DEAR EDITOR
Dear Editor Arms to Cuba? In "The Unraveling of the Reagan Presidency" (NL, December 29, 1986), Irving Louis Horowitz reports four absurdities, among them the CIA's shipment of "845...
...Kudos is in order, too, for Harold M. Waller, who in the same issue relentlessly exposed the bias in David K. Shipler's book on the Arab-Israel dispute...
...Whatever the case, they illustrate the sad state of affairs in government by satrapies, which my article sought to document and explain...
...In "The Unraveling of the Reagan Presidency" (NL, December 29, 1986), Irving Louis Horowitz reports four absurdities, among them the CIA's shipment of "845 tonsofarmamentstoCuba from its Miami airbase conduit, presumably for trans-shipment to Angola...
...Airline officials subsequently maintained that they were providing emergency relief for the Red Cross and logistical help to diamond mining operations...
...Is that prejudice...
...When I checked with an official of the CIA, he said the planes were carrying concrete for U.S...
...New York City Richard H. Shvlman...
...He was referring to the consular officials representing U.S...
...Mangan, who sought verification or denial from officials of Southern Air to no avail, further reported that in December 1985 alone, Southern Air made 120 flights ferrying a total of 2,700 tons of cargo into the Angolan capital...
...yet even the CID omits sdrucciola as no longer in use...
...Considering how unfair the author's conclusions are, I question the validity of his raw data, the interviews...
...political interests presumably aligned against U.S...
...ing the situation...
...Although I had not heard about the aforementioned absurdity, in view of other such absurdities I do not question Professor Horowitz' statement...
...The paragraph he quotes from, it should be noted, went on to say that the purpose of the shipments was "to protectU.S.oilfieldinterests in Angola (which are guarded by Castro's soldiers) against America's leading friend there, Jonas Savimbi and his unita forces seeking to liberate the nation from a Communist-led regime...
...It must be pointed out that there is no disputing the odd condition whereby Castro's troops guard United States petroleum interests in MPLA held territoryChevron and Gulf in particular—against the forces of unita...
...Simon's vocabulary...
...As Representative Gonzalez observed when given the same cover story: "You don't bring in 845 tons of supplies a month to supply two people...
...Though I once published poetry, I never heard of sdrucciola but referred to the device as a trisyllabic or dactylic rhyme...
...It takes little imagination to believe that the Southern Air flights, direct and indirect, have served to buoy Castro's logistical position by giving his troops sophisticated weaponry to fend off potential attacks from Savimbi's forces, which already control 70 per cent of the countryside...
...The Congressman was Democrat Henry B. Gonzalez of Texas, who made his charge on the strength of Civil Aeronautics Board records showing that since 1982 Miami-based Southern Air Transport has made an average of two trips a month into Havana, carrying between 15-28 tons of cargo per trip...
...Still, Mr...
...My source was a mid-December Associated Press report by Andrew Mangan carried in a variety of newspapers, including the Newark Star-Ledger, that began: "A Texas Congressman claimed yesterday that a commercial air cargo company linked to the Administration's covert Iran and Nicaragua arms shipments has flown hundreds of flights into Cuba and Angola...
...economic interests, with Castro's troops brokerThe New Leader welcomes comment and criticism on any of its features, but letters should not exceed 300 words...
...And the absence of any Administration response to Gonzalez' charges would seem to confirm that the Miami-Havana-Luanda airlink is real, and that it has military aspects, if not more than military aspects...
...At least my 'sdeath crops up as lateas 1869in Browning's TheRingandtheBook...
...Lido Beach, N. Y. Walter A. Sheldon Irving Louis Horowitz replies: Walter Sheldon raises a question that others have understandably asked as well...
...Winter Books As a lover of words and a devoted admirer of John Simon's erudition and felicity with his adopted tongue, I must point out an error in his beautiful review of the latest supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary, which appeared in the Winter Books issue (NL, December 1-15, 1986...
...Raffs acumen prompts me to work sdrucciola, if not into my writing, at least into my cocktail-party badinage...
...The author blamed the dispute on mutual prejudice...
...I have been very critical of our policy vis-à-vis Angola and have written to a number of people in Washington advocating a 180-degree reorientation...
...Although he says "there are no words in English starting in sd," my Webster's Second International defines sdrucciola as a triple rhyme with the accent on the antepenultimate syllable—the way viable rhymes with reliable...
...It is a word most of us could live our whole lives without needing to know, yet I should think that such a word belongs both in the OED—I haven't checked to see if it is there—and in Mr...
...interests in Havana, and went on to declare that "somehow the CIA has found some way to deal with Fidel through Angola...
...Israeli soldiers are known to regret having to kill, even in self-defense...
...Morton Raff John Simon replies: I'm grateful for Morton Raffs information: sdrucciola is indeed in the OED (though not in any OEDS), where it is labeled "obs...
...Thus Angola is the site of a weird alliance thai has U.S...
...the reviewer traced it to Arab intoleranceof a Jewish state...
...Chevy Chase, Md...
...embassy reconstruction...
...rare" and its last recorded appearance is dated 1605...
...Gonzalez said that this CIA air conduit also flew cargo from Dobbins Air Force Base in Georgia to an airport in Luanda, Angola, which is controlled by the Marxist government there...
...The Cambridge Italian Dictionary lists the noun sdrucciola (a slip or slippery place) and verso sdrucciola, a 12syllable verse with accent on the antepenult...
...But I would like to have the source...
...There is some indirect evidence that the flights have been reduced and perhaps even terminated...
...In her article on "Publishing in Poland" in the Winter Books issue, Anna Husarska renewed one's hope with her description of the resourceful Polish underground's various publishing enterprises...
Vol. 70 • February 1987 • No. 2
