The Key West Citizen

Portuguese Forces Prepare To Repel Liberation Try In Goa
By HAROLD K. MILLS

Nova Goa, Portuguese India ( )—Portuguese Goa, which legend says was saved from invaders by a miracle two centuries ago, is depending today on different forces to halt a threatened march from India on Aug. 15.

The presence of a team of observers from six other nations, proposed this week by Portugal and agreed to by India, may postpone or even avert the invasion.

But if the foreign watchers don't have that effect, the Portuguese say they are ready. Gov. Gen. Paulo Bernard Guedes, grayhaired leader of Portugal's government here, has alerted all troops and police to repel any attempt by a "liberation army" to invade this ancient fountainhead of the Christian religion in the Indian subcontinent.

Behind these forces stand more than 300,000 Goan Christians whose forefathers helped to send the earliest Roman Catholic missionaries into India. Christians now number more than five million in India.

Portugal and the Latin nations supporting its defense of Goa regard the battle against Indian demands for a merger of the territory with the Indian republic as a holy war.

The action, they say, is in defense of the shrine of St. Francis Xavier - the Portuguese missionary who led the Catholic march to Goa and died more than 400 years ago.

In New Delhi, Prime Minister Nehru's government rejects both the claim that it is threatening the ancient fountainhead of the Christian religion in India and that the merger with India movement is a violation of Portuguese sovereignty. India, says its spokesmen, simply supporting "legitimate attempts of the Goans themselves to win freedom from colonial suppression."

The Portuguese, and many Goan leaders here, dispute this argument. India, they say, is attempting to foment a movement both within and without the Portuguese territory to throw Portugal out of the subcontinent.

The Indian government has repeatedly asserted that it intends when and if it wins possession of Portuguese India, to retain and defend both the religious and cultural developments there.

Since 1510, when the Portuguese entered what is now Goa to help drive the Mogul armies from this territory, it has been the center of Catholic religious activity not only for India but for the whole of Southeast Asia.

The miracle which saved Goa from invaders two centuries ago directly concerned St. Francis Xavier, whose body in a great silver casket is the area's most prized religious shrine.

Military defense against the Mogul hordes seemed hopeless. The military governor of the colony prayed for divine assistance. He grasped from its shrine in Goa's cathedral the staff of St. Francis, which had been preserved as a holy relic. The invading armies turned back before reaching Goa.

The staff still is handed over to each new governor general to give him strength to defend Goa.

With or without the staff, Gen. Guedes has ample strength today to drive back "volunteers" from India. But it will take a greater miracle than that of two centuries ago to save Goa for Portugal if Nehru decides to send his regular army and air forces against Goa in support of any "liberation movement."