Inflation is beginning to slow the steady growth in defense budgets of the Western alliance and Japan, though not yet to the damaging degree that had been feared by defense planners in the United States. A country-by-country survey by the New York Times on the impact of inflation on defense budgets of the major allies of the United States finds that most of them are still increasing their budgets sufficiently to keep pace with inflation, except for Britain, Canada and Italy, and that the United States defense budget has been hardest hit by inflation. The Pentagon had been projecting a $1.7‐billion increase this fiscal year in the purchasing power of the defense budget. Because of inflation, it now appears there will be a $5‐billion reduction in what Pentagon planners term “the real program value” of the defense budget.
Thus far, the trends do not support the gloomy projections of Pentagon officials that the North Atlantic Treaty Onganization is being driven to “unilateral disarmament” by inflation. But it is a long‐term prospect that continues to haunt Pentagon officials as they contemplate the relative military efforts of the Soviet Union and the United States and worry that inflation and recession may cause some allies cut back. Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger has been warning that continuation of presen trends could turn the United States into a “second‐class power” because of the erosive effect of inflation. What particularly concerns Mr. Schlesinger is the relative decline of the American defense budget, while that of the Soviet Union has been increasing.
Secretary of State Kissinger was quoted yesterday as saying that the United States would consider tying the price of oil to that of other commodities. A preliminary condition, Mr. Kissinger said in a TIME magazine interview, would be a cut in the price of oil by the members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which have long demanded parity in the prices of what they buy and what they sell. However, they have sought to “index” their oil prices to go up from the present high base as prices of their own imports rise. Mr. Kissinger took issue with this and said he hoped a unity conference of consumers and then a meeting with the OPEC members would bring agreement.
The World Bank published a sweeping criticism of education in developing countries and offered over $350 million to help change the situation. In a 73-page report, the bank complained that schools in developing countries “show an elitist bias, favoring urban and middle-class groups… In its new basic education plan for the masses, the bank proposed a “fundamental, flexible, low-cost education for those whom the formal system cannot yet reach or has already passed by.”
The Greek public prosecutor today charged former President George Papadopoulos and four of his closest associates in the former military junta with high treason and sedition. Both charges carry a possible death penalty.
Police, backed by troops, stormed the main cellblock of Portlaoise Prison in Northern Ireland and overpowered Irish Republican Army prisoners who had taken 27 guards as hostages, prison authorities said. Officials said the guards were not harmed. Earlier, a police spokesman said the 120 IRA prisoners had surrendered and returned to their cells after negotiations with the prison governor. There was no explanation for the differing reports.
Aston Martin, makers of prestige sports cars that sell for $25,000 to $35,000, announced plans tonight to end production. The company, which faced a cash shortage, said that the decision would mean the dismissal of its 500 workers. It said the decision had been made because of economic crisis and the difficulty in obtaining loans. Company officials said they had orders totaling more than $4‐million from the United States at the time they decided to go into voluntary liquidation. The sports cars, first produced in 1913, are among the best known and most expensive in the world. The Aston Martin, favored by connoisseurs of fine automobile engineering for years, won wider recognition after it was featured in a James Bond movie, equipped with a host of gimmicks.
All 33 people aboard a TAROM airlines flight within Romania were killed when the Antonov An-24 turboprop crashed into the side of a mountain. The airplane was making its approach to Sibiu for an unscheduled stop, after departing Oradea on a flight to Bucharest. It made at an altitude of 5,600 feet (1,700 m) while making its approach to Sibiu and crashed into a peak in the Lotru Mountains.
Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader, today received Egypt’s Foreign Minister, Ismail Fahmy, and the new Minister of War, General Mohammed Abdel Ghany al-Gamasy, for talks following their arrival here yesterday. Virtually no details were known about their visit, which Egyptian diplomats had explained only as preparation for Mr. Brezhnev’s scheduled visit to Egypt on January 14. The official press agency Tass, however, did not mention the scheduled Brezhnev visit in its brief report on the talks. The Soviet press has given only passing mention to the presence of the two Egyptian ministers in Moscow, in contrast to their more publicized official visit in October, 1973.
He was a “principal factor” in quadrupling oil prices and he “now holds more power than any other leader to lower them or raise them. Both in his own right, and as a symbol of the other newly powerful potentates of oil, Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal is the Man of the Year,” declared TIME magazine. The weekly has been naming a Man of the Year since it chose Charles A. Lindbergh in 1927. The choice is always a person who “in the judgment of TIME’s editors has affected for good or ill the lives of the greatest number of people and in the process left an indelible mark on history.” TIME said, “Throughout 1974, Faisal’s actions about oil prices and related matters touched, in various degrees, the lives and pocketbooks of virtually every human being on earth.” Politically, too, the magazine added, “1974 was marked by the increasing cohesion and power of the Arab world, a urging strength fueled by the largest transfer of capital in history.”
The Iraqi government newspaper Al Thawra accused the United States of using “twisted and sly methods” to drive up the market price of gold in order to harm the economies of developing countries. The paper called for world monetary reform. It said the United States drove up the price of gold by lifting the ban on private ownership and said such action “will only add to the current economic anarchy.”
At least 300 persons and perhaps as many as 1,000 were believed to have been killed in a severe earthquake that destroyed the remote mountain village of Paten, which had a population of about 4,000, in northern Pakistan, officials in Rawalpindi, the capital, said. Another village was badly damaged. Pakistan did not immediately call for international aid. Officials said the government preferred first to learn the full extent of the damage.
Operating under a state of emergency that was declared yesterday, Bangladeshi Prime Minister Mujibur Rahman began a drive today against banditry and political violence, which have killed 3,000 of his followers since Bangladesh won independence in 1971. Authorities sent reinforced patrols into the streets of Dacca. Reports reaching here said troops and militiamen had also taken up key positions in smaller cities and towns across the country. The emergency rule, which was proclaimed by President Mohammadullah on the recommendation of Sheik Mujib, empowered the Prime Minister to take virtually whatever measures he deemed necessary to restore law and order and rescue the country’s sinking economy. His decision won praise from most of the capital’s newspapers. Predictions were voiced that the emergency could generate new government measures to increase the role of the army.
A two‐day political drama ended today for the Thai Government when former Premier Thanom Kittikachorn flew back into the exile from which he had returned Friday. The 63‐year‐old former field marshal, who had thrown Thailand’s ruling officials into a state of confusion and suspicion by slipping into the country, was flown today to Singapore aboard a Thai Air Force plane after the government decided to banish rather than to try him. At a crowded news conference at Government House this morning, Premier Sanya Dharmasakti explained that “political considerations took precedence over legal ones” when a rump Cabinet session last night reversed itself and chose to send the unwanted Mr. Thanom back out of the country.
A Laotian Government delegation and rebel troops who took over a border town last Tuesday have reached an agreement ending the tension there, the Laotian national radio announced tonight.
British member of Parliament John Stonehouse went into hiding after his release from an illegal immigrants center in Melbourne. His freedom was ordered by Immigration Minister Clyde Cameron, but the former British cabinet minister must report once a week to officials in Melbourne until it is decided whether he can settle in Australia. In Britain, political sources said the government will initiate action early in the new year to oust Stonehouse from Parliament if he fails to resign on his own accord.
Families leaving Darwin, Australia in the airlift following the cyclone that smashed the city Christmas Day are told they can carry 50 pounds of possessions but no pets aboard the planes. Dr. Rex Patterson, Minister for the Northern Territory, says that nevertheless family pets were smuggled in hand luggage aboard an evacuation plane on which he traveled. “Soon we had cats and dogs running up and down the aisles, and even small birds flying around,” he said. The minister took a tolerant view. “With little children you have to be lenient,” he said. “Many of them have lost mothers or fathers, and it would be heartbreaking to take away their pets.”
A three-nation effort to descend into an active volcanic crater in Antarctica has been abandoned. The expedition, which included French, American and New Zealand members, was to have collected gas samples from the inner crater of the 12464-foot Mt. Erebus on Ross Island. The venture was called off because of hazardous volcanic activity.
American victims of a Guatemalan plane crash Saturday night included a family of four from New Jersey, 15 persons from New York City and two from Columbus, Ohio. The chartered plane crashed in flames while taking off from a remote jungle airport near the Mayan ruins of Tikal. Also killed were three Guatemalans.
The Nicaraguan government agreed to release 26 political prisoners and fly them to Cuba in exchange for the lives of a group of prominent politicians and business leaders seized by leftist guerrillas at a Christmas party in Managua Friday night. Earlier in the day, the guerrillas released five remaining women hostages, but kept 13 men for bargaining purposes.
Ethiopia’s military rulers announced it has been agreed to hold direct negotiations with the rebel Eritrean Liberation Front and its Marxist rival, the Popular Liberation Front. Both groups are fighting government troops for the independence of the northern province of Eritrea.
Three Angolan liberation movements have agreed to meet the Lisbon government in Portugal January 10 to decide a timetable for independence in the last and largest of the Portuguese colonies in Africa. The five-day conference is expected to produce plans for a transitional government leading to full independence for Angola within a year.
A high administration source said that President Ford had abandoned his proposal for an income tax surcharge as an anti-inflation measure. Government economists reportedly were putting strong pressure on the President to do the opposite and cut taxes as a means of pulling the economy out of a worsening recession. Also in Washington, high Administration officials said that continued Federal deficit spending on a large scale threatened to trim the size of any antirecession tax reduction that President Ford is expected to propose to Congress. Presidential support for a tax increase has been waning ever since Mr. Ford proposed it on October 8, Ron Nessen, the White Rouse spokesman, has implied to newsmen. With recession overtaking inflation since then as the nation’s chief economic problem, Federal economists and Congressmen pronounced the idea of a tax surcharge dead weeks ago. But today’s was the first solid indication that the President had dropped it entirely. The major constraint on a tax reduction is the huge size of the budget deficit that may exceed $30 billion.
Three more high-ranking officials of the Central Intelligence Agency resigned last week in a major shake-up of the agency’s Counterintelligence Division, well-informed government sources said. Their resignations occurred within a week of that of James Angleton, who had been the CIA’s counter-intelligence chief who has been linked to widescale domestic spying in disclosures reported by the New York Times. The Government sources said the newly retired officer’s, whose resignations were accepted without objection by William E. Colby, Director of Central Intelligence, are Raymond Rocca, Mr. Angleton’s chief deputy; William J. Hood, executive officer of the Counterintelligence Division, and Newton S. Miller, chief of operations.
In a related development, Senator William Proxmire, Democrat of Wisconsin, said today that he had received independent verification of the allegations of CIA domestic spying that were initially published December 22 in the Times. There has been no official denial or confirmation of The Times’s account from the Ford Administration. “I can say on the basis of the information I have, and I think it is very good information,” Mr. Proxmire said on “Issues and Answers,” the ABC‐TV interview show, “that the stories and the allegations in The New York Times about the file of 10,000 names of people who had been under investigation by the CIA, about the surveillance, about the breaking and entering and about wiretaps, that those are accurate and correct.”
On December 22, The Times quoted well‐placed government sources as saying that the intelligence agency had violated its charter dining the Nixon Administration by mounting a massive, illegal intelligence operation against the antiwar movement and other dissident groups in the United States. Intelligence files on at least 10,000 American civilians were compiled, the sources said. In today’s issue, The Times also quoted a former undercover C.I.A. agent as saying that much of the spying against radicals had been conducted by members of the highly secret Domestic Operations Division of the agency.
Suraj Narayan, 40, wanted in the bludgeon slaying of Sandra Zahler, 25, was charged with second-degree murder after he surrendered to police in the city room of the New York Daily News. Narayan’s lawyer, Stephan H. Peskin, said his client was “not involved in any way, shape or form in the death” of his girlfriend. Miss Zahler was found dead early Christmas Day in her Queens apartment. The building faces the spot where Kitty Genovese was murdered 10 years ago while neighbors ignored her screams for help.
The percentage of persons dismissed from the military services with less than honorable discharges was the highest in 24 years during fiscal 1974, Rep. Les Aspin (D-Wisconsin) said. Aspin, making public what he claimed were official Pentagon statistics, said 11.15% of those discharged or retiring did not get honorable discharges, the first time since 1950 the rate had exceeded 10%. Aspin said the Marine Corps had the highest rate of bad discharges in 1974 — 17%. For the Army it was 16%, the Navy 10% and the Air Force 4%, he said.
Marxist supporters of Puerto Rico’s independence movement tramped a rural highway near where Vice President Rockefeller and Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger are vacationing. It was a peaceful protest as the demonstrators marched past the Dorado Beach Hotel, 35 miles west of San Juan carrying signs denouncing the Central Intelligence Agency and “Yankee Imperialism.” Organizers of the protest were the Puerto Rican Socialist Party and its student affiliation. A spokesman said Rockefeller and Kissinger were not disturbed by the demonstration.
Senator William Proxmire (D-Wisconsin) announced he would offer legislation at the start of the next Congress repealing the “equal time” requirement for political broadcasts. Under the present law, a radio or television station giving one candidate time on the air must offer an equal amount to all other candidates for the same office. “Under current law, citizens are deprived of meaningful debate among leading candidates for political office,” Proxmire said. Proxmire added that he also would propose the repeal of the Federal Communications Commission’s “fairness” doctrine, which requires stations to air opposing views on controversial subjects.
Former Teamsters President James R. Hoffa said he still planned to run for high office in the union although the US. Supreme Court ruled last week that Presidents could impose conditions when they commuted prison sentences. Hoffa served almost five years of a combined 13-year term for jury tampering and mail fraud. In 1971, former President Richard M. Nixon commuted the prison term but barred Hoffa from direct or indirect participation in union activities until 1980. An appeal of those conditions is pending before a federal appeals court.
The tough old factory town of Detroit — a rough, unfinished metropolis of browns and grays and tarnished brick‐reds — looks like what some people say it is: the frontier of the industrial society. “Detroit today, America tomorrow,” is how Mayor Coleman A. Young characterizes the position of the country’s fifth largest city. What happens here sometimes turns out to be an indicator of what is in store for the economic and social order at large. And in this time of steadily worsening recession, the message from Detroit grows more unsettling all the time. A fearful uncertainty grips much of the city. Automobile production is at a 23‐year low for December, and there are virtually no signs of upturn. Unemployment in the metropolitan area is expected to surpass 10 per cent for December. Things are not yet catastrophic, but some persons including the Mayor, detect a potential for serious social dislocation, even strife, should the recession continue far into 1975.
John Gardner, chairman of the Common Cause “people’s lobby,” said the new campaign finance reform bill must be vigorously enforced if it is to be effective. Gardner said the law, which takes effect Wednesday, had flaws but represented a “major step” because it established an independent enforcement body to watch campaign spending limits.
For the second straight year, Secretary of State Kissinger heads the Gallup Poll’s list of men Americans admire most. The Rev, Billy Graham finished second in the poll for the fifth straight year. Mr. Graham has figured among the top 10 most admired men 18 times since the list was first compiled in 1946. For the fifth time in the poll’s history an incumbent President failed to take the top spot. President Ford was in third place, the same position as was President Nixon in last year’s list. This year Mr. Nixon dropped to seventh.
Windmill power is the answer to our electricity problems, a Nobel Prize winner and his colleague said. Walter H. Brattain, co-winner of the 1956 Nobel Prize for physics, and Dr. Craig Gunsul, both of Whitman College in Washington, said 1,000 windmills would equal about one nuclear power plant, and would be cheaper. They advocated windmills on 200-foot towers and on ocean floats for commercial use and smaller types for home use.
Murray Schisgal’s stage comedy “All Over Town”, directed by Dustin Hoffman, opens at the Booth Theatre, NYC; runs for 233 performances
The contractual partnership of The Beatles was formally dissolved, more than four years after John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr had performed together for the last time.
Soviet Olympic champion weightlifter Vasily Alekseyev set a new world record of 536.75 pounds (243.47 kg) in the super-heavyweight jerk.
AFC Conference Championship:
Pittsburgh Steelers 24, Oakland Raiders 13
After trailing 10–3 at the end of the third quarter, the Pittsburgh Steelers scored three touchdowns in the final period to earn their first championship appearance in team history, beating the Oakland Raiders, 24–13 to earn a berth in Super Bowl IX. The first half was controlled by both defenses. Oakland got a big opportunity in the first quarter when they recovered a muffed punt return by Lynn Swann on the Steelers 41-yard line, but Mel Blount’s deflection of a 3rd down pass by Ken Stabler forced them to settle for a 40-yard field goal from George Blanda. Meanwhile, the Steelers got close to the Oakland end zone twice, but each time they had to settle for Roy Gerela field goal attempts. He missed his first one from 20 yards in the first quarter but kicked a 23-yard field goal in the second to tie the game at 3 going into halftime.
Steelers linebacker Jack Lambert blocked a Blanda field goal in the second quarter, however in the second half, the Raiders eventually took a 10–3 lead with Ken Stabler’s 38-yard touchdown pass to Cliff Branch. But Pittsburgh tied the game again six seconds into the fourth quarter with Franco Harris’ 8-yard touchdown run at the end of a 61-yard drive. Then linebacker Jack Ham intercepted a pass from Stabler (his second interception of the day) and returned it to the Raiders’ 9-yard line, setting up Bradshaw’s 6-yard touchdown pass to Swann. Oakland responded with a drive to the Steelers 7-yard line, featuring a 45-yard reception by Fred Biletnikoff, but on 3rd down, a blitz by Mike Wagner forced Stabler to throw the ball away, and the team to setting for a 24-yard Blanda field goal, and the Steelers still led, 17–13.
Oakland got the ball back for a chance to drive for a go-ahead touchdown, but J. T. Thomas made a clutch interception and returned the ball 37 yards to the Raiders 24. Harris then scored on a 21-yard rushing touchdown to put the game away. Harris rushed for 111 yards and 2 scores, while Rocky Bleier added 98 rushing yards and 2 receptions for 25. Branch finished the game with 9 receptions for 186 yards and a touchdown. This was the third postseason meeting between the Steelers and Raiders. Both teams split the previous meetings.
NFC Conference Championship:
Los Angeles Rams 10, Minnesota Vikings 14
On an unusually balmy day for December in Minnesota, the Vikings were able to hold onto the ball for the final 5:37 of the game to preserve a 14–10 victory over the Los Angeles Rams and advance to the Super Bowl against the Pittsburgh Steelers. After a scoreless first quarter, Minnesota quarterback Fran Tarkenton threw a 29-yard touchdown to Jim Lash. Rams kicker David Ray later added a 27-yard field goal to cut the lead to 7–3 before halftime.
In the third quarter, Los Angeles advanced the ball from their own 1-yard line to the Minnesota 1-yard line. The big play on the drive was a 73-yard pass play to Harold Jackson, who was finally pushed out of bounds at the Vikings 2 by safety Jeff Wright. With the ball inside the one-yard line, Rams guard Tom Mack was controversially called for illegal procedure (replays showed Mack did not move). Moved back to the six-yard line, the Rams were forced to pass for a touchdown on third down but the pass was deflected and Vikings linebacker Wally Hilgenberg intercepted the ball in the end zone for a touchback. Minnesota then went on a 15-play drive that took almost eight minutes off the clock to score on Dave Osborn’s 4-yard touchdown run. With 7:15 left to play in the game, the Rams then cut the deficit to 14–10 with Harold Jackson’s 44-yard touchdown reception. Then after forcing the Vikings to punt, Los Angeles drove to the Minnesota 45-yard line. But a third down sack forced the Rams to punt again and the Vikings kept the ball to run out the clock. This was the second postseason meeting between the Rams and Vikings. Minnesota won the only previous meeting.
Born:
Mekhi Phifer, American TV and film actor (“ER”, “8 Mile”), in Harlem, New York, New York.
Yevgeny Tarelkin, Russian cosmonaut (Soyuz TMA-06M); in Pervomaysky, Chita Oblast, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union.
Richmond “Richie” Sexson, MLB first baseman and outfielder (All-Star, 2002, 2003; Cleveland Indians, Milwaaukee Brewers, Arizona Diamondbacks, Seattle Mariners, New York Yankees), in Portland, Oregon.
Emil Brown, MLB outfielder (Pittsburgh Pirates, San Diego Padres, Kansas City Royals, Oakland A’s, New York Mets), in Chicago, Illinois.
James Darling, NFL linebacker (Philadelphia Eagles, New York Jets, Arizona Cardinals), in Denver, Colorado.
Tom Knight, NFL cornerback (Arizona Cardinals, Baltimore Ravens), in Marlton, New Jersey.
Tommy Westlund, Swedish NHL right wing and centre (Carolina Hurricanes), in Fors, Sweden.
Died:
Ivane Beritashvili, 89, Georgian Soviet physiologist and pioneer in biobehavioral science.
Joseph W. Ferman, 68, Russian Empire-born American science fiction publisher (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction)
Sophie Podolski, 21, Belgian poet and graphic artist, died by suicide.
History Diaries 