Portrait of the Week— 'THE BEST LAID SCHEMES of mice
and men gang aft agley': as America and Russia played cliff- top politics, both sides began treading danger- ously near the brink, and a slip by either could mean disaster. On Monday both President Ken- nedy and Richie Benaud warned of stiff tests ahead: the one said it wasn't cricket, the other said it was. In a speech to the American nation i on TV, Kennedy moved into a forward policy in the cold war: revealing the closely guarded secret that the CIA, on its best behaviour, had Photographed Russian missile bases sprouting al- most overnight in Cuba, he announced a military quarantine around the island. Compared with Cuba, all other rumours of war seemed more like vicarage tea-parties. In the Himalayas, China and India fought out bloody battles before the winter snows end the fighting : Mr. Sandys praised the Indians for their 'patience and restraint' in the lace of aggression, although at the time the Indians were fighting for all they were worth. Katanga and the Yemen bubbled ominously, but nobody cared. Nor were home affairs very Prominent: the Minister of Labour, Mr. Hare, Promised government action to give greater se- curity for jobs. At the same time, a shop- steward at Ford's of Dagenham was sacked at a moment's notice, and the resulting strike was costing Ford's £-} million a day and endangering 3.2,000 jobs. Threats of more rail strikes receded l!" a time, when Dr. Beeching and Mr. Greene ..b.ecame friends, resolving to work together to put
country back on its feet.
IFIE LEANING TOWER OF EUROPE, President de Gaulle, threatened to resign if the majority for his referendum this Sunday was not overwhelm- ing enough to please him. Yet another secrets trial in London. when an Admiralty clerk W.IS sentenced to eighteen years' imprisonment for being a vassal to Russia for six years. Yet another official inquiry was set up, but it is not expected to uncover many secrets. Otherwise this '‘'as a week of refusals: at home NALGO by ballot declined the proposal to join the TUC, and the latter again stressed its distaste for NIC. The duke of Edinburgh affirmed his distaste for an The degree from an Australian university. ihe Minister for Aviation, Mr. Amery, refused to allow BOAC to include six pages of criticism of lints Ministry in its annual report. Abroad, twelve nuclear disarmers were turned back at Leningrad, but s s emed quite pleased to have go so far. Mr. ,ane Kenny, Establishment-minded t theatre de- 1,gner, declined an invitation to work in 7avana, suddenly losing all interest in Cubism. bil! space the US Ranger rocket refused to send id( signals as intended, as its mechanism had beep ruined by the US rainbow bomb test. * Do NOT LOVE THEE, MR. FELL: the reason why o„ know full well'—the chairman of the Great armouth Tories resigned in protest at Mr. Fell's °PPosition to Europe; Mr. Fell went ahead with Plans to ask for a vote of confidence, just to see if anyone did love him. The twentieth anniversary Or the battle of El Alamein took place on Sun- day : even so, the anniversary did not pass quietly, 'Is th generals were still squabbling over who r,!,allye did win the war. That other entertainment, workers Playtime, celebrated its twenty-first ,nbirthday on Tuesday• the official age of Workers' T"„aYlime jokes was not revealed. Both sides of inyv were on the fringes of the news : while the Z`3° man, George Dangerfield, was fined for Poaching, Alan Melville, of What's My Line ? ..ould not appear, as his dachshund had just died. Tayhe it was an only dog. Meanwhile British Railways issued their winter schedules—expiring In June. 1963.
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