World News
‘Ten or fifteen minute’ stretches
American advisors ‘set foot’ in Cambodia
SAIGON AP—American advisors and
South Vietnamese officers are traveling
together on command and control
helicopters in Cambodia and periodically
setting foot on the ground—despite Pen
tagon assertions to the contrary—it was
learned reliably Thursday.
The Americans usually do not spend
“more than 10 or 15 minutes on Cambodian
soil” and land only when necessary to get a
briefing or make a map coordination,
sources said.
The sources familiar with the
operations of South Vietnamese troops
taking part in the massive drive to open up
Cambodia’s Highway 4, also provided a
partial identification of an American who
was photographed on the ground in
Cambodia last Thursday.
They said he was a U.S. Army major
with a name like “Hawks,” but could not
provide a precise identification.
He was traveling in a command and
control helicopter with his Vietnamese
counterpart, who was not identified.
The landing in the photograph oc
curred at Veal Renh, forward command
post for South Vietnamese forces making
the northward push through Stung Chhay
Pass and trying to open the road by linking
"p with a Cambodian force driving south.
“They were not on the ground in ex
cess of 10 or 15 minutes,” the source said.
Two other Americans also were seen
on the ground by western eyewitnesses
last Friday, a day after the photo was
taken at Veal Renh.
In the Pentagon’s latest statements on
the question of American participation in
the Cambodian operation, press officer
Jerry Friedheim said there were no U.S.
advisors in Cambodia, either in the air or
on the ground.
Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, at
a news conference Wednesday, replied
“yes” when asked whether he felt that
legislation passed Congress last Dec. 30,
barring U.S. advisors or ground troops in
Cambodia, precluded him from providing
division or regimental level advisors to
Cambodian or South Vietnamese forces
there.
Friedheim later said the same reply
could be extended to battalion-level or
other advisors.
The U.S. Command had no immediate
comment Thursday on the claim that U.S.
advisors were flying with their Viet
namese counterparts and occasionally
setting foot on Cambodian soil, nor on the
mysterious Major “Hawks.”
‘Longhairs’ and *hard hatters’
clean beach after ships collide
SAN FRANCISCO AP—
Hundreds of youthful volunteers
have joined hard-hatted refinery
workers in a massive effort to
clean up a giant oil slick and
rescue birds from the con
taminated water.
The youths, many with long
hair and barefooted, were among
several thousand persons who
flocked to the beaches Tuesday,
converging on bird-cleaning
centers.
“I’m sure proud of these kids,”
said Orville Kendrick, a super
visor for Standard Oil of
California. “I don’t know what
we’d do without them.”
The slick resulted from a
collision of two Standard Oil
tankers in dense fog early
Monday near the Golden Gate
Bridge. No one was hurt.
The Coast Guard called an
inquiry today into the mishap,
which caused between 500,000
and 1.9 million gallons of thick
bunker oil to ooze from ruptured
tanks.
It left the largest oil slick in the
history of San Francisco Bay.
Globs have drifted out into the
Pacific and over about 50 miles of
coastline.
Dead birds began washing
ashore Tuesday, but there was no
estimate on the number killed,
said John Marston, who is
heading patrols by the Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to
Animals.
An estimated 550 waterfowl
coated with oil have been brought
in for cleaning at special wildlife
rescue centers.
Standard Oil reported it had 500
laborers on the beaches,
spreading straw on the oil as it
surged ashore, then shoveling it
up to where loaders could place it
in dump trucks.
The beach crews toiled through
the darkness but the 50 boats
Standard has working offshore
were docked for the night due to
thick fog.
"We don’t want any more
collisions,” said a Standard
spokesman.
The company rushed crews and
equipment to Bolinas, 20 miles
northwest of here, Tuesday when
oil carried out through the Golden
Gate and then back to shore
made its way into Bolinas
Lagoon, a wildlife sanctuary. The
crews worked through the night
by floodlight, sealing off the
lagoon with a boom and
gathering in the thick oil with
straw.
Students were excused from
school at Bolinas to rescue
waterfowl from the lagoon en
trance north to Point Reyes
National Seashore.
The oil also spread south 20
miles along the coast to Pedro
Point, near Pacifica. Other main
trouble spots were inside the bay
near the Presidio, where the 6th
Army sent GIs to join the hard
hats and volunteers, and on the
shore of the Tiburon Peninsula,
another bird sanctuary.
No green cheese,
maybe water though
SAN DIEGO, Calif. AP—
Several scientists studying lunar
rocks and soil brought back by
Apollo astronauts say they
believe the moon has water. Dr.
Albert E.J. Engel, professor of
geology at Scripps Institution of
Oceanography, told a news
conference Tuesday the moon
may contain large quantities of
water trapped in rocks.
“In fact,” he said, “most of us
geologists are betting that the
moon has water. If we sampled
the rocks in 50 places on the moon
just at random, the chances are
we would find water.”
Dr. Harold Urey, 1934 Nobel
Prize winner for his doscovery of
heavy hydrogen, supported the
idea.
Ecological time capsule
LEVITTOWN. N Y AP—Construction workers, uprooting a huge
maple tree to make way for a shopping center, unearthed a green
bottle that had a lot of people puzzled.
Two pieces of yellowed tablet paper were rolled up inside.
“We shall love beauty forever," read a Latin inscription, copied
down over a list of 31 signatures. “We shall always strive for the sky,
the planets and the stars ”
The mystery was cleared up this week by Michael Stokes, 74. a
retired Long Island auto dealer who recognized the list of names as his
1906 classmates at Island Trees School.
Stokes said he and others at the one-room schoolhouse buried the
bottle when they planted a sapling maple tree on Arbor Day in 1906.
Recent evidence, he said, in
dicates parts of the moon are
considerably more dense than the
satellite as a whole.
“Water underground,” he
added, "would explain this very
neatly.”
Additional support for the
water-in-the-moon theory came
from Dr. Gustaf Arrhenius,
professor of oceanography at
Scripps, who said certain
minerals he and his colleagues
found in the lunar samples are
much like hydrous, or water
bearing, minerals found on earth.
Engel said there was every
reason to believe water was an
important component of the
moon at the time of its formation
because hydrogen and oxygen—
which combine to make water
are among the most common
elements in the solar system.
He said the chances were ex
cellent that a lot of water was
trapped inside rocks.
"Now,” he said, “the question
is, has all the water boiled out
and the answer is that it can't
have been without us recognizing
it in the rocks, unless all this
boiling occurred early in the
history of the moon.”
Other scientists studying rocks
brought back from the moon have
concluded it never had any
water.
News Roundup
From AP Reports
CAIRO—A Cairo report that the Palestine guerrillas had
abandoned their stand against peaceful settlement of the
Middle East conflict brought a denial Wednesday from a
member of the guerrillas’ ruling Central Committee. “The
Palestine revolution is continuing the armed struggle for the
liberation of the whole Palestine,” said committee member
Ibrahim Bakr. The Central Committee of the Palestine
Liberation Organization acts as the over-all command of the
guerrilla movement in the Middle East. Bakr added,
however, that the Central Committee’s commitment to fight
on, “should not interfere with Egypt’s efforts to remove the
consequences of the 1967 war as long as they do not infringe
on the rights of the Palestinians and restrict their struggle.”
WASHINGTON—Starting his third year in office,
President Nixon pledged Wednesday he will propose a bold,
comprehensive and far-reaching domestic program for 1971.
A broad outline of Nixon’s legislative package will be
featured in the annual state of the union address to Congress,
which will be broadcast live Friday night by major television
and radio networks.
WASHINGTON—President Nixon, hoping to save a wild,
meandering river noted for its unique semitropical grandeur,
has ordered the Corps of Engineers to abandon construction
of a shipping canal across Florida. Conservationists lauded
Nixon’s action, but vowed to continue a legal battle to
establish a court precedent blocking other Corps projects
they consider damaging to the environment.
WASHINGTON—Richard Russell, a commanding figure
in the Senate for four decades, was listed in very critical
condition today, weakening fast in a six-week battle against a
respiratory infection. An aide said the 73-year-old
Democratic Senator from Georgia made no progress
Tuesday.
PORTSMOUTH, Va. AP—The Coast Guard admitted
Wednesday that it did not divulge the existence of a large oil
spill from one of its own cutters cruising off the Atlantic
Coast earlier this month. The spill, which involved 10,000
gallons of fuel oil, came from the cutter Mendota, cruising off
the North Carolina coast Jan. 11.
Rocks thrown at Nixon
‘blown out of proportion ’
SAN JOSE, Calif—A judge said
Tuesday the rock-throwing
violence surrounding a visit by
President Nixon should have
been probed by a special com
mission, adding that he feels the
incident apparently was “blown
all out of proportion.” Superior
Court Judge Vincent Bruno,
explaining why the Santa Clara
County grand jury’s report of the
Oct. 29 incident was kept secret,
reminded newsmen that state
law prohibits disclosure of grand
jury proceedings except when
they result in an indictment.
“Some kind of commission
should have been appointed if
someone really wanted to know
what happened,” said Bruno,
who presided over the grand
jury. Since none was named, he
said, he assumes “this two
minute incident was a tempest in
a teapot and blown all out of
proportion ”