What was going on when I was born?

Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. met in New York today with Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, and a State Department spokesman said later that United States ''assistance'' would be necessary well into the 1990's for what was called ''the support'' of five Saudi Awacs aircraft. The statement was worded differently from one made by Mr. Haig yesterday in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Mr. Haig told the committee that because of what he called a shortage of Saudi air crews and technicians, ''there will be an American presence in the aircraft and on the ground well into the 1990's.'' Department of Defense estimates of the time necessary to train crews for Airborne Warning and Control System aircraft are much less than the more than 10 years suggested by Mr. Haig's testimony yesterday. Training Time Varies A published United States Air Force statement said that about 300 NATO airmen who began training in July at Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma to operate NATO Awacs were in programs that ''vary from 3 to 55 weeks, with an average time of about 4 months.''

1 BOMBER By RICHARD HALLORAN Speci al to the New York Times WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - President Reagan, announcing his long-awaited proposals to revitalize the nation's strategic nuclear deterrent today, swept aside the much-debated plan for a ''shell game'' of MX missiles shuttled among shelters in the Western deserts. He said that he intended to base the new intercontinental missile in existing silos that will be super-hardened. The President also revived the B-1 long-range bomber, canceled by President Carter, and proposed building 100 President's remarks on weapons plan and background statement, page 12. of the aircraft. And he told reporters at the White House that more powerful and accurate nuclear missiles would be acquired for Trident submarines, to strengthen the least vulnerable leg of the triad of weapons that make up the strategic deterrent.

President Reagan's decision today on modernizing the American strategic nuclear arsenal is based on an apparent contradiction: There is a continued belief that land-based missiles are vulnerable to a surprise Soviet attack, yet the programs it proposes to set in motion will do virtually nothing to reduce that theoretical vulnerability. According t o Pentagon experts, the President's p lan to build MX missiles, place them in existing silos and pour more concrete to harden them against blast represents a giant step aw ay from a solution. To them, safety can come only from mobility, and Mr. Reagan has scrapped that approach for now. If land-based missiles are vulnerable, they are so because, as Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger himself said at his confirmation hearings, their locations are fixed, detectable by Soviet satellites and capable of being struck by accurate Soviet missiles.

New York State's populations of deer, geese, beaver, wild turkey and several other species are growing so fast that some have become nuisances, wildlife officials say. Even coyotes and moose have been spotted for the first time in many years. The number of deer is estimated at 650,000, the highest in history, the officials say, which has led the state to take advantage of the hunting season to cut that figure back. And increasing numbers of such smaller animals as otters and raccoons have led to a renewal of the trapping industry.

A new leak has been discovered in the tubing of a steam generator at the Indian Point 3 nuclear plant - one of 17 in the country where such tubing has been affected by rust. The leak has delayed plans by the Power Authority of the State of New York to put the plant back into service after several weeks of routine maintenance. The authority, which said it was conducting inspections of the plant's steam generator system, said yesterday that it did not know how long the plant would be out of service. Indian Point 3 and the adjacent Indian Point 2, both in the Westchester County village of Buchanan, are owned by the Consolidated Edison Company. Indian Point 2 has also been identified as a plant with a rust problem.

Deployment of a limited number of MX missiles, starting in 1986, in existing Titan or Minuteman missile silos, which would be ''hardened'' to withstand the effects of a nuclear attack. At least 100 missiles to be deployed by the end of the decade in one or more of the following modes: aboard aircraft in continuous flight, in deep underground silos or in bases protected by missile defense systems.

An extensive loss of jobs among adults, including more layoffs of construction workers and schoolteachers, pushed the nation's unemployment rate up to 7.5 percent in September, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The unemployment rate was three-tenths of a percentage point higher than the 7.2 percent level in the previous month, marking the second successive increase after three months of decline last summer. The bureau reported that 7,966,000 Americans were unemployed last month, 309,000 more than in August. At the same time, the total number of those with jobs dropped to 98,270,000, a decline of 675,000. Dr. Janet L. Norwood, commissioner of the bureau, said the marked rise in unemployment combined with the drop in the number of people now working indicated that ''at best the economy is very flat.''

Vice President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt conveyed to President Reagan today an urgent request that the United States take immediate steps to bolster the Sudan's military forces in the face of growing clashes between Sudanese and Libyan forces along the Sudan's border with Chad. The Reagan Administration, which has already pledged to help any nation that faces threats from Libya, has asked Congress for an increase from $30 million to $100 million in foreign military credits for the Sudan in the new fiscal year, but the aid bill has not yet been acted upon by Congress. In addition, the Administration has offered to sell the Sudan F-5E fighter planes, but the Sudanese have been unable to arrange the financing for them, State Department officials said.

Occupied West Bank, Sept. 29 - Israel has begun carrying out a revised policy of occupation designed to build up moderate Palestinian Arabs on the West Bank and curtail the radical political influence of the Palestine Liberation Organization. On the orders of Ariel Sharon, the new Defense Minister, West Bank residents who travel abroad have been warned that if they so much as speak to anyone from the P.L.O. they will be arrested upon their return. In addition, Palestinian officials say, funds from the P.L.O. and Arab countries, which for years had sustained municipal foundations in the region's small cities and towns, have been cut off completely by the Israeli authorities, with no compensat ing Israeli money to fill the gap. This week, the Palestinians add, a military decree was issued prohibiting West Bank residents from holding bank accounts abroad. The measure is expected to cause severe disruption in the territory's financial life.

Hiroshima, the target of an atomic bomb in World War II, sent telegrams to the United States and the Soviet Union today protesting nuclear tests carried out by both nations yesterday. The telegrams, signed by Mayor Takeshi Araki of Hiroshima, were sent to the Ambassadors of the United States and the Soviet Union, Mike Mansfield and Dmitri S. Polyansky. City officials said the Mayor, in his telegrams, criticized yesterday's nuclear tests in Nevada and Novaya Zemlya, an archipeligo in the Soviet northwest, and called for an end to nuclear testing.

Jordan and Qatar have offered their support to Kuwait if it is attacked again, and other Arab countries today strongly condemned yesterday's air strike on a Kuwaiti oil installation. Kuwait, supported by United States air surveillance reports, has accused Iran of carrying out the raid, which damaged a major oil complex but caused no casualties.

Iranians voted amid heavy security today to elect their second president in less than three months, and the expected winner went on the radio even before the polls closed to promise that he would retain the present Government. While official results are not expected for a few days, Hojatolislam Ali Khamenei, the leader of the governing Islamic Republican Party, announced that as president he would retain Ayatollah Mohammed Riza Mahdavi-Kani as Prime Minister and back the policies of the fundamentalist Government. Prime Minister Mahdavi-Kani had been one of the four other candidates in the election, but he withdrew last night in favor of the party leader. (Another nominee, Energy Minister Hasan Ghafuri-Fard, announced his withdrawal while the election was under way, leaving two candidates with little support opposing Mr. Khamenei in the race, United Press International reported.)