THE WEEK

In Ceylon, a motley Popular Front of nationalists, religious extremists, official and Trotskyite Communists has defeated the able and courageous Sir John Kotelawala, who has been Prime Minister since 1953. Ceylon, lying off the tip of India, is in a strategic position to dominate the Bay of Bengal, Southeast Asia, and the great ocean highway of the Strait of Malacca. The new Prime Minister, Solomon West Ridgway Diaz Bandaranaike, under pressure from the left wing of his coalition, indicated that his first move will be: to push the British out of their two air bases and the station that their Fleet still maintains in the fine harbor of Trincomalee; to enter into diplomatic relations with Moscow and Peiping; and to begin steps to nationalize foreign-owned tea, rubber and cocoanut plantations. Undoubtedly the State Department will take the opportunity to launch a program of prodigious foreign aid to Ceylon.

The sound and fury that accompanied the veto of the Natural Gas Bill has fizzled out with the report of the special Senate Committee which was appointed to inquire into John Neff’s attempted contribution to the campaign fund of Senator Francis Case. The Committee found “galloping irresponsibility”; convicted Mr. Neff of lobbying “in an inept fashion” (a conclusion that will not be disputed); and concluded in sum that “there was neither a bribe nor an attempt to bribe.” In other words, the Committee sought, no doubt wisely, to push the whole matter out of political sight. It certainly offered no explanation for the President’s veto of a bill that he had himself described as both just and expedient.

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In Ceylon, a motley Popular Front of nationalists, religious extremists, official and Trotskyite Communists has defeated the able and courageous Sir John Kotelawala, who has been Prime Minister since 1953. Ceylon, lying off the tip of India, is in a strategic position to dominate the Bay of Bengal, Southeast Asia, and the great ocean highway of the Strait of Malacca. The new Prime Minister, Solomon West Ridgway Diaz Bandaranaike, under pressure from the left wing of his coalition, indicated that his first move will be: to push the British out of their two air bases and the station that their Fleet still maintains in the fine harbor of Trincomalee; to enter into diplomatic relations with Moscow and Peiping; and to begin steps to nationalize foreign-owned tea, rubber and cocoanut plantations. Undoubtedly the State Department will take the opportunity to launch a program of prodigious foreign aid to Ceylon.

The sound and fury that accompanied the veto of the Natural Gas Bill has fizzled out with the report of the special Senate Committee which was appointed to inquire into John Neff’s attempted contribution to the campaign fund of Senator Francis Case. The Committee found “galloping irresponsibility”; convicted Mr. Neff of lobbying “in an inept fashion” (a conclusion that will not be disputed); and concluded in sum that “there was neither a bribe nor an attempt to bribe.” In other words, the Committee sought, no doubt wisely, to push the whole matter out of political sight. It certainly offered no explanation for the President’s veto of a bill that he had himself described as both just and expedient.