Challenge in Asia

Sir: Despite all its obscurities, the war in South Viet Nam is a Chinese test of our resolve to contain their expansion by whatever means necessary. The Chinese can see that a victory for them in Viet Nam will raise their bargaining stature in the inevitable nuclear showdown between Communist China and the West. If Washington trembles at the prospect of conventional war with China, we will surely hide under the bed when China finally confronts us with nuclear weapons.

ELLIOTT SMITH

La Jolla, Calif.

Sir: What is the matter with these foolish people who talk about negotiating with the Communists over South Viet Nam? Have they not yet learned that a Communist's word means nothing?

MARIE E. CASH

Lebanon, Ind.

Sir: The farther we go with Viet Nam, the worse off we are. It may cost a great loss of face to pull out now, but the loss will be much greater if we are forced out --which is inevitable.

GEORGE S. CLARKE

New Orleans

Sir: To advocate patience in the face of possible Communist domination is to advocate disaster.

SANDY TOLBERT

Lubbock, Texas

Sir: You refer to the problem of inadequate protection for our landing strips and encampments in Viet Nam. Our soldiers have been paying tribesmen $5 a month to protect them. This is outrageous. In this age of scientific advancement, we surely could provide sufficient protection for our men and our bases anywhere. Westmoreland could set up electric eyes at certain intervals and guard these positions with only a few soldiers, making an almost foolproof fence around the base or the airstrip.

MATTHEW WALSH

Notre Dame, Ind.

Sir: When an American can buy the services of a South Vietnamese for $5 a month, no wonder the U.S. does not want to get out of South Viet Nam.

GORDON DISHKE

Hagersville, Ont.

Sir: What bitter irony. L.B.J. finally is doing in Viet Nam exactly what a "trigger-happy warmonger" named Barry Goldwater advocated three years ago. In his heart, Lyndon knows Barry was right.

FRANK C. WORBS JR.

Vanport, Pa.

Sir: Westmoreland is a very symbolic name, but remember that "Qui veut tout n'aura rien."*

ROBERT V. YOUNG

Ann Arbor, Mich.

Cairo v. Bonn

Sir: Where is the integrity of the West German government in its meek surrender to Egyptian blackmail [Feb. 19]? And where is the good sense of the U.S. Government when it tiptoes around instead of positively and proudly meeting the defense requirements of Israel, the only Western-oriented country in the Middle East?

A. MIRONER

Syracuse, N.Y.

Sir: As a naturalized U.S. citizen, born of German Jewish parents who were the victims of persecution and ultimate death in concentration camps, I have been trying to understand and forgive Germany, but Bonn and its wavering policies make this difficult.

Mr. Nasser harbors openly many ex-National Socialists and war criminals who have escaped German jurisdiction. For all I know, the murderers of my family are among them.

GERD S. GROMBACHER

Lieutenant Colonel,

U.S.A. Fort Leavenworth, Kans.

Sir: What does Israel want to do with these arms? Do the Zionist Israelis wish to kill more Arabs? The Palestinian Arabs, of whom I am one, lived in Palestine centuries before the Americas were discovered, and yet you mention nothing about the ugly crimes of the Zionists against us.

J. F. ZEID

Sunnyvale, Calif.

Hot Blood

Sir: Your sneering little accounts of "Life--Italian Style" [Feb. 19] amused me, particularly as I had just finished reading about Life--American Style in the preceding pages. But when I reached your Law section, you really made my "hot Italian blood" boil! I ask you, is it pure coincidence that the rate of juvenile delinquency in divorceless Italy is one of the lowest in the world? Is it more civilized to tolerate the sporadic "irregular" situation that exists among a small percentage of the Italian population or the legal hanky-panky we have in the U.S. concerning marriage and divorce?

STELLA BRESCACIN

Somerville, N.J.

Sir: Italians are not "always violent, usually passionate, and rarely predictable." We do become so, however, when we hear such careless generalities.

THOMAS LAWRENCE COLAROSSI

Dearborn, Mich.

Sir: Simple solution to Carlo Ponti's problem: he should embrace Islam.

M. YUSUF KHAN

Calcutta

Red Profits

Sir: You consider as a sign of "failure" of one of Communism's cardinal creeds the fact that the U.S.S.R. accepts the profit motive [TIME cover, Feb. 12]. In reality, the notion of profit in the Soviet economy has existed for quite a long time. Actually it is thanks to this profit that since 1923 the Soviet Union has been able to set up all its funds and industry, whose level is 60 times higher than that of Czarist Russia. However, those in the West often make believe that profit was formerly denied in the U.S.S.R. And now they allege that the Soviet Union has all of a sudden started zealously deriving profit.

Denial of profit by socialism and recognition of profit by capitalism has never served as the feature distinguishing socialism from capitalism. The difference is in the way profit is formed, appropriated and used.

In the U.S.S.R., profit belongs to society as a whole and is not the sole purpose of production. It is merely the means for raising living standards, for extending and improving production. Under the conditions of a planned economy, profit can and must express actual efficiency of methods of production. Many Soviet economists think that profit can be used as an index for assessing and encouraging the work of our enterprises. However, this does not mean that the Soviet state intends to relinquish its centralized planning management, which will suffer no harm from the improvement of assessment and encouragement, but on the contrary will grow stronger. Your article ignores the role of centralized planning in the Soviet economy and emphasizes profit.

Centralized planning in the U.S.S.R. ensures rapid development of the Soviet economy without crises. With the purpose of fulfilling general plan assignments, each large enterprise or production association should get orders from its customer establishments on the basis of direct contract relations. These contracts are not the product of sporadic market fluctuations but are rather the embodiment and realization of centralized planning. That is why the new system will never lead to unemployment. We intend to assess the work of enterprises, first of all, by the way in which they carry out orders placed with them, and only then shall we make appraisal of and encourage their efficiency.

EVSEI LIBERMAN

Professor

Kharkov University

Kharkov, U.S.S.R.

Misplaced Dakotan

Sir: In crediting the Honorable George S. McGovern to North Dakota [Feb. 26], you short changed my native state by one Senator, leaving the entire burden upon the Honorable Karl E. Mundt. All loyal sons of South Dakota protest this realignment of the Senate of the United States.

D. A. WILLIAMS

Administrator

Soil Conservation Service

Washington

Down Alpine Noses

Sir: It has been a shattering experience to read your story [Feb. 19] on Switzerland. Your correspondent is unobjective. Reduction of foreign labor, totaling at present 1,000,000 in a population of 5.9 million, is not xenophobia but one of three measures to combat rampant inflation (14% in the past five years v. 5% in the U.S.). The other two: tighter credit and a reduction in public and industrial construction, to prevent continued economic overexpansion. The last OECD report called these three measures justified, even insufficient!

RETO L. M. WYLER

Zurich

Sir: Congratulations for your excellent article about the foreign labor situation in Switzerland. After 2 1/2 years in the U.S., I recently returned to my native country and was ashamed of the treatment of the foreign residents. I blame the present situation on Swiss industry, which prefers importing cheap labor to making investments for modernization and mechanization.

ROBERT U. VON ARX

Zurich

Sir: Although I agree in general with your article about Switzerland, there is one remark in it that I feel is unjust. You stated that the Swiss do not like foreigners except for their money. Do you know how many Swiss have learned the Italian language for no other purpose than for ease of communication with the immigrants?

RENE BRUeTSCH

Schaffhausen, Switzerland

Sir: Criticize a Swiss and you have an enemy. We are great at criticizing others, but never or seldom criticize ourselves. We are too perfect in everything, like our chocolates and cheeses are. And naturally, we look up to our mountains and then down our short noses over the rest of the world. Right you are!

MRS. D. LIENHARD

Minusio, Switzerland

Sir: I offer a slightly different version of your first paragraph: Except for its pounds and francs, the rest of the world has never really been good enough for the Americans, who for 20 years have looked down their Rocky noses at the other people on earth.

DR. ERNST BASLER

Zurich

Moon Dust

Sir: I see we have made our second attempt to determine if the moon is made of dust, rock or green cheese by taking pictures of it [Feb. 26]. Why not shoot a small projectile from the nose of the next missile when it is several miles from the moon? The pictures of the projectile hitting the surface and the resulting splatter will show if the surface is soft or hard.

FRED J. EBELING

Glyndon, Md.

Optimistic Lion

Sir: The reviewer of my novel The Smile on the Face of the Lion [Feb. 12] writes that "[the author] seems to have derived his literary manner in equal measure from Marcel Proust, Ian Fleming, Bernard Shaw and Michelangelo Antonioni." I have read the regular amount of Proust, very little Shaw, and no Fleming--though I am planning to. As for Antonioni, the really relevant thing we have in common is, of course, optimism (i.e., the awareness that making films, writing novels, etc., are the ultimately worthwhile pursuits).

P. M. PASINETTI

Venice

Spector's Fleet Fame

Sir: Re your article on Phil Spector, today's pacesetter in rock 'n' roll [Feb. 19]: nearing 20, my taste in music has tended to drift away from the slam-bam, guitar-twangin', noise-styled rock 'n' roll, but I still maintain a liking for the work of Spector, who should be thanked for his efforts to raise the music of his time to artful expression.

JACK GARNER

St. Bonaventure, N.Y.

Sir: I feel that You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' isn't as bad as some records, but please, can we disown this Phil Spector? He's worse than anything that has come out of England, and he's not even English!

CINDY EDMONDS

Austin, Tex.

Sir: I think his real name should be Spectre.

LEE KOVACH

Wheaton, Ill.

Motorized Slopes

Sir: Re snowmobiles [Feb. 19]: the roads are clogged with motorized traffic; the airways are clogged with motorized traffic; the seas, lakes and rivers are clogged with motorized traffic; and now the slopes! Good Lord, deliver us!

GEORGE C. THAYER

London

Clean Fun

Sir: The tremendous gesture of the Los Angeles Times in starting a clean-up on movie advertisements [Feb. 12] should lead other movie producers to be as smart as Walt Disney and present family entertainment. Mary Poppins got me into the Chicago State-Lake Theater, and that was the first time in ten years I had been to the Loop for a movie. After you read the sexy advertisements for the movies, all desire to attend one dissolves. For years people on the Academy Award show have halfheartedly jested about movies dying. They are not really dying--they are committing suicide!

LETITIA M. SULLIVAN

Lisle, Ill.

*He who wants all, will have nothing.

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