This day in History
The Day the Wall Fell (BBC Radio 2- Tuesday 3 Nov)
A quick heads up about a programme on Radio 2 next week.
According to the programme guide:
Jeremy Vine marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall by looking at its history, from construction in 1961, to the day it was finally breached on 9 November 1989.
Jeremy visits the city to examine what remains of the Wall and speaks to those who lived on both sides - East and West. He visits some of the key locations in the Wall’s history including Checkpoint Charlie; the Brandenburg Gate; Bernauer Strasse, which was cut in two in 1961; and Mauerstrasse, where the largest remaining section of the Wall exists today. Jeremy explores why the Wall went up in the first place, why it came down and asks whether the psychological scars of a divided Germany still remain.
The programme contains firsthand testimony from Germans who escaped from the East and those who helped them. It also considers what it was like to live in a state controlled by the secret police or Stasi and hears from a political reformer who was held in the notorious Hohenschönhausen prison. He considers to what extent the phenomenon of “ostalgie” or nostalgia for life in the former East Germany still exists, particularly as some former Stasi and government officials have prospered since the Wall came down 20 years ago.
There are interviews with escapee Joachim Neuman, who spent two years working on tunnels under the Wall to bring his girlfriend to the West; and escapee Irmgard Muller, who escaped from East Berlin under a false passport to be with her husband. We also hear from West Berliner Horst Seeliger, who was in East Berlin on November 9 1989, and one of the first people to cross back through the border into the West; and Vera Lengsfeld, an East German reformist politician who was imprisoned by the Stasi.
Additional contributors include historian Frederick Taylor; Sunday Times journalist Peter Millar and veteran BBC reporter Brian Hanrahan, who both covered the fall of the wall; and Ben Bradshaw, Secretary Of State for Culture, Media & Sport, who was a young BBC reporter in Berlin in 1989.
The Wall Street Crash - Interactive Guide
On the 80th anniversary of the Wall Street Crash, the Guardian has produced this excellent interactive guide to the events in 1929.
History Categories
The day that Malcolm X died
Today is the anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X in the Audubon Ballroom, New York.
Take a look at the BBC’s ‘On This Day’ segment:
Yet Another Balkans Crisis?
Yesterday Kosovo’s parliament declared unanimously declared itself to be independent from Serbia.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7249034.stm
Just about immediately Serbia and her close supporter, Russia, made their protests as riot police faced protesters in Belgrade and grenades were thrown in the ethnically Serb town of Mitrovica in Kosovo.
Today Serbia withdrew her ambassador to the USA, stating that the country had violated international law by recognising Kosovo.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7251802.stm
Amongst EU nations opinion has been divided with Spain not recognising the new state, in a directly opposite action to that taken by France, Germany and the UK.
All this not only brings back memories of the conflict in the late 1990s but also to the wider unrest in the region that has bedevilled wider European relations for upwards of 150 years. Even without going back to the strife prior to the Nineteenth Century there is enough to keep historians occupied. The crises of 1875-78, 1886, 1912-13 and, of course, 1914 all had international repercussions. It can only be hoped that both local and regional tensions will ease before more blood is spilt in a most contentious corner of our continent.
8th February 1983: Ariel Sharon quits after Sabra and Shatila massacres
The June 6th 1982 invasion of Lebanon (codenamed Operation Peace of the Galilee) by Israeli forces was ordered in direct reponse to the attempted assassination of the Israeli ambassador to the UK, Shlomo Argov by the Abu Nidal Organisation (Palestinian ‘terrorist’, a founder of Fatah who had split from Yasser Arafat and the PLO). Lebanon had, after the 1948-49 conflict become the home to around 100,000 Palestinian refugees who had fled from their homes in present day Israel. By the early 1980s this number had grown to about 300,000, with the PLO establishing their own area of control in southern Lebanon. It was this influence that the Israelis sought to end - with the actions of the Abu Nidal Organisation being used as a convenient excuse.
read more...»Light a virtual candle for Holocaust Memorial Day
January 27th is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. It is also day when the Holocaust is remembered in the UK and around the world. The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, responsible for the commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day in this country, runs events and provides advice to schools and local community groups who wish to have their own commemoration.
So, even if your school is not holding an event you can still show your support for Holocaust Memorial Day 08 by visiting the Trust’s website and lighting a virtual candle.
It was sixty five years ago today…(14 Jan)
...that US President Franklin D Roosevelt met British Prime Minister Winston Churchill at a wartime conference in Casablanca. The ten day meeting in French Morocco, which was codenamed SYMBOL, most significantly ended with an agreement entitled the ‘Casablanca Declaration’. This committed the Allies to settle for nothing less than the unconditional surrender of the Axis forces. In setting out the declaration to the American people FDR told them:
‘...that the only terms on which we shall deal with an Axis government or any Axis factions are the terms proclaimed at Casablanca: “Unconditional Surrender.” In our uncompromising policy we mean no harm to the common people of the Axis nations. But we do mean to impose punishment and retribution in full upon their guilty, barbaric leaders… ‘
The officials at the conference had several dilemmas to sort out. The key questions centred on what kind of split of forces between the Far East / Pacific and Europe / North Africa and where, if at all, a second front should be opened. Essentially, and for possibly for the last time, the British held sway. The American delegation found themselves agreeing to devote their major efforts to the European theatre although without launching a major invasion of north-west Europe in 1943.
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