A Letter From The Publisher: Oct. 21, 1966

TWENTY years ago, when the red, white and blue flag of the new Republic of the Philippines was hoisted over the islands, replacing the Stars and Stripes, which had flown during 48 years of U.S. colonial rule, TIME carried a cover story on President Manuel Roxas and the problems facing his country. At that time, the future looked bleak. “There is no national economy, no export trade,” we reported. Threatened by 150,000 Huk guerrillas, the “newest and poorest nation on earth could never hope to outlive its first free month” without massive U.S. aid.

Today, under President Ferdinand Marcos, the Philippines stand on their own feet. The country has serious problems; but as this week’s cover makes clear, it has taken its place as a full-fledged member of the Asian community of nations.

When TIME scheduled the Marcos cover, the reporting team dispatched to Manila found itself with a double duty. Hong Kong Bureau Chief Frank McCulloch and Correspondent Art Zich were faced not only with 14 days of interviews, but they also had to prepare TIME’S coverage of the Manila Conference next week, which will draw 600 newsmen, with a resulting strain on hotels, communications and transport.

Our correspondents traveled from the Huk-ridden Pampanga province north of Manila to Cebu, 400 miles to the southeast. McCulloch spent 20 hours at Malacanang Palace, the presidential residence. Zich managed to interview several outlaw Huk leaders in a brandy-braced session that broke up at 4 a.m., when the bandits and gun-toting bodyguards disappeared into the jungle.

Associate Editor Robert Jones, who wrote the cover story, spent six months in the Philippines during a tour with the Navy in the 1950s. “At first it all seems kind of scruffy and jungly,” he recalls. “Then it starts to grow on you, and you want to go back. It has a crazy kind of charm.”

TIME is written by 40 individualists, each too intent upon his own stories to compare notes with fellow writers. Yet somehow, without consultation, a phrase or a theme will occasionally run through the pages of an issue. This week seems to be animal week.

Some of the animals are metaphorical, like the ten-ton mouse that turns up in the Cinema review of Hawaii, or the plump bird who nests alone in another movie review, or the pug dog with brain damage in a Show Business account of a new comedienne. One of the beasts is mythological: the angry river dragon who threatens the forthcoming Laotian election as reported in The World. Another is symbolic: the burnt butterfly in Show Business’ report on Viet Nam protest plays.

But many of the animals are real.

Sport takes a look at hunting falcons, while a Medicine story on the latest Nobel Prize tells how a Plymouth Rock hen helped in cancer research. Singing lizards show up in The Nation’s report on U.S. civilians in Viet Nam, and World Business relates how German businessmen are up in arms over a frozen pig.

One of the more intriguing animals—the bedbug, being considered by the U.S. Army for use as an enemy-detection device—had to be deleted by the editors for lack of space.