JAPAN: No Time for Tea

In Tokyo one day early this month, a Japanese policeman noticed a woman hurrying furtively along the street, asked her what was in the bundle she was carrying. Instead of answering, the woman made for a truck, tossed the bundle in, and managed to shake off the cops. Police followed the truck to a garage, found it to be crammed with Communist records and literature. Japan’s eight top Communist leaders had been in hiding ever since the government ordered their arrests more than a year ago. The new find gave police evidence enough to crack down on most of the second-stringers who had taken their places in the hierarchy.

One day last week a fleet of white trucks loaded with 440 cops sped away from Tokyo’s metropolitan police station. The arrival of the raiders at Red headquarters near Meiji Park sent men & women party members tumbling out of the doors to be collared outside. Inside, sitting calmly at a clean-topped desk, was Eiichi Iwata, a high party official. “I knew you were coming,” he told the raiders. “I’ve developed a terrific sixth sense from long years of experience. The place is swept clean, but I had no time to prepare tea.” Other raids—at a greengrocer’s home in Shimizu, a metal shop in Osaka—led to the arrest of seven more, leaving 19 Red fugitives, including top dog Sanzo Nozaka, still at large.