News stories from Sunday September 21, 1980

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

About 12,000 Iranian students are in the United States illegally, and 2,000 of them have been ordered to leave the country after deportation hearings, according to immigration service officials. The others are awaiting deportation hearings. Officials estimate that there are 70,000 Iranian students in the United States. [New York Times] Most immigrants are not a burden on taxpayers, as some Americans believe, according research gathered for a federal study commission. Immigrant families start earning more than native-born American families within 10 years after their arrival in the United States. The report also says that immigrants contribute more in taxes than they receive in public services, and that their children, after an initial disadvantage, tend to "overtake" the children of native-born families in academic performance. [New York Times] John Anderson and Ronald Reagan held the first presidential debate of 1980. They disagreed on abortion, tax cuts, energy policy and the MX mobile missile and the role of the private sector in revitalizing cities. And they took a few swipes at President Carter, who skipped the debate. [New York Times] Jimmy Carter's West Coast campaign was to start tomorrow with a trip that is part of an ambitious, high-risk assault on Ronald Reagan's home base, California. The Carter-Mondale commitee has assembled a large paid staff, purchased much television time -- the total budget is $2.25 million -- to win the state that Mr. Reagan governed for eight years. [New York Times] A nuclear warhead was ejected from the Titan 2 missile that exploded in its silo in Arkansas early Friday and landed within the secured area of the missile site, military sources said. They said that the warhead, described as "unarmed" because no command to detonate had been given, remained within the missile site. Defense Secretary Harold Brown adhered to established security policy of refusing even to acknowledge the warhead's existence, but tried to be reassuring. [New York Times] American missile and bomber forces are becoming increasingly vulnerable to a Soviet attack, and this is one of the serious military problems that needs to be rectified in the next few years to help the United States keep a clear edge over the Soviet Union, according to defense specialists. [New York Times] Philadelphia's teachers' strike could end with a tentative two-year contract agreement reached after a 19-hour bargaining session. The strike began 22 days ago, keeping 220,000 children out of school. Teachers' walkouts in other cities continued, but one, in Bellevue, Wash., reportedly was settled. [New York Times] Klamath Indians received large checks from the government as part of an $81.54 million settlement for 135,000 acres of timberland, and they were determined not to repeat a bitter lesson of the past. The new payments are for the remains of the former huge Klamath Reservation in Klamath Falls, Ore. [New York Times] The United States Embassy in Kabul released a Soviet soldier who sought asylum there to Soviet authorities after he had been promised by the Soviet ambassador to Afghanistan that he would not be prosecuted and could leave the army, the State Department said. [New York Times] The border war between Iran and Iraq intensified. Both sides reported heavy fighting in the oil-rich region surrounding the disputed Shatt al Arab waterway, and Iraq claimed the destruction of five Iranian gunboats. On Wednesday, President Saddam Hussein of Iraq abrogated a 1975 treaty with the Shah of Iran providing for joint administration of the waterway and a border running through its middle and deepest channel. He vowed to take back land that Iran had "usurped." [New York Times] West Berlin railroad traffic was disrupted by striking West Berlin employees of the East German railroad who carried out threats to cut off rail lines between the city and West Germany by seizing a traffic control center at a West Berlin station. The rail employees walked out early last week, seeking better working conditions and independent trade unions. Emergency bus and air transportation was organized after the strikers seized the traffic control center. [New York Times] Turkey's new civilian cabinet was announced by the military government. Among the 26 members are 7 retired generals and 13 former government officials. The others are four professors, a labor union leader, a journalist and an industrialist. [New York Times]