August 16, 1974
ST. PAUL, Minn. - The FBI, hinting that it will balk at a
subpoena, has announced that it must consult U.S. Attorney
General William Saxbe before testifying about surveillance
and harassment of the Minnesota Socialist Workers Party.
The Minnesota branch of the FBI was given a subpoena by an Ethics Commission official July 31 while demonstrators picketed outside the FBI's Minneapolis offices. The protesters were demanding that the FBI testify.
The next night, Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Palmer told commissioners that federal law required FBI agent Philip Enlow to get permission from the U.S. Attorney General before testifying. However, a spokesman for the FBI in Washington, D.C. told the St. Paul Dispatch Aug. 2 that he knew of no law requiring FBI agents to secure permission from the attorney general's office before testifying at hearings of a government agency.
Jane Van Deusen, Socialist Workers candidate for governor of Minnesota, said, "We don't want `just anything,' but the sordid details of the FBI's criminal attack on our party. If the FBI refuses to testify it will only be a confirmation of our charges against them and another reason for the commission to grant our request for an exemption."
The FBI has already admitted, under the pressure of lawsuits, that it has conducted extensive surveillance of the SWP and has had a disruption program in effect designed to block the SWP's growth. But much of the detail of the FBI's illegal activity remains top secret.
August 15, 1949
After giving over 4.5 billion dollars and considerable
military aid to Chiang's Chinese National Government,
Washington now reveals for the first time, through the "White
Paper" issued by the State Department, that as far back as
1943 and 1944 it was already well aware of the "incompetence
and corruption" of the Chinese ruling clique.
The White Paper seeks to justify the huge expenditure of funds wrung from the overtaxed American masses to bolster a hated regime. The chief claim is that aid was given in order to win the war as soon as possible and thereby save the lives of perhaps a million American soldiers. But the truth of the matter is that the great bulk of the financial and military aid, over 3 billion dollars, was given since the end of the war.
Even the friendly Chiang Kai-shek was not notified of the stab in the back he received at Yalta. There Stalin received the blessing of the imperialist powers to exploit Manchuria paving the way for the despoliation of its industries which were dismantled and shipped into the Soviet Union.
Again the State Department tried to suppress General Wedemeyer's report which called for the virtual partition of Manchuria among the U.S. Soviet Union, England and France, with the hope, undoubtedly, of getting the lion's share for American imperialism, as is the dismemberment of Germany. If Washington failed to follow Wedemeyer's recommendation it was because it knew the Chinese masses would never permit it.