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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, SEPTEMBER 7, 1984
PAGE 9
dollar, now valued at less than 80 U.S. cents. (However, Canada's exten
sive and expensive welfare state system won't be touched.) The 45-year-old
Mulroney had campaigned on a promise to improve relations with the United
States, often strained during Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's nearly 16-
year tenure. The U.S. State Department and the Reagan administration are
quite happy over the election outcome.
Washington, on the other hand, is not pleased at all over the July 14 elec
tion results in New Zealand, which brought a left-wing government, headed
by David Lange, into power, ending the long tenure of pragmatic Prime Min
ister Robert Muldoon, who was saddled with blame for the country's falter
ing economy. The new leader, in one of his first statements, promised to
implement a plank in his Labour Party's campaign platform whereby New Zea
land would no longer welcome atomic-powered or atomic-weaponed U.S. war
ships in its ports. The U.S. State Department warned that such an attitude
could spell the end to the ANZUS defense pact, linking Australia and New
Zealand with the United States. As further evidence of New Zealand's shift
to the left, Mr. Lange announced his government would seriously reconsider
cutting diplomatic ties to South Africa. Pretoria didn't waste any time in
its response. It announced it was closing down its mission in Auckland
right away, rather than waiting six months or so to be kicked out.
Finally, in Britain the Labour Party, on July 27, took its long-expected
lurch to the left in foreign policy. The party leadership decided to go
into the next general election unreservedly committed for the first time to
a policy of unilateral nuclear disarmament. The party's National Executive
Committee agreed--without even a vote--that in government it would scrap
the present Polaris and cancel the future Trident nuclear submarines, throw
NATO cruise missiles out of Britain, and shut down the American nuclear
bases. Never before had Labour gone so far.
Should Labour resume reigns of power and actually implement such policies,
it could be the death knell of NATO. The American commitment to Europe
could not survive such a program. And Britain herself would be naked before
her enemies.
"The Temple Mount Plot"
Finally, we present excerpts from a fascinating article in the June 18,
1984 issue of THE NEW REPUBLIC. Entitled "The Temple Mount Plot," it con
tains more information on the growing mood in Israel to establish some sort
of Jewish presence on the Temple Mount. The authors are Barbara and Michael
Ledeen. She was formerly assistant editor at BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGY REVIEW,
and he is now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in
Washington, D.C. They specifically draw attention to the backing given to
the Temple Mount movement by so-called evangelical Christians in the U.S.:
A casual observer might be excused for believing that nearly all
of the recent violence in Israel has been part of the usual cycle
of Arab-Israeli conflict. The observer would be wrong•.•• Much
of the destructive intent is fueled by a mixture of nationalist
politics, messianic longing, and the search for roots. In fact,
some of the current extremism is a direct outgrowth of the an
cient forecast of the Apocalypse.