THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
79th Year, No.100
The University of Kansas—Lawrence, Kansas
Friday, March 21, 1969
Soviet missiles now a threat
UDK News Roundup
By United Press International
Truce almost stopped
CAIRO - Cuba and Communist China tried to prevent a cease-fire in the 1967 Middle East war, the semi-official Egyptian newspaper Al Ahram reported today.
"It is no secret that some of the world's revolutionary leaders who are friends of the Arabs, including Chinese party Chairman Mao Tse-tung and Cuban Premier Fidel Castro, thought the Arabs should reject the cease-fire," wrote Al Ahram Editor Hassaeinein Haikal.
The Cairo editor said the United Arab Republic was not in a position to reject a truce, since its army was defeated and needed time to replace its losses.
SFS boycott ends
SAN FRANCISCO - The long, violent student boycott at San Francisco State College has ended with student leaders saying they won all their demands and mediators terming the settlement a "model for colleges around the country."
The dispute began last Nov. 6 when the school's Black Students Union issued 10 "non-negotiable" demands and stopped attending classes. The Third World Liberation Front joined the boycott a few days later and issued five demands of its own.
Pike to probe Pueblo
WASHINGTON — Rep. Otis G. Pike, D.N.Y., says his special subcommittee will investigate why the Air Force was advised "not to contact" the South Koreans when the spy ship Pueblo was seized.
The hearings into North Korea's seizure of the Pueblo, being conducted by Pike's special House armed service subcommittee, were in recess today. The next scheduled witness in Gen. Earle G. Wheeler, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who may testify next week.
Reds attack planes
SAIGON — Communist gunners pushed their nationwide offensive to its highest pitch in a week today. One of their 65 overnight attacks destroyed or damaged 20 million-dollar American warplanes on the flight line of Chu Lai.
U. S. intelligence sources revealed interrogation reports from captured guerrillas that said the Reds plan an attack on Saigon this weekend. Senior American officials gave it a 50-50 chance of coming off.
Soviets propose ban
GENEVA - The Soviet Union indicated today it is willing to compromise with the United States on a treaty banning nuclear weapons from the world's seabeds.
Chief Soviet disarmament negotiator Alexei A. Roshchin said the text of his country's suggested treaty should not be taken too literally. He made the comment after U.S. delegation sources had indicated that parts of the Soviet proposal were unacceptable
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WASHINGTON (UPI) - The Nixon administration, presenting its case for the antiballistic missile system (ABM), disclosed yesterday that the Russians now have the power to "destroy substantially all" of America's Minuteun missiles.
Not only is the first-line U.S. nuclear deterrent already in jeopardy, Defense Department officials told Congress and the nation, but the Polaris missile submarine fleet will become vulnerable to Soviet attack in three or four years.
This appraisal of a rapidly growing Soviet missile threat was presented to a nationally-broadcast hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee by Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird and his chief deputy, David Packard.
Senate approval
Both urged Senate approval of President Nixon's decision to deploy an antimissile defense—the new Safeguard ABM—which would protect Minutemen missiles stored underground in 11 strategically located sites, as well as Washington, D.C.
Both made clear it is impossible to defend the American population against a heavy nuclear attack and that protection of the nation's deterrent missiles is the only logical alternative.
"We cannot stop a massive Soviet attack on our cities," said Laird. "Technically we just don't know how. We must rely on deterrence to ensure that nuclear war doesn't start in the first place."
And in reply to ABM critics, Laird said the safeguard would not obstruct arms control talks but actually would give the Russians "an added incentive to negotiate a meaningful agreement" on jointly reducing offensive and defensive weapons.
Another complaint
Packard noted another complaint, directed against the Johnson administration's Sentinel ABM system, that a limited antimissile defense primarily around the cities inevitably would be expanded into a full-scale or "thick" system against Soviet attack that would cost an estimated $40 billion or more.
The deputy defense secretary said the Safeguard system, which will cost between $6 billion and $7 billion, "rejects the thick system . . . that we try to defend our cities against a heavy Soviet attack." Moving the Safeguard sites away from the cities, he said, "provides us with no base in the system we are recommending for going ahead with a thick system."
In a chilling report on Russia's
expanding nuclear capability, Laird said the Soviets are installing many SS9 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs)“a large and accurate weapon."
Pentagon studies show that the SS9 can carry a 20-megaton warhead, one thousand times more powerful than the Hiroshima atomic bomb, and that Minute'mean underground silos cannot be hardened enough to withstand its effects if it strikes within a quarter-mile.
Packard said the Pentagon's analysis of Soviet nuclear gains has "brought us to the conclusion that the Soviet Union has the capability to destroy substantially all of our Minuteman missiles in hardened silos if they chose to do so."
As for submarines, Laird said the United States has "firm, hard intelligence" that the Soviet Union is building Polaris-type nuclear missile subs at the rate of seven a year, and could produce one a month.
Packard and Gen. Earle G. Wheeler, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the committee the Russians are developing a means of knocking out U.S. Polaris subs but they refused to discuss details.
Packard said there are "some things the Soviet Union might do" to make Polaris submarines "less reliable."
Eight girls named to squad in pom pon tryout last night
The pom pon squad for 1969-70 was selected last night in Allen Field House.
Judged on appearance, coordination, rhythm, stage presence, vivaciousness, and creativity, eight regulars and four alternates were chosen from 30 finalists.
Members of the squad are:
Annette Westermann, Kansas City
junior; Connie Cerne, Lawrence
sophomore; Beth Fontron, Topeka
junior; Patty Johnson, Overland
Park sophomore; Janet Merrick,
Prairie Village junior; Mary Williams, Kansas City, Mo., sophomore; Marilyn Marshall, Kansas City, Mo., freshman, and Debbie Youngstrom, Des Moines, Iowa junior.
Chosen as alternates were: Ann
Leadwig, Overland Park freshman;
Sherry Fortenberry, Leawood
freshman; Sandy Hoagland, Palto
Alto, Calif., freshman; and
Rosemary Sicks, Independence
sophomore.
Judging the event were: Vince Bilotta, alumni field director; Ben
Ollison, assistant football coach; Bari Sue Robinson, Kansas City, Mo., senior and 1968-69 pom pon squad member; Shirley Gossett, Overland Park senior and head of the 1968-69 pom pon squad; R. Lyle Hartman, Los Angeles junior and head yell leader; John Geissal, Prairie Village junior and yell leader; Fred McElhenie, associate dean of men; Stephanie Schoeneberg, Frosh Hawks president, and Bob Sanders, assistant professor of bioloby and physics.
1969-70 pom pon squad
Photo by Ron Bishop