The Charlotte News

Friday, November 21, 1958

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Berlin that East Germany had signed an agreement this date assuring West German civilian traffic freedom of movement into and out of West Berlin, according to authoritative sources. The reported agreement, at the height of a new crisis regarding the isolated city of Berlin, had no effect, however, on the question of control of Western allied supply lines to the divided city. Rather, it appeared to be an assurance to the 2.2 million West Berliners that they would not be affected when and if the Soviet Union pulled out of the four-power occupation agreement and turned control of allied supply lines over to Communist East Germany. During the 1948-49 blockade of Berlin, the Soviet Union had not only stopped military traffic but also civilian traffic, creating the need for the airlift which had broken the blockade eventually. Under present circumstances, an airlift would be designed to support only the 10,000 allied fighting men plus Western civilian officials and their families in West Berlin. A West Berlin official said that the agreement "is a positive sign of relief of tension." The bulk of West Berlin's supplies moved from West Germany over a 110-mile highway-rail link and a network of canals. Western military traffic used the same lifelines but it was checked through Soviet controls, as agreed under the postwar four-power pacts. The U.S., France and Britain did not recognize East Germany diplomatically and refused to have any dealings with its regime, as it was not a duly elected popular government. Sources said that the East-West German agreement had also provided for an exchange of West German steel for East German soft coal, mainly for the supply of Berlin. The West Germans had always felt that they held a trump card with the East Germans in the Berlin dispute because of the interzonal trade issue. East Germany was anxious to continue interzonal trade to help fulfill its ambitious economic plans. Trade talks between East and West Germany had been continued on a semiofficial basis in Berlin. As previously, they had been regarded as being of a technical nature which did not involve West German recognition of East Germany. The agreement on access to Berlin would not interfere, however, with any Communist plan to close the border between East and West Berlin. West Berlin officials freely predicted that such would be the next East German move. By that action, the East Germans could cut off free travel without passports between the two sectors of the city to close an escape hatch through which more than a million East Germans had fled to the West. Stopping that flow of refugees appeared to be one of the major objectives of Premier Nikita Khrushchev's efforts to drive the Western allies from Berlin. The Soviet Premier demanded on November 10 that the U.S., Britain and France withdraw their occupation troops, but the allies had refused to abandon West Berlin to the Communists surrounding it. It might be noted that the current crisis would be essentially a prelude to the erection of the Berlin wall in August, 1961, although that had come in direct response to both the April Bay of Pigs failed invasion of Cuba and the icy bilateral meeting between President Kennedy and Mr. Khrushchev in Vienna in June, combined with the May 1, 1960 incident involving the shooting down by the Soviets of a U-2 spy plane over Russian territory, which had prompted the cancellation of the scheduled summit meeting in Paris between President Eisenhower and Mr. Khrushchev.

In Boston, Army Secretary Wilber Brucker said this date that U.S. intervention in the Taiwan Strait had prevented a major Sino-Soviet propaganda victory which "would have undermined our whole moral position in the Far East."

The Air Force announced on Thursday that the Ground Observer Corps, comprised of 200,000 civilian volunteers who had spent many hours during the previous nine years watching for enemy planes over American skies, would be disbanded as of January 31, as the human eye could not keep up with the requirements of the jet and missile age. Several radar networks across the Arctic, Canada and the U.S. northern border, and along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, now protected the U.S. The Air Force believed that those networks would spot jets and missiles long before they flew over the 16,000 observation posts of the Ground Observer Corps. In addition, the Air Force said that new automatic equipment could collect and interpret observation data faster than the GOC's 50 filter centers. The director of the Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization, Leo Hoegh, invited members of the GOC to take part in civil defense work after the Corps would be disbanded.

The director of the Pentagon's program for development of nuclear-powered aircraft, Air Force Maj. General Donald Keirn, stated the previous day in talks with reporters and at an ordnance group meeting that if the Russians won the race to obtain such an airplane, it might not be "too sophisticated". He indicated that by using an atomic power plant in a conventional plane, the Russians might manage such a flight before the end of the year or early the following year. But he made it clear that the U.S. had specifically designed an airplane for atomic power, one which was capable of virtually unlimited range at supersonic speeds. He said that the goal was to have a manned aircraft which could "carry a large payload and remain on nomadic patrol for extended periods of time in various areas of the world." In addition to being able to launch missiles, such a plane would be capable of low-level, high-speed flights into enemy territory. He said that the plane might be similar in size and weight to the present B-52 jet bomber. He added that the Air Force would soon be ready to embark on a flight-testing program of an atomic plane and that it had "a reasonably good handle" on the problem of developing ways to shield the plane's crew from nuclear radiation. He said that equipment and procedures also were being devised to protect people on the ground in the event of the crash of such an airplane. Yeah, right… Don't go flying those over us.

In Rangoon, Burma, the first consignment of American arms and equipment for the Burmese Army was being unloaded this date. Another three or four shiploads were expected before the end of the year.

In Nicosia, Cyprus, a Turkish Cypriot policeman had been killed and two others wounded by an electrically-detonated mine near a village in West Cypress the previous night.

In Jerusalem, an Israeli Army spokesman charged that Syrians had opened fire again this date on an Israeli reclamation area south of Lake Huleh. The area had been the scene of a clash the previous night. No casualties had been reported from either incident.

In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, New York Governor-elect Nelson Rockefeller had taken off to return to New York this date after a 13-day vacation in Venezuela and Brazil.

In Brussels, it was reported that Belgian industry had ground slowly toward a standstill this date because of a strike by gas and electricity workers, with an estimated half-million workers being idled by plant shutdowns.

In Pensacola, Fla., a raging fire had destroyed more than two million dollars worth of waterfront facilities early this date and apparently had put the port of Pensacola out of business for the time being. The actual damage would be figured later in the day.

In Jackson, Miss., Governor J. P. Coleman said this date that he was not a candidate for vice-president and would not seek the nomination. He said in a prepared statement handed to newsmen that he would devote his time to doing all he could "to promote the good name of Mississippi in the eyes of the nation."

In Birmingham, Ala., evangelist Billy Graham, talking to the Alabama Baptist Convention at its closing session the previous night, said that he was concerned that the race issue might divide Southern Baptists. He said that he was praying to God that Southern Baptists were not divided on the racial issue and that they would stand "united at the cross". He addressed about 6,000 persons in the Municipal Auditorium, where, in April, 1956, four white men had charged the stage where singer Nat King Cole was performing before another packed crowd. Mr. Cole had been knocked to the floor but was not hurt. The four men had been given the maximum sentences allowed upon conviction of misdemeanors. The Reverend Graham said, "Some people have made segregation and integration their gospel, but our gospel is this," then holding up a Bible. He said that Protestants were diminishing while Roman Catholics were increasing, because the latter were providing the answers and speaking with authority "while Protestants are growing cold and modernistic." He said that Christians the world over were a diminishing minority because "we have not become God-intoxicated."

In Lincoln, Neb., it was reported that the jury continued to deliberate in the first-degree murder case against 15-year old Caril Ann Fugate, charged with aiding and abetting her erstwhile boyfriend, Charles Starkweather, in the murder of 17-year old Robert Jensen in nearby Bennet, Neb., on January 27. While, if the jury would find her guilty, it could recommend either life imprisonment or the death penalty, which the trial court would be bound by law then to impose, the prosecutor during final argument had indicated that the State was not any longer seeking the death penalty but would leave it up to the jury to fix the punishment. Caril had contended during her trial that she was a hostage throughout the murder spree committed by Mr. Starkweather, involving ten victims in January, including the mother, stepfather and baby half-sister of Ms. Fugate, the first victims, apparently killed on January 21. She claimed that she had believed Mr. Starkweather when he told her that her family was still alive and that they were being held at a remote location and would be killed unless she cooperated and did what Mr. Starkweather told her. The prosecution had presented evidence that she had been taken by Mr. Starkweather to the remote location on one occasion, but had not attempted to go inside to see her family, and that she had possessed, when arrested on January 29, clippings from a Lincoln newspaper of January 27, which contained the headlines regarding the deaths of the three family members. She claimed, however, that she had only seen a picture of herself and Charles on the front page of the Lincoln Journal of January 27 and had not had time to read the associated stories. Other testimonial evidence had also been presented by both the prosecution and defense on both sides of the issue of whether she was a hostage or had freely accompanied Charles, which had become key to her case. The jury had been out for eight hours and 25 minutes the previous day after receiving the case in the morning, and had recessed for the evening the previous day without reaching a verdict. The jury was sequestered during their deliberations—and the Lincoln Star reiterates their names and home addresses should you wish to contact them and tell them what you think of their efforts so far. Caril was awaiting the verdict some four miles from the courthouse at the Lincoln State Hospital, where she had been confined for 9 1/2 months since her capture on January 29. Her father, William Fugate, maintained a silent vigil with newsmen and court officials. Mr. Starkweather, 19, had been convicted in May and sentenced to death for the murder of Mr. Jensen. While the other killings, including that of Mr. Jensen's 16-year old girlfriend, Carol King, had been referenced in testimony in both trials, they were not formally charged in either trial, with the prosecution electing to attempt first to obtain a conviction for the murder of Mr. Jensen, failing which, they could have then proceeded on any one of the other murders. Mr. Starkweather had also admitted the killing on December 1, 1957, of a young service station attendant in Lincoln, with which Ms. Fugate was not connected.

Meanwhile, on the flipside, the rest was silence.

On the editorial page, "Germany: Once More To the Chessboard" finds that hardly had the Chinese left the State Department to its habitual slumber when the German nightmare had returned. There had been a longer interval since the previous crisis, but except for that fact, the crisis in Berlin at present resembled the Quemoy-Matsu crisis in the Formosa Strait, which had also erupted in 1955.