News stories from Sunday September 10, 1978

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

Papers turned over to the National Archives by the National Security Agency indicate that after the Pearl Harbor attack, Japan conducted spy operations in the United States through personnel of the Spanish diplomatic service, who represented Japan's interests in the United States during the war. [Chicago Tribune] Soviet defector Viktor Korchnoi survived an expected defeat with excellent defensive play to salvage a draw from the adjourned 20th game against champion Anatoly Karpov in the world chess championships. No one offered a draw, said Deputy Arbiter Miroslav Filip of Czechoslovakia. The players merely glanced at each other and signed their scoresheets, ending the game after 63 moves. When the game was adjourned Saturday, even Korchnoi's backers had described his position as hopeless. [Chicago Tribune] President Carter telephoned the Shah of Iran to express hope that violence in Iran would soon end and to reaffirm the importance of Iran's "continued alliance with the West," the White House announced. In a statement designed to bolster the Shah's position, the White House said that Carter had called the Shah and discussed the "present situation in Iran," where bloody anti-government demonstrations led by Moslem extremists have claimed at least 95 lives since Friday. [Chicago Tribune] In a nationwide offensive, Marxist Sandinista guerrillas said they seized control of Leon, the nation's second-largest city, and parts of Managua. Government forces disputed the rebels' victory claims. National Guard troops battled the insurgents in the streets with tanks, fighter planes, and machine guns and said they had retaken Leon. Fighting, however, was reported continuing. [Chicago Tribune] Israeli jets cracked sonic booms over Beirut for the first time since the Camp David summit began, to quell the worst fighting in two months between Syrian troops and Israeli-armed Christians. The new sortie was a dramatic response to former Lebanese President Camille Chamoun's charge that hard-line Syria had engineered renewed Beirut fighting in a bid to undermine the summit called by President Carter. The Phalangist radio said 2,000 Syrian shells and rockets plowed into Christian areas in southeastern Beirut late Saturday and early Sunday, damaging 300 buildings. [Chicago Tribune] Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat were seen chatting across the muzzle of a Union cannon at the Gettysburg Civil War battle site, and that was close to being the best hint of how summit talks on Mideast peace may be going. Israeli Defense Minister Ezer Weizman, also along on the outing, told reporters that two or three more days are needed "for things to crystallize." [Chicago Tribune] As the number of suspected cases of Legionnaires' disease in New York City rose to 97, city and federal officials began medical detective work to pinpoint the source of the mysterious illness. Mayor Edward Koch said that since the number of confirmed cases in the garment district outbreak remained at six, two of them fatal, "we believe it is possible that the phase has peaked." [Chicago Tribune] The people who attended were surprised to see him. Eugene McCarthy, former Democratic presidential candidate, showed up at a G.O.P. pig roast in Charlottesville, Va., today and was photographed smiling alongside John Warner, Virginia's G.O.P. candidate for the U.S. Senate. McCarthy, who has a home in Rappahannock County, said he was invited to the roast by local Republican friends. He insisted that his presence does not mean he is about to switch parties. "I don't get invited to too many Democratic or regular Republican parties anymore," McCarthy said, "But politicians have to go to political meetings once in a while." [Chicago Tribune] After he spoke to American Embassy employees in Moscow recently, Sen. Edward Kennedy asked if there was anyone from Massachusetts in the crowd. Three or four hands shot into the air, along with shouts of "Boston" and "Springfield." "Well, I hope you all get home by 1982," Kennedy said with a wide grin. A reporter asked, "Did you mean by 1980, Senator (the year of the next presidential election)?" Kennedy grinned even more but said nothing. [Chicago Tribune]