CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE BULLETIN

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79T00975A012400040001-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 17
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 16, 2003
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: October 24, 1968
• Content Type: REPORT

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DIRECTORATE OF
INTELLIGENCE
Central Intelligence Bulletin
Secret
50
24 October 1968
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No. 0295/68
24 October 1968
Central Intelligence Bulletin
CONTENTS
South Vietnam: Situation report. (Page 1)
Peru: The government plans to discredit the former
administration. (Page 3)
France: The Communist Party leadership has resisted
Soviet efforts to bring it back into line on Czech-
oslovakia. (Page 4)
Burma: The crackdown on rice black marketeers may
result in a smaller rice crop in 1969. (Page 5)
Iraq: A group of guerrillas is operating in the
southern marshes. (Page 7)
Sudan: Recent reunification of the Umma Party could
lead to a no-confidence vote in the Assembly. (Page 9)
Yugoslavia: Defense spending (Page 11)
Persian Gulf: Federation of Arab Amirates (Page 11)
Lebanon: Political maneuvering (Page 12)
Bolivia: Student congress (Page 12)
Guyana: Coalition collapses (Page 12)
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South Vietnam: The Saigon government has reduced
some of the opportunities for graft in IV Corps by
changing trade regulations which supposedly have been
used to deny rice supplies to the Viet Cong.
On 25 September, the government removed some of
the restrictions on the movement of rice in the delta
which have hampered the flow of trade and been a source
of graft for province officials there since the mid-
1950s. Rice merchants in IV Corps and Long An Prov-
ince--rice surplus areas--will no longer be required
to obtain a permit from the province chief to ship
rice out of the province to Saigon or to other prov-
inces in the delta.
Since 1955, province chiefs have been able to
interrupt the free flow of trade by holding up ship-
ments of rice in order to stabilize local rice prices,
to await--and produce--higher prices in Saigon, or to
help merchant friends maintain monopolistic controls
over rice trade in their provinces. Moreover, the
issuance of rice export permits often came only after
bribes were paid to the chiefs or their subordinates.
The new regulations do not, however, eliminate
all restrictions on the movement of rice within the
delta or all opportunities for corruption. All com-
modities must still pass through police checkpoints
on the roads and waterways, and rice shippers are re-
quired to fill out a declaration for record-keeping
purposes.
Controls over the movement of rice to rice def-
icit provinces in I, II, and III corps are not af-
fected by the new regulations. Rice shipments in
these areas remain under the control of the central
government. Each province chief in these corps areas
still determines the additional rice requirements of
his province and authorizes merchants to act as whole-
Central Intelligence Bulletin
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Peru: The military government is planning a
broad campaign to discredit the former administra-
tion, as well as the political parties and congress.
The first victims of the "moralization" cam-
paign are three of Belaunde's cabinet ministers who
were involved in the agreement with the International
Petroleum Company last August. The ministers are
charged with "extortion against the state" for their
role in that agreement. The military apparently in-
tend to continue the campaign with a series of sen-
sational disclosures and charges against the Belaunde
government generally, the political parties, and mem-
bers of congress.
The new government, however, is using much of
the Belaunde administration's fiscal program in its
own austere economic policy. It plans to follow
through with the foreign debt refinancing begun un-
der Belaunde as well as to retain the tax increases
decreed by him. In addition to drawing on Belaunde's
program, the military intend to cut expenditures--
possibly including even the military budget--to hold
down wage increases and to reform the working of gov-
ernment ministries.
The military are in a better position to carry
through reforms than was Belaunde. They have wide-
spread popular support for their expropriation of
the International Petroleum Company holdings, and
the campaign against corruption should distract
public attention from the country's economic failings.
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France: The leadership Of the French Communist
Party has thus far successfully resisted Soviet ef-
forts to bring the party back into line on the Czech-
oslovak issue.
At a special session of the central committee
early this week Secretary General Waldeck Roc'het
rallied the party's top leadership in support of
his dual policy of condemning the Soviet invasion
while avoiding an open break with Moscow. The com-
munique issued at the end of the meeting referred
to a unanimous rejection of "the point of view of
comrade Jeannette Thorez--Vermeersch," a Stalinist
war horse who led the fight against Rochet's poli-
cies and who has now resigned from both the politburo
and the central committee.
The communique indicates that the central com-
mittee balanced this by reprimanding liberal Roger
Garaudy for his strong anti-Soviet pronouncements.
It also announced that a meeting will be held with
the Soviet Communist Party on 4 November to discuss
differences between the two "fraternal parties."
The meeting will be the first between the top lead-
ers of the two parties since Rochet went to Moscow
in August to warn against military intervention in
Czechoslovakia.
Rochet has a difficult task before him. The
Soviets are likely to press the French party to rec-
ognize that the invasion was justified, and failing
that, at the very least. to cease all criticism of
the action. The Soviets will cite the treaty le-
galizing the posting of troops in Czechoslovakia
as progress in the "normalization" of Soviet-Czecho-
slovak relations. To agree to this--probably the
minimum required to satisfy Moscow and pro-Soviet
elements in the French party--would lead to a new
outcry from party liberals. More importantly, it
would severely damage the French party's already
weak domestic position and further strain its ten-
uous links with the non-Communist left.
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Burma: Rangoon's crackdown on rice black mar-
keteers has brought in more rice for export than was
expected, but may lead to a smaller over-all rice
crop in 1969.
Ne Win's heavy-handed treatment of rice black
marketeers has caused a virtual collapse of black-
market rice prices and has led farmers to dispose
of some of their surplus rice through government
channels. As a result, the government now has more
rice for export than earlier estimates suggested.
Until 1964 Burma was one of the world's leading
rice exporters, but exports have since fallen mark-
edly, largely because of government policies. In
1963, rice exports amounted to 1.7 million tons,
but this year they will be only 450,000 tons at
best--the lowest level since World War II.
The Burmese Government pays the farmer so little
for his rice--less than in any other Asian country--
that he usually sells his crop on the black market.
The government's repression of this market may have
led the farmers to plant even less rice for next
year's crop.
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Guerrilla Operations Reported in South Iraq
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Iraq: A small group of Guevara-style guerrillas
is reportedly operating in the marshes of southern
Iraq.
The "Al Hajj" faction of the Iraq Communist
Party--a splinter group which has declared itself
independent of both Moscow and Peking--has report-
edly been carrying out small-scale guerrilla opera-
tions for some months. Although information is
scanty and in most cases unreliable, one report puts
the number of active Communists involved at only
75 to 100. Their activities have consisted mainly
of isolated attacks on police posts and official
cars. The most serious attacks, which occurred last
summer, forced the government to send in reinforce-
ments from Nasiriyah as well as a mobile police
company from Basra.
The Al Hajj group is reportedly trying to ex-
ploit discontent among Iraqi adherents to the Shiah
sect of Islam. Although the Shiahs make up 55 per-
cent of the Iraqi population, they have always been
discriminated against by the Sunni minority, who
monopolize both the civil government posts and the
officer corps of the army. So far, however, the
Al Hajj group seems to have failed to mobilize any
significant support among the Shiahs.
This failure may be because the Al Hajj are
operating on the fringe of the settlements of the
Marsh Arabs--one of the most unique and isolated
peoples of the Middle East. The Marsh Arabs are
extremely religious Shiahs who are unlikely to be
amenable to Marxist ideas; even Iraq's present
socialist government offends their innate conserva-
tism. They are poor but self-sufficient, and have
never been exposed to the unsettling currents that
exploitation of oil has brought to tribal societies
elsewhere in the area.
(continued)
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The Al. Hajj guerrillas are reportedly talking
of a "peasant uprising" in the south., to be coordi-
nated with a renewal of the Kurdish war in the north--
presumably no earlier than next, spring. The area
is ideally suited for guerrilla, operations, and,
even though the group lacks wide support? the govern-
ment may find itself unable to eradicate the guer-
rillas. If a Kurdish uprising did in fact take
place simultaneously, it might well unbalance a
central government already threatened by serious
internal differences.
(Map)
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Sudan: The recent reunification of the Umma
Party could lead to a no-confidence vote in Khartoum's
Constituent Assembly and to the formation of a new
government.
The party, divided by factional differences in
mid-1967, was further split after the national elec-
tions in May 1968. At that time the Imam of the An-
sar sect led his faction of the Umma into a merger
with the radical coalition of the National Unionist
Party and the Egyptian-oriented People's Democratic
Party. The remaining faction was left in disarray
under Umma president Sadiq al-Mahdi, former prime
minister and nephew of the Imam, whose assembly seat
was also a casualty of the election. The radicals
in the coalition have since dominated the government
and followed an extreme leftist line, particularly
in the area of foreign policy.
As lineal and spiritual descendents of "the"
Mahdi who massacred the Sudan's Anglo-Egyptian ad-
ministrators in 1885, the Umma leadership is tradi-
tionally anti-Egyptian. The Imam is reported to have
now grown fearful that his partners in the coalition
are paving the way for Egyptian domination, and he has
therefore effected a reconciliation with Sadiq to re-
unite the Umma.
If the reunification sticks, the Umma may have
a good chance of attracting enough support from other
anticoalition assembly members to overturn the pres-
ent government. Sadiq has indicated that he favors
the formation of a national government which would
be dominated by the Umma but would include members of
the present government as well. He claims that at
this time he has no intention of participating in
the government directly, though he may seek to regain
his lost seat through a by-election.
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Progress Seen in Arab Federation Effort
S A U D I A R A B I A
Boundory undeFined
MUSCAT,
AND
OMAN
AL MASIRAH
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Yugoslavia: Yugoslavia has announced a supple-
mentary defense allocation for 1968 of $32 million,
citing the current world situation as the cause. The
announced increase, which may be related to expenses
connected with the current mobilization, adds weight
to a recent speech by President Tito warning that
Yugoslavia would resist any invader. The 1968 de-
fense budget now amounts to $514 million, about 20
percent above the 1967 military figure. Expenditures
under the supplementary allocation are to be covered
largely from a budgetary surplus that the government
expects this year.
Persian Gulf: The embryonic Federation of
Arab Amirates seems to be making a determined effort
to keep itself alive. The rulers of the member
states held their second meeting in Qatar from 20
to 22 October. They agreed to set up a joint de-
fense force, leaving each state in charge of its own
internal security forces. Committees have been or-
ganized to examine policy unification in economic
and social fields.
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The fact that the meeting took place at all and
that the rulers reportedly worked with a spirit of
cooperation and determination to make progress is
encouraging, but it is not yet possible to predict
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(continued)
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Lebanon: Another round in the struggle between
Lebanon's evenly matched parliamentary blocs ended
on 22 October with the election of a new speaker of
the Chamber of Deputies. Supporters of former pres-
ident Shihab elected their candidate through a com-
bination of defections from the ranks of ex-president
Chamoun and of voting abstentions
The victors
may now attempt to press their advantage by demand-
ing a new cabinet dominated by Shihabists, a move
which could unsettle the present uneasy political
truce,
Bolivia: Christian Democratic students in co-
alition with pro-Soviet Communists overwhelmingly
won the elections at the National Student Congress,
The congress, which was clearly sympathetic to the
late Che Guevara, called for Bolivia to break rela-
tions with the US? It also voted to break with the
democratic-oriented international student federation
and establish full membership in the Cuba-sponsored
and Moscow-oriented international federations. This
strengthens Communist domination of Bolivian student
politics and presages a continuation of student dem-
onstrations, especially if the Communists maintain
control of the La Paz local federation.
Guyana: The coalition of :Prime Minister Burnham's
People's National congress and ex-finance minister
D'Aguiar's United Force fell apart yesterday when
the :latter refused to support an electoral. bill Burn-
ham is determined to push through parliament. The
prime minister believes he has enough votes even
without United Force support to get his legislation
passed and therefore his government is not. expected
to fall. Furthermore, Burnham intends to dissolve
parliament next month in preparation for national
elections in December and the electoral bill was the
last major legislation scheduled.
I I
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