The Dr. Peter David Beter Audio Letter (R)

Introduction to The Dr. Peter David Beter Audio Letter (R)  Excerpted from the Dr. Beter AUDIO LETTER(R) REFERENCE DIGEST Copyright (C) Audio Books Inc., 1983  

  The AUDIO LETTER cassette tape reports were recorded over a period from June, 1975, to November, 1982, by Dr. Peter Beter. Each AUDIO LETTER tape report is approximately one hour in length. The basic schedule of release was once a month, but the exact date of release each month was flexible to accommodate events. There were also two periods during which the AUDIO LETTER reports were suspended temporarily. The first, which extended from May to August 1977, separated AUDIO LETTER issues #24 and #25, and took place due to an action campaign by Dr. Beter with his listeners. The second suspension extended from February to June 1980, and separated issues #54 and #55. It was brought about by a major heart attack which Dr. Beter suffered while in the midst of recording AUDIO LETTER #54.  

Dr. Beter terminated his AUDIO LETTER cassette tape report series in November, 1982, after recording AUDIO LETTER #80. Having fought heart-related ailments for years, his health was declining. After conferring with doctors, he decided that the time had come to discontinue recording the tapes.  

The Dr. Beter AUDIO LETTER series grew out of Dr. Beter's collaboration with supporters who first learned about Dr. Beter by way of radio talk shows in 1974. At that time Dr. Beter was in great demand to appear on talk shows nationwide, which he did in most cases by long-distance telephone hookup from his residence in suburban Washington, D.C. After many years as a highly successful Washington attorney, government official and international legal and financial consultant, Dr. Beter had become famous in 1973 as the author of a best-selling book, The Conspiracy Against the Dollar. In his talk shows Dr. Beter had a habit of saying things which sounded preposterous at the time, but which were proven correct later on. Early in 1973 he declared that Vice President Spiro Agnew would be swept up in a sudden scandal beginning in late summer that would lead quickly to his resignation. At the time Agnew was flying high, and it sounded like an unlikely turn of events. But it happened, right on schedule. In the spring of 1974, Dr. Beter described a sequence of events by which the Watergate Scandal would make Richard Nixon the first U.S. 

President in history to resign. At the time, Watergate seemed to be running out of steam, and Nixon appeared to be "toughing it out." Even less believably, Dr. Beter described a secret agreement which he said existed by which then-Vice President Gerald Ford would nominate Nelson Rockefeller to be his new Vice President after Nixon resigned. In the spring of 1974 those things sounded hard to believe indeed. But they took place. Dr. Beter claimed that events like these, while shocking to the public, were planned far in advance. He said that they were known within certain intelligence and even business circles here in America and abroad. Drawing upon his extensive contacts with these circles, Dr. Beter was making public what the privileged few already knew. Having begun as skeptical listeners to Dr. Beter's radio appearances, a small group of private citizens became increasingly concerned as they saw Dr. Beter's revelations proven correct, time after time. They decided to investigate further, and finally contacted him. In September, 1974, Audio Books, Inc., was founded by these supporters of Dr. Beter to provide an avenue by which Dr. Beter could make his reports public without censorship or cutoff by those who controlled the radio waves. After several individual AUDIO BOOK(R) tapes, the Dr. Beter AUDIO LETTER series began in 1975.  

About Dr. Beter [Note: born June 21, 1921; died March 14, 1987 (J.V.)]  

Dr. Peter Beter (yes, it rhymes) first came to widespread popular attention in 1973, through his best-selling nonfiction book, The Conspiracy Against the Dollar (George Braziller, Inc., N.Y.). It was a gripping tale of international economic intrigue and monetary manipulation, carried out by the coordinated action of multinational corporations grown more powerful than many of their host countries. The objective: to deliberately undermine and ultimately destroy the United States dollar, as a major tool of political and economic conquest under the banner of a "new imperialism." A crescendo of unhappy consequences were to be expected: an accelerating economic "stagflation" (a now-popular word coined years ago by Dr. Beter), deteriorating financial status of municipal and state governments, deepening social unrest, increasing tensions over the Panama Canal, and more. 

 Events during the past decade have followed to an astonishing degree the blueprint which Dr. Beter revealed in his book. In September 1974 Dr. Beter acquired a new distinction as "the man who opened Fort Knox." The previous April Dr. Beter had charged in congressional testimony that the legendary U.S. Bullion Depository at Fort Knox had been looted of America's monetary gold hoard allegedly stored there. He stood ready to present evidence and witnesses to substantiate his charges. But neither a grand jury nor a congressional inquiry into the matter materialized...so Dr. Beter then took his case directly to the public. Through lectures, radio talk shows, and publication of his charges in a tabloid newspaper (National Tattler), he was able to put such intense pressure on the federal government that a completely unprecedented step was taken in order to still the public outcry. The U.S. Treasury Department arranged a so-called "gold inspection" visit for a few Congressmen and 100 invited newsmen on September 23, 1974. Significantly, however, Dr. Beter himself was not among those invited...nor was any other outside expert on gold. The celebrated Fort Knox visit and the so-called "gold audit" which followed contained many irregularities which the Treasury Department has never explained.


  In AUDIO LETTER tapes #14 and #15 (July and August 1976), Dr. Beter made public intelligence he had been given that the Soviet Union was planting short-range underwater missiles in U.S. territorial waters in preparation for a surprise nuclear attack. In issue #15 he listed navigational coordinates for 64 missiles which he said had been planted worldwide so far...urged his listeners to pressure the Joint Chiefs of Staff to take counteractive measures...and in effect dared the government to prove him wrong. The resulting hue and cry from Dr. Beter's listeners nationwide created shock waves within the U.S. Government which were never reported by the major news media. In mid-September 1976, Dr. Beter and an associate met for over an hour with General George S. Brown, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, in Gen. Brown's Pentagon office. Only two weeks earlier, a letter over Gen. Brown's signature had been sent to Dr. Beter (with photocopies to concerned citizens nationwide), seeming to say that Dr. Beter's charges about Soviet underwater missiles had been investigated and found untrue. Yet when Dr. Beter then requested a meeting with Gen. Brown to relay to him the locations of a second round of 48 newly-planted missiles, the meeting was granted without delay. The Pentagon confirmed to the press that the meeting had taken place*, but never explained this curious sequence of events. *See, e.g., Norfolk (Va.) Ledger-Star, Sept. 27, 1976, p. E8, article by G. Bradshaw and J. Kestner. Or see Chicago Tribune, Dec. 4, 1977, Section 2, "Special Report: Undersea Warfare."

Professional credentials: The things made public by Dr. Beter are extraordinary--but so is the professional background which preceded his public visibility. He practiced general law in Washington, D.C., from 1951 to 1961, becoming a member of the U.S. Court of Military Appeals in 1952 and the U.S. Supreme Court in 1964. Many of his cases were against the federal government, all of which he won--including one case in which he caught none other than the U.S. Department of Justice burning records in an attempt to defeat him. The resulting decision--Farley vs. U.S., 131 C. Cls. 776 (1955), 127 F Supp. 562--made new law. In 1961 President John F. Kennedy appointed Dr. Beter Counsel to the U.S. Export-Import Bank, the largest government-owned bank in the Western world, where he served until 1967. After leaving the Ex-Im Bank, Dr. Beter became an international financial and legal consultant, as well as one of the chief developers of private international business in the Republic of Zaire. He is a member of the Judicature Society, the Bankers' Club of America, the Royal Commonwealth Society of London, and the United States Naval Institute. He is listed in biographical reference works such as Who's Who in the East, the Blue Book of London, and 2000 Men of Achievement (London).

Index of News Alerts

• Peter Beter News Alert 1: Poland After the Pope: Why Walesa Was "Fired"

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-1-poland-after.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/n3ir1nDoT16tXMBv2

• Peter Beter News Alert 2: Setback in the Space Shuttle ASAT Program

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-2-setback-in.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/B9i5qNaWXKc3FJrC2

• Peter Beter News Alert 3 : The "Korean Airliner Massacre": Who, How, Why

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-3-korean.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/wc7QyRJmMd0dLDIU2

• Peter Beter News Alert 4 : Marine Deaths and a New "Vietnam" in Lebanon

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-4-marine-deaths.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/USqe2or7Z2krQaqe2

• Peter Beter News Alert 5 : Economic Time Bombs & Deregulation and the Secret New U.S. Constitution

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-5-economic-time.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/b5vvbhS66nrxPha53

• Peter Beter Newsletter 6 : Perspective: Soviet-American Confrontation The "Reverse Cuba" Missile Crisis Now Underway

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-newsletter-6-perspective.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/I5nHzHX11lxLGTBw1

• Peter Beter News Alert 7: The "Mayaguez Strategy" for Invasion of Grenada & The Campaign to Control What Americans Know

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-7-mayaguez.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/TLUbFDcDU1Lr8kOv2

• Peter Beter News Alert 8: Perspective: Soviet Union & The Legacy of the Late Yuri Andropov

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-8-perspective.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/9GBAj2SKr0fKbmCB2

• Peter Beter News Alert 9: Perspective: The Gathering Storm & U.S.-Israel "Strategic Cooperation" to Partition Lebanon

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-9-perspective.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/PM7DE0IyZ8BAbn943

• Peter Beter News Alert 10: Perspective: The Gathering Storm (Part 2) Multiplying Storm Clouds on the World Horizon

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-10-perspective.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/uXQ2us9JiPEquojw1

• Peter Beter News Alert 11: Jesse Jackson's "Wild Card" Mission to Syria

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-11-jesse.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/YHUmVkVUvDwsD7H62

• Peter Beter News Alert 12: Key Trends and Events to Watch

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-12-key-trends.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/cV33Qo5BV0sWc8MB3

• Peter Beter News Alert 13: ProgressReport

http://drpeterbeter.blogspot.com/2016/07/peter-beter-news-alert-13-progressreport.html

JPEG: https://photos.app.goo.gl/7asuYI2bHR6Rx8cf1

Peter Beter News Alert 13: ProgressReport

11408 Audelia Rd,, "P119 Dallas, TX 75243

ProgressReport

March 26, 1984

Dear Friends:

It has been two months since we were last able to communicate with you, by way of NewsALERT #12.     In this first Progress Report, we want to bring you up to date on our present status,  give you some preliminary thoughts about what we hope to do later on, and include brief comments about several important recent news events.

First of all, THANK YOU for your understanding and patience!    Without that, there would be no chance at all of resuming the NewsALERT reporting program.     With our financial resources decimated following Dr.  Beter's discontinuance of his tape program in November 1982, we carried on against very heavy odds.     Having at last been forced by financial exhaustion to suspend our informational efforts, making a whole new start is not going to be easy.     But that is what we want to do, and as long as we continue to have your interest and support we will feel a responsibility to you.
A fresh start for NewsALERT is going to take time.     In the interim, we will do our best to keep you informed with occasional progress reports such as this one.

Our Present Status

Tape sales now discontinued.     In NewsALERT #11 we announced that circumstances were making it necessary for us to terminate sales of the cassette tapes which used to be main business of Audio Books, Inc. (publisher of NewsALERT).     In NewsALERT #12, we alerted readers to the fact that we would be able to continue filling orders for tapes only as long as enough orders were received to meet costs, after which we would have no choice but to return any further orders unprocessed.     That point was reached in late February.     We regret that it has been necessary to return a few orders received since then, which arrived too late for processing.     We also regret that under our crisis circumstances, it proved impossible for us to respond to several requests for special-case quotations for non-standard batches of tapes.

In NewsALERT #11 we announced an "open licensing" arrangement intended to insure that the Dr. Beter AUDIO LETTER tapes will continue to be available.     Even though we have now discontinued tape sales, you may now obtain them from the following sources

Dan Holt  Video    Land on G. Nusz
36841  Row River  Road    1025 Cadillac Way, #212
Cottage Grove,   OR  97424    Burlingame, CA 94010
d_ariholtvideo@gmail. com

Please contact either of these sources directly for information as to prices and so on. NewsALERT is providing these names/addresses as a service only; we have no ties to these tape sources, and therefore can accept no responsibility for any dealings you may have with them.

—

Change of location.     The circumstances discussed in NewsALERT #12, which dictated a suspension of publication for the time being, have also led to a change in our location.     As most of you know, Audio Books, Inc, is a Texas-based company. In the spring of 1980 we moved our headquarters to the Washington, D6 C„ area. This was done while Dr. Beter was recovering from his near-fatal February 1980 heart attack.     The purpose of the move was to husband our resources, which were very badly depleted by the business impact of Dr. Beter's illness.     The move to Washington with its resultant proximity to Dr.  Beter enabled some cost-cutting and streamlining, which made it possible to resume producing Dr. Beter's tapes when he was ready.

Now the situation is far different.     When Dr.  Beter discontinued his tape reports in November 1982 he permanently severed his ties with Audio Books,  Inc. ,  a fact which we have re-emphasized in the past several issues of NewsALERT at his request. Of course, that eliminated the purpose for which we had moved to Washington four years ago.     In the present circumstances, rebuilding a fresh financial base has become the essential #1 priority for us--and the best way to begin doing that has turned out to be by returning to our Texas roots.

As a result we have vacated the Washington D. C. area completely, and have moved to temporary quarters in the Dallas,  Texas, area.     Until further notice, please send ALL mail to the following address:

NewsALERT

11408 Audelia Rd. , #2419 Dallas,  TX 75243

A new beginning.     In NewsALERT #12 we discussed very frankly with you the absolute necessity for our taking a breather to rebuild our financial base from the ground up. The resources with which we started when we began supporting Dr. Beter's efforts over nine years ago have been used up.

The kind of work to which NewsALERT is devoted cannot be financed by seeking a bank loan, because that would render us vulnerable to the very "mammon" forces whose control over America's money system is a fundamental evil requiring exposure. For similar reasons, we cannot support ourselves with a government subsidy or grant, since wrongdoing of the government itself must be highlighted without flinching.     Nor can we operate as a tax-exempt foundation or with foundation support, because the restrictions under which foundations operate render them always vulnerable to devastating reprisals by the government which grants them tax advantages. 

 Finally, any reporting operation like NewsALERT is--as we discovered very conclusively--simply not able to support itself without help during the costly start-up phases. . . perhaps even for the first few years.     Like Dr. Beter's former AUDIO LETTER tape program which was discontinued, NewsALERT will have to have help financially for awhile--perhaps quite awhile — before it can grow to the point where it can be self-sustaining.

Therefore, by necessity, your NewsALERT staff is now engaged primarily in some business ventures intended to raise the capital for a new start.     Only in this way do we feel that we can raise the finances needed to resume the NewsALERT program, without compromising our independence or further burdening you, our readers.

Key Developments in the News

The regular NewsALERT reporting program is based upon continuous, intensive gathering, cross-checking and analysis of information.     Our efforts in this direction are necessarily very limited by comparison under the present circumstances.     No one can do everything at once, and we cannot maintain our normal level of informational analysis while simultaneously laboring to rebuild our essential financial base.

Even so, a skeleton effort is being maintained while NewsALERT publication is sus­pended, in order to track the most key developments as best we can.     Based on this skeleton effort,  our information indicates strongly that the "pause" in events which we discussed in NewsALERT #12 is continuing and being extended.     There are and will be plenty of dramatic and unsettling developments in the news, of course.     But the very dangerous U. S. -Soviet confrontation which was ignited late last summer has been cooled off for the time being.     The single most important key to this turn of events lies in space, which today is the umbrella under which all other U.S. -Soviet military competition takes place.

The Triple Debacle of Space Shuttle #10

Last month on Feb. 3 the Space Shuttle Challenger blasted off from Cape Canaveral. It was supposed to impress the world while quietly bootlegging some secret military hardware into orbit.     Instead,  three successive incredible failures--"accidents, " said NASA--turned much of the flight to a shambles.

When the Shuttle took off last month, it flew into the teeth of a threatening posture by the Russian Space Command.     The Russians are making it clear in various ways that they are increasingly irritated with efforts by the Pentagon to use the Shuttle to sneak military missions into space.     Having established military superiority in space starting in late 1977, the Russians have no intention of giving it up.     The previous Shuttle mission --Shuttle #9, with Spacelab aboard--was strongly influenced by this reality. Originally scheduled to take off last Sept. 30, it was delayed for two months while the Europeans wrung their hands over the serious loss of scientific data which the delay would cause. Supposedly the Shuttle #9/Spacelab mission last fall was delayed for reasons related to the TDRS satellite problem (Interim News Alert #2) and the alleged near-failure of a booster rocket on a Shuttle mission last summer.     The real reason, however, was the 57° orbit planned for Shuttle #9/Spacelab.     That orbit was required in order to give the Europeans the observational data they wanted--but it also carried the Shuttle far north over Soviet territory.     Through private channels, the Russians insisted on ironclad guarantees that no covert spying on Russia would be done during the Spacelab flight.

That guarantee was delivered to the Russians early last November, by way of a news conference in which it was announced that the cameras aboard the Shuttle would not be used over Afghanistan, contrary to earlier plans.     With that and other guarantees, the Russians finally signalled their willingness to let the joint U. S. -European flight take place without interference, which it did early last December.

The Russians did not interfere with the orbital operations of the Shuttle last December,

but they did monitor it closely.     At one point, one of Russia's high-speed jumbo cosmo­spheres buzzed the orbiting Shuttle at close enough range for several of the astronauts to see it.     The startled astronauts radioed Houston to ask what had flashed past their windows.     Houston helpfully replied that it had no idea.     Despite the fact that NORAD continuously keeps track of over 5, 000 orbiting objects in space,  ranging from functioning satellites to useless debris, something unknown--and something big--had had a near miss with the Shuttle.

The Russians intended that false-UFO incident in space last December as a warning. But the warning was not heeded: the American astronauts aboard the joint U. S. -European Shuttle/Spacelab flight last December did make some militarily useful photographs through the overhead windows of the Shuttle's rear deck.     Several were even published later in the aerospace industry magazine, Aviation Week and Space Technology.

The only real hazard faced by the Shuttle/Spacelab flight last December as a conse­quence of its encounter with a jumbo cosmosphere was unintentional.     The powerful electromagnetic field which the cosmosphere uses for levitation and propulsion extends out a long way, and its fringes evidently brushed the Shuttle as it flashed past. This dislodged some microscopic bits of conductive material--tiny manufacturing trash--inside the Shuttle's computers.     When the Shuttle began its descent from orbit to end the mission, two of the five computers aboard malfunctioned, as did a guidance and navigation system.     Just after the Shuttle landed at Edwards Air Force Base, two separate fires also broke out in the tail of the craft, but those appear to be unrelated to the cosmosphere "UFO" incident.

All this was the background which led up to last month's Space Shuttle #10 flight. The Russians were angry over the picture-taking which took place last December in violation of private pledges.    So when Challenger reached orbit on Friday, Feb. 3, the Russian Space Command was on hand.     Not far away but out of view, a jumbo cos­mosphere matched orbits with Challenger and waited.

The first big task of Shuttle #10 was to deploy the Westar VI communications satellite from its cargo bay.     After drifting away from the Shuttle, a rocket booster called a PAM-D was supposedly set to push the satellite up to a stationary equatorial orbit, 22,300 miles above the Galapagos Islands.     But that is also the neighborhood where Russia's ballistic missile early warning satellites are parked (Interim News Alert #2), watching American missile bases for any sign of a first strike.     As the satellite and its rocket booster climbed away from the Shuttle, the cosmosphere kept pace with it and closed in.     Perhaps 500 miles above the Shuttle and far out of sight, the cosmosphere used its particle beam weapon to punch a hole through the rocket booster.     The rocket flame flickered out in the vacuum of space, and the cosmosphere then closed in and took the satellite-and-rocket assembly into its cargo bay for inspection.

For several hours, Western Union (the satellite's owner), NASA and NORAD searched in vain for the satellite.     It had simply disappeared.     Jumbo cosmospheres are not detectable in orbit by ordinary radar, so as long as the Westar VI satellite assembly remained inside the cosmosphere cargo bay it was undetectable.

The cosmosphere crew discovered that the Westar VI satellite/rocket assembly was not quite as advertised.     Both the satellite and the rocket booster were specially lightenec and the booster was not a standard PAM-D but a higher-performance modification. In the area between satellite and booster was a small cluster of anti-satellite (ASAT) war­heads.     It was a modified version of the TDRS satellite charade of last April, 1983 (Interim News Alert #2).     This time, the idea was for the ASAT warheads to ride piggyback aboard a civilian communications satellite and sit there indefinitely until needed.     Then, at a push of a button, the U. S. Pentagon would have been able to blast nearby Russian early-warning satellites.    This is a capability badly wanted by the new U.S. Bolsheviks, who want to twist America's defensive nuclear might into an offensive, nuclear first strike posture.

The cosmosphere crew disabled the satellite/rocket booster/ASAT combination and then dumped it in a useless, low-looping orbit ranging from about 190 to 760 nautical miles above the earth.     NORAD then found it,  and NASA announced that alas, the Westar VI satellite had gone astray.

Two days later the Challenger Space Shuttle crew began the deployment of an aluminum-coated balloon for use as a rendezvous target in practice space maneuvers. No problem was expected with the balloon: ever since the days of the Echo I satellite a quarter-century ago, balloons have been about the simplest and most foolproof devices that can be placed in orbit.     But as the balloon drifted outward from Challenger's cargo bay and began to inflate on Feb. 5, it exploded violently--"just like a stick of dynamite, " said astronaut Robert L. Stewart.

The balloon explosion was mystifying to many, but for certain members of the military Space Shuttle team it was a chillingly clear message from Moscow.     The violent blast of the unassuming balloon had been caused by a burst from the particle beam weapon of a Russian jumbo cosmosphere shadowing the Shuttle.

The next day a second communications satellite was scheduled to be launched from the Shuttle--the Palapa-B satellite for Indonesia.     It suffered the same fate as the Westar VI three days earlier.     It turned out to be nothing more than advertised--a civilian com­munications satellite with a PAM-D booster.     But the Russians were taking no chances, so it ended up like the Westar VI,  stranded in a useless orbit after hours of invisibility to all American tracking efforts.

Now, as usual, NASA is trying to cover its tracks by trying to devise some plausible excuse for the two-in-a-row failures of the PAM-D booster.     That isn't easy,  since the PAM-D had established a record of very high reliability: all 16 previous launches using that booster had been flawless.     But of course, NASA dares not tell the truth.

The failure of the effort to place covert ASAT warheads in space aboard the Westar VI satellite has once again thrown the Pentagon's space weaponry plans into a cocked hat. With the ASAT's in place over the Galapagos Islands, a Shuttle launch had been scheduled for July 14 to place a secret Defense Department payload in orbit.     The payload was to be a new Attack Confirmation Sensor, in preparation for a possible nuclear confrontation with Russia to follow the re-election of Ronald Reagan as President.     But now the July launch has been scrubbed.     It's "back to the drawing boards" for the Bolshevik war planners in the Pentagon.

The Collapse of the Lebanon "Vietnam" Plan

The joint U„ S0 -Israeli plans to turn Lebanon into a "Vietnam" for America (News­ALERT #4) were part of a master plan for direct confrontation between the U0 S. and the USSRc     The master plan started being undone (for the time being) on Feb. 3, when the "Westar VI satellite was intercepted and disabled in space.     Immediately, the Lebanon aspect of the master plan started coming apart as well.     That same weekend, Moslem members of the Gemayel cabinet led the cabinet as a whole to resign.     This was brought about by Syria, acting on advice from Moscow that the moment to act had arrived.

By the afternoon of Feb. 6, the trio of stunning "failures" of Space Shuttle #10 had made it clear that the Pentagon's military space planning for the next few months was badly flawed.     At the same time, U. S. control of events in Lebanon was coming unglued, and the master strategy of which Lebanon was a part had been upset by the military developments in space.     On Feb. 7, President Reagan made headlines by announcing that U. S. combat troops would be pulled out of Lebanon.     It was a stunning turnabout: only 5 days earlier he had insisted to the Wall Street Journal: "If we get out, that means the end of Lebanon. "    But that had been a day before Space Shuttle #10 blasted off into the teeth of the Russian Space Command.

On Feb.  10, the U. S. presence in Lebanon in force prematurely came to an end in Vietnam-like fashion, as U. S. civilians were evacuated from a disintegrating Beirut. Nearly a thousand persons were evacuated, and there were countless scenes of people running frantically to helicopters as they had done a decade earlier in Saigon.   On Feb. 25, as the Marines themselves began pulling out, the Reagan Administration announced that it had placed its policies toward Lebanon on "hold" for the time being.     And so it has.     Until the Bolsheviks here can sort out what hit them and devise a new strategy, just about everything is on "hold. "


The Announced Death of Russia's Yuri Andropov


With the Pentagon's machinations in space and in Lebanon thrown off stride for the moment, the Kremlin at last obtained the breather desired for the belated announcement of the death of Yuri Andropov*     For more than 3 months following his unexpected death on Nov. 5 (NewsALERT #8), the fiction of his continued leadership had been maintained in order to avoid an appearance of vulnerability.     But there was a deadline: the March 4 elections for the Supreme Soviet called absolutely for Andropov to make a prior public appearance.     With the Reagan Administration reeling from the setbacks in space and in Lebanon, the belated announcement of Andropov's death was made on Feb. 10.

The new nominal Russian leader, 73-year-*old Konstantin Chernenko, is well enough known to look credible, but he is only a transitional figurehead.     He is the least powerful of a troika (trio) now leading Russia.     The other two are Grigory Romanov and--most powerful and youngest of all--Mikhail Gorbachev.     Gorbachev, Andropov's hand-picked protege, has succeeded in replacing about 1/3 of the key regional leaders needed to carry out the next phase of the anti-Bolshevik purge in Russia (NewsALERT #8), and his power is growing fast.

IN SUMMARY--Our Lord Jesus Christ is giving us all a pause for now, a respite from the imminence of grave threats.     Your NewsALERT staff will try to use this time wisely, to prepare to resume serving you when He makes it possible.     Meanwhile, thanks for your continued patience, and may Godbless you.

Peter Beter News Alert 13: ProgressReport