September 15, 1971
ATTICA, N.Y., - Today the Buffalo Courier Express carried a bulletin reading: "State Correction Commission Russell G. Oswald confirmed Tuesday night that nine of the ten hostages who died in the Attica prison riot succumbed to gunshot wounds fired by state police during the retaking of the maximum security facility Monday morning. He said that earlier reports that the hostages died of cut throats were false."

According to an unidentified state policeman, the orders handed down before the assault were to "shoot to kill," and this order was savagely carried out by the 600 state police, sheriff deputies, and prison guards, and the 400 National Guardsmen who stormed the prison at 8:45 Monday morning. Any inmate who resisted or raised his hand was cut down in a hail of rifle fire.

The Attica rebellion was the biggest to date. More than 1,200 of the 2,254 inmates participated. Inmate leaders read a statement which captured the essence of their action. It said in part, "the entire incident that has erupted here at Attica is a result ... of the unmitigated oppression wrought by the racist administration network of this prison .... We are men .... We are not beasts, and we do not intend to be beaten or driven as such.... What has happened here is but the sound before the fury of those who are oppressed."

September 21, 1946

A tremendous upsurge of the Japanese labor movement involving almost 1,000,000 workers - one third of the organized labor force - began on Sept. 10 in Tokyo with a general strike of the All-Japan Seaman's Union. This was followed in a few days by a strike of 556,000 men in the Japanese CIO and 330,000 farm hands in the All-Japan Agricultural Union. p> This powerful strike wave is taking place in the face of a dictatorial decree by General MacArthur two weeks ago, backed up by the puppet government prohibiting "strikes, walkouts, or other work stoppages." p> The Hitler-like decree and MacArthur's threat to use occupation troops as strikebreakers served to smash a three-day strike of seamen in Sasebo. This week, according to union reports, 3,899 ships are tied up, virtually paralyzing the Japanese merchant marine. Sympathy strikes of the Japan Port Workers Union and Japan Coastal Shipping Union added 60,000 strikers to the 54,000 merchant seamen who walked off the ships. The Japanese Congress of Industrial Unions ordered all its major industrial affiliates to go on strike and stay out until "the reactionary government of Premier Yoshida collapses."  
 
 
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