CURRENT INTELLIGENCE BULLETIN - 1956/04/15

• Document Type: SPECIALCOLLECTION
• Collection: Current/Central Intelligence Bulletin Collection
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 02995600
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: October 25, 2019
• Document Release Date: October 31, 2019
• Publication Date: April 15, 1956

. Approved for Release: 2019/10/21
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CURRENT
INTELLIGENCE
BULLETIN
15 April 1956
Copy No.
POCUMENT NO.
NO CHANGE IN
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NEXT REVIEW DATE:
03
AUT
REVIEWS
OFFICE OF CURRENT INTELLIGENCE
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
A
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CONTENTS
1.
2. USSR OFFERS ARMS TO LEBANON
page 5
�
3. INDONESIAN GOVERNMENT ANNOUNCES WILLINGNESS
TO ACCEPT SOVIET AID (page 6).
4 SUBMARINE CONSTRUCTION AT SHANGHAI
(page 7).
5. CAPTURE OF HOA HAO DISSIDENT LEADER BA CUT
(page 8).
6. SOVIET OFFICERS INSPECT AFGHAN INSTALLATIONS
ON PAKISTANI BORDER (page 9).
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 2
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2. USSR USSR OFFERS ARMS TO LEBANON
The Soviet military attach�n Beirut
offered in early April to supply Lebanon
with antitank weapons, tanks and planes,
according to General Chehab, Lebanese
chiel ol stall. Chehab stated he had declined the offer by
saying that Lebanon did not have funds for this purpose.
On 13 April, Chehab informed the Ameri-
can military attach�hat Lebanon urgently needed 24 recoiless
105 or 106-mm. antitank guns and 50 to 100 rounds of am-
munition per gun. He indicated that price was no object as
the Lebanese militgry budget for this year had just been in-
creased by 7 million Lebanese pounds to permit additional
procurement.
Comment The Soviet offer of military assistance to
the Lebanese was probably made in an
attempt to encourage Lebanon to identify itself more closely
with the Egyptian-Saudi-Syrian bloc, which is now receiving
arms from the Soviet bloc. The USSR may have estimated
that the new Lebanese cabinet headed by Prime Minister
Yafi, who is known for his anti-Western sentiments, would
be more open to Soviet offers than previous governments.
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 5
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3. INDONESIAN GOVERNMENT ANNOUNCES WILLINGNESS
TO ACCEPT SOVIET AID
Comment
Indonesian foreign minister Abdulgani
told the press on 12 April that Indonesia
had agreed' in principle to accept a re-
cent Soviet offer to extend economic and
technical aid. Abdulgani said the proposal,
had not yet been studied in detail so that
the amount involved, and whether it would
be a grant or a loan, were not yet elear.
Presumably negotiations to define the of-
fer are in progress. The Soviet ambas-
sador said on 10 April that the aid might be applied to any
fields including agriculture and industry.
Previous Soviet offers have been ignored
by the Indonesian government. Its present receptiveness
has probably been influenced by recent examples of Burma
and India in accepting Soviet aid.
(Concurred in by ORR)
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 6
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4. SUBMARINE CONSTRUCTION AT SHANGHAI
A major expansion of Chinese Commu-
nist capabilities in submarine con-
struction over the past year is in-
dicated
;he Kiangnan ship-
yard at Shanghai,
was largely occupied with submarine construction. By
contrast. in April 1955
the yard did not then have the many shops and
heavy equipment needed to build submarines,
approxi-
mately 150 Soviet specialists are at the yard supervising
the construction of ten large coastal submarines of Soviet
design. "top priority" has
been assigned to submarine building, since such craft
would be the "backbone of China's coastal defense."
Information
constitutes the first evidence that the Chinese may be
constructing their own submarine hulls rather than merely
assembling hull sections prefabricated in the USSR.
the submarine hull plates were
rolled at China's largest steel mill at Anshan in Manchuria.
The Anshan plant is known to be capable of such production.
(Prepared jointly with
ORR)
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 7
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5, CAPTURE OF HOA HAO DISSIDENT LEADER BA CUT
The capture of Hoa Hao leader Ba
Cut by the Vietnamese army on 13
April is an important victory for
President Diem in his long campaign
against warlordism in South Vietnam.
Since the surr enaer -of Iloallao rebel
Tran Van Soai in February, Ba Cut
had been the last prominent figure in
militant opposition to the government.
obtain his surrender had failed despite
heavy military pressure against him.
Ba Cut's followers were recently esti-
mated at up to 3,000', about a third of whom were armed
and active. The Viet Minh, having infiltrated the rebels,
has been using Ba Cut's dissidence as a cover for its own
activities and as an auxiliary arm of its clandestine organi-
zation in the south.
Although Ba Cut's capture reil...oves an
important asset to the Viet Minh's subversive apparatus,
the Communists will attempt to rethAn control over those
Hoa Hao elements remaining at large.
15 Apr 56
CUrrent Intelligence Bulletin Page 8
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6. SOVIET OFFICERS INSPECT AFGHAN INSTALLATIONS
ON PAKISTANI BORDER
A party of Soviet officers and enlisted
men inspected Afghan army posts in
the Baroghil area along Pakistan's
northern frontier in the latter part of
March,
Soviet officer who made two trips to the arez
One
accompanied on his second visit by a newly
assigned Afghan officer who was placed in charge of the
area.
Comment
Baroghil is situated on Pakistan's extreme northern
border in a mountainous area where Pakistan is separated
from the USSR by less than 50 miles of Afghan territory.
Traditional caravan routes from Pakistan to China and
Russia, now closed, ran through the Baroghil Pass.
The presence of Soviet military person-
nel in this area which the Afghans have always treated as
highly restricted suggests that Kabul is now giving the
Russians a much freer hand within Afghanistan than in
the past.
The Russian visit was probably primarily
for routine military intelligence�
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 9
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THE ARAB-ISRAELI SITUATION
(Information as of 1700, 15 April)
information had been received
that Israeli army officers were saying Israel would make a
"sudden attack on Egypt and Jordan after Hammarskj old had
finished his visit." While the UN -secretary general presumably
-
will return to New York sometime late this week, there is no
fixed date for the end of his mission. He is expected to visit
Israel and Egypt again following talks with his staff this week
end in Beirut.
the arrival of an Egyptian force
at the'Syrian port of Latakia. The force, whose size
and purpose are unknown, had come on the Egyptian yacht
Mahroussa, which has previously carried personnel between
Egypt and Yugoslavia. The force was expected to arrive in
Damascus at 2230 hours the same day. This is the first time
that what purports to be an Egyptian military force, as distinct
from advisers or headquarters parties, has been despatched
to another Arab state.
The Israeli mobilization activity which began
in Tel Aviv on 12 April continued on 13 April with about 100
taxis picking up call-ups in Ramat Gan motor park. One unit
called up has been identified as a heavy mortar battalion �
another is an antiaircraft/antitank unit.
On 12 April, a single Israeli transport air-
craft was observed making practice paratroop drops of single
sticks of 20 men each.
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the director general of the Israelj Defense Ministry
left Israel on an overseas mission, country unknown, on 13
April,
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 10
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A French Foreign Ministry official has told
the American embassy in Paris that France is not contemplating
further deliveries of Mystere jet fighters to Israel "at least not
before the Pineau-Dulles meeting."
15 Apr 56
Current Intelligence Bulletin Page 11
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