European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 12, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Thursday january 12, 1989 the stars and stripes Page 7 soviets May have . Missile recorder Washington a the Penta gon is investigating the loss of a flight data recorder from a Long Range nuclear missile test in 1987, and there is a possibility the soviets May have recovered the device the Pentagon said tuesday night. T the recorder would contain valuable information about the performance of the minuteman 2 missile according to lbs evening news which first reported the Story. The recorder was part of a july 7, 1987, test shot said army maj. Bill o Connell a spokesman for the defense department. The missile which carried a Dummy warhead and not an actual nuclear weapon was launched from California toward Kwajalein atoll a Coral ringed atoll in the Marshall islands in the Western Pacific Ocean which the United states uses to test the accuracy of its strategic nuclear weapons. . Officials recovered 400 pounds of debris from the Bottom of the Lagoon the next morning and shipped it Back to the United states for analysis lbs said. But the 45-Day Long analysis turned up no sign of the flight data recorder. Part of the payload from the Dummy warhead which splashed Down in the atoll was lost said o Connell. It is unlikely that the soviets recovered it in the hours Between splashdown and the first search but that possibility cannot be ruled  there Are Many possibilities that might account for the loss including accidents during the handling of the recovered debris poor record keeping and problems in shipping he said. None of these possibilities has been ruled out and the investigation is  the recorder was not classified o Connell noted but its recovery would be useful to our missile testing efforts and five searches have accordingly been mounted to find  the soviets May have grabbed the re Corder with a mini submarine lbs said. A soviet trawler was about 50 Miles away from Kwajalein the network re ported. O Connell refused to say if a soviet sub had been detected in the area. There have been a number of reports of soviet submarine sightings and these re ports Are not being ignored he said. I cannot however confirm that there was soviet submarine activity in or near  but he did confirm a lbs report that soviet personnel May have landed on Kwajalein which is supposed to be Unin habited. . Officials have found Vodka bottles cigarettes Bug Spray and a few tech Nical items of soviet manufacture that could not have floated ashore and would have been unlikely to have been left ashore purposefully he said. The test shot came nine months after the soviets had ended a fishing agreement with Kiribati the Island nation next to the marshalls o Connell noted. If the fishing agreement had still been in effect the soviets would have had support capabilities to try to recover the payload with a submarine he said. But in july 1987, the soviet fishing Fleet Only had Access to Vanuatu Over 2,000 Miles from Kwajalein. O Connell said in a statement that Clandestine soviet landings in the mar shall islands Are illegal and a Clear infringement of the sovereignty of the mar shall islands in addition to being a Challenge to the Security of the . Test ing  it s just a flesh wound pardner president Reagan uses his bandaged hand to tip a Cowboy hat presented to him this week by a Trade organization he was addressing. Reagan under went 2vi hours of surgery saturday at Walter Reed army medical Center to have a curvature of his left ring Finger corrected. Bush to enforce deficit panel s report deadline by the los Angeles times Washington president elect George Bush told the National economic commission tuesday that he wants it to present its recommendations for cutting the Federal budget deficit March 1 As scheduled rather than to continue deliberating until autumn As its leaders had hoped. The request relayed to Drew Lewis the commission s Republican co chairman by Treasury Secretary Nicholas f. Brady is expected to intensify pressure on the 14-Mem ber panel and possibly even nullify its Impact entirely if it cannot overcome its partisan disagreements soon. Both Lewis and Robert s. Strauss the panel s democratic co chairman have warned that the commission could end up split along party lines if it is forced to meet the March 1 deadline. They suggested that the commission could have More Impact if the recommendations were delayed until fall. Some democratic members of the panel expressed dismay tuesday Over Brady s Call. One suggested that the move might be designed deliberately to Blunt the panel s influence by forcing it to act before its Mem Bers have time to thrash out their differences. The panel set up by Congress in late 1987, was de signed to Hammer out a bipartisan deficit reduction plan similar to the Way an earlier commission worked out a proposal for overhauling the social Security financing system. Bush has been Cool to the commission concept pre Ferring negotiations Between his administration and Congress. However he does t want to snub the panel for fear of creating turmoil in financial circles and of appearing unconcerned about the deficit. Murders in la Kean urges scrapping no fault Law dropped in 88 los Angeles a the City s murder rate dropped to its lowest level in 10 years but gang slayings and gang re lated crimes Rose in los Angeles last year police said. Murders in the nation s second largest City fell from 832 in 1987 to 734 last year the lowest total since 1978, when there were 678 homicides according to police statistics released monday. There were 257 gang killings in the City in 1988 compared with 205 in 1987, an increase that was caused by a near doubling of the gang population. Los Angeles murder rate of 22.9 kill Ings for every 100,000 residents is lower than that of Many other Large cities department spokesman cmdr. William Booth said. Washington d.c., the nation s Mur Der Leader lists 59.2 murders per 100,000 people followed by Detroit with 58 and Dallas with 56.7. Trenton . Not reflecting the growing anger of car owners Over soaring insurance premiums gov. Thomas h. Kean tuesday proposed scrapping new Jersey s 16-year-old sys tem of no fault automobile insurance an Experiment originally intended to save Drivers Money. The proposal was the first admission by a top political Leader that the system was irrevocably flawed and beyond repair. New Jersey motorists have seen their premiums Rise sharply in recent years while politicians tried to pin blame on each other. The governor s proposal was delivered As part of his seventh state of the state message to a joint sesion of the legis lature in which he hailed new Jersey s economic Progress and warned of shrink ing state revenues. Kean outlined a modest list of Initia Tives including programs that would help create Low income housing preserve open lands and allow Public financing of legislative races. With the average Premium for Auto insurance now More than $ 1,000 a year and with a $2.5 billion deficit for the state s underwriting association insurance protest rallies have become com Mon and politicians have competed with one another to blame special interests for the motorists plight. Until tuesday however most politicians have suggested ways to Reform no fault insurance rather than dismantle it. If we can t have real no fault it is time to admit the system does t work and shoot it and put us out of our mis Ery Kean said. At the heart of the problem is an insurance system established in 1973 that preserved the right of motorists to sue when an Accident caused More than $200 in medical expenses. The result was a Sharp increase in the number of litigation and in the Cost of insurance. In a 1983 Reform attempt the legis lature passed and Kean signed a Bill to create a joint underwriting association to serve Drivers who could not buy insurance from companies because they were considered poor risks. The Bill permitted private insurance agents to sell the association s policies but the association which is operated by the state would pay out claims. In fact the legislation made it Profita ble for agents to sell the association s policies. As a result about half of new Jersey s Drivers wound up with policies from the association and last year the association ran a $2.5 billion deficit. With new Jersey s automobile insurance rates the highest in the country the governor last fall signed a Bill intended to bail out the association and get most Drivers Back into the private or voluntary Market. Even with that latest move expert say motorists premiums Are expected to continue climbing