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The subcommittee of the Committee on Internal Security met, pursuant to call, at 11 a.m., in room 311, Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C., Hon. Claude Pepper, chairman of the subcommittee, presiding.

(Subcommittee members: Representatives Claude Pepper of Florida, chairman; Richard H. Ichord of Missouri, chairman of the full committee; Richardson Preyer of North Carolina; John M. Ashbrook of Ohio; and Roger H. Zion of Indiana.)

Subcommittee members present: Representatives Pepper, Ashbrook, and Zion.

Committee member also present: Representative John G. Schmitz of California.

Staff members present: Donald G. Sanders, chief counsel, Richard L. Schultz, associate chief counsel, and Herbert Romerstein, minority chief investigator.

Mr. PEPPER. The subcommittee will come to order.

Mr. Counsel, what witnesses do we have today?

Mr. SCHULTZ. We have Mrs. R. Hart Phillips.

Mr. PEPPER. Mrs. Phillips, would you please stand and be sworn? Do you solemnly swear the testimony you are about to give before this hearing shall be the truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. I do.

Mr. PEPPER. We have, today, Mrs. R. Hart Phillips as our witness. I am sure she will be able to make a valuable contribution to the subject of this inquiry.

TESTIMONY OF RUBY HART PHILLIPS

Mr. ASHBROOK. First of all, Mrs. Phillips, could you give us your full name and address?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Ruby Hart Phillips, Miami, Florida, at the present

moment.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Mr. Chairman, I have a biographical sketch on Mrs. Phillips which I would like to put in the record at this time, which indicates she was a correspondent of the New York Times for 25 years in Cuba. She has traveled extensively through Latin America.

Mr. PEPPER. Without objection, the biography of Mrs. Phillips will appear in the record.

(Mrs. Phillips' biographical sketch follows:)

Mrs. R. Hart Phillips was correspondent of the New York Times for 25 years in the island of Cuba. In 1961 she came out of the island, following the Bay of Pigs invasion, and established a Times Bureau in Miami.

Two years later she resigned from the Times and became the Latin American correspondent of Newsday of Long Island. For 5 years Mrs. Phillips, with headquarters in Panama, flew throughout Central America, the Caribbean, and South America writing two opinion columns weekly and feature stories.

Mrs. Phillips has two books on Cuba: Cuba: Island of Paradox, published in July 1959, and The Cuban Dilemma, published in 1963. The former book covers the period of Cuban events from 1931 to 1959 and is the only book on that period either in English or Spanish. The later book covers the Castro regime from 1959 to 1962.

Mrs. Phillips has appeared on ABC, NBC, and CBS television, lectured at universities and various organizations, as well as appearing on radio. She is considered an authority on Cuba in particular and on Latin America.

On October 29, 1969, Mrs. Phillips was given the Tom Wallace Award for coverage of Latin America at the meeting of the Inter-American Press Association in Washington, D.C.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Mrs. Phillips, could you please outline for us the details of your experiences in studying the problems in Latin America, those problems which the committee is presently looking into of communist subversion in Latin and South America, particularly in Cuba? Mrs. PHILLIPS. Well, in 1932 I became correspondent of the Times Wide World, the photographic service. In 1937 I became the New York Times correspondent for Cuba.

I came out of Cuba after the Bay of Pigs in 1961. Then I had a bureau in Miami for 2 years for the New York Times. Afterwards I traveled 5 years in Latin America, except Mexico, for the Newsday of Long Island.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Mrs. Phillips, you were in Cuba during the Castro takeover and remained in Cuba, as you pointed out, until 1961 or 1963? Mrs. PHILLIPS. 1961.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Until after the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion. I personally have read your articles in the New York Times and am aware of the fact that you had pinpointed the danger of a communist takeover in Cuba very early in the game, as a matter of fact, when many other columnists were indicating otherwise. Would you please give us the basis for your reasoning at that time, your observations during those years in Cuba?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. In the first place, I was a little suspicious of Fidel Castro because everybody knew that Raul Castro is a communist and that his girlfriend, Vilma Espin, was also a communist. Then investigations showed that Che Guevara was a communist.

So when Castro arrived in Havana after making his famous march, the first thing he did was to dissolve all political parties except the Popular Socialist Party, which was the Communist Party.

In the meantime, the communists had started taking over all of the labor headquarters. A young captain came in my office who was with Castro. He said, "when I was in Camaguey, I found that the com

munists had all the labor headquarters. I threw them out." Many of Castro's people were not communists. That is the reason they defected so rapidly.

Then there was Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, who was the head of the youth of the communist party. I knew that he had gone to the Castro headquarters in Sierra Maestra in October. I didn't know the details of the deal they made, but it was perfectly apparent that they had a deal.

Then, when Castro came into Havana-I think it was the second day. I am not sure I am quoting him correctly, but he said if the Americans attacked there would be 200,000 gringos dead. The evidence just piled up. The first meeting he had in front of the Presidential palace of course he had the meeting in Camp Colombia when he first arrived-but at the first big public meeting, it was, "Down with imperialism" and "Paredon." Then he began to execute people.

Mr. ASHBROOK. This is obviously interesting to many of us who thought, at that time, that Castro was not a communist, at least not under the influence and possible domination of the communists. So many people came to the opposite view. You, of course, working for the New York Times, may well recall how in 1958 many church groups and others in our country who were well meaning were led to help Castro and urged to help Castro because he was going to get rid of Batista.

Probably the principal argument that I personally ran into at that time, to show that Castro was all right, were articles that appeared in the New York Times by Herbert Matthews. You came to the conclusion that Castro was a communist. Herbert Matthews and many well-known reputable reporters and columnists came to an opposite conclusion. That is very interesting.

Mrs. PHILLIPS. I never could understand Herbert in the first place. I sent him out to the mountains to meet Castro, arranged the whole thing, but he became an advocate and not a correspondent.

Mr. ASHBROOK. He was really a fan.

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Yes, that is what he was. I never could figure out Matthews. Perhaps he was what the communists called "useful idiots," because he always thought that Castro was great. He has written a biography in the last 2 years of Castro, which is more a eulogy than anything else. After all Castro has done, Matthews hasn't reached the conclusion he is a communist yet.

But in 1961, in December, Castro said, "I am a communist and I have always been one, but I didn't tell anybody for fear that I would get no support."

Mr. ASHBROOK. It is also interesting to know that all those people who supported Castro in that period usually said it was our fault, that we drove him into the communist camp.

Mrs. PHILLIPS. That was utterly ridiculous because, in the first place, Che Guevara probably had more influence on Castro than anyone else. His followers used to say that Che could talk to Castro and before it was over with, Castro thought he was the one who had the idea. Che was quite clever.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Mrs. Phillips, after leaving Cuba, you continued to serve as the Times Caribbean correspondent. You then served Newsday

as its Latin American correspondent. You traveled constantly, as you point out, for approximately 5 years. Would you outline for the committee what, on the basis of your considerable experience, the problems of Latin America are, with particular emphasis on the dangers of communist takeover in the various Latin American countries?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Let's go back to 1945. In 1945 I wrote an article for the New York Times; a rather short dispatch in which I said the Soviet Legation in Havana was then the center of propaganda and subversion. The Soviet Union wanted to destroy the influence of the United States in the whole of Latin America.

That dispatch was read on the floor of the United States Senate and created a great furor. The Soviet charge d'affairs in Havana gave a press conference and wanted to have me deported. Then I wrote an article for the old American Mercury in which I expanded this information and told exactly what they were doing.

They had 50 people in the press section of the Legation. They had no commercial relations with Cuba. It was all political. Then all the papers came down to Cuba-The Washington Post, the New York Herald Tribune, the Chicago Tribune-they all came down to write a story.

But that was simply the end of it. The United States paid no attention to the fact that that is exactly what they were doing. The Soviets organized a small nucleus in every country and distributed propaganda either clandestinely or openly if they could.

The communists have worked since 1945. They are not in a hurry. The democrats are always in a hurry to spread democracy over the world, but not the communists. They go at it very slowly. So today you have a communist group in every country of Latin America.

Castro has helped naturally. He sends the arms and the ammunition and the technicians and fighters. The Soviet Union, through its Embassies, furnish the dollars for all of this.

Now the United States never made any effort whatever to combat any of this. In the first place, the propaganda of the communists is all against the United States. That is the one main point.

So the United States has a USIS and the Voice of America, which is based on the wrong premise. It should attack and not defend. It is always defending the American way of life and who cares about it? Nobody. Not in Latin America.

And when the Soviet Union makes a statement against the United States there is never any rebuttal. There is nothing. Personally, I think they should have a radio station in every country and they should attack the communists every day. Otherwise the U.S. position is not generally known. When the papers in the United States carry some story planted by the communists and the next day somebody says it is not true, who reads the second story? Nobody.

So the Americans have become convinced-I mean the Latin Americans have become convinced that the United States is far weaker than the Soviet Union. And when I was traveling around they would all say, "If the United States can't win over little North Vietnam, who said they were a great military power?"

So this communist propaganda is dropping like water on a rock all the time. It has created a situation in which the Latin Americans simply have no respect for the United States. The prestige of the

United States is the lowest it has ever been in history as far as I know. Mr. ASHBROOK. Mrs. Phillips, it is often said, just as a general statement without specific proof, that in virtually any country in Latin and South America in which the communists would want to foment trouble that they would be able to do so. For example, during the trip of Vice President Nixon or anyone else, the communists could rally a considerable number of students, some labor people, and so forth, to cause trouble or embarrassment for the United States. Would this be your observation? Have they achieved the capability of, as a matter of fact, being able to push a button and cause trouble in almost any place in Latin America?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Of course, it is all organized. The communists penetrate many institutions, the universities and even the lower school grades, the army, and labor.

Mr. ASHBROOK. You say the army?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. The army. Take a look at Peru.

Mr. ASHBROOK. In most South American and Latin countries wouldn't the army be the one group which is basically anticommunist? Mrs. PHILLIPS. They are basically anticommunist, but strangely enough you have a situation in Peru in which the military government is following the pattern of Castro. You know that from the dispatches. The communists try, in every country, to penetrate the army. In many countries they are not successful.

Mr. ASHBROOK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know Mr. Zion has some questions.

Mr. PEPPER. Mrs. Phillips, you spoke about those who claim that we forced or drove Castro into the arms of communism. Did the United States recognize him?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Six days after he came in.

Mr. PEPPER. He had already been accorded recognition as the head of the Cuban government. What did we do to drive him into the arms of the communists?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. Nothing whatever. As a matter of fact, Felipe Pazos, who became president of the National Bank of Cuba, told me when he came up here with Castro (the Castro who had deceived the Cuban people and most of the Americans) he said that he almost had to sew up his pockets for fear the Americans would put million dollar bills in

them.

Mr. PEPPER. Thank you.

Mr. ZION. Mrs. Phillips, thank you very much for being here. We appreciate your testimony. I believe you made a statement that they should have a radio station in each country to attack communism. I presume by each country you mean Latin American countries.

Mrs. PHILLIPS. That is what I mean.

Mr. ZION. You say "they." Who is "they?"

Mrs. PHILLIPS. I am talking about the USIA, your propaganda. In the first place, the propaganda is more or less useless.

Mr. ZION. In other words, we are trying to respond rather than to initiate propaganda?

Mrs. PHILLIPS. You are initiating nothing. You are talking about the American way of life, the scientific advances that are happening, and so forth, while the communists are hitting you every day by radio,

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