Conflict & Security in the 20th century

1,978 sourced entries, 1900 CE to 1999 CE, oldest first. Also see Conflict & Security across every century or everything else in the 20th century.

• 1900January 6 – Second Boer War: Boers attempt to end the Siege of Ladysmith, which leads to the Battle of Platrand.source
• 1900January 24 – Second Boer War: Battle of Spion Kop – Boer troops defeat the British Army.source
• 1900January 27 – Boxer Rebellion: Foreign diplomats in Peking, Qing dynasty China, demand that the Boxer rebels (who oppose foreign interests in the country) be disciplined.source
• 1900January 31 – Datu Muhammad Salleh, leader of the Mat Salleh Rebellion in North Borneo, is shot dead in Tambunan.source
• 1900February 8 – Second Boer War: British troops defeat the Boers at Ladysmith, South Africa.source
• 1900February 15 – Second Boer War: The Siege of Kimberley is lifted.source
• 1900February 17 – Second Boer War: Battle of Paardeberg – British troops defeat the Boers.source
• 1900February 27 – Second Boer War: British military leaders accept the unconditional notice of surrender from Boer General Piet Cronjé.source
• 1900April 22 – Battle of Kousséri: French forces secure their domination of Chad. Warlord Rabih az-Zubayr is defeated and killed.source
• 1900May 17 – Second Boer War: The British Army relieves the Siege of Mafeking.source
• 1900May 17 – Boxer Rebellion: Boxers destroy three villages near Peking and kill 60 Chinese Christians.source
• 1900May 21 – The Chinese province of Manchuria is invaded by the Russian Empire.source
• 1900May 28 – Boxer Rebellion: Boxers attack Belgians in the Fengtai railway station.source
• 1900May 31 – Boxer Rebellion: Peacekeepers from various European countries arrive in China, where they eventually unite with Japanese forces.source
• 1900June 11 – 1899–1900 peasant unrest in Bulgaria starts to turn passive.source
• 1900June 17 – Boxer Rebellion: Battle of Dagu Forts – Naval forces of the Eight-Nation Alliance capture the Taku Forts, on the Hai River estuary in China.source
• 1900June 20 – Boxer Rebellion: Boxers gather about 20,000 people near Peking, and kill hundreds of European citizens, including the German ambassador.source
• 1900July 29 – King Umberto I of Italy is assassinated by Italian-born anarchist Gaetano Bresci in Monza.source
• 1900August 14 – Boxer Rebellion: An international contingent of troops, under British command, invades Peking and frees the European hostages.source
• 1900September 13 – Philippine–American War: Battle of Pulang Lupa – Filipino resistance fighters defeat a detachment of American soldiers.source
• 1900September 17 – Philippine–American War: Battle of Mabitac – Filipinos under Juan Cailles defeat the Americans.source
• 1900November 29 – Herbert Kitchener succeeds Frederick Roberts as commander-in-chief of the British forces in South Africa and implements a scorched earth strategy.source
• 1900December 5 – The final Anglo-Ashanti War, "War of the Golden Stool", is declared over. Most of the British troops and Governor James Willcocks depart the city of Kumasi.source
• 1900December 24 – Boxer Rebellion Demands: The foreign powers present their 12 conditions for reform to the Chinese Imperial government, including the payment of a large indemnity.source
• 1901January 9 – Lord Kitchener reports that Christiaan de Wet has shot one of the "peace" envoys, and flogged two more, who had gone to his commando to ask the Burgher citizens of South Africa to halt fighting.source
• 1901February 26 – Chi-hsui and Hsu-cheng-yu, Boxer Rebellion leaders, are executed in Peking.source
• 1901February 27 – The Sultan of Turkey orders 50,000 troops to the Bulgarian frontier because of unrest in Macedonia.source
• 1901March 5 – Irish nationalist demonstrators are ejected by police from the House of Commons of the United Kingdom in London.source
• 1901March 6 – In Bremen, an assassination attempt is made on Wilhelm II, German Emperor.source
• 1901April 29 – Anti-Semitic rioting breaks out in Budapest.source
• 1901June 18 – British peace campaigner Emily Hobhouse reports on the high mortality and cruel conditions in the Second Boer War concentration camps.source
• 1901September 7 – The Boxer Rebellion in Qing dynasty China officially ends with the signing of the Boxer Protocol.source
• 1901September 28 – Philippine–American War: Balangiga massacre: Filipino guerrillas kill more than forty United States soldiers in a surprise attack in the town of Balangiga.source
• 1901October 29 – Leon Czolgosz is executed in the electric chair for the assassination of William McKinley in Buffalo, New York on September 6.source
• 1902January 23 – Hakkōda Mountains incident: A snowstorm in the Hakkōda Mountains of northern Honshu, Japan, kills 199 during a military training exercise.source
• 1902March 7 – Second Boer War: Battle of Tweebosch – South African Boers win their last battle over the British Army, with the capture of a British general and 200 of his men.source
• 1902March 10 – Clashes between police and Georgian workers led by Joseph Stalin leave 15 dead, 54 wounded, and 500 in prison.source
• 1902July 2 – Philippine–American War ends.source
• 1902October 18 – Venezuela: President Castro's army overcomes rebels in seven-day battlesource
• 1902November 15 – King Leopold II of Belgium survives an attempted assassination in Brussels by Italian anarchist Gennaro Rubino.source
• 1903January 10 – The Aceh Sultanate was fully annexed by Dutch forces, deposing the last sultan, and marking the end of the Aceh War that had lasted almost 30 years.source
• 1903April 19–21 (April 6–8 O.S.) – The first Kishinev pogrom, beginning on Easter Day, takes place in Kishinev, capital of the Bessarabia Governorate of the Russian Empire. At least 47 Jews are killed during mob rioting encouraged by blood libel articles in the press and led by priests.source
• 1903May 4 – Macedonian Bulgarian revolutionary Gotse Delchev is killed in a skirmish with the Ottoman army.source
• 1903May 24 – The Paris–Madrid race for automobiles begins, during which at least eight people are killed; the French government stops the event at Bordeaux and impounds all of the competitors' cars.source
• 1903June 11 (May 29 O.S.) – King Alexander Obrenović and Queen Draga of Serbia are assassinated in Belgrade by the Black Hand (Crna Ruka) organization.source
• 1903July 30–August 23 (July 17–August 10, O.S.) – The Second Congress of the All-Russian Social Democratic Labour Party is held in exile in Brussels, transferring to London.source
• 1903August 2 – The Ilinden–Preobrazhenie Uprising, organized by the Secret Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization, breaks out in the Ottoman provinces of Macedonia and Adrianople.source
• 1904January 12 – The Herero Wars in German South West Africa begin.source
• 1904February 8–9 – Battle of Port Arthur: A surprise Japanese naval attack on Port Arthur (Lüshun) in Manchuria starts the Russo-Japanese War.source
• 1904March 31 – British expedition to Tibet: The Battle of Guru – British troops under Colonel Francis Younghusband defeat ill-equipped Tibetan troops.source
• 1904June 16 – Finnish nationalist Eugen Schauman assassinates Nikolay Bobrikov, the Russian Governor-General of Finland, in Helsinki.source
• 1904July – Pavlos Melas enters Macedonia with a small unit of men during the Macedonian Struggle.source
• 1904August 11 – Battle of Waterberg: Lothar von Trotha defeats the Herero people in German South West Africa, and drives them into the Omaheke desert, starting the Herero and Namaqua genocide.source
• 1904August 17 – Russo-Japanese War: A Japanese infantry charge fails to take Port Arthur.source
• 1904October 21 – Russo-Japanese War: Dogger Bank incident – The Russian Baltic Fleet fires on British trawlers it mistakes for Japanese torpedo boats, in the North Sea.source
• 1905January 1 – In a major defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, Russian General Anatoly Stessel surrenders Port Arthur, located on mainland China, to the Japanese.source
• 1905January 22 (January 9 O.S.) – The Bloody Sunday massacre of peaceful Russian demonstrators at the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg takes place, leading to an unsuccessful uprising.source
• 1905January 29 – Rioting breaks out in Warsaw, at this time under Russian Imperial rule with a Russian Governor-General.source
• 1905Russian Revolution of 1905: The Imperial Russian Army opens fire on demonstrators in Riga, Governorate of Livonia, killing 73 people and injuring 200.source
• 1905February 4 – A simultaneous uprising begins at six cities in Argentina against the government of President Manuel Quintana.source
• 1905February 6 – Eliel Soisalon-Soininen, the Chancellor of Justice of the Grand Duchy of Finland (at this time part of the Russian Empire) is assassinated at Helsingfors (Helsinki).source
• 1905February 17 – Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia, the Governor-General of Moscow and uncle of Tsar Nicholas II, is assassinated.source
• 1905February 20 – In the Russo-Japanese War, the Battle of Mukden begins in Manchuria.source
• 1905March 10 – Russo-Japanese War: The Japanese capture of Mukden (modern-day Shenyang) completes the rout of Russian armies in Manchuria.source
• 1905March 23 – The Theriso revolt begins in Crete as about 1,500 people led by Eleftherios Venizelos demand unification with Greece.source
• 1905April 6 – A violent strike by the Teamsters' Union begins in Chicago.source
• 1905April 23 – German General Lothar von Trotha commander of troops in Germany's colony of Südwestafrika (modern-day Namibia), orders the extermination of the Nama people within the colony's borders, ultimately killing 10,000. Von Trotha's proclamation Aan de oorlogvorende Namastamme, proclaims that "The Nama who chooses not to surrender and lets himself be seen in German territory will be shot, until all are exterminated."source
• 1905May 28 – Japanese victory in the Battle of Tsushima, the only decisive battle fought between fleets of battleships; Russian personnel losses were 216 officers and 4,614 men killed; with 278 officers and 5,629 men taken as prisoners of war (POWs). Interned in neutral ports were 79 officers and 1,783 men. Escaping to Vladivostok and Diego-Suarez were 62 officers and 1,165 men. Eight battleships and three coastal battleships were either sunk, scuttled or captured. The Japanese lost three torpedo boats and 117 officers and men killed, with 583 officers and men wounded.source
• 1905June 13 – Theodoros Deligiannis, Prime Minister of Greece, is assassinated.source
• 1905July 14 – In New Zealand, the first known suicide attack by a civilian (as opposed to sacrifices made in military combat) takes place in Murchison.source
• 1905July 21 – Sixty members of the crew of the USS Bennington are killed in an explosion of the U.S. Navy gunboat in the harbor at San Diego.source
• 1905July 30 – At Basel in Switzerland, the International Zionist Conference delegates vote to reject the British offer of land in Uganda for a Jewish homeland.source
• 1905August 9 – The peace conference to end the Russo-Japanese War between Russia and Japan begins at Portsmouth, New Hampshire.source
• 1905September 2 – The millennia-old imperial examination system for the civil service is abolished in Qing dynasty China.source
• 1905October 29 (October 16 O.S.) – In the Russian Empire:source
• 1905Russian Revolution of 1905: The Imperial Russian Army opens fire on a meeting at a street market in Tallinn, Governorate of Estonia, killing 94 and injuring over 200 people.source
• 1905November–December – Russian Revolution of 1905: In the Baltic governorates, workers and peasants burn and loot hundreds of Baltic German manors. The Imperial Russian Army thereafter executes and deports thousands of looters.source
• 1905December 7–18 – Moscow Uprising: A Bolshevik-led revolt is suppressed by the army.source
• 1905December 11 – In support of the Moscow Uprising, the Council of Workers' Deputies of Kiev stages a mass uprising, establishing the Shuliavka Republic in the city, December 12–16.source
• 1906February 11 – Two British members of a poll tax collecting expedition are killed near Richmond, Natal, sparking the Bambatha Rebellion.source
• 1906August 23 – Unable to control a rebellion, Cuban President Tomás Estrada Palma requests United States intervention. This leads to the Second Occupation of Cuba, which lasts until 1909.source
• 1907March 11 – The Prime Minister of Bulgaria, Dimitar Petkov, is assassinated by an anarchist in Sofia.source
• 1907August 24–31 – The International Anarchist Congress of Amsterdam meets in the Netherlands.source
• 1907October 18 – The Hague Convention is revised by the (second) Hague Peace Conference (effective 26 January 1910), focussing on naval warfare.source
• 1907October 27 – Černová massacre: Fifteen people are shot during the consecration of a Catholic church in Hungary (modern-day Slovakia).source
• 1907December 21 – Santa María School massacre: In Chile, soldiers fire at striking mineworkers gathered in the Santa María School in Iquique; over 2,000 are killed.source
• 1908March 23 – American diplomat Durham Stevens, an employee of Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is assassinated in San Francisco by two Korean immigrants, unhappy with his recent support for the increasing Japanese presence in Korea.source
• 1908July 3 – Young Turk Revolution in the Ottoman Empire: Major Ahmed Niyazi, with 200 followers (Ottoman troops and civilians), begins an open revolution by defecting from the 3rd Army Corps in Macedonia, decamping into the hill country.source
• 1908October 6 – The Bosnian crisis begins, after the Austro-Hungarian Empire annexes Bosnia and Herzegovina from the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1909January 28 – The last United States troops leave Cuba, after being there since the Spanish–American War of 1898.source
• 1909March 31 – Serbia accepts Austrian control over Bosnia and Herzegovina.source
• 1909April 13 (March 31 by Eastern reckoning) – A countercoup begins in the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1909April 14 – Adana massacre: Ottoman Turks kill 15,000–30,000 Armenian Christians, in the Adana Vilayet.source
• 1909June 2 – French forces capture Abéché, capital of the Wadai Empire in central Africa.source
• 1909July 1 – In London, Indian nationalist student Madan Lal Dhingra assassinates Curzon Wyllie, political aide to the Secretary of State for India.source
• 1909July 25–August 2 – "Tragic Week" (La Semana Trágica/la Setmana Tràgica): The city of Barcelona experiences a workers' uprising.source
• 1909October 26 – Itō Hirobumi, four time Prime Minister of Japan (the 1st, 5th, 7th and 10th) and Resident-General of Korea, is assassinated by An Jung-geun, an activist of the Korean independence movement, at the Harbin railway station in Manchuria.source
• 1909November 18 – In Nicaragua, 500 revolutionaries (including 2 Americans) are executed by order of dictator José Santos Zelaya. The United States responds by sending 2 warships.source
• 1909December 14 – New South Wales Premier Charles Wade signs the Seat of Government Surrender Act 1909, formally completing the transfer of State land to the Commonwealth, to create the Australian Capital Territory.source
• 1910January 6 – Abé people in the French West Africa colony of Côte d'Ivoire rise against the colonial administration; the rebellion is brutally suppressed by the military.source
• 1910February 20 – Boutros Ghali, the first native-born Prime Minister of Egypt, is assassinated in Cairo.source
• 1910March 23 – A rebellion by Rif tribesmen in Spanish Morocco is finally suppressed after 8 months. During the conflict, an estimated 8,000 Berbers and 2,000 Spanish soldiers have been killed.source
• 1910March – Albanian revolt of 1910: An uprising against Ottoman rule breaks out in Albania.source
• 1910July 4 – Jack Johnson defeats James J. Jeffries by technical knockout in the 15th round at Reno, Nevada, in the bout billed as the "Fight of the Century". Johnson retains his world heavyweight boxing title over the previously undefeated Jeffries, who had been promoted as boxing's "Great White Hope". The result sparks race riots across more than 25 states, leaving at least 20 people dead.source
• 1910July 24 – Ottoman forces capture the city of Shkodër to put down the Albanian Revolt of 1910.source
• 1910July – First Girl Guide troops registered in the United Kingdom, under the supervision of Agnes Baden-Powell.source
• 1910November 18 – Black Friday: 300 suffragettes clash with police outside the Parliament of the United Kingdom over the failure of the Conciliation Bill.source
• 1910November 20 – The Mexican Revolution begins, when Francisco I. Madero proclaims the elections of 1910 null and void, and calls for an armed revolution against the illegitimate presidency/dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz.source
• 1910November 22 – Revolt of the Lash at Rio de Janeiro: Mutineers in the Brazilian Navy, led by João Cândido, seize control of the new dreadnought battleship Minas Geraes and other ships, whose guns are aimed at the city as the crews demand improvements in their conditions (which are conceded on November 26 by the Brazilian government).source
• 1910December 19 – The second 1910 United Kingdom general election (the last to be fought with an all-male electorate) concludes with confirmation of a majority for the Liberal Party in alliance with the Irish Parliamentary Party, resolving the battle of wills between the House of Commons of the United Kingdom and the House of Lords by giving a majority for restriction of the powers of the Lords and support for the Irish Home Rule movement.source
• 1911January 3 – Siege of Sidney Street in London: Two Latvian anarchists die, after a seven-hour siege against a combined police and military force. Home Secretary Winston Churchill arrives to oversee events.source
• 1911February 5 – The revolution in Haiti is suppressed after the leader, General Montreuil Guillaume, is captured by government troops and shot. General Millionard is executed two days later.source
• 1911April 13 – Mexican Revolution: Rebels take Agua Prieta on the Sonora–Arizona border; government troops take the town back April 17, when the rebel leader "Red" López gets drunk.source
• 1911April 19 – Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero's troops besiege Ciudad Juárez, but General Juan J. Navarro refuses his surrender demand.source
• 1911April 27 – Huanghuagang Uprising: In China, rebels take five villages in an attempt to create a power base to fight Imperial rule; those who die are remembered as "The 72 Martyrs" (the event is also called the "Second Guangzhou Uprising" and the "Yellow Flower Mound Revolt").source
• 1911May 8 – Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa launches an attack against government troops in Ciudad Juárez without Madero's permission; the government troops surrender on May 10.source
• 1911May 13–15 – Mexican Revolution: Torreón massacre – Over 300 Chinese residents are massacred by the revolutionary forces of Francisco I. Madero, in the Mexican city of Torreón.source
• 1911May 24 – Mexican Revolution: Government troops fire at anti-Diaz demonstrators in Mexico City, killing about 200 (officials claim only 40).source
• 1911July 1 – The presence of the German warship in the Moroccan port of Agadir triggers the Agadir Crisis.source
• 1911September 18 – Pyotr Stolypin, third Prime Minister of the Russian Empire is assassinated in Kiev by Leftist revolutionary Dmitry Bogrov and is succeeded by Count Vladimir Kokovtsov.source
• 1911September 29 – Italy declares war on the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1911October 10 – The Wuchang Uprising starts the Xinhai Revolution that leads to the founding of the Republic of China.source
• 1911October 16 – Mexican Revolution: Felix Diaz, nephew of Porfirio Díaz, occupies the port of Veracruz, as a sign of rebellion against Madero.source
• 1911November 1 – The world's first combat aerial bombing mission takes place in Libya, during the Italo-Turkish War. Second Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti of Italy drops several small bombs.source
• 1911November 5 – Italy annexes Tripoli and Cyrenaica (confirmed by an act of the Italian Parliament on February 25, 1912).source
• 1912February 24 – Battle of Beirut: Italy makes a surprise attack on the Ottoman port of Beirut, when the cruiser Giuseppe Garibaldi and the gunboat Volturno bombard the harbour, killing 97 sailors and civilians.source
• 1912March 6 – Italian forces become the first to use airships in war as two dirigibles drop bombs on Turkish troops encamped at Janzur, from an altitude of 6,000 feet.source
• 1912April 11 – makes her last call, at Queenstown in Ireland.source
• 1912April 17 – Lena massacre: Russian troops kill or wound 500 striking gold miners in Siberia.source
• 1912April 18 – Cunard Line vessel arrives in New York with the 705 survivors.source
• 1912August 4 – United States occupation of Nicaragua: U.S. Marines land from the USS Annapolis in Nicaragua, to support the conservative government at its request.source
• 1912October 8 – The First Balkan War begins: Montenegro declares war against the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1912October 14 – John Flammang Schrank attempts to assassinate Theodore Roosevelt in Milwaukee.source
• 1912October 18–21 – First Balkan War: The Greek navy captures the island of Lemnos for use as a forward base against the Dardanelles.source
• 1912October 24 – First Balkan War: Battle of Kumanovo – Serbian forces defeat the Ottoman army in Vardar Macedonia.source
• 1912December 3 – Bulgaria, Montenegro, and Serbia (the Balkan League, but not Greece) sign an armistice with the Ottoman Empire at Çatalca, temporarily halting the First Balkan War after 2 months. (The armistice will expire on February 3, 1913, and hostilities will resume.)source
• 1913January 3 – First Balkan War: Greece completes its capture of the eastern Aegean island of Chios, as the last Ottoman forces on the island surrender.source
• 1913January 18 – First Balkan War: Battle of Lemnos – Greek admiral Pavlos Kountouriotis forces the Turkish fleet to retreat to its base within the Dardanelles, from which it will not venture for the rest of the war.source
• 1913January 23 – 1913 Ottoman coup d'état: Enver Pasha comes to power.source
• 1913February 9 – Mexican Revolution: "La Decena Trágica", the rebellion of some military chiefs against the President Francisco I. Madero, begins.source
• 1913February 22 – Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero and José María Pino Suárez are assassinated.source
• 1913March 4–6 – First Balkan War: Battle of Bizani – Forces of the Kingdom of Greece capture the forts of Bizani (covering the approaches to Ioannina) from the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1913March 18 – King George I of Greece is assassinated after 50 years on the throne; he is succeeded by his son Constantine I.source
• 1913March 26 – Mexican Revolution: Venustiano Carranza announces his Plan of Guadalupe, and begins his rebellion against Victoriano Huerta's government, as head of the Constitutionals.source
• 1913March 26 – Balkan Wars: The Siege of Adrianople ends, when Bulgarian forces take Adrianople from the Ottomans.source
• 1913Following the assassination of his rival Song Jiaoren, Yuan Shikai uses military force to dissolve China's parliament, and rules as a dictator.source
• 1913May 24–25 – Adolf Hitler moves from Vienna to Munich.source
• 1913June 11 – Battle of Bud Bagsak: Armed with guns and heavy artillery, U.S. and Philippine troops under General John J. "Black Jack" Pershing fight a four-day battle against 500 Moro rebels, who are armed mostly with kampilan swords. The rebels are killed in a final desperate charge on June 15.source
• 1913June 29 – The Second Balkan War begins with Bulgaria attacking Serbia and Greece.source
• 1913August 31 – Dublin Lock-out: "Bloody Sunday": The dispute escalates when the Dublin Metropolitan Police kill one demonstrator and injure 400, in dispersing a demonstration.source
• 1913October 1 – Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa's troops take Torreón after a 3-day battle, when government troops retreat.source
• 1913October 18 – The Monument to the Battle of the Nations at Leipzig, Germany is finished.source
• 1913November 5 – King Otto of Bavaria is deposed by his cousin, Prince Regent Ludwig, who assumes the title Ludwig III.source
• 1914April 20 – Colorado Coalfield War: Ludlow Massacre – The Colorado National Guard attacks a tent colony of 1,200 striking coal miners in Ludlow, Colorado, killing 21 people.source
• 1914April 24–25 – Larne Gun Running: 35,000 rifles and over 3 million rounds of ammunition from a German dealer are landed at Larne, Bangor and Donaghadee in Ulster for the Unionist Ulster Volunteers.source
• 1914June 12–18 – Greek genocide: Ottoman Greeks in Phocaea are massacred by Turkish irregular troops.source
• 1914June 28 – Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria: Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip, 19, assassinates Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife, Duchess Sophie, in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, triggering the July Crisis overnight and eventually World War I. Anti-Serb riots in Sarajevo and Zagreb break out.source
• 1914June 29 – Khioniya Guseva attempts and fails to assassinate Grigori Rasputin at his hometown in Siberia.source
• 1914July 29 – World War I: Austro-Hungarian Navy river monitor fires the first shots of the war, opening the bombardment of the defenses of Belgrade, Serbia's capital.source
• 1914August 1 – The German Empire declares war on the Russian Empire, following Russia's military mobilisation in support of Serbia; Germany also begins mobilisation.source
• 1914August 2 – German troops occupy Luxembourg, in accordance with the Schlieffen Plan.source
• 1914August 4 – World War I: German invasion of Belgium – At 08:02 (local time) Imperial German Army troops enter Belgium, bringing the July Crisis to a climax. At 23:00 (GMT) the British entry into World War I takes place when King George V in London declares war on Germany for this violation of Belgian neutrality (protected by the Treaty of London (1839)) and especially to defend France. This means a declaration of war by the whole British Empire against the German Empire. The United States declares neutrality.source
• 1914Battle of Mulhouse: France launches its first attack of the war, in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to recover the province of Alsace from Germany, beginning the Battle of the Frontiers.source
• 1914German warships and (both commissioned in 1912), which reached Constantinople on August 10, are transferred to the Ottoman Navy, Goeben becoming its flagship, Yavuz Sultan Selim.source
• 1914September 17 – World War I: The Race to the Sea, by opposing forces on the Western Front, begins.source
• 1914German light cruiser SMS Emden bombards Madras, the only Indian city to be attacked by the Central Powers in the War.source
• 1914The conclusion of the Battle of Grand Couronné ends the Battle of the Frontiers, with the north-east segment of the Western Front stabilising.source
• 1914October 9 – World War I: Siege of Antwerp: Antwerp (Belgium) falls to German troops.source
• 1914The Greek army occupies Northern Epirus with the approval of the Allies.source
• 1914The Race to the Sea effectively ends, with the Western Front reaching the Belgian coast.source
• 1914November 9 – World War I: Battle of Cocos – The German cruiser Emden, the last active warship of the Central Powers in the Indian Ocean, is sunk by the Australian cruiser Sydney.source
• 1914November 13 – Zaian War: Battle of El Herri – Zayanes (Berbers) in Morocco overpower French forces.source
• 1914November 23 – Mexican Revolution: The last U.S. forces withdraw from Veracruz, occupied seven months earlier in response to the Tampico Affair; Venustiano Carranza's troops take over, and Carranza makes the town his headquarters.source
• 1914The Battle of Tanga ends, with the British Indian Expeditionary Force B failing to capture German East Africa defences.source
• 1914December 8 – World War I: Battle of the Falkland Islands: A superior British Royal Navy squadron under Doveton Sturdee defeats ships of the Imperial German Navy under Maximilian von Spee (who goes down with his ship).source
• 1914December 19 – Serbian Campaign (World War I): The Battle of Kolubara ends, resulting in a decisive Serbian victory over Austria-Hungary.source
• 1914December 24 – World War I: An unofficial and temporary Christmas truce begins between British and German soldiers on the Western Front.source
• 1915January 1 – WWI: Battle of Broken Hill: A train ambush near Broken Hill, Australia, is carried out by two men (claiming to be in support of the Ottoman Empire) who are killed, together with four civilians.source
• 1915January 17 – WWI: Caucasus Campaign – Battle of Sarikamish: Russia defeats Ottoman Turkey.source
• 1915January 23 – Chilembwe uprising: Baptist minister John Chilembwe initiates an ultimately unsuccessful uprising against British colonial rule in Nyasaland (modern-day Malawi).source
• 1915January 24 – WWI: Battle of Dogger Bank – The British Grand Fleet defeats the German High Seas Fleet, sinking the armoured cruiser .source
• 1915January 31 – WWI: Battle of Bolimów – Germany's first large-scale use of poison gas as a weapon occurs, when 18,000 artillery shells containing liquid xylyl bromide tear gas are fired on the Imperial Russian Army, on the Rawka River west of Warsaw; however, freezing temperatures prevent it being effective.source
• 1915February 18 – WWI: Germany regards the waters around the British Isles to be a war zone from this date, as part of its U-boat Campaign.source
• 1915Gallipoli campaign: A Franco-British naval attack on the Dardanelles fails.source
• 1915Constantinople Agreement: Britain, France and the Russian Empire agree to give Constantinople (Istanbul) and the Bosphorus to Russia in case of victory (the treaty is later nullified by the Bolshevik Revolution).source
• 1915Battle of Más a Tierra: Off the coast of Chile, the British Royal Navy forces the Imperial German Navy light cruiser SMS Dresden (last survivor of the German East Asia Squadron) to scuttle.source
• 1915April 24 – Armenian genocide: deportation of Armenian notables from Istanbul begins.source
• 1915April 25 – WWI: Start of the Gallipoli Campaign by land forces (lasting until January 1916) – A landing at Anzac Cove is conducted by Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, and a landing at Cape Helles by British and French troops, to begin the Allied invasion of the Gallipoli peninsula in the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1915May 1 – General Louis Botha, Prime Minister of South Africa, leads the army in the occupation of German South West Africa.source
• 1915May 9 – WWI – Second Battle of Artois: German and French forces fight to a standstill; German forces defeat the British at the Battle of Aubers Ridge.source
• 1915June 3 – Mexican Revolution: Troops of Álvaro Obregón and Pancho Villa clash at León; Obregón loses his right arm in a grenade attack, but Villa is decisively defeated.source
• 1915July 7 – Sinhalese militia captain Henry Pedris is executed in British Ceylon for inciting race riots, a charge later proved false; he becomes a hero of the Sri Lankan independence movement.source
• 1915WWI: South West Africa Campaign – The Union of South Africa occupies German South West Africa with assistance from Canada, the United Kingdom, the Portuguese Republic and Portuguese Angola. South Africa will occupy South West Africa until March 1990.source
• 1915September 8 – WWI: A Zeppelin raid destroys No. 61 Farringdon Road, London; the premises are rebuilt in 1917, and called The Zeppelin Building.source
• 1915September 12 – French soldiers rescue over 4,000 Armenian genocide survivors stranded on Musa Dagh, a mountain in the Hatay province of Turkey.source
• 1915September 25–October 14 – WWI: Battle of Loos – British forces take the French town of Loos, but with substantial casualties, and are unable to press their advantage. This is the first time the British use poison gas in World War I, and also their first large-scale use of 'New' (or Kitchener's Army) units.source
• 1915October 15 – WWI: Serbian Campaign – Austria-Hungary invades the Kingdom of Serbia. Bulgaria enters the war, also invading Serbia. The Serbian First Army retreats towards Greece.source
• 1915October 21 – The United Daughters of the Confederacy holds its first annual meeting outside the South, in San Francisco. Historian General Mildred Rutherford addresses the gathering on the "Historical Sins of Omission & Commission", of Yankee historians.source
• 1915October 23 – WWI: The torpedoing of armored cruiser results in only 3 men being rescued from a crew of 675, the greatest single loss of life for the Imperial German Navy in the Baltic Sea during the war.source
• 1915November 24 – William J. Simmons revives the American Civil War era Ku Klux Klan at Stone Mountain, Georgia.source
• 1915December 26 – The Irish Republican Brotherhood Military Council decides to stage an Easter Rising in 1916.source
• 1916January 9 – WWI: Gallipoli Campaign – The last British troops are evacuated from Gallipoli, as the Ottoman Empire prevails over a joint British and French operation to capture Constantinople.source
• 1916January 13 – WWI: Battle of Wadi – Ottoman Empire forces defeat the British, during the Mesopotamian campaign in modern-day Iraq.source
• 1916February 21 – WWI: The Battle of Verdun begins in France.source
• 1916March 8–9 – Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa leads about 500 Mexican raiders in an attack against Columbus, New Mexico, killing 12 U.S. soldiers. A garrison of the U.S. 13th Cavalry Regiment fights back and drives them away.source
• 1916March 15 – United States President Woodrow Wilson sends 12,000 United States troops over the U.S.–Mexico border to pursue Pancho Villa; the 13th Cavalry regiment enters Mexican territory.source
• 1916March 16 – Mexican Revolution: The U.S. 7th and 10th Cavalry regiments under John J. Pershing cross the border, to join the hunt for Villa.source
• 1916April 11 – WWI: The Egyptian Expeditionary Force begins the occupation of the Sinai Peninsula.source
• 1916April 24–30 – The Easter Rising occurs in Ireland. Members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood proclaim an Irish Republic, and the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizen Army occupy the General Post Office and other buildings in Dublin, before surrendering to the British Army. A total of 485 Irish Volunteers, British soldiers and Irish civilians were killed as well as 2,200 wounded and 16 rebel leaders would be executed.source
• 1916April 29 – WWI: Mesopotamian campaign – The Siege of Kut ends with the surrender of British Indian Army forces to the Ottoman Empire at Kut-al-Amara on the Tigris in Basra Vilayet.source
• 1916May 3–12 - 15 Irish rebel leaders who took part in the Easter Rising in Dublin in April are executed. Among them were Patrick Pearse, James Connolly, Thomas Clarke and William Pearse, brother of Patrick Pearse who had served as a captain rather than a leader.source
• 1916May 31–June 1 – WWI: Battle of Jutland, between the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet in the North Sea, the war's only large-scale clash of battleships. The result is tactically inconclusive, but British dominance of the North Sea is maintainedsource
• 1916June 10 – The Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire, to create a single unified Arab state spanning from Aleppo to Aden, is formally declared by Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca.source
• 1916July 1–November 18 – WWI: Battle of the Somme, opening with explosion of the British Y Sap and Lochnagar mines and the Battle of Albert: More than one million soldiers die, with 57,470 British Empire casualties on the first day, 19,240 of them killed, the British Army's bloodiest day. The immediate result is tactically inconclusive.source
• 1916August 3 - Roger Casement is executed by hanging in Pentonville Gaol, London for his role in the Easter Rising in Dublin.source
• 1916August 3–5 – WWI: Sinai and Palestine Campaign – Battle of Romani: British Imperial troops secure victory over a joint Ottoman-German force.source
• 1916September 4 – WWI: East African Campaign – Dar es Salaam surrenders to British Empire forces, securing them control of the Central Line of railway through German East Africa.source
• 1916September 15–22 – WWI: Battle of Flers–Courcelette, France – The battle is significant for the first use of the tank in warfare; also for the debut of the Canadian and New Zealand Divisions in the Battle of the Somme.source
• 1916October 7 – The Georgia Tech vs. Cumberland College American football game ends in a score of 222–0.source
• 1916October 27 – Battle of Segale: Negus Mikael of Wollo, marching on the Ethiopian capital in support of his son Emperor Iyasu V, is defeated by Fitawrari Habte Giyorgis, securing the throne for Empress Zewditu.source
• 1916November 5 – Everett massacre: An armed confrontation in Everett, Washington, between local authorities and members of the Industrial Workers of the World results in seven deaths.source
• 1916November 18 – WWI – Battle of the Somme: In France, British Expeditionary Force commander Douglas Haig calls off the battle, which started on July 1.source
• 1916November 23 – WWI: Eastern Front – Bucharest, the capital of Romania, is occupied by troops of the Central Powers.source
• 1916December 18 – WWI: The Battle of Verdun ends in France with German troops defeated.source
• 1916December 23 – WWI: The Desert Column captures the Ottoman garrison during the Battle of Magdhaba.source
• 1917March 26 – WWI: First Battle of Gaza – British Egyptian Expeditionary Force troops virtually encircle the Gaza garrison, but are then ordered to withdraw, leaving the city to the Ottoman defenders.source
• 1917(February 23, O.S.) – The February Revolution begins in Russia: Women calling for bread in Petrograd start riots, which spontaneously spread throughout the city.source
• 1917April 17 – WWI: The Egyptian Expeditionary Force begins the Second Battle of Gaza. This unsuccessful frontal attack on strong Ottoman defences along with the first battle, results in 10,000 casualties, the dismissal of force commander General Archibald Murray, and the beginning of the Stalemate in Southern Palestine.source
• 1917April 17 – The Times and the Daily Mail (London newspapers both owned by Lord Northcliffe) print atrocity propaganda of the supposed existence of a German Corpse Factory processing dead soldiers' bodies.source
• 1917May 15 – Robert Nivelle is replaced as Commander-in-Chief of the French Army, by Philippe Pétain.source
• 1917July 1 – WWI: Russian General Brusilov begins the major Kerensky offensive in Galicia, initially advancing towards Lemberg.source
• 1917July 28 – The Silent Parade is organized by the NAACP in New York City, to protest the East St. Louis massacre of early July, as well as lynchings in Tennessee and Texas.source
• 1917Battle of Aqaba: Arabian troops, led by T. E. Lawrence, capture Aqaba from the Ottoman Empire.source
• 1917September 26–October 3 – WWI: Battle of Polygon Wood (part of the Battle of Passchendaele) near Ypres in Belgium – British and Australian troops capture positions from the Germans.source
• 1917October 27 – WWI: Battle of Buqqar Ridge – Ottoman forces attack British Desert Mounted Corps units garrisoning El-Buqqar Ridge, during the last days of the Stalemate in Southern Palestine.source
• 1917November 5 (N.S.) (October 23, O.S.) – Estonian and Russian Bolsheviks seize power in Tallinn, Autonomous Governorate of Estonia, two days before the October Revolution in Petrograd.source
• 1917November 6 – WWI: The Battle of Hareira and Sheria is launched by the British XX Corps and Desert Mounted Corps, against the central Ottoman defences protecting the Gaza to Beersheba Road.source
• 1917November 7 – Iran (which has provided weapons for Russia) refuses to support the Allied Forces after the October Revolution.source
• 1917November 7 – WWI: The Battle of Hareira and Sheria continues, when the XX Corps and Desert Mounted Corps capture Hareira and Sheria, marking the end of the Ottoman Gaza to Beersheba line.source
• 1917November 7 – WWI – Third Battle of Gaza: The British Army XXI Corps occupies Gaza, after the Ottoman garrison withdraws.source
• 1917November 16 – WWI: Battle of Ayun Kara: The ANZAC Mounted Division occupies Jaffa.source
• 1917November 17 – WWI: The Battle of Jerusalem (1917) begins, with the British Imperial Egyptian Expeditionary Force launching attacks against Ottoman forces in the Judean Hills.source
• 1917November 23 – The Bolsheviks release the full text of the previously secret Sykes–Picot Agreement of 1916 in Izvestia and Pravda; it is printed in the Manchester Guardian on November 26.source
• 1917The ANZAC Mounted Division (Desert Mounted Corps) successfully fights the Battle of Ayun Kara, in the aftermath of the Battle of Mughar Ridge against strong German rearguards.source
• 1917The British Desert Mounted Corps begins the Battle of Tel el Khuweilfe, in the direction of Hebron and Jerusalem.source
• 1917Battle of Mughar Ridge: The British Imperial Egyptian Expeditionary Force attacks retreating Ottoman-German Yildirim Army Group forces, resulting in the capture of 10,000 Ottoman prisoners, 100 guns and 50 mi km of Palestine territory.source
• 1917December 11 – WWI: General Edmund Allenby leads units of the British Egyptian Expeditionary Force into Jerusalem on foot through, the Jaffa Gate.source
• 1917December 30 – WWI: The British Egyptian Expeditionary Force secures the victory at the Battle of Jerusalem, by successfully defending Jerusalem from numerous counterattacks by the Ottoman-German Yildirim Army Group.source
• 1917Battle of Jerusalem: The British Egyptian Expeditionary Force accepts the surrender of Jerusalem by the mayor, Hussein al-Husayni, following the effective defeat of the Ottoman-German Yildirim Army Group.source
• 1918February 3 – Finnish Civil War: Battle of Oulu – The White Guard defeats the Reds.source
• 1918March 21–July 18 – WWI: The Spring Offensive by the German Army along the Western Front fails to make a breakthrough, despite large losses on each side, including nearly 20,000 British Army dead on the first day, Operation Michael, on the Somme.source
• 1918March 30 – March Days: Bolshevik and Armenian Revolutionary Federation forces suppress a Muslim revolt in Baku, Azerbaijan, resulting in up to 30,000 deaths.source
• 1918April 30 – WWI: The Second Transjordan attack on Shunet Nimrin and Es Salt, launched by units of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, ends on 4 May, with their withdrawal back to the Jordan Valley.source
• 1918May 14 – The Three Minute Pause, initiated by the daily firing of the Noon Gun on Signal Hill, is instituted by Cape Town Mayor Sir Harry Hands. It will inspire the introduction of the two-minute silence in November 1919.source
• 1918June 10 – WWI: The Austro-Hungarian dreadnought battleship SMS Szent István is sunk by two Italian MAS motor torpedo boats off the Dalmatian coast.source
• 1918July 3 – Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War: The Siberian Intervention is launched by the Allies, to extract the Czechoslovak Legion from the Russian Civil War.source
• 1918August 2 – North Russia Intervention: Anti-Bolshevik forces stage a coup at Arkhangelsk, and an occupation by Allied forces follows.source
• 1918August 16 – The Battle of Lake Baikal is fought by the Czechoslovak legion, against the Red Army.source
• 1918September 3 – The Bolshevik government of Russia publishes the first official announcement of the Red Terror, a period of repression against political opponents, as an "Appeal to the Working Class" in the newspaper Izvestia.source
• 1918September 18 – WWI: Battle of Épehy – British approach the Hindenburg Line along the St Quentin Canal.source
• 1918The Capture of Damascus begins, with the Charge at Irbid by the 4th Cavalry Division (India).source
• 1918The British Army's Egyptian Expeditionary Force launches the Battle of Megiddo, incorporating the Battle of Sharon, and the Battle of Nablus, an attack in the Judaean Mountains. This day are fought the Battle of Tulkarm, and the Battle of Arara, which break the Ottoman front line stretching from the Mediterranean coast to the Judaean Mountains, while the Battle of Tabsor extends into September 20.source
• 1918Battle of St Quentin Canal begins; Allied forces advance towards the Hindenburg Line.source
• 1918October 30 – The Armistice of Mudros ends conflict between the Ottoman Empire and the Allies of World War I, and grants independence to the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen.source
• 1918October 31 – Revolution overthrows the pro-Habsburg government in Hungary, effectively dissolving the Austro-Hungarian Empire.source
• 1918November 3 – WWI: The Armistice of Villa Giusti is signed between Austria-Hungary and the Allies near Padua.source
• 1918November 3 – German Revolution: Kiel mutiny by sailors in the German fleet at Kiel while throughout northern Germany soldiers and workers begin to establish revolutionary councils on the Russian soviet model.source
• 1918November 20 – U-boats start to rendezvous off Harwich, to begin the surrender of the High Seas Fleet to the British Royal Navy; in the following week the German warships are escorted to internment in Scapa Flow.source
• 1918November 21 – Lwów pogrom: Polish troops, volunteers and freed criminals massacre at least 320 Ukrainian Christians and Jews in Lwów, Galicia.source
• 1918November 22 – The Belgian royal family returns to Brussels after the war, King Albert I having commanded the Allied army group in the September–October Courtrai offensive, which liberated his country.source
• 1918November 25 – General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, German commander in German East Africa, signs a ceasefire at Abercorn in Northern Rhodesia.source
• 1918November 28 – Estonian War of Independence: The Red Army invades Estonia, starting the war. The Commune of the Working People of Estonia is established as a Soviet puppet state in Narva on the next day.source
• 1918December 27 – Greater Poland Uprising (1918–19): Poles in Greater Poland (the former Grand Duchy of Posen) rise up against the Germans, ignited by a patriotic speech made in Poznań by pianist and politician Ignacy Jan Paderewski.source
• 1919January 7 – Estonian War of Independence: With Soviet Russian forces just 40 km outside of the capital Tallinn, Estonian forces start a general and successful counter-offensive against the Red Army.source
• 1919January 9 – Estonian War of Independence: Battle of Tapa – Estonian forces liberate Tapa, Estonia, from the Red Army.source
• 1919January 16 – The Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, authorizing Prohibition, is ratified.source
• 1919February 11 – The Seattle General Strike ends, when Federal troops are summoned by the State of Washington's Attorney General.source
• 1919February 14 – The Polish–Soviet War begins, with the Battle of Bereza Kartuska.source
• 1919February 16–21 – Estonian War of Independence: Uniformed peasants in Saaremaa rebel against the government of Estonia; the rebellion is crushed by government forces, leaving more than 200 dead.source
• 1919March 3–April – Russian Civil War: Beginning of the Chapan War as peasants of the provinces of Samara and Simbirsk rebel against Soviet rule.source
• 1919March 8 – British authorities in Egypt arrest populist leader Saad Zaghloul, exiling him to Malta, triggering the Egyptian Revolution of 1919.source
• 1919April 13 – Amritsar Massacre: Under the command of Reginald Dyer, detachments of the 9th Gorkha Rifles and the 59th Scinde Rifles massacre 379 Sikh civilians at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, in the Punjab Province.source
• 1919April 13 – Eugene V. Debs enters prison at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia for speaking out against conscription in the United States during World War I.source
• 1919May 15 – Greek landing at Smyrna: The Hellenic Army lands at Smyrna assisted by ships of the British Royal Navy.source
• 1919May 19 – Mustafa Kemal Atatürk lands at Samsun on the Anatolian Black Sea coast, marking the start of the Turkish War of Independence. The anniversary of this event is also an official day of Turkish Youth.source
• 1919May 25 – Estonian War of Independence: Estonian forces capture Pskov from the Red Army, and soon hand it over to the White forces.source
• 1919May 27 – Siege of Spin Boldak (Third Anglo-Afghan War). This is the last time the British Army uses an escalade.source
• 1919June 5 – Estonian and Latvian Wars of Independence: The advancing pro-German Baltische Landeswehr initiates war against Estonia in Northern Latvia.source
• 1919June 15 – Pancho Villa attacks Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. When the bullets begin to fly to the American side of the border, two units of the United States 7th Cavalry Regiment cross the border, to push Villa's forces from American territory.source
• 1919June 20–25 – Russian Civil War, Southern Front: The White Volunteer Army defeats the exhausted Red forces in the Kharkiv Operation, capturing the industrial city of Kharkiv.source
• 1919June 21 – Bloody Saturday of the Winnipeg general strike: Royal North-West Mounted Police fire a volley of bullets into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two.source
• 1919June 26 – British Foreign Office official St John Philby and T. E. Lawrence arrive in Cairo for discussions about Arab unrest in Egypt, having been flown by Canadian pilot Harry Yates in a Handley Page bomber which set off from England on June 21.source
• 1919July 5–20 – Russian Civil War, Eastern or Siberian Front, Ekaterinburg Operation: The Red Army captures the city of Ekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains from the White rule of Admiral Alexander Kolchak.source
• 1919August 18 – Russian Civil War: North Russia intervention – The Bolshevik fleet at Kronstadt, protecting Petrograd on the Baltic Sea, is substantially damaged by British Royal Navy Coastal Motor Boats (torpedo boats) and military aircraft in a combined operation.source
• 1919November 11 – The first Remembrance Day is observed in the British Empire with a two-minute silence at 11:00 hours.source
• 1919November 11 – Russian Civil War: The Northwestern Army of General Nikolai Yudenich retreats to Estonia and is disarmed.source
• 1919November 16 – After Entente pressure, Romanian forces withdraw from Budapest and allow Admiral Horthy to march in.source
• 1920January 1 – Polish–Soviet War: The Russian Red Army increases its troops along the Polish border from 4 divisions to 20.source
• 1920January 7 – Russian Civil War: The forces of Russian White Admiral Alexander Kolchak surrender in Krasnoyarsk; the Great Siberian Ice March ensues.source
• 1920March 13–17 – Wolfgang Kapp and Walther von Lüttwitz's Kapp Putsch (an attempted coup in Germany) briefly ousts the Weimar Republic government from Berlin, but fails due to public resistance and a general strike.source
• 1920March 15–16 – Constantinople is occupied by British Empire forces, acting for the Allied Powers against the Turkish National Movement. Retrospectively, the Grand National Assembly of Turkey regards this as the dissolution of the Ottoman regime in Istanbul.source
• 1920March 25 – Irish War of Independence: British recruits to the Royal Irish Constabulary begin to arrive in Ireland. They become known from their improvised uniforms as the "Black and Tans".source
• 1920April 3 – Failed assassination attempts on General Mannerheim, retired leader of the victorious White Guard in the Finnish Civil War, led by Aleksander Weckman by order of Eino Rahja, during a White Guard parade in Tampere, Finland.source
• 1920April 11 – Mexican Revolution: Álvaro Obregón flees from Mexico City (during a trial intended to ruin his reputation) to Guerrero, where he joins Fortunato Maycotte.source
• 1920April 24 – Polish–Soviet War: Polish and anti-Soviet Ukrainian troops attack the Red Army in Soviet Ukraine.source
• 1920May 7 – Polish–Soviet War: Polish troops occupy Kyiv. The government of the Ukrainian People's Republic returns to the city.source
• 1920May 26 – Ganja revolt: Anti-Soviet opposition in the Azerbaijan SSR launches an abortive revolt in Ganja.source
• 1920June 12 – Polish–Soviet War: The Red Army retakes Kyiv.source
• 1920July 2 – Polish–Soviet War: The Red Army continues its offensive into Poland.source
• 1920July 19–August 7 – The Second Congress of the Communist International takes place in Saint Petersburg and Moscow; the Twenty-one Conditions are adopted.source
• 1920July 22 – Polish–Soviet War: Poland sues for peace with Soviet Russia (which refuses).source
• 1920July 24 – Battle of Maysalun: The French defeat the Syrian army, whose leader Yusuf al-'Azma is killed. French troops occupy Damascus and depose Faisal I of Syria as king.source
• 1920August 3 – Irish War of Independence: Catholics riot in Belfast, in protest at the continuing British Army presence.source
• 1920August 13 – Irish War of Independence: The Restoration of Order in Ireland Act (passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom) receives Royal Assent, providing for Irish Republican Army activists to be tried by court-martial, rather than by jury in criminal courts.source
• 1920August 13–25 – Polish–Soviet War: Battle of Warsaw – The Red Army is defeated.source
• 1920August 19–25 – Second Silesian Uprising: The Poles in Upper Silesia rise up against the Germans.source
• 1920August 19 – Russian Civil War: Peasants in Tambov Governorate begin the Tambov Rebellion against the Bolshevik government of Soviet Russia.source
• 1920September 16 – Wall Street bombing: A bomb in a horse wagon (perhaps planted by Galleanisti) explodes in front of the J. P. Morgan Building in New York City, killing 38 and injuring 400.source
• 1920September 27 – Polish–Soviet War: Soviet Russia sues for peace with Poland.source
• 1920October 16 – Polish–Soviet War: After the Polish army captures Tarnopol, Dubno, Minsk and Dryssa, the ceasefire is enforced.source
• 1920November 21 – Irish War of Independence: Bloody Sunday – The Irish Republican Army (IRA), on the instructions of Michael Collins, shoot dead the "Cairo gang", 14 British undercover agents in Dublin, most in their homes. Later this day in retaliation, the Auxiliary Division of the Royal Irish Constabulary open fire on a crowd at a Gaelic Athletic Association football match in Croke Park, resulting in 14 deaths with 60 wounded. Three men are shot this night in Dublin Castle "while trying to escape".source
• 1921February 12 – Red Army invasion of Georgia: The Democratic Republic of Georgia is invaded by forces of Bolshevist Russia.source
• 1921February 21 – 1921 Persian coup d'état: Rezā Khan and Zia'eddin Tabatabaee stage a coup d'état in Qajar dynasty Iran.source
• 1921February 25 – Red Army invasion of Georgia: The Red Army enters the Georgian capital Tbilisi and occupies the country, installing a new government and proclaiming the Georgian Soviet Republic.source
• 1921February 28 – The Kronstadt rebellion is initiated by sailors of the Soviet Navy's Baltic Fleet.source
• 1921March 5 – Irish War of Independence: Clonbanin ambush: A force of about 100 Irish Republican Army members attacks a British Army convoy of 40 soldiers, killing several, including Brigadier General Cumming.source
• 1921March 8 – Spanish Premier Eduardo Dato e Iradier is assassinated while exiting the parliament building in Madrid.source
• 1921March 13 – Occupation of Mongolia: The Russian White Army captures Mongolia from China; Roman von Ungern-Sternberg declares himself ruler.source
• 1921March 17 – The Red Army crushes the Kronstadt rebellion, and a number of sailors flee to Finland.source
• 1921March 21 – Irish War of Independence: Headford Ambush – The Irish Republican Army kills at least 9 British Army troops.source
• 1921May 1–7 – Jaffa riots: Riots at Jaffa, Mandatory Palestine result in 47 Jewish and 48 Arab deaths.source
• 1921May 2–July 5 – Third Silesian Uprising: Poles in Upper Silesia rise against the Germans.source
• 1921May 25 – Irish War of Independence: The Irish Republican Army occupies and burns The Custom House in Dublin, the centre of local government in Ireland. Five IRA men are killed, and over 80 are captured by the British Army which surrounds the building.source
• 1921May 31–June 1 – Tulsa Race Massacre (Greenwood Massacre): Mobs of white residents attack black residents and businesses in Greenwood District, Tulsa, Oklahoma. The official death toll is 36, but later investigations suggest an actual figure between 100 and 300. 1,250 homes are destroyed and roughly 6,000 African Americans imprisoned in one of the worst incidents of mass racial violence in the United States.source
• 1921June 22–July 12 – The Third Congress of the Communist International takes place.source
• 1921July 21 – Rif War: Battle of Annual – Spanish troops are dealt a crushing defeat at the hands of Abd el-Krim in Morocco.source
• 1921July 26 – U.S. President Warren G. Harding receives Princess Fatima of Afghanistan who is escorted by imposter Stanley Clifford Weyman.source
• 1921August 25 – The Battle of Blair Mountain, the largest labor uprising in United States history and the country's largest peacetime armed uprising, begins in Logan County, West Virginia as part of the Coal Wars, continuing until September 2.source
• 1921August 26 – Following the assassination of former Finance Minister Matthias Erzberger by right-wing terrorists, the German government declares martial law.source
• 1921September 1 – Poplar Rates Rebellion: Nine members of the borough council of Poplar, London, are arrested.source
• 1921October 3 – Simko, the leader of the Shikak tribe, kills the Iranian commander Colonel Mohammad Taqi Pessian by beheading him in the Battle of Jafarabad, which is the first incident of his rebellion.source
• 1921October 7 – During his first rebellion, Simko Shikak launches an attack on the Savujbulak district of Mahabad. With a force of approximately 3,900, he attacks the gendarmes, killing 400 of them and looting the local population.source
• 1921October 24 – In the continuing Rif War, the Spanish Army defeats rifkabyl rebels in Morocco.source
• 1921November 4 – After a speech by Adolf Hitler in the Hofbräuhaus in Munich (Germany), members of the Sturmabteilung ("brownshirts") physically assault his opposition.source
• 1921November 11 – During an Armistice Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, the Tomb of the Unknowns is dedicated by Warren G. Harding, President of the United States.source
• 1922January 26 – Italian forces occupy Misrata, Libya; the reconquest of Libya begins.source
• 1922February 8 – In the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, the Cheka becomes the Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upravlenie (GPU), a section of the NKVD.source
• 1922February 14 – Finnish Minister of the Interior Heikki Ritavuori is assassinated by Ernst Tandefelt.source
• 1922February 15 – The inaugural session of the Permanent Court of International Justice (PCIJ) is held in The Hague.source
• 1922March 16 – The Rand Rebellion, which began as a strike by white South African mine workers on 28 December 1921 and became open rebellion against the state, is suppressed.source
• 1922May 8 – In Moscow, eight priests, two laymen and one woman are sentenced to death for opposition to the Soviet government's confiscation of church property.source
• 1922June 1 – Bolshevik forces defeat Basmachi troops, under Enver Pasha.source
• 1922June 22 – Irish Republican Army agents assassinate British Army field marshal Sir Henry Wilson in London; the assassins are sentenced to death on July 18.source
• 1922June 28 – The Irish Civil War and Battle of Dublin begin when the Irish National Army, using artillery loaned by the British, begins to bombard the anti-Treaty Irish Republican Army forces occupying the Four Courts in Dublin. Fighting in Dublin lasts until July 5.source
• 1922August 22 – Irish Civil War: General Michael Collins is assassinated in West Cork.source
• 1922August 23 – Morocco revolts against the Spanish.source
• 1922August 26 – A Turkish large-scale attack opens against Greek forces in Afyon; Turkish victory is achieved on August 30.source
• 1922August 28 – Japan agrees to withdraw its troops from Siberia.source
• 1922September 9 – Turkish forces pursuing withdrawing Greek troops enter İzmir, effectively ending the Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922).source
• 1922September 24 (O. S. September 11) – 11 September 1922 Revolution in Greece.source
• 1922October 11 – Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922 ends in Turkish victory.source
• 1922October 28 – The Red Army occupies Vladivostok.source
• 1922October 28 – In Italy, the March on Rome brings the National Fascist Party and Benito Mussolini to power. Italy begins a period of dictatorship that lasts until the end of the Second World War.source
• 1922November 15 – 1922 Guayaquil general strike: During a 3-day strike action in the city of Guayaquil, Ecuador, police and military fire into a crowd, killing at least 300.source
• 1922December 16 – Gabriel Narutowicz, sworn on December 11 as first president of the Second Polish Republic, is assassinated by a right-wing sympathizer in Warsaw.source
• 1922During his first rebellion, Simko Shikak launched an attack on Mahabad in mid-May and July. In the ensuing fighting, Simko's forces captured Mahabad and killed a Persian commander.source
• 1923January 5 – Lithuania begins the Klaipėda Revolt to annex the Klaipėda Region (Memel Territory).source
• 1923January 11 – Despite strong British protests, troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area, to force Germany to make reparation payments.source
• 1923May 24 – The Irish Civil War ends.source
• 1923May 27 – The Ku Klux Klan in the United States defies a law requiring publication of its membership.source
• 1923June 9 – Bulgarian coup d'état of 1923: A military coup in Bulgaria ousts prime minister Aleksandar Stamboliyski (he is killed June 14).source
• 1923June 16 – The storming of Ayan in Siberia concludes the Yakut Revolt and the Russian Civil War.source
• 1923September 1 – The Kantō Massacre begins and continues for several weeks. Ethnic Koreans are killed by lynch mobs based on rumors that Koreans are committing crimes and plotting to overthrow the government. The death toll (and even the occurrence of) the massacre is disputed, with figures ranging from a few dozen to over 6,000 deaths. Most of the deaths are of Korean people, although it is said that other ethnic minorities and even Japanese people with unusual dialects are also killed.source
• 1923September 6 – The Fukuda Village Incident occurs as a part of the larger Kantō Massacre. Nine Japanese people, including a pregnant woman and children, are killed based on false beliefs that they are ethnic Koreans.source
• 1923September 13 – Military coup in Spain: Miguel Primo de Rivera takes over, setting up a dictatorship. Trade unions are prohibited for 10 years.source
• 1923September 26 – In Bavaria, Gustav Ritter von Kahr takes dictatorial powers.source
• 1923September 30 – Küstrin Putsch: Outside Berlin, Major Ernst Buchrucker, a leader of the Black Reichswehr, attempts a putsch by seizing several forts.source
• 1923October 2 – Küstrin Putsch: After two days of siege, Major Buchrucker and his men surrender.source
• 1923October 6 – The Occupation of Constantinople ends when the great powers of World War I withdraw.source
• 1923October 23 – Hamburg Uprising: In Germany, the Communists attempt a putsch in Hamburg, which results in street battles in that city for the next two days, when it ends unsuccessfully.source
• 1923October 27 – In Germany, General Hans von Seeckt orders the Reichswehr to dissolve the Social Democratic-Communist government of Saxony, which is refusing to accept the authority of the Reich government.source
• 1923October 28 – In Qajar dynasty Persia, Reza Khan becomes Ahmad Shah Qajar's prime minister.source
• 1923November 8 – Beer Hall Putsch: In Munich, Adolf Hitler leads the Nazis in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the Bavarian government; police and troops crush the attempt the next day in one of several significant events on 9 November in German history. 20 people die as a result of associated violence.source
• 1923December 27 – Toranomon Incident: In Tokyo, Crown Prince Hirohito of Japan survives an assassination attempt by communist student Daisuke Nanba.source
• 1924May 26 – Harry Grindell Matthews attempts to demonstrate his "death ray" to the War Office in the United Kingdom.source
• 1924July 19 – Napalpí massacre: Around 400 indigenous people of Toba ethnicity are massacred in Argentina.source
• 1924August 28 – August Uprising: Georgia rises against rule by the Soviet Union in an abortive rebellion, in which several thousands die.source
• 1924September 9–11 – The Kohat riots break out in India.source
• 1924September 9 – The Hanapepe massacre occurs on Kauai, Hawaii.source
• 1924October 25 – The British press publishes the Zinoviev letter, released the previous day by the Foreign Office. This purports to be a directive from Grigory Zinoviev, head of the Communist International in Moscow, to the Communist Party of Great Britain.source
• 1924November 19 – Major-General Sir Lee Stack, British Governor-General of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and Sirdar of the Egyptian Army, is shot in Cairo by a gang of Egyptian nationalist students, dying the following day.source
• 1924December 1 – A Soviet-backed communist 1924 Estonian coup d'état attempt fails in Estonia.source
• 1924December 20 – In Germany, Adolf Hitler is released from Landsberg Prison after serving nine months for his crucial role in the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923.source
• 1924Autumn – In the United States, the final raid of the Renegade period of the Apache Wars takes place, bringing the American Indian Wars to a close, after 315 years.source
• 1925January 1 – The Syrian Federation is officially dissolved, the State of Aleppo and the State of Damascus having been replaced by the State of Syria.source
• 1925January 3 – Benito Mussolini makes a pivotal speech in the Italian Chamber of Deputies which will be regarded by historians as the beginning of his dictatorship.source
• 1925March 1 – New York City Fire Department Rescue 2 is put in service in Brooklyn.source
• 1925March 9–May 1 – Pink's War: The British Royal Air Force bombards mountain strongholds of Mahsud tribesmen in South Waziristan.source
• 1925April 16 – A communist assault on St Nedelya Church claims roughly 150 lives in Sofia, Bulgaria.source
• 1925April 20 – Iranian forces of Reza Shah occupy Ahvaz and arrest Sheikh Khazʽal Ibn Jabir.source
• 1925July 18 – Adolf Hitler publishes Volume 1 of his personal manifesto Mein Kampf in Germany.source
• 1925August 25 – The French complete their evacuation of the Ruhr region of Germany.source
• 1925October 19–29 – Incident at Petrich: A brief conflict occurs between Bulgaria and Greece after a Greek soldier accidentally crosses into the Bulgarian side and is shot by border guards.source
• 1925November 9 – Formal foundation date of the Schutzstaffel (SS) as a personal bodyguard for Adolf Hitler in Germany.source
• 1925New York City becomes the largest city in the world, taking the lead from London.source
• 1926January 31 – British and Belgian troops leave Cologne.source
• 1926April 7 – An assassination attempt against Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini fails.source
• 1926April 17 – Zhang Zuolin's army captures Beijing.source
• 1926May 9 – The French navy bombards Damascus, because of Druze riots.source
• 1926May 12 – The United Kingdom general strike is called off by the trade unions, although miners remain on strike.source
• 1926May 26 – The Rif War ends, when Rif rebels surrender in Morocco.source
• 1926May 28 – The 1926 coup d'état, commanded by Manuel Gomes da Costa in Portugal, installs the Ditadura Nacional (National Dictatorship), followed by António de Oliveira Salazar's Estado Novo.source
• 1926July 9 – In Portugal, General Óscar Carmona takes power in a military coup.source
• 1926July 10 – A bolt of lightning strikes Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey; the resulting fire causes several million pounds of explosives to blow up in the next 2–3 days.source
• 1926August 1 – In Mexico, the entry into force of anticlerical measures stipulated in the Constitution of 1917 causes the Cristero War from August 3.source
• 1926September 11 – In Rome, Italy, Gino Lucetti throws a bomb at Benito Mussolini's car, but Mussolini is unhurt.source
• 1926September 20 – The North Side Gang attempts to assassinate Al Capone, at the apex of his power at this time, spraying his headquarters in Cicero, Illinois with over a thousand rounds of machine gun fire in broad daylight, as Capone is eating there. Capone escapes harm.source
• 1926October 16 – An ammunition explosion on troopship Kuang Yuang near Jiujiang, China, kills 1,200.source
• 1926December 17 – 1926 Lithuanian coup d'état: A democratically elected government is overthrown in Lithuania; Antanas Smetona assumes power.source
• 1926December 23 – Nicaraguan President Adolfo Díaz requests U.S. military assistance in the ongoing civil war. American peacekeeping troops immediately set up neutral zones in Puerto Cabezas and at the mouth of the Rio Grande to protect American and foreign lives and property.source
• 1927January 24 – U.S. Marines invade Nicaragua by orders of President Calvin Coolidge, intervening in the Nicaraguan Civil War, and remaining in the country until 1933.source
• 1927February 7 – An attempted military coup in Lisbon, Portugal, is successfully put down.source
• 1927February 12 – British troops land in Shanghai as a result of UK government concerns about the safety of residents in the British settlement.source
• 1927February 19 – A general strike takes place in Shanghai in protest against the presence of British troops.source
• 1927March 24 – Nanking Incident: After six foreigners have been killed in Nanking, and it appears that Kuomintang and Chinese Communist Party forces will overrun the foreign consulates, warships of the U.S. Navy and the British Royal Navy fire shells and shoot to disperse the crowds.source
• 1927April 12 – April 12 Incident (Shanghai Massacre): Kuomintang troops kill a number of communist-supporting workers in Shanghai. The 1st United Front between the Nationalists and Communist ends, and the Civil War lasting until 1949 begins.source
• 1927April 23 – Cardiff City wins the FA Cup, beating Arsenal 1–0; it is the only time a team from outside England has won the competition.source
• 1927May 18 – Bath School disaster: A series of violent attacks by a school official results in 45 deaths, mostly of children, in Bath Township, Michigan, United States.source
• 1927June 9 – The Soviet Union executes 20 people for alleged espionage in retaliation for the assassination two days earlier of Pyotr Voykov, the Soviet ambassador to Poland, at the railway station in Warsaw. Voykov had been shot by 19-year-old Boris Kowerda, an exiled Russian, in retaliation for having signed the death warrants in 1918 for Tsar Nicholas II and the Russian Imperial Family.source
• 1927July 15 – July Revolt of 1927: After police in Vienna fire on an angry crowd, 85 protesters (mostly members of the Social Democratic Party of Austria) and 5 policemen are left dead; more than 600 people are injured.source
• 1927July 24 – The Menin Gate is dedicated as a war memorial at Ypres, Belgium.source
• 1927August 1 – The Communist Chinese People's Liberation Army is formed, during the Nanchang Uprising.source
• 1927August 22 – 200 people demonstrate in Hyde Park, London, against the death sentences on Italian American anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti. Other protests are held across the world at this time.source
• 1927September – The Autumn Harvest Uprising occurs in China.source
• 1927October 9 – The Mexican government crushes a rebellion in Veracruz.source
• 1927November 21 – The Columbine Mine massacre: Colorado state police open fire on 500 rowdy but unarmed miners during a strike, killing 6.source
• 1927December 19 – Three members of the revolutionary movement for Indian independence – Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil, Thakur Roshan Singh and Ashfaqulla Khan – are executed by the British Raj. Rajendra Nath Lahiri had been executed two days before.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
• 1928January 17 – The OGPU arrests Leon Trotsky in Moscow; he assumes a status of passive resistance and is exiled with his family.source
• 1928April 10 – Pineapple Primary: The United States Republican Party primary elections in Chicago are preceded by violence, bombings and assassination attempts (two politicians are killed, Octavius C. Granady and Giuseppe Esposito).source
• 1928April 12 – A bomb attack against Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini in Milan kills 17 bystanders.source
• 1928May 3 – Jinan incident: An armed conflict between the Imperial Japanese Army (allied with Northern Chinese warlords) and the Kuomintang's southern army occurs in Jinan, China.source
• 1928May 23 – A bomb attack against the Italian consulate in Buenos Aires, Argentina, kills 22 and injures 43.source
• 1928June 8 – By seizing Beijing and renaming it Běipíng, the National Revolutionary Army puts an end to the 'Fengtian warlords' Beiyang government there.source
• 1928June 20 – Puniša Račić kills three opposition representatives in the Yugoslavian Parliament, and injures three others, in a gun attack.source
• 1928July 17 – José de León Toral assassinates Álvaro Obregón, president-elect of Mexico.source
• 1928July 25 – The United States recalls its troops from China.source
• 1928November 14 – the Afghan Civil War begins as rebels besiege Jalalabad.source
• 1928December 6 – The government of Colombia sends military forces to suppress a month-long strike by United Fruit Company workers, resulting in an unknown number of deaths.source
• 1929January 6 – 6 January Dictatorship: King Alexander of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes suspends his country's constitution.source
• 1929January 17 – Kabul falls to Habibullāh Kalakāni's forces, beginning a 9-month period of Saqqawist rule in Afghanistan while the Afghan Civil War continues.source
• 1929February 14 – "Saint Valentine's Day Massacre": Five gangsters (rivals of Al Capone), plus a civilian, are shot dead in Chicago.source
• 1929February 21 – In the first battle of the Warlord Rebellion in northeastern Shandong against the Nationalist government of China, a 24,000-strong rebel force led by Zhang Zongchang is defeated at Zhifu by 7,000 NRA troops.source
• 1929March 3 – A revolt by Generals José Gonzalo Escobar and Jesús María Aguirre fails in Mexico.source
• 1929March 28 – Japanese forces withdraw from Shandong province to their garrison in Qingdao, bringing an end to the Jinan Incident.source
• 1929June 1 – The 1st Conference of the Communist Parties of Latin America is held in Buenos Aires.source
• 1929July 27 – The Geneva Convention addresses the treatment of prisoners of war.source
• 1929August 16 – The 1929 Palestine riots break out between Palestinians and Jews in Mandatory Palestine, and continue until the end of the month. In total, 133 Jews and 116 Palestinians are killed.source
• 1929August 29 – The 1929 Palestine riots: 18–20 Jews are killed in Safed by Palestinian Arabs.source
• 1929September 17 – A coup ousts Augustinas Voldemaras from his prime minister position in Lithuania; he is replaced by the brother-in-law of President Antanas Smetona, Juozas Tūbelis.source
• 1929October 13 – Afghan Civil War ends.source
• 1929October 22 – The government of Aristide Briand falls in France.source
• 1929December 28 – "Black Saturday" in Samoa: New Zealand colonial police kill 11 unarmed demonstrators, an event which leads the Mau movement to demand independence for Samoa.source
• 1930February 10 – The Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng launch the Yên Bái mutiny in the hope of ending French colonial rule in Vietnam.source
• 1930March 2 – Mahatma Gandhi informs the British Viceroy of India that civil disobedience will begin the following week.source
• 1930April 18 – The Chittagong Rebellion begins in India with the Chittagong armoury raid.source
• 1930May 17 – French Prime Minister André Tardieu decides to withdraw the remaining French troops from the Rhineland (they depart by June 30).source
• 1930July 3–10 – The First Eastern Women's Congress takes place in Damascus in Syria.source
• 1930July 7 – The far-right Lapua Movement marches in Helsinki, Finland.source
• 1930August 12 – Turkish troops move into Persia to fight Kurdish insurgents.source
• 1930August 27 – A military junta takes over in Peru.source
• 1930September 6 – 1930 Argentine coup d'état: José Félix Uriburu carries out a military coup, overthrowing Hipólito Yrigoyen, President of Argentina.source
• 1930September 17 – The Kurdish Ararat rebellion is suppressed by the Turks.source
• 1930October 24 – Revolution of 1930: Getúlio Vargas overthrows Washington Luís.source
• 1931February 21 – Peruvian revolutionaries hijack a Ford Trimotor aeroplane, and demand that the pilot drop propaganda leaflets over Lima.source
• 1931April 6 – The Portuguese government declares martial law in Madeira and in the Azores, because of the Madeira uprising in Funchal.source
• 1931April 15 – Assassination of Giuseppe (Joe the Boss) Masseria, New York City Mafia boss.source
• 1931May 14 – Ådalen shootings: Five people are killed in Ådalen, Sweden, when soldiers open fire on an unarmed trade union demonstration.source
• 1931May 15 – The Chinese Communists inflict a sharp defeat on the Kuomintang forces.source
• 1931May 31 – The Second Encirclement Campaign against Jiangxi Soviet ends in the defeat of the Kuomintang.source
• 1931June 5 – Anti-Chinese rioting occurs in Pyongyang. Approximately 127 Chinese people are killed, 393 wounded, and a considerable number of properties are destroyed by Korean residents.source
• 1931June 19 – The Geneva Convention (1929) relative to the treatment of prisoners of war enters into force.source
• 1931July 13 – Royal soldiers shoot and kill 22 people demonstrating against the Maharaja Hari Singh, of the Indian princely state of Kashmir and Jammu.source
• 1931September 18 – The Japanese military stages the Mukden Incident, an explosion blamed on Chinese dissidents and used as a pretext for the Japanese invasion of Manchuria.source
• 1931September 20 – Held at gunpoint, the Chinese commander of Kirin province announces the annexation of that territory to Japan.source
• 1931October 11 – A rally in Bad Harzburg, Germany leads to the Harzburg Front being founded, uniting the NSDAP, the DNVP, the Stahlhelm and various other right-wing factions.source
• 1932January 9 – Sakuradamon Incident: Korean nationalist Lee Bong-chang fails in his effort to assassinate Emperor Hirohito of Japan. The Kuomintang's official newspaper runs an editorial expressing regret that the attempt failed, which is used by the Japanese as a pretext to attack Shanghai later in the month.source
• 1932January 22 – The 1932 Salvadoran peasant uprising begins; it is suppressed by the government of Maximiliano Hernández Martínez.source
• 1932January 24 – Marshal Pietro Badoglio declares the end of Libyan resistance.source
• 1932January 28 – January 28 incident: Conflict between Japan and China in Shanghai.source
• 1932January 31 – Japanese warships arrive in Nanking.source
• 1932March 2 – The Mäntsälä rebellion ends in failure; Finnish democracy prevails. The Lapua Movement is condemned by conservative Finnish president Pehr Evind Svinhufvud in a radio speech.source
• 1932March 5 – Dan Takuma, prominent Japanese businessman and director of the Mitsui Zaibatsu conglomerate is assassinated by the radical right-wing League of Blood group.source
• 1932April 6 – U.S. president Herbert Hoover supports armament limitations at the World Disarmament Conference.source
• 1932April 29 – Korean pro-independence paramilitary Yun Bong-gil detonates a bomb at a gathering of Japanese government and military officials in Shanghai's Hongkou Park, killing General Yoshinori Shirakawa and injuring Mamoru Shigemitsu and Vice Admiral Kichisaburō Nomura.source
• 1932May 10 – There are violent scenes in the German Reichstag building in Berlin as Hermann Göring and other Nazi MRDs attack the Defense Minister General Wilhelm Groener for his lack of belief in a supposed Social Democratic putsch. After the debate, General Schleicher tells Groener that he has lost the confidence of the Army and must resign at once.source
• 1932May 15 – May 15 Incident, an attempted military coup in which Japanese prime minister Tsuyoshi Inukai is assassinated by naval officers. Japanese troops leave Shanghai.source
• 1932June 24 – After a relatively bloodless military rebellion, Siam becomes a constitutional monarchy.source
• 1932July 9 – The Constitutionalist Revolution starts in Brazil with the uprising of the state of São Paulo.source
• 1932July 17 – Altona Bloody Sunday: In Altona, Germany, a bloody clash with heavy police involvement occurs when Nazi marchers enter a working class area with many communist supporters; 18 are killed.source
• 1932July 20 – The Preußenschlag in Germany. The political coup gives Franz von Papen control of Prussia, the most powerful state in Germany, and is a major blow to German democracy.source
• 1932August – A farmers' revolt begins in the Midwestern United States.source
• 1932September 9 – Beginning of the Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia because of delimitation problems and others.source
• 1932September 17 – A speech by Laureano Gómez leads to the escalation of the Leticia Incident between Colombia and Peru.source
• 1932September 17 – Start of the Han–Liu War over Shandong.source
• 1932October 25 – George Lansbury becomes the leader of the opposition British Labour Party.source
• 1932November 2 – The Emu War, a nuisance wildlife management military operation, begins in Australia.source
• 1932November 3 – Strike by transport workers in Berlin. The Nazis and the Communists both co-operate in support of the strike. The Nazi-Communist co-operation damages the Nazis at the upcoming election with many right-wing voters switching back to the German National People's Party.source
• 1932November 9 – Geneva massacre: Military of Switzerland fire on a socialist anti-fascist demonstration in Geneva leaving 13 dead and 60 injured.source
• 1932December 10 – The Emu War in Australia ends in failure.source
• 1933February 1 – Adolf Hitler gives his "Proclamation to the German People" in Berlin.source
• 1933February 5 – A mutiny starts on the Royal Netherlands Navy coastal defence ship De Zeven Provinciën in the Dutch East Indies. After 6 days, it is bombed by a Dutch aircraft, killing 23 men, and the remaining mutineers surrender.source
• 1933February 15 – In Miami, Giuseppe Zangara attempts to assassinate President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but instead fatally wounds the Mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak. Zangara is executed on March 20 by the electric chair.source
• 1933February 23 – The Imperial Japanese Army invades Rehe province in northern China.source
• 1933March 20 – Dachau, the first Nazi concentration camp, is completed in Germany (it opens March 22 to hold political prisoners).source
• 1933April 1 – The recently elected Nazis (under Julius Streicher) organize a one-day boycott of all Jewish-owned businesses in Germany.source
• 1933April 3 – An anti-monarchist rebellion occurs in Siam (Thailand).source
• 1933May 10 – Chaco War: Paraguay formally declares war on Bolivia.source
• 1933June 17 – Kansas City massacre: At the Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri, gangsters kill four law enforcement officers and detained fugitive bank robber Frank Nash.source
• 1933June 25 – Wilmersdorfer Tennishallen delegates convene in Berlin to protest against the persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses in Nazi Germany.source
• 1933July 1 – Business Plot: Smedley Butler becomes involved in a coup attempt led by Gerald MacGuire against the President of the United States Franklin Delano Roosevelt which fails (according to his testimony in 1934).source
• 1933August 7 – Simele massacre: More than 3,000 Assyrian Iraqis are killed by Iraqi government troops.source
• 1933August 12 – British politician Winston Churchill makes his first speech publicly warning of the dangers of German rearmament.source
• 1933October 1 – Engelbert Dollfuss, leader of the Fatherland's Front in Austria, is seriously injured in a failed assassination attempt.source
• 1933October 12 – The United States Army Disciplinary Barracks on Alcatraz is acquired by the United States Department of Justice, which plans to incorporate the island into its Federal Bureau of Prisons as a penitentiary.source
• 1933December 29 – Members of the Iron Guard assassinate Ion Gheorghe Duca, prime minister of Romania.source
• 1934February 6 – French political crisis: The French far-right leagues rally in front of the Palais Bourbon, in an attempted coup d'état against the Third Republic.source
• 1934February 12–15 – Austrian Civil War: The Fatherland Front consolidates its power in a series of clashes across the country.source
• 1934February 21 – Augusto César Sandino is assassinated in Managua, by the National Guard.source
• 1934March 12 – Prime Minister Konstantin Päts stages a self-coup by declaring a state of emergency in Estonia, with the approval of the parliament, beginning the country's Era of Silence.source
• 1934May 19 – Kimon Georgiev stages a coup d'état in Bulgaria.source
• 1934June 30 – The Nazi Party SA camp Oranienburg becomes a national camp, taken over by the Schutzstaffel (SS).source
• 1934July 25 – July Putsch: Austrian Nazis assassinate chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, during a failed coup attempt.source
• 1934August 8 – The Wehrmacht swears a personal oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler.source
• 1934September 5–10 – The 6th Nuremberg Rally is staged by the German Nazi Party.source
• 1934October 9 – King Alexander of Yugoslavia and French foreign minister Louis Barthou are assassinated, during the king's state visit in Marseille.source
• 1934October 16 – The Long March of the People's Liberation Army of the Chinese Communist Party begins.source
• 1934November 23 – An Anglo-Ethiopian boundary commission in the Ogaden discovers an Italian garrison at Walwal, which lies well within Ethiopian territory. This encounter leads to the Abyssinia Crisis.source
• 1934December 5 – Abyssinia Crisis: Ethiopian and Italian troops exchange gunfire. Reported casualties for the Ethiopians are 150, and for the Italians 50.source
• 1935March 1 – 1935 Greek coup d'état attempt: Nikolaos Plastiras, Anastasios Papoulas and other Venizelists lead a coup against the People's Party government in Greece. The attempt is suppressed by March 11, and the leaders condemned to death for treason.source
• 1935March 19 – Harlem riot of 1935: A race riot breaks out in Harlem (New York City), after a rumor circulates that a teenage Puerto Rican shoplifter in the S. H. Kress & Co. department store has been brutally beaten.source
• 1935April 27 – Sheffield Wednesday beat West Bromwich Albion 4–2 at Wembley Stadium in England to win the FA Cup final.source
• 1935May 13 – T. E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia") is involved in a motorcycle accident, near his home in Dorset, England, resulting in his death a few days later.source
• 1935June 9 – He–Umezu Agreement: China's Kuomintang government concedes Japanese military control of north-eastern China.source
• 1935June 12 – The Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia ends.source
• 1935August 16 – Representatives of France, Britain and Italy meet in Paris in an unsuccessful attempt to negotiate a solution to the Abyssinia Crisis.source
• 1935October 2–3 – The Second Italo-Ethiopian War begins, as Italian General Emilio De Bono invades Ethiopia.source
• 1935December 27 – In China, Mao Zedong issues the Wayaobu Manifesto, On Tactics Against Japanese Imperialism, calling for a National United Front against the Japanese invasion.source
• 1936January 8 – Reza Shah of Iran issues the Kashf-e hijab which bans all Islamic veils such as the hijab, in addition to many types of male traditional clothingsource
• 1936February 10–19 – Second Italo-Ethiopian War: Battle of Amba Aradam – Italian forces gain a decisive tactical victory, effectively neutralizing the army of the Ethiopian Empire.source
• 1936February 26 – February 26 Incident (二・二六事件, Niniroku Jiken): The Imperial Way Faction engineers a failed coup against the Japanese government; some politicians are killed.source
• 1936April 15 – The Tulkarm shooting, followed by Jewish retaliation, begins the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine against British administration, and stokes opposition to Jewish immigration.source
• 1936May 5 – March of the Iron Will: Italian forces occupy Addis Ababa unopposed.source
• 1936July 17 – The Spanish Army of Africa launches a coup d'état against the Republican Second Spanish Republic, beginning the Spanish Civil War.source
• 1936July 19 – The first of hundreds of concentration camps open in Francoist Spain in the Alcazaba of Zeluán.source
• 1936July 24 – Carmelite Martyrs of Guadalajara: 3 nuns are shot dead by the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War).source
• 1936August 4 – A self-coup is staged by Greek Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas, marking the beginning of the authoritarian 4th of August Regime, which will rule Greece until the Axis occupation of Greece in 1941.source
• 1936September 5 – Spanish Civil War: Robert Capa's photograph The Falling Soldier is taken.source
• 1936September 9 – 1936 Naval Revolt (Portugal): The crews of Portuguese Navy frigate NRP Afonso de Albuquerque and destroyer Dão mutiny while anchored in Lisbon Harbour. Opposed to the Salazar dictatorship's support of General Franco's coup in Spain, they declare their solidarity with the Second Spanish Republic.source
• 1937January 15 – Spanish Civil War: The Second Battle of the Corunna Road ends inconclusively.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
• 1937February 8–27 – Spanish Civil War – Battle of Jarama: Nationalist and Republican troops fight to a stalemate.source
• 1937February 21 – The League of Nations Non-Intervention Committee prohibits foreign nationals from fighting in the Spanish Civil War.source
• 1937March 21 – Ponce massacre: A police squad, acting under orders from Governor of Puerto Rico Blanton Winship, opens fire on peaceful demonstrators protesting at the arrest of Puerto Rican Nationalist Party leader Pedro Albizu Campos, killing 17 people and injuring over 200.source
• 1937April 1 – The Bombing of Jaén is carried out in Spain, by the Condor Legion of the Nazi German Luftwaffe.source
• 1937April 26 – Spanish Civil War: The Bombing of Guernica is carried out in Spain, by the Condor Legion of the Nazi German Luftwaffe, in support of the Francoists. Three-quarters of the town is destroyed and hundreds killed.source
• 1937May 7 – Spanish Civil War: The German Condor Legion Fighter Group, equipped with Heinkel He 51 biplanes, arrives in Spain to assist Francisco Franco's forces.source
• 1937May 21 – As one of the reprisals for the attempted assassination of Italian viceroy Rodolfo Graziani, a detachment of Italian troops massacres the entire community of Debre Libanos in Ethiopia, killing 297 monks and 23 laymen.source
• 1937May 30 – Memorial Day massacre of 1937: The Chicago Police Department shoot and kill 10 unarmed demonstrators in Chicago.source
• 1937July 25–31 – Sino-Japanese War: Battle of Beiping–Tianjin, a series of actions fought around Beiping and Tianjin, result in Japanese victory.source
• 1937July 29 – Tongzhou Mutiny: Units of the East Hebei Army mutiny and kill Japanese troops and civilians in Tongzhou.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
• 1937August 13 – Second Sino-Japanese War: The Battle of Shanghai opens.source
• 1937August 24 – Spanish Civil War: The government of the autonomous Basque Country agrees to surrender to the nationalists.source
• 1937September 5 – Spanish Civil War: The city of Llanes falls to the Falangists.source
• 1937September 25 – Second Sino-Japanese War - Battle of Pingxingguan: The Communist Chinese Eighth Route Army defeats the Japanese.source
• 1937September 30 – Hedy Lamarr, an Austrian-born actress of Jewish descent, arrives in New York City to flee from her possessive husband, Friedrich Mandl, who made arms agreements with the Nazis, and to begin her Hollywood career.source
• 1937October 2–8 – Parsley Massacre: Under the orders of President Rafael Trujillo, Dominican troops kill thousands of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic.source
• 1937October 3 – Second Sino-Japanese War: Japanese troops advance toward Nanjing, capital of the Republic of China.source
• 1937October 18–21 – Spanish Civil War: The whole Spanish northern seaboard falls into the Falangists' hands; Republican forces in Gijón, Spain, set fire to petrol reserves prior to retreating before the advancing Falangists.source
• 1937November 5 – World War II: In the Reich Chancellery, Adolf Hitler holds a secret meeting and states his plans for acquiring "living space" for the German people (recorded in the Hossbach Memorandum).source
• 1937December 1 – Second Sino-Japanese War: The Battle of Nanjing begins.source
• 1937December 13 – Second Sino-Japanese War: The Battle of Nanjing ends with the Japanese occupying the city. In the Nanjing Massacre which follows, Japanese soldiers kill over 200,000 Chinese in 3 months. A few days previously, the Nationalist government of China had moved its capital to the southwestern city Chongqing.source
• 1938February 10 – Second Sino-Japanese War: Bombing of Chongqing begins.source
• 1938February 12 – Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg of Austria meets Adolf Hitler at Berchtesgaden and, under threat of invasion, is forced to yield to German demands for greater Nazi participation in the Austrian government.source
• 1938February 22 – The Battle of Teruel ends in a Nationalist victory with recapture of the city, a turning point in the Spanish Civil War.source
• 1938March 12 – Anschluss: German troops occupy Austria; annexation is declared the following day.source
• 1938March 28 – At a meeting with Hitler in Berlin, Konrad Henlein is instructed to make increasing demands concerning the status of the Sudetenland, but to avoid reaching an agreement with Czechoslovak authorities.source
• 1938May 21 – Tsuyama massacre: Matsuo Toi kills 30 people in a village in Okayama, Japan, in the world's worst spree killing by an individual until 1957.source
• 1938May 23 – No evidence of German troop movements against Czechoslovakia is found, and the May Crisis subsides. Germany is, nevertheless, perceived to have backed down in the face of Czechoslovak mobilization and international diplomatic unity, but the issue of the future of the Sudetenland is far from resolved.source
• 1938May 28 – In a conference at the Reich Chancellery, Hitler declares his decision to destroy Czechoslovakia by military force, and orders the immediate mobilization of 96 Wehrmacht divisions.source
• 1938June 22 – Heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis knocks out Max Schmeling in the first round of their rematch, at Yankee Stadium in New York City.source
• 1938July 3 – The last reunion of the Blue and Gray commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.source
• 1938July 6 – The Evian Conference on Refugees is convened in France. No country in Europe is prepared to accept Jews fleeing persecution, and the United States will take only 27,370.source
• 1938July 28 – 1938 Greek coup d'état attempt: A revolt against the Ioannis Metaxas dictatorship in Greece is put down in Chania.source
• 1938August 18 – Colonel General Ludwig Beck, convinced that Hitler's decision to attack Czechoslovakia will lead to a general European war, resigns his position as Chief of the Army General Staff in protest.source
• 1938August 23 – Hitler, hosting a dinner on board the ocean liner Patria in Kiel Bay, tells the Regent of Hungary, Admiral Horthy, that action against Czechoslovakia is imminent and that "he who wants to sit at the table must at least help in the kitchen", a reference to Horthy's designs on Carpathian Ruthenia.source
• 1938August – In the face of overwhelming Japanese military pressure, Chiang Kai-shek withdraws his government to Chungking.source
• 1938September 13 – The followers of Konrad Henlein begin an armed revolt against the Czechoslovak government in Sudetenland. Martial law is declared and after much bloodshed on both sides order is temporarily restored. Neville Chamberlain personally sends a telegram to Hitler, urgently requesting that they both meet.source
• 1938September 21 – Winston Churchill warns of grave consequences to European security, if Czechoslovakia is partitioned. The same day, Soviet Foreign Commissar Maxim Litvinov makes a similar statement in the League of Nations.source
• 1938September 29 – Colonel Graham Christie, former British military attaché in Berlin, is told by Carl Friedrich Goerdeler that the mobilization of the Royal Navy has badly damaged the popularity of the Nazi regime, as the German public realizes that Fall Grün is likely to cause a world war.source
• 1938September 29 – The Republic of Hatay is declared in Syria; it lasts for less than a year.source
• 1938September – The European crisis over German demands for annexation of the Sudeten borderland of Czechoslovakia becomes increasingly severe.source
• 1938October 16 – Winston Churchill, in a broadcast address to the United States, condemns the Munich Agreement as a defeat, and calls upon America and western Europe to prepare for armed resistance against Hitler.source
• 1938October 21 – In direct contravention of the recently signed Munich Agreement, Adolf Hitler circulates among his high command a secret memorandum stating that they should prepare for the "liquidation of the rest of Czechoslovakia" and the occupation of Memel.source
• 1938October 24 – French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet carries out a major purge of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, dismissing or exiling a number of anti-appeasement officials such as Pierre Comert and René Massigli.source
• 1938November 7 – Ernst vom Rath, the Third Secretary at the German Embassy in Paris, is assassinated by Herschel Grynszpan.source
• 1939March 20 – At an emergency meeting in London to deal with the Romanian crisis, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet suggests to Lord Halifax that the ideal state for saving Romania from a German attack is Poland.source
• 1939March – The 1936–39 Arab revolt in Palestine ends.source
• 1939April 9 – African-American singer Marian Anderson performs before 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., after having been denied the use both of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution, and of a public high school by the federally controlled District of Columbia. First Lady of the United States Eleanor Roosevelt resigns from the DAR because of their decision.source
• 1939April 28 – In a speech before the Reichstag, Adolf Hitler renounces the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish declaration of non-aggression.source
• 1939August 25 – 1939 Coventry bombing: An Irish Republican Army bomb explodes in the centre of Coventry, England, killing 5 people.source
• 1939August 26 – The Kriegsmarine orders all German-flagged merchant ships to head to German ports immediately, in anticipation of the invasion of Poland.source
• 1939September 15 – WWII: Diverse elements of the German Wehrmacht surround Warsaw, and demand its surrender. The Poles refuse, and the siege begins in earnest.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 22 – WWII: A joint victory parade is staged by the Wehrmacht and Red Army in Brest-Litovsk, at the end of the Invasion of Poland.source
• 1939Following the invasion of Poland, the Free City of Danzig (modern-day Gdańsk, Poland) is annexed to Nazi Germany.source
• 1939The Soviet Union invades Poland, and then occupies eastern Polish territories.source
• 1939The United Kingdom, France, New Zealand, Australia and India (by its Viceroy) declare war on Nazi Germany. Prime Minister of Canada Mackenzie King, in English, and Justice Minister Ernest Lapointe, in French, give an international radio address stating the Dominion's intention to declare war also.source
• 1939October 6 – WWII: The Battle of Kock ends the Polish Campaign. Polish resistance moves underground.source
• 1939October 8 – WWII: Germany annexes Western Poland.source
• 1939November 6 – WWII: Sonderaktion Krakau – Germans take action against scientists from the University of Kraków, and other Kraków universities.source
• 1939November 8 – WWII: In Munich, an attempt to kill Adolf Hitler is made by Georg Elser while Hitler is celebrating the 16th anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.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
• 1939November 30 – WWII: Winter War – Soviet forces attack Finland and reach the Mannerheim Line, starting the war. Sweden declares itself a non-belligerent in the Winter War.source
• 1939December 6 – WWII: Winter War – The Red Army's advance on the Karelian Isthmus is stopped by Finns at the Mannerheim Line during the Battle of Taipale.source
• 1939December 9 – WWII: The first soldier of the British Expeditionary Force is killed: Corporal Thomas Priday triggers a French land mine.source
• 1939December 13 – WWII – Battle of the River Plate: The German heavy cruiser Admiral Graf Spee is trapped by cruisers , HMNZS Achilles, and after a running battle off the coast of Uruguay. Graf Spee is scuttled by its crew off Montevideo Harbor, on December 17.source
• 1939December 14 – WWII: Winter War – The League of Nations expels the USSR for attacking Finland.source
• 1939December 18 – WWII: Battle of the Heligoland Bight – RAF Bomber Command, on a daylight mission to attack Kriegsmarine ships in the Heligoland Bight, is repulsed by Luftwaffe fighter aircraft.source
• 1939German submarine U-36 is torpedoed and sunk by British submarine HMS Salmon off Stavanger, the first enemy submarine lost to a British one during the war.source
• 1940January 6 – WWII: Winter War – General Semyon Timoshenko takes command of all Soviet forces.source
• 1940January 7 – WWII: Winter War: Battle of Raate Road – Outnumbered Finnish troops decisively defeat Soviet forces.source
• 1940Winter War: Battle of Suomussalmi – Finnish forces destroy the Soviet 44th Rifle Division.source
• 1940February 1 – WWII: Winter War – Soviet forces launch a major assault on Finnish troops occupying the Karelian Isthmus.source
• 1940February – The last mounted charge by a British cavalry regiment is made when the Royal Scots Greys are called to quell Arab rioters in Mandatory Palestine.source
• 1940March 13 – Indian nationalist Udham Singh assassinates Sir Michael O'Dwyer (in revenge for the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre) at Caxton Hall in London, for which he is hanged on 31 July at HM Prison Pentonville.source
• 1940April 9 – WWII: Germany invades the neutral countries of Denmark and Norway in Operation Weserübung, opening the Norwegian campaign. The British Royal Navy attempts to attack elements of the German fleet off Norway. Vidkun Quisling proclaims a new collaborationist regime in Norway. The German invasion of Denmark lasts for about six hours, before that country capitulates.source
• 1940April 10 – WWII: First naval Battle of Narvik – The British Royal Navy attacks the German fleet in the Ofotfjord. At Bergen, German cruiser Königsberg is sunk by British Fleet Air Arm Blackburn Skua dive bombers, flying from RNAS Hatston in Orkney.source
• 1940April 12 – The Faroe Islands are occupied by British troops, following the German invasion of Denmark. This action is taken to avert a possible German occupation of the islands, with serious consequences for the course of the Battle of the Atlantic.source
• 1940April 16 – In American baseball, the Cleveland Indians, behind Bob Feller's Opening Day no-hitter, defeat the Chicago White Sox, 1–0.source
• 1940Rotterdam is subjected to savage terror bombing by the Luftwaffe; 980 are killed, and 20,000 buildings destroyed. General Henri Winkelman announces the surrender of the Dutch army (outside Zeeland) to German forces.source
• 1940Zeeland is overrun by German forces, ending the Battle of the Netherlands and beginning full German occupation of the Netherlands (Noord-Beveland surrenders on May 18, and the remaining Dutch troops are withdrawn from Zeelandic Flanders on May 19).source
• 1940June 30 – WWII: German forces land in Guernsey, marking the start of the 5-year Occupation of the Channel Islands.source
• 1940Winston Churchill tells the House of Commons of the United Kingdom: "The Battle of France is over. The Battle of Britain is about to begin... if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, This was their finest hour."source
• 1940August 4 – U.S. Gen. John J. Pershing, in a nationwide radio broadcast, urges all-out aid to Britain in order to defend the Americas, while Charles Lindbergh speaks to an isolationist rally at Soldier Field in Chicago.source
• 1940August 25 – WWII: The first Bombing of Berlin is carried out, by the British Royal Air Force.source
• 1940September 7 – WWII: The Blitz – Nazi Germany begins to rain bombs on London (the first of 57 consecutive nights of strategic bombing).source
• 1940October 28 – WWII: Greco-Italian War begins when Italian troops invade Greece, meeting strong resistance from Greek troops and civilians. This action signals the start of the Balkan Campaign.source
• 1940November 2–8 – WWII: Greco-Italian War – Battle of Elaia–Kalamas in Epirus: Outnumbered Greek forces repel the Italian Army.source
• 1940November 12 – WWII: The Battle of Gabon, begun on October 27, concludes with Free French Forces taking control of the colony of Gabon and the remainder of French Equatorial Africa from the Vichy regime.source
• 1940November 20–24 – WWII: Hungary, Romania and Slovakia join the Axis powers.source
• 1940November 26–27 – Jilava Massacre: In Romania, coup leader General Ion Antonescu's Iron Guard arrests and executes over 60 of exiled King Carol II of Romania's aides, starting at a penitentiary near Bucharest. Among the dead is former minister and acclaimed historian Nicolae Iorga.source
• 1940November 27 – WWII: Battle of Cape Spartivento: The British Royal Navy and Italian Regia Marina battle to a draw.source
• 1940December 9 – WWII: Operation Compass – British forces in North Africa begin their first major offensive, with an attack on Italian forces at Sidi Barrani, Egypt.source
• 1941January 5 – WWII: Battle of Bardia in Libya: Australian and British troops defeat Italian forces, the first battle of the war in which an Australian Army formation takes part.source
• 1941February 3 – WWII: The Nazis forcibly restore Pierre Laval to the office of Prime Minister in occupied Vichy France.source
• 1941The occupied Netherlands starts the first popular uprising in Europe against the Axis powers, the "February strike" against German deportation of Jews in Amsterdam and surroundings.source
• 1941April 28 – World War II persecution of Serbs: Gudovac massacre – Members of the Croatian nationalist Ustashe movement kill around 190 Bjelovar Serbs in the village of Gudovac, in the Independent State of Croatia.source
• 1941May 9 – WWII: is captured by the British Royal Navy in the North Atlantic. On board is the latest Enigma cryptography machine, which Allied cryptographers later use to break coded German messages.source
• 1941May 13 – WWII: Yugoslav General Draža Mihailović and a group of 80 soldiers and officers cross the Drina river in Bosnia and Herzegovina, arrive at Ravna Gora, in western Nazi-occupied Serbia and start fighting with German occupation troops.source
• 1941May 20 – WWII: The Battle of Crete begins, as Germany launches an airborne invasion of Crete, the first mainly airborne invasion in military history.source
• 1941May 30 – WWII: Manolis Glezos and Apostolos Santas tear down the Nazi swastika on the Acropolis in Athens and replace it with the Greek flag.source
• 1941June 8 – WWII: British and Free French forces invade Syria.source
• 1941June 22 – WWII: The First Sisak Partisan Brigade, the first anti-fascist armed unit in occupied Europe, is founded by Yugoslav partisans near Sisak, Croatia.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
• 1941July 30 – WWII: Glina massacre of July–August 1941 – The Ustaše brutally kill 200 Serbs inside a Serbian Orthodox church in Glina, Croatia, with a total of 700–1,200 being killed in the area of the next few days.source
• 1941A German SS unit arrives in Vilnius, Lithuania, and begins the Ponary massacre, the systematic execution of up to 100,000 people over the next three years.source
• 1941August 16 – The Holocaust: Units of the Wehrmacht and the Einsatzgruppen (as part of Operation Barbarossa) start killing Jewish children, signalling the start of the Jewish Genocide.source
• 1941August 29 – WWII: The Government of National Salvation, a Serb puppet state of the Axis powers, is established by General Milan Nedić in Nazi-occupied Serbia in Belgrade, under military commander Heinrich Danckelmann; the regime includes 15 Ministers.source
• 1941August 31 – WWII (Uprising in Serbia): Battle of Loznica: Chetniks capture the town of Loznica in Nazi-occupied Serbia.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
• 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 30 and December 8 – Rumbula massacre: Nazi forces kill approximately 24,000 Latvian Jews and 1,000 German Jews outside of Riga.source
• 1941As 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
• 1941December 23 – WWII: A second Japanese landing attempt on Wake Island is successful, and the American garrison surrenders, after a full night and morning of fighting.source
• 1941Germany and Italy declare war on the United States. The U.S. responds in kind.source
• 1942Dutch East Indies campaign: Japan declares war on the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies. Japanese forces invade Borneo and Celebes.source
• 1942The USS Langley, first aircraft carrier of the United States Navy, is attacked by 9 Japanese bombers while ferrying a cargo of USAAF P-40 fighters to Java. Langley is so badly damaged that she has to be scuttled to avoid falling into Japanese hands.source
• 1942President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066, allowing the United States military to define areas as exclusionary zones. These zones affect the Japanese on the West Coast, and Germans and Italians primarily on the East Coast.source
• 1942March 6 – WWII: Yugoslav Partisans, operating in Nazi-occupied Serbia, assassinate Đorđe Kosmajac in Belgrade.source
• 1942April 3 – WWII: Japanese forces begin the last phase of the Battle of Bataan, an all-out assault on the United States and Filipino troops on the Bataan Peninsula.source
• 1942April 5 – WWII: Easter Sunday Raid – Aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy attack Colombo, Ceylon (Sri Lanka). Royal Navy cruisers and are sunk southwest of the island.source
• 1942May 5 – WWII: Battle of Madagascar (Operation Ironclad) begins when British forces land on the Vichy French colony of Madagascar. On May 7 the northern city of Diego Suarez surrenders.source
• 1942Second Battle of Kharkov: In the eastern Ukraine, the Soviet Army initiates a major offensive to capture the city of Kharkov from the German Army, only to be encircled and destroyed.source
• 1942June 5 – WWII: The United States declares war on Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania.source
• 1942June 12 – The Holocaust: On her 13th birthday, Anne Frank receives the book that she will use to keep her diary in occupied Amsterdam.source
• 1942July 19 – WWII: Battle of the Atlantic: German Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz orders the last U-boats to withdraw from there the United States Atlantic coast positions, in response to an effective American convoy system.source
• 1942July 21 – WWII: The Japanese establish a beachhead on the north coast of New Guinea in the Buna-Gona area; a small Australian force begins a rearguard action on the Kokoda Track campaign.source
• 1942August 7 – WWII: Guadalcanal campaign – The U.S. Navy and the U.S. Marine Corps start the first American offensive of the war, with an amphibious landing on the island of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands.source
• 1942August 21 – WWII: Operation Edelweiss: German forces (Gebirgsjäger) of the 1st Mountain Division place the Nazi swastika flag on the summit of Mount Elbrus, a prominent peak of the Caucasus at 5.629 meters.source
• 1942August 23 – WWII: Battle of Stalingrad: German forces of the 16th Panzer Division reach the suburbs of Stalingrad. The German 6th Army under General Friedrich Paulus stabilishes the frontier and takes up positions at the Volga River.source
• 1942August 27–28 – Sarny Massacre: Nazi troops and the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police systematically execute more than 14,000 people, mostly Jews, in and around Sarny in German-occupied Poland.source
• 1942November 2 – A USAAF squadron, including B-24 Liberators, intercepts many Luftwaffe patrols off the coast of Oran, Algeria.source
• 1942November 6 – WWII: Battle of Madagascar ends when Vichy French forces on Madagascar sign an armistice with the Allies.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
• 1942November 30 – WWII: Battle of Tassafaronga – In a nighttime naval battle as part of the Guadalcanal campaign, ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy defeat those of the United States Navy.source
• 1942The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal ends: Although the United States Navy suffers heavy losses, it retains control of Guadalcanal.source
• 1942Operation Torch: Elements of the Allied expeditionary force (some 105,000 men) under Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower lands simultaneously along the coastline of Morocco and Algeria in French North Africa.source
• 1942December 12 – WWII: German troops began Operation Winter Storm, an attempt to relieve encircled Axis forces during the Battle of Stalingrad.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
• 1943January 22 – WWII: Battle of Buna–Gona: American and Australian forces secure control of the territory of Papua.source
• 1943January 29–30 – WWII: Battle of Rennell Island – The Imperial Japanese Navy resists the United States Navy's attempt to interrupt the withdrawal of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal, in the last major naval battle of the Guadalcanal campaign.source
• 1943February 2 – WWII: In Russia, the Battle of Stalingrad comes to an end, with the surrender of the German 6th Army.source
• 1943February 9 – WWII: The Guadalcanal campaign in the Solomon Islands ends with United States forces in command of Guadalcanal, the evacuation of Japanese forces in Operation Ke having been completed two days earlier.source
• 1943February 10–March 3 – Mohandas Gandhi (under arrest by forces of the British Raj in Pune as a member of the Quit India Movement) keeps a hunger strike to protest his imprisonment.source
• 1943February 13 – WWII: Operation Longcloth: Chindit forces (some 3,000 men) of the 77th Indian Infantry Brigade under Brigadier General Orde Wingate cross the Chindwin River and proceed into Burma.source
• 1943February 16 – WWII: The Soviet Union reconquers Kharkiv, but is later driven out in the Third Battle of Kharkiv.source
• 1943German forces recapture Kharkiv after four days of house-to-house fighting against Soviet troops, ending the month-long Third Battle of Kharkiv.source
• 1943The Holocaust: Josef Mengele begins his position as a medical officer in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.source
• 1943June (late) – The Holocaust: The last trainload of Jewish prisoners is moved from Bełżec extermination camp in occupied Poland (for gassing at Sobibór), and for the remainder of the year the Nazis make efforts to obliterate the site.source
• 1943July 10 – (0245 GMT (4:45 a.m. local time)) – WWII: Allied invasion of Sicily – The Allied invasion of Axis-controlled Europe begins, with landings on the island of Sicily off mainland Italy by the Seventh United States Army and the British Eighth Army, including the 1st Canadian Infantry Division.source
• 1943July 12 – WWII: Main engagement of the Battle of Prokhorovka – The Wehrmacht and the Red Army fight to a draw in one of the largest tank battles in military history.source
• 1943Nazi Germany commences Operation Citadel. It will eventually lead to the Battle of Kursk, the largest tank battle in history.source
• 1943Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army within the Reichskommissariat Ukraine (Volhynia) peak.source
• 1943August 1 – Operation Tidal Wave: 177 B-24 Liberator bombers from the U.S. Army Air Force bomb oil refineries at Ploiești, Romania.source
• 1943August 23 – WWII: The Battle of Kursk ends, with a strategic defeat for the German forces.source
• 1943August 26 – WWII: Louis Mountbatten is named Supreme Allied Commander for Southeast Asia.source
• 1943United States Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) are formed, consolidating the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS) and Women Airforce Service Pilots (WFTD).source
• 1943The Seventh U.S. Army, under General George S. Patton, meets the Eighth British Army under Field Marshal B. L. Montgomery in Messina, Sicily, completing the Allied invasion of Sicily.source
• 1943September 22–October 2 – WWII: Landing at Scarlet Beach on the Huon Peninsula of New Guinea by Allied forces, the first time Australian troops have made an opposed amphibious landing since the Gallipoli Campaign of 1915.source
• 1943Operation Baytown: Mainland Italy is invaded by Allied forces under General Bernard Montgomery, for the first time in the war.source
• 1943October 14 – The Holocaust: Uprising in Sobibór extermination camp; about half the inmates escape. Three days later, the camp is closed.source
• 1943November 19 – The Holocaust: Inmates of Janowska concentration camp, near Lwów (at this time in German-occupied Poland), stage a failed uprising, after which the SS liquidates the camp, resulting in at least 6,000 deaths.source
• 1944January 14 – WWII: Soviet troops start the offensive at Leningrad and Novgorod.source
• 1944February 15 – WWII: Battle of Monte Cassino – The monastery atop Monte Cassino is destroyed by Allied bombing.source
• 1944March 15 – WWII: Battle of Monte Cassino: Allied aircraft bomb the monastery, and an assault is staged.source
• 1944March 23 – WWII: Members of the Italian Resistance attack Nazis marching in Via Rasella, killing 33.source
• 1944April 10 – The Holocaust: Rudolf Vrba and Alfréd Wetzler escape from Auschwitz concentration camp; on April 25–27 they prepare the Vrba–Wetzler report, one of the earliest and most detailed descriptions of the extermination of Jews in the camp.source
• 1944May 14 – The Holocaust: Predominantly Muslim Albanian troops of the 21st Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Skanderbeg (1st Albanian) round up 281 Jews in Priština, and hand them over to the Germans for transportation to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.source
• 1944May 15 – WWII: Allied military and political leaders, including Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, George Patton, Bernard Montgomery and more, meet for the final D-Day joint briefing at St. Paul's School in London.source
• 1944May 15–July 8 – The Holocaust: Hungarian Jews are deported to Auschwitz and other Nazi concentration camps.source
• 1944May – Jean-Paul Sartre's existentialist drama No Exit (Huis Clos) premières in Nazi-occupied Paris.source
• 1944Battle of Monte Cassino: The Germans evacuate Monte Cassino and Allied forces, led by Władysław Anders from Polish II Corps, take the stronghold after a struggle that has claimed 20,000 lives.source
• 1944Operation 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
• 1944More than 1,000 British bombers drop 5,000 tons of bombs on German gun batteries on the Normandy coast, in preparation for D-Day.source
• 1944July 20 – WWII: Adolf Hitler survives the 20 July plot to assassinate him led by Claus von Stauffenberg; he and his fellow conspirators in this and Operation Valkyrie are executed the following day.source
• 1944July 27 – WWII: Soviet forces liberate Lvov, Stanislav and Białystok, and the following day enter Brest, Belarus.source
• 1944The largest convoy of the war embarks from Halifax Harbour, Nova Scotia, under Royal Canadian Navy protection.source
• 1944August 28 – WWII: Operation Dragoon – The Free French Army liberates the cities of Marseille and Nice.source
• 1944September 17 – WWII: Operation Market Garden: Allied airborne landings begin in the Netherlands and Germany.source
• 1944An approaching formation of 36 US bombers is engaged by a German fighter squadron (Jagdgeschwader) in the Battle over the Ore Mountains. After the first German attack on the bombers, US Mustangs attack the German squadron in aerial dogfights.source
• 1944October 4 – WWII: Milan Nedić's collaborationist puppet government of the Axis powers, the Government of National Salvation in Nazi-occupied Serbia, is disbanded.source
• 1944October 6 – WWII: The Battle of Debrecen starts on the Eastern Front, lasting until October 29.source
• 1944Belgrade Offensive ends when Belgrade is liberated by Yugoslav Partisans, together with the Bulgarian Army and the Red Army, and the remnants of Nedić's collaborationist Serbian puppet state, the Government of National Salvation, are abolished.source
• 1944Nazi troops end the Warsaw Uprising. Home Army commander Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski signs the act of capitulation. This is followed by the Destruction of Warsaw.source
• 1944November 8 – WWII: A German surrender of Middelburg, Zeeland, to Allied forces ends the Battle of the Scheldt after five weeks, opening the Belgian port of Antwerp to Allied shipping. The bulk of the fighting has been by Canadians, with over 6,000 casualties.source
• 1944November 17 – WWII: Partisan troops of the National Liberation Movement enter Tirana, the capital of Albania.source
• 1945January 12 – WWII: The Soviet Union begins the Vistula–Oder Offensive in Eastern Europe, against the German Army.source
• 1945Raid at Cabanatuan: 121 American soldiers and 800 Filipino guerrillas free 813 American prisoners of war from the Japanese-held camp in the city of Cabanatuan, in the Philippines.source
• 1945February 19 – WWII: Battle of Iwo Jima – About 30,000 United States Marines land on Iwo Jima.source
• 1945The US Army 11th Airborne Division, with Filipino guerrillas, free the captives of the Los Baños internment camp.source
• 1945Battle of Iwo Jima: A group of United States Marines reach the top of Mount Suribachi on the island, and are photographed raising the American flag. The photo, Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima (taken by Joe Rosenthal), later wins a Pulitzer Prize.source
• 1945The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is liberated by combined American and Filipino ground troops. The suburb of Intramuros is devastated.source
• 1945March 29 – WWII: The Red Army almost destroys the German 4th Army in the Heiligenbeil Pocket in East Prussia.source
• 1945April 1 – WWII: Battle of Okinawa: The Tenth United States Army lands on Okinawa.source
• 1945American troops led by 2nd Infantry Division and 69th Infantry Division capture the city of Leipzig.source
• 1945German surrender at Lüneburg Heath: All German armed forces in northwest Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands surrender unconditionally to British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, effective on May 5 at 08:00 hours British Double (and German) Summer Time.source
• 1945The Soviet Union marks VE Day as the Red Army enters Prague, celebrated in the USSR as Victory Day.source
• 1945A Holocaust death march from Dachau to the Austrian border is halted under two kilometers west of Waakirchen by the segregated, all-Nisei 522nd Field Artillery Battalion of the U.S. Army in southern Bavaria, saving several hundred prisoners.source
• 1945The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin. The famous picture of Raising a Flag over the Reichstag is taken at this date.source
• 1945August 15 – The August Revolution in Vietnam begins, with the Viet Minh taking over the capital Hanoi, taking advantage of the collapse of Japanese power.source
• 1945August 19 – Chinese Civil War: Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek meet in Chongqing to discuss an end to hostilities between the Communists and the Nationalists.12source
• 1945August 28 – The American-led Allied Occupation of Japan effectively begins with General Douglas MacArthur's arrival at Atsugi Air Base.source
• 1945The 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
• 1945Vietnam's capital Hanoi is taken by the Viet Minh, which ends the French occupation in what becomes North Vietnam, and thus the southern provinces become South Vietnam. This ends the August Revolution.source
• 1945September 4 – WWII: Japanese forces surrender on Wake Island, after hearing word of their country's surrender.source
• 1945September 9 – Japanese troops in Keijō (modern-day Seoul) formally relinquish control over Southern Korea to the United States Army Military Government in Korea, while Soviet forces control Northern Korea from Heijō (modern-day Pyongyang), effectively ending 35 years of Korea under Japanese rule and beginning the Division of Korea at the 38th parallel.source
• 1945October 19 – Members of the Indonesian People's Army attack Anglo-Dutch forces in Indonesia.source
• 1945October 27–November 20 – Indonesian National Revolution: Battle of Surabaya – Pro-independence Indonesian soldiers and militia fight British and British Indian troops in Surabaya.source
• 1945November 18 – The Tudeh party starts a bloodless coup, and will form Azerbaijan within days. Soviet troops prevent Iranian troops from getting involved.source
• 1945November 28 – British fascist John Amery pleads guilty to treason, and is condemned to death.source
• 1946January 19 – Expulsion of Germans of Hungary begins from Wudersch.source
• 1946January 19 – General Douglas MacArthur establishes the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo, to try Japanese war criminals.source
• 1946February 15 – The Gouzenko Affair: Canada announces the discovery of a ring of Canadian communist spies based at the Soviet embassy in Ottawa, passing atomic bomb secrets to Russia.source
• 1946March 5 – In a speech at Westminster College, in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill talks about the Iron Curtain.source
• 1946April 1 – The Battle of Määritsa takes place between Estonian partisans and Soviet forces in southeastern Estonia.source
• 1946April 3 – Japanese Lt. General Masaharu Homma is executed outside Manila in the Philippines, for leading the Bataan Death March.source
• 1946April 14 – Sh'erit ha-Pletah members of Nakam, the "Jewish Avengers", use arsenic to poison bread baked for SS prisoners of war held at Stalag XIII-D by the Americans.source
• 1946April 18 – The League of Nations, in its last meeting, transfers its mission to the United Nations and disbands itself.source
• 1946April 18 – The inaugural session of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) takes place at The Hague.source
• 1946June 8 – In Indonesia, Sukarno incites his supporters to fight Dutch colonial occupation.source
• 1946June 30 – The War Relocation Authority, which has administered the internment of Japanese Americans, is abolished.source
• 1946July 4 – The Kielce Pogrom takes place in Poland.source
• 1946July 21 – An Irgun bomb explodes in Jerusalem, during secretive talks between Jews and Britain to consolidate the state of Israel.source
• 1946July 22 – King David Hotel bombing: The Irgun bombs the King David Hotel (headquarters of the British civil and military administration) in Jerusalem, killing 90.source
• 1946August 16 – Direct Action Day: Violence between Muslims and Hindus in Calcutta begins "The Week of the Long Knives", which leaves 3,000 dead.source
• 1946August 18 – The Vergarola explosion of ordnance in Croatia kills 70.source
• 1946September 10 – Operation Black Tulip, the expulsion of Germans from the Netherlands, begins in Amsterdam.source
• 1946October 10 – The Noakhali riots in Bengal begin: several hundred Hindus are massacred by Muslims.source
• 1946October 24–November 11 – 1946 Bihar riots: Hindu mobs target Muslim families in the Indian state of Bihar, resulting in anywhere between 2,000 and 30,000 deaths.source
• 1946November 23 – Vietnamese riot in Haiphong and clash with French troops. In the Haiphong incident, the French cruiser Suffren opens fire, killing 6,000 Vietnamese.source
• 1946December 12 – Iran crisis of 1946: Iranian troops recapture the Azerbaijan province.source
• 1946December 15 – Iran crisis of 1946: Iranian troops recapture the Kurdish Republic of Mahabad.source
• 1946December 19 – Viet Minh forces begin a war against French occupying forces in Vietnam, succeeding in 1954 with France's surrender at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu.source
• 1946The Chinese Civil War intensifies between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party.source
• 1947January 11 – The Afghan tribal revolts of 1944–1947 conclude with the Surrender at Datta Khel.source
• 1947February 28 – In Taiwan, civil disorder is put down, with large loss of civilian lives.source
• 1947March 12 – The Cold War begins: The Truman Doctrine is proclaimed, to help stem the spread of Communism.source
• 1947March 15 – Hindus and Muslims clash in Punjab.source
• 1947March 29 – A rebellion against French rule erupts in Madagascar.source
• 1947April 1 – The 1947 Royal New Zealand Navy mutinies begin.source
• 1947May 1 – Portella della Ginestra massacre: The Salvatore Giuliano gang of Sicilian separatists opens fire on a Labour Day parade at Portella della Ginestra, Sicily, killing 11 people and wounding 27.source
• 1947June 15 – The Estado Novo in Portugal orders 11 military officers and 19 university professors, who are accused of revolutionary activity, to resign.source
• 1947July 18 – Following wide media and UNSCOP coverage, the Exodus is captured by British troops, and refused entry into Palestine at the port of Haifa.source
• 1947July 19 – Burmese nationalist Aung San, and six members of his newly formed cabinet, are assassinated during a cabinet meeting.source
• 1947August 5 – The Netherlands ends Operation Product, the first of its major military Police Actions in Indonesia.source
• 1947September 18 – In the United States:source
• 1947The Department of War becomes the Department of the Army, a branch of the new Department of Defense.source
• 1947November 9 – Junagadh is invaded by the Indian army.source
• 1947November 10 – The arrest of four steel workers in Marseille begins a French communist riot, that also spreads to Paris.source
• 1947November 16 – Great Britain begins withdrawing its troops from Palestine.source
• 1947November 20 – Paul Ramadier resigns as Prime Minister of France. He is succeeded by Robert Schuman, who calls in 80,000 army reservists to quell rioting miners in France.source
• 1947November 24 – McCarthyism: The United States House of Representatives votes 346–17 to approve citations of Contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten", after the screenwriters and directors refuse to co-operate with the House Un-American Activities Committee concerning allegations of communist influences in the movie business. The ten men are blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studios on the following day.source
• 1947December 4 – French Interior Minister Jules S. Moch takes emergency measures against his country's rioters, after six days of violent arguments in the National Assembly.source
• 1947December 12 – The Iranian Royal Army takes back power in the Azerbaijan province.source
• 1948January 12 – Mahatma Gandhi begins his fast-unto-death in Delhi, to stop communal violence during the Partition of India.source
• 1948January 30 – Assassination of Mahatma Gandhi: Indian pacifist and leader Mahatma Gandhi is shot by Nathuram Godse in New Delhi.source
• 1948February 11 – General Douglas Gracey becomes Commander-in-chief of Pakistan Army.source
• 1948February 25 – 1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état: Edvard Beneš, President of Czechoslovakia, cedes control of the country to the Communist Party, a day celebrated by that regime as "Victorious February" (; ) until November 1989.source
• 1948April 5 – 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine: Haganah launches Operation Nachshon, provoking the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight.source
• 1948April 9 – The Deir Yassin massacre takes place in British Mandatory Palestine.source
• 1948April 22 – Civil War in Mandatory Palestine: Battle of Haifa – Jewish paramilitary group Haganah captures Haifa from the Arab Liberation Army.source
• 1948May 15 – 1948 Arab–Israeli War: The British Mandate of Palestine is officially terminated; expeditionary forces from Egypt, Transjordan, Syria and Iraq invade Israel and clash with Israeli forces after declaring war.source
• 1948June 18 – Malayan Emergency: A state of emergency is declared in the Federation of Malaya, due to a communist insurgency.source
• 1948June 24 – Cold War: The Berlin Blockade begins.source
• 1948July 14 – The attempted assassination of Palmiro Togliatti, general secretary of the Italian Communist Party, results in numerous strikes all over the country.source
• 1948July 31 – American defector Elizabeth Bentley, previously working on behalf of the Soviet Union, appears under subpoena before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) of the United States House of Representatives regarding Communist espionage; she implicates Whittaker Chambers.source
• 1948August 12 – Babrra massacre: About 600 unarmed members of the Khudai Khidmatgar movement are shot dead on the orders of the Chief Minister of the North-West Frontier Province, Abdul Qayyum Khan Kashmiri, on Babrra ground in the Hashtnagar region of Charsadda District, North-West Frontier Province (modern-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), Pakistan.source
• 1948August 19 – Toho strikes: A sitdown strike at Toho film studio in Tokyo ends after the studio is surrounded by 2,000 police and a platoon of U.S. Eighth Army soldiers.source
• 1948August 20 – Lee Pressman, Nathan Witt and John Abt, represented by Harold I. Cammer, plead the Fifth Amendment, in response to allegations of Communism by Whittaker Chambers before the HUAC.source
• 1948August 27 – Whittaker Chambers states that Alger Hiss was a communist on Meet the Press radio.source
• 1948September 13–18 – Indian annexation of Hyderabad ("Operation Polo"): The princely state of Hyderabad is invaded by the Indian Armed Forces in a "police action", in the aftermath of Pakistani leader Jinnah's death. The Nizam of Hyderabad surrenders his state, which is amalgamated into the newly independent Dominion of India; thousands are killed as a result of this event.source
• 1948September 17 – Lehi members, also known as the Stern Gang, assassinate Swedish count Folke Bernadotte, United Nations Mediator in Palestine, in Jerusalem.source
• 1948October 29 – 1948 Arab–Israeli War: Massacres of Palestinian Arab villagers by the Israel Defense Forces:source
• 1948November 1 – A boiler and ammunition explosion aboard merchant ship Xuan Huai evacuating troops of the Republic of China Army from Yingkou, China for Taiwan causes thousands of deaths.source
• 1948November 17 – Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi divorces his second wife, the former Princess Fawzia of Egypt.source
• 1948December 1 – José Figueres Ferrer abolishes the army in Costa Rica, making it the first country in history to do so.source
• 1948December 11–12 – Malayan Emergency: Batang Kali massacre: Scots Guards shoot 24 Chinese villagers in Malaya.source
• 1948December 31 – Arab-Israeli War: Israeli troops drive Egyptians from the Negev.source
• 1949January 1 – A United Nations-sponsored ceasefire brings an end to the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947. The war results in a stalemate and the division of Kashmir, which still continues as of 2026source
• 1949January 31 – Forces from the Chinese Communist Party enter Beijing.source
• 1949February 26 – The Revolutionary Communist Party of India stages attacks at Dum Dum.source
• 1949March 1 – Indonesia seizes Yogyakarta from the Dutch.source
• 1949March 28 – United States Secretary of Defense James Forrestal resigns suddenly.source
• 1949March 30 – A military coup in Syria ousts President Shukri al-Quwatli.source
• 1949March 30 – An anti-NATO riot in Iceland takes place, prompted by the decision of the Icelandic parliament to join the newly formed NATO.source
• 1949April 20 – Royal Navy frigate HMS Amethyst goes up the Yangtze River, to evacuate British Commonwealth refugees escaping the advance of Mao's Communist forces. Under heavy fire, she grounds off Rose Island. After an abortive rescue attempt on April 26, she anchors 10 mi km upstream. Negotiations with the Communists to let the ship leave drag on for weeks, during which time the ship's cat Simon raises the crew's morale.source
• 1949April 23 – Chinese Communist troops take Nanjing.source
• 1949April 28 – Former First Lady of the Philippines Aurora Quezon, 61, is assassinated while en route to dedicate a hospital in memory of her late husband; her daughter and 10 others are also killed.source
• 1949July 31 – Captain Kerans of HMS Amethyst decides to make a break after nightfall, under heavy fire from the Chinese People's Liberation Army on both sides of the Yangtze River, and successfully rejoins the fleet at Woosung the next day.source
• 1949August 18 – Kemi Bloody Thursday: two protesters die in the scuffle between the police and the strikers' protest procession in Kemi, Finland.source
• 1949August 31 – Six of the last sixteen surviving veterans of the Union Army, in the American Civil War, meet in Indianapolis.source
• 1949August 31 – The retreat of the Democratic Army of Greece to Albania, after its defeat at Mount Gramos, marks the end of the Greek Civil War.source
• 1949September 6 – Allied military authorities relinquish control of former Nazi Germany assets back to Germany.source
• 1949September 9 – Albert Guay affair: A dynamite bomb destroys Canadian Pacific Airlines Douglas DC-3, in Quebec.source
• 1949October 3 – Albanian Subversion: First Anglo-American attempt to infiltrate guerillas into Albania; the operation is fatally flawed, by being under the control of double agent Kim Philby.source
• 1949October 16 – Greek Civil War ends with a communist surrender.source
• 1949October 17 – Chinese communist troops take Guangzhou.source
• 1949October 27 – Battle of Kuningtou: Chinese communist troops fail to take Quemoy; their advance towards Taiwan is halted.source
• 1949November 15 – Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte are executed for assassinating Mahatma Gandhi.source
• 1949December 7 – Retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan finishes, and it declares Taipei its temporary capital city, a status it will retain more than 50 years later.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
• 1950April 21 – Nainital wedding massacre: A mass stabbing occurs at Nainital in India, killing 22 members of the Harijan caste.source
• 1950May 6 – Cazin rebellion in Bosnia against Communist agrarian reforms.source
• 1950May 17 – Israeli Air Force Spitfires intercept a British Royal Air Force Short Sunderland when it inadvertently crosses into Israeli airspace, forcing it to land at Lod Airport. The Sunderland's crew have been issued maps that do not depict Israel, as Britain had not recognized the Jewish state at the time they were issued.source
• 1950June 8 – Sir Thomas Blamey becomes the only Field Marshal in Australian history.source
• 1950June 25 – The Korean War begins: Troops and T-34 tanks of the North Korean People's Army cross the 38th parallel into South Korea.source
• 1950Bodo League massacre begins: South Korean armed forces and police summarily execute at least 100,000 suspected North Korean sympathizers.source
• 1950July 14–21 – Korean War: Battle of Taejon – North Korean forces capture the city held by the U.S. 24th Infantry Division, but the delay allows establishment of the Pusan Perimeter.source
• 1950July 20 – Air Battle of South Korea: After a month-long campaign, the majority of North Korea's People's Air Force is destroyed by anti-communist forces.source
• 1950July 22 – Royal question in Belgium: King Leopold III returns from exile, provoking a general strike, particularly in Wallonia.source
• 1950July 30 – 4 workers striking over the "Royal question" in Belgium are shot dead by the Gendarmerie, at Grâce-Berleur near Liège.source
• 1950August 5 – 2 Squadron SAAF departs from South Africa to take part in the Korean War.source
• 1950August 12 – Korean War: Bloody Gulch massacre – 75 U.S. soldiers are executed after being captured in battle by North Korea.source
• 1950August 17 – Korean War: Hill 303 massacre – 39 U.S. soldiers are executed after being captured in battle by North Korea.source
• 1950August 23 – Legendary African American singer-actor Paul Robeson, whose passport has recently been revoked because of his alleged Communist affiliations, meets with U.S. officials in an effort to get it reinstated. He is unsuccessful, and it is not reinstated until 1958.source
• 1950September 15 – Korean War: Battle of Inchon – Allied troops commanded by Douglas MacArthur land in Inchon, occupied by North Korea, to begin a U.N. counteroffensive.source
• 1950September 19 – Korean War: An attack by North Korean forces is repelled at the Battle of Nam River.source
• 1950October 7 – Battle of Chamdo: The Annexation of Tibet by the People's Republic of China, begins with the Chinese People's Liberation Army invading across the Jinsha River. By October 19 they will have taken the border town of Chamdo, and the Tibetan army will have surrendered.source
• 1950October 30 – The Jayuya Uprising is started by Puerto Rican Nationalists against the United States-supported government.source
• 1950November 1 – Puerto Rican nationalists Griselio Torresola and Oscar Collazo attempt to assassinate U.S. President Harry S. Truman, who is staying at the Blair-Lee House in Washington, D.C. during White House repairs.source
• 1950November 8 – Korean War: While in an F-80, United States Air Force Lt. Russell J. Brown intercepts 2 North Korean MiG-15s near the Yalu River and shoots them down, in the first jet-to-jet dogfight in history.source
• 1950November 26 – Korean War: Troops from the People's Republic of China launch a massive counterattack against South Korean and United Nations forces at the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River and the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, dashing any hopes for a quick end to the conflict.source
• 1950December 2 – Korean War: The Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River ends with the Chinese People's Volunteer Army expelling United Nations forces from North Korea.source
• 1950President Harry Truman sends United States military advisers to Vietnam, to aid French forces.source
• 1951January 4 – Korean War: Third Battle of Seoul – Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul for the second time (having lost the Second Battle of Seoul in September 1950).source
• 1951January 11 – In the U.S., a top secret report is delivered to U.S. President Truman by his National Security Resources Board, urging Truman to expand the Korean War by launching "a global offensive against communism" with sustained bombing of Red China and diplomatic moves to establish "moral justification" for a U.S. nuclear attack on the Soviet Union. The report will not be declassified until 1978.source
• 1951February 1 – The United Nations General Assembly declares that China is an aggressor in the Korean War, in United Nations General Assembly Resolution 498.source
• 1951March 14 – Korean War: Operation Ripper – For the second time, United Nations troops recapture Seoul.source
• 1951March – The Israeli government organizes Operation Ezra and Nehemiah, a mass airlift of Jews out of Iraq.source
• 1951May 15 – A military coup occurs in Bolivia.source
• 1951May 25–26 – British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean leave the United Kingdom to defect to the Soviet Union.source
• 1951July 2 — The cremated remains of Mary Reeser are found at her home in Saint Petersburg, Florida. She is believed to have been a victim of spontaneous human combustion. The FBI believes that the near total consumption of her body by the fire was caused by the Wick effect.source
• 1951July 10 – Korean War: Armistice negotiations begin at Kaesong.source
• 1951July 20 – King Abdullah I of Jordan is assassinated by a Palestinian while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem. He is succeeded by his son, King Talal.source
• 1951September 9 – Chinese Communist forces move into Lhasa, the capital of Tibet.source
• 1951September 10 – The United Kingdom begins an economic boycott of Iran.source
• 1951October 3–8 – Korean War: First Battle of Maryang-san – United Nations (primarily Australian) forces drive back the Chinese.source
• 1951October 6 – Malayan Emergency: Communist insurgents kill British commander Sir Henry Gurney.source
• 1951October 16 – Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan of Pakistan is assassinated.source
• 1951November 1 – Desert Rock exercises, the first military exercises for nuclear war, with infantry troops included, are held in the Nevada desert.source
• 1951December 6 – A state of emergency is declared in Egypt, due to increasing riots.source
• 1952February 21 – In Dhaka, East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh) police open fire on a procession of students, killing 4 people and starting a country-wide protest, which leads to the recognition of Bengali as one of the national languages of Pakistan. The day is later declared "International Mother Language Day" by UNESCO.source
• 1952March 10 – General Fulgencio Batista re-takes power in Cuba in a coup.source
• 1952March 21 – The last two executions in the Netherlands take place.source
• 1952March 27 – Konrad Adenauer survives an assassination attempt organized by members of a small underground group connected to Irgun, an Israeli militant Zionist organization.source
• 1952April 4 – At a tribunal in The Hague, Israel demands reparations worth $3 billion from West Germany.source
• 1952April 11 – Battle of Nanri Island: The Republic of China seizes the island from the People's Republic of China.source
• 1952April 11 – Bolivian National Revolution: Rebels take over Palacio Quemado.source
• 1952May 1 – East Germany threatens to form its own army.source
• 1952June 13 – Polttoainehankinta, a secret Finnish Defence Forces operations order is approved.source
• 1952June 19 – The Special Forces (United States Army) are created.source
• 1952July 23 – General Mohammed Naguib leads the Free Officers (formed by Gamal Abdel Nasser – the real power behind the coup) in the overthrow of King Farouk of Egypt.source
• 1952September 15 – The United Nations cedes Eritrea to Ethiopia.source
• 1952October 17 – 17 October affair: Indonesian troops led by General Nasution surround the presidential palace, seeking the dismissal of the People's Representative Council; Sukarno avoids confrontation.source
• 1952October 20 – Martial law is declared in Kenya, in the face of the Mau Mau uprising.source
• 1952November 18 – Jomo Kenyatta is arrested in Kenya, for an alleged connection to the Mau Mau Uprising.source
• 1952December 25 – One West German soldier is killed in a shooting incident in West Berlin.source
• 1952During the Mau Mau Uprising, the poisonous latex of the African milk bush is used to kill cattle, in an incident of Biological warfare.source
• 1953January 24 – Mau Mau Uprising: Rebels in Kenya kill the Ruck family (father, mother, and six-year-old son).source
• 1953February 3 – Batepá massacre: Hundreds of native creoles, known as forros, are massacred in São Tomé, by the colonial administration and Portuguese landowners.source
• 1953February 11 – United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower refuses a clemency appeal for Ethel and Julius Rosenberg.source
• 1953March 25–26 – Lari Massacre in Kenya: Mau Mau rebels kill up to 150 Kikuyu natives.source
• 1953May 25 – Nuclear testing: At the Nevada Test Site, the United States conducts its only nuclear artillery test: Upshot-Knothole Grable.source
• 1953June 1 – Uprising in Plzeň: Currency reform causes riots in Czechoslovakia.source
• 1953June 17 – Workers' Uprising in East Germany: The Soviet Union orders a Division of troops into East Berlin to quell a rebellion.source
• 1953July 26 – Fidel Castro and his brother lead a disastrous assault on the Moncada Barracks, preliminary to the Cuban Revolution.source
• 1953July 27 – The Korean War ends, with the Korean Armistice Agreement: The United Nations Command (Korea) (United States), China and North Korea sign an armistice agreement at Panmunjom, and the north remains communist, while the south remains capitalist. No formal peace treaty is ever signed.source
• 1953August 5 – Operation Big Switch: Prisoners of war are repatriated to the United States after the Korean War.source
• 1953August 8 – Soviet prime minister Georgi Malenkov announces that the Soviet Union has a hydrogen bomb.source
• 1953August 15–19 – Cold War: 1953 Iranian coup d'état – Overthrow of the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh, by Iranian military in favour of strengthening the monarchical rule of the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, with the support of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (as "Operation Ajax") and the United Kingdom.source
• 1953August 20 – The French government ousts King Mohammed V of Morocco, and exiles him to Corsica.source
• 1953August 25 – The French general strike ends.source
• 1953October 9 – Fearing communist influence in British Guiana, the British Government suspends the constitution, declares a state of emergency, and militarily occupies the colony.source
• 1953October 12 – The play The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial opens at the Plymouth Theatre, New York.source
• 1953November 9 – The Laotian Civil War begins between the Kingdom of Laos and the Pathet Lao, all the while resuming the First Indochina War against the French Army in a Two-front war.source
• 1953November 20–22 – First Indochina War: Operation Castor – In a massive airborne operation in Vietnam, French forces establish a base at Điện Biên Phủ.source
• 1953November 25 – Match of the Century (1953 England v Hungary football match): The England national football team loses 6–3 to Hungary at Wembley Stadium, their first ever loss to a continental team at home.source
• 1953November 29 – First Indochina War: Battle of Dien Bien Phu – French paratroopers consolidate their position at Điện Biên Phủ.source
• 1953November 30 – Kabaka crisis: Edward Mutesa II, the kabaka (king) of Buganda, is deposed and exiled to London by Sir Andrew Benjamin Cohen, Governor of Uganda.source
• 1953December 7 – A visit to Iran by American Vice President Richard Nixon sparks several days of riots, as a reaction to the August 19 overthrow of the government of Mohammed Mossadegh by the U.S.-backed Shah. Three students are shot dead by police in Tehran. This event becomes an annual commemoration.source
• 1954March 1 – U.S. Capitol shooting incident: Four Puerto Rican nationalists open fire in the United States House of Representatives chamber and wound 5; they are apprehended by security guards.source
• 1954March 13 – Việt Minh forces under General Võ Nguyên Giáp began a massive artillery bombardment on the French military, beginning the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the climactic battle of the First Indochina War.source
• 1954March 19 – Joey Giardello knocks out Willie Tory at Madison Square Garden in the first televised boxing prize fight to be shown in colour.source
• 1954March 23 – In Vietnam, the Viet Minh capture the main airstrip of Dien Bien Phu. The remaining French Army units there are partially isolated.source
• 1954March 25 – The Soviet Union recognises the sovereignty of East Germany. Soviet troops remain in the country.source
• 1954March 27 – The Castle Romeo nuclear test explosion is executed at Bikini Atoll, in the Marshall Islands.source
• 1954April 3 – Petrov Affair: Diplomat Vladimir Petrov defects from the Soviet Union and asks for political asylum in Australia.source
• 1954April 14 – Aneurin Bevan resigns from the British Labour Party's Shadow Cabinet in protest over his party's failure to oppose the rearmament of West Germany.source
• 1954April 22 – Senator Joseph McCarthy begins hearings investigating the United States Army for being "soft" on Communism.source
• 1954April 28 – U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles accuses Communist China of sending combat troops to Indo-China to train Viet Minh guerrillas.source
• 1954May 4 – General Alfredo Stroessner deposes Federico Chaves in a coup d'état in Paraguay; from August 15 he will hold the office of President until 1989.source
• 1954May 7 – First Indochina War: The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ends in a French defeat (the battle began on March 13).source
• 1954May 11 – U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles declares that Indochina is important but not essential to the security of Southeast Asia, thus ending any prospect of American intervention on the side of France.source
• 1954May 14 – The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict is adopted in The Hague, Netherlands.source
• 1954May 16 – Beginning of the Kengir uprising in the Gulag.source
• 1954June 9 – McCarthyism: Joseph N. Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy, during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army, saying, "Have you, at long last, no decency?" The exchange results in the decline of McCarthy's popularity.source
• 1954June 17 – A CIA-engineered military coup occurs in Guatemala.source
• 1954June 27 – Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz steps down in a CIA-sponsored military coup, triggering a bloody civil war that continues for more than 35 years.source
• 1954July 21 – First Indochina War: The Geneva Conference sends French forces to the south, and Vietnamese forces to the north, of a demarcation line. The agreement leads to the establishment of the North Vietnam regime and the state of South Vietnam.source
• 1954August 1 – The First Indochina War ends with the Vietnam People's Army in North Vietnam, the Vietnamese National Army in South Vietnam, the Kingdom of Cambodia in Cambodia, and the Kingdom of Laos in Laos, emerging victorious against the French Army.source
• 1954October 31 – Algerian War of Independence: The Algerian National Liberation Front begins a revolt against French rule.source
• 1954November 1 – The FLN attacks representative and public buildings of the French colonial power.source
• 1954November 10 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima Memorial), at the Arlington National Cemetery.source
• 1954December 2 – Red Scare: The United States Senate votes 67–22 to censure Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute."source
• 1955January 18–20 – Battle of Yijiangshan Islands: The Chinese Communist People's Liberation Army seizes the islands from the Republic of China (Taiwan).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
• 1955February 10 – The United States Seventh Fleet helps the Republic of China evacuate the Chinese Nationalist army and residents from the Tachen Islands to Taiwan.source
• 1955March 2 – Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old African-American girl, refuses to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, to a white woman after the driver demands it. She is carried off the bus backwards, while being kicked, handcuffed and harassed on the way to the police station. She becomes a plaintiff in Browder v. Gayle (1956), which rules bus segregation to be unconstitutional.source
• 1955April 1 – EOKA starts a resistance campaign against British rule in the Crown colony of Cyprus.source
• 1955April 5 – Richard J. Daley defeats Robert Merrian to become Mayor of Chicago, by a vote of 708,222 to 581,555.source
• 1955April 11 – Taekwondo, a form of Korean martial arts, is officially recognized in South Korea. A board convened by General Choi Hong Hi, including master instructors, historians and societal leaders, officially adopts the name Taekwon-Do for the unified Korean martial art.source
• 1955April 11 – The Taiwanese Kuomintang put a bomb on the airplane Kashmir Princess, killing 16 but failing to assassinate the People's Republic of China leader, Zhou Enlai.source
• 1955May 7 – Newcastle United F.C. beat Manchester City F.C. 3–1 to win the 1955 FA Cup final in English Association football.source
• 1955August 18 – The First Sudanese Civil War begins.source
• 1955August 20 – Hundreds of people are killed in anti-French rioting in Morocco and Algeria.source
• 1955August 25 – The last Soviet Army forces leave Austria.source
• 1955August 26 – Satyajit Ray's film Pather Panchali is released in India.source
• 1955September 6 – Istanbul pogrom: Istanbul's Greek minority is the target of a government-sponsored pogrom.source
• 1955September 16 – The military coup to unseat President Juan Perón of Argentina is launched at midnight.source
• 1955September 19–21 – President of Argentina Juan Perón is ousted in a military coup.source
• 1955October 27 – The film Rebel Without a Cause, starring James Dean, is released in the United States.source
• 1955November 1 – Official start date of the Vietnam War between the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and Republic of Vietnam; the north is allied with the Viet Cong.source
• 1956January 8 – Operation Auca: Five U.S. evangelical Christian missionaries, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, Ed McCully, Jim Elliot and Pete Fleming, are killed for trespassing by the Waorani people of Ecuador, shortly after making contact with them.source
• 1956January 25–26 – Finnish troops reoccupy Porkkala, after Soviet troops vacate its military base. Civilians can return February 4.source
• 1956February 14–25 – The 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is held in Moscow.source
• 1956March 9 – The Soviet Armed Forces suppress mass demonstrations in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic, reacting to Nikita Khrushchev's de-Stalinization policy.source
• 1956March 19 – At age 48, Dutch boxer Bep van Klaveren contests his last match in Rotterdam.source
• 1956April 7 – Spain relinquishes its protectorate in Morocco.source
• 1956June 14 – The Flag of the United States Army is formally dedicated.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
• 1956September 21 – Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza García is assassinated.source
• 1956October 23 – The Hungarian Revolution breaks out against the pro-Soviet government, originating as a student demonstration in Budapest. Hungary attempts to leave the Warsaw Pact.source
• 1956October 24 – The Protocol of Sèvres, a secret agreement between Israel, France and the United Kingdom, is signed, allowing the former to invade the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and occupy the Suez Canal with the support of the other two governments, giving rise to the Suez Crisis.source
• 1956October 26 – Soviet Red Army troops invade Hungary.source
• 1956October 29 – Suez Crisis: Israel invades the Sinai Peninsula and pushes Egyptian forces back toward the Suez Canal.source
• 1956November 3 – Khan Yunis massacre (Suez Crisis): Israeli soldiers shoot dead hundreds of Palestinian refugees and local inhabitants in Khan Yunis Camp.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
• 1956November 7 – Suez Crisis: The United Nations General Assembly adopts a resolution calling for the United Kingdom, France and Israel to withdraw their troops from Arab lands immediately.source
• 1956November 11 – Hungarian Revolution of 1956: Last insurgents succumb to the invading Soviet army.source
• 1956December 3 – The 1956 Bush Terminal explosion occurs in Brooklyn, United States.source
• 1957February 4 – France prohibits U.N. involvement in Algeria.source
• 1957February 18 – Kenyan rebel leader Dedan Kimathi is executed by the British colonial government.source
• 1957April 13 – The 1957 alleged Jordanian military coup attempt against Hussein Bin Talal is made by Ali Abu Nuwar.source
• 1957May 8 – South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem begins a state visit to the United States, his regime's main sponsor.source
• 1957May 15 – Operation Grapple: At Malden Island in the Pacific, Britain tests its first hydrogen bomb, which fails to detonate properly.source
• 1957May 24 – May 24 incident: Anti-American riots erupt in Taipei, Taiwan.source
• 1957September 5 – Cuban Revolution: Fulgencio Batista’s forces bomb anti-government riots in Cienfuegos.source
• 1957November 30 – Indonesian president Sukarno survives a grenade attack at the Cikini School in Jakarta, but several children are killed.source
• 1958January 13 – Battle of Edchera: The Moroccan Army of Liberation ambushes a Spanish patrol.source
• 1958February 23 – Cuban rebels kidnap five-time world driving champion Juan Manuel Fangio, releasing him 28 hours later.source
• 1958March 8 – The is decommissioned, leaving the United States Navy without an active battleship for the first time since 1896 (she is recommissioned October 22, 1988).source
• 1958April 3 – In Cuba, Castro's revolutionary army begins its attacks on Havana.source
• 1958April 28 – A bomber flown by a U.S. Central Intelligence Agency operative in support of Indonesian Permesta rebels bombs the harbor at Balikpapan, Borneo, Indonesia, hitting an Indonesian naval corvette and two British oil tankers. In June, the Indonesian and British governments both claim that Indonesian rebels are responsible for such attacks, concealing the C.I.A.'s involvement.source
• 1958May 13 – During a visit to Caracas, Venezuela, Vice President Richard Nixon's car is attacked by anti-American demonstrators.source
• 1958May 13 – Crisis in France: French Algerian protesters seize government offices in Algiers, leading to a military coup.source
• 1958May 20 – The Cuban government of Fulgencio Batista launches a counteroffensive against Castro's rebels.source
• 1958May 30 – The bodies of unidentified United States soldiers killed in action during World War II and the Korean War are buried at the Tomb of the Unknowns, in Arlington National Cemetery.source
• 1958June 30 – The 1957–58 Ifni War ends in Spanish Sahara.source
• 1958July 14 – July 14 Revolution in Iraq: King Faisal II and several family members are executed. Abd al-Karim Qasim assumes power.source
• 1958July 15 – 1958 Lebanon crisis: 5,000 United States Marines land in the Lebanese capital Beirut in support of the pro-Western government.source
• 1958August 6 – The Law of Permanent Defense of Democracy, which outlawed the Communist Party of Chile and banned 26,650 persons from the electoral lists, is repealed.source
• 1958August 7 – 1958 East Pakistan-India border skirmishes, a skirmish between East Pakistan and the Indian Army in Laxmipur.source
• 1958August 23 – The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis begins with the People's Republic of China's People's Liberation Army shelling the island of Kinmen (Quemoy) which is controlled by the Republic of China (Taiwan)'s Kuomintang forces.source
• 1958August 26 – A general strike is called in Paraguay.source
• 1958August 30–September 1 – Notting Hill race riots: Riots occur between blacks and whites in Notting Hill, London.source
• 1958September 1 – The first Cod War begins between the United Kingdom and Iceland.source
• 1958December 29 – Battle of Santa Clara: Rebel troops under Camilo Cienfuegos and Che Guevara begin to invade Santa Clara, Cuba.source
• 1958December 30 – The Guatemalan Air Force fires on Mexican fishing boats which had strayed into Guatemalan territory, triggering the Mexico–Guatemala conflict.source
• 1958December 31 – After the fall of Santa Clara, Cuban President Fulgencio Batista flees the country.source
• 1959January 1 – Cuba: Fulgencio Batista flees Havana when the forces of Fidel Castro advance.source
• 1959January 4 – In Cuba, rebel troops led by Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos enter the city of Havana.source
• 1959January 4 – Léopoldville riots: At least 49 people are killed during clashes between the police and participants of a meeting of the ABAKO Party in Léopoldville in the Belgian Congo.source
• 1959March 10 – The Tibetan uprising erupts in Lhasa when Chinese officials attempt to arrest the Dalai Lama.source
• 1959May 2 – 1959 FA Cup Final: Nottingham Forest defeat Luton Town 2–1 at Wembley Stadium.source
• 1959May 18 – The National Liberation Committee of Côte d'Ivoire is launched in Conakry, Guinea.source
• 1959May 23 – In Laos the Laotian Civil War begins between the Kingdom of Laos and communist rebels, the Pathet Lao.source
• 1959June 14 – A 3-front invasion of the Dominican Republic by exile forces backed by Fidel Castro and Venezuela attempts to overthrow Rafael Trujillo.source
• 1959July 14 – Groups of Kurdish and communist militias rebel in Kirkuk, Iraq against the central government.source
• 1959August 4 – Martial law is declared in Laos.source
• 1959August 17 – In the United States:source
• 1959September 26 – First large unit action of the Vietnam War takes place, when two companies of the ARVN's 23rd Division are ambushed by a well-organized Viet Cong force of several hundred, identified as the "2nd Liberation Battalion".source
• 1959October 12 – At the national Alianza Popular Revolucionaria Americana Congress in Peru, a group of leftist radicals is expelled from the party; they later form APRA Rebelde.source
• 1959October 31 – Riots break out in the Belgian Congo.source
• 1959November 1 – In Rwanda, Hutu politician Dominique Mbonyumutwa is beaten up by Tutsi forces, leading to a period of violence known as the wind of destruction.source
• 1960January 22 – Charles de Gaulle, President of France, dismisses Jacques Massu as commander-in-chief of French troops in Algeria.source
• 1960February 11 – China–India relations: Twelve Indian soldiers die in clashes with Red Chinese troops along their small common border.source
• 1960March 5 – Alberto Korda takes his iconic photograph of Che Guevara, Guerrillero Heroico, in Havana.source
• 1960March 6 – Vietnam War: The United States announces that 3,500 American soldiers will be sent to Vietnam.source
• 1960March 17 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower approves a covert Central Intelligence Agency plan to train a paramilitary force against Cuba, which will result in the 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion.source
• 1960March 21 – The Sharpeville massacre in South Africa results in more than 69 black protesters shot dead by police, 300 injured.source
• 1960April 19 – April Revolution: South Korean students hold a nationwide pro-democracy protest against President Syngman Rhee, eventually leading him to resign from office.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 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
• 1960May 27 – In Turkey, a bloodless military coup d'état removes President Celâl Bayar, and installs General Cemal Gürsel as the head of state.source
• 1960June 10 – The "Hagerty Incident": As part of the ongoing Anpo protests in Japan against the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, a car carrying Dwight D. Eisenhower's press secretary James Hagerty and U.S. Ambassador to Japan Douglas MacArthur II is mobbed by protesters outside of Tokyo's Haneda Airport, requiring the occupants to be rescued by a U.S. Marine helicopter.source
• 1960June 15 – The "June 15 Incident": As part of the massive Anpo protests against the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty in Japan, radical student activists from the Zengakuren student federation attempt to storm the National Diet compound, precipitating a battle with police in which female Tokyo University student Michiko Kanba is killed.source
• 1960June 24 – Assassination attempt of Venezuelan President Rómulo Betancourt.source
• 1960August 9 – The government of Laos is overthrown in a coup.source
• 1960September 5 – Congolese President Joseph Kasa-Vubu dismisses Patrice Lumumba's entire government, and also places Lumumba under house arrest.source
• 1960September 6 – Martin and Mitchell defection: William Hamilton Martin and Bernon F. Mitchell, two American cryptologists, announce their defection to the Soviet Union at a press conference in Moscow.source
• 1960September 14 – Colonel Joseph Mobutu takes power in Republic of the Congo via a military coup.source
• 1960September 29 – At the United Nations General Assembly, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev angrily interrupts British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, banging the desk and shouting in Russian. Macmillan drily says "I should like that to be translated, if I may".source
• 1960December 2 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorizes the use of $1.0 million for the relief and resettlement of Cuban refugees, who have been arriving in Florida at the rate of about 1,000 per week.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
• 1960December 9 – French President Charles de Gaulle's visit to Algeria is bloodied by European and Muslim rioters in Algeria's largest cities. These riots cause 127 deaths.source
• 1960December 13 – 1960 Ethiopian coup attempt: While Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia visits Brazil, his Kebur Zabagna (Imperial Bodyguard) leads a military coup against his rule, proclaiming that the emperor's son, Crown Prince Asfaw Wossen Taffari, is the new emperor.source
• 1960December 17 – Troops loyal to Emperor Haile Selassie in Ethiopia overcome the coup that began on December 13, returning the reins to the Emperor upon his return from a trip to Brazil. The Emperor absolves his own son of any guilt.source
• 1961January 17 – Patrice Lumumba of the Republic of Congo is assassinated.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 4 – The Portuguese Colonial War begins in Angola.source
• 1961March 15 – The Union of Peoples of Angola, led by Holden Roberto, attacks strategic locations in the north of Angola. These events result in the beginning of the colonial war with Portugal.source
• 1961March 18 – A ceasefire takes effect in the Algerian War of Independence.source
• 1961April 17 – The U.S.-backed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba begins; it fails by April 19.source
• 1961April 20 – Fidel Castro announces that the Bay of Pigs Invasion has been defeated.source
• 1961April 22 – Algiers putsch: Four French generals who oppose de Gaulle's policies in Algeria fail in a coup attempt.source
• 1961May 14 – Civil rights movement: A Freedom Riders bus is fire-bombed near Anniston, Alabama, and the civil rights protestors are beaten by an angry mob of Ku Klux Klan members.source
• 1961May 16 – Park Chung Hee takes over in a military coup, in South Korea.source
• 1961May 21 – Civil rights movement: Alabama Governor John Patterson declares martial law in an attempt to restore order, after race riots break out.source
• 1961July 25 – U.S. President John F. Kennedy gives a widely watched TV speech on the Berlin Crisis, warning "we will not be driven out of Berlin." Kennedy urges Americans to build fallout shelters, setting off a four-month debate on civil defense.source
• 1961July 31 – At Fenway Park in Boston, the first Major League Baseball All-Star Game tie occurs, when the game is stopped in the 9th inning due to rain (the only tie until 2002).source
• 1961September 1 – The first meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement is held in Belgrade. The Soviet Union resumes nuclear testing, escalating fears over the ongoing Berlin Crisis.source
• 1961September 1 – The Eritrean War of Independence begins with the Battle of Adal in which Hamid Idris Awate and his companions shoot at Ethiopian police and military. The war will continue until 1991.source
• 1961September 17 – Military rulers in Turkey hang former prime minister Adnan Menderes, together with the former Minister of Foreign Affairs Fatin Rüştü Zorlu and former Minister of Finance Hasan Polatkan.source
• 1961September 17 – London police arrest over 1,300 protesters in Trafalgar Square during a Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament rally.source
• 1961September 21 – In France, the Organisation de l'armée secrète (OAS) slips an anti-de Gaulle message into TV programming.source
• 1961September 28 – 1961 Syrian coup d'état: A military coup in Damascus, Syria effectively ends the United Arab Republic, the union between Egypt and Syria.source
• 1961October 17 – 1961 Paris massacre: French police in Paris attack about 30,000 people protesting against a curfew applied solely to Algerians. The official death toll is 3, but human rights groups claim 240 dead.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 19 – Indonesian president Sukarno announces that he will take West Irian by force, if necessary.source
• 1961December 19 – The Portuguese surrender Goa to India, after 400 years of Portuguese rule.source
• 1962January 12 – The Indonesian Army confirms that it has begun operations in West Irian.source
• 1962January 24 – The Organisation armée secrète (OAS, a right-wing paramilitary organization opposed to Algerian independence) bombs the French Foreign Ministry.source
• 1962January 27 – The Soviet government changes all place names honoring Molotov, Kaganovich and Georgy Malenkov.source
• 1962February 3 – A United States embargo against Cuba is announced.source
• 1962February 7 – The United States embargo against Cuba comes into effect, prohibiting all U.S.-related Cuban imports and exports.source
• 1962March 2 – A military coup in Burma brings General Ne Win to power.source
• 1962March 19 – An armistice begins in Algeria; however, the OAS continues its terrorist attacks against Algerians.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
• 1962May 1 – Norwich City F.C. wins the English Football League Cup, beating Rochdale in the final.source
• 1962May 23 – Ruben Jaramillo, Mexican peasant leader, and his wife and children, are gunned down by the Mexican army and federal police in Xochitepec, Morelos, Mexico.source
• 1962June 30 – The last soldiers of the French Foreign Legion leave Algeria.source
• 1962July 13 – In what the press dubs the "Night of the Long Knives", United Kingdom Prime Minister Harold Macmillan dismisses one-third of his Cabinet.source
• 1962August 11 – King Kong vs. Godzilla is released in Japan, becoming the first Godzilla and King Kong film in colour. It also becomes the 3rd film in both franchises.source
• 1962August 22 – Petit-Clamart attack: An assassination attempt is made against French President Charles de Gaulle by machine-gunning his car in the Paris suburbs. The mastermind, Jean Bastien-Thiry, will later be executed.source
• 1962August 24 – A group of armed Cuban exile terrorists fire at a hotel in Havana from a speedboat.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
• 1962October 27 – Cuban Missile Crisis: Vasily Arkhipov, executive officer of Soviet submarine B-59, refuses to launch nuclear torpedoes against the U.S. Navy. This event is widely regarded as crucial in averting a worldwide nuclear war.source
• 1962The first black student, James Meredith, registers at the University of Mississippi, escorted by Federal Marshals to protect him from official obstruction and violent segregationalist protest, the "Ole Miss riot of 1962".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
• 1962November 21 – The Sino-Indian War ends with a Chinese victory with India surrendering Aksai Chin to China.source
• 1962December 2 – Vietnam War: After a trip to Vietnam at the request of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield becomes the first American official to make a pessimistic public comment on the war's progress.source
• 1962December 8 – The North Kalimantan National Army revolts in Brunei, in the first stirrings of the Indonesian Confrontation.source
• 1962December 24 – Cuba releases the last 1,113 participants in the Bay of Pigs Invasion to the U.S., in exchange for food worth $53 million.source
• 1962December 30 – United Nations troops occupy the last rebel positions in Katanga; Moise Tshombe moves to South Rhodesia.source
• 1963January 2 – Vietnam War – Battle of Ap Bac: The Viet Cong win their first major victory.source
• 1963January 13 – 1963 Togolese coup d'état: A military coup in Togo results in the installation of coup leader Emmanuel Bodjollé as president.source
• 1963January 26 – The Australia Day shootings rock Perth; 2 people are shot dead and 3 others injured by Eric Edgar Cooke.source
• 1963March 4 – In Paris, six people are sentenced to death for conspiring to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle. De Gaulle pardons five, but the other conspirator, Jean Bastien-Thiry, is executed by firing squad several days later.source
• 1963June 3 – Huế chemical attacks: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam rains liquid chemicals on the heads of Buddhist protestors, injuring 67 people. The United States threatens to cut off aid to the regime of Ngô Đình Diệm.source
• 1963June 11 – In Saigon, Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Đức commits self-immolation to protest the oppression of Buddhists by Ngô Đình Diệm's government.source
• 1963June 12 – Civil Rights activist Medgar Evers is assassinated by white supremacist Byron De La Beckwithsource
• 1963June 26 – John F. Kennedy gives his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech in West Berlin, Germany.source
• 1963July 7 – Double Seven Day scuffle: Secret police loyal to Ngô Đình Nhu, brother of President Ngô Đình Diệm, attack American journalists including Peter Arnett and David Halberstam at a demonstration during the Buddhist crisis in South Vietnam.source
• 1963July 11 – South Africa: police raid Liliesleaf Farm to the north of Johannesburg, arresting a group of African National Congress leaders.source
• 1963August 15 – Trois Glorieuses: President Fulbert Youlou is overthrown in the Republic of Congo after a three-day uprising in the capital, Brazzaville.source
• 1963August 21 – Xá Lợi Pagoda raids: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces loyal to Ngô Đình Nhu, brother of President Ngô Đình Diệm, vandalise Buddhist pagodas across South Vietnam, arresting thousands and leaving an estimated hundreds dead. In the wake of the raids, the Kennedy administration by Cable 243 orders the United States Embassy, Saigon to explore alternative leadership in the country, opening the way towards a coup against Diệm.source
• 1963August 28 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to an audience of at least 250,000, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. It is, at that point, the single largest protest in American history.source
• 1963September 15 – American civil rights movement: The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, in Birmingham, Alabama, kills 4 and injures 22.source
• 1963September 18 – Rioters burn down the British Embassy in Jakarta, to protest the formation of Malaysia.source
• 1963September 25 – In the Dominican Republic, Juan Bosch is deposed by a coup d'état led by the military with civilian support.source
• 1963October 3 – 1963 Honduran coup d'état: A violent coup in Honduras pre-empts the October 13 election, ends a period of reform under President Ramón Villeda Morales and begins two decades of military rule under General Oswaldo López Arellano.source
• 1963October 7 – Buddhist crisis: Amid worsening relations, outspoken South Vietnamese First Lady Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu arrives in the US for a speaking tour, continuing a flurry of attacks on the Kennedy administration.source
• 1963October 14 – A revolution starts in Radfan, South Yemen, against British colonial rule.source
• 1963November 2 – 1963 South Vietnamese coup: Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem, the South Vietnamese President.source
• 1963November 6 – 1963 South Vietnamese coup: Coup leader General Dương Văn Minh takes over as leader of South Vietnam.source
• 1963November 22 – Assassination of John F. Kennedy: In a motorcade in Dallas, Texas, U.S. President John F. Kennedy is fatally shot by Lee Harvey Oswald, and Governor of Texas John Connally is seriously wounded at 12:30 CST. Upon Kennedy's death, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson becomes the 36th president of the United States.source
• 1963November 29 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of John F. Kennedy.source
• 1963December 3 – The Warren Commission begins its investigation into the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy.source
• 1964January 30 – General Nguyễn Khánh leads a bloodless military coup d'état, replacing Dương Văn Minh as Prime Minister of South Vietnam.source
• 1964February 9 – The Beatles perform for the first time for an American audience on The Ed Sullivan Show to a record television audience of 73 million people, launching Beatlemania in the United States, as part of The British Invasion.source
• 1964March 6 – American boxer Cassius Clay announces the change of his name to Muhammad Ali.source
• 1964March 31 – The military overthrows Brazilian President João Goulart in a coup, starting 21 years of dictatorship in Brazil, lasting until 1985.source
• 1964April 20 – Nelson Mandela makes his "I Am Prepared to Die" speech at the opening of the Rivonia Trial, a key event for the anti-apartheid movement.source
• 1964May 24–25 – The crowd at a football match in Lima, Peru, riots over a referee's decision in the Peru-Argentina game; 319 are killed, 500 injured.source
• 1964May 27 – The ongoing Colombian conflict starts, with an assault by 1,000 Colombian soldiers, backed by fighter planes and helicopters, against about 50 guerrillas in the community of Marquetalia.source
• 1964June 11 – Cologne school massacre: In Cologne, West Germany, Walter Seifert attacks students and teachers in an elementary school with a flamethrower, killing 10 and injuring 21.source
• 1964July 16 – Six days of race riots begin in Harlem, New York, United States, apparently prompted by the shooting of a teenager.source
• 1964July 19 – Vietnam War: At a rally in Saigon, South Vietnamese Prime Minister and military leader Nguyễn Khánh calls for expanding the war into North Vietnam.source
• 1964July 21 – Race riots begin in Singapore between ethnic Chinese and Malays.source
• 1964August 5 – Vietnam War: Operation Pierce Arrow – Aircraft from carriers USS Ticonderoga and USS Constellation bomb North Vietnam in retaliation for strikes against U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.source
• 1964August 5 – The Simba rebel army in the Democratic Republic of the Congo captures Stanleyville, and takes 1,000 Western hostages.source
• 1964August 7 – Vietnam War: The United States Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, giving U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson broad war powers to deal with North Vietnamese attacks on U.S. forces.source
• 1964August 16 – Vietnam War: In a coup, General Nguyễn Khánh replaces Dương Văn Minh as South Vietnam's chief of state and establishes a new constitution, drafted partly by the U.S. Embassy.source
• 1964September 11 – In Jacksonville, Florida, during a tour of the United States, John Lennon announces that the Beatles will not play to a segregated audience.source
• 1964September 24 – The Warren Commission, the first official investigation of the assassination of United States President John F. Kennedy, submits its written report.source
• 1964October 14 – American civil rights movement leader Martin Luther King Jr. becomes the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, which is awarded to him for leading non-violent resistance to end racial prejudice in the United States.source
• 1964November 10 – Australia partially reintroduces compulsory military service due to the Indonesian Confrontation.source
• 1964November 19 – The United States Department of Defense announces the closing of 95 military bases and facilities, including Fort Jay, the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the Brooklyn Army Terminal.source
• 1964November 24 – Belgian paratroopers and mercenaries capture Stanleyville, but a number of hostages die in the fighting, among them American Evangelical Covenant Church missionary Paul Carlson.source
• 1964November 28 – Vietnam War: United States National Security Council members, including Robert McNamara, Dean Rusk, and Maxwell Taylor, agree to recommend a plan for a 2-stage escalation of bombing in North Vietnam, to President Lyndon B. Johnson.source
• 1964December 11 – Che Guevara addresses the United Nations General Assembly. A bazooka attack is launched at the Headquarters of the United Nations in New York City.source
• 1964December 14 – Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (379 US 241 1964): The U.S. Supreme Court rules that, in accordance with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, establishments providing public accommodation must refrain from racial discrimination.source
• 1965March 2 – Vietnam War: Operation Rolling Thunder – The United States Air Force 2nd Air Division, United States Navy and South Vietnamese air force begin a 3-year aerial bombardment campaign against North Vietnam.source
• 1965March 7 – "Bloody Sunday": Some 200 Alabama State Troopers attack 525 civil rights demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, as they attempt to march to the state capitol of Montgomery.source
• 1965March 8 – Vietnam War: Some 3,500 United States Marines arrive in Da Nang, South Vietnam, becoming the first American ground combat troops in Vietnam.source
• 1965March 9 – The "Turnaround Tuesday" march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, under the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr., stops at the site of "Bloody Sunday", to hold a prayer service and return to Selma, in obedience to a court restraining order. On the same day, White supremacists attack three white ministers, leaving Unitarian Universalist minister James J. Reeb in a coma.source
• 1965March 20 – The Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 begins.source
• 1965April 24 – In the Dominican Republic, officers and civilians loyal to deposed President Juan Bosch mutiny against the right-wing junta running the country, setting up a provisional government. Forces loyal to the deposed military-imposed government stage a countercoup the next day, and civil war breaks out, although the new government retains its hold on power.source
• 1965April 24 – The bodies of Portuguese opposition politician Humberto Delgado and his secretary Arajaryr Moreira de Campos are found in a forest near Villanueva del Fresno, Spain (they were killed February 12).source
• 1965June 10 – Vietnam War – Battle of Dong Xoai: About 1,500 Viet Cong mount a mortar attack on Đồng Xoài, overrunning its military headquarters and the adjoining militia compound.source
• 1965June 19 – Houari Boumediene's Revolutionary Council ousts Ahmed Ben Bella, in a bloodless coup in Algeria.source
• 1965June 20 – Police in Algiers break up demonstrations by people who have taken to the streets chanting slogans in support of deposed President Ahmed Ben Bella.source
• 1965July 24 – Vietnam War: Four F-4C Phantoms escorting a bombing raid at Kang Chi are targeted by antiaircraft missiles, in the first such attack against American planes in the war. One is shot down and the other 3 sustain damage.source
• 1965August 11 – Racial rioting in the Los Angeles, California neighborhood of Watts breaks out after an African American motorist, Marquette Frye, is stopped on suspicion of drunken driving. Six days of unrest are quelled by over 14,000 members of the California National Guard. There are 34 deaths and over $40 million in property damage. It is the largest and costliest urban rebellion of the Civil Rights movement.source
• 1965August 18 – Vietnam War: Operation Starlite – 5,500 United States Marines destroy a Viet Cong stronghold on the Van Tuong peninsula in Quảng Ngãi Province, in the first major American ground battle of the war. The Marines were tipped off by a Viet Cong deserter who said that there was an attack planned against the U.S. base at Chu Lai.source
• 1965September 2 – Vietnam War: In a follow-up to August's Operation Starlite, United States Marines and South Vietnamese forces initiate Operation Piranha on the Batangan Peninsula, 23 mi km south of the Chu Lai Marine base.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
• 1965September 20 – Vietnam War: An USAF F-104 Starfighter piloted by Captain Philip Eldon Smith is shot down by a Chinese MiG-19 Farmer. The pilot is held until March 15, 1973.source
• 1965September 22 – Radio Peking announces that Indian troops have dismantled their equipment on the Chinese side of the border.source
• 1965September 30 – The Indonesian army, led by General Suharto, crushes an alleged communist coup attempt (see Transition to the New Order and 30 September Movement).source
• 1965October 21 – The Organization of African Unity meets in Accra, Ghana.source
• 1965October 30 – Vietnam War: Near Da Nang, United States Marines repel an intense attack by Viet Cong forces, killing 56 guerrillas. A sketch of Marine positions is found on the dead body of a 13-year-old Vietnamese boy who sold drinks to the Marines the day before.source
• 1965November 5 – Martial law is announced in Rhodesia. The United Nations General Assembly accepts British intent to use force against Rhodesia if necessary by a vote of 82–9.source
• 1965November 8 – Vietnam War – Operation Hump: The United States Army 173rd Airborne is ambushed by over 1,200 Viet Cong.source
• 1965November 14 – Vietnam War – Battle of Ia Drang: In the Ia Drang Valley of the Central Highlands in Vietnam, the first major engagement of the war between regular United States and North Vietnamese forces begins.source
• 1965November 27 – Vietnam War: The Pentagon tells U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson that if planned major sweep operations to neutralize Viet Cong forces during the next year are to succeed, the number of American troops in Vietnam will have to be increased from 120,000 to 400,000.source
• 1966January 3 – 1966 Upper Voltan coup d'état: President Maurice Yaméogo is deposed by a military coup in the Republic of Upper Volta (modern-day Burkina Faso).source
• 1966January 10 – The House of Representatives of the US state of Georgia refuses to allow African-American representative Julian Bond to take his seat, because of his anti-war stance.source
• 1966January 22 – The military government of Nigeria announces that ex-prime minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa was killed during the coup a week previously.source
• 1966February 23 – 1966 Syrian coup d'état: An intra-party military coup in Syria replaces the previous government of Amin al-Hafiz by one led by Salah Jadid.source
• 1966February 24 – A coup led by the police and military of Ghana raises the National Liberation Council to power while president Kwame Nkrumah is abroad.source
• 1966March 29 – The 23rd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is held: Leonid Brezhnev demands that U.S. troops leave Vietnam, and announces that Chinese-Soviet relations are not satisfactory.source
• 1966April 5 – During the Buddhist Uprising, South Vietnamese military prime minister Nguyễn Cao Kỳ personally attempts to lead the capture of the restive city of Đà Nẵng before backing down.source
• 1966April 7 – The United Kingdom asks the United Nations Security Council for authority to use force to stop oil tankers that violate the embargo against Rhodesia (authority is given April 10).source
• 1966April 21 – Haile Selassie visits Jamaica for the first time, meeting with Rasta leaders.source
• 1966May 15 – The South Vietnamese army besieges Da Nang.source
• 1966May 24 – Battle of Mengo Hill: Ugandan army troops arrest Mutesa II of Buganda and occupy his palace.source
• 1966May 25 – No. 9 Squadron RAAF becomes part of the 4,500 strong Australian Task Force assigned to duties in Vietnam, leaving for Southeast Asia aboard the aircraft carrier HMAS Sydney.source
• 1966June 17 – An Air France personnel strike begins.source
• 1966June 28 – Argentine Revolution: In Argentina, a military junta calling itself Revolución Argentina deposes president Arturo Umberto Illia in a coup and appoints General Juan Carlos Onganía to power.source
• 1966July 23 – Katangese troops in Stanleyville, Congo, revolt for several weeks in support of the exiled minister Moise Tshombe.source
• 1966July 24 – A USAF F-4C Phantom #63-7599 is shot down by a North Vietnamese SAM-2 45 mi northeast of Hanoi, the first loss of a U.S. aircraft to a Vietnamese surface-to-air missile in the Vietnam War.source
• 1966July 29 – 1966 Nigerian counter-coup: Army officers from the north of Nigeria execute head of state General Aguiyi-Ironsi and install Yakubu Gowon.source
• 1966August 18 – Vietnam War – Battle of Long Tan: D Company, 6th Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, meets and defeats a Viet Cong force estimated to be four times larger, in Phuoc Tuy Province, Republic of Vietnam.source
• 1966September 9 – NATO decides to move Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe to Belgium.source
• 1966September 13 – Cultural Revolution in China: Clashes between the Chinese Communist Party and the Red Guards are reported by TASS in the Soviet Union.source
• 1966October 15 – Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton found the Black Panther Party in the United States.source
• 1966November 2 – North Korean commandos ambush a UN command control consisting of 2nd Infantry Division soldiers south of the Korean Demilitarized Zone.source
• 1966November 27 – The Washington Redskins defeat the New York Giants 72–41 in the highest scoring game in National Football League history.source
• 1966December 5 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Bond v. Floyd that the Georgia House of Representatives must seat Julian Bond, having violated his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights.source
• 1967January 25 – South Vietnamese junta leader and Prime Minister Nguyen Cao Ky forces his rival, Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Nguyen Huu Co, into exile while overseas on a diplomatic visit.source
• 1967March 11 – The first phase of the Cambodian Civil War begins between the Kingdom of Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge.source
• 1967April 7 – Six-Day War (approach): Israeli fighters shoot down 7 Syrian MIG-21s.source
• 1967April 15 – Large demonstrations are held against US involvement in the Vietnam War in New York City and San Francisco. The march, organized by the National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam, from Central Park to the United Nations drew hundreds of thousands of people, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Harry Belafonte, James Bevel, and Dr. Benjamin Spock, who marched and spoke at the event. A simultaneous march in San Francisco is attended by Coretta Scott King.source
• 1967May 2 – The Toronto Maple Leafs win the Stanley Cup. It is their last Stanley Cup and last finals appearance to date. It will turn out to be the last game in the Original Six era. Six more teams will be added in the fall.source
• 1967May 8 – The Philippine province of Davao is split into three: Davao del Norte, Davao del Sur, and Davao Oriental.source
• 1967May 17 – President Gamal Abdal Nasser of Egypt demands withdrawal of the peacekeeping UN Emergency Force in the Sinai. U.N. Secretary-General U Thant complies (May 18).source
• 1967May 18 – In Mexico, schoolteacher Lucio Cabañas begins guerrilla warfare in Atoyac de Alvarez, west of Acapulco, in the state of Guerrero.source
• 1967June 5 – Six-Day War begins: Israel launches Operation Focus, an attack on Egyptian Air Force airfields; the allied armies of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Jordan invade Israel. Battle of Ammunition Hill, start of the Jordanian campaignsource
• 1967June 7 – East Jerusalem is captured in a battle conducted by Israeli forces, without the use of artillery, in order to avoid damage to the Holy City.source
• 1967June 8 – USS Liberty incident: a United States Navy spy ship is attacked by Israeli forces, allegedly in error, killing 34 crew.source
• 1967June 10 – Six-Day War ends: Israel and Syria agree to a United Nations-mediated cease-fire.source
• 1967July 5 – Troops of Belgian mercenary commander Jean Schramme revolt against Mobutu Sese Seko, and try to take control of Stanleyville, Congo.source
• 1967July 6 – Nigerian Civil War: Nigerian forces invade the secessionist Biafra May 30.source
• 1967July 12 – 1967 Newark riots: After the arrest of an African-American cab driver for allegedly illegally driving around a police car and gunning it down the road, race riots break out in Newark, New Jersey, lasting 5 days and leaving 26 dead.source
• 1967August 19 – West Germany receives 36 East German prisoners it has "purchased" through the border posts of Herleshausen and Wartha.source
• 1967September 4 – Vietnam War – Operation Swift: The United States Marines launch a search and destroy mission in Quảng Nam and Quảng Tín provinces. The ensuing 4-day battle in Que Son Valley kills 114 Americans and 376 North Vietnamese.source
• 1967October 12 – Vietnam War: U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk states during a news conference that, because of North Vietnam's opposition, proposals by the U.S. Congress for peace initiatives are futile.source
• 1967October 18 – Vietnam War: Students at the University of Wisconsin–Madison protest over recruitment by Dow Chemical on the university campus; 76 are injured in the resulting riot.source
• 1967October 21 – Approximately 70,000 Vietnam War protesters march in Washington, D.C. and rally at the Lincoln Memorial; in a successive march that day, 50,000 people march to the Pentagon, where Allen Ginsberg, Abbie Hoffman, and Jerry Rubin symbolically chant to "levitate" the building and "exorcise the evil within."source
• 1967November 3 – Vietnam War – Battle of Dak To: Around Đắk Tô (located about 280 miles north of Saigon near the Cambodian border), heavy casualties are suffered on both sides; U.S. troops narrowly win the battle on November 22.source
• 1967November 11 – Vietnam War: In a ceremony in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 3 United States prisoners of war are released by the Viet Cong and turned over to American "New Left" antiwar activist Tom Hayden.source
• 1967November 21 – Vietnam War: United States General William Westmoreland tells news reporters: "I am absolutely certain that whereas in 1965 the enemy was winning, today he is certainly losing."source
• 1967November 30 – U.S. Senator Eugene McCarthy announces his candidacy for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, challenging incumbent President Lyndon B. Johnson over the Vietnam War.source
• 1968January 21 – Vietnam War: Battle of Khe Sanh – One of the most publicized and controversial battles of the war begins, ending on April 8.source
• 1968January 30 – Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive begins as Viet Cong forces launch a series of surprise attacks across South Vietnam.source
• 1968February 8 – Civil rights movement in the United States: Orangeburg Massacre – A civil rights demonstration on a college campus to protest de facto racial segregation in South Carolina is broken up by highway patrolmen; three African American students are killed, the first instance of police killing student protestors at an American campus.source
• 1968February 24 – Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive is halted; South Vietnam recaptures Huế.source
• 1968March 10–11 – Vietnam War: Battle of Lima Site 85, the largest single ground combat loss of United States Air Force members (12) during the (at this time) secret war later known as the Laotian Civil War.source
• 1968March 12 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson barely edges out antiwar candidate Eugene McCarthy in the New Hampshire Democratic primary, a vote which highlights the deep divisions in the country, and the party, over Vietnam.source
• 1968March 16 – Vietnam War – My Lai massacre: American troops kill between 347 and 504 unarmed civilians and rape women and children. The story, initially covered up as a military victory, will first become public in November 1969 and will help undermine public support for the U.S. efforts in Vietnam.source
• 1968March 28 – Brazilian high school student Edson Luís de Lima Souto is shot by the police in a protest for cheaper meals at a restaurant for low-income students. The aftermath of his death is one of the first major events against the military dictatorship.source
• 1968April 4 – Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.: Martin Luther King Jr. is shot dead at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee by James Earl Ray. King-assassination riots erupt in major American cities, lasting for several days afterwards.source
• 1968April 6 – A shootout between Black Panthers and police in Oakland, California, United States, results in several arrests and deaths, including 17-year-old Panther Bobby Hutton.source
• 1968April 26 – The nuclear weapon "Boxcar" is tested at the Nevada Test Site in the biggest detonation of Operation Crosstie.source
• 1968May 17 – The Catonsville Nine enter the Selective Service offices in Catonsville, Maryland, take dozens of selective service draft records, and burn them with napalm as a protest against the Vietnam War.source
• 1968May 19 – Nigerian forces capture Port Harcourt and form a ring around the Biafrans. This contributes to a humanitarian disaster as the surrounded population already suffers from hunger and starvation.source
• 1968May 29 – May 68: President de Gaulle of France leaves Paris without telling his prime minister, Georges Pompidou, where he is going – which is in fact to the headquarters of the French Forces in Germany at Baden-Baden to assure himself of military support.source
• 1968June 5 – Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy: Senator Robert F. Kennedy, a leading 1968 Democratic presidential candidate, is shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Palestinian-born Sirhan Sirhan is arrested.source
• 1968June 17 – The Malayan Communist Party launches a second insurgency and the state of emergency is again imposed in Malaysia.source
• 1968June 21 – A student demonstration in front of the Jornal do Brasil ("JB") building in Rio de Janeiro ends with 28 dead and over a thousand arrested.source
• 1968June 26 – The "March of the One Hundred Thousand" takes place in Rio de Janeiro as crowds demonstrate against the Brazilian military government.source
• 1968August 22–30 – 1968 Democratic National Convention protests: Police clash with anti-Vietnam War protesters in Chicago outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention, which nominates Hubert Humphrey for U.S. president and Edmund Muskie for vice president. The riots and subsequent trials are an essential part of the activism of the Youth International Party.source
• 1968September 13 – Albania officially withdraws from the Warsaw Pact upon the Soviet Union-led Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia, having already ceased to participate actively in Pact activity since 1962.source
• 1968September 17 – The D'Oliveira affair: The Marylebone Cricket Club tour of South Africa is cancelled when the South Africans refuse to accept the presence of Basil D'Oliveira, a Cape Coloured, in the England side.source
• 1968September 23 – Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive comes to an end in South Vietnam.source
• 1968October 3 – In Peru, Juan Velasco Alvarado takes power in a revolution.source
• 1968November 7 – Start of the 1968 movement in Pakistan, which leads to the resignation of General Ayub Khan, and ultimately the split of the country and formation of Bangladesh.source
• 1969January 4 – The Government of Spain hands over Ifni to Morocco.source
• 1969January 19 – End of the siege of the University of Tokyo, marking the beginning of the end for the 1968–69 Japanese university protests.source
• 1969March 2 – Soviet and Chinese forces clash at a border outpost on the Ussuri River.source
• 1969April 17 – Sirhan Bishara Sirhan is found guilty of the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.source
• 1969April 20 – British troops arrive in Northern Ireland to reinforce the Royal Ulster Constabulary.source
• 1969May 10 – The Battle of Dong Ap Bia, also known as Hamburger Hill, begins during the Vietnam War.source
• 1969May 13 – May 13 Incident: Race riots occur in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.source
• 1969May 14 – Colonel Muammar Gaddafi visits Mecca, Saudi Arabia.source
• 1969May 20 – United States National Guard helicopters spray skin-stinging powder on anti-war protesters in California.source
• 1969June 5 – An international communist conference begins in Moscow.source
• 1969June 17 – After a 23-game match, Boris Spassky defeats Tigran Petrosian to become the World Chess Champion in Moscow.source
• 1969June 28 – The Stonewall riots, a milestone in the modern gay rights movement in the United States, began in New York City.source
• 1969July 14 – Football War: After Honduras loses an association football match against El Salvador, rioting breaks out in Honduras against Salvadoran migrant workers. Of the 300,000 Salvadoran workers in Honduras, tens of thousands are expelled, prompting a brief Salvadoran invasion of Honduras. The OAS works out a cease-fire on July 18, which takes effect on July 20.source
• 1969July 30 – Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard Nixon makes an unscheduled visit to South Vietnam, meeting with President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu and U.S. military commanders.source
• 1969August 4 – Vietnam War: At the apartment of French intermediary Jean Sainteny in Paris, U.S. representative Henry Kissinger and North Vietnamese representative Xuan Thuy begin secret peace negotiations. They eventually fail since the two sides cannot agree to any terms.source
• 1969August 13 – Serious border clashes occur between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China.source
• 1969August 14 – The Troubles: British troops are deployed in Northern Ireland to restore order following three days of political and sectarian violence, marking the beginning of the 37-year Operation Banner.source
• 1969September 1 – 1969 Libyan coup d'état: A bloodless coup in Libya ousts King Idris and brings Colonel Muammar Gaddafi to power.source
• 1969October 9–12 – Days of Rage: In Chicago, the Illinois National Guard is called in to control demonstrations involving the radical Weathermen, in connection with the "Chicago Eight" Trial.source
• 1969October 15 – Vietnam War: Hundreds of thousands of people take part in Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam demonstrations across the United States.source
• 1969October 21 – General Siad Barre comes to power in Somalia in a coup, 6 days after the assassination of President Abdirashid Ali Shermarke.source
• 1969November 19 – Vietnam War: A Cleveland, Ohio newspaper, The Plain Dealer, publishes explicit photographs of dead villagers from the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam.source
• 1969December 1 – Vietnam War: The first draft lottery in the United States since World War II is held. September 14 is the first of the 366 days of the year selected, meaning that anyone born on September 14 in the years from 1944 to 1951 would be the first to be summoned. On January 4, 1970, The New York Times will run a long article, "Statisticians Charge Draft Lottery Was Not Random".source
• 1969December 24 – Nigerian troops capture Umuahia. The last Biafran capital before its dissolution becomes Owerri.source
• 1970January 15 – After a 32-month fight for independence from Nigeria, Biafran forces under Philip Effiong formally surrender to General Yakubu Gowon, ending the Nigerian Civil War.source
• 1970March 18 – General Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia and holds Queen Sisowath Kossamak under house arrest.source
• 1970April 8 – Israeli Air Force F-4 Phantom II fighter bombers kill 47 Egyptian school children at an elementary school in what is known as Bahr el-Baqar massacre. The single-floor school is hit by five bombs and two air-to-ground missiles.source
• 1970April 29 – Cambodian campaign: The U.S. incursion into Cambodia begins.source
• 1970May 4 – Kent State shootings: Four students at Kent State University in Ohio, are killed and nine wounded by Ohio National Guardsmen at a protest against the U.S. incursion into Cambodia.source
• 1970May 6 – Arms Crisis in the Republic of Ireland: Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney are dismissed as members of the Irish Government for accusations of their involvement in a plot to import arms for use by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland.source
• 1970May 14 – Jackson State killings: In the second day of violent demonstrations at Jackson State University in Jackson, Mississippi, state law enforcement officers fire into the demonstrators, killing 2 and injuring 12.source
• 1970June 8 – A coup in Argentina brings a new junta of service chiefs; on June 18, Roberto M. Levingston becomes President.source
• 1970July 23 – 1970 Omani coup d'état: Said bin Taimur, Sultan of Muscat and Oman, is deposed in a bloodless palace coup by his son, Qaboos, with covert British support. Among the reforms he introduces is the abolition of chattel slavery in Oman.source
• 1970September 1 – An assassination attempt against King Hussein of Jordan precipitates the country's Black September crisis.source
• 1970September 3–6 – Israeli forces fight Palestinian guerillas in southern Lebanon.source
• 1970September 5 – Vietnam War: Operation Jefferson Glenn: The United States 101st Airborne Division and the South Vietnamese 1st Infantry Division initiate a new operation in Thua Thien Province (the operation ends in October 1971).source
• 1970September 17 – Black September: King Hussein of Jordan orders the Jordanian Armed Forces to oust Palestinian fedayeen from Jordan.source
• 1970September 19 – Kostas Georgakis, a Greek student of geology, sets himself ablaze in Matteotti Square in Genoa, Italy, as a protest against the dictatorial Greek junta led by Georgios Papadopoulos.source
• 1970September 21 – Palestinian armed forces reinforce guerillas in Irbidi, Jordan.source
• 1970October 3 – In Lebanon, the government of Prime Minister Rashid Karami resigns.source
• 1970October 9 – The Khmer Republic is proclaimed in Cambodia, escalating the Cambodian Civil War between the government and the Khmer Rouge.source
• 1970November 21 – In Ethiopia, the Eritrean Liberation Front kills an Ethiopian general.source
• 1970November 21 – Vietnam War – Operation Ivory Coast: A joint Air Force and Army team raids the 4Sơn Tây prison camp in an attempt to free American prisoners of war thought to be held there (no Americans are killed, but the prisoners have already moved to another camp; all U.S. POWs are moved to a handful of central prison complexes as a result of this raid).source
• 1970November 22 – Guinean president Ahmed Sékou Touré accuses Portugal of an attack when hundreds of mercenaries land near the capital Conakry. The Guinean army repels the landing attempts over the next three days.source
• 1970November 25 – In Tokyo, author and Tatenokai militia leader Yukio Mishima and his followers take over the headquarters of the Japan Self-Defense Forces in an attempted coup d'état. After Mishima's speech fails to sway public opinion towards his right-wing political beliefs, including restoration of the powers of the Emperor, he commits seppuku (public ritual suicide).source
• 1970November 28 – The Montreal Alouettes defeat the Calgary Stampeders, 23–10, to win the 58th Grey Cup in Canadian football.source
• 1970December 16 – The Ethiopian government declares a state of emergency in the region of Eritrea over the activities of the Eritrean Liberation Front.source
• 1970December 30 – In Biscay in the Basque country of Spain, 15,000 go on strike in protest at the Burgos trial death sentences. Francisco Franco commutes the sentences to 30 years in prison.source
• 1971January 24 – The Guinean government sentences to death 92 Guineans who helped Portuguese troops in the failed landing attempts in November 1970; 72 are sentenced to hard labor for life; 58 of the sentenced are hanged the next day.source
• 1971March 1 – A bomb explodes in the men's room at the United States Capitol; the Weather Underground claims responsibility.source
• 1971March 8 – "Fight of the Century": Boxer Joe Frazier defeats Muhammad Ali in a 15-round unanimous decision at Madison Square Garden.source
• 1971March 25 – Bangladesh Liberation War: The Pakistani army starts Operation Searchlight in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) at midnight after President Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan, a military ruler, voids election results that gave the Awami League an overwhelming majority in the parliament; start of the 1971 Bangladesh genocide. That ended the non-cooperation movement.source
• 1971March 29 – U.S. Army lieutenant William Calley is found guilty of 22 murders during the My Lai Massacre and is sentenced to life in prison (he is later pardoned).source
• 1971April 5 – In Ceylon, a group calling themselves the People's Liberation Front begins a rebellion against the Bandaranaike government.source
• 1971April 26 – The government of Turkey declares a state of siege in 11 provinces, including Ankara, in response to violent demonstrations.source
• 1971May 6 – The government of Ceylon begins a major offensive against the People's Liberation Front.source
• 1971May 18 – The Montreal Canadiens win the Stanley Cup against the Chicago Black Hawks. The Canadiens became only the second team in NHL history to win the Cup in Game 7 on the road, and did so after the home team had won each of the previous six games in the series. This also marked Jean Béliveau's last NHL game.source
• 1971June 13 – Vietnam War: The New York Times begins to publish the Pentagon Papers.source
• 1971July 10–11 – Coup attempt in Morocco: 1,400 cadets take over the king's palace for three hours and kill 28 people; 158 rebels die when the king's troops storm the palace (ten high-ranking officers are later executed for involvement).source
• 1971July 13 – Reggie Jackson's long home run, which hits a transformer on the roof of Tiger Stadium, helps the American League defeat the National League 6–4 in the Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Detroit.source
• 1971September 1– Operation Sourisak Montry VIII opens when forces of the Royal Thai Army recapture several positions in the territory of Laos on the south bank of the Mekong in response to an encroaching Chinese presence to the north.source
• 1971September 9–13 – Attica Prison riot: A revolt breaks out at the maximum-security prison in Attica, New York. In the end, state police and the United States National Guard storm the facility; 42 are killed, 10 of them hostages.source
• 1971October 29 – Vietnam War – Vietnamization: The total number of American troops still in Vietnam drops to a record low of 196,700 (the lowest since January 1966).source
• 1971November 10 – Cambodian Civil War: In Cambodia, Khmer Rouge forces attack Phnom Penh and its airport, killing 44, wounding at least 30 and damaging 9 airplanes.source
• 1971November 12 – Vietnam War – Vietnamization: U.S. President Richard M. Nixon sets February 1, 1972, as the deadline for the removal of another 45,000 American troops from Vietnam.source
• 1971November 28 – The 59th Grey Cup Game sees the Calgary Stampeders beat the Toronto Argonauts 14–11.source
• 1971November 30 – Iranian forces occupy the Persian Gulf islands of Abu Musa (joint occupation by agreement with Sharjah) and the Greater and Lesser Tunbs (taken by force from Ras Al Khaimah).source
• 1971December 3 – The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 begins with Operation Chengiz Khan as Pakistan launches preemptive attacks on nine Indian airbases. The next day India launches a massive invasion of East Pakistan.source
• 1971December 4 – The McGurk's Bar bombing by the Ulster Volunteer Force in Belfast kills 15.source
• 1971December 7 – Battle of Sylhet rages between the Pakistani military and the Indian Army.source
• 1971December 16 – Victory Day of Bangladesh: The Pakistan Army in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) surrenders to the joint forces of India and the Bengali nationalist separatists, ending the Bangladesh Liberation War.source
• 1971December 25 – In the longest American football game in National Football League history, the Miami Dolphins beat the Kansas City Chiefs 27–24 after 82 minutes, 40 seconds of playing time. Garo Yepremian kicked the winning 37-yard field goal after 7:40 of the second overtime period.source
• 1972January 21 – A New Delhi bootlegger sells wood alcohol to a wedding party; 100 people die.source
• 1972January 30 – Bloody Sunday: The British Army kills 14 unarmed nationalist civil rights marchers in Derry, Northern Ireland.source
• 1972February 22 – The Troubles: 1972 Aldershot bombing – A car bomb planted by the Official Irish Republican Army kills seven people outside a British military base in Aldershot, England.source
• 1972March 30 – Vietnam War: The Easter Offensive begins after North Vietnamese forces cross into the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) of South Vietnamsource
• 1972May 10 – Operation Linebacker and Operation Custom Tailor begin with large-scale bombing operations against North Vietnam by tactical fighter aircraft.source
• 1972May 30 – The Troubles: The Official Irish Republican Army declares a ceasefire.source
• 1972May 30 – Lod Airport massacre: Three Japanese Red Army members operating on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – External Operations kill 26 and injure 80 people at Lod Airport, Israel.source
• 1972June 8 – Vietnam War: Associated Press photographer Nick Ut takes his Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of a naked nine-year-old Phan Thi Kim Phuc running down a road after being burned by napalm.source
• 1972June 23 – Watergate scandal: U.S. President Richard M. Nixon and White House chief of staff H. R. Haldeman are taped talking about using the C.I.A. to obstruct the investigation by the F.B.I. into the Watergate break-ins.source
• 1972July 2 – Following Pakistan's surrender to India in the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, both nations sign the historic Simla Agreement, agreeing to settle their disputes bilaterally.source
• 1972July 10–14 – The Democratic National Convention meets in Miami Beach. Senator George McGovern, who backs the immediate and complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from South Vietnam, is nominated for president. He names fellow Senator Thomas Eagleton as his running mate.source
• 1972July 21 – The Troubles: Bloody Friday – 22 bombs planted by the Provisional Irish Republican Army explode in Belfast, Northern Ireland; nine people are killed and 130 seriously injured.source
• 1972Operation Motorman 4:00 AM : The British Army begins to regain control of the "no-go areas" established by Irish republican paramilitaries in Belfast, Derry ("Free Derry") and Newry.source
• 1972August 4 – Expulsion of Asians from Uganda: Dictator Idi Amin declares that Uganda will expel 50,000 Asians with British passports to Britain within 3 months. Most of their property is confiscated.source
• 1972August 16 – As part of a coup attempt, members of the Royal Moroccan Air Force fire upon, but fail to bring down, Hassan II of Morocco's plane while he is traveling back to Rabat.source
• 1972August 21 – The Republican National Convention in Miami Beach, Florida, renominates U.S. President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew for a second term.source
• 1972September 1 – The Second Cod War begins between the United Kingdom and Iceland.source
• 1972October 26 – A coup in the Republic of Dahomey (later Benin) led by Mathieu Kérékou removes a civilian government (which has been headed by a triumvirate consisting of Ahomadégbé, Apithy and Maga).source
• 1972November 11 – Vietnam War: Vietnamization – The United States Army turns over the massive Long Binh military base to South Vietnam.source
• 1972December 8 – International Human Rights Day is proclaimed by the United Nations.source
• 1972December 16 – Mozambican War of independence: The Portuguese army kills 400 Africans in Tete, Mozambique.source
• 1972December 21 – Rhodesian Bush War: ZANLA troopers attack Altera Farm in north-east Rhodesia.source
• 1972December 22 – A peace delegation that includes singer-activist Joan Baez and human rights attorney Telford Taylor visit Hanoi to deliver Christmas mail to American prisoners of war (they will be caught in the Christmas bombing of North Vietnam).source
• 1972December 23 – Swedish Prime minister Olof Palme compares the American bombings of North Vietnam to Nazi massacres. The U.S. breaks diplomatic contact with Sweden.source
• 1973January 15 – Vietnam War: Citing progress in peace negotiations, U.S. President Richard Nixon announces the suspension of offensive action in North Vietnam.source
• 1973February 8 – A military insurrection in Uruguay poses an institutional challenge to President Juan María Bordaberry.source
• 1973March 8 – The Troubles: A referendum is held in Northern Ireland over whether to reunite with the Republic of Ireland or to stay a part of the UK. The result was 98% remain. The Provisional Irish Republican Army responds to the referendum by planting four car bombs in London on the same day, two of which went off, causing one death and injuring over 200 people.source
• 1973March 10 – Sir Richard Sharples, Governor of Bermuda, is assassinated outside Government House, along with his aide-de-camp.source
• 1973April 10 – Operation Spring of Youth: Israeli commandos raid Beirut, assassinating 3 leaders of the Palestinian Resistance Movement. The Lebanese army's inaction brings the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Saeb Salam, a Sunni Muslim.source
• 1973April 17 – The West German counter-terrorist force GSG 9 is officially formed in response to the Munich massacre.source
• 1973June 20 – The Ezeiza massacre occurs in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Snipers shoot at left-wing Peronists, killing at least 13 and injuring more than 300.source
• 1973June 27 – Coup d'état in Uruguay: pressed by the military, President Juan María Bordaberry dissolves Parliament; a 12-year-long civic-military dictatorship begins.source
• 1973July 3 – Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE).source
• 1973July 16 – Watergate scandal: Former White House aide Alexander Butterfield informs the United States Senate Watergate Committee that President Richard Nixon had secretly recorded potentially incriminating conversations.source
• 1973July 17 – King Mohammed Zahir Shah of Afghanistan is deposed by his cousin Mohammed Daoud Khan while in Italy undergoing eye surgery.source
• 1973July 20 – France resumes nuclear bomb tests in Mururoa Atoll, over the protests of Australia and New Zealand.source
• 1973August 5 – Black September members open fire at the Athens airport; 3 people are killed, 55 injured.source
• 1973August 15 – The U.S. bombing of Cambodia ends, officially halting 12 years of combat activity in Southeast Asia according to the Case–Church Amendment-an act that prohibits military operations in Laos, Cambodia, and North and South Vietnam as a follow-up of the Paris Peace Accords.source
• 1973September 11 – Chile's democratically elected government is overthrown in a violent military coup after serious political instability. President Salvador Allende allegedly commits suicide during the coup in the presidential palace and General Augusto Pinochet heads a US-backed military junta that governs Chile for the next 17 years.source
• 1973September 20 – Billie Jean King beats Bobby Riggs in a singles tennis match billed as the "Battle of the Sexes".source
• 1973October 6 – Yom Kippur War begins: The fourth and largest Arab–Israeli conflict begins, as Egyptian and Syrian forces attack Israeli forces in the Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights on Yom Kippur.source
• 1973October 14 – Thai popular uprising: Students revolt in Bangkok – In the Thammasat student uprising over 100,000 people protest in Thailand against the Thanom military government, 77 are killed and 857 are injured by soldiers.source
• 1973October 17 – An OPEC oil embargo against several countries supporting Israel triggers the 1973 energy crisis.source
• 1973October 20 – The Saturday Night Massacre: U.S. President Richard Nixon orders Attorney General Elliot Richardson to dismiss Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. Richardson refuses and resigns, along with Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus. Solicitor General Robert Bork, third in line at the Department of Justice, then fires Cox. The event prompts calls for Nixon's impeachment.source
• 1973November 17 – The Athens Polytechnic uprising occurs against the military regime in Athens, Greece.source
• 1973November 25 – Greek dictator Georgios Papadopoulos is ousted in a military coup led by Brigadier General Dimitrios Ioannidis.source
• 1973December 20 – Spanish prime minister Luis Carrero Blanco is assassinated in Madrid by the separatist organization ETA.source
• 1973December 30 – Terrorist Carlos fails in his attempt to assassinate British businessman Joseph Sieff.source
• 1974January 31 – The People's Republic of China released Gerald Emil Kosh, a U.S. civilian captured during the Battle of the Paracel Islands.source
• 1974March 29 – The Terracotta Army of Qin Shi Huang is discovered at Xi'an, China.source
• 1974April 11 – The Kiryat Shmona massacre takes place in Israel.source
• 1974April 24 – Guillaume Affair: exposure of an East German spy Günter Guillaume within the West German government, leading to the resignation of West German Chancellor Willy Brandt.source
• 1974April 25 – Carnation Revolution: A left-wing military coup in Portugal restores democracy, ending 41 years of the Estado Novo dictatorship in the country. Portuguese Prime Minister Marcelo Caetano flees to Brazil and is granted political asylum by Brazilian President Ernesto Geisel.source
• 1974May 17 – The Troubles: The Dublin and Monaghan bombings are carried out by the Ulster Volunteer Force, when they explode four car bombs in counties Dublin and Monaghan in the Republic of Ireland. The attacks kill 33 civilians and wound almost 300, the highest number of casualties in any single event during the conflict.source
• 1974June 17 – A bomb explodes in Westminster Hall, the oldest part of the British Houses of Parliament. The hall's annex, housing offices, and a canteen are destroyed by the bombing, attributed by police to the Provisional wing of the Irish Republican Army.source
• 1974July 15 – The Greek military junta sponsors a coup d'état in Cyprus, replacing President Makarios III with Nikos Sampson. On that same day, reporter Christine Chubbuck commits suicide for the first-time-ever on live television.source
• 1974July 20 – The Turkish invasion of Cyprus occurs.source
• 1974August 14 – Turkey invades Cyprus for the second time, occupying 37% of the island's territory.source
• 1974August 14 – Greece withdraws its forces from NATO's military command structure, as a result of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus.source
• 1974September 8 – President Gerald Ford signs Proclamation 4311, granting a full and unconditional pardon to Richard Nixon, his predecessor.source
• 1974September 12 – Ethiopian Revolution: Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia is deposed by the Derg, bringing an end to the Solomonic dynasty's rule since 1270. The Ethiopian Civil War begins.source
• 1974September 13 – Japanese Red Army members seize the French Embassy in The Hague, Netherlands.source
• 1974September 20 – The Kootenai War is declared, and 10-cent tolls are charged on U.S. Highway 95.source
• 1974October 26 – Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional Puertorriqueña (FALN) sets off 5 bombs in Manhattan, with their largest bomb set off in the Financial District.source
• 1974November 21 – Birmingham pub bombings: In Birmingham, England, two pubs are bombed, killing 21 people in an attack widely believed at the time to be linked to the Provisional Irish Republican Army. The Birmingham Six are later sentenced to life in prison for this, but their convictions are quashed after a lengthy campaign.source
• 1975February 5 – The Argentinian president Isabel Perón decrees Operativo Independencia, aiming to neutralize or annihilate the "subversive elements" in the province of Tucuman. She assumes extraordinary powers.source
• 1975March 6 – A bomb explodes in the Paris offices of Springer publishers. The March 6 Group (connected to the Red Army Faction) demands amnesty for the Baader-Meinhof Group.source
• 1975March 10 – Vietnam War: North Vietnamese troops attack Ban Mê Thuột in South Vietnam on their way to capturing Saigon.source
• 1975April 13 – Bus massacre: The Kataeb militia kills 27 Palestinians during an attack on their bus in Ain El Remmeneh, Lebanon, triggering the Lebanese Civil War which lasts until 1990.source
• 1975April 17 – The Khmer Republic surrenders, when the Communist Khmer Rouge guerilla forces capture Phnom Penh ending the Cambodian Civil War, with mass evacuation of American troops and Cambodian civilians.source
• 1975April 25 – Vietnam War: As North Vietnamese Army forces close in on the South Vietnamese capital Saigon, the Australian Embassy is closed and evacuated, almost 10 years to the day since the first Australian troop commitment to South Vietnam.source
• 1975April 29 – Vietnam War: North Vietnam concludes its East Sea Campaign by capturing all of the Spratly Islands that were being held by South Vietnam.source
• 1975April 30 – Vietnam War – Fall of Saigon: The Vietnam War concludes as Communist forces from North Vietnam take over Saigon, resulting in mass evacuation of the remaining American troops and South Vietnam civilians. As the capital is taken, South Vietnam surrenders unconditionally and is replaced with a temporary Provisional Government.source
• 1975May 15 – Mayaguez incident: The American merchant ship Mayaguez, seized by Cambodian forces, is rescued by the U.S. Navy and Marines; 38 Americans are killed.source
• 1975June 25 – Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declares a state of emergency in India, suspending civil liberties and elections.source
• 1975August 15 – Some members of Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Armageddon will occur this year based on the group's chronology and some sell their houses and businesses to prepare for the new world paradise which they believe will be created when Jesus establishes God's Kingdom on Earth.source
• 1975August 15 – Founder President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman of Bangladesh is killed during a coup led by Major Syed Faruque Rahman.source
• 1975August 24 – Officers responsible for the military coup in Greece in 1967 are sentenced to death in Athens. The sentences are later commuted to life imprisonment.source
• 1975The first Cuban forces arrive in Angola to join Soviet personnel who are there to assist the MPLA that controls less than a quarter of Angolan territory. The United States, Zaire and Zambia request South Africa to provide training and support for the FNLA and UNITA forces.source
• 1975September 5 – In Sacramento, California, Lynette Fromme attempts to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford, but is thwarted by a Secret Service agent.source
• 1975September 22 – In San Francisco, Sara Jane Moore tries to assassinate U.S. President Ford, but is foiled by the Secret Service.source
• 1975October 14 – The South African Defence Force invades Angola during Operation Savannah in support of the FNLA and UNITA prior to the Angolan elections scheduled for November 11.source
• 1975October 16 – The "Balibo Five", Australian television journalists are killed at Balibo by Indonesian Army special forces in the buildup to the Indonesian invasion of East Timor.source
• 1975November 10 – United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3379: By a vote of 72–35 (with 32 abstentions), the United Nations General Assembly approves a resolution equating Zionism with racism. The resolution provokes an outcry among Zionists. It is repealed in 1991.source
• 1975November 10 – Lev Leshchenko revives "Den Pobedy", one of the most popular World War II songs in the Soviet Union.source
• 1975November 16 – Beginning of the Third Cod War between UK and Iceland, which lasts until June 1976.source
• 1975November 25 – A failed military coup d'état by far-left activists occurs in Portugal.source
• 1975November 28 – South African Navy frigates evacuate 26 SADF members from behind enemy lines at Ambrizete, 160 km mi north of Luanda in Angola.source
• 1975December 7 – Indonesian invasion of East Timor: Indonesia invades East Timor; the occupation continues until 1999 when U.N. peacekeepers take control, which they did until 2002.source
• 1976January 27 – Western Sahara War: The First Battle of Amgala breaks out between Morocco and Algeria in the Spanish Sahara.source
• 1976February 13 – General Murtala Mohammed of Nigeria is assassinated in a military coup.source
• 1976February 26 – The Spanish Armed Forces withdraw from Western Sahara.source
• 1976March 24 – A general strike takes place in the People's Republic of the Congo.source
• 1976March 27 – The South African Defence Force withdraws from Angola and concludes Operation Savannah.source
• 1976March 29 – The military dictatorship of General Jorge Rafael Videla comes to power in Argentina.source
• 1976April 5 – Segovia prison break: in Spain's largest prison break since the Spanish Civil War, 29 political prisoners escape from Segovia prison.source
• 1976May 16 – The Montreal Canadiens sweep the Philadelphia Flyers in four games to win the Stanley Cup in ice hockey.source
• 1976May 31 – Syria intervenes in the Lebanese Civil War in opposition to the Palestine Liberation Organization, which it has previously supported.source
• 1976June 27 – Palestinian militants hijack an Air France plane in Greece with 246 passengers and 12 crew. They take it to Entebbe, Uganda.source
• 1976June 29 – The Conference of Communist and Workers Parties of Europe convenes in East Berlin.source
• 1976July 10 – Four mercenaries, three British and one American, are shot by firing squad in Angola, following the Luanda Trial.source
• 1976July 15 – Jimmy Carter is nominated for U.S. president at the Democratic National Convention in New York City.source
• 1976July 21 – A Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb kills Christopher Ewart-Biggs, new British ambassador to the Irish Republic, and Judith Cooke, a Northern Ireland Office private secretary, in Dublin; two others are seriously wounded but survive.source
• 1976California State University, Fullerton massacre: seven people are shot and killed, and two others are wounded in a mass shooting on campus at California State University, Fullerton.source
• 1976August 1 – Defending F1 World Champion Niki Lauda suffers serious burns in the German Grand Prix after a huge accident that nearly cost him his life.source
• 1976August 5 – The clock of "Big Ben" at the Palace of Westminster in London suffers internal damage and requires frequent repairs. The clock is stopped at times on 26 of the next 275 days.source
• 1976August 9 – The Selous Scouts of the Rhodesian Army conduct a cross-border raid into Nyadzonya, Mozambique in Operation Eland, an action that led to severe political and diplomatic consequences on Rhodesia.source
• 1976August 11 – A sniper rampage in Wichita, Kansas on a Holiday Inn results in 3 deaths while 7 others are wounded.source
• 1976August 18 – At Panmunjom, North Korea, two United States soldiers are killed while trying to chop down part of a tree in the Korean Demilitarized Zone which has obscured their view.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
• 1976September 21 – Orlando Letelier is assassinated in Washington, D.C. by agents of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet.source
• 1976October 6 – Students gathering at Thammasat University in Bangkok, Thailand are massacred, while protesting the return of ex-dictator Thanom Kittikachorn by a coalition of right-wing paramilitary and government forces, triggering the return of the military to government.source
• 1976October 6 – In San Francisco, during his second televised debate with Jimmy Carter, U.S. President Gerald Ford incorrectly declares that "there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe" (there is at the time).source
• 1977January 8 – Three bombs explode in Moscow within 37 minutes, killing seven. The bombings are attributed to an Armenian separatist group.source
• 1977January 24 – The Massacre of Atocha occurs, during the Spanish transition to democracy.source
• 1977March 9 – Hanafi Siege: Approximately a dozen armed Hanafi Movement members take over 3 buildings in Washington, D.C., killing 1 person and taking 149 hostages (the hostage situation ends 2 days later).source
• 1977April 28 – A federal court in Stuttgart, West Germany, sentences Red Army Faction members Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, and Jan-Carl Raspe to life imprisonment.source
• 1977April 30 – The Cold War between Cambodia and Vietnam evolves into the Cambodian–Vietnamese War.source
• 1977May 1 – The Taksim Square massacre in Istanbul results in 34 deaths and hundreds of injuries.source
• 1977May 23 – Moluccan terrorists take over a school in Bovensmilde, northern Netherlands (105 hostages), and a passenger train on the Bovensmilde–Assen route nearby (90 hostages) at the same time. The children are released on May 26. On June 11, Dutch Royal Marines storm the train, and six terrorists and two hostages are killed.source
• 1977June 5 – A bloodless coup installs France-Albert René as President of the Seychelles.source
• 1977July 9 – The Pinochet dictatorship in Chile organises the youth event of Acto de Chacarillas, a ritualised act reminiscent of Francoist Spain.source
• 1977July 13 – Somalia declares war on Ethiopia, starting the Ethio-Somali War.source
• 1977July 21–24 – The Libyan–Egyptian War, sparked by a Libyan raid on Sallum, begins.source
• 1977July 22 – The purged Chinese Communist leader Deng Xiaoping is restored to power nine months after the "Gang of Four" was expelled from power in a coup d'état.source
• 1977July 30 – Left-wing German terrorists Susanne Albrecht, Brigitte Mohnhaupt and Christian Klar assassinate Jürgen Ponto, chairman of the Dresdner Bank in Oberursel, West Germany.source
• 1977September 4 – The Golden Dragon massacre, involving rival Chinatown gangs, takes place in San Francisco, United States. Five are killed.source
• 1977September 19 – Under pressure from the Carter Administration, President of Nicaragua Anastasio Somoza Debayle lifts the state of siege in Nicaragua.source
• 1977September 20 – The Petrozavodsk phenomenon is observed in the Soviet Union and some northern European countries.source
• 1977October 28 – Hong Kong police attack the ICAC headquarters.source
• 1977November 9 – Gen. Hugo Banzer, president of the military government of Bolivia, announces that the constitutional democracy will be restored in 1978 instead of 1980 as previously provided.source
• 1978February 6 – King Dragon operation in Arakan: Burmese General Ne Win targets Muslim minorities in the village of Sakkipara.source
• 1978February 11 – Somalia mobilizes its troops to deal with an apparent Ethiopian attack.source
• 1978February 19 – Egyptian raid on Larnaca International Airport: Egyptian Special Forces attempt to rescue several hostages in Larnaca, Cyprus; 20 Egyptian commandos are injured or killed.source
• 1978March 3 – Ethiopia admits that its troops are fighting with the aid of Cuban soldiers, against Somalian troops in the Ogaden.source
• 1978March 3 – Rhodesian Bush War: Rhodesia attacks Zambia.source
• 1978March 11 – Coastal Road massacre: Palestinian terrorists kill 34 Israelis.source
• 1978March 14 – Operation Litani: Israeli forces invade Lebanon.source
• 1978March 26 – The control tower and some other facilities of New Tokyo International Airport, which were scheduled to open on March 31, are illegally occupied and damaged in a terrorist attack by New Left activists, forcing a rescheduling of its opening date to May 20.source
• 1978April 14 – Thousands of Georgians demonstrate against an attempt by Soviet authorities to change the constitutional status of the Georgian language.source
• 1978April 18– 30 – The Khmer Rouge massacres 3,157 civilians in Ba Chúc, Vietnam.source
• 1978May 4 – South African Border War: The Battle of Cassinga occurs in southern Angola.source
• 1978May 12 – Shaba II: In Zaire, rebels occupy the city of Kolwezi, the mining centre of the province of Shaba. The Zairean government asks the U.S., France and Belgium to restore order.source
• 1978May 12–13 – A group of mercenaries, led by Bob Denard, oust Ali Soilih in the Comoros; ten local soldiers are killed. Denard forms a new government.source
• 1978May 15 – Students of the University of Tehran riot in Tabriz; the army stops the riot.source
• 1978May 19–20 – French Foreign Legion paratroopers land in Kolwezi, Zaire, to rescue Europeans in the middle of a civil war.source
• 1978May 25 – First Unabomber attack: A bomb explodes in the security section of Northwestern University, wounding a security guard.source
• 1978June 21 – A shootout between Provisional IRA members and the British Army in Northern Ireland leaves one civilian and three IRA men dead.source
• 1978June 26 – A bombing by Breton nationalists causes destruction in the Palace of Versailles.source
• 1978August 22 – Sandinistas seize the Nicaraguan National Palace.source
• 1978November 18 – In Guyana, Jim Jones leads his Peoples Temple cult in a mass murder–suicide in his commune, Jonestown, that claims 918 lives in all, 909 of them at Jonestown itself, including over 270 children. Representative Leo J. Ryan is assassinated by members of Peoples Temple shortly beforehand.source
• 1978November 27 – Moscone-Milk assassinations: San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk are assassinated by disgruntled former Supervisor Dan White.source
• 1978December 11 – Iranian Revolution: Two million demonstrate against the Shah in Iran.source
• 1978December 22 – Argentina begins Operation Soberanía against Chile, but Argentinian forces quickly withdraw.source
• 1978December 25 – Vietnam launches a major offensive against the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia.source
• 1979January 22 – Uganda–Tanzania War: Battle of Mutukula: The Tanzanian military captures the Ugandan border town of Mutukula after a short battle.source
• 1979February 1 – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran, Iran after nearly 15 years of exile.source
• 1979February 7 – Iranian Revolution: Supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini take over the Iranian law enforcement, courts, and government administration; the final session of the Iranian National Consultative Assembly is held.source
• 1979February 17 – The People's Republic of China invades northern Vietnam, launching the Sino-Vietnamese War.source
• 1979March 30 – Airey Neave, Conservative M.P. in the British House of Commons, is killed, presumably by an Irish National Liberation Army bomb in the car park for the Houses of Parliament.source
• 1979April 11 – Uganda–Tanzania War: Fall of Kampala: Tanzanian troops take Kampala, the capital of Uganda; Idi Amin flees.source
• 1979April 23 – Fighting breaks out in London between the Anti-Nazi League and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group; protester Blair Peach receives fatal injuries during the incident, now officially attributed to the SPG.source
• 1979May 21 – The Montreal Canadiens defeat the New York Rangers four games to one to win their fourth consecutive Stanley Cup.source
• 1979June 25 – NATO Supreme Allied Commander Alexander Haig escapes an assassination attempt in Belgium by the Baader-Meinhof terrorist organization.source
• 1979July 3 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter signs the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan.source
• 1979July 9 – A car bomb destroys a Renault owned by Nazi hunters Serge and Beate Klarsfeld at their home in France. A note purportedly from ODESSA claims responsibility.source
• 1979July 12 – Carmine Galante, boss of the Bonanno crime family, is assassinated in Brooklyn.source
• 1979August 3 – Dictator Francisco Macías Nguema of Equatorial Guinea is overthrown in a bloody coup d'état led by Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.source
• 1979September 22 – Vela incident: The "South Atlantic Flash" is observed near the Prince Edward Islands in the Indian Ocean, thought to be a nuclear weapons test conducted by South Africa and Israel.source
• 1979October 14 – National March for gay rights takes place in Washington, D.C., involving tens of thousands of people.source
• 1979November 1 – Iran hostage crisis: Iranian Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini urges his people to demonstrate on November 4 and to expand attacks on United States and Israeli interests.source
• 1979November 2 – Assata Shakur (née Joanne Chesimard), a former member of the Black Panther Party and Black Liberation Army, escapes from a New York prison to Cuba, where she remains under political asylum until her death in 2025.source
• 1979November 3 – Greensboro massacre: In Greensboro, North Carolina, five members of the Communist Workers Party are shot to death and seven are wounded by a group of Klansmen and neo-Nazis, during a "Death to the Klan" rally.source
• 1979November 4 – Iran hostage crisis begins: 500 Iranian radicals, mostly students, invade the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and take 90 hostages (53 of whom are American). They demand that the United States send the former Shah of Iran back to stand trial.source
• 1979November 12 – Iran hostage crisis: In response to the hostage situation in Tehran, U.S. President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all oil imports into the United States from Iran.source
• 1979November 17 – Iran hostage crisis: Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini orders the release of 13 female and African American hostages being held at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.source
• 1979November 20 – Grand Mosque seizure: A group of 200 Juhayman al-Otaybi militants occupy Mecca's Masjid al-Haram, the holiest place in Islam. They are driven out by Saudi military forces after bloody fighting that leaves 250 people dead and 600 wounded.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
• 1979December 26 – In Rhodesia, 96 Patriotic Front guerrillas enter the capital Salisbury to monitor a ceasefire that begins December 28.source
• 1980January 9 – In Saudi Arabia, 63 Islamist insurgents are beheaded for their part in the siege of the Great Mosque in Mecca in November 1979.source
• 1980January 31 – Burning of the Spanish Embassy in Guatemala: The Spanish Embassy in Guatemala is invaded and set on fire, killing 36 people. In the United States, it is dubbed "Spain's own Tehran".source
• 1980February 2–3 – The New Mexico State Penitentiary riot takes place; 33 inmates are killed and more than 100 inmates injured.source
• 1980February 25 – A coup in Suriname ousts the government of Henck Arron; leaders Dési Bouterse and Roy Horb replace it with a National Military Council.source
• 1980February 27 – M-19 guerrillas begin the Dominican embassy siege in Colombia, holding 60 people hostage, including 14 ambassadors.source
• 1980March 18 – Fifty people are killed at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Russia, when a Vostok-2M rocket explodes on its launch pad during a fueling operation.source
• 1980March 21 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter announces that the United States will boycott the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.source
• 1980April 2 – The St Pauls riot breaks out in Bristol.source
• 1980April 12 – 1980 Liberian coup d'état: Samuel K. Doe overthrows the government of Liberia in a violent coup d'état, executing President William Tolbert and ending over 130 years of democratic presidential succession in that country.source
• 1980April 27 – The Dominican embassy siege in Colombia ends with all remaining hostages released after the guerrillas are allowed to escape to Cuba.source
• 1980April 30 – Iranian Embassy siege: Six Iranian-born terrorists take over the Iranian embassy in London, England. SAS retakes the Embassy on May 5; one terrorist survives.source
• 1980May 14 – The Sumpul River massacre occurs in Chalatenango, El Salvador.source
• 1980May 17 – Internal conflict in Peru: On the eve of presidential elections, Maoist guerrilla group Shining Path attacks a polling location in the town of Chuschi, Ayacucho.source
• 1980May 18–27 – Gwangju Uprising: Students in Gwangju, South Korea, begin demonstrations, calling for democratic reforms.source
• 1980May 24 – The International Court of Justice calls for the release of U.S. Embassy hostages in Tehran.source
• 1980May 26 – John Frum supporters in Vanuatu storm government offices on the island of Tanna. Vanuatu government troops land the next day and drive them away.source
• 1980June 10 – Apartheid: The African National Congress in South Africa publishes a statement by their imprisoned leader Nelson Mandela.source
• 1980June 25 – A Muslim Brotherhood assassination attempt against Syrian president Hafez al-Assad fails. Assad retaliates by sending the army against them.source
• 1980June 27 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter signs Proclamation 4771, requiring 18- to 25-year-old males to register for a peacetime military draft, in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.source
• 1980July 8 – A wave of strikes begins in Lublin, Poland.source
• 1980July 16 – Former California Governor and actor Ronald Reagan is nominated for U.S. president, at the 1980 Republican National Convention in Detroit. Influenced by the Religious Right, the convention also drops its long-standing support for the Equal Rights Amendment, dismaying moderate Republicans.source
• 1980September 12 – Kenan Evren stages a military coup in Turkey. It stops political gang violence, but begins stronger state violence leading to the execution of many young activists.source
• 1980September 26 – Oktoberfest bombing: 13 people are killed and 211 injured in a right-wing terror attack in Munich (West Germany).source
• 1981January 10 – Salvadoran Civil War: The FMLN launches its first major offensive, gaining control of most of Morazán and Chalatenango departments.source
• 1981February 23 – 1981 Spanish coup d'état attempt ("23-F"): Antonio Tejero, with members of the Guardia Civil, enters the Spanish Congress of Deputies and stops the session where Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo is about to be named president of the government. The coup fails after being denounced by King Juan Carlos.source
• 1981March 1 – 1981 Irish hunger strike: Bobby Sands, a Provisional Irish Republican Army member, begins a hunger strike for political status at HM Prison Maze (Long Kesh) in Northern Ireland, dying on May 5, the first of 7 IRA and 3 INLA hunger strikers to die.source
• 1981March 30 – Attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan: U.S. President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John Hinckley Jr.; two police officers and Press Secretary James Brady are also wounded.source
• 1981April 11 – 1981 Brixton riot: Rioters in south London, UK, throw petrol bombs, attack police and loot shops.source
• 1981May 13 – Pope John Paul II assassination attempt: Pope John Paul II is shot by Mehmet Ali Ağca, a Turkish gunman, as he enters St. Peter's Square in Vatican City to address a general audience. The Pope recovers.source
• 1981May 30 – Bangladeshi President Ziaur Rahman is assassinated in Chittagong.[https://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/may/30/newsid_4401000/4401129.stm]source
• 1981June 12 – Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first film of the Indiana Jones franchise is released in theaters in the United States.source
• 1981July 3 – The Toxteth riots in Liverpool, England, start after a mob prevents a youth from being arrested. Shortly afterward, the Chapeltown riots in Leeds start amid increased racial tension.source
• 1981July 10 – 1981 Handsworth riots in Birmingham begin, followed by further 1981 England riots in several urban areas including Liverpool and Leeds.source
• 1981July 17 – Lebanese Civil War: Israeli aircraft bomb Beirut, destroying multi-story apartment blocks containing the offices of PLO-associated groups, killing approximately 300 civilians and resulting in worldwide condemnation and a U.S. embargo on the export of aircraft to Israel.source
• 1981August 19 – Gulf of Sidra incident: Libyan president Muammar Gaddafi sends two Sukhoi Su-22 fighter jets to intercept two U.S. Navy fighters over the Gulf of Sidra. The U.S. jets destroy the Libyan fighters.source
• 1981August 23 – South African troops attack SWAPO bases in Xangongo and Ongiva, Angola, during Operation Protea.source
• 1981August 31 – A bomb explodes at the United States Ramstein Air Base in West Germany, injuring 20 people.source
• 1981September 7 – British plantation company Guthrie is taken over by the Malaysian government after successfully purchasing shares to become the major shareholder. This is famously called the 'Dawn Raid attack'.source
• 1981September 27–29 – Iran–Iraq War: Iranian forces break the Siege of Abadan in Operation Samen-ol-A'emeh.source
• 1981October 6 – Egyptian President Anwar Sadat is assassinated during a military parade.source
• 1981October 14 – Vice President Hosni Mubarak is elected President of Egypt, one week after the assassination of Anwar Sadat during a parade, by servicemen who belong to the Egyptian Islamic Jihad organization led by Khalid Islambouli and oppose his negotiations with Israel.source
• 1981November 23 – Iran–Contra affair: U.S. President Ronald Reagan signs the top secret National Security Decision Directive 17 (NSDD-17), authorizing the Central Intelligence Agency to recruit and support Contra rebels in Nicaragua.source
• 1981November 25–26 – 1981 Seychelles coup d'état attempt: A group of mercenaries led by Mike Hoare take over Mahe airport. Most of them escape by a commandeered Air India passenger jet; six are later arrested.source
• 1981December 11 – Boxing: Muhammad Ali loses to Trevor Berbick; this proves to be Ali's last-ever fight.source
• 1981December 11 – El Mozote massacre: In El Salvador, army units kill 900 civilians.source
• 1981December 13 – Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland, to prevent the dismantling of the communist system by Solidarity.source
• 1981December 31 – A coup d'état in Ghana removes President Hilla Limann's PNP government and replaces it with the PNDC led by Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings.source
• 1982February 2 – The Hama massacre begins in Syria.source
• 1982March 10 – The United States places an embargo on Libyan oil imports, alleging Libyan state-sponsored terrorism.source
• 1982April 1 – The 1982 invasion of the Falkland Islands begins when Argentine forces land near Stanley, beginning the Falklands War.source
• 1982April 2 – Rex Hunt, the British governor of the Falkland Islands, surrenders the islands to Argentine forces, leading to their occupation.source
• 1982April 3 – Invasion of the Falkland Islands: Argentine forces begin the invasion of South Georgia.source
• 1982April 26 – Falklands War: British troops retake South Georgia Island during Operation Paraquet.source
• 1982April 30 – The Bijon Setu massacre takes place in broad daylight at a railway crossing in India.source
• 1982May 18 – Falklands War: The British Special Air Service launches Operation Plum Duff, a reconnaissance mission preliminary to Operation Mikado, which is planned to destroy three Argentinean Exocet missiles and five Super Étendard fighter-bombers. Both Operation Plum Duff and Operation Mikado are called off after the Plum Duff insertion is revealed by a helicopter landing in Chile.source
• 1982May 24 – Iran-Iraq War: Iranian troops retake Khorramshahr.source
• 1982May 28–29 – Falklands War: Battle of Goose Green: British forces defeat a larger Argentine force.source
• 1982June 6 – The 1982 Lebanon War begins: Israeli forces under Defense Minister Ariel Sharon invade southern Lebanon in their "Operation Peace for the Galilee," eventually reaching as far north as the capital Beirut. The United Nations Security Council votes to demand that Israel withdraw its troops from Lebanon.source
• 1982June 8 – The Los Angeles Lakers defeat the Philadelphia 76ers in six games to win the 1982 NBA Finals.source
• 1982June 8 – Falklands War: British supply ship RFA Sir Galahad is destroyed during the Bluff Cove Air Attackssource
• 1982June 14 – Argentine surrender in the Falklands War: Argentine forces in the island capital, Stanley, surrender to British forces.source
• 1982June 18 – Argentine military dictator Leopoldo Galtieri resigns in the wake of his country's defeat in the Falklands War.source
• 1982August 1 – Attempted coup against the government of Daniel Arap Moi in Kenya.source
• 1982August 4 – The United Nations Security Council votes to censure Israel because its troops are still in Lebanon.source
• 1982August 20 – Lebanese Civil War: A multinational force lands in Beirut to oversee the PLO withdrawal from Lebanon.source
• 1982September 14 – Lebanese President-elect Bachir Gemayel is assassinated in Beirut.source
• 1982September 18 – Sabra and Shatila massacre: A Lebanese Christian militia (the Phalange) kill thousands of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in West Beirut; the massacre is a response to the assassination of the president-elect, Bachir Gemayel, four days earlier.source
• 1982September 24 – The Wimpy Operation, the first act of armed resistance against Israeli troops in Beirut.source
• 1982October 20 – Luzhniki disaster: During the UEFA Cup match between FC Spartak Moscow and HFC Haarlem, 66 people are crushed to death.source
• 1982November 11 – In Lebanon, the first Tyre headquarters bombing kills between 89 and 102 people.source
• 1982December 16 – The United Freedom Front bombs an office of South African Airways in Elmont, NY and an IBM office in Harrison, NY. Two police officers suffer hearing damage. In March 1984, the UFF claims responsibility for the IBM building bombing, stating that the company was targeted because of its business in South Africa under Apartheid.source
• 1983January 14 – The head of Bangladesh's military dictatorship, Hussain Muhammad Ershad, announces his intentions to "turn Bangladesh into an Islamic state."source
• 1983February 12 – 100 women protest in Lahore, Pakistan, against military dictator Zia-ul-Haq's proposed Law of Evidence. The women are tear-gassed, baton-charged and thrown into lock-up but are successful in repealing the law.source
• 1983February 18 – Wah Mee massacre: 13 people are killed in an attempted robbery in the Chinatown area of Seattle, United States.source
• 1983February 18 – Nellie massacre: Over 2,000 people, mostly Bangladeshi Muslims, are massacred in Assam, India, during the Assam agitation.source
• 1983April 29 – Erich Honecker cancels planned goodwill visit to Bonn due to escalating nuclear tensions.source
• 1983May 11 – Aberdeen F.C. beat Real Madrid 2–1 to win the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1983, becoming only the third Scottish side to win a European trophy.source
• 1983May 20 – Church Street bombing: A car bombing in Pretoria, South Africa, kills 19 people. The bomb has been planted by members of Umkhonto we Sizwe, a military wing of the African National Congress.source
• 1983May 25 – Hamburger SV defeat Juventus 1–0 in the final of the European Cup.source
• 1983June 5 – The Second Sudanese Civil War begins in Sudan.source
• 1983June 18 – Iranian teenager Mona Mahmudnizhad and nine other women are hanged because they are members of the Baháʼí Faith.source
• 1983June 22 – Emanuela Orlandi, a 15-year-old Vatican girl, mysteriously disappears in Rome while returning home from a music lesson. The disappearance of the girl led to many speculations involving international terrorism, Italian organized crime, and even a plot inside the Vatican to cover a sexual scandal inside the Holy See. Because of all these theories, the Orlandi case would later become Italy's most famous mystery.source
• 1983July 15 – The Orly Airport attack in Paris leaves eight dead and 55 injured.source
• 1983July 23 – 13 Sri Lanka Army soldiers are killed during a deadly ambush by the militant Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, thus beginning the Sri Lankan Civil War, which would continue until 2009.source
• 1983July 24 – The Black July anti-Tamil riots begin in Sri Lanka, killing between 400 and 3,000 Sri Lankan Tamils and Hill-country Tamils.source
• 1983August 21 – Benigno Aquino Jr., Philippines opposition leader, is assassinated in Manila just as he returns from exile.source
• 1983September 26 – 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident: Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a worldwide nuclear war by correctly identifying a warning of attack by U.S. missiles as a false alarm.source
• 1983October 9 – The Rangoon bombing kills South Korea's Foreign Minister, Lee Bum Suk, and 21 others. The perpetrators are believed to be North Koreans.source
• 1983October 19 – Maurice Bishop, Prime Minister of Grenada, and 40 others are assassinated in a military coup.source
• 1983October 23 – Beirut barracks bombing: Simultaneous suicide truck-bombings destroy both the French Army and United States Marine Corps barracks in Beirut, killing 241 U.S. servicemen, 58 French paratroopers and 6 Lebanese civilians.source
• 1983October 25 – Invasion of Grenada by United States troops at the behest of Eugenia Charles of Dominica, a member of the Organization of American States.source
• 1983November 3 – Commencement of the battle of Tripoli between Arafat loyalists and PLO dissidents.source
• 1983November 7 – Able Archer 83: Many Soviet officials misinterpret this NATO exercise as a nuclear first strike, causing the last nuclear scare of the Cold War.source
• 1983November 7 – 1983 U.S. Senate bombing: A bomb explodes in the United States Senate with the intent to kill Republican senators; no one is injured. The perpetrators are members of the May 19th Communist Organization.source
• 1984March 5 – Iran accuses Iraq of using chemical weapons; the United Nations condemns their use on March 30.source
• 1984March 23 – General Rahimuddin Khan becomes the first man in Pakistan's history to rule over two of its provinces, after becoming interim Governor of Sindh.source
• 1984April 13 – India launches Operation Meghdoot, bringing most of the disputed Siachen Glacier region of Kashmir under Indian control and triggering the Siachen conflict with Pakistan.source
• 1984April 16 – More than one million people, led by Tancredo Neves, occupy the streets of São Paulo to demand direct presidential elections during the Brazilian military government of João Figueiredo. It is the largest protest during the Diretas Já civil unrest, as well as the largest public demonstration in the history of Brazil. The elections are granted in 1989.source
• 1984April 17 – Metropolitan Police officer Yvonne Fletcher was fatally shot, during a demonstration outside the Libyan embassy in London, leading to an eleven-day siege of the embassy, and the severing of diplomatic relations between the United Kingdom and Libya.source
• 1984June 5 – The Indian government begins Operation Blue Star, the planned attack on the Golden Temple in Amritsar.source
• 1984June 10 – A Soviet soldier defects to West Germany across the inner German border, the first such defection since 1976.source
• 1984August 21 – Half a million people in Manila demonstrate against the regime of Ferdinand Marcos.source
• 1984September 2 – Seven people are shot and killed and 12 wounded in the Milperra massacre, a shootout between the rival motorcycle gangs Bandidos and Comancheros in Sydney, Australia.source
• 1984September 7 – An explosion on board a Maltese patrol boat disposing illegal fireworks at sea off Gozo kills seven soldiers and policemen.source
• 1984September 20 – Hezbollah car-bombs the U.S. Embassy annex in Beirut, killing 24 people.source
• 1984October 12 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) attempts to assassinate Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the British Cabinet in the Brighton hotel bombing with an explosive device planted nearly a month earlier in their conference hotel. The terror attack kills five people and injures 31.source
• 1984October 31 – Assassination of Indira Gandhi: Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi is assassinated by her two Sikh security guards in New Delhi. Anti-Sikh riots break out, leaving 10,000 to 20,000 Sikhs dead in Delhi and surrounding areas with the majority populations of Hindus. Rajiv Gandhi becomes Prime Minister of India.source
• 1984November 1–4 – Anti-Sikh mass murder takes place in Delhi and various parts of India following the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.source
• 1984November 3 – 600,000 to 1 million people were attending the funeral of Father Jerzy at St. Stanislaus Kostka Church in Żoliborz following his assassination.source
• 1984November 12 – Western Sahara conflict: Morocco leaves the Organization of African Unity in protest at the admission of Western Sahara as a member.source
• 1984November 14 – Zamboanga City mayor Cesar Climaco, a prominent critic of the government of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, is assassinated in his home city.source
• 1984November 21 – Start of Operation Moses, the evacuation of refugee Beta Israel Ethiopian Jews from Sudan to Israel via Brussels.source
• 1984November 30 – Sri Lankan Civil War, Kent and Dollar Farm massacres: the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam begin their first massacres of the Sinhalese people, in North and East Sri Lanka. 127 are killed.source
• 1984December 4 – Sri Lankan Civil War, 1984 Mannar massacre: Sri Lankan Army soldiers kill over 200 civilians in the town of Mannar.source
• 1985January 28 – The charity single record "We Are the World" is recorded by USA for Africa.source
• 1985February 14 – Lebanon hostage crisis: CNN reporter Jeremy Levin is freed from captivity in Lebanon.source
• 1985February 16 – Israel begins withdrawing troops from Lebanon.source
• 1985February 28 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army carries out a mortar attack on the Royal Ulster Constabulary police station at Newry in Northern Ireland. With nine officers dead, it is the highest loss of life for the RUC on a single day.source
• 1985March 8 – A Beirut car bomb, planted in an attempt to assassinate Islamic cleric Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, kills more than 80 people and injures 200 more.source
• 1985March 29 - two Lockheed CC-130H Hercules of the RCAF collided mid-air above the Canadian Forces base in Edmonton killing 10 servicemen.source
• 1985April 12 – El Descanso bombing: A terrorist bombing attributed to the Islamic Jihad Organization in the El Descanso restaurant near Madrid, Spain, mostly attended by U.S. personnel from the Torrejón Air Base, causes 18 deaths (all Spaniards) and 82 injuries.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
• 1985May 5 – U.S. President Ronald Reagan joins West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl for a controversial funeral service at a cemetery in Bitburg, West Germany, which includes the graves of 59 elite S.S. troops from World War II.source
• 1985May 9 – The 3rd total Victory Day Parade (the first being in 1945 and the next in 1965) is held on Red Square in Moscow in the Soviet Union. It features T-34-85 tanks, veterans of World War II from Poland, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, and is the first parade to be held during the reign of Mikhail Gorbachev.source
• 1985May 13 – Philadelphia police drop bombs on a row home occupied MOVE during a gun battle between police and MOVE, killing six adults and five childrensource
• 1985May 29 – Heysel Stadium disaster: Thirty-nine spectators are killed in rioting on the terraces during the European Cup final between Liverpool F.C. and Juventus (0–1) at Heysel Stadium in Brussels, Belgium.source
• 1985June 22 – British and Irish police foil a "mainland bombing campaign" sponsored by the Provisional Irish Republican Army which targets luxury vacation resorts.source
• 1985July 20 – Apartheid: State President of South Africa, P. W. Botha, declares a state of emergency in 36 magisterial districts of South Africa amid growing civil unrest in black townships.source
• 1985August 14 – The Accomarca massacre takes place in Ayacucho, Peru.source
• 1985October 1 – Operation Wooden Leg: The Israeli air force bombs Palestine Liberation Organization headquarters near Tunis.source
• 1985November 6 – Palace of Justice siege: Members of the 19th of April Movement (M-19) Marxist guerrilla group take over the Palace of Justice of Colombia in Bogotá and hold the Supreme Court hostage. Hours later, after a military raid, the incident leaves almost half of the 25 Supreme Court Justices dead.source
• 1985November 29 – Gérard Hoarau, exiled political leader from the Seychelles, is assassinated in London.source
• 1986January 13–24 – South Yemen Civil War.source
• 1986January 25 – Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Army Rebel group takes over Uganda after leading a five-year guerrilla war in which up to half a million people are believed to have been killed. They will later use January 26 as the official date to avoid a coincidence of dates with Dictator Idi Amin's 1971 coup.source
• 1986February 7 – The snap presidential election in the Philippines earlier announced by President Ferdinand Marcos is held amidst controversy, that paves the way for a chain of protests, culminating in the People Power Revolution.source
• 1986February 16 – Ouadi Doum air raid: The French Air Force raids the Libyan Ouadi Doum airbase in northern Chad.source
• 1986February 22 – The People Power Revolution begins in the Philippines to remove President Ferdinand Marcos from office.source
• 1986April 1 – Sector Kanda: Communist Party of Nepal (Mashal) cadres attack a number of police stations in Kathmandu, seeking to incite a popular rebellion.source
• 1986April 5 – 1986 Berlin discotheque bombing: The West Berlin discothèque La Belle, a known hangout for United States soldiers, is bombed, killing three and injuring 230; Libya is held responsible.source
• 1986April 17 – The Hindawi affair begins when an Irish woman is found carrying explosives onto an El Al flight from London to Tel Aviv.source
• 1986May 16 – The Seville Statement on Violence is adopted by an international meeting of scientists, convened by the Spanish National Commission for UNESCO, in Seville, Spain.source
• 1986May 23 – Somali President Siad Barre is injured in a car accident in Mogadishu and taken to Saudi Arabia for treatment. Somali opposition groups see this as an opportunity to try to remove Barre, beginning the Somali Civil War.source
• 1986June 4 – Jonathan Pollard pleads guilty to espionage for selling top secret United States military intelligence to Israel.source
• 1986September 6 – In Istanbul, two Abu Nidal terrorists kill 22 and wound 6 inside the Neve Shalom Synagogue during Shabbat services.source
• 1986September 7 – Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet survives an assassination attempt by the FPMR; 5 of Pinochet's bodyguards are killed.source
• 1986November 3 – Iran–Contra affair: The Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa reports that the United States has been selling weapons to Iran in secret, in order to secure the release of 7 American hostages held by pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon.source
• 1986November 21 – Iran-Contra Affair: National Security Council member Oliver North and his secretary, Fawn Hall, start shredding documents implicating them in selling weapons to Iran and channeling the proceeds to help fund the Contra rebels in Nicaragua.source
• 1986December 4 – 29 people are killed in the Pozzetto massacresource
• 1986December 16 – Jeltoqsan, mass anti-government protests, break out across the Kazakh SSR, resulting in the massacre of over 165 protesters.source
• 1986December 19 – Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov is permitted to return to Moscow after six years of internal exile.source
• 1987January 2 – Chadian–Libyan conflict – Battle of Fada: The Chadian army destroys a Libyan armoured brigade.source
• 1987January 3 – Afghan leader Mohammad Najibullah says that Afghanistan's 1978 Communist revolution is "not reversible," and that any opposition parties will have to align with Communist goals.source
• 1987January 24 – 1987 Forsyth County protests: About 20,000 protestors marched in a civil rights demonstration in Forsyth County, Georgia, United States.source
• 1987February 25 – Beginning of the Phosphorite War protest movement in the Estonian SSR.source
• 1987February 26 – Iran–Contra affair: The Tower Commission rebukes U.S. President Ronald Reagan for not controlling his National Security Council staff.source
• 1987March 7 – 1987 Lieyu massacre: The Republic of China Army execute 19 unarmed Vietnamese refugees on Donggang beach, Lieyu, Kinmen off Mainland China.source
• 1987April 15 – An insurrection in Sri Lanka by the Marxist–Leninist group, JVP, begins.source
• 1987May 17 – Iran–Iraq War: is hit by two Iraqi-owned Exocet AM39 air-to-surface missiles killing 37 sailors.source
• 1987May 22 – The Hashimpura massacre occurs in Meerut, India.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
• 1987June 19 – Hipercor bombing: the Basque terrorist group ETA perpetrate a car-bomb attack at an Hipercor market in Barcelona, killing 21 and wounding 45.source
• 1987July 31 – Four hundred pilgrims are killed in clashes between demonstrating Iranian pilgrims and Saudi Arabian security forces in Mecca.source
• 1987August 9 – Hoddle Street massacre in Australia: Julian Knight, 19, goes on a shooting rampage in the Melbourne suburb of Clifton Hill, Victoria, killing 7 people and injuring 19 before surrendering to police.source
• 1987August 14 – Angolan Civil War: The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale begins in Angola and further intensifies the South African Border War.source
• 1987August 19 – Hungerford massacre: Sixteen people die in an apparently motiveless mass shooting in the United Kingdom, carried out by Michael Ryan.source
• 1987August 24 – Mozert v. Hawkins decision: The U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals rules that the class readings assigned by public schools in Hawkins County, Tennessee do not violate Christian students' First Amendment rights.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
• 1987September 7 – Erich Honecker makes a visit to Bonn, the first (and last) visit by an East German head of state to West Germany.source
• 1987September 11 – Chadian–Libyan War: Chad and Libya sign a ceasefire under supervision of the Organisation of African Unity, officially ending the 14-year territorial conflict. Sporadic fighting will continue.source
• 1987October 15 – In Burkina Faso, a military coup is orchestrated by Blaise Compaoré against incumbent President Thomas Sankara.source
• 1987October 19 – Operation Earnest Will: US warships destroy two Iranian oil platforms in the Persian Gulf.source
• 1987November 12 – The first Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Mainland China opens in Beijing, near Tiananmen Square.source
• 1987November 15 – In Brașov, Romania, workers rebel against the communist regime led by Nicolae Ceaușescu.source
• 1987December 8 – Israeli–Palestinian conflict: The First Intifada begins in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.source
• 1988January 7–8 – In the Soviet-Afghan War, 39 men of the Soviet Airborne Troops from the 345th Independent Guards Airborne Regiment fight off an attack by 200 to 250 Mujahideen in the Battle for Hill 3234, later dramatized in the Russian film The 9th Company.source
• 1988February 20 – The Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast votes to secede from the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic and join the Armenian SSR, triggering the First Nagorno-Karabakh War.source
• 1988February 23 – Start of Anfal campaign, a genocidal counterinsurgency operation within the Iran–Iraq War carried out by Ba'athist Iraqi forces led by Ali Hassan al-Majid on the orders of President Saddam Hussein that will kill between 50,000 and 182,000 Kurds in Iraqi Kurdistan.source
• 1988February 27–29 – Collapse of the Soviet Union: The Sumgait pogrom of Armenians occurs in Sumqayit.source
• 1988March 6 – Operation Flavius: A Special Air Service team of the British Army shoots dead 3 unarmed members of a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) Active service unit in Gibraltar.source
• 1988March 16 – The Halabja chemical attack is carried out by Iraqi government forces.source
• 1988March 16 – Milltown Cemetery attack: Three men are killed and 70 wounded in a gun and grenade attack by loyalist paramilitary Michael Stone on mourners at Milltown Cemetery in Belfast, Northern Ireland, during the funerals of the 3 IRA members killed in Gibraltar.source
• 1988March 17 – Eritrean War of Independence – Battle of Afabet: The Nadew Command, an Ethiopian army corps in Eritrea, is attacked on 3 sides by military units of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF).source
• 1988March 19 – Corporals killings in Belfast: Two British Army corporals are abducted, beaten and shot dead by Irish republicans after driving into the funeral cortege of IRA members killed in the Milltown Cemetery attack.source
• 1988March 20 – Eritrean War of Independence: Having defeated the Nadew Command, the EPLF enters the town of Afabet, victoriously concluding the Battle of Afabet.source
• 1988April 10 – The Ojhri Camp Disaster occurs in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.source
• 1988April 14 – The USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) strikes a naval mine in the Persian Gulf, while deployed on Operation Earnest Will, during the Tanker War phase of the Iran–Iraq War.source
• 1988May 15 – Soviet–Afghan War: After more than 8 years of fighting, the Soviet Army begins its withdrawal from Afghanistan.source
• 1988May 16–18 – 1988 Gilgit massacre: A revolt by the Shias of Gilgit (in northern Pakistan) is ruthlessly suppressed by the Zia-ul Haq regime.source
• 1988May 27–29 – Somaliland War of Independence: Somali National Movement launches a major offensive against Somali government forces in Hargeisa and Burao, then second and third largest cities of Somalia.source
• 1988June 21 – The Poole explosion of 1988 caused 3,500 people to be evacuated out of the town centre in the biggest peacetime evacuation the United Kingdom had seen since the World War II.source
• 1988June 27 – Villa Tunari massacre: Bolivian anti-narcotics police kills 9 to 12 and injures over a hundred protesting coca-growing peasants.source
• 1988August 5 – The 1988 Malaysian constitutional crisis culminates in the ousting of the Lord President of Malaysia, Salleh Abas.source
• 1988August 8 – 8888 Uprising: Thousands of protesters in Burma, now known as Myanmar, are killed during anti-government demonstrations.source
• 1988August 20 – A ceasefire effectively ends the Iran–Iraq War, with an estimated one million lives lost.source
• 1988September 11 – Singing Revolution: In the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic, 300,000 people gather to express their support for independence.source
• 1988October 12 – The Birchandra Manu massacre occurs in Tripura, India.source
• 1988October 30 – Jericho bus firebombing: Five Israelis are killed and five wounded in a Palestinian attack in the West Bank.source
• 1988November 3 – 1988 Maldives coup attempt: The People's Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam, a Sri Lankan Tamil militant group, attempts to overthrow the Maldivian government. At the request of President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, the Indian military suppresses the coup attempt within 24 hours.source
• 1989February 2 – Soviet–Afghan War: The last Soviet Union armoured column leaves Kabul, ending nine years of military occupation since 1979.source
• 1989February 3 – 1989 Paraguayan coup d'état ("La Noche de la Candelaria"): A military coup overthrows Alfredo Stroessner, dictator of Paraguay since 1954.source
• 1989March 9 – Revolutions of 1989: The Soviet Union submits to the jurisdiction of the World Court.source
• 1989March 14 – General Michel Aoun declares a "War of Liberation" to rid Lebanon of Syrian forces and their allies.source
• 1989March 14 – Gun control: U.S. President George H. W. Bush bans the importation of certain guns deemed "assault weapons" into the United States.source
• 1989April 9 – Tbilisi massacre: Georgian demonstrators are massacred by Soviet Army soldiers in Tbilisi's central square during a peaceful rally; 20 citizens are killed, many injured. This causes further protests.source
• 1989April 27 – A major demonstration occurs in Beijing as part of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.source
• 1989May 19 – 1989 Tiananmen Square protests: Zhao Ziyang meets the demonstrators in Tiananmen Square.source
• 1989May 19 – 1989 Ürümqi unrest: Uyghur and Hui Muslim protesters riot in front of the government building in Ürümqi, China.source
• 1989May 24 – Milan of Italy wins the European Cup beating Steaua București of Romania 4–0 in Barcelona.source
• 1989May 26 – Arsenal F.C. defeat Liverpool F.C. by 2 goals to nil at Anfield, in the final game of the season, to win the Football League First Division.source
• 1989May 29 – An attempted assassination of Miguel Maza Marquez, director of the Departamento Administrativo de Seguridad (DAS) in Bogotá, Colombia is committed by members of the Medellín Cartel, who kill four and injure 37.source
• 1989June 4 – 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre: A violent military crackdown takes place on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square, Beijing.source
• 1989June 5 – State funeral of Ruhollah Khomeini: Eight people are killed and hundreds injured in a human crush during the viewing of the body of Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini at the Musalla in Tehran, two days after his death at the age of 89 in Tehran.source
• 1989July 6 – The Tel Aviv–Jerusalem bus 405 suicide attack, the first Palestinian suicide attack on Israel, takes place.source
• 1989August 31 – In the aftermath of the Chadian–Libyan conflict of 1978–87, representatives of Libya and Chad agree to let the International Court of Justice determine ownership of the Aouzou Strip, which has been occupied by Libya since 1973.source
• 1989September 26 – Vietnam announces that it has withdrawn the last of its troops from the State of Cambodia, ending an eleven-year occupation.source
• 1989November 1 – The President of Nicaragua ends a ceasefire with U.S.-backed contras that has been in effect since April 1988.source
• 1989November 17 – Cold War: Velvet Revolution – A peaceful student demonstration in Prague, Czechoslovakia, is severely beaten back by riot police. This sparks a revolution aimed at overthrowing the Communist government (it succeeds on December 29).source
• 1989November 20 – Cold War: Velvet Revolution – The number of peaceful protesters assembled in Prague, Czechoslovakia, swells from 200,000 the day before to an estimated half-million.source
• 1989December 1 – A military coup attempt begins in the Philippines against the government of Philippine President Corazon C. Aquino. It is crushed by United States intervention ending by December 9.source
• 1989December 2 – The Second Malayan Emergency concludes with a peace agreement. The Malayan Communist Party disbands and Chin Peng remains in exile in Thailand until his death in 2013.source
• 1989December 20 – The United States invasion of Panama ("Operation Just Cause") is launched in an attempt to overthrow Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.source
• 1989December 22 – After a week of bloody demonstrations, Ion Iliescu takes over as President of Romania, ending the communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu, who flees his palace in a helicopter after the palace is invaded by rioters. Most of the army has joined with the rioters in Bucharest.source
• 1990January 3 – United States invasion of Panama: General Manuel Noriega is deposed as leader of Panama and surrenders to the American forces.source
• 1990January 15 – Thousands storm the Stasi headquarters in East Berlin in an attempt to view their government records.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
• 1990March 31 – "The Second Battle of Trafalgar": A massive anti-poll tax demonstration in Trafalgar Square, London, turns into a riot; 471 people are injured, and 341 are arrested.source
• 1990April 1 – Strangeways Prison riot: The longest prison riot in Britain's history begins at Strangeways Prison in Manchester, and continues for 3 weeks and 3 days, until April 25.source
• 1990April 13 – Cold War: The Soviet Union apologizes for the Katyn massacre.source
• 1990May 13 – In the Philippines, gunmen kill two United States Air Force airmen near Clark Air Base on the eve of talks between the Philippines and the United States over the future of American military bases in the Philippines.source
• 1990May 13 – The Dinamo–Red Star riot takes place at Stadion Maksimir in Zagreb, Croatia between the Bad Blue Boys (fans of GNK Dinamo Zagreb) and the Delije (fans of Red Star Belgrade).source
• 1990June 13 – Cold War: The destruction of the Berlin Wall by East Germany officially starts, 7 months after it was opened the previous November.source
• 1990July 25 – Roseanne Barr sings "The Star-Spangled Banner" extremely poorly, causing controversy.source
• 1990August 2 – Gulf War: Iraq invades Kuwait, eventually leading to the Gulf War.source
• 1990August 6 – Gulf War: With United Nations Security Council Resolution 661 the United Nations Security Council orders a global trade embargo against Iraq in response to its invasion of Kuwait.source
• 1990August 10 – Egypt, Syria, and 10 other Arab states vote to send military forces to Saudi Arabia to discourage an invasion from Iraq.source
• 1990August 21 – The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone send peacekeepers to intervene in the First Liberian Civil War.source
• 1990August 26 – In Sofia, protesters set fire to the headquarters of the governing Bulgarian Socialist Party.source
• 1990September 6 – In Myanmar, the State Law and Order Restoration Council orders the arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi and five other political dissidents.source
• 1990September 29–30 – The United Nations World Summit for Children draws more than 70 world leaders to United Nations Headquarters.source
• 1990October 1 – The rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front invades Rwanda from Uganda, marking the start of the Rwandan Civil War.source
• 1990October 4 – Moro conflict: Rebel forces seize two military posts on the island of Mindanao, Philippines before surrendering on October 6.source
• 1990October 6 – White supremacist David Duke receives 44% of the vote in the Louisiana Senate race, but ultimately loses the vote to Bennett Johnson.source
• 1990October 8 – Israeli–Palestinian conflict: In Jerusalem, Israeli police kill 17 Palestinians and wound over 100 near the Dome of the Rock mosque on the Temple Mount.source
• 1990October 13 – Lebanese Civil War: Syrian military forces invade and occupy Mount Lebanon, ousting General Michel Aoun's government. This effectively consolidates Syria's 14 year occupation of Lebanese soil and ends the civil war.source
• 1990October 24 – Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti reveals the existence of Operation Gladio, a clandestine NATO "stay-behind" operation in Italy during the Cold War.source
• 1990November 29 – Gulf War: The United Nations Security Council passes UN Security Council Resolution 678, authorizing military intervention in Iraq if that state does not withdraw its forces from Kuwait and free all foreign hostages by Tuesday, January 15, 1991.source
• 1991January 5 – Georgian troops attack Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, starting the 1991–92 South Ossetia War.source
• 1991January 9 – Gulf War: U.S. Secretary of State James Baker meets with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz but fails to produce a plan for the withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait.source
• 1991January 12 – Gulf War: The 102nd U.S. Congress passes a resolution authorizing the use of military force to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait.source
• 1991January 15 – Gulf War: The UN deadline for the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from occupied Kuwait expires, preparing the way for the start of Operation Desert Storm.source
• 1991January 16 – Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm begins with air strikes against Iraq.source
• 1991February 18 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army explodes bombs in the early morning, at both Paddington station and Victoria station, in London.source
• 1991February 27 – Gulf War: U.S. President Bush declares victory over Iraq and orders a cease-fire. U.S. troops begin to leave the Persian Gulf on March 10.source
• 1991April 16–18 – General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev begins the first ever visit of a Soviet leader to Japan, but fails to resolve the two countries' dispute over ownership of the Kuril Islands.source
• 1991May 21 – Ethiopian Civil War: Mengistu Haile Mariam, president of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, flees Ethiopia to Zimbabwe, effectively bringing the Ethiopian Civil War to an end.source
• 1991May 21 – At Sriperumbudur, India, a suicide bomber from LTTE attacks a political meeting, killing former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and at least 14 others.source
• 1991May 24 – Following authorisation by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, Operation Solomon commences to airlift most of the remaining Beta Israel community from Ethiopia to Israel. The same day the Eritrean People's Liberation Front enters Asmara, the capital of Eritrea.source
• 1991June 12 – Sri Lankan civil war: Sri Lankan Army soldiers kill 152 civilians in Kokkadichcholai.source
• 1991June 20 – Harry Collinson, the planning officer for Derwentside District Council, is shot dead at Butsfield, County Durham, England, and the incident is caught on camera by a BBC regional news crew.source
• 1991June 28 – Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Comecon is dissolved in Moscow, Russia.source
• 1991July 31 – Singing Revolution: Soviet Special Purpose Police Unit forces (OMON) kill seven Lithuanian customs officials in Medininkai, the deadliest of the Soviet OMON assaults on Lithuanian border posts.source
• 1991August 25 – Dissolution of Yugoslavia: Serbian forces begin an attack on the Croatian town of Vukovar.source
• 1991August 29 – Lebanon hostage crisis: Maronite general Michel Aoun leaves Lebanon on a French warship into exile.source
• 1991September 11 – Lebanon hostage crisis: Israel releases 51 Arab prisoners and the bodies of nine guerrillas, paving the way for the release of the last western hostages in Lebanon.source
• 1991October 1 – Dissolution of Yugoslavia: Forces of the Yugoslav People's Army surround Dubrovnik, beginning the Siege of Dubrovnik, which lasts until May 31, 1992.source
• 1991October 7 – Dissolution of Yugoslavia: The Yugoslav Air Force bombs the office of Croatian President Franjo Tuđman, causing the Croatian Parliament to cut all remaining ties with Yugoslavia the following day.source
• 1991October 11 – Iraq disarmament crisis: The UN Security Council passes Resolution 715, demanding that Iraq "accept unconditionally the inspectors and all other personnel designated by the Special Commission." Iraq rejects the resolution, calling it "unlawful".source
• 1991November 18 – Dissolution of Yugoslavia: The forces of the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) and Serb paramilitaries take the Croatian town of Vukovar after the 87-day Battle of Vukovar. They kill more than 260 Croatian prisoners of war.source
• 1991November 20 – An Azerbaijani Mil Mi-8 helicopter carrying a 19-member peacekeeping mission team is shot down by Armenian military forces in Khojavend District, Azerbaijan.source
• 1991December 22 – Armed opposition groups launch a military coup against President of Georgia Zviad Gamsakhurdia.source
• 1992January 6 – 1991–92 Georgian coup d'état: President of Georgia Zviad Gamsakhurdia flees the country as a result of the military coup.source
• 1992January 26 – In Mauritania, security forces open fire on violent extremist opponents of President of Mauritania Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya, allegedly killing at least four people.source
• 1992January 27 – First Nagorno-Karabakh War: in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, fighting between Armenians and Azeris leaves at least 60 people dead.source
• 1992February 4 – In Venezuela, Hugo Chávez leads an unsuccessful coup attempt against President of Venezuela Carlos Andrés Pérez.source
• 1992February 9 – Algerian Civil War: The government of Algeria declares a state of emergency and begins a crackdown on the Islamic Salvation Front.source
• 1992February 14 – Ukraine and four other nations in the Commonwealth of Independent States reject Russia's proposal to maintain unified armed forces. Ukraine, Moldova and Azerbaijan announce they will go ahead with plans to create their own military forces.source
• 1992February 18 – Iraq disarmament crisis: The Executive Chairman of UNSCOM details Iraq's refusal to abide by UN Security Council disarmament resolutions.source
• 1992February 21 – The United Nations Security Council approves Resolution 743 to send a UNPROFOR peacekeeping force to Yugoslavia.source
• 1992February 25–26 – 613 Azerbaijani civilians are massacred in Khojaly.source
• 1992March 1 – The first victims of the Bosnian War are a Serb bridegroom's father and an Orthodox priest in a Sarajevo shooting. In the Bosnian independence referendum, held from February 29 to March 1 and boycotted by Bosnian Serbs, the majority of the Bosniak and Bosnian Croat communities have voted for Bosnia-Herzegovina's independence.source
• 1992March 2 – In Dubăsari, Moldova, escalating tensions turn into open hostilities and the beginning of the Transnistria War.source
• 1992April 5 – Bosnian War: Serb troops, following a mass rebellion of Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina against the Bosnian declaration of independence from Yugoslavia, besiege the city of Sarajevo.source
• 1992April 10 – First Nagorno-Karabakh War: Maraga massacre – At least 43 Armenian civilians are killed as their village of Maraga, Azerbaijan, is captured and destroyed by the Azerbaijani Armed Forces.source
• 1992April 16 – President of Afghanistan Mohammad Najibullah is ousted and detained by Muslim rebels moving towards Kabul, setting the stage for the civil war in Afghanistan (1992–96).source
• 1992April 29 – Los Angeles riots: The acquittal of four policemen in the Rodney King beating criminal trial triggers massive rioting in Los Angeles. The riots will last for six days resulting in 63 deaths and over $1 billion in damages before order is restored by the military.source
• 1992May 5 – Armand Césari Stadium disaster in Bastia on Corsica: 18 people are killed and 2,300 are injured when one of the terraces collapses before a football match between SC Bastia and Olympique de Marseille.source
• 1992May 16–17 – Bosnian War: U.N. peacekeepers withdraw from Sarajevo.source
• 1992May 17 – Protests begin in Bangkok, Thailand, against the government of General Suchinda Kraprayoon, sparking a bloody crackdown.source
• 1992August 24 – Concordia University massacre: Valery Fabrikant murders four colleagues and seriously wounds another in a shooting at Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec.source
• 1992August 29 – In Rostock, Germany, tens of thousands rally to protest neo-Nazi attacks on refugees and immigrants begun on August 22.source
• 1992September 7 – In Ciskei, members of the Ciskei Defence Force loyal to dictator Oupa Gqozo open fire into a crowd of anti-Gqozo protestors organized by the African National Congress, killing at least 28 people and wounding nearly 200.source
• 1992October 2 – A riot breaks out in the Carandiru Penitentiary in São Paulo, Brazil, resulting in the Carandiru massacre.source
• 1992November 8 – More than 350,000 people rally in Berlin to protest right-wing violence against immigrants; stones and eggs are thrown at President of Germany Richard von Weizsäcker and Chancellor of Germany Helmut Kohl.source
• 1992December 3 – UN Security Council Resolution 794 is unanimously passed, approving a coalition of United Nations peacekeepers led by the United States to form UNITAF, tasked with ensuring that humanitarian aid gets distributed and establishing peace in Somalia.source
• 1993January 6 – January 6–20 – The Bombay riots take place in Mumbai.source
• 1993January 6 – Douglas Hurd is the first high-ranking British official to visit Argentina since the Falklands War.source
• 1993January 13 – Iraq disarmament crisis: US, British and French aircraft attack Iraqi Surface to Air Missile sites in Southern Iraq.source
• 1993January 19 – Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq refuses to allow UNSCOM inspectors to use its own aircraft to fly into Iraq and begins military operations in the demilitarized zone between Iraq and Kuwait, and the northern Iraqi no-fly zones. U.S. forces fire approximately 40 Tomahawk cruise missiles at Baghdad factories linked to Iraq's illegal nuclear weapons program (→ January 1993 airstrikes on Iraq). Iraq then informs UNSCOM that it will be able to resume its flights.source
• 1993February 15 – Abortion in Poland: Lech Walesa signs into law one of the strictest anti-abortion laws in Eastern Europe, banning abortion for any reason other than rape, incest, genetic deformity, or if the mother's life is in danger. Polish women seeking elective abortions must hereafter travel to the Czech Republic.source
• 1993March 17 – The Kurdistan Workers' Party announces a unilateral ceasefire in Iraq.source
• 1993April 16 – Bosnian War: the enclave of Srebrenica is declared a UN-protected "safe area". Also members of the Jokeri unit of the HVO entered the village of Ahmići and killed 120 Muslim residents.source
• 1993April 19 – Waco siege: A 51-day stand-off at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas, ends with a fire that kills 76 people, including David Koresh.source
• 1993May 1 – Assassination of Ranasinghe Premadasa: During a May Day rally, President of Sri Lanka Ranasinghe Premadasa is assassinated by a Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam suicide bomber. Prime Minister Dingiri Banda Wijetunga succeeds Premadasa as the 3rd executive president of Sri Lanka.source
• 1993May 4 – UNOSOM II assumes the Somalian duties of the dissolved UNITAF.source
• 1993May 26 – Albanian President Sali Berisha urges the United States and NATO to take action to prevent Serbian ethnic cleansing of Kosovo Albanians.source
• 1993June 1 – President of Guatemala Jorge Serrano Elías is forced to flee the country after an attempted self-coup.source
• 1993June 5 – Attack on Pakistani military in Somalia: twenty-four Pakistani troops in the United Nations forces are killed in Mogadishu, Somalia.source
• 1993June 8 – Kurdish–Turkish conflict: the PKK-declared ceasefire ends in Iraq.source
• 1993June 18 – Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq refuses to allow UNSCOM weapons inspectors to install remote-controlled monitoring cameras at two missile engine test stands.source
• 1993June 27 – U.S. President Bill Clinton orders a cruise missile attack on Iraqi intelligence headquarters in the Al-Mansur District of Baghdad, in response to an Iraqi plot to assassinate former U.S. President George H. W. Bush during his visit to Kuwait in mid-April.source
• 1993July 5 – Iraq disarmament crisis: UN inspection teams leave Iraq. Iraq then agrees to UNSCOM demands and the inspection teams return.source
• 1993July 25 – In a terrorist attack members of the Azanian People's Liberation Army open fire on a congregation inside St James Church in Kenilworth, Cape Town, killing eleven and injuring fifty.source
• 1993September 27 – War in Abkhazia: Fall of Sukhumi – Eduard Shevardnadze accuses Russia of passive complicity.source
• 1993October 3–4– Battle of Mogadishu: The U.S. Army conducts Operation Gothic Serpent in the city of Mogadishu, Somalia, deploying Task Force Ranger. Two U.S. Army UH-60 Blackhawks are shot down and the operation leaves over 1,000 Somalis dead and over 74 Americans wounded in action, 18 killed and 1 captured.source
• 1993October 4 – The Russian constitutional crisis culminates with Russian military and security forces, using tanks and clearing the White House of Russia Parliament building by force, quashing a mass uprising against President Boris Yeltsin.source
• 1993October 11–28 – The UNMIH is prevented from entering Haiti by its military-led regime. On October 18, United Nations economic sanctions (abolished in August) are reinstated. U.S. President Bill Clinton sends 6 American warships to enforce them.source
• 1993November 17 – In Nigeria, General Sani Abacha ousts the government of Ernest Shonekan in a military coup.source
• 1993November 28 – The Observer reveals that a channel of communications has existed between the Provisional Irish Republican Army and the British government, despite the government's persistent denials.source
• 1994February 3 – In the aftermath of the Chadian–Libyan conflict, the International Court of Justice rules that the Aouzou Strip belongs to the Republic of Chad.source
• 1994February 6 – Markale massacres: a Bosnian Serb Army mortar shell kills 68 civilians and wounds about 200 in a Sarajevo marketplace.source
• 1994February 28 – Four United States F-16s shoot down four Serbian J-21s over Bosnia and Herzegovina for violation of the Operation Deny Flight and its no-fly zone.source
• 1994March 20 – Italian journalist Ilaria Alpi and TV cameraman Miran Hrovatin are assassinated in Somalia.source
• 1994March 23 – Mexican presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio is assassinated at a campaign rally in Tijuana.source
• 1994March 28 – Shell House massacre: Inkatha Freedom Party and ANC supporters battle in central Johannesburg, South Africa.source
• 1994April 6 – Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundi President Cyprien Ntaryamira die when a missile shoots down their jet near Kigali, Rwanda. This is taken as a pretext to begin the Rwandan genocide.source
• 1994April 7 – The Rwandan genocide begins in Kigali, Rwanda.source
• 1994April 21 – The Red Cross estimates that hundreds of thousands of Tutsi have been killed in Rwanda.source
• 1994June 6–8 – Ceasefire negotiations for the Yugoslav War begin in Geneva; they agree to a one-month cessation of hostilities (which does not last more than a few days).source
• 1994June 17 – NFL star O. J. Simpson and his friend Al Cowlings flee from police in a white Ford Bronco. The low-speed chase ends at Simpson's Los Angeles mansion, where he surrenders.source
• 1994July 4 – Rwandan Patriotic Front troops capture Kigali, a major breakthrough in the Rwandan Civil War.source
• 1994July 7 – 1994 civil war in Yemen: Aden is occupied by troops from North Yemen.source
• 1994July 12 – The Allied occupation of Berlin officially ends with a casing of the colors ceremony attended by U.S. president Bill Clinton.source
• 1994July 18 – AMIA bombing: In Buenos Aires, a terrorist attack destroys a building housing several Jewish organizations, killing 85 and injuring many more.source
• 1994August 5 – Maleconazo: Groups of protesters spread from Havana, Cuba's Castillo de la Punta ("Point Castle"), creating the first protests against Fidel Castro's government since 1959.source
• 1994August 31 – The Troubles: The Provisional Irish Republican Army announces a "complete cessation of military operations" as part of the Northern Ireland peace process. This will temporarily end in 1996 with the Docklands bombing in England before a definite ceasefire in 1997. In 1998, the Good Friday Agreement is signed and the IRA decommissions its weapons in 2005source
• 1994August 31 – The Russian Army leaves Estonia and Latvia, ending the last traces of Eastern Europe's Soviet occupation.source
• 1994September 5 – New South Wales State MP for Cabramatta John Newman is shot outside his home, in Australia's first political assassination since 1977.source
• 1994September 13 – President Bill Clinton signs the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which bans the manufacture of new firearms with certain features for a period of 10 years.source
• 1994September 19 – Operation Uphold Democracy: U.S. troops stage a bloodless invasion of Haiti to restore the legitimately elected leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, to power.source
• 1994September 28 – José Francisco Ruiz Massieu, Mexican politician, is assassinated on orders of Raúl Salinas de Gortari.source
• 1994November 5 – Influential Afrikaner theologian and critic of apartheid Johan Heyns is assassinated; the killers are never apprehended or identified.source
• 1994November 11 – Iraq formally rescinds its claims over Kuwait, which it has claimed as a province since 1990 and had administered under military occupation until 1991 when it was ejected by an international coalition during the Persian Gulf War.source
• 1995February 13 – Twenty-one Bosnian Serb commanders are charged with genocide and crimes against humanity in the United Nations' International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, a tribunal on human rights violations during the Wars in the Balkans.source
• 1995March 3 – United Nations Operation in Somalia II, the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Somalia, ends.source
• 1995April 7 – First Chechen War: Samashki massacre – Russian paramilitary troops begin a massacre of at least 250 civilians in Samashki, Chechnya.source
• 1995May 17 – 1995 San Diego tank rampage: In San Diego, Shawn Nelson steals an M60A3 tank from a local California Army National Guard armory and goes on a rampage for 25 minutes, damaging over $149,201 of property. The rampage ended when San Diego police forced the hatch open and fatally shot him.source
• 1995May 24 – AFC Ajax wins the UEFA Champions League at the Ernst Happel Stadium in Vienna by defeating A.C. Milan 1–0.source
• 1995June 2 – A United States Air Force F-16 piloted by Captain Scott O'Grady is shot down over Bosnia and Herzegovina while patrolling the NATO no-fly zone. O'Grady is rescued by U.S. Marines six days later.source
• 1995June 29 – Iraq disarmament crisis: According to UNSCOM, the unity of the U.N. Security Council begins to fray as a few countries, particularly France and Russia, become more interested in making financial deals with Iraq than in disarming the country.source
• 1995July 9 – Sri Lankan Civil War: 125 civilians are killed in Navaly as result of bombing by the Sri Lanka Air Force.source
• 1995July 10 – Burmese dissident Aung San Suu Kyi is freed from house arrest.source
• 1995July 11 – Srebrenica massacre: Units of the Army of Republika Srpska, under the command of General Ratko Mladić, enter Srebrenica with little resistance from Dutch peacekeepers of the United Nations Protection Force, going on to kill thousands of Bosniak men and boys and rape many women.source
• 1995July 21–26 – Third Taiwan Strait Crisis: The Chinese People's Liberation Army fires missiles into the waters north of Taiwan.source
• 1995July – Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq threatens to end all cooperation with UNSCOM and IAEA if sanctions against the country are not lifted by August 31. Following the defection of his son-in-law, Hussein Kamel al-Majid, Saddam Hussein makes new revelations about the full extent of Iraq's biological and nuclear weapons programs. Iraq also withdraws its last U.N. declaration of prohibited biological weapons and turns over a large amount of new documents on its WMD programs.source
• 1995August 4 – Croatian forces, with the cooperation of the ARBiH, launch Operation Storm against rebel forces of the Republic of Serbian Krajina, which subsequently ceases to exist as a political entity.source
• 1995August 29 – Eduard Shevardnadze, the Georgian head of state, survives an assassination attempt in Tbilisi.source
• 1995August 30 – Operation Deliberate Force, the NATO bombing campaign against Bosnian Serb artillery positions, begins in Bosnia and Herzegovina, continuing into September. At the same time, ARBiH forces begin an offensive against the Bosnian Serb Army around Sarajevo, central Bosnia and Bosnian Krajina.source
• 1995September 19 – The Washington Post and The New York Times publish the Unabomber Manifestosource
• 1995September 27–28 – Bob Denard's mercenaries capture President Said Mohamed Djohar of the Comoros; the local army does not resist.source
• 1995October 16 – The Million Man March is held in Washington, D.C. The event was conceived by Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.source
• 1995November 1 – Participants in the Yugoslav Wars begin negotiations at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio.source
• 1995November 2 – The Supreme Court of Argentina orders the extradition of ex-S.S. captain Erich Priebke.source
• 1995November 4 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated at a peace rally in Tel Aviv.source
• 1995November 20 – A car bomb explosion outside the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan destroys the façade of the building, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens more.source
• 1995November 30 – Operation Desert Storm officially ends.source
• 1995December 20 – NATO begins peacekeeping in Bosnia.source
• 1996February 9 – An IRA ceasefire ends with the Docklands bombing in London's Canary Wharf District, killing two people and causing over £85,000,000 worth of damage.source
• 1996February 10 – Bosnian Serbs break off contact with the Bosnian government and with representatives of IFOR, the NATO localised force, in reaction to the arrest of several Bosnian Serb war criminals.source
• 1996February 14 – Violent clashes erupt between Filipino soldiers and Vietnamese boat people, as the Filipino government attempts to forcibly repatriate hundreds of Vietnamese asylum seekers.source
• 1996February 15 – Begum Khaleda Zia is re-elected as Prime Minister of Bangladesh. The country's second democratic election is marred by low voter turnout, due to several boycotts and pre-election violence, which has resulted in at least thirteen deaths.source
• 1996February 24 – Cuban fighter jets shoot down two American aircraft belonging to the Cuban exile group Brothers to the Rescue. Cuban officials assert that they invaded Cuban airspace.source
• 1996February 29 – The Bosnian government declares the end of the Siege of Sarajevo.source
• 1996March 3–4 – Two suicide bombs explode in Israel, killing 32 people. The Yahya Ayyash Units admit responsibility, and Palestinian president Yasser Arafat condemns the killings in a televised address. Israel warns of retaliation.source
• 1996April 3 – Burundian Civil War: massacres of Hutus by Tutsis in Burundi take place with more than 450 killed within a few days.source
• 1996April 6 – First Liberian Civil War: fighting breaks out in Monrovia, Liberia, between various rebel factions struggling for power in the country's interrupted civil war. Several foreign nationals leave the nation.source
• 1996April 6 – Turkish authorities begin Operation Hawk, a military offensive against rebels from the Kurdistan Workers' Party in south-east Turkey.source
• 1996April 11 – The Israeli government launches Operation Grapes of Wrath, consisting of massive attacks on Lebanon, in retaliation for "terrorist attacks", and sparking off a violent series of retaliations.source
• 1996April 18 – Qana massacre: Over 100 Lebanese civilians are killed after Israel shells the United Nations compound in Qana.source
• 1996April 28 – Port Arthur massacre (Australia): Martin Bryant kills 35 people at the Port Arthur tourist site in Tasmania.source
• 1996May 27 – First Chechnya War: Russian president Boris Yeltsin meets with Chechnyan rebels for the first time and negotiates a ceasefire for the dispute.source
• 1996July 25 – The Tutsi-led Burundian army performs a coup and reinstalls previous president Pierre Buyoya, ousting current president Sylvestre Ntibantunganya.source
• 1996Iraq disarmament crisis: U.N. Inspector Scott Ritter attempts to conduct surprise inspections on the Republican Guard facility at the airport but is blocked by Iraqi officials.source
• 1996August 1 – A pro-democracy demonstration supporting Megawati Sukarnoputri in Indonesia is broken up by riot police.source
• 1996August 21 – Former State President of South Africa, F. W. de Klerk, makes an official apology for crimes committed under Apartheid to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Cape Town.source
• 1996The invasive species Asian long-horned beetle is found in New York City.source
• 1996September 4 – The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia attack a military base in Guaviare, Colombia, starting three weeks of guerrilla warfare that will claim the lives of at least 130 Colombians.source
• 1996September 20 – Leader of Pakistani opposition party Pakistan Peoples Party Murtaza Bhutto is killed during a gunfight with police.source
• 1996September 27 – In Afghanistan, the Taliban capture the capital city of Kabul, after driving out President Burhanuddin Rabbani and executing former leader Mohammad Najibullah.source
• 1996December 17 – The Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement takes 72 hostages in the Japanese Embassy in Lima, Peru.source
• 1996December 27 – Taliban forces retake the strategic Bagram Air Base, solidifying their buffer zone around Kabul, Afghanistan.source
• 1997January 11 – Turkey threatens Cyprus on account of a deal to buy Russian S-300 missiles, prompting the Cypriot Missile Crisis.source
• 1997February 10 – Sandline affair: Australian newspapers publish stories that the government of Papua New Guinea has brought mercenaries onto Bougainville Island.source
• 1997February 28 – North Hollywood shootout: Two robbers, wearing kevlar body armor, and armed with illegally modified Type 56S rifles with high-capacity magazines and other weapons, injure 20 police officers and civilians in a gun battle. The incident sparks debate on the appropriate firepower for United States patrol officers to have available in similar situations in the future.source
• 1997February 28 – 1997 Turkish military memorandum: As a result of a meeting held by the National Security Council, the Turkish Armed Forces issues a memorandum to adopt more secular criteria. Later on June 18, the Turkish government resigns because of the pressure.source
• 1997March 7 – In Sri Lanka, the Tamil Tigers overrun a military base and kill over 100 Sri Lankan troops.source
• 1997April 3 – The Thalit massacre in Algeria: all but 1 of the 53 inhabitants of Thalit are killed by guerrillas.source
• 1997April 22 – A 126-day hostage crisis at the residence of the Japanese ambassador in Lima, Peru.source
• 1997May 15 – The United States government acknowledges existence of the "Secret War" in Laos (1953–1975) during the Vietnam War, and dedicates the Laos Memorial in honor of Hmong and other "Secret War" veterans.source
• 1997May 17 – Troops of Laurent Kabila march into Kinshasa.source
• 1997May 23 – A riot in Banjarmasin, Indonesia breaks out, causing at least 137 deaths.source
• 1997May 25 – A military coup in Sierra Leone replaces President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah with Major Johnny Paul Koroma.source
• 1997July 5 – The Egyptian Islamic Group announces a cessation-of-violence initiative.source
• 1997July 5 – In Cambodia, Hun Sen of the Cambodian People's Party overthrows Norodom Ranariddh in a coup.source
• 1997August 29 – Over 98 (and possibly up to 400) are killed in the Rais massacre in Algeria.source
• 1997September 18 – Al-Qaeda carries out a terrorist attack in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina.source
• 1997September 21 – The Islamic Salvation Army, the Islamic Salvation Fronts' armed wing, declares a unilateral ceasefire in Algeria.source
• 1997October 1 – Luke Woodham walks into Pearl High School in Pearl, Mississippi and opens fire, killing two girls, after killing his mother earlier that morning.source
• 1997October 3 – The President of Paraguay, Juan Carlos Wasmosy, orders the arrest of political opponent Lino Oviedo.source
• 1997October 12 – Sidi Daoud massacre: 43 are killed at a false roadblock in Algeria.source
• 1997October 17 – The remains of Che Guevara are laid to rest with full military honours in a specially built mausoleum in the city of Santa Clara, Cuba, where he had won the decisive battle of the Cuban Revolution 39 years before.source
• 1997October 29 – Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq says it will begin shooting down Lockheed U-2 surveillance planes being used by UNSCOM inspectors.source
• 1997December 1 – In the Indian state of Bihar, Ranvir Sena attacks the CPI(ML) Party Unity stronghold Lakshmanpur-Bathe, killing 63 lower caste peoplesource
• 1997December 21 – Brazil beats Australia 6–0 in the FIFA Confederations Cup final.source
• 1997December 27 – Ulster loyalist paramilitary leader Billy Wright is assassinated inside Long Kesh prison in Northern Ireland.source
• 1998January 11 – Over 100 people are killed in the Sidi-Hamed massacre in Algeria.source
• 1998January 15 – U.N. peacekeepers return Eastern Slavonia to Croatian control; 80,000 displaced Croatians begin returning home, while 60,000 Serbs begin vacating the region. The area will remain under UNPSG supervision until October.source
• 1998February 21 – King Hussein of Jordan imposes martial law in Ma'an to quell growing pro-Iraqi demonstrations.source
• 1998February 28 – A massacre in Likoshane, FR Yugoslavia starts the Kosovo War.source
• 1998March 24 – Westside Middle School shooting: Five people are killed in Jonesboro, Arkansas.source
• 1998April 17 – 1998 Australian waterfront dispute: Patrick Stevedores fires all 1,400 employees.source
• 1998April 23 – The Yugoslav Army ambushes a group of Kosovo Liberation Army fighters attempting to smuggle weapons from Albania into Kosovo, killing 19.source
• 1998May 6 – A large Eritrean mechanized force enters Badme in Tigray Region, Ethiopia, resulting in the Eritrean–Ethiopian War.source
• 1998May 13–14 – Riots directed against Chinese Indonesians break out in Indonesia, killing around 1,000 people. Maria Catarina Sumarsih holds Prabowo Subianto the responsibility for being involved in a series of human rights abuses during the riot.source
• 1998May 15 – Argentina expels seven Iranian diplomats over their connections to the 1994 AMIA bombing.source
• 1998May 19 – The wreck of the aircraft carrier , sunk during the Battle of Midway in 1942, is found near Midway Atoll by a team led by former US Navy officer Robert D. Ballard.source
• 1998May 28 – Nuclear testing: In response to a series of Indian nuclear tests, Pakistan explodes five nuclear devices of its own in the Chagai hills of Baluchistan, codenamed Chagai-I, prompting the United States, Japan and other nations to impose economic sanctions. Pakistan celebrates Youm-e-Takbir annually.source
• 1998June 7 – Former Brigadier-General Ansumane Mané seizes control over military barracks in Bissau, marking the beginning of the Guinea-Bissau Civil War (1998–99).source
• 1998July 24 – Russell Eugene Weston Jr. enters the United States Capitol Building and opens fire, killing two members of the United States Capitol Police, Jacob Chestnut and John Gibson.source
• 1998August 4 – The Second Congo War begins; 5.4 million people die before it ends in 2003, making it the bloodiest war, to date, since World War II.source
• 1998August 7 – 1998 U.S. embassy bombings: the bombings of the United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya, kill 224 people and injure over 4,500; they are linked to terrorist Osama bin Laden, an exile of Saudi Arabia.source
• 1998August 8 – Afghan Civil War: The Taliban takes control of Mazar-i-Sharif.source
• 1998August 10 – Voters in Nevis narrowly reject an independence referendum.source
• 1998August 15 – The Troubles: The Omagh bombing is carried out in Northern Ireland by the Real Irish Republican Army as a reaction to the Good Friday Agreement. 29 people are killed and 220 are injured. Shortly after these events, the group will call a ceasefire in response, signaling an end to the 30+ year conflict.source
• 1998September 2 – A United Nations court finds Jean-Paul Akayesu, the former mayor of a small town in Rwanda, guilty of nine counts of genocide, marking the first time that the 1948 law banning genocide is enforced.source
• 1998September 5 – The Government of North Korea adopts a military dictatorship on its 50th anniversary. The constitution is amended, and the late Kim Il Sung is enshrined as the eternal President.source
• 1998September 17 – Basque conflict: Basque Homeland and Liberty reaches a ceasefire agreement with the government of Spain, the second such agreement in two years.source
• 1998September 24 – Iranian President Mohammad Khatami retracts a fatwa against Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie that was in force since 1989 stating that the Iranian government will "neither support nor hinder assassination operations on Rushdie".source
• 1998December 14 – The Yugoslav Army ambushes a column of 140 Kosovo Liberation Army militants attempting to smuggle arms from Albania into Kosovo, killing 36.source
• 1999February 16 – Across Europe, Kurdish protestors take over embassies and hold hostages after Turkey arrests one of their rebel leaders, Abdullah Öcalan.source
• 1999February 16 – In Uzbekistan, an apparent assassination attempt against President Islam Karimov takes place at government headquarters.source
• 1999February 23 – Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Öcalan is charged with treason in Ankara, Turkey.source
• 1999March 24 – NATO launches air strikes against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign state.source
• 1999March 27 – Kosovo War: A U.S. Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk is shot down by Yugoslav forces.source
• 1999April 7 – Kosovo War: Kosovo's main border crossings are closed by Yugoslav forces to prevent Kosovo Albanians from leaving.source
• 1999April 9 – Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, president of Niger, is assassinated.source
• 1999April 14 – Kosovo War: NATO warplanes repeatedly bomb ethnic Albanian refugee convoys for 2 hours over a 12-mile stretch of road, after mistaking them for Yugoslav military trucks, between Đakovica and Dečani in western Kosovo, killing at least 73 refugees.source
• 1999May 7 – Kosovo War: in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, three Chinese embassy workers are killed and 20 others wounded when a NATO B-2 aircraft bombs the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade.source
• 1999May 7 – In Guinea-Bissau, President João Bernardo Vieira is ousted in a military coup.source
• 1999May 26 – The 1999 UEFA Champions League final takes place at the Camp Nou Stadium, Barcelona, in which the English side Manchester United defeats the German side Bayern Munich 2–1.source
• 1999May 26 – Kargil War: The Indian Air Force launches an attack on intruding Pakistan Army troops and mujahideen militants in Kashmir.source
• 1999June 5 – The Islamic Salvation Army, the armed wing of the Islamic Salvation Front, agrees in principle to disband in Algeria.source
• 1999June 10 – Kosovo War: NATO suspends its airstrikes after Slobodan Milošević agrees to withdraw Yugoslav forces from Kosovo.source
• 1999June 12 – Kosovo War: Operation Joint Guardian/Operation Agricola begins: NATO-led United Nations peacekeeping forces KFOR enter Kosovo, Yugoslavia.source
• 1999June 24 – Kosovo War: NATO marines shoot three gunmen in Kosovo, Yugoslavia after being attacked by the latter, killing one of them and injuring the other two.source
• 1999July 11 – India recaptures Kargil, forcing the Pakistani army to retreat. India announces victory, ending the 2-month conflict.source
• 1999August 7 – Dagestan incursions: Hundreds of Chechen guerrillas invade the Russian republic of Dagestan, triggering the short war.source
• 1999August 10 – The Atlantique incident occurs as an intruding Pakistan Navy plane is shot down in India, sparking tensions between the two nations, a month after the end of the Kargil War.source
• 1999August 19 – In Belgrade, tens of thousands of Yugoslavs rally to demand the resignation of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević.source
• 1999August 30 – East Timor votes for independence from Indonesia (which had invaded and occupied it since 1975) in a referendum.source
• 1999September 8 – The first of a series of Russian apartment bombings occurs. Subsequent bombings occur on September 13 and 16, while a bombing on September 22 fails.source
• 1999October 12 – Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif attempts to dismiss Army Chief General Pervez Musharraf, who is out of the country. The generals lead a coup d'état, ousting Sharif's administration, and Musharraf takes control of the government.source
• 1999October 27 – Armenian parliament shooting: Gunmen open fire in Armenia's National Assembly building, killing Prime Minister Vazgen Sargsyan, Parliament Chairman Karen Demirchyan, and six other members.source