January 14, 1974

D K Shipler survey of land reform in S Vietnam finds program reversing in some areas after reaching near success in dissolving large land holdings and distributing them to poor tenant farmers, thus eliminating one of the Vietcong's strongest pol issues; plantation owners in secure areas around S Vietnam are coming back to reclaim land they abandoned because of the war; local officials demand that peasants relinquish land titles they were given a few yrs ago; moves erode what was one of the most ambitious land‐reform programs in Asia, financed largely by US aid and undertaken in ‘70 as a pol effort to woo peasants from allegiance to the Vietcong; in its 3 1/2 yrs program has transferred 1/5 millions acres to farmers; Mekong Delta was area where tenancy had been virtually eliminated; some legislators and Govt officials are concerned that current backsliding, affecting provs adjacent to Saigon and parts of Central Highlands, will revive land issue for the Communists; earlier land reform programs discussed; S Vietnamese officials, Vu Cong Minh and Bui Huu Tiem, and farmers comment; farmer illus (L)

Questions and answers on reality and cause of oil shortage (M)

The Administration will propose spending about $1.6billion for energy research and development during the next fiscal year. Page 20.

Rept by former White House aide David R Young Jr, submitted to Pres Nixon in ‘72, reptdly concludes that classified materials were provided to columnist Jack Anderson, whose publication in Dec, ‘71, of White House papers on India‐Pakistan war initially prompted investigation into alleged mil intelligence operation inside White House

Torn between bucolic calm and hard cash, the voters of Wolcott, near Waterbury, approved the construction of Connecticut's first thoroughbred track. Article, Page 31.