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Soviet Union

former country in Eurasia (1922–1991)

272 dated entries naming Soviet Union, drawn from 72 separate years between 1890 CE and 2022 CE. Nothing here is written by us: each line is the sentence a Wikipedia year article used, and the link beside it opens the exact revision.

Also written as Soviet, Soviets, U.S.S.R., USSR, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in the source articles; Wikipedia redirects those to the same subject, so their entries are on this page.

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19th century

  • 1890March 9 (new style) – Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet politician (died 1986)source

20th century

  • 1922December 30 – Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and the Transcaucasian Republic (Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia) come together to form the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.source
  • 1923March 9 – Vladimir Lenin suffers his third stroke, which renders him bedridden and unable to speak; consequently he retires from his position as Chairman of the Soviet government.source
  • 1923March 17 – Dobrolyot is formed as the first Soviet civil aviation service; it will become part of flag carrier Aeroflot.source
  • 1923July 10 – Large hailstones kill 23 people in Rostov, Soviet Union.source
  • 1924January 20–30 – Kuomintang in China holds its first National Congress, initiating a policy of alliance with the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party.source
  • 1924August 28 – August Uprising: Georgia rises against rule by the Soviet Union in an abortive rebellion, in which several thousands die.source
  • 1925March 6 – Pionerskaya Pravda, one of the oldest children's newspapers in Europe, is founded in the Soviet Union.source
  • 19256 August - Grigory Kotovsky, Soviet military and political activist, commander of the Red Army and member of the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union (born 1881)source
  • 1926Industrial output surpasses the level of 1913 in the USSR after a period of economic downturn.source
  • 19279 February – Romania and Poland ratify the Treaty on Mutual Assistance against Aggression and on Military Aid, to build the Polish–Romanian alliance and protect against potential aggression from the Soviet Union.source
  • 1927May 12 – British police officers raid the office of the Soviet trade delegation in London.source
  • 1927May 24 – The United Kingdom cuts its diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union due to revelations of espionage and underground agitation.source
  • 1927November 12 – Leon Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party, leaving Joseph Stalin with undisputed control of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1927December – The Communist Party Congress condemns all deviation from the general party line in the USSR.source
  • 1928January 1 – Eastern Bloc emigration and defection: Boris Bazhanov, Joseph Stalin's personal secretary, crosses the border to Iran to defect from the Soviet Union.source
  • 1928October 1 – Joseph Stalin launches the first five-year plan (1928–1932); the average nonfarm wage falls by 50% in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1929February 9 – "Litvinov's Pact" is signed in Moscow by the Soviet Union, Poland, Estonia, Romania and Latvia, who agree not to use force to settle disputes between themselves.source
  • 1930January 30 – Pavel Molchanov launches a radiosonde from Slutsk in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1931March 2 – Mikhail Gorbachev, the 8th and final leader of the Soviet Union, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (died 2022)source
  • 1931March 11 – The Ready for Labour and Defence of the USSR programme, abbreviated as GTO, is introduced in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1933August 2 – The White Sea–Baltic Canal, Stalin's 227 km ship canal constructed using forced labour in the Soviet Union, opens, connecting the White Sea with Lake Onega and the Baltic.source
  • 1933November 16 – The United States and the Soviet Union establish formal diplomatic relations.source
  • 1934September 19 – The Soviet Union joins the League of Nations.source
  • 1935December 28 – Pravda publishes a letter from Pavel Postyshev, who revives the New Year tree tradition in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1936Joseph Stalin's Great Purge begins in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1936December 5 – The 1936 Soviet Constitution, promulgated by Stalin, is adopted in the Soviet Union. The Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic is dissolved, and Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia become full Republics of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1937Soviet industry produces about four times as much as it had in 1928.source
  • 1937January 23 – Moscow Trials: Trial of the Anti-Soviet Trotskyist Center – In the Soviet Union 17 leading Communists go on trial, accused of participating in a plot led by Leon Trotsky to overthrow Joseph Stalin's regime, and assassinate its leaders.source
  • 1937July 31 – NKVD Order No. 00447 "Об операции по репрессированию бывших кулаков, уголовников и других антисоветских элементов" ("The operation for repression of former kulaks, criminals and other anti-Soviet elements") is approved by the decision of the Politbureau of the CC of the VKP(b) of the Soviet Union, initially as a 4-month plan for 75,950 people to be executed and an additional 193,000 to be sent to the Gulag.source
  • 1937August 5 – The Soviet Union commences one of the largest campaigns of the Great Purge, to "eliminate anti-Soviet elements". Within the following year, at least 724,000 people are fired on order of the troikas, directed by Joseph Stalin. This is an offensive that targets social classes (such as the kulaks or nobles) and Stalin's personal opponents from the Communist Party and their sympathizers.source
  • 1938unknown date – Family plots produce 22% of all Soviet agricultural produce, on only 4% of all cultivated land.source
  • 1938September 18 – During a meeting between Neville Chamberlain, the recently elected Premier of France, Édouard Daladier, and Daladier's Foreign Minister, Georges Bonnet, it becomes apparent that neither the British nor the French governments are prepared to go to war over the Sudetenland. The Soviet Union declares it will come to the defence of Czechoslovakia only if France honours her commitment to defend Czechoslovak independence.source
  • 1939August 23 – The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact is signed between Germany and the Soviet Union, a neutrality treaty that also agrees to division of spheres of influence (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, eastern Poland and Bessarabia (modern-day Moldova), north-east province of Romania to the Soviet Union; Lithuania and western Poland to Germany). Its annex reassigns Lithuania to the Soviet Union.source
  • 1939September 16 – A ceasefire ends the Battles of Khalkhin Gol, the undeclared border war between the Soviet Union (and Mongolian allies) and Japan.source
  • 1939September 17 – The Soviet Union invades Poland, and then occupies eastern Polish territories.source
  • 1939September 18 – WWII: Orzeł incident: Polish submarine ORP Orzeł escapes internment from Tallinn Harbour, Estonia, leading both the Soviet Union and Germany to question Estonia's neutrality.source
  • 1939November 26 – Shelling of Mainila: The Soviet Union's Red Army shells the Russian village of Mainila, then claims that the fire originated from Finland, giving a casus belli for the Winter War.source
  • 1939December 1 – The Soviet Union establishes the Finnish Democratic Republic puppet state in Terijoki.source
  • 1940January 6 – WWII: Winter War – General Semyon Timoshenko takes command of all Soviet forces.source
  • 1940March 12 – Moscow Peace Treaty: The Soviet Union and Finland sign a peace treaty in Moscow, ending the Winter War; Finns, along with the world at large, are shocked by the harsh terms.source
  • 1940July 23 – Welles Declaration: United States Under Secretary of State Sumner Welles announces that the U.S. will not accord diplomatic recognition to the Soviet Union's occupation of the Baltic states.source
  • 1940August 3 – The Lithuanian SSR is annexed into the Soviet Union, followed by the Latvian SSR on August 5 and the Estonian SSR August 6, just seven weeks after their occupation. Ethnic Germans will be deported to Germany.source
  • 1941June 13 – TASS, the official Soviet news agency, denies reports of tension between Germany and the Soviet Union.source
  • 1941June 14 – June deportation: Soviet officials deport about 65,000 people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to Siberia.source
  • 1941June 22 – WWII: Operation Barbarossa: Nazi Germany (with allies) invades the Soviet Union and declares war on it. Winston Churchill promises all possible British assistance to the Soviet Union in a worldwide broadcast: "Any man or state who fights against Nazidom will have our aid. Any man or state who marches with Hitler is our foe." Italy and Romania declare war on the Soviet Union.source
  • 1941June 25 – WWII: Finland (as a co-belligerent with Germany) attacks the Soviet Union, starting the Continuation War.source
  • 1941September 3 – The Holocaust: SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl Fritzsch first uses the pesticide Zyklon B to execute Soviet prisoners of war en masse at Auschwitz concentration camp; eventually it will be used to kill about 1.2 million people.source
  • 1941September 8 – WWII: Siege of Leningrad – German forces begin a siege against the Soviet Union's second-largest city, Leningrad. Stalin orders the Volga Germans deported to Siberia.source
  • 19418 September — The Siege of Leningrad begins: German forces begin a siege against the Soviet Union's second-largest city, Leningrad.source
  • 1941October 8 – WWII: In their invasion of the Soviet Union, Germany reaches the Sea of Azov, with the capture of Mariupol (Ukraine).source
  • 1941October 30 – WWII: Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States, approves US$1 billion in Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union.source
  • 1941November 12 – As the Battle of Moscow begins, temperatures around Moscow drop to −12 °C, and the Soviet Union launches ski troops for the first time, against the freezing German forces near the city.source
  • 1942May 26 – The Anglo-Soviet Treaty of 1942, to help establish a military and political alliance between the USSR and the British Empire, is signed in London by foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov.source
  • 1942July 29 – The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union institutes the Order of Suvorov and Order of Kutuzov and reinstates the Order of Alexander Nevsky.source
  • 1942November 19 – WWII: Battle of Stalingrad: Soviet Union forces under General Georgy Zhukov launch the Operation Uranus counter-attacks at Stalingrad, turning the tide of the battle in the USSR's favor.source
  • 1942November 22 – WWII: Battle of Stalingrad: The situation for the German attackers of Stalingrad seems desperate during the Soviet counter-attack Operation Uranus, and General Friedrich Paulus sends Adolf Hitler a telegram, saying that the German Sixth Army is surrounded.source
  • 1943January 18 – WWII: Soviet officials announce that the Red Army has broken the Wehrmacht's siege of Leningrad as part of Operation Iskra, opening a narrow land corridor to the city. Georgy Zhukov is promoted to Marshal of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1943October 10 – The Order of Bogdan Khmelnitsky is instituted in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1944January 15 – The Soviet Union ceases production of the Mosin–Nagant 1891/30 sniper rifle.source
  • 1944March 15 – The Soviet Union introduces a new anthem, replacing The Internationale.source
  • 1944May 18 – Crimean Tatars are deported by the Soviet Union.source
  • 1944May 18 – WWII: Deportation of the Crimean Tatars by the government of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1944June 22 – Operation Bagration: A general attack by Soviet forces clears the German forces from Belarus, resulting in the destruction of German Army Group Centre, possibly the greatest defeat of the Wehrmacht during WWII.source
  • 1944August 23 – King Michael's Coup: Ion Antonescu, Conducator of Romania, and Mihai Antonescu, Foreign Minister of Romania, are arrested and a new military government established. Romania leaves the war against the Soviet Union, joining the Allies. General Constantin Sanatescu is the "armed force" of the coup d'état and will be appointed by King Michael of Romania as prime minister of Romania on September 1.source
  • 1944October 9 – WWII: Fourth Moscow Conference: British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin begin a 9-day conference in Moscow, to discuss the future of Europe.source
  • 1944October 11 – The Tuvan People's Republic is annexed into the Soviet Union.source
  • 1945January 12 – WWII: The Soviet Union begins the Vistula–Oder Offensive in Eastern Europe, against the German Army.source
  • 1945February 4–11 – WWII: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin hold the Yalta Conference.source
  • 1945March 6 – A Communist-led government is formed in Romania under Petru Groza, following Soviet intervention.source
  • 1945May 2 – The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin. The famous picture of Raising a Flag over the Reichstag is taken at this date.source
  • 1945May 9 – The Soviet Union marks VE Day as the Red Army enters Prague, celebrated in the USSR as Victory Day.source
  • 1945June 29 – Czechoslovakia cedes Carpathian Ruthenia to the Soviet Union.source
  • 1945August 9 – The Soviet–Japanese War opens: The Soviet Union begins its army offensive against Japan, in the northern part of the Japanese-held puppet region of Manchuria, including the 25th Army (Soviet Union)'s advance into the northern peninsula of Korea.source
  • 1945October 24 – The United Nations is founded by ratification of its Charter, by 29 nations including the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Canada, Egypt, Brazil, Haiti, Luxembourg, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and others.source
  • 1946January 31 – Yugoslavia's new constitution, modeled on the Soviet Union, establishes 6 constituent republics (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia).source
  • 1946February 1 – The Kingdom of Hungary becomes a republic, heavily influenced by the Soviet Union.source
  • 1946August 7 – The Soviet Union escalates the Turkish Straits crisis through a diplomatic demand to Turkey.source
  • 1946November 27 – Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru appeals to the United States and the Soviet Union to end nuclear testing and start nuclear disarmament, stating that such an action would "save humanity from the ultimate disaster."source
  • 1946December 25 – The first artificial, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in Europe is initiated, within the Soviet (Russian) nuclear reactor F-1.source
  • 1947February 12 – The fragments of a meteorite create a number of impact craters up to 36 metres wide in Sikhote-Alin, in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1947February 17 – Cold War: The Voice of America begins to transmit radio broadcasts into Eastern Europe and the Soviet Unionsource
  • 1947April 16 – American financier and presidential adviser Bernard Baruch describes the post–World War II tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States as a "Cold War".source
  • 1947August 28 – The United States request the Korean issue to be handled by the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the Republic of China in a four-country conference.source
  • 1948February 1 – The Soviet Union begins to jam Voice of America broadcasts.source
  • 1948July 20 – President Harry S. Truman issues the second peacetime military draft in the United States, amid increasing tensions with the Soviet Union (the first peacetime draft occurred in 1940 under President Roosevelt)source
  • 1948August 1945 – 1948 – Due to Korea being under Japanese rule during World War II, Korea was considered an Axis belligerent against the Allies. The surrender of Japan led to the division of Korea into southern and northern occupation zones. The southern being administered by the United States and the area north of the 38th parallel being administered by the Soviet Union. The division was to be temporary and was meant to return a unified Korea back to its people after the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and China could implement a single government for Korea. Due to differing opinions between the two parties on the implementation of Joint Trusteeship over Korea, two separate governments were established in 1948 with two opposing ideologies; the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the First Republic of Korea – both claiming to be the legitimate government of the entire Korean peninsula.source
  • 1948October 10 – The R-1 missile on test becomes the first Soviet launch to enter space.source
  • 194925–28 March – an extensive deportation campaign was conducted in Estonian SSR, Latvian SSR, and Lithuanian SSR. The Soviet authorities deported over 90,000 people from the Baltics to remote areas of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1949c. January 28 – Stalin and antisemitism: The media in the Soviet Union resume a propaganda campaign against "rootless cosmopolitans", a euphemism for Soviet Jews, accusing them of being pro-Western and antisocialist.source
  • 1949January 25 – The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or COMECON) is established by the Soviet Union and other communist nations.source
  • 1949March 25 – Operation Priboi: An extensive deportation campaign begins in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Soviet authorities deport more than 92,000 people from the Baltic states to remote areas of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1949May 12 – Cold War: The Soviet Union lifts the Berlin Blockade.source
  • 1949August 29 – The Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb, RDS-1 ("Joe 1"). Its design imitates the American plutonium bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945.source
  • 1949September 13 - The Soviet Union vetoes United Nations membership for Ceylon, Finland, Iceland, Italy, Jordan and Portugal.source
  • 1950January 24 – Cold War: Klaus Fuchs, German émigré physicist, confesses to a British MI5 interrogator that he is a Soviet spy: for seven years, he passed top secret data on U.S. and British nuclear weapons research to the Soviet Union. Fuchs is formally charged on February 2.source
  • 1950January 31 – United States President Harry S. Truman orders the development of the hydrogen bomb, in response to the detonation of the Soviet Union's first atomic bomb in 1949.source
  • 1950January 31 – President Harry S. Truman orders the development of the hydrogen bomb, in response to the detonation of the Soviet Union's first atomic bomb in 1949.source
  • 1951February - Albania and the Soviet Union signs an agreement on mutual economic assistance.source
  • 1951April 21 – The National Olympic Committee of the Soviet Union is formed. The USSR will first participate in the Olympic Games at Helsinki, Finland, in 1952.source
  • 1951May 25–26 – British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean leave the United Kingdom to defect to the Soviet Union.source
  • 1951September 8 – Treaty of San Francisco: In San Francisco, 48 representatives out of 51 attending sign a peace treaty with Japan, formally ending the Pacific War; the delegations of the Soviet Union, Poland and Czechoslovakia do not sign the treaty, instead favoring separate treaties.source
  • 195225 June – Romania signs a trade agreement with the Soviet Union.source
  • 1952August 30 – The last Finnish war reparations are sent to the Soviet Union.source
  • 1952September 18 – The Soviet Union vetoes Japan's application for membership in the United Nations.source
  • 1952November 5 – The 9.0 Mw Severo-Kurilsk earthquake hits the Kamchatka Peninsula of the Soviet Union with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). A tsunami took the lives of more than 2,300 people.source
  • 1953February 11 – The Soviet Union breaks diplomatic relations with Israel, after a bomb explodes at the Soviet Embassy, in reaction to the 'Doctors' plot'.source
  • 195311 February – The Soviet Union breaks diplomatic relations with Israel after an explosion occurs in the Soviet embassy building in Tel Aviv, which was planted by the Tzrifin Underground.source
  • 1953March 1 – Joseph Stalin suffers a stroke, after an all-night dinner with Soviet Union interior minister Lavrentiy Beria and future premiers Georgy Malenkov, Nikolai Bulganin, and Nikita Khrushchev. The stroke paralyzes the right side of his body and renders him unconscious until his death on March 5.source
  • 1953June 17 – Workers' Uprising in East Germany: The Soviet Union orders a Division of troops into East Berlin to quell a rebellion.source
  • 1953August 8 – Soviet prime minister Georgi Malenkov announces that the Soviet Union has a hydrogen bomb.source
  • 1953September 7 – Nikita Khrushchev becomes head of the Soviet Central Committee.source
  • 1953September 25 – The first German prisoners of war return from the Soviet Union to West Germany.source
  • 1953December 23 – The Soviet Union announces officially that Lavrentiy Beria has been executed.source
  • 1954After the death of Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union starts releasing political prisoners and deportees from its Gulag prison camps.source
  • 1954February 19 – 1954 transfer of Crimea: The Soviet Politburo of the Soviet Union orders the transfer of the Crimean Oblast from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR.source
  • 1954March 25 – The Soviet Union recognises the sovereignty of East Germany. Soviet troops remain in the country.source
  • 1954April 3 – Petrov Affair: Diplomat Vladimir Petrov defects from the Soviet Union and asks for political asylum in Australia.source
  • 1954September 14 – The Soviet Union carries out the Totskoye nuclear exercise.source
  • 1954September 18 – Finnish president J. K. Paasikivi is the first Western head of state to be awarded the highest honor of the Soviet Union, the Order of Lenin.source
  • 1955January 25 – The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union announces the end of the war between the USSR and Germany, which began during World War II in 1941.source
  • 1955May 14 – Eight Communist Bloc countries, including the Soviet Union, sign a mutual defence treaty in Warsaw, Poland, that is called the Warsaw Pact (it will be dissolved in 1991).source
  • 1955June 13 – Mir mine, the first diamond mine in the Soviet Union, is discovered.source
  • 1955October 29 – Soviet battleship Novorossiysk explodes at moorings in Sevastopol Bay, killing 608 (the Soviet Union's worst naval disaster to date).source
  • 1956Pianist Glenn Gould tours the Soviet Unionsource
  • 1956January 25–26 – Finnish troops reoccupy Porkkala, after Soviet troops vacate its military base. Civilians can return February 4.source
  • 1956February 11 – British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean resurface in the Soviet Union, after being missing for 5 years.source
  • 1956April 19 – British diver Lionel (Buster) Crabb (working for MI6) dives into Portsmouth Harbour, to investigate a visiting Soviet cruiser, and vanishes.source
  • 1956June 1 – Vyacheslav Molotov resigns as foreign minister of the Soviet Union; he later becomes ambassador to Mongolia.source
  • 1956June 28 – Poznań 1956 protests: Labour riots in Poznań, Poland, are crushed with heavy loss of life. Soviet troops fire at a crowd protesting high prices, killing 53 people.source
  • 1956July 4 – An American Lockheed U-2 reconnaissance aircraft makes its first flight over the Soviet Union.source
  • 1956July 31 – Luzhniki Stadium, well known sports venue of Russia and the Soviet Union, officially opens in Moscow.source
  • 195622 October – The last SovRom joint enterprises with the Soviet Union, Sovromcuarț and Sovrompetrol, are dissolved.source
  • 1956November 4 – Hungarian Revolution of 1956: More Soviet troops invade Hungary, to crush the revolt that started on October 23. Thousands are killed, more are wounded, and nearly a quarter million leave the country.source
  • 1957February 15 – Andrei Gromyko becomes foreign minister of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1957October 4 – Space Age – Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to orbit the Earth.source
  • 1957November 3 – Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2, with the first animal to orbit the Earth, a dog named Laika, on board. There is no technology available to return her to Earth.source
  • 1958May 15 – The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 3.source
  • 1958September 30 – The U.S.S.R. performs a nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya.source
  • 1958December 16 – Soviet polar pilot V. M. Perov on Li-2 rescues four Belgian polar explorers, led by Gaston de Gerlache, who have survived a plane crash in Antarctica 250 km from their base five days earlier.source
  • 1959January 15 – The Soviet Union conducts its first census after World War II.source
  • 1959September 30 – Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev meets Mao Zedong in Beijing.source
  • 1959December 1 – Cold War: Antarctic Treaty – 12 countries, including the United States and the Soviet Union, sign a landmark treaty that sets aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve and bans military activity on the continent (the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War).source
  • 1960May 1 – The U-2 incident: Several Soviet surface-to-air missiles shoot down an American Lockheed U-2 spy plane. Its pilot, Francis Gary Powers of the Central Intelligence Agency, is captured.source
  • 1960May 15 – The satellite Sputnik 4 is launched into orbit by the Soviet Union.source
  • 1960May 16 – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev demands an apology from President Dwight D. Eisenhower for the U-2 reconnaissance plane flights over the Soviet Union, thus aborting their summit meeting scheduled for Paris this year.source
  • 1960July 1 – Cold War: A Soviet Air Force MiG-19 fighter plane flying north of Murmansk, Russia, over the Barents Sea, shoots down a six-man RB-47 Stratojet reconnaissance plane of the U.S. Air Force. Four of the U.S. Air Force officers are killed, and the two survivors are held prisoner in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1960July 17 - Joseph Kasavubu and Patrice Lumumba, unhappy with the United Nations' progress in pressuring Belgium to withdraw its troops from the former Belgian Congo, added a new dimension to the crisis with an ultimatum: If Belgian troops did not withdraw within 48 hours, the Congolese leaders would invite the Soviet Union to send troops to the African nation.source
  • 1960October 12 – Cold War: Shoe-banging incident – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev pounds his shoe on a desk at a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, his way of protesting the discussion of the Soviet Union's policies toward Eastern Europe.source
  • 1960December 1 – A Soviet satellite containing live animals (dogs Pcholka and Mushka) and plants is launched into orbit. Due to a malfunction, it burns up during re-entry.source
  • 1960December 4 - The Islamic Republic of Mauritania had applied to be the 100th member of the United Nations, but the request was vetoed in the Security Council by the Soviet Union, on grounds that Mongolia had been denied admission.source
  • 1960December 4 – The admission of Mauritania to the United Nations is vetoed by the Soviet Union.source
  • 1960December 7 – The United Nations Security Council is called into session by the Soviet Union, in order to consider Soviet demands for the Security Council to seek the immediate release of former Congolese Premier Patrice Lumumba.source
  • 1961January 9 – British authorities announce they have uncovered a large Soviet spy ring, the Portland spy ring, in London.source
  • 1961January 25 – In Washington, D.C., President John F. Kennedy delivers the first live presidential news conference. In it, he announces that the Soviet Union has freed the two surviving crewmen from the July 1 1960 RB-47 shootdown incident involving a USAF reconnaissance aircraft and a MiG-19 over the Barents Sea.source
  • 1961February 12 – The USSR launches Venera 1 towards Venus.source
  • 1961February 15 – United States President John F. Kennedy warns the Soviet Union to avoid interfering with the United Nations' pacification of the Congo.source
  • 196127 February – The border between Romania and the Soviet Union is agreed, including passing Snake Island to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.source
  • 1961March 13 – 1961 Kurenivka mudslide: A dam bursts in Kiev, USSR, killing 145.source
  • 1961May 8 – British intelligence officer George Blake is sentenced to 42 years imprisonment for spying, having been found guilty of being a double agent in the pay of the Soviet Union, the longest non-life sentence ever handed down by a British court.source
  • 1961October 27 – Berlin Crisis: Confrontation at Checkpoint Charlie – A standoff between Soviet and American tanks in Berlin, Germany, heightens Cold War tensions.source
  • 1961October 30 – Nuclear weapons testing: The Soviet Union detonates a 58-megaton yield hydrogen bomb known as Tsar Bomba, over Novaya Zemlya (it remains the largest ever man-made explosion).source
  • 1961December 10 – Albania–Soviet relations: The Soviet Union severs diplomatic relations with Albania.source
  • 1962January 27 – The Soviet government changes all place names honoring Molotov, Kaganovich and Georgy Malenkov.source
  • 1962March–May – Yi–Ta incident: At least 60,000 Chinese citizens migrate from the People's Republic of China to the Soviet Union, predominantly (but not exclusively) ethnic Kazakhs.source
  • 1962October 16 – Cuban Missile Crisis begins when U.S. President Kennedy is told of photographs (taken from U-2 flights) showing Soviet nuclear weapon installations being constructed on Cuba in the Caribbean. A stand-off ensues for 12 days between the United States and the Soviet Union, threatening the world with nuclear war.source
  • 1962Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's novella One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (Оди́н день Ива́на Дени́совича, Odin den' Ivana Denisovicha), the author's pseudo-autobiographical account of life in the gulag, is published in Novy Mir, in an unprecedented acknowledgement of the Soviet Union's Stalinist past.source
  • 1962November 20 – Cuban Missile Crisis: In response to the Soviet Union agreeing to remove its missiles from Cuba, President John F. Kennedy ends the blockade of the island.source
  • 1963May 23 – Fidel Castro visits the Soviet Union.source
  • 1963June 19 – Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, returns to Earth, landing in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1963June 20 – Swedish Air Force Colonel Stig Wennerström is arrested as a spy for the Soviet Union.source
  • 1963August 5 – The United States, United Kingdom and Soviet Union sign the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.source
  • 1963December 5 – The Seliger Forschungs-und-Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH demonstrates rockets for military use to military representatives of non-NATO-countries near Cuxhaven. Although these rockets land via parachute at the end of their flight and no allied laws are violated, the Soviet Union protests this action.source
  • 1964January 29 – The Soviet Union launches two scientific satellites, Elektron I and II, from a single rocket.source
  • 1965September 19 – Pakistani Forces achieve a decisive victory at the Battle of Chawinda, ultimately halting the Indian advance and successfully stabilizing the Sialkot Front; it is the world's largest tank battle since the Battle of Kursk in the Second World War between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.source
  • 1965November 16 – Venera program: The Soviet Union launches the Venera 3 space probe from Baikonur, Kazakhstan toward Venus (on March 1, 1966, it becomes the first spacecraft to reach the surface of another planet).source
  • 1965December 21 – The Soviet Union announces that it has shipped rockets to North Vietnam.source
  • 1966February 20 – While Soviet author and translator Valery Tarsis is abroad, the Soviet Union negates his citizenship.source
  • 1966March 31 – The Soviet Union launches Luna 10, which becomes the first space probe to enter orbit around the Moon.source
  • 1966April 27 – Pope Paul VI and Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko meet in the Vatican (the first meeting between leaders of the Roman Catholic Church and the Soviet Union).source
  • 1966May 4 – Fiat signs a contract with the Soviet government to build a car factory in the Soviet Union.source
  • 19667 August – The Storskog border control between Norway and the Soviet Union is opened. It remains the only legal border crossing from Norway to Russia till this day.source
  • 1966October 7 – The Soviet Union declares that all Chinese students must leave the country before the end of October.source
  • 1967June 12 – Venera program: Venera 4 is launched by the Soviet Union (the first space probe to analyze another planet's atmosphere and successfully return data).source
  • 1967November 7 – The 50th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution is celebrated in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1968March 8 – The Soviet ballistic missile submarine K-129 sinks with all 98 crew members, about 90 nautical miles (104 miles or 167 km) southwest of Hawaii.source
  • 1969March 2 – Soviet and Chinese forces clash at a border outpost on the Ussuri River.source
  • 1969May 16 – Venera program: Soviet space probe Venera 5 lands on Venus.source
  • 1969July 24 – The Soviet Union returns British lecturer Gerald Brooke to the United Kingdom freed from a Soviet prison in exchange for their spies Peter and Helen Kroger (Morris and Lona Cohen).source
  • 1969August 13 – Serious border clashes occur between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China.source
  • 1969November 17 – Cold War: Negotiators from the Soviet Union and the United States meet in Helsinki, to begin the SALT I negotiations aimed at limiting the number of strategic weapons on both sides.source
  • 1970May 26 – The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.source
  • 1970June 1 – Soyuz 9, a two-man spacecraft, is launched from the Soviet Union for an orbital flight of nearly 18 days, an endurance record at this time.source
  • 197030 July – War of Attrition: A large-scale dogfight, codenamed Rimon 20, takes place west of the Suez Canal, in which Israeli pilots down five Soviet-piloted MiGs, while the Israeli Air Force suffers no casualties except a damaged Mirage.source
  • 1970October 15 – The domestic Soviet Aeroflot Flight 244 is hijacked and diverted to Turkey.source
  • 1970November 17 – Luna programme: The Soviet Union lands Lunokhod 1 on Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) on the Moon. This is the first roving remote-controlled robot to land on another world, and is released by the orbiting Luna 17 spacecraft.source
  • 1971May 19 – Mars probe program: Mars 2 is launched by the Soviet Union.source
  • 1971December 2 – The Soviet Mars 3 lander reaches the surface of Mars, transmits for a few seconds and then goes silent. It is the first spacecraft to reach the planet.source
  • 1971December 18 – The world's largest hydroelectric plant in Krasnoyarsk, Soviet Union, begins operations.source
  • 1972February 21 – The Soviet uncrewed spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.source
  • 1972March 4 – Libya and the Soviet Union sign a cooperation treaty.source
  • 19729 April – The Iraqi-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Co-operation was signed in Baghdad, for a term of 15 years, after which the USSR supplied increased military aid to Iraq, as part of an agreement "to develop their cooperation in the matter of strengthening their defence capacity".source
  • 1973In November, Dinamo Minsk from Soviet Union toured Dhaka, Jessore and Comilla, and played four exhibition matches between 5 and 14 November.source
  • 1973July 25 – The Soviet Mars 5 space probe is launched.source
  • 1975November 10 – Lev Leshchenko revives "Den Pobedy", one of the most popular World War II songs in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1976June 2 – The Philippine government opens relations with the Soviet Union.source
  • 1976September 6 – Cold War: Soviet Air Force pilot Lt. Viktor Belenko lands a MiG-25 jet fighter at Hakodate, on the island of Hokkaidō in Japan, and requests political asylum in the United States.source
  • 1977February 7 – The Soviet Union launches Soyuz 24 (Viktor Gorbatko, Yury Glazkov) to dock with the Salyut 5 space station.source
  • 1977A Soviet surveillance satellite detects South Africa's nuclear test preparations and alerts the United States.source
  • 1977September 20 – The Petrozavodsk phenomenon is observed in the Soviet Union and some northern European countries.source
  • 1978January 24 – Soviet satellite Kosmos 954 burns up in Earth's atmosphere, scattering radioactive debris over Canada's Northwest Territories.source
  • 1978April 14 – Thousands of Georgians demonstrate against an attempt by Soviet authorities to change the constitutional status of the Georgian language.source
  • 1978October 13 – The Soviet Union launches a major Russification campaign throughout all union republics.source
  • 1979April 2 – Sverdlovsk anthrax leak: A Soviet biowarfare laboratory at Sverdlovsk accidentally releases airborne anthrax spores, killing 66 plus an unknown amount of livestock. It is a violation of the Biological Weapons Convention of 1972.source
  • 1979November 9 – Nuclear false alarm: the NORAD computers and the Alternate National Military Command Center in Fort Ritchie, Maryland, detect an apparent massive Soviet nuclear strike. After reviewing the raw data from satellites and checking the early-warning radars, the alert is cancelled.source
  • 1979November 15 – British art historian and former Surveyor of the Queen's Pictures Anthony Blunt's role as the "fourth man" of the 'Cambridge Five' double agents for the Soviet NKVD during World War II is revealed by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom; she gives further details on November 21.source
  • 1979December 24 – The Soviet Union covertly launches its invasion of Afghanistan – 3 days later, PDPA general secretary Hafizullah Amin is executed in Operation Storm-333 and Babrak Karmal replaces him, beginning the war.source
  • 1980January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission.source
  • 1980January 22 – Andrei Sakharov, Soviet scientist and human rights activist, is arrested in Moscow.source
  • 1980March 8 – The Soviet Union's first rock music festival starts.source
  • 1980July 19–August 3 – The 1980 Summer Olympics are held in Moscow, Soviet Union. As 82 countries boycott the Games, athletes from 16 of them participate under a neutral flag.source
  • 19811 April – Daylight saving time was implemented for the first time in the USSRsource
  • 1983April 25 – Manchester, Maine schoolgirl Samantha Smith is invited to visit the Soviet Union by its leader Yuri Andropov, after he read her letter in which she expressed fears about nuclear war.source
  • 1983August 7 – Soviet authorities pass harsher punishments for drunkenness and absenteeism, responding to public calls to curb high rates of alcoholism.source
  • 19831 September – A Malaysian named Siow Woon Kwang was among the victims in Korean Air Lines Flight 007 that was shot down by a Soviet interceptor jet and crashed near Moneron Island, Soviet Union, killing all 269 passengers.source
  • 19831 September – 23 Taiwanese citizens were among the victims in Korean Air Lines Flight 007 that was shot down by a Soviet interceptor jet and crashed near Moneron Island, Soviet Union, killing all 269 passengers and crew.source
  • 1983September 6 – The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Lines Flight 007, stating that the pilots did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace.source
  • 1984May 8 – The Soviet Union announces that it will boycott the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.source
  • 198425 December – Soviet premier Nikolai Tikhonov arrives in Ankara for official visit.source
  • 1984December 28 – A Soviet cruise missile plunges into Lake Inari in Finnish Lapland, known as the Lake Inari missile incident. Finnish authorities announce the fact in public on January 3, 1985.source
  • 1985March 11 – Mikhail Gorbachev becomes General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party and de facto leader of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1985Soviet–Afghan War: The Soviet Union begins to transfer the burden of fighting the mujahideen to the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan, a cause of the Revolutions of 1989.source
  • 1985The Soviet Union begins to transfer the burden of fighting the mujahideen to the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.source
  • 1985April 19 – The Soviet Union performs a nuclear weapon test in eastern Kazakhstan.source
  • 1985July 10 – Aeroflot Flight 5143 crashes near Uchquduq, Uzbek SSR, Soviet Union, killing all 200 people on board.source
  • 1985November 19 – Cold War: In Geneva, U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev meet for the first time.source
  • 1986February 11 – Human rights activist Natan Sharansky is released by Soviet authorities and leaves the country for Israel.source
  • 1986February 19 – The Soviet Union launches the Mir space station.source
  • 1986April 26 – Chernobyl disaster: A mishandled safety test at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Pripyat, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union "killed at least 4,056 people and damaged almost $7 billion of property". Radioactive fallout from the accident is concentrated near Belarus, Ukraine and Russia and at least 350,000 people are forcibly resettled away from these areas. After the accident, "traces of radioactive deposits unique to Chernobyl were in nearly every country in the northern hemisphere".source
  • 1986August 31 – The Soviet passenger liner SS Admiral Nakhimov collides with the bulk carrier Pyotr Vasev in the Black Sea and sinks almost immediately, killing 398.source
  • 1987May 28 – Eighteen-year-old West German pilot Mathias Rust evades Soviet air defenses and lands a private plane on Red Square in Moscow. He is immediately detained (released on August 3, 1988).source
  • 1987June 12 – During a visit to Berlin, Germany, U.S. President Ronald Reagan challenges Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall.source
  • 1987September 2 – In Moscow, USSR, the trial begins for 19-year-old pilot Mathias Rust, who flew his Cessna airplane into Red Square in May.source
  • 1987November 7 – The Soviet Union celebrates the 70th Anniversary of The October Revolution with a Parade on Moscow's Red Square.source
  • 1988April 14 – In the Geneva Accords, the Soviet Union commits itself to withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan.source
  • 1988May 29–June 3 – The Moscow Summit meeting between U.S. President Ronald Reagan and General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev takes place, where the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) was finalized.source
  • 1988November 15 – In the Soviet Union, the uncrewed Shuttle Buran is launched by an Energia rocket on its maiden orbital spaceflight (the first and last space flight for the shuttle).source
  • 1989February 2 – Soviet–Afghan War: The last Soviet Union armoured column leaves Kabul, ending nine years of military occupation since 1979.source
  • 1989March 9 – Revolutions of 1989: The Soviet Union submits to the jurisdiction of the World Court.source
  • 1989October 9 – An official news agency in the Soviet Union reports the landing of a UFO in Voronezh.source
  • 1989December 1 – In a meeting with Pope John Paul II, General Secretary of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev pledges greater religious freedom for citizens of the Soviet Union.source
  • 1990January 20 – Cold War: Black January – Soviet troops occupy Baku, Azerbaijan SSR, under the state of emergency decree issued by General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev, and kill over 130 protesters who were demonstrating for independence. The Nakhichevan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic declares its independence from the USSR.source
  • 1990April 13 – Cold War: The Soviet Union apologizes for the Katyn massacre.source
  • 1990May 4 – Singing Revolution: The Latvian SSR declares independence from the Soviet Union.source
  • 1990July 27 – Cold War: Belarus declares its sovereignty, a key step toward independence from the Soviet Union.source
  • 1990August 1 – RELCOM is created in the Soviet Union by combining several computer networks. Later in August, the Soviet Union got its first connection to the Internet.source
  • 1990August 24 – The Armenian SSR declares its independence from the Soviet Union.source
  • 1990September 10 – The first Pizza Hut opens up in the Soviet Union.source
  • 1990October 1 – The Soviet Union enacts a law permitting religious freedom, ending government interference in religious activity and permitting Soviet citizens to engage in private religious study in their homes.source
  • 1990October 12 – A leader of the right-wing Pamyat organization is arrested in the Soviet Union for spreading antisemitic hatred.source
  • 1990October 17 – A major financial service of Russia, VTB Bank is founded in Russia SSR, former part of Soviet Union, as predecessor name was Vneshtorg Bank.source
  • 1991March 15 – Germany formally regains complete independence after the four post-World War II occupying powers (France, the U.K., the U.S. and the U.S.S.R.) relinquish all remaining rights to the country.source
  • 1991March 31 – Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Georgia votes for independence from the Soviet Union while on April 9, the Supreme Council declares the independent Republic of Georgia.source
  • 1991July 31 – The United States and the Soviet Union sign the START I treaty in Moscow limiting strategic nuclear weapons.source
  • 1991October 18 – The Soviet Union restores its diplomatic relations with Israel, which have been suspended since the 1967 Six-Day War.source
  • 1991December 8 – Dissolution of the Soviet Union: In the Białowieża Forest Nature Reserve in Belarus, the leaders of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine sign an agreement officially ending the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place.source
  • 1991December 8 – In the Białowieża Forest Nature Reserve in Belarus, the leaders of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine sign an agreement officially ending the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place.source
  • 1992July 31 – Georgia becomes the 179th member of the United Nations after seceding from the Soviet Union the previous year.source
  • 1992October 25 – Lithuania holds a referendum on its first constitution after declaring independence from the Soviet Union in 1990.source
  • 1994August 31 – The Russian Army leaves Estonia and Latvia, ending the last traces of Eastern Europe's Soviet occupation.source

21st century

  • 2014On October 16, 2014, a military parade by the Serbian Army was held in front of more than 100,000 spectators for the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Red Army liberating city of Belgrade from Nazi Germany. The parade was also part of Russian president Vladimir Putin's official visit. Besides Putin who was the parade's centerpiece guest, the main stand featured Serbian dignitaries, president Tomislav Nikolić and prime minister Aleksandar Vučić as well as Republika Srpska president Milorad Dodik and Republika Srpska prime minister Željka Cvijanović.source
  • 2022August 30 – Mikhail Gorbachev, the final leader of the Soviet Union, dies at the age of 91.source

Named in the same entries