June 25, 1986

The House Armed Services Committee voted today to sharply limit the deployment of MX missiles until major development begins for a smaller mobile missile, Congressional officials said. The measure, adopted in a closed session on a voice vote, puts pressure on the Pentagon to back development of the a smaller, single-warhead missile, dubbed Midgetman. Senior Defense Department civilians have argued that a larger version of the mobile missile would be more economical, while some moderate members of Congress have backed a single-warhead, 37,000-pound version. The Air Force has stressed the virtues of the smaller version of the missile in Congressional testimony, although some Air Force officials are not enthusiastic about the program.

In a major move reflecting the increased competitiveness among private hospital companies, National Medical Enterprises announced today that it would sell nine traditional hospitals and put more emphasis on psychiatric care, treatment of drug and alcohol abuse and care of the elderly. National Medical, one of the nation's largest hospital management companies, also said it would take write-offs of about $53 million after taxes in connection with the restructuring. The charges mean that in its just-ended fiscal year, the company will show a profit decline for the first time in its 16-year history.

Hurt by falling exports, Japan's economy contracted last quarter, the first such fall in 11 years, the Economic Planning Agency reported today. The agency said that Japan's gross national product for the first quarter of 1986 fell five-tenths of 1 percent in real terms from the fourth quarter of 1985. It was the first decline since the first quarter of 1975, when rising oil prices sparked a recession. [ In New York, the credit markets welcomed the news as reason to hope that the Japanese central bank would lower its discount rate.

A Moscow dispatch on June 11 about drug abuse in the Soviet Union incorrectly described the part of the poppy plant from which opium is derived. Normally the stems and seed pods, not the seeds, contain opium.

The Koch administration is considering whether to dismiss the counsel to the city's Transportation Department for refusing to waive his immunity against prosecution and testify before a Bronx grand jury, city officials said yesterday. Mayor Koch, in a meeting with reporters on Monday, said that officials who invoked their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination and declined to testify in the ongoing investigations into municipal corruption might raise a ''question of my confidence in their judgment'' and could be subject to dismissal. The Mayor said there was one official who fell into that category, but did not identify him. Other officials said he was referring to the Transportation Department counsel, Robert A. Shaw. Mr. Shaw was appointed to the post by Anthony R. Ameruso, who resigned as Transportation Commissioner earlier this year.