grain to the Russians. I was under the impression the Russians were trying to buy our wheat, not that we were trying to sell them our wheat. There is a great difference involved here. It would appear the Russians have put us on the defensive in this matter, in a position where we will eventually be asking them to take the wheat off our hands.

The lure of Russian gold has been removed from the haggling room.

The honest cost of our wheat is not a point the Russians consider relevant.

The profits of American vessels and longshoremen now appear as nothing more than a hopeful promise.

American taxpayers should get ready for the news that the Russians received a loan in order to buy our wheat. I hope no one will be so rude as to recall that the Russians now Owe us over $10 billion-and they have made it clear they have no intention of repaying those loans.

This is but another example of Russian confusion techniques at their best. Time will tell just how confused we have become in the Odyssey of a RussianAmerican wheat game.

SELLING WHEAT TO RUSSIA Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. DAGUE] may extend his remarks at this point in the RECORD and include extraneous matter. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Iowa?

There was no objection.

Mr. DAGUE. Mr. Speaker, I am unqualifiedly opposed to the sale of U.S. wheat to Communist Russia. My opposition stems from the firm conviction that the purchase of wheat outside the Communist bloc is a move to their strategic advantage. As I read it, the law specifically forbids traffic with Russia under Public Law 480, and I feel that any attempt to circumvent that edict in the case of wheat would be completely

reprehensible.

As regards the sale of wheat or other strategic commodities to the U.S.S.R. by nations with whom we are allied, I would state as emphatically as I know how that continuation of such sales should automatically cancel any aid we may be now ing special condemnation, in my opinion, is Canada's assistance to Cuba; and I think that forthright action by our Government is indicated, including blockade of such traffic if necessary.

providing the countries involved. Deserv

As for the "bleeding hearts" who will defend the sale of wheat to the Soviets on humanitarian grounds, I would suggest that Russia will be able adequately to feed her people if she will simply cut back on her military establishment, now being maintained for aggressive purposes, and use the funds and personnel thus released for the increased production of food and fiber.

SELLING WHEAT TO RUSSIA Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman

from Illinois [Mr. DERWINSKI] may extend his remarks at this point in the RECORD and include extraneous matter. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Iowa?

There was no objection.

Mr. DERWINSKI. Mr. Speaker, I join my colleague, the gentleman from Iowa, in expressing vigorous opposition to the Kennedy administration decision to sell American wheat to the Soviet Union.

It is my strong conviction that any aid to any Communist government serves to perpetuate its dictatorial control over the people and does not provide for their material or political wellbeing. Thus, we are acting in direct contradiction to our historic support of the principle of self-determination of peoples by bolstering their oppressive Communist governments.

It has been clearly established that there will be no starvation in the Soviet Union if we refuse to cooperate with the Communists' request for our wheat. Therefore, the argument that the deal should be consummated for humanitarian reasons certainly has no validity. The Soviet Union plans to continue its exports of wheat to other countries, so it is obvious that the United States, by its sale of wheat to the Soviet Union, is contributing to politically motivated trade policies of the Communists.

By this misguided deal, which is a symptom of the illness of appeasement from which this administration is suffering, we are also helping the Soviet dictatorship to forestall the collapse of the collective farms, the ineffectiveness of which has been the major factor in the crop failure in the Soviet Union.

The American taxpayer is being forced by the administration to subsidize

this infamous sale and the American

shipowners are being given the choice of drastically cutting their charges or losing the job of shipping our wheat to the Communist countries. In spite of the President's specific requirement that the wheat be shipped in American bottoms, the Commerce Department is now pressuring our shipowners to meet Soviet demands for lower shipping charges.

defensible for the United States to alleIt would be far wiser and more morally viate its balance-of-payments problems by reducing foreign aid to Communist Yugoslavia and the left-leaning neutral countries we are now supporting than by this direct support of the Soviet Government in the form of the sale of wheat.

Mr. Speaker, I again protest this deal made by the present administration on moral and practical political and economic grounds and urge that Congress act to make sure that such a betrayal of both the American people and the captive peoples of communism will never occur again.

GENERAL LEAVE TO REVISE AND EXTEND REMARKS

Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that those Members who participated in the discussion may

be permitted to revise and extend their remarks.

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LIBONATI). Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Iowa? There was no objection.

THE NEW WHEAT DEAL The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under previous order of the House, the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. LAIRD] is recognized for 20 minutes.

Mr. LAIRD. Mr. Speaker, it has come to my attention that the Export-Import Bank has decided to guarantee all commercial credit extended by private commercial banks for purchase of U.S. farm commodities by Communist countries.

Normal practice for the Export-Import Bank is to guarantee no more than half the amounts due from foreigners. This normal practice applies to every free world ally this country has.

Many of us in the Congress seriously criticized our Government's decision to approve a wheat sale to Communist countries. We felt that at least sufficient time should have been permitted prior to such an approval during which the Congress could have made a thorough study of the feasibility of such a sale.

This was not done. In apparent disregard of the Johnson Act and the Latta amendment, the executive branch went ahead with the approval.

The Latta amendment, in its loosest construction, was at least a guideline set down by the Congress. The President chose to ignore it.

In his press conference of October 9, the President stated his own guidelines to accompany the approved sale. He said that the deal would be between the Communists and private American merchants. He said that the wheat we sell would be carried in available American ships, supplemented by ships of other countries, as required.

The President has now chosen to ignore his own guidelines almost as readily as he chooses to ignore congressional guidelines whenever they come into conflict with his own views on a given matter.

He said it would be a private deal. Yet the Export-Import Bank, a U.S. agency, has mysteriously agreed to shatter its own precedents and to guarantee up to 100 percent of the credit extended by commercial banks to those American dealers who will carry out the transaction with the Communists. At present, this guarantee has been extended to a $6 million corn sale to Hungary. All indications are that this same 100 percent guarantee will also be extended to the entire $250 million proposed and Government-approved deal with the Communists. This goes far beyond even the most-favored-nation treatment we accord our allies.

At the same time-if not by definition, at least in actuality-the Export-Import Bank's action makes this not a private, but a public and therefore a Government deal. The risk which should accrue to the dealers themselves and to the commercial banks which extend the creditthis risk has been nationalized.

If the Communists default, the American taxpayer will pick up the entire tab.

Mr. Speaker, this makes no sense at all, from any perspective. As a strict business deal, he who enters into a transaction expecting to make a profit, should take upon his own shoulders some of the risk involved.

In his press conference, the President's insistence that this would be a strictly private deal was obviously brought into the picture because the President was uncertain of his ground vis-a-vis existing statutes concerning this matter if it had been a Government deal. If the Government now chooses to assume the entire risk, it would certainly and plainly seem to follow that the Government is a major party to this transaction and the Congress should look deeply into the altered circumstances of this transaction. Parenthetically, Mr. Speaker, it seems inconceivable that the Government of the United States would find it possible and attempt to make palatable the fact that every time we make a concession to the Soviets, the quid pro quo we find ourselves accepting is another and graver incident in Berlin.

I have heard reports that the adminis now contemplating istration an agonizing reappraisal of its relations with the Soviet Union. Many of us in the Congress requested such an appraisal before the test ban was ratified, before a joint moon shot was suggestednaively, I might add-by our President, before we agreed to bail our sworn enemy, the Soviet Union out of an agricultural mess, and before we established a meaningful and effective policy with respect to what we would demand as reciprocal concessions for our own generosity.

Let us hope, Mr. Speaker, that after 31⁄2 years of consistently bad guesses, woefully inadequate analyses of Communist intentions, and imperfectly devised policies, the administration has now come to the point where it will deal with realities and not dreams.

GOVERNMENT DEBT BEING PAID MORE THAN ONCE-A BILLION DOLLARS A YEAR PAID TO FEDERAL RESERVE ON BONDS THAT HAVE BEEN PAID ONCE, WITH INTEREST-IF BONDS ALREADY PAID ONE TIME ARE EXCLUDED FROM NATIONAL DEBT THE BILL TO INCREASE NATIONAL DEBT TO $315 BILLION UNNECESSARY The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under previous order of the House, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. PATMAN] is recognized for 30 minutes.

Mr. PATMAN. Mr. Speaker, I asked to be heard before the Rules Committee this morning on H.R. 8969, a bill to increase temporarily the public debt limit to $315 billion.

The sole purpose of my appearance was to request that when the Rules Committee reports a rule to consider H.R. 8969 it do so with an open rule, so that amendments to the bill may be offered in the House.

DEBT LIMIT INCREASE UNNECESSARY

It will be my purpose, when the bill reaches the floor of the House, to offer

an amendment if the rule permits which will make an increase in the debt limit will make an increase in the debt limit unnecessary, simply by requiring that the outstanding public debt be properly counted.

GOVERNMENT BONDS THAT HAVE BEEN PAID

SHOULD NOT BE INCLUDED IN NATIONAL DEBT

If we as individuals or as businessmen paid off a debt we owed and got back our canceled note or our canceled mortgage, we would no longer count that previous debt as debt which we still owe. We would eliminate that former debt from any accounting of our financial condition which we might give to Dun & Bradstreet, to a bank, or anyone else. & Bradstreet, to a bank, or anyone else.

It should be the same with the Federal debt, but at present this is not the case. Certain Treasury bonds, notes, certificates, and other evidence of indebtedness which the U.S. Government itself owns on behalf of the general public are counted as outstanding debt. This is an irrational and misleading method of accounting.

DIFFERENT WAYS GOVERNMENT BONDS HELD BY

AGENCY

Let me make clear that agencies of the Federal Government hold Federal debt obligations under two entirely distinct circumstances. In one circumstance, Federal agencies hold Government securities in certain trust accounts, where the agency is merely acting as trustee, and for funds belonging to particular segments of the population. Examples of these trust accounts are the unemployment compensation and the old age retirement funds; the civil service retirement funds; the railroad retirement fund; postal savings deposits; Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation funds; Federal savings and loan insurance funds, and so on. The general public does not own the securities in these funds. The Government has merely invested the funds of some particular group who have entrusted the funds to the Government. Government securities held in such trust funds are of course properly counted as outstanding public debt. They are quite properly counted as a part of the debt which is subject to the debt ceiling.

STABILIZATION FUND EXAMPLE

There are, however, circumstances where the Government itself owns debt obligations, not on behalf of any particular segment of the population but on behalf of the general public. These obligations should not be counted as outstanding debt. When the Secretary of the Treasury takes the general funds the Treasury takes the general funds of the Treasury, for example, and invests them in Government debt obligations these obligations have been paid for by the general public, and should not be counted as outstanding debt. This is the case of Federal debt obligations held by the Treasury in the exchange stabilization fund.

The exchange stabilization fund represents funds which have been taken out resents funds which have been taken out of the general fund of the Treasury and of the general fund of the Treasury and set aside in a special fund to be used as may be needed, to purchase foreign currencies for the purpose of stabilizing the exchange value of the dollar in terms of foreign currencies.

On October 31, 1963, the Treasury held $33 million of Federal debt obligations in the exchange stabilization fund-see "Daily Statement of the U.S. Treasury," October 31, 1963. This is not a large amount, in terms of $307 billion Federal debt; but this amount could well grow in the months ahead, because of our peculiar balance-of-payments problem and the steps which may be necessary to carry on stabilization activities.

HIGHWAY TRUST FUND

Similarly, the Treasury held $465.4 million in the highway trust fund on October 31, 1963-same source as above.. True, these funds have been collected, through gasoline taxes, for a special purpose-highway building-but they are funds which belong to the general public, not to some special set of claimants, and in my view these obligations should not be counted as outstanding debt. They have been paid for with the taxpayers money.

GOVERNMENT SECURITIES HELD BY FEDERAL RESERVE OPEN MARKET COMMITTEE HAVE BEEN PAID ONCE

Finally, a very large amount of Federal debt obligations belonging to the general public is held at all times by the Federal Reserve System. On October 30, 1963, the amount of U.S. Government securities which had been bought outright and held by the Federal Reserve was $32.4 billion, or more than 10 percent of the total outstanding Federal debt, as outstanding Federal debt is presently counted-see "Factors Affecting Bank Reserves and Condition Statement of Federal Reserve Banks, Board of Governors, Federal Reserve System," October 31, 1963. How can we as Members of Congress further condone making our constituents pay our debts more than one time? Or to pay interest on debts and interest that have been paid once?

How have these debt obligations been held? Who owns them? And what disacquired? For what purpose are they position will finally be made of them?

These obligations-consisting of Treasury bonds, bills, notes, certificates, and other interest-bearing Treasury obligations have been purchased simply by creating the money with which to buy them. This is not as horrible as it may sound; indeed, it is an essential part of the system used in all industrial nations to provide the growth in the supply of money necessary to accommodate growths in population and even greater growths in economic transactions. Money has to be created, because it does not come from heaven, and it does not grow on trees.

Under our Constitution the power to create money is assigned to the Federal Government and, more specifically, it is assigned to the Congress. This power to create money has been delegated to the Federal Reserve System and to the private commercial banks. The Federal Reserve System has been delegated the responsibility for determining how much money shall be created and in circulation at any one time, and also responsibility for determining, within wide limits, what portion of the money supply shall be created by the private banks

and what portion by the Federal Reserve itself.

MONEY CREATED BY FEDERAL RESERVE AND COMMERCIAL BANKS

Getting down to mechanics, the Federal Reserve creates money in much the same way that private banks create money. It creates demand deposits to the account of the private banks which are called bank reserves. When the Federal Reserve finds it necessary to expand bank reserves by, say, $1 billion, it does so simply by buying $1 billion of Government securities from the open market and paying for them by creating $1 billion of bank reserves, credited to the account of one or more private commercial banks. This money created is highpowered dollars, which banks can use to create 10 additional dollars to loan or invest on every high-powered dollar.

Under present regulations of the Federal Reserve, the money-creating powers are divided between the Federal Reserve and the private banks on an approximate 1-to-10 basis. In other words, when the Federal Reserve expands bank reserves by a billion dollars, this automatically entitles the private commercial banking systems to create $10 billion of new bank deposits. The private commercial banks may do this by purchasing $10 billion of Government securities, by purchasing private securities, or by making loans to business and consumers, or by whatever mixture of loans and investments they see fit to make.

Now, we might ask, will the time ever come when the Federal Reserve will find it appropriate to sell some substantial amount of its Government securities in order to contract the supply of money? The answer is "no," because as a general rule the supply of money must be expanded by about 3 percent each year, compounded, in order to keep up with the growth of economic transactions which are effectuated with transactions in money.

BANKS CREATE MONEY ON BASIS OF 10 TO 1

Of course, the bank reserves which the Federal Reserve has on its books are a liability of the Federal Reserve to the commercial banks. Any commercial bank caring to do so can draw out currency, on a dollar-for-dollar basis, in exchange for its reserves. But no bank wishes to draw out any more currency than is absolutely necessary to accommodate its customers, because currency draws no interest and, what is more important, with each dollar of reserves the bank draws down by taking out currency, that bank loses the power to create $10 of demand deposits in exchange for $10 worth of interest-bearing assets.

Even so, the public's demand for "hand money," or currency, continues to grow also. Coincidentally, the amount of Federal Reserve currency in circulation is about equal to the value of the Treasury obligations it holds. So in one sense it could be said that by issuing currency, the Federal Reserve has acquired interest-bearing Government obligations by issuing non-interest-bearing GovernGovernment obligations in exchange for them.

The following table will illustrate the postwar growth in the Federal Reserve's holdings of Government securities and

Since it is manifest that the Federal Reserves' holdings of Government securities must continue to increase in the years ahead, we might ask why these securities are not canceled? They could be, because they will be held in perpetuity. In truth, the Fed merely holds them, draws the interest from the Treasury, spends all of this interest income it cares to spend, then returns the rest back to the Treasury.

NINETY-NINE PERCENT OF EARNINGS OF FEDERAL RESERVE BANKS COMES FROM TAXPAYERS WHO HAVE PAID THE BONDS AND INTEREST ONE

TIME

Last year the Federal Reserves' total income was $1,049 millions. Of this amount, $1,039 millions, or better than 99 percent, came from interest payments from the Treasury, on its holdings of Government obligations-the Treasury paid the System an average interest rate of 3.52 percent. From this income, the Federal Reserve spent or otherwise disposed of $250 million and returned the other $799 million to the Treasury. The people are being compelled to pay a billion dollars a year interest on bonds that It is a have already been paid once. subsidy with a vengeance.

IS THIS BEING CONTINUED TO PROTECT FEDERAL RESERVE IN ITS BACK-DOOR SPENDING?

The Federal Reserve System is, we might note, the biggest and most freewheeling back-door spending operation ever conceived. It spends all the public funds it cares to spend without so much as a by your leave from Congress. It submits no budget; its expenditures are not in the President's budget; and it is not even audited by the General Accounting Office or any other agency of the Government.

GOVERNMENT OWNS FEDERAL RESERVE BANKS

I know that some people have an idea that the private commercial banks own the Federal Reserve banks, and, therefore, own the assets of these banks, including their holdings of Government obligations. But this notion is completely in error. The notion arises from the fact that the member banks in the Federal Reserve System have been required to make a small investment in the System, totaling less than $400 million, in what has been incorrectly called stock. This stock in no sense represents ownership, or a share of ownership, in the System or the Federal Reserve banks. The statute of 1913 which set up the Federal Reserve System makes this clear. Under this statute the so-called stock

cannot be sold, it cannot be voted, it cannot be hypothecated or pledged to secure a loan, and it cannot share in the profits of the System, except for a fixed 6-percent-interest payment on the investment. And finally, the statute makes clear that if and when the System is terminated, all of the assets of the System will go into the Treasury, exclusive of an amount necessary to pay the stipulated 6-percent interest per annum on the so-called stock.

Over the years I have questioned many officials of the Federal Reserve Systemincluding the present Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board and the past Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Mr. Marriner Eccles-and all have testified to the effect that the Federal Reserve banks are owned by the Federal Government-general public-not by the private commercial banks-see samples of testimony attached.

In summary, Mr. Speaker, the present method of counting as part of the outstanding public debt those debt obligations which have been paid for by the Government, and are thus owned by the general public, is bad and misleading. It will cause difficulties, because the amount of such obligations owned by the Government itself will necessarily grow, giving the public an impression that the public debt which is outstanding is growing a great deal faster than it actually is growing. We owe the public a proper accounting of the public debt, and if we the public debt, it will not now be necesgive the public a proper accounting of sary to increase the debt ceiling and thus disturb the minds of a great many people who are properly concerned about the public debt.

QUOTATIONS FROM TESTIMONY ON OWNERSHIP OF FEDERAL RESERVE ASSETS Mr. PATMAN. Now these 6,500 banks, they have paid in 3 percent of their capital and surplus to the Federal Reserve bank.

Mr. MARTIN. That is right. * * * Now it is not, and I am glad it is not, proprietary interest on the part of the banks. (Wm. McC. Martin, Jr., Chairman, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, before the House Select Committee on Small Business, Nov. 21, 1957, p. 338.)

Mr. MARTIN. The banks through their stock ownership, which you have rightly pointed out a number of times, is not proprietorship, is not ownership. (Chairman Martin before the House Banking and Currency Committee, July 31, 1957, p. 377.)

Mr. PATMAN. Do you agree with Mr. Martin that the member banks do not own the Federal Reserve banks, and have no claim to their assets or income other than the interest payment on the so-called stock which the member banks are required to subscribe to the Federal Reserve banks?

Mr. SZYMCZAK. That is correct. (M. S. Szymczak, member, Board of Governors, before the House Select Committee on Small Business, Apr. 16, 1958, p. 416.)

Mr. MILLS. Not a proprietary interest in the sense that the ownership or the representation of stock ownership in the Federal Reserve bank entitles the member banks to the type of ownership and control of resources that is associated with stock ownership in private enterprise. (Abbot L. Mills, Jr., member, Board of Governors, before the House Select Committee on Small Business, Apr. 17, 1958, p. 448.)

Mr. ROBERTSON. The commercial banks hold stock in the Federal Reserve banks, but all that represents, as far as I can see, is

membership in the Federal Reserve System * * *. They have no proprietary interest in the Federal System as such. (J. L. Robertson, member, Board of Governors, before the House Select Committee on Small Business, Apr. 17, 1958, p. 466.)

Mr. SHEPARDSON. I think we have never contended that the central bank, the Federal Reserve System, is owned by the commercial banks. On the contrary, we have taken every occasion in my knowledge to disabuse that idea. (Charles N. Shepardson, member, Board of Governors, before the House Select Committee on Small Business, Apr. 17, 1958, p. 480.)

THE UNITED STATES DID NOT HAVE A ROLE IN THE SOUTH VIETNAM COUP

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under previous order of the House, the gentleman from Delaware [Mr. MCDOWELL] is recognized for 10 minutes.

Mr. MCDOWELL. Mr. Speaker, having just returned from South Vietnam, as a member of the special study group of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, I can say with a certainty that the United States did not have a role in the bloody South Vietnam coup.

The fact of the matter is that both President Diem and his powerful brother, Ngo Dinh Nhu knew that a coup was in the making, and, furthermore, they knew that they could take steps to improve their government and thereby abort the coup by cutting the ground out from under the leaders of the coup which was being prepared. They did not take such steps, even though the United States took every step and every means possible to encourage them to do so.

As Joseph Alsop points out in the Washington Post of November 6:

Until the very eve of the coup, moreover, Ambassador Lodge continued his fruitless effort to persuade President Diem to set his house in order. His last attempt was made on Sunday, October 27, when Diem invited Lodge to join him on a visit of inspection in the countryside.

These are sad and horrible days for this little country, on which the hopes of so much of the free world rest for turning back the tide of communism in Asia.

We must ask ourselves, as Roscoe Drummond does in his column today:

Why are we doing all this-putting lives and treasure and troops into such a distant battle? We are doing it because the safety of all southeast Asia is at stake on this front of the anti-Communist struggle. Laos and Cambodia, Thailand, and Burma would be next.

South Vietnam is the crucial place to turn back the Communist aggression-by-guerrillawarfare. The evidence is mounting that it can be done.

I think we must give the new government of Vietnam the same kind of powerful military support which we gave the Diem-Nhu government it has replaced. If we falter and are irresolute now we will undoubtedly sacrifice the keystone of the whole free world in Asia, and the cost of stopping the Communist aggression will escalate and skyrocket incalculably. I commend the columns by Joseph Alsop and Roscoe Drummond to my col

leagues and to my countrymen, and include them here:

[From the Washington Post, Nov. 6, 1963] TURNOVER IN SAIGON: NEW TEAM PROMISING START

(By Roscoe Drummond)

The rapidly moving events in Saigonrevolt, and new government replacing Diem in a span of 36 hours-are now sufficiently clear to begin to answer the questions which must deeply concern most Americans and many others.

Did the U.S. Government plot and procure the overthrow of the Diem regime?

How will it affect the anti-Communist war?

Why is the United States putting lives, treasure ($1.5 million a day), and troops (nearly 15,000 military advisers and technicians) into this distant and bitter battle? The Communist press in Moscow and North Vietnam (where the Communist Vietcong are in control) find it convenient to answer the first question both ways. For several weeks they have been berating the United States for supporting the repressive Diem government and now berate the United States for bringing about its downfall.

The candid and factual answer is this: Neither the CIA nor the Embassy in Saigon nor any American official planned or plotted the coup. It could not have been seriously begun nor successfully completed unless the circumstances within South Vietnam had been ripe for revolt.

American policy unquestionably gave encouragement and incentive to the revolt.

The Kennedy administration welcomes the outcome in the conviction that the repressive policies of the Diem regime had lost it the loyalty of many Vietnamese people, and that it was thereby dissipating the vast American aid in its war against the Communist guerrillas.

President Kennedy, Secretary of State Dean Rusk and influential Members of Congress made it evident that military assistance could not continue indefinitely under these circumstances. Some reduction in aid was beginning to be carried out.

This confronted the South Vietnamese military leaders, who unitedly joined in the anti-Diem revolt, with a point-of-no-return decision. They either had to accept the continuance of the Diem-Nhu regime with all its autocratic shortcomings or see the war lost to the Communists for lack of American assistance.

The decision which Gen. Duong Van Minh and his associates made was that the fate of their nation depended upon freeing it from the divisive Diem-Nhu regime.

What next? Obviously no one can be sure. Government by military junta can go in any direction. But the beginnings are encouraging. It has elevated Vice President Nguyen Ngoc Tho, a figurehead under Diem. It has freed the Buddhist monks and other antiCommunist critics of Diem. It has lifted the censorship and has promised elections.

Undoubtedly the new government will step up the battle against the Vietcong. The generals in the revolt are not neutralists. They have no intention of negotiating away the independence of their country in some amorphous deal with the North Vietnamese Communists. They have the will to win.

There are two reasons why they will now have more means of winning. First, the United States will have the incentive to lend the maximum aid because it will be effectively used. Secondly, many security forces, which could have been deployed to the fighting areas, were hoarded by Diem for his own protection. They will now be available against the Communists.

Why are we doing all this-putting lives and treasure and troops into such a distant battle? We are doing it because the safety of

all southeast Asia is at stake on this front of the anti-Communist struggle. Laos and Cambodia, Thailand and Burma would be next.

South Vietnam is the crucial place to turn back the Communist aggression by guerrilla warfare. The evidence is mounting that it can be done.

[From the Washington Post, Nov. 6, 1963] MATTER OF FACT: BLOOD ON OUR HANDS? (By Joseph Alsop)

The American role in the bloodstained but purgative coup in South Vietnam is a subject demanding serious inquiry, if only because so much bosh is sure to be talked about it unless the facts are understood.

Beginning, then, at the beginning, the American Government was of course aware that the leaders of the Vietnamese Army were talking with one another about ways and means of displacing President Ngo Dinh Diem. Indeed, there was no way to avoid being aware of this.

As long as 2 months ago, when this reporter was in Saigon, he was taken into the confidence of one of the most active organizers of the coup. This member of the future junta listed the other generals who had already placed themselves under the leadership of Gen. Duong Van Minh; he said the coup would come soon; and he actually asked that the information be transmitted at once to Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge.

Long before the coup occurred, therefore, it was quite clear there was trouble ahead. The expectation of early trouble in fact led Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara to send his personal plane to Saigon, so that Ambassador Lodge could make his planned visit to Washington without the extra days away from his post required for travel by the commercial airlines.

That simple fact in turn reveals another aspect of the story. While aware that trouble was brewing, the U.S. Government was in no sense a party to the preparations for the coup. Otherwise, the plan would never have been made for this Lodge trip to Washington, which was so abruptly forestalled when the coup took place.

Until the very eve of the coup, moreover, Ambassador Lodge continued his fruitless effort to persuade President Diem to set his house in order. His last attempt was made on Sunday, October 27, when Diem invited Lodge to join him on a visit of inspection in the countryside.

The long day with Diem gave the Ambassador the opportunity to discuss both the state of affairs in Vietnam, and its effects on United States-Vietnamese relations, in detail and at great length. He offered a list of modest but significant steps which Diem could take to relax the tension in Saigon, and to improve the climate in Washington. Every item on the Lodge list was categorically vetoed by Diem.

Lodge then asked Diem whether he had any suggestions of his own about possible means of escape from the impasse. Diem merely gave the Ambassador "a blank look and changed the subject," as Lodge subsequently reported. Yet on Monday Lodge returned to the attack with Diem's intelligent and flexible minister of defense, Nguyen Dinh Thuan.

Thuan, who described the program pressed by Lodge on Diem as "extremely moderate," promised to go to Diem and see whether his persuasions would have any effect. His first report was decidedly encouraging. But the second report from Thuan, the next day, was a gloomy, final negative. Diem's brother, the all-powerful and half-mad Ngo Dinh Nhu, had had his say in the interval.

In short, there was no way to save Diem and Nhu from themselves. Or rather, there was only one way. It was indicated to Secretary McNamara just before he left Vietnam by the able Englishman, Prof.

Patrick Honey, who is the unusual expert on Vietnam without a personal ax to grind.

"You must understand," Honey told McNamara, "that the Diem regime will surely be destroyed by a coup unless the U.S. Government makes a ringing reassertion of confidence in Diem and support for his government as soon as you get back to Washington."

McNamara gave Honey's judgment to President Kennedy as his own judgment.

But no reassertion of confidence in the Diem

regime was possible, simply because the U.S. Government had quite rightly lost confidence in the Diem regime.

Such are the facts. They constitute an interesting moral problem. On the one hand, the U.S. Government had foreknowledge that a coup was being considered. In addition, the U.S. Government could have forestalled the coup-by stultifying itself. But the U.S. Government refused to stultify itself. Diem refused to put his house in order. And so the coup took place.

LEAVE OF ABSENCE

By unanimous consent, leave of absence was granted to:

Mr. BATES (at the request of Mr. PRICE), on account of official business.

Mr. PIRNIE (at the request of Mr. HALLECK), for today, and for the balance of the week, on account of official business as a member of the Committee on Armed Services.

Mr. HOLIFIELD (at the request of Mr. PRICE), on account of official business.

Mr. HOSMER (at the request of Mr. PRICE), on account of official business.

Mr. ANDERSON (at the request of Mr. PRICE), on account of official business.

Mr. RIVERS of South Carolina, for November 6, 1963, through November 15, 1963, on account of being a delegate to the NATO Parliamentarians Confer

SPECIAL ORDERS GRANTED

By unanimous consent, permission to address the House, following the legislative program and any special orders heretofore entered, was granted to:

Mr. WILSON of Indiana, for 15 minutes, on Tuesday next.

Mr. WILSON of Indiana, for 15 minutes, on Wednesday next.

Mr. LAIRD for 20 minutes, today, and to revise and extend his remarks.

Mr. UTT, for 45 minutes, on November 7.

Mr. PATMAN, for 30 minutes, today, to revise and extend his remarks and to include extraneous matter.

Mr. SCHADEBERG (at the request of Mr. REIFEL), for 60 minutes, on Thursday, November 7, 1963.

EXTENSION OF REMARKS

By unanimous consent, permission to extend remarks in the CONGRESSIONAL RECORD, or to revise and extend remarks, was granted to:

Mr. FINO.

Mr. STAEBLER.

(The following Member (at the request of Mr. REIFEL) and to include extraneous matter:)

Mr. DOLE.

ENROLLED BILLS SIGNED

Mr. BURLESON, from the Committee on House Administration, reported that that committee had examined and found truly enrolled bills of the House of the following titles, which were thereupon signed by the Speaker:

H.R. 7405. An act to amend the Bretton Woods Agreements Act to authorize the U.S. Governor of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development to vote for

an increase in the Bank's authorized capital stock; and

H.R. 8821. An act to revise the provisions of law relating to the methods by which amounts made available to the States pursuant to the Temporary Unemployment Compensation Act of 1958 and title XII of the Social Security Act are to be restored to the Treasury.

SENATE ENROLLED BILLS SIGNED

The SPEAKER announced his signature to enrolled bills of the Senate of the following titles:

S. 876. An act to authorize the Administrator of General Services to convey certain lands in Prince Georges County, Md., to the American National Red Cross; and

S. 1201. An act for the relief of Dr. James T. Maddux.

BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTION PRESENTED TO THE PRESIDENT

Mr. BURLESON, from the Committee on House Administration, reported that on House Administration, reported that that committee did on November 5, 1963, that committee did on November 5, 1963, present to the President, for his approval, bills and a joint resolution of the House of the following titles:

H.R. 1049. An act to amend sections 334, 367, and 369 of the Bankruptcy Act (11 U.S.C. 734, 767, 769) and to add a new section 355 so as to require claims to be filed and to limit the time within which claims may be filed in chapter XI (arrangement) proceedings to the time prescribed by section 57n of the Bankruptcy Act (11 U.S.C. 93n); H.R. 1311. An act for the relief of Jolan Berczeller;

H.R. 1345. An act for the relief of Peter Carson;

H.R. 2260. An act for the relief of Mrs. Rozsi Neuman;

H.R. 2445. An act for the relief of Mrs. Barbara Ray Van Olphen;

H.R. 2754. An act for the relief of Mercedes Robinson Orr;

H.R. 2757. An act for the relief of Woo You Lyn (also known as Hom You Fong and Lyn Fong Y. Hom);

H.R. 2835. An act to clarify the status of circuit and district judges retired from regular active service;

H.R. 2968. An act for the relief of Kazimierz Kurmas and Zdzislaw Kurmas;

H.R. 3384. An act for the relief of Lee Suey Jom (also known as Tommy Lee and Lee Shue Chung);

H.R. 4145. An act for the relief of certain individuals;

Pedro B. Montemayor, Jr.;

H.R. 6097. An act for the relief of Dr.

H.R. 6260. An act for the relief of Wai Chan

Cheng Liu;

H.R. 6500. An act to authorize certain con

struction at military installations, and for other purposes; and

H.J. Res. 626. Joint resolution granting the consent of Congress to the establishment of an interstate school district by Hanover, N.H., and Norwich, Vt., and to an agreement between Hanover School District, New Hampshire, and Norwich Town School District, Vermont.

ADJOURNMENT

Mr. WAGGONNER. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 4 o'clock and 56 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Thursday, November 7, 1963, at 11 o'clock a.m.

EXECUTIVE COMMUNICATIONS,

ETC.

Under clause 2 of rule XXIV, executive communications were taken from the Speaker's table and referred as follows:

1354. A letter from the Administrative Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, transmitting a list of negotiated purchases and contracts made by the Coast Guard since May 19, 1963, pursuant to section 2304e of title 10, United States Code; to the Committee on Armed Services.

1355. A letter from the Comptroller General of the United States, transmitting a report on the unsatisfactory condition of combat vehicles and equipment in the 3d Marine Division (Reinforced), Okinawa, U.S. Marine Corps, Department of the Navy; to the Committee on Government Operations.

1356. A letter from the Deputy Director, Bureau of the Budget, Executive Office of the President, transmitting a draft of a proposed bill entitled "A bill to provide uniform policies with respect to recreation and fish and wildlife benefits and costs of Federal multiple-purpose water resource projects, and to provide the Secretary of the Interior with authority for recreation development of projects under his control"; to the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs.

REPORTS OF COMMITTEES ON PUBLIC BILLS AND RESOLUTIONS

Under clause 2 of rule XIII, reports of committees were delivered to the Clerk for printing and reference to the proper calendar, as follows:

Mr. HÉBERT: Committee on Armed Services. H.R. 2512. A bill to clarify the status of members of the National Guard while attending or instructing at National Guard schools established under the authority of the Secretary of the Army or Secretary of