Despite the hopeful plans of early October, the proposed tour of the National Russian Basketball Team to this courtesy has been cancelled by the official athletic body of the United States-the Amstar Athletic Union. The A.A.U., however, has left several questions unanswered-questions which many basketball experts feel might embarrass the A.A.U. if they were answered.

Last summer Frank Walsh, who formerly worked for the Cow Palace in San Francisco, went to the Soviet Union to work out a program to exchange a U.S. team with the Russians. He secured the permission of the Soviet Athletic Union and a tentative schedule was drawn up here. The touring Russians were to play Harvard, Springfield, North Carolina State, Butler, and Kentucky, beginning the first week of December.

But no sooner had contracts been signed with the schools involved, than Daniel Ferris, the secretary of the A.A.U., announced that his group had not extended an official invitation to the Russians. What this meant, he said, was that the State Department would not issue the needed visas to the Russians. A spokesman for the Department verified this. "If the A.A.U. won't recognize the Russians," he said, "we won't issue visas. We've worked with them for years, and we'll go along with them on this."

The only reason that the A.A.U. has given for the non-recognition is that Walsh went above "its head" in arranging the trip. The fault with this explanation is that Roy Clogston, the athletic director of North Carolina State, offered to invite the Russians through his school, and thus make it "legal" in the A.A.U.'s eyes. The A.A.U. had indicated that it might have sanctioned the trip if Walsh as an individual had not arranged it.

Moreover, Walsh said that all profits from the tour would go to the Basketball Hall of Fame to be erected at Springfield College. This would seem to make any official charge of professionalism invalid, work out a program to exchange a U.S. although it is true that Walsh would have gained tremendous prestige worth thousands of dollars in publicity.

What has bothered basketball experts is the ridiculous silence the A.A.U. has maintained and why it hasn't publicity announced its reasons for the cancellation. One of the coaches who would have played the Russians was very bitter at the cancellation.

"The A.A.U. shouldn't have interfered here," he said. "We all are members of the NCAA and it hasn't said a word against the games." The games, especially in the South, would have been complete sell-outs. It is even conceivable that at Harvard people would have had to be turned away.

One coach, angered at the A.A.U.'s decision, had a unique explanation for it. "The A.A.U. wants to win the Olympics," he said, "and since the Russians finished second to us in '52, the A.A.U. is afraid that the Russians will learn too much by playing U.S. teams, and eventually defeat the Americans in Australia."

This interpretation is dangerous. It implies that the United States is afraid of good competition--the Russians would have easily won half their games here--and that the U.S. is only interested in winning the Olympics--a charge often made against the so-called Russian "professionals." The A.A.U. should answer these charges, and give its real reasons for the cancellation if there are any.