The Bedford Incident

Don’t-miss this film—

it’s like ‘Strangelove’

The Bedford Incident, with Rich-
ard Widmark,’ Sidney Poitier,
James MacArthur and Eric Port-
man. Directed by James B. Harris.
Playing at the Capitol Theatre in
Vancouver, the Paramount in New
Westminster and coming soon to
other localities in B.C.

)

n an improvised laboratory
i board a U,S, destroyer,
scientists are testing some ma-
terial dredged up from the sea,
It is galley refuse, they discover:
red cabbage in particular, of a
type enjoyed by the Soviet Navy.

Further analysis of the cook-
ing-oil sediment confirms that a
Soviet submarine is in the vicini-
ty. The three hundred men aboard
the U,S, vessel are alerted to
action stations, The enemy must
be hounded down!

No—this fsn’t some madman’s

.dream of a future possible war.

It is today’s grim peacetime
reality, as expressed inthis film,

Like its forerunners, Fail Safe

and Dr, Strangelove, it is a film’

which presents a serious and
powerful warning of the conse-
quences of the cold war,

The U.S, destroyer Bedford is
on a routine submarine patrol in
the Greenland Straits, But it is
run on operational wartime lines.
The crew, tense and unquestion-
ing, are kept continually at the
ready.

The captain is an aggressive
individualist whose declared in-
tention is to destroy every enemy
that threatens his country, And
in his pig-headed view, the mere

existence of a Soviet submarine
constitutes a threat,

Richard Widmark (who is co-
producer as well as one of the
leading actors) makes him into
a genuinely terrifying figure—
not by caricaturing him, but by
underplaying.

In this gripping but over-
charged sea- drama, densely
packed with action and dialogue,
you have to strain to catch every
word and look; the tactics aren’t
always easy to follow.

It isn’t clear how the Soviet sub
gets into Greenland’s territorial
waters; but one gathers it has
been forced there by the cap-
tain’s aggressive strategy.

When NATO H,Q, delays per-
mission to intercept, the captain
pursues the sub vindictively into
neutral waters, and then forces
it to remain submerged although
he knows its air supply is rapidly
giving out,

A distinguished journalist (Sid-
ney Poitier), who has been re-
luctantly admitted aboard,
watches with mounting appre-
hension and horror as the cap-
tain plays out histerrifying game
of war.

The equivocal position of the
ex-nazi U-boat commander (Eric
Portman), whom the captain has
invited on board as anadviser, is
a sop, perhaps to West German
audiences,

There’s an even more calcu-

lated kind of double-think about

Richard Widmark as the U.S. Captain and Sidney Poitier as the newspaperman in The Bedford Incident..

Sidney Poitier’s role, He seems
to represent an approved “White
House” view,

The script tries to make it
clear, through him, that it’s real
target is Goldwaterism and the
military clique, while the subtler
aggressive policy of the Admin-
istration itself is, in effect, de-
fended,

But the final appalling catas-
trophe demolishes all *ifs” and
“buts,”

It demonstrates with chilling
clarity the horrifying dangers of
NATO, with its rocket-armed
U.S, warships patrolling the high
seas — a perpetual menace to
peace,

—Nina Hibbin.

Billy Graham vs. Pope?,

L.A, Vancouver, B,C, writes:
I guess President Johnson be-
lieves he has cancelled out the
influence of the Pope’s address
to the U,N, on the urgency of

Peace, By using ‘Evangelist’
Billy Graham’s public announce-
ments of approval ofthe U.S, war
in Vietnam, Johnson may think
that cancels out the Pope. But he
should remember that the Pope
has most of the ethics taught by
Christ on his side, as well ashis
position and influence in the
Catholic world,

I just wonder how much and
what form of pressure was put
on Billy Graham to get him
whooping it up for US, aggres-
sion in Vietnam?

That Pentagon Kipling

K.K, Johnson, Salmon Arm,
writes: Sometimes I think Presi-
dent Johnson’s favorite script
writer must be a Pentagon Kip-
ling. These lines occurred to
me:

On the ranch, Brand LBJ, where
the war promoters play, the cow
boss rode a nightmare bed and
his Love Bug heard him say:
Ho Chi Minh! Ho Chi Minh! Why
cain’t yuh be like Gunga Din?
Admit that spreadin’ .slaughter
is no sin, and fetch a soda water
fo’ our gin, Once we’ve belted
yuh an’ flayed yuh, by the livin’

Gawd that made yuh, we’d even
patronize yuh like yuh had a real
white skin, Don’t yuh know yuh’re
yella, what yuh wanchee fella?
How much will yuh charge tuh let
me win? Ah can spare mah sons-
abitches—we got robots diggin’
ditches—but ah’ll even spend mah
riches, an’ ah’m a richer man
than yuh are, Ho Chi Minh!

I don’t think I’11 send LBJ this
example of the Kipling style. It
might spoil his taste for litera-
ture when he retires, which will
be soon, I hope.

Doesn’t Expect Answer

Mort McQueen, Nanaimo,
writes: I am enclosing a question
to the PT, and would you please
answer it through the columns of

your paper.

Can a Socialist country sup-
port and give military aid to an
imperialist country in order to
wage war upon a socialist coun-
try?

I will be looking forward to
seeing your answer,

Ed. Note: Since there is no in-

stance to our knowledge where -

such “aid” for such purposes is in
evidence, Mr. McQueen’s question
is purely conjectural and, we sus-
pect, slightly facetious. Even so, we
will say the answer is NO.

Capitalist Cup of Milk

Joe Ivens, Okanagan Mission,
writes: Before me I have a copy
of the Vancouver Sun, What caught

my eye was the caption ‘Calling
all F-F-F’ers aid Cup of Milk
Fund,’ I am sure most people
will commend Penny Wise, es-
pecially as Christmas. draws
near, The spirit of giving, as
Penny says, has become com-
mercialized. I might add it has
become part of our culture,

‘Starving Children in Korea;’
it doesn’t say which Korea but I
presume South Korea. That you
will remember, is what John
Foster Dulles “saved” for dem-
ocracy, And in Hong Kong, a
British “possession,” there are
also countless starving children.

India also has to be fed. There
hunger is ever present, I’ve taken
time out before to write certain
editors on this subject, but my
letters were never published,
There’s a reason of course,

May I ask why none of the
Socialist countries are included,
They never are, I am reminded
of only a few short years ago
when the starving people of Rus-
sia even quarrelled with the dogs
on the street for a bone, Social-
ism had ended all thata longtime
ago.

Not long ago I also heard over
the radio that China is “stary-
ing,” this in spite of the thous-
ands of tons of wheat we ship
them (and which they pay for),
This kind of bunk just don’t make

.sense, but it is all good propa-

ganda—for capitalism,

To understand Quebec
you must read this

Quebec in Revolt, by Herman
Buller. The story of the celebrated
Guibord Affair, this is the second
edition of this historical novel—the
first having been sold out three
weeks after publication. Price $4.80.
Available at Co-op Book Store, 341
W. Pender.

e.

uebec in Revolt, set in the

framework of a novel, is
based on The Guibord Affair, an
international ‘cause celebre’ that
resounded throughout the length
and breadth of North America
and echoed and_ re-echoed
throughout the capitals of the
world,

For too long, The Guibord
Affair has been relegated to his-
toric limbo, Not only was Joseph
Guibord gagged and excommu-
nicated during his lifetime, but
the methodical suppression of
reference to The Guibord Affair
consigned him to oblivion after
death,

Quebec in Revolt opens with
the courtship and marriage of
Guibord, The tempo is stepped up
with the thunder and violence of
the rebellion of the Patriotes,

The reader is introduced to
a controversial band of passion-
ately independent thinkers, Gui-

bord is among those French
Canadians who found a radical
society known as the Institut Ca-
nadien, A society where sparks
fly and ideas are thrown from
hand to hand like grenades, and
where the seeds of modern
secularism and separatism are
sewn,

The novel moves quickly, ad-
venture following. adventure,
Panic becomes universal as the
streets of Montreal overflow with

~Irish immigrants, carrying fever

on their backs and famine in their
stomachs,

With a panoramic sweep, we
witness the bloody massacre of
the Gavazzi riots, where bullets
pelt like rattling hail and the
blood of corpses reddens the
streets,

This book is required reading
for anyone who wants to under-
stand what is going on in Qebec
today, The problems that Joseph
Guibord faced helped shape our
nation; and the crises of those
years still bear bitter fruit today,

Quebec In Revolt contains the
raw material of tomorrow’s head-
lines,

A Monkey's View

Three monkeys Sat in a coconut tree
Discussing things as they’re said to be;
Said one to the others, “Now listen you two,
There’s a certain rumor that can’t be true,
That man descended from our noble race,
The very idea! ... it’s a disgrace;

No monkey ever deserted his wife,

Starved her baby and ruined her life,

And you’ve never known a mother monk

To leave her babies with others to bunk

Or pass them on from one to another

*Til they scarcely know who is their mother,
And another thing! you’ll never see

A monk build a fence round a coconut tree,
And let the coconuts go to waste,
Forbidding all other monks a taste,

Why, if I put a fence around this tree
Starvation would force you to steal from me,
Here’s another thing a monk won’t do:

Go out at night and get in a stew;

Or use a gun, or club, or knife

To take some other monkey’s life.

Yes, man descended, the ornery cuss,

But, brother, he didn’t descend from us!

—Commonwealth, Dec. 1, 1965

December 17, 1965—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 9