"Outrage"

An unarmed Catalina flying boat emblazoned with the three gold crowns of the Swedish royal air force lumbered above the Baltic early one morning this week in search of a sister plane that had been missing for four days. Cruising east, some 60 miles off the coast of Estonia and no miles from the Swedish coast, the defenseless Catalina was ambushed.* Two Russian MIG-15 jets bansheed down and made seven passes at the Catalina, one of them blasting away with its 20-mm. cannon. Hit several times, the Swedish plane got off a message to its home base: it had been crippled but would try for home.

The Catalina did not make it. About 90 miles from home, it made a forced landing at sea, and cracked up. For tantalizing hours, Sweden heard no more. Then came another report--a German merchant ship had rescued the Catalina's seven crewmen, two of them wounded.

Two Protests. The news explained beyond much doubt what had happened to the first missing plane, an equally defenseless transport used as a "flying classroom" for Swedish air force radio operators, and to its complement of eight. The Baltic from Finland to Danzig was aswim with Soviet warships and submarines, the sky was thick with Russian jets; all were engaged in sea and air maneuvers.

A wave of cold anger swept across doggedly neutral Sweden, which stayed out of World Wars I and II and now refuses to join Norway and Denmark in NATO. The anger was aggravated by an event in Stockholm: the opening of a treason trial against seven Swedes who are accused of selling out the secrets of Sweden's entire northern defense system to Soviet espionage agents. On the streets and in the coffeehouses, Swedes muttered their indignation. Prime Minister Tage Erlander summoned Soviet Ambassador Konstantin Rodionov. As he left his own embassy, a crowd of Swedes jeered at the ambassador and spat into the embassy compound. When he walked out of the Foreign Office, he carried away with him two irate Swedish protests.

Answers, Please. One protested Soviet espionage in Sweden and demanded that the Reds make their diplomats stop spying. The second demanded retribution for the "act of violence perpetrated by Soviet military aircraft" and steps "to punish those responsible for the outrage."

* In just about the same area two years ago, Russian fighters shot down a U.S. Navy Privateer, with a crew of ten. The men were never found. The Russians admitted that they had attacked the plane, rejected U.S. protests, and decorated the Soviet airmen who performed the deed.

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