Invitation Withdrawn

Apolitical as they are supposed to be, the Olympic Games rarely are free of political intrigue and controversy. In 1936, Adolf Hitler tried to make them a showcase for Aryan supremacy, and might have succeeded but for the herculean efforts of a U.S. Negro named Jesse Owens. The 1956 Summer Games were marred by bitter East-West disputes, denunciations and defections--understandably enough, since they were staged soon after the Hungarian revolt and the Suez crisis. And last February's Winter Olympics at Grenoble produced their quota of incidents: the angry withdrawal of North Korea--because it insisted on being called the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea"; the cries of outrage from East Germany after three of its tobogganists were disqualified for cheating; the attempts by officials of rival nations to vilify France's great skier, Jean-Claude Kilty.

Last week politics once again took precedence over sport. Meeting in Lausanne, the executive board of the International Olympic Committee unanimously voted to withdraw South Africa's invitation to compete in next October's Mexico City Olympics--provided a majority of the I.O.C.'s 71 members agreed. They did.

Fear of a Fiasco. The decision naturally infuriated South Africans, who had only been restored to Olympic grace last February--after a four-year suspension--by finally agreeing to field a fully integrated team. Athletes would be chosen without regard to color, would live and train together in Mexico City. Nevertheless, such was the outcry over the reinstatement that Mexican officials feared their games would turn into an $84 million fiasco if South Africa were permitted to compete.

Incensed at South Africa's hypocrisy --integration abroad, apartheid at home --at least 40 nations announced that they would boycott the Olympics unless the invitation was rescinded. In some cases it was an empty threat: such small countries as Malawi and Upper Volta are not recognized by the I.O.C. and could not compete in Mexico anyway. The clincher came when the Soviet Union threatened to pull out and a number of top U.S. Negro athletes opted to boycott too. That kind of pressure, plus the worldwide reaction to Martin Luther King's assassination, left the I.O.C. with only one practical course: banning South Africa.

While the decision was popular, it set a dangerous precedent. What, for example, is to prevent Egypt and its friends from attempting the same tactic to force the expulsion of Israel? And the people most sorely hurt by the I.O.C. action are South Africa's athletes. For Sprinter Paul Nash, who last month tied the 100-meter world record four times in eight days, or for Swimmer Karen Muir, the world's No. 1 backstroker, it means losing a crack at Olympic gold medals. Both Nash and Muir are white. For the blacks on South Africa's team, the loss is even greater: a chance to compete for the first time on an integrated basis--thereby carving a chink, however small, in South Africa's armor of prejudice.

"Why should these innocent people be penalized?" Captain Asbury Coward, a U.S. Olympic Committee member, demanded last week. Coward suggested that such athletes should be permitted to compete as independents--under, say, an Olympic flag instead of their own national banner. In fact, the Olympics might be better off if everybody competed as an independent. That, after all, was the idea in the first place.

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