
He concludes, "It is too late to think about how to avoid a Third World War. But, he says, "We must have the courage and lucidity to stop the Fourth. To stov not to fall to our knees." Aleksandr Solzhenitsvn has uttered both an appeal and a warning. And he speaks from the vantage point of one who knows only too well tile price of liberty and cost of freedom. Unfortunately, Solzhenitsyn's soul-searing thoughts on the deepening crisis in the West have largely been ignored by our news media. His words can be ignored only at our peril..
"PENSIONS" CASE TO BE APPEALED TO SUPREME COURT
AIM has decided to appeal the case of the NBC program, "Pensions: The Broken Promise," to the Supreme Court.
This case was slated for a hearing before the Court of Appeals on April 2, when the court suddenly cancelled the hearing and referred the case back to a three-judge panel to decide on the issue of mootness. The court also reinstated the three-judge panel's reversal of the FCC ruling that the program violated the fairness doctrine.
The outlook suddenly changed when the chief judge of the Court of Appeals, David Bazelon, issued a sharply worded, lengthy dissent from the action taken by his colleagues in this case. Judge Bazelon made it clear that he did not agree with the opinion of the original three-judge panel. He did a masterful job of exposing the errors in that opinion. He also demolished the contention of the FCC that the case had become moot because pension reform legislation had been passed. He felt that the court should have heard the case en banc as originally planned.
This statement by Judge Bazelon provides a good basis on which to appeal to the Supreme Court for a hearing. Chief Justice Warren Burger has granted AIM a sixty day extension to give us time to file our petition.
This move will be costly, but we are counting on our faithful supporters to help us battle this important test of the fairness doctrine through to a successful conclusion. We urge your support. Please make a special contribution today to help us defer our legal costs.