A retired Navy admiral has affirmed that the nerve gas sarin was used during the Vietnam War, but that he did not know about its use until afterward Operation Tailwind. The Pentagon has insisted that sarin gas was never used during the Vietnam War, but the chemical was in their arsenal at the time. Because of these reports, Defense Secretary William Cohen has ordered an investigation of the Army and Air Force. Officials are saying they're not sure they believe the reports because sarin gas would have been ineffective in the heat. The investigation may be hampered, because according to the report, commanders said they did not file complete reports after the mission. Sarin gas, lethal if even just 100 milligrams is inhaled, was used in recent memory on an attack in a Tokyo subway.

A magnitude-5.1 earthquake rocked eastern California late Monday but there were no reports of injuries or damage. It hit about 10:25 pm (7:25 pm EDT) and was centered about 10 miles southeast of Mammoth Lakes. About 3 minutes later a 3.3 aftershock arrived and was followed by dozens of smaller quakes. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) monitors the region for volanic unrest but says there is no immediate risk of eruption. Mammoth Lakes is a popular Eastern Sierra ski resort town which sits on the edge of the ancient Long Valley caldera, formed by a volcanic explosion 760,000 years ago. The most recent eruption in the region was about 500 years ago in the Mono Craters area.

Monday at Utah Valley State College, Count Nikolai Tolstoy committed a crime that could land him in a British jail for a three-year sentence. He broke a British court order by talking passionately about his discovery that a highranking English official ordered the illegal banishment of some 50,000 Cossacks to Soviet slave camps at the end of WWII. Judges have barred Tolstoy from speaking or writing about his research which was gleaned from thousands of government documents and interviews with survivors. In 1990 he was slapped with a British court injunction and fined the equivalent of $2.5 million for writing in a book that a military leader lied in documents dealing with Britains military maneuvers with the Cossacks. Instead of shepherding the horsemen to Austria as was written in the papers, an official named Lord Aldington ordered them into cattle trucks and shipped them to a Stalin-run gulag. Resistors met a violent death. Tolstoy was tried in closed-door proceedings, and the white-wigged judge refused to weigh evidence presented in the form of testimony from soldiers and unsealed government papers. Now he claims to have since uncovered information, including some found in the Russian archives, supporting his claim that Aldington committed perjury during the libel trial. President Boris Yeltsin personally ordered the books be opened to Tolstoy for research. The closed-door trial resulted in a lien being placed against Tolstoy's estate and belongings, including his extensive book collection. However, they have not yet taken his things. A European Court of Human Rights ruled in 1995 that Britain violated his civil rights, and has asked the court to overturn its previous decision. Tolstoy was financially supported during this trial by donations and a European prince who backed his cause. He decided to speak out this year because he believes Britain should accept the consequences of its actions.

Tolstoy has also agreed to exhibit the Cross of St. Spyridon at the LDS Church Museum of History and Art. It will be the first showing in the United States of the golden cross, which was given to the Tolstoy family in 1420 by Czar Vasily the Blind. The cross was last shown in public at the Tolstoy Exhibition in Paris about 20 years ago.

The city's plan to put physically and mentally disabled mothers to work for their welfare benefits is supposed to help the women become self-sufficient according to NYC Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Citing that advocates used to argue that people with disabilities were not given work opportunities, he emphasized that the program will enroll them in work experience programs where they will get training, where they will get help, and where they will be moved along to the level of self-sufficiency they can reach. But advocates for the needy say the mayor is trying to shoehorn thousands of disabled women into the workforce, and in many cases could jeopardize the women's chances of qualifying for federal benefits. A staff attorney with Legal Aid said "Workfare is not rehabilitation. It's sweeping streets, cleaning out wastebaskets in the courthouse." Of the 410 women evaluated so far, only 36% were found fit to work. The director of rehab services at Goodwill Industries, which is screening participants for the city, said "I don't think there are going to be as many people participating as we had thought. There's a significant percentage of these folks that are quite seriously disabled." Similar debates have been going on in other states, including Wisconsin and Utah. Since the federal government will cut off benefits to most welfare recipients within five years, it makes sense for the women to get on-the-job training, according to Giuliani's office.

Washington's man in the former Soviet republic of Belarus returned from work to find the gates to his residence had been welded shut. Daniel Speckhard and his family, along with diplomats from 21 other countries, were evicted from the compound. The government of President Alexander Lukashenko - a Soviet-era hardliner - had warned the diplomats to leave the compound, insisting that it needed repairs. Reportedly this authoritarian president has restored a Soviet-style command economy, and last April he fired and jailed dozens of officials for a drop in the value of the Belarus ruble. Citing Hitler's stewardship of Germany as a role model for his presidency, its fair to assume this guy doesn't care too much about diplomatic niceties.