1904 – American Marines arrive in Seoul, Korea, to guard the U.S. legation there.
1940 – FM radio is demonstrated to the Federal Communications Commission for the first time.
1942 – U.S. and Filipino troops complete their withdrawal to a new defensive line along the base of the Bataan peninsula.
1943 – USS Helena (CL-50) fired first proximity fused projectile in combat and shot down Japanese divebomber in southwest Pacific.
1943 – General Clark’s Fifth Army becomes operational in Tunisia.
1943 – On Guadalcanal the Japanese begin their planned withdrawal. US forces fail to take note of the evacuation. Japanese resistance on Mount Austen is maintained despite growing American pressure.
1944 – Elements of the US 32nd Division at Saidor encounter Japanese forces while patrolling westward from their positions. Australian forces advancing westward along the north coast of the Huon Peninsula capture Kelanoa.
1945 – Admiral Smith leads a force of cruisers and destroyers to shell Iwo Jima, Haha Jima and Chichi Jima. There is a simultaneous attack by USAAF B-29 Superfortress bombers.
1945 – Admiral McCrea leads three cruisers and nine destroyers to bombard Suribachi Wan in the Kuriles.
1945 – The Soviet government gives formal recognition to the Polish Lublin Committee as the Provisional Government of Poland. The USA and Britain declare their continued recognition of the Polish government in exile, based in London. On the eve of a major offensive into Poland, the Soviet Union decides to recognize the pro-Soviet Lublin Committee as the Provisional Government of Poland instead of the government-in-exile that was temporarily being headquartered in London. On September 1, 1939, a massive German army invaded Poland. Sixteen days later, the USSR invaded Poland from the east. During this tumultuous period, Gen. Wladyslaw Sikorski became leader of a Polish government-in-exile in London. He developed a good working relationship with the Allies until April 1943, when Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin broke off Polish-Soviet diplomatic relations after Sikorski requested that the Red Cross investigate the alleged Soviet slaughter of Polish officers in the Katyn forest of eastern Poland in 1942. As the war progressed and the Soviets battled the Germans in western Poland, the Polish government-in-exile began to fear that Soviet domination might follow if the Soviets defeated Germany for control of the Polish territory. Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, Sikorski’s successor as the provisional government head, pleaded with the Allies to secure Poland’s postwar borders and sovereignty, but no such assurances were granted. In August 1944, the Polish Home Army, fearful that the Soviets would march on Warsaw to battle the Germans and never leave the capital, led an uprising against the German occupiers. They hoped that if they could defeat the Germans, the Allies would help install the anti-Communist government-in-exile after the war. Unfortunately, the Soviets, rather than aiding the uprising that they encouraged in the name of beating back their common enemy, stood idly by and watched as the Germans slaughtered the Poles and sent survivors to concentration camps. With native Polish resistance eradicated, and in anticipation of one last offensive against the Germans, the Soviet Union created its own pro-communist Polish provisional government to counter the anti-communist government-in-exile. At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, the Allies agreed that an interim government would be formed from both the pro- and anti-communist sides, with free elections to follow. The Soviets had other plans, though, and promptly turned the exhausted and battered Poland into a nondemocratic satellite country, which it remained until 1989.
1945 – In the Ardennes, the US 3rd Army reports reduced activity on its line while US 1st Army continues its attacks. There are German attacks just north of Strasbourg. Eisenhower’s decision to divide command responsibility for the Allied defenses around the bulge between Montgomery in the north and Bradley in the south is made public.
1951 – Fifty-nine B-29s dropped 672 tons of incendiary bombs on Pyongyang. The 18 FBG staged its final missions from Suwon. U.S. ground troops burned the buildings at Suwon’s airfield before withdrawing.
1953 – Twelve B-29s of the 307th BW bombed the Huichon supply areas and railroad bridge.
1957 – In response to the increasingly tense situation in the Middle East, President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a proposal to Congress that calls for a new and more proactive U.S. policy in the region. The “Eisenhower Doctrine,” as the proposal soon came to be known, established the Middle East as a Cold War battlefield. The United States believed that the situation in the Middle East degenerated badly during 1956, and Egypt leader Gamal Nasser was deemed largely responsible. The U.S. used Nasser’s anti-western nationalism and his increasingly close relations with the Soviet Union as justification for withdrawing U.S. support for the construction of the Aswan Dam on the Nile River in July 1956. Less than a month later, Nasser seized control of the Suez Canal. This action prompted, in late October, a coordinated attack by French, British, and Israeli military on Egypt. Suddenly, it appeared that the Middle East might be the site of World War III. In response to these disturbing developments, President Eisenhower called for “joint action by the Congress and the Executive” in meeting the “increased danger from International Communism” in the Middle East. Specifically, he asked for authorization to begin new programs of economic and military cooperation with friendly nations in the region. He also requested authorization to use U.S. troops “to secure and protect the territorial integrity and political independence of such nations.” Eisenhower did not ask for a specific appropriation of funds at the time; nevertheless, he indicated that he would seek $200 million for economic and military aid in each of the years 1958 and 1959. Only such action, he warned, would dissuade “power-hungry Communists” from interfering in the Middle East. While some newspapers and critics were uneasy with the open-ended policy for U.S. action in the Middle East (the Chicago Tribune called the doctrine “goofy”), the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate responded with overwhelming votes in favor of Eisenhower’s proposal. The “Eisenhower Doctrine” received its first call to action in the summer of 1958, when civil strife in Lebanon led that nation’s president to request U.S. assistance. Nearly 15,000 U.S. troops were sent to help quell the disturbances. With the Eisenhower Doctrine and the first action taken in its name, the United States demonstrated its interest in Middle East developments.
1967 – 1st Battalion, 9th U.S. Marines and South Vietnamese Marine Brigade Force Bravo conduct amphibious operations in the Kien Hoa Province in the Mekong Delta, located 62 miles south of Saigon. This action, part of Operation Deckhouse V, marked the first time that U.S. combat troops were used in the Mekong Delta. The target area, called the Thanh Phu Secret Zone by the Viet Cong guerrillas, was believed to contain communist ammunition dumps, ordinance and engineering workshops, hospitals, and indoctrination centers. During the course of the operation, which lasted until January 15, seven U.S. Marines and 21 Viet Cong were killed.
1968 – U.S. forces in Vietnam launch Operation Niagara I to locate enemy units around the Marine base at Khe Sanh.
1968 – First Male Nurse Corps officer in Regular Navy, LT Clarence W. Cote.
1969 – President-elect Richard Nixon names Henry Cabot Lodge to succeed W. Averell Harriman as chief U.S. negotiator at the Paris peace talks. Lawrence Edward Walsh, a New York lawyer and former deputy attorney general, was named deputy chief negotiator to replace Cyrus R. Vance. Marshall Green, an Asian affairs expert and ambassador to Indonesia, was assigned to assist the negotiating team. The peace talks started on May 10, 1968, but had been plagued from the beginning by procedural questions that inhibited any meaningful negotiations or progress. Unfortunately, the change in personnel had no effect in fostering more meaningful negotiations.
1972 – United States President Richard Nixon orders the development of a Space Shuttle program.
1979 – Vietnamese troops occupy Phnom Penh and the Cambodian ruler Pol Pot is ousted from power.
1989 – Lawrence E. Walsh, the special prosecutor in the Iran-Contra case, asked for a dismissal of two charges against Oliver North, citing the Reagan administration’s refusal to release material sought by North.
1991 – President Bush met at Camp David, Maryland, with UN Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar to discuss the Persian Gulf crisis. The same day, a pretaped radio address by Bush was broadcast in which the president warned Iraq: “Time is running out.”
1994 – The Clinton administration said North Korea had agreed to allow renewed international inspections of seven nuclear sites.
1999 – Four U.S. Air Force and Navy jets fired at Iraqi MiGs testing the “no-fly” zone over southern Iraq in the first such confrontation in more than six years. 6 missiles fired by 2 US F-15s missed the 4 MiG 25s of Iraq.
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