Israel entered a new phase in its atomic weapons research program when it activated its first nuclear reactor at its Negev Nuclear Research Center at Dimona. An American inspection team would learn of the development about three weeks later, on January 18, but would find no evidence of plutonium or irradiated uranium at that time and conclude that Israel had “no weapons making capability”.
The United Kingdom, Greece and Turkey created the Joint Truce Force to enforce a ceasefire in Cyprus. Armed forces of three nations under command of British Lieutenant General P. G. Young begin the task today of restoring order in strife-torn Cyprus. British troop reinforcements were on the way to join Greek and Turkish contingents who agreed to serve under Young’s command. Archbishop Makarios, Greek Cypriot president of Cyprus, conferred with General Young late last night and then issued a statement announcing that three-nation patrols were beginning their duties this morning.
The government statement appealed to the public to be helpful and cooperative “so that the task of the forces in assisting in restoration of law and order may be more effectively achieved.” A convoy of seven United States embassy cars draped with American flags drove in and out of the beleaguered Turkish sector of Nicosia yesterday to rescue American citizens. They had been stranded there since fighting between Greek and Turkish Cypriots broke out seven days ago.
U.S. President Johnson today sent a personal message to President Makarios and Vice President Fazil Kutchuk of Cyprus calling upon them to spare no efforts to end the fighting between Greek and Turkish factions in the Mediterranean island nation. “I cannot believe that you and your fellow-Cypriots will spare any efforts, any sacrifice, to end this terrible fraternal strife,” Johnson said in his message. “I hope and trust that tomorrow will find all Cypriots living at peace with one another and with the three nations which have special treaty responsibilities for the security of Cyprus.”
The President told Makarios, a Greek archbishop, and Kutchuk, a leader of the Turkish minority in Cyprus, that his Christmas holiday and those of the American people were “saddened by the thought that Cypriots of both the Greek and Turkish communities comprising the nation of Cyprus are killing and wounding one another. Johnson recalled that less than 18 months ago, as Vice President, he visited Cyprus and those engaged in the current hostilities were among the people he met there. “I will not presume to judge the root causes, or rights and wrongs as between Cypriots of the two communities,” the President said in his message.
The Johnson administration today approved sales of more than 40 million dollars’ worth of subsidized surplus American wheat to Russia. A Commerce Department spokesman said the deal was “on a flat cash basis with a number of conditions to be worked out.”
The authorization of two export licenses broke a two-and-a-half-month deadlock in the program to sell grain to the Soviet Union. They were the first exports to Russia approved, and apparently the first such licenses applied for. An unimpeachable official said late last night that no contracts have been signed, nor has money changed hands. “There are negotiations between dealers and Russian buyers which have approached the point of consummation,” the official said. “The traders wanted export licenses, with certain conditions outlined, to take to the Russians as hard evidence that we would approve the sale.”
Commerce officials said that each of the sales involved $20,320,000 worth of wheat. The bushel quantities, the sellers who applied for the licenses, and all other details were kept secret. The program, which has been expected to involve a total of 250 million dollars or more, was first announced by the late President Kennedy at a press conference on October 9. For several weeks before that, administration officials had been working with Congress and through public announcements to determine the degree of opposition that might be expected to it.
Government troops in South Vietnam are abandoning an outmoded system of forts in the Mekong Delta in the face of mounting Communist pressure.
The United States and Cambodia have accepted a Philippine offer to try for conciliation in the dispute between them, according to a high Philippine official.
A cross was added today to many others on the Berlin Wall to honor another who lost his life trying to escape tyranny, and anger built up in West Berlin over the Christmas day murder of a teenager by East Berlin guards. West German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard, who tomorrow will fly to the United States for talks with President Johnson, said in Bonn: “The assassination at the wall on the day of peace and love fills everyone with abhorrence and indignation. Those responsible for this outrage again have shown to the world their true, criminal face.”
The new wooden cross, decorated with fir branches, was erected at the blood-stained barrier in the American sector for Paul Schulz, an 18-year-old electrician from New Brandenburg, East Germany, who was fatally wounded by border guards when scaling the wall into West Berlin yesterday afternoon. Despite efforts by West Berlin doctors to save his life, the boy died five hours after a communist bullet pierced his body.
West Berliners continued flocking to the East sector although bloodstains of the Christmas slaying by Communist guards were still visible on the wall.
A former Bulgarian diplomat at the United Nations pleads guilty at a trial before the Bulgarian Supreme court to a charge of spying for the United States. The accused spy, Ivan-Asen Christof Georgiev, 56, says he quit after seven years because of the “petty spying tasks” assigned to him.
East Jerusalem, Jordan: The most rigorous security precautions Jerusalem has ever taken have started in preparation for the 70-hour visit of Pope Paul which begins Saturday, January 4. The leaders and scores of members of the Muslim extremist organization Ikhwan el-Muslemeen (Muslim brotherhood) have been rounded up. They will be detained at least until the night of January 6, when the pontiff flies from Amman to Rome.
The Jordan police and army swooped on the brotherhood after learning that its leaders were planning a secret meeting to discuss tactics during the pope’s stay and also the publication of a proclamation calling for the satisfaction of their claims in Palestine. Jerusalem is swarming with policemen in plain clothes, many of them specially recruited for the occasion from the Jordan army on which King Hussein’s throne depends. Thousands of uniformed soldiers are moving in to reinforce those who have been stationed here since early December when the regime took emergency measures to thwart a projected coup by pro-republic groups.
Similar measures are being applied in the Israeli part of Jerusalem where officials fear demonstrations and agitation by Orthodox Jewish zealots. In both sectors of the divided city the fundamental problem is to eliminate any chance of an attack on the person of the pope by some individual whose fanaticism has been inflamed into madness.
Japan, an early admirer of Western culture and science, has forged ahead of the “imitation” stage and now has a firm foundation for its own scientific competence.
Senator Barry Goldwater (R-Arizona) charged President Johnson today with playing politics with Christmas in forcing a showdown in Congress on foreign aid during the holidays. He accused the President of “arm twisting” and of using tactics that are “rash” and “out of order.” Goldwater asserted that White House pressure on the House to force a vote last Tuesday probably succeeded only because it was Christmas Eve. He said the Senate now is being pressured to rubber-stamp the President’s demands before adjournment.
The Arizona senator, who is in Phoenix recovering from minor surgery on his right heel, criticized President Johnson in a telegram to Mark Trice, secretary to the G.O.P. Senate minority. He said he hopes to return to the capital next Monday to vote against the bill. Goldwater is a possible Republican Presidential nominee next year. He telegraphed Trice that he thought most Americans were against government-guaranteed credit by the Export-Import bank on wheat sales to Russia. He said he was certain most Americans opposed spending the 3 billion dollars on foreign aid still in the bill.
Harold Stassen (R-Minnesota) announces he is a candidate for the race for the Republican nominee for President in 1964.
Although avoiding an outright personal endorsement, San Francisco’s Mayor George Christopher said New York’s Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller now appears to be the Republicans’ best bet to win the Presidency.
Interior Secretary Stewart Udall has abandoned plans to export surplus Northern California water to Arizona and indicated other changes are near.
The stamp collection of the late Philip H. Ward was purchased by a New Orleans dealer for 1.1 million dollars. The collection, winner of the 1947 international stamp exhibition, is expected to bring 2 million dollars in subsequent resale in smaller lots to collectors. Raymond H. Weill company of New Orleans is the purchaser.
The 1964 Yearbook of American churches discloses that membership in religious bodies has climbed to an all-time high of 117,946,000 in the United States. The growth rate of Protestant churches slumps to eight-tenths of 1 percent. Roman Catholic membership increases 2.3 percent over the 1963 Yearbook total. Sunday school enrollment continues a slow decline.
Inconsistencies in medical practice in various parts of the country and other “imbalances” are leading toward more government controls of medicine, the president of a national hospital plan warned.
A new theory about the earth’s past was advanced by a UCLA geophysicist at the opening session of the meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Cleveland. Gordon MacDonald discounts any idea of continental drift in favor of a theory of crustal expansion and contraction.
[Ed: MacDonald is wrong; and the idea of plate tectonics is rapidly catching on with geologists as more and more evidence piles up.]
Jacob J. Shubert, 83, theatrical magnate known as the man who produced a thousand shows, died in his Manhattan apartment of a cerebral hemorrhage.
“Double Dublin” opens at Little Theater NYC for 4 performances.
Capitol Records released the 45 rpm recording of the Beatles song “I Want to Hold Your Hand” in the United States, accompanied by a $50,000 promotional campaign and the printing of five million posters that proclaimed “The Beatles Are Coming!”. Within five weeks, the song (which had been released in the United Kingdom on November 29) would become the bestselling record in America.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 760.21 (+3.35).
Born:
Lars Ulrich, Danish rock drummer (Metallica), in Gentofte, Denmark.
Died:
Titina De Filippo, 65, Italian actress famous for her interpretation in Filumena Marturano.
Jacob J. Shubert, 84, Polish-born American theatrical entrepreneur.
History Diaries 