U.S. and South Vietnamese planes bomb a radar station at Ba Bình, 10 miles north of the 17th parallel, and attack a North Vietnamese convoy on Route 1. South Vietnamese and United States pilots bombed a North Vietnamese radar station today. This followed by a day a strike by United States planes at another radar installation. Eight A-1H Skyraiders, one piloted by a United States Air Force captain, hit the Ba Bình radar station 10 miles north of the demilitarized zone at the 17th parallel. Continuing north, the aircraft also attacked North Vietnamese convoys traveling along” Route 1, the coastal highway.” Troops in the trucks fired back with heavy machine guns, the pilots reported.
A Vietnamese announcement said that the Skyraiders had. “attacked many Communist positions on National Route 1 from the Bến Hải River to the area south of Đồng Hới.” The pilots spent about 40 minutes in North Vietnam and reported heavy ground fire at the Ba Bình station. Under a policy announced yesterday, South Vietnamese and American bombers can seek out “military targets of opportunity” in the North. They may hit those targets, such as the convoys today, in addition to their assigned targets or instead of such targets if bad weather interferes.
Authoritative American sources here have denied that the United States or South Vietnam aircraft would bomb targets in North Vietnam without announcement, as United States aircraft have done in Laos for months. One high-ranking official predicted a decline in public interest as the strikes continued, but said the American mission would continue to make the strikes public. The bombing raid was preceded, as all prior missions have been, by United States jet fighter-bombers assigned to knock out anti-aircraft installations and suppress ground fire.
In the strike yesterday, eight American F-105’s bombed an early-warning radar station at Vĩnh Sơn, 60 miles above the 17th parallel. The mission today represented the 10th day that American and South Vietnamese planes had bombed targets in North Vietnam since last month. Six of the strikes have been within the last 10 days. The American flying with the Vietnamese pilots was Captain John R. Walters of Phoenix, Arizona.
The White House said today that President Johnson had not been consulted about the usc of nausea-inducing gases in the South Vietnamese war. George Reedy, the President’s press secretary, asked for information on that question, replied: “That’s not the sort of thing that comes up for that kind of approval. For many years, this kind of authority has been delegated to area commanders.” In answer to criticism at home and abroad, the Administration insisted that the tear gases and nausea gases used in Vietnam were similar to those employed by police forces throughout the world. Mr. Reedy described the gases as “a rather standard type riot-control agent.”
Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara also emphasized their similarity to gases employed by police forces. The war-gas controversy also arose in a speech by Michael Stewart, the British Foreign Secretary, at the National Press Club. Mr. Stewart said he had expressed to Secretary of State Dean Rusk “the very grave concern” felt in Britain and other countries about the use of gas in Vietnam.
Observing that the choice, of weapons should be based not only on their military characteristics but also on their effects on world opinion, Mr. Stewart added, “I am, in fact, asking your Government — to quote your own Declaration of Independence — to display a decent respect for the opinions of mankind.” Secretary McNamara was particularly mindful of British protests. In a statement to reporters who had been summoned to his office, he said similar riot-control agents were used by the British in Cyprus in 1958.
Leonid Brezhnev hints that the Soviet Union may join North Vietnam in the war and claims that many Russians have already volunteered to serve. But U.S. authorities and most Western diplomats continue to doubt that the Soviet Union will allow Russian personnel to become involved in the war. Leonid I. Brezhnev, First Secretary of the Communist party, told tens of thousands of cheering Muscovites at a Red Square rally celebrating the nation’s space achievements that many Soviet citizens had offered to serve as volunteers in Vietnam. But he did not say that their applications would be accepted.
Despite the sharpness of his speech, in which he attacked the United States for its “barbarous bombings” in Vietnam, most Western diplomats in Moscow doubted that the Soviet Union intended to send any volunteers. They said it was far more likely that Moscow would continue a policy of avoiding direct involvement. The Soviet party chief charged that the United States had fanned “flames of war” and that these flames now “threatened to spread to other areas, and to jeopardize world peace.”
Britain’s Foreign Secretary, Michael Stewart, reported today after talks with President Johnson and other officials that none of the Communist nations had given any sign of readiness to discuss a satisfactory settlement in Vietnam.
In Morocco, a declaration by King Hassan II, requiring students to be at least 17 years old to enroll in advanced high school classes, triggered several mass protests, which were violently repressed. Analysts concluded that 103 rioters and six police were killed over two days.
Leonid F. Ilyichev, Nikita S. Khrushchev’s right-hand man in matters of ideology, was appointed a Deputy Foreign Minister today in an evident demotion from the Soviet leadership group.
Reliable sources said today that Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej chose Nicolae Ceaușescu to succeed him as First Secretary of the Rumanian Workers’ (Communist) party. Mr. Ceaușescu, 47 years old, had been an intimate associate of the late President since they were imprisoned together by the monarchy during World War II. His accession as party chief was announced last night. Observers agreed that the selection of Mr. Ceaușescu was a clear sign that the Rumanian leadership would continue its distinctive foreign and domestic policies along the lines laid out by Mr. Gheorghiu-Dej. The new party leader has been one of the most outspoken defenders of Rumania’s stance of independence and of neutrality in the Chinese-Soviet split.
The Soviet Union’s two newest astronauts were given a triumphal homecoming reception in Moscow today. A five-hour round of activities and celebrations honoring Colonel Pavel I. Belyayev, the 39-year-old commander of the spaceship Voskhod II, and his co-pilot, Lieutenant Colonel Aleksei A. Leonov, 30, the first man to float in space, began with the traditional airport welcome by the Government’s top hierarchy when the two men arrived by airliner from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. After a 20-mile motorcade in a flower-bedecked open car past waving and smiling crowds, the astronauts joined the Soviet leaders on top of Lenin’s Mausoleum to be greeted by tens of thousands in Red Square. A Kremlin reception followed.
A Communist union of postal workers has imposed a mail and telegraph boycott on the United States Embassy and has refused to handle traffic for American news agencies in Jakarta.
Cuban Premier Fidel Castro’s Government wants its soldiers to be ready to help “all countries in the world that fight for Communism and fight for their independence.”
Voters set back leftist Prime Minister Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike but failed to give her pro-Western opponent enough support to form a new Ceylon government. The United National party, conservative and pro-Western, has won 66 seats, the largest bloc for a single party, in the new Ceylonese Parliament, the official returns from yesterday’s erection show. But it is not a majority.
Field Marshal Mohammad Ayub Khan was sworn in today for his second term as President of Pakistan.
Archbishop Makarios, President of Cyprus, was reported today to have reaffirmed his independence of Athens in dealing with the crisis on the island. Reports to this effect followed an unexpected visit by Peter Garoufalias, the Greek Defense Minister, to Cyprus. He arrived late Sunday and returned this morning to Athens after talks with the President, General George Grivas, the commander of the Greek Cypriot armed forces, and Cabinet Ministers. Mr. Garoufalias made the traditional departure pronouncement that there was “full uniformity of views” between Athens and Nicosia. But close observers of the Cyprus scene and of the recurring Athens-Nicosia frictions disputed his assessment.
Japanese and South Korean negotiators cleared away today the last major obstacle to normal ties between the two countries by agreeing demarcation line for Korean fishermen.
Senator Robert F. Kennedy (D-New York), tied by a rope to two veterans of Mt. Everest, began his ascent of the Canadian mountain named after his slain brother.
The United States launched Gemini 3, the first crewed mission of the Gemini program, the nation’s first space mission with two astronauts, and the first maneuverable spacecraft from any nation, from complex 19 at Cape Kennedy at 9:24 a.m. EST. The crew were command pilot Astronaut Virgil I. Grissom and pilot Astronaut John W. Young. The Gemini capsule (named for the “Unsinkable Molly Brown” by Grissom, who managed to escape his Mercury-Redstone 4 capsule in 1961 before it sank) made three orbits around the Earth. During the flight, Grissom altered the orbit, rotating it 180 degrees on its horizontal axis (yaw) “so the crew faced backward”, then aligned it with the horizon so that it was “flying sideways”, before slightly changing the direction of its orbit.
At 1:45, the Molly Brown was brought in for a landing as it passed over Hawaii, and splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean 33 minutes later at 2:18 p.m. Landing point accuracy was unexpectedly poor. The spacecraft landed about 60 nautical miles (110 km; 69 mi) from its nominal landing point. The crew had to remain afloat until a helicopter could transport them to the prime recovery ship, the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid (CV-11). Seasick and uncomfortably hot after the capsule had rocked during the wait, Grissom would note, “Gemini may be a good spacecraft, but she’s a lousy ship.” It was discovered after the flight ended that Young, who admitted that he did not eat his dehydrated lunch, had smuggled a corned beef sandwich on board. NASA reprimanded Young and Grissom because of the danger that floating breadcrumbs might have damaged the ship’s electronics.
President Johnson extended the nation’s admiration and gratitude to astronauts Virgil (Gus) Grissom and John W. Young and invited them to Washington for special honors.
Betty Grissom and Barbara Young, wives of the astronauts, had a “great day” but disagreed over whether they want to go through anxious moments of another space flight real soon.
Scientists nudged the Ranger 9 spacecraft with a radio signal today, adjusting its course to land within a few miles of the lunar crater Alphonsus. The unmanned 800-pound, 10-foot-high space vehicle is expected to hit the moon tomorrow at 9:08:18 AM, Eastern Standard Time. Pictures taken by the Ranger’s six television cameras during the 20 minutes before impact are to be broadcast live by all three major television networks.
The Alabama Freedom Marchers passed the halfway point of their 54-mile protest walk today with sore feet and high spirits. They camped for the night in a rain-soaked pasture 21.7 miles from their destination, Montgomery, with 32.3 miles behind them. They expect to camp tomorrow night inside the city limits. After a gala evening with two or three dozen well-known entertainers, the marchers will get up Thursday morning and with thousands of well-wishers, from around the country, walk the last five miles to the state Capitol. There they will try to present a petition for Black rights to Governor George C. Wallace, who will probably be absent.
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who limped into camp with a blistered left foot last night, left today to make a speech in Cleveland after spending the night in Selma. He is to return tomorrow. The marchers walked most of today in the rain, much of it torrential. When they arrived at camp, many of them threw themselves down, exhausted, under the four big tents. Others crowded around portable heaters and dried their clothes. Gary Merrill, the actor, who has been working as a roustabout, helping pitch tents and make camp since the march began Sunday, stood in the pasture in mud up to nis ankles, wet, dirty, wearing three days of beard and expensive English trousers rolled to his knees. Mr. Merrill was asked what he thought of the Black Belt mud. “I think mud is the same everywhere,” he said. “It’s what’s on top of the mud that’s different here.” Timothy Murphy, a 59-year-old sandhog from New York, who only last Wednesday marched in the St. Patrick’s Day parade in New York, explained what he was doing marching through Alabama in the rain, In an Irish brogue he said, “I want my grandchildren to live in a world where they are not afraid of their fellow man.”
The marchers are spending the night on a farm owned by A. G. Gaston of Birmingham, a Black millionaire. It is one-fifth of a mile south of U.S. Highway 80, four miles inside Lowndes County. After an hour tonight, the campsite was transformed into a quagmire. Hay was spread over the mud inside the circus tent and on the path outside, but it, too, was absorbed in the ooze. However, the marchers bedded down and by 9 PM almost all of the weary 300 were asleep. Three marchers dropped out today, a white minister suffering fatigue, a Black girl nursing a blistered foot and another Black girl whose reason was not known.
The number of marchers has remained fairly constant at just under 300, the limit imposed by a federal court order for the two-lane stretch of highway through Lowndes County. However, a few extra persons have joined the march periodically and walked along behind or ahead without being chased away by the Federal troops accompanying the group. These extras changed frequently, with new ones coming to replace them, so that many more than the official 300 will be able to say that they marched through Lowndes County. Several hundred persons are expected to join the march tomorrow morning when the highway widens to four lanes about a quarter of a mile from the campsite. The court order did not restrict the number along the four-lane section of road.
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said tonight that the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, “may turn out to be as important an event in American history as Gandhi’s march to the sea was in Indian history.”
The House Ways and Means Committee approved today an expanded version of the Administration’s program of health care for the aged. In addition to the basic hospital and nursing-care benefits proposed by the Administration, the bill provides for a voluntary insurance plan covering doctors fees. It also calls for a 7 percent increase in cash benefits under the present Social Security insurance program and for liberalization of various other features of the program. President Johnson, in a statement issued at the White House, enthusiastically endorsed the revised measure as “a tremendous step forward for all of our senior citizens.”
Attorney General Nicholas deB. Katzenbach agreed with a southern foe of President Johnson’s voting rights bill that the legislation is “fairly strong medicine.” For more than three hours today Senator Sam J. Ervin Jr. of North Carolina maintained that the new voting-rights bill was unconstitutional. He insistently asked Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach whether he agreed. Just as insistently, Mr. Katzenbach said he did not.
President Johnson will probably be receptive to a plea by the nation’s governors for a new study of a plan to distribute about $2.5 billion a year in income tax revenues to the states informed sources said today.
The House Armed Services Committee voted today to authorize $14,793,000,000 for new aircraft, missiles and ships after slashing $654 million from Defense Department requests.
The Democratic National Committee moved today to eliminate racial discrimination in all state delegations seated at future national conventions.
Spokesmen for two leading lay organizations concerned with the nation’s health added their endorsements today to proposed legislation requiring the labeling of cigarettes as a menace to health.
A Harvard medical school professor challenged the ethics involved in a significant amount of experimentation on human beings.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 898.69 (+2.57)
Born:
Richard Grieco, American actor (“21 Jump Street”, “Booker”), in Waterton, New York.
Marti Pellow [Mark McLachlan], Scottish pop singer, and musical theater performer (Wet, Wet, Wet – “Love Is All Around”), in Clydebank, Scotland.
Daren Puppa, Canadian NHL goalie (NHL All-Star, 1990; Buffalo Sabres, Toronto Maple Leafs, Tampa Bay Lightning), in Kirkland Lake, Ontario, Canada.
Wayne Presley, NHL right wing (Chicago Blackhawks, San Jose Sharks, Buffalo Sabres, New York Rangers, Toronto Maple Leafs), in Detroit, Michigan.
Iiro Järvi, Finnish National Team and NHL right wing and left wing (Olympics, silver medal, 1988; Quebec Nordiques), in Helsinki, Finland.
Dante Jones, NFL linebacker (Chicago Bears, Denver Broncos), in Dallas, Texas.
Died:
Mae Murray, 79, American film star of the 1920s. At her height in 1926, she had amassed a fortune of about three million dollars (equivalent to more than $40 million in 2016), before breaking her contract with MGM Studios, but was broke ten years later. She spent her final years at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital, a retirement community supported by contributions from people in the film and television industry.
PFC Harold Dollens is buried at East Lawn Memorial Park in Mexico, Missouri. He is honored on the Wall at Panel 1E, line 97.
History Diaries 