The Khmer Rouge began the campaign that would put it in control of Cambodia, cutting off the supply lines to Phnom Penh. Communist-led insurgents launched a series of attacks on the outskirts of Phnom Penh today and thousands of refugees, hundreds of them injured, streamed into the capital. A new defense perimeter making use of armored personnel carriers was set up by Government forces in an effort to halt the drive against the city. Military sources said government outposts along the east bank of the Mekong River opposite Phnom Penh had fallen to the insurgents. More than 200 soldiers swam to safety after the outposts were lost, they said.
The military command in Phnom Penh had only sketchy details of the fighting in the last 18 hours, but it said that Government forces were counterattacking on all fronts threatened by the insurgents. There was evidence of guerrilla activity all around the capital. Six miles to the north an oil storage depot was hit by about 25 rounds of rocket and mortar fire and set ablaze, sending clouds of black smoke billowing into the sky. Military sources said two persons had been killed and five injured. Two rockets struck the city’s central area this morning, one hitting the former royal palace and the other landing near the Foreign Ministry. No casualties were reported.
Defense Minister Sisouk na Champassak of Laos said today that Pathet Lao troops who had entered the town of Ban Houayxay to side with Royal Laotian Army soldiers who seized control had withdrawn to a cease‐fire line 15 miles away. “The situation in Ban Houayxay is normal, “Mr. Sisouk said, “and the town is under the control of the royal army. It is safe for everyone up there now.” He added that the Laotian Air Force had resumed flights to the town. Americans caught by the mutiny in the Mekong river town in northwestern Laos were evacuated yesterday after government negotiators reached an accord with rebellious Lao Theung tribesmen demanding neutralization of the town and repeal of the opium law. The tribesmen had reportedly been transferred to the Royal Laotian Army from clandestine forces said to be financed by the United States Central Intelligence Agency.
The United States has spent more than $8 billion in military and economic aid to Southeast Asia since the cease-fire agreement on January 28, 1973, Rep. Les Aspin (D-Wis.) said. More than $6 billion was “for the continuing war in Southeast Asia,” he said, adding, “This must be the most expensive cease-fire in the history of man. It must also be the phoniest.”
The United States is prepared to propose a Cyprus peace plan which would divide the island into Swisstype cantons, to be dominated by either Greek Cypriots or Turkish Cypriots, reliable sources said in Athens. The State Department said in Washington that the US ambassadors to Greece, Turkey and Cyprus would be meeting with Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger soon to discuss the Cyprus crisis.
The Pentagon refused comment on a report that a U.S. nuclear submarine had collided with a Soviet submarine under the North Sea last November. Columnist Jack Anderson quoted “on-the-spot sources” as saying that the American Polaris submarine USS James Madison was patrolling when it and a Soviet vessel scraped hulls Both surfaced, Anderson said, where they inspected each other warily. No communications were exchanged.
Viennese police released three West German skiers held on suspicion of starting a snowslide that claimed at least 12 lives at Gaschurn in western Austria. Officials said traces of blood found at the point where the avalanche of wet snow began indicated it had been set off by one of the victims. The snowslide was blamed on skiers ignoring warning signs against going out on the loose snow, sending thousands of tons of snow roaring down the mountainside, burying a ski slope and part of a ski lift.
The Irish Republican Army is expected to extend its holiday ceasefire for a month in response to Britain’s decision to free a group of IRA prisoners in Northern Ireland. The British government offered Tuesday to free 170 prisoners, mostly IRA members, and cut the size of its 16, 000-man military force in the province if the truce lasts.
Queen Elizabeth II conferred knighthood on comedian Charlie Chaplin, author P. G. Wodehouse, athlete Roger Bannister, and cricket legend Gary Sobers. Charlie Chaplin and P.G. Wodehouse were named knights by Queen Elizabeth in Britain’s New Year’s Honor List. Mr. Chaplin, now 85 and living in Switzerland, and Mr. Wodehouse, 93 and a resident of Long Island, are both of English birth. Mr. Chaplin and his films have always been popular in Britain; for Mr. Wodehouse, the honor came as a seeming act of forgiveness for the author’s World War II broadcasts from Berlin after being taken into German custody when France fell in 1940.
The new Constitution of Sweden came into effect.
The European-Mediterranean Seismological Center (EMSC), well-known in Europe and worldwide as a geological and landscape observation and survey center, was founded in Strasbourg, France.
Impatience is growing in the Arab world for a resolution of the confrontation with Israel, which is frustrating the Arabs’ vision of an economic renaissance through their new oil wealth. Their leaders seem bent on recovering the lands lost to Israel in the 1967 war, whatever the cost to their societies. Moderate Arabs look to Secretary of State Kissinger to compel Israel to enter productive negotiations for withdrawal from these lands. The prevailing view was once expressed by Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat: “The Russians can give you arms, but only the United States can give you a solution.” Government sources in Egypt and Syria would accept an arrangement of non-belligerence with Israel following Israeli withdrawal from Sinai, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and the Golan Heights. East Jerusalem would come under an Arab civil administration under an international statute guaranteeing free access.
Industrial workers went on a rampage in downtown Cairo — its first riot in many years. Their targets appeared indiscriminately chosen, including American, Soviet, French and Libyan installations. They shouted against high prices and against the Premier, who controls economic policy. Inflation is estimated at 30 percent since the October war despite subsidies of food and basic commodities.
Israeli military headquarters here said today that an Israeli force searching for Arab guerrillas in southern Lebanon blew up a house with guerrillas inside it this morning after an exchange of fire. The action began as an Israeli task force reached Taiba village, two miles across the border. Shots were fired at them from within, according to the announcement. The Israelis “returned the fire, hit the terrorists and destroyed the house,” the command statement said. There was no immediate report of any deaths. The Israeli action followed an attack on an Israeli patrol across the border last night, when bazooka and light‐arms fire were aimed at soldiers north of Yiftah.
Foreign Minister Yigal Allon, in the first related official Israeli comment since the postponement of the Cairo visit of the Soviet leader Leonid I. Brezhnev, said today that there would be no need to coax Israel to negotiate if Egypt was really ready for significant talks. “If that is indeed the situation,” he told Parliament in Jerusalem, “Israel is herself interested in advancing negotiations and does not need pushing and prodding from outsiders,” presumably an allusion to the United States. “On the contrary,” he went on, “if attempts are made to press the pace and substance, they could lead to contrary results.” Mr. Allon, who was replying to an Opposition motion for a full‐dress parliamentary debate, said the government was still studying and assessing the political implication of the recent developments between the Soviet Union and Egypt. It is too early to make declarations, he observed. Another member of the government, Defense Minister Shimon Peres, advised Israelis not to get too excited over the postponement of the Soviet visit. In a speech in Rehovot, he recalled that there had been earlier crises in relations between the two governments that had been patched up.
The government of Libya, without an official announcement, has lifted its 14-month embargo on oil exports to the United States, according to a story printed in the London Times The report said companies operating in the Libyan deserts have been told they may resume exports to any destination Before the embargo was imposed after the 1973 Middle East war, the United States was one of Libya’s biggest single oil markets. Output has declined sharply since, in large part because of overpricing.
Ethiopia moved further toward socialism today with the nationalization of all banks, mortgage corporations and insurance companies, many of them partly foreign owned. An announcement on the Government radio said the move was in line with the economic objectives of the provisional military council that deposed Emperor Haile Selassie last September. On December 20, the council said it would turn Ethiopia from a feudal country into a socialist state with a single party, direct state control over most of the economy and collective farming on Government land.
King Faisal of Saudi Arabia gave $10‐million today for Pakistan’s earthquake victims. Relief efforts were running into difficulties. High winds in the narrow valleys of the Karakoram Mountains, in the north, hampered helicopters taking medical teams and food to villages cut off in the four days since the quake, which is estimated to have killed 5,200 people. The donation by King Faisal dwarfed contributions from other countries. “To say it was more than we expected would be an understatement,” a Foreign Ministry source said in Rawalpindi. “It was more than we even dared hope for from all the countries put together.”
Japan and China will resume negotiations early in 1975 on a treaty of peace and friendship, leading Tokyo newspapers said, quoting government sources. Preliminary talks began last autumn when Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Han Nien-lung visited Tokyo for talks with former Japanese Foreign Minister Toshio Kimura.
A bus full of holiday skiers plunged off a winding road in the Japan Alps into a lake today, killing 23 persons. The police at Omachi, 125 miles northwest of Tokyo, said 36 other passengers and the driver had escaped, swimming to safety before the bus sank in Lake Aoki. Most of the dead were young people from Tokyo and Osaka who had come to mountainous Nagano Province for the New Year’s holiday. The police said the bus was owned by a Tokyo company that operates a ski run and two hotels in the Lake Aoki area. It was used to transport skiers from a nearby railroad station to the Ski lift.
President Carlos Andres Perez raised the Venezuelan flag on Bollvar Hill, a mountain of iron ore 500 miles southeast of Caracas, to symbolize the nationalization of the operations of US. Steel and Bethlehem Steel which went into effect at the beginning of the new year. “The. foreign policy of Venezuela is not directed at the use of oil or iron as instruments of confrontation or retaliation,” he said. “But we could not sacrifice our dignity and we reject the threats or discriminations that can come from abroad.”
Guyana and Reynolds Metals Co. have reached a settlement on the amount of compensation to be paid for nationalized Reynolds bauxite holdings in Guyana. The government is expected to pay Reynolds $14.5 million. However, the government said an estimated $4.3 million would be deducted to cover a 1971 production levy, income taxes and additional state taxes.
Former U.S. Attorney General John N. Mitchell, former White House Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman, and John Ehrlichman were found guilty by a jury of 9 women and 3 men on charges of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and perjury in the cover-up of the Watergate scandal. Robert Mardian, a fourth defendant, was found guilty on one count of conspiracy. A Washington jury convicted four of the most powerful men in the Nixon administration — John Mitchell, H. R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman and Robert Mardian — on all counts in the Watergate cover-up trial. They acquitted Kenneth Parkinson, a lawyer hired by the Nixon re-election committee after the break-in. The verdict was reached after 15 hours’ deliberation over three days. The four men found guilty face prison terms ranging from five to 25 years. Each said personally or through counsel that he would appeal the verdict. Judge John Sirica polled and thanked the jurors. He said that the case would be referred to probation officers, leaving the date of sentencing uncertain. A federal grand jury had named Mr. Nixon as an unindicted co-conspirator in the case.
The verdict brought few tears and only one open display of anger in the courtroom when Mrs. Robert Mardian, wife of one defendant, stuck out her tongue and sounded a Bronx cheer. But all defendants and their wives were shocked. Former Attorney General John Mitchell flushed deeply as the clerk intoned “guilty” but leaned down to whisper words of comfort to his attorney, “Don’t take it so hard.”
Associate Justice William O. Douglas of the United States Supreme Court was flown to Washington and admitted to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center after suffering a stroke in the Bahamas, where he was to make a speech tomorrow. He was described as “alert” and his vital signs “stable.”
The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division has enlisted the support of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in its effort to uncover illegal price-fixing around the country. The new move was made without publicity late in 1974 and is too recent to have shown results. While high antitrust officials caution against excessive expectations from the step, they are hopeful that more “discoveries” of price‐fixing conspiracies will turn up If the FBI becomes involved. Agents of the FBI will not have to become experts in such esoteric antitrust areas as “oligopoly theory,” concentrated industries or corporate mergers. Instead, they are being asked to keep on the alert for straightforward conspiracies among sellers, small as well as large, to fix prices and thus eliminate competition for a product or a service.
Police using an armor-plated anti-riot vehicle dispersed 1,500 New Year’s revelers in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, after they began throwing rocks, bottles and beer cans at officers along a strip of the beach. There were 42 arrests. It was the third New Year’s in a row that police have had to break up unruly crowds that have poured out of beach-front bars into the street along a four-block stretch. A four-block section was blocked off around 11 pm, said Police Chief Leo Callahan, because we wanted to allow the kids to go into the streets to party around. But when they started throwing bottles at my officer, it was time to move.
William J. Leary, Boston School Superintendent, today ordered the racially troubled South Boston High School Complex not to reopen tomorrow or Friday and said that a move was under way to seek its permanent closing. The superintendent’s order came after school officials met for more than two hours this afternoon with ranking city and state police officers to discuss possible danger brought on by the passions of the controversy here over school desegregation by busing. Yesterday, Boston’s Police Commissioner, Robert J. diGrazia, flanked by other law enforcement officials, held a news conference to urge that the high school be permanently closed and the students moved to a more “neutral” site.
Retired Army Major General Frederic E. Davison, nominated to be a top District of Columbia official, has withdrawn his name after clearing up an old city income tax bill. He had been under consideration for a $36,000-a-year post as a troubleshooter for Mayor-elect Walter E. Washington when it was disclosed last week that he had not paid city income taxes for 11 years between 1956 and 1973. Davison had lived elsewhere during the period while maintaining a legal residence in the district. The general, 57, retired as commander of the Military District of Washington on Tuesday, settled the tax bill of about $14,000 and withdrew his name from consideration.
Armed Menominee Indians demanding land and buildings took over a religious order’s estate at Gresham, Wisconsin, and held the caretaker’s family hostage until members of the order agreed to talk with the Indians today. The four hostages were released unharmed after 2½hours but the 30 to 40 Indians kept control of the buildings. An Indian spokesman said, “It looks like a long stay. Another said the Menominees hoped to use part of the 175-acre estate and 64-room mansion for a school or hospital. The site adjoins the Menominee reservation. The Alexian Brothers, a Roman Catholic order used the estate for a noviciary until 1968.
A record of 968 homicides was set in. Chicago in 1974, and within two hours after the new year began, four persons were dead of gunshot wounds. Authorities speculated that the city’s 1975 toll could reach 1,100. Two of those killed after the new year began were teenage girls slain in a tavern, apparently during a New Year’s Eve celebration. The last victim of 1974, police said, was typical. He was Glen Bladen, 23, a drifter found shot to death in an alley for no known reason. The previous homicide record for Chicago was 864 in 1973.
An estimated 150,000 capsules of a prescription drug for treatment of epilepsy have been mislabeled as aspirin and shipped to Connecticut for use in prisons, hospitals and other state institutions, according to the US Food and Drug Administration A state official said, however, that the drug was not harmful unless taken excessively. He added that all users had been notified to withhold the medication, which was identified as sodium diphenylhydantoin.
Louisiana’s new state Constitution, which sets forth a basic set of laws for the state’s 3.5 million residents, took effect today at one minute past midnight. The Constitution replaced a 255,000‐word charter, written in 1921, that was often blamed for many of the state’s troubles. The old Constitution, which set severe limits on the authority of local governing bodies, had been amended 537 times and had fallen into general disrepute among politicians and the public.
Reports circulated in Detroit that Chrysler Corp plans to close three assembly plants during part of January and reduce production at another, idling an additional 10,000 workers. Radio station WAYZ said it learned from United Auto Workers sources that the No. 3 autocar would close its Hamtramck, Michigan assembly plant for three weeks while the St. Louis and Detroit Lynch Road Amembly plants would be shut for two-week periods.
A system of testing the anti-pollution performance of automobiles selected at random from manufacturers’ production lines has been proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency. Only sample vehicles submitted by manufacturers before each new model year are now tested by the EPA. Under the new proposal, if the failure rate of any model topped 10% of the production line cars tested, federal authorization to sell the model would be suspended until the problem is corrected. The system would apply to both U.S.-made and imported cars and light-duty trucks according to Russell E. Train, EPA administrator.
Topping the list of the women “most admired” by Americans in 1974 was Golda Meir, the former Israeli prime minister. And next in order come First Lady Betty Ford and former First Lady Pat Nixon. Mrs. Meir was first last year, second in 1972 and first in 1971. Mrs. Ford was a newcomer to the list, chosen in a Gallup Poll survey of 1,517 adults. Mrs. Nixon has been among the top 10 most admired women for 11 years. Rose Kennedy, in fourth place this year and third place last year, has figured prominently among the top 10 since the late ’60s. In fifth place was Happy Rockefeller, who was the only other newcomer to the ratings except for Mrs. Ford. Rounding out the top 10 were Rep. Shirley Chisholm (D-New York) and India’s Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (tied for 6th), Coretta Scott King, Lady Bird Johnson, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Mamie Eisenhower.
A series of earthquakes shook the southeast slope of Mauna Loa volcano early today, but none caused damage. Less than 24 hours earlier, the slope erupted in spectacular fashion along a three‐mile front in an unpopulated area of the island of Hawaii. Donald Peterson, scientist in charge of the United States Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory, said the tremors today included one shock that registered 5.0 on the Richter scale. The quake was regarded as moderately strong. No visible lava flows were reported this morning.
A winter snowstorm accompanied by strong, gusty winds bore down on parts of the Southwest and travelers were alerted from northeastern Arizona across southern New Mexico into Texas. Snow falls continued in the northern Appalachians, around the lower Great Lakes and the northern part of the upper Great Lakes area.
In fiction, the 2000 novel “White Teeth,” by Zadie Smith, opens with Archie Jones making an attempt at suicide on January 1, 1975.
In college football, the previously undefeated Alabama Crimson Tide, ranked #1 in the UPI poll and #2 by the AP, lost to #9 Notre Dame, 13–11, in the Orange Bowl, giving Irish coach Ara Parseghian a victory in his final game. The #5 USC Trojans, going for a 2-point conversion rather than kicking an extra point, defeated #3 Ohio State (#2 in UPI), 18–17, to win the Rose Bowl before a crowd of 106,000. The University of Oklahoma, ranked #1 by the AP, was ineligible for a bowl and for a ranking in the UPI Coaches’ Poll, while #4 Michigan was not invited to a bowl.
39th Cotton Bowl Classic: The #7-ranked Penn State Nittany Lions defeated the #12-ranked Baylor Bears by a score of 41–20. Steve Beaird gave the Bears the lead when he scored on a 4-yard touchdown run as the first quarter ended. Penn State retaliated with a Chris Bahr field goal with 1:09 left to narrow the lead to 7–3 at halftime. The Nittany Lions scored first with a Tom Donchez touchdown run. Baylor scored back with a Ricky Thompson touchdown catch from Neal Jeffrey. But Penn state scored on a Jimmy Cefalo catch from Tom Shuman as the Nittany Lions led 17–14 going into the fourth quarter. Things started to fall apart for the Bears in the fourth quarter. Jimmy Cefalo scored on a touchdown run to increase the lead. Bahr added in a field goal, and Mike Johnson intercepted a pass which led to a Shuman touchdown run. Running out of time, Thompson caught a touchdown pass from Mark Jackson with :14 left, missing the conversion. To add insult to injury, Joe Jackson returned the ensuing kickoff for a touchdown, making it 41–20 as the final seconds ticked off, giving Penn State their second Cotton Bowl Classic win.
61st Rose Bowl: #5 Southern California beat #3 Ohio State, 18–17. After a touchdown pass with two minutes remaining to draw within a point, USC quarterback Pat Haden passed to Shelton Diggs for a two-point conversion to take the lead. Until that time, the Buckeyes, favored by six points and ranked third in The Associated Press poll, had led 17-10 over the fifth-ranked Trojans. As both clubs proved error-prone in the first three periods, most of the scoring was crammed into the fourth when Ohio State tallied 10 points and USC 15 before the throng of 106,721 in the bowl plus a nationwide television audience. USC got a 30-yard field goal in the first quarter and Ohio State had a two-yard touchdown smash by Champ Henson in the second. The third period was scoreless. Southern California came to life late in the third stanza, starting a 72-yard march with Haden hitting Jim Obradovich with a nine-yard scoring pass after 1:14 of the final period. Combined with Chris Limahelu’s conversion, the Trojans moved ahead 10-7. The lead proved short-lived as Buckeye quarterback Cornelius Greene marshalled an 82-yard drive in 11 plays, his own 24-yard run and a 21-yard pass to Griffin providing the keys. Greene, faking to fullback Pete Johnson, ran in for the score from the three. Tom Klaban converted and minutes later, after OSU recovered a Trojan fumble, kicked a 32-yard field goal. Then Haden sent his club 83 yards in nine plays, capping it with the pass to McKay. We felt we weren’t going for a tie,” said Coach John McKay of the two-point conversion try. “With Ohio State’s offense, we were afraid we wouldn’t get the ball again.” Quarterback Pat Haden & split end John McKay, Jr. were named co-MVPs. USC’s star running back Anthony Davis was injured and played less than 1 quarter. Undefeated Oklahoma was the #1 team in the AP poll, but were on probation and ineligible for a bowl game. The UPI poll excluded teams on probation, and after the regular season, the UPI had Alabama first, followed by Ohio State, Michigan, USC, and Auburn. The Trojans’ dramatic Rose Bowl win over Ohio State enabled them to leapfrog idle Michigan, and when Notre Dame upset Alabama in the Orange Bowl, 13–11, USC was voted #1 in the UPI poll. This game marked USC head coach John McKay’s eighth and last appearance in the Rose Bowl and his fifth win.
41st Orange Bowl: #9 Notre Dame beat #2 Alabama, 13–11. The final game of New Year’s Day, the Orange Bowl kicked off at night; midway through the first quarter, Alabama’s Willie Shelby fumbled a punt that was recovered by Notre Dame’s Al Samuel at the Crimson Tide 16-yard line. Five plays later, the Irish scored on a four-yard Wayne Bullock touchdown run to take a 7–0 lead. Their lead was extended to 13–0 midway through the second quarter after Mark McLane scored on a nine-yard touchdown run to cap a 17-play drive that covered 77 yards. A 21-yard field goal by Danny Ridgeway cut the lead to 13–3 at the half. After a scoreless third, the Crimson Tide scored a late touchdown on a 48-yard Richard Todd touchdown pass to Russ Schamun, and with a successful two-point conversion closed the gap to 13–11. After a defensive stop, Alabama got the ball back at its own 38 with under two minutes remaining, needing only a field goal to win. After two completions, the ball was on the Irish 38; Todd missed an open Ozzie Newsome and threw an interception to Reggie Barnett, effectively ending the comeback for the Tide. Bullock was the leading rusher at 83 yards, and was named the game’s outstanding player, with Alabama defensive end Leroy Cook.
Born:
Fernando Tatís, Dominican MLB third baseman, outfielder, and first baseman (Texas Rangers, St. Louis Cardinals, Montreal Expos, Baltimore Orioles, New York Mets), in San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic.
Chris Anstey, Australian National Team and NBA center (Olympics, 2000, 2008; Dallas Mavericks, Chicago Bulls), in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
History Diaries 