ANYONE who has ever served on a Navy ship knows the all too familiar experience of being ordered out of port on short notice, racing to a featureless coordinate at sea, and then circling for days without ever knowing all of the reasons why. There was no uncertainty at all among the sailors and airmen of the Sixth Fleet ships that steamed watchfully in the eastern Mediterranean all last week. They knew from TIME'S cover story on the outbreak of civil war in Jordan (see cut), as well as from other sources, that Washington "was carefully leaking muted warnings of U.S. intervention"--and that the fleet was there to back up those warnings.

In this week's cover story, TIME tells how U.S. policy--and the presence of the fleet--helped to contain the crisis. The story, written by Ed Magnuson, researched by Linda Young and edited by Laurence Barrett, focuses on the Administration's handling of the tense Mideast situation. It draws heavily on reports by Correspondents Herman Nickel, who covered the State Department, Simmons Fentress, who spent most of the week at the White House, and Washington Bureau Chief Hugh Sidey, who provided an analysis of the President's handling of the crisis.

At the scene of the action in Jordan, communications were shut down much of the week, and over-zealous royalist sharpshooters kept Western journalists virtually imprisoned in Amman's Jordan Intercontinental Hotel. Correspondent Roland Flamini spent eight harrowing days there before he managed to get to Beirut and report on his experience (see PRESS). Needless to say, he is happy to be out. "Winston Churchill once said that there's nothing more gratifying than being shot at without result," Flamini said later. "Personally, I find more gratification in not being shot at at all."

The Cover: Watercolor and tempera by Boris Chaliapin.

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