77-20-B1

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Olympics

Transcript As 1980 edges closer I’m sure many of us will find our thoughts turning to Moscow and the Olympic games. I’ll be right back. Some time ago on one of these broadcasts I told how the Soviet Union through some several of it’s spiritual unofficial allies—you might in the absence of formal ties call them ideological soul mates—was working to shut Israel out of the 1980 Olympics. At the time I indicated a little unhappiness with the International Olympic Committees tendency to waffle a bit when a stand on principle is called for. The committee was established from the beginning to be above politics, absolutely independent of any and all governments, supreme authority and sole owner of the Olympic games. Membership on the committee is pretty exclusive, new members can be appointed only by recommendation of established members of the committee. Each new committee member takes a solemn oath to keep himself free “from all political, sectarian or commercial influence.” Now that pledge didn’t cause any problems in an earlier day but in the world as it is now obviously no citizen of a totalitarian country could take such an oath. And yet the roster shows the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Cuba and East Germany represented on the committee by full fledged members in good standing. Can it be we’re wrong and totalitarians will permit a certain freedom in the name of sport? No, it seems the International Olympic Committee solves this problem as it has so many others. The oath was waived for these members. The late Avery Brundage President of the Olympics for 20 years1 said that “unfortunately there are large sections of the world today where the form of government precludes full independence of it’s citizens.” Alexander Solzhenitsyn puts it a little more bluntly. But in 1969 it was also ruled that such non-independent members could never total more than 10% of the membership. And last June in observance of that quota the committee, turned down recommendations from Eastern block Iron Curtain countries—the “People's Democratic Republic of Korea (that’s North Korea) included. Now that sounds better—or it did until the committee decided to boost it’s membership by accepting citizens from such bastions of freedom as Mali, Mongolia and Libya. It is not known whether they were asked to take the oath of independence. Possibly they weren’t since the individuals chosen are members Presidents of their national Olympic committees & are therefore fully accountable to their govts. And those govts, are not exactly our idea of a Republic or a Democracy. In Mali the power all of it, is vested in the Revolutionary Military Council. In Mongolia it is the Communist party and in Libya it is Colonel Qaddafi2 the absolute Dictator. One thing is certain, they are all solid allies of the Kremlin and will be helpful in seeing that the 1980 Olympics in Moscow are successful, as success is defined by the Kremlin. I’ve always suspected the Russian Athletes do as well as they do because they think there are real bullets in the starters gun. If there were I won- der if the International Committee would protest. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening.		Details Batch Number 77-20-B1 Production Date 09/27/1977 Book/Page RPtV-201 Audio Youtube? No
		Added Notes from the book: Avery Brundage was president of the International Olympic Committee from 1952 to 1972. Muammar Qaddafi.