I am all alone in the palace as Imelda left at about 6:30 PM by Quantas for Hongkong, thence to New Delhi. She may be away until the 25th. She goes to New Delhi where she meets with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who tenders a luncheon and President [Varahagiri Venkata] and Mrs. [Saraswati] Giri. Then to Iran where she stays up to the 16th on to London where she visits the children. To the U.S. to see President [Richard] Nixon to reconfirm Nixon’s assurance that they would not intervene on any internal matter which may lead to martial law (Ambassador [Henry] Byroade had said they would support me stating farther that this assurance came from Pres. Nixon) I do not want any Ngo Dinh Diem plots by the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency].
For even our Nica [National Intelligence Coordinating Agency] and the local police (Maj. [Felicisimo] Lazaro of MPD [Manila Police District] receives $1,000 a month for instance) are infiltrated and financed by CIA.
I am now working on the problem.
I talked to Don Manolo Elizalde to convince [Andres] Andy Soriano [Jr.] and other businessmen to support an openly anti-communist newspaper. He was agreeable inasmuch as none of the present newspapers are willing to fight communism frontally.
After Imelda left and I returned to the palace I
Checked with Gen. [Fabian] Ver the deficiencies of our internal security inside the palace. We must find out who is monitoring my movements.
Official Gazette for October 9, 1971: President Marcos led well-wishers in seeing off the First Lady, Imelda R. Marcos, who left early in the evening on a combined diplomatic-cultural mission to Iran. The First Lady took a Qantas Fokker plane which took off from the Manila International Airport at 6 :30 p.m.
In addition to attending the 2,500th anniversary of the founding of the Iranian dynasty under Cyrus the Great, Mrs. Marcos was scheduled to meet with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi of India, during which she would pursue discussions on the establishment of the Asian Cultural Association which she had earlier proposed, and would want to be organized as soon as possible.
Shortly before boarding the plane, the First Lady said that she had been asked by the President to undertake the mission to attend the Iranian anniversary rites. “On this important occasion in Iran’s history,” the First Lady said, “we are called upon, not only by our existing formal ties but also by the special bond existing between that country and our Muslim brothers in the South, to make a genuine expression of amity and goodwill.”
At the “Meet the Press” television interview later in the evening, the President said that in-depth studies were being made on all military and economic agreements of the Philippines with the United States so as to determine “our own intentions and our own national interest” on these matters. Covered by such studies, he said, were such questions as: 1. Are the U.S. bases necessary? 2. How much longer they should stay? 3. Should they not be taken over by Filipinos, and if so, when and how?
The President was tied down to his desk most of the morning and afternoon because of the pressure of paper work.
2. Worked on the plans for setting up shipbuilding facilities.
3. Dictated the outline for the new book for the establishment of a framework for the research on legislation, policies and projects.
It will include not only a study of the coming age of pluralization from the fast fading age of polarization as well as the prospects of Japan rearming, Russia coming into Asia, resulting in the four powers of China, USA, Russia and Japan vying for dominance—dictating the need for a neutralization of Southeast Asia guaranteed by the super-powers.
Then studies on land reform.
The failures of collectivism in Russia, China and its success in the kibbutz in Israel.
The welfare state.
Gunnar Myrdal’s incomplete studies on the failure of the land reform program in India.
Cuba’s failure according to [Fidel] Castro.
And the distortion of news by the visual media or the press—
And a critique of the policies of the super powers.