The Daily Express was inaugurated at the Port Area this afternoon at 4:30 PM. The first edition will come out on April 27th, Thursday.
The Taal Volcano exploded 47 times rocking the island in the last 24 hours.
The South Vietnamese have lost another three bases in the Central Highlands.
But Donahue and George Calaris, the first the Intelligence Officer of the US Embassy here and the latter the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] man, briefed me at 9:00 AM today and claimed:
- That the North Vietnamese have committed all their available troops of 100,000 and have not succeeded in taking their targets.
- That since the fighting has shifted from unconventional to conventional, this indicates:
a.That the North Vietnamese were compelled to shift to conventional warfare because their recruitment and popular support had gone so low inside South Vietnam.
b.That the North Vietnamese can no longer depend on the countryside for their supplies.
a.That the North Vietnamese would be vulnerable to bombing now because of concentration of forces and their long supply lines. When the North Vietnamese were engaged in unconventional warfare, bombing was ineffective.
3. That there is a stalemate with a few changes in position.
4. That the press dispatches were unreliable.
5.That there is inefficient and faulty coordination between the tank, artillery and infantry commanders of the North Vietnamese.
Official Gazette for April 24, 1972: THE PRESIDENT was guest of honor in the afternoon at the inauguration and blessing of the modern printing plant of the Daily Express, a national newsmagazine.
In an interview with staffers of Channel 5 later, the President said the government will encourage the establishment of any additional medium of communications “for the dissemination of our democratic way of life.”
The President spent the earlier part of the day on official papers.
6. That the B-52’s are bombing at 60,000 feet
7. And the U.S. has sophisticated counter action equipment to turn around the flying Sam’s [surface-to-air missile] and other missiles of the North Vietnamese. ·
The North Vietnamese are using an anti-tank weapon which seems to be a missile. Effective and accurate.
I attach some papers given to Donahue.
Today’s newspaper are in a separate envelope.