February 28, 1981

At Georgetown University, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of Britain receives mantle from the Rev. J. Donald Freeze, left, and the Rev. Timothy S. Healy, right, school president. Page 4.

The Reagan Administration plans to request funds to reactivate two World War II battleships as soon as possible, and possibly two more later, when it submits a new military budget authorizing nearly $223 billion for the fiscal year 1982 to Congress next Wednesday, Pentagon and Congressional officials disclosed today. The Administration, those officials said, has decided to build a much larger fleet than previously planned. The budget request will be the first tangible evidence of the course it has set to counter what a senior naval intelligence officer has described in Congressional testimony as ''unbelievably ambitious'' Soviet program of naval construction. The revised budget, which has grown by $3 billion in recent weeks, would include about $9 billion more for the Navy to buy new ships and aircraft. That would be about 40 percent more than the Carter Administration requested for naval procurement. The new military budget, on which finishing touches are still being applied, also calls for funds to begin construction of a new class of nuclear-powered battle cruisers to be fitted with the Aegis system of radar and computer-controlled weapons for fleet defense.

A bus and subway fare increase of 10 cents to 15 cents appears to be a virtual certainty despite the aid provided in the transportation program Governor Carey will present next week, officials familiar with the plan said today. The Governor's program is aimed entirely at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's capital needs. It provides no new operating funds for the authority, leaving a deficit estimated at $100 million to $120 million for the state's new fiscal year, which begins April 1. According to Arthur G. Perfall, a spokesman for the authority, the deficit would require the agency to commit itself to a fare increase or find some other new source of revenue by July 1. That date is the authority's deadline for adopting a budget for the New York City Transit Authority.

The White House announced today that President Reagan had decided on additional budget cuts of $10 billion to $13 billion to achieve his goal of reducing the growth of Federal spending and offset a budgetary miscalculation on spending in the next fiscal year. A scheduled two-hour meeting ran 30 minutes overtime as the President and members of his Cabinet went step by step through options designed to cut the budget to meet the Administration's goal of holding Federal spending to $695.5 billion in the fiscal year 1982. This would be an increase over the estimated $654.7 billion in this year's budget, but $41.4 billion less than what the 1982 budget proposed by President Carter would have been if left unchanged. On Feb. 18, President Reagan outlined reductions in 83 programs totaling $34.4 billion and said he would announce $7 billion in additional cuts on March 10. But after the disclosure Wednesday that the Office of Management and Budget had underestimated the growth in Government spending for 1982, Mr. Reagan had to find $3 billion to $6 billion more in spending reductions to meet his goal.

More than one million people marched through the center of Madrid tonight to express their support for the nation's young democratic institutions and to condemn this week's failed military coup. Big crowds gathered elsewhere in Spain for similar demonstrations. King Juan Carlos I, who halted the coup attempt by rallying key commanders as the plot unfolded, was repeatedly cheered. A flag bearing the words ''Long Live the King!'' drew strong applause, even from young students, as did a large photograph of the King borne aloft by one man.