Listen To This3lesson 24

A bomb exploded early today in a mid-town Manhattan abortion clinic, slightly injuring two passers-by, but it did not stop those at the center from performing abortions later in the day. The bombing caused about $10,000 in damage. Police say several phone calls to the bomb squad warned of the attack, but no one has claimed responsibility.


America's trade deficit grew at a slower pace again last month. The gap between imports and exports expanded by $12,500,000,000 in September, $2,000,000,000 less than the August deficit increase. It's the second straight monthly decline in the growth of the trade deficit. Commerce Department says the figure showed that the administration's policy of lowering the dollar may be paying off. The administration has also tried with mixed success, to persuade allies with big trade surpluses to stimulate their economies to expand export markets for US goods.


There are new details today on Austrian President Kurt Waldheim's involvement in the German army during WWII. The full text of the 1947 Yugoslav indictment of Waldheim for war crimes was made public. NPR's Mike Shuster has details. "The indictment charges Waldheim with participating in the planning of German reprisals against Yugoslavian citizens in 1944 and 1945. At the time, Waldheim was a lieutenant in a German Intelligence unit, and the indictment says Waldheim helped plan attacks that resulted in the burning of at least twenty villages and the execution of hundreds of Yugoslavian citizens. It has been known that Waldheim had been indicted in Yugoslavia almost forty years ago. But the specifics of the indictment were not known until today. Yesterday, Waldheim, through a spokesman, admitted that he had been part of a unit that carried out a massacre in Yugoslavia in 1942. But Waldheim denied a Washington Post report today that the Yugoslav and Soviet governments had used the file on Waldheim to blackmail him into becoming a communist agent. The Post quotes intelligence sources in Yugoslavia as saying the blackmail had been successful. This is Mike Shuster in New York."


More important details emerged today about the case of Austrian President Kurt Waldheim's involvement it the German army during WWII. In 1947, the former United Nations Secretary General was indicted in Yugoslavia for war crimes. Today, the full text of that indictment became available. Also today, reports that Yugoslavia and that Soviet Union may have blackmailed Waldheim during his diplomatic career. NPR's Mike Shuster has a report.
Until now, it has been known that Yugoslavia indicted Waldheim forty years ago for war crimes, for murder and massacres in the shooting of hostages. But until today, the specific crimes Waldheim was accused of were not known, nor was it known what these accusations were based on. The indictment, a translation of which was released today by the Simon Wiesenfeld Center in the United States, specifies at least a score of villages in Yugoslavia that were targeted by the German army for reprisals in 1944 and 1945. The indictment, according to Mark Weitzman, a spokesman for the Wiesenfeld Center, charges that Waldheim actually participated in the planning for those reprisals. "They lay a list of twenty-one villages and towns directly there. And I'll quote. Many more similar crimes can be cited: May 1944, village was burned; Macednia, September-October '44, shot civilians in many villages. Even more detailed: village of Smola where four persons were shot; Garbervo, twenty-four houses burned, two people shot."
In 1944 and 45, the German army undertook a series of reprisals in the Yugoslav regions of Basnia, Mecedonia and Montenegro in retaliation for partisan attacks on German army units. The reprisals usually involved the execution of local civilians: ten Yugoslavians for each German killed and the torching of villages.
The indictment of Waldheim makes the argument that Hitler ordered the policy of reprisal in the Balkans, but that all the details—the quota of hostages taken, the specific arrests and executions, the specific villages burned—were for the local German army intelligence units to work out. Waldheim was a lieutenant in one of those units.
The indictment does not specify his presence, but there's no question about it, issuing responsibility to him, I mean, just to sum up the indictment, and I'll read: "On the basis of all that has been set forth, the state commission confirms that Lieutenant Kurt Waldheim is a war criminal responsible for the war crimes described and assessed above."
Throughout his campaign last spring for the Austrian Presidency, Waldheim maintained that he was only a supply officer and an interpreter in his unit in the Balkans. But yesterday through a spokesman, Waldheim admitted that he was connected with a unit that carried out a massacre in Yugoslavia in 1942. The spokesman did not address the allegations in the indictment made public today.
The Washington Post reported today that the Yugoslav and Soviet governments may have used the indictment and the investigative file it was based on to blackmail Waldheim into becoming a communist agent. The Post quotes former Yugoslav intelligence and government officials as saying they were involved in an effort to blackmail Waldheim in 1948. One former official, according to the Post , says that Moscow informed the Yugoslav government in 1948 that Waldheim had been recruited. The Post report also suggests that the dossier, an indictment of Waldheim, might have been complied with the sole aim of comprising him, not prosecuting him. Waldheim was never tried for war crimes. A spokesman for Waldheim denied that he had ever been reproached for communist recruitment. Under some pressure from Congress, there has been a review of the Waldheim case at the Justice Department for several months. Today, Attorney General Meese said that if Waldheim were to express a desire to visit the US, the details of his case that emerged today would be additional facts in the government's review of the whole matter. This is Mike Shuster in New York.


There's been yet another merger in the airline industry. The Delta, the sixth largest carrier in the United States, will join wings with Western, which ranks ninth. By one standard, that will create the nation's third largest airline. The merger, agreed to by Western yesterday, makes sense, according to Con Hitchcock of the Aviation Consumer Action Project.
"The reason that the merger makes sense for a company like Delta is that Delta's based primarily in eastern United States, with a hub in Atlanta and some in Cincinnati and Dallas and Fort Worth. But it doesn't really have a western presence. Western is based in Salt Lake City and has also got a lot of presence in Los Angeles. And if you can merge the two together successfully, there's the chance you'll have a successful large carrier that can compete with United and American and other companies that are bigger than Delta."
"What about the urge to merge? We've had an incredibly large number of mergers just in the last six months or so."
"There's feeling in some sectors of the airline industry that if you want to be a survivor, if you want to be around, you have to get bigger. You have to get into a number of markets, and the easy way to do that is to buy off your competitors rather than try to expand from within. And in some senses, it is easier to go out and raise the money rather than do things like try to get into the congested airports. You've got airports like Chicago and Denver and Los Angeles that are fairly crowded, that it's just difficult to go in a big way and establish yourself and attract a lot of customers. And it's easier to go out and buy a company with an established market position than try to work your way up from ground zero."
"What about a time factor? Is there any reason we're seeing all these merges now? Deregulation's been with us since 1978. Why now?"
"I think there are a couple of reasons why there are so many airline merges now. First of all, there's sort of a herd mentality. When United picked up Pan Am's Pacific routes earlier this year, that set off a ripple effect. Northwest said, well, we're going to buy Republic in order to get bigger and compete, TWA Ozark, etc. etc." There really is a wave. Secondly, there's the perception in the industry that the Department of Transportation which has to approve airline mergers, is more lenient than the Justice Department would be. But D.O.T. only has that authority for another two years. And there's concern that if you don't do it now, the Justice Department may stop you if you try a couple years from now. The third reason is related to the tax bill. The tax bill that's pending in Congress will take away some of the benefits that make mergers easy to finance, staring on January 1st. So I think you're going to see a number of mergers in a lot of other industries as well between now and December 31st.
"When deregulation came into being, there was a lot of talk that what would happen is, you would have four or five major airlines, a number of very successful regional airlines and the commuters. It seems as though that trend is here."
"We seem to be headed in that direction, and it's unfortunate. I mean, deregulation was supposed to be more airlines competing for consumers' business, not fewer. There is inevitably …"
"Well, there are more."
"There are more, but the big ones are getting bigger. And there are some advantages in the sense that you can travel from one city to another on a singer airline without having to change lines and that sort of thing. But the drawback is the industry shrinks, is that you have fewer mavericks, or fewer airlines that might say, 'Gee, let's start a price war to raise some more traffic.' It can get very comfortable very quickly, and I'm not sure that's in the consumer's interest in the long term."
"Thanks very much. Con Hitchcock of the Aviation Consumer Action Project."