’79 - Hell of a Year I
February 1979
Commercial flights into Rhodesia (and domestic flights within Rhodesia) are terminated due to the danger of flying over combat zones (ZPLF rebels are firing at airliners with Strela-2 rockets).
February 25, 1979
Soyuz 32 launched into Earth orbit. Delivered crew to Salyut 6 station. The Soyuz 32 capsule returned unmanned to Earth on June 13, 1979. (The Soyuz 32 crew had originally been intended to trade places with the Soyuz 33 crew in April, however the Soyuz 33 suffered a technical failure and had to abort its mission before reaching the Salyut 6 station).
March – May 1979
Continuing border skirmishes between Portugal and Spain escalate through the spring. Cuban troops are detected operating with their Portuguese counterparts. In Portugal the revolutionary government lead by Vasco Goncalves and Álvaro Cunhal tries to stir up public support by denouncing the fascist aggression of the Spanish regime.
March 2, 1979
The Senate Judiciary Committee begins hearings on the candidacy of Gov. Richard Lamm (D-CO) for the office of Vice President of the United States.
Tapes – NSC Meeting – March 3, 1979
Graham Claytor (Secretary of Defense): The Iraqis have six divisions, roughly half their army, invested in this Saudi operation, and three more divisions in Kuwait as an occupation force and a reserve, though I doubt they will need it. The fall of the monarchy left the Saudi military in a precarious state, and the Iraqis have made short work of them in the Gulf and Red Sea coast areas. Mainly the Jihadi group have been driven into the deserts and are conducting a guerrilla war.
Bill Nichols (White House Chief of Staff): Effectively, Iraq has annexed Kuwait and Saudi Arabia?
Claytor: Not politically, not that I’m aware of, but ...
Cyrus Vance (Ambassador to the U.N.): They have filed a legal claim to Kuwait with the UN calling it as a integral part of the Ottoman province of Basra, to which they contend modern Iraq is the political heir. Nothing’s been said about Arabia yet; their Ambassador to the UN, Salah Omar Al-Ali has been selling this as a humanitarian exercise, Iraqi Arabs helping brother Arabs, etc.
President Wallace: Thing is, they still have the oil...
Henry Jackson (Secretary of State): Some of the most productive oil fields on the planet, and a grip on the western end of the Persian Gulf, and now potential influence in the Red Sea stretching around Jordan to Egypt. The Israelis are in near hysterics thinking they are being encircled by Iraq.
President Wallace: Can we push him out?
General Louis H. Wilson, Jr USMC (Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff): Yes. Essentially we would be looking at a two stage operation. First we would need to degrade his defences and infrastructure with a sustained air campaign launched from carriers and air bases in Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Iran – as well as long range bombers based on Diego Garcia and from Europe. Once we have sufficiently destroyed his air power, and blown holes through his ground capabilities, we would then need to launch a ground force invasion using amphibious landings along the coast, coupled with an overland strike from whatever neighboring countries would give us consent for staging and launching an invasion. Israel would of course be the best equipped as a staging area from a ...
Vance: Forget it. We involve Israel in this and we’ll turn this into a Holy War between ourselves and the Arabs, and other Muslims, especially if we invade Arabia of all places.
Jackson: The Israelis could be of immense help.
Nicholas A. Veliotes (Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs): Ambassador Vance is right on the perceptual question, especially with our military still in place in Syria, involving Israel in a military action could widely be seen as a crusade. We would also have to address the question of Mecca and Medina, the two holy cities, which are closed to non-Muslims. If our forces entered those cities, under any circumstances, and especially to expel an Arab army that has largely been welcomed by the populace, we could face serious blow back across the region and beyond.
Paul Nitze (National Security Advisor): Surely we can develop an information program to explain our actions to our allies, after all they must see the risk...
Veliotes: Of the Iraqi military conquering a sizeable chunk of the Arab world by force – yes a number of them, not least King Hussein and President al-Gamsay, are wetting their pants at the thought of what he might do next. But for the populations in those countries, this is not as much of a crisis as the religious rebellion was. Don’t forget, a lot of Arabs were happy that we got rid of Bayannouni, but at the same time they hated that we did it.
Nitze: That’s a contradiction.
Jackson: Welcome to the Arab mind.
President: General Wilson, how big a force would you need to do this?
Wilson: Eight, nine divisions plus naval assets and a Marine Expeditionary force – perhaps as big as Operation Bold Eagle.
Nichols: You sound like this could be a major war, like Vietnam.
Wilson; Not like Vietnam Mr. Nichols, but we are talking about a significant use of military power. I might add that if we push him out of Saudi Arabia we would also have to consider a follow-on operation to take back Syria, and move into Iraq proper, if we were to completely neutralize his fighting capabilities. For the last part we are ideally suited to strike from Syria and Iran as well.
Vance: With all due respect, General, that could ignite the entire Middle East.
Nitze: Let’s keep in mind that in order for our forces to get from Syria to Iraq, they would have to go over a Soviet division encamped on the border.
Nichols: Are the Soviet forces in Syria helping the Iraqis with this?
Lew Allen (Secretary of National Intelligence Coordination and Oversight): We have no evidence of it, no.
Dr. Fred Ickle (Director of Central Intelligence): They are arming Iraq, which is a Soviet client. I’d call that evidence of assisting them.
Allen: There has been no direct Soviet military involvement, and I might add that the Iraqis have also been purchasing French equipment, which they have publicly claimed is superior to the Soviet materiel – with the exception of tanks – that they have been getting. Our assessment, and its one shared by the British, is that in taking the oil fields, the Baath regime is attempting to come out of the Soviets shadow and establish itself as a regional power. They seemed to have learned a lesson from Nasser and Sadat about relying too heavily on the Soviets when the chips are down.
Ickle: We still have to face the possibility that this is part of a Soviet move to gain a grip on the world’s oil supply.
Nitze: Added to their reserves, this could make the Soviets the world’s oil superpower. That’s something that we can’t allow.
Stephen L.R. McNichols (Secretary of the Treasury, past Secretary of Energy): I can’t see it as being that co-ordinated; the Iraqis are not going to play second fiddle to the Soviet Union on the oil question. Frankly this is an effort by Baghdad to take control of OPEC and dictate terms on the oil world market. If anything, we are looking at a situation where the Iraqis and the Soviets would, effectively, be commercial competitors.
Nitze: You make that sound like a good thing.
McNichols: It could be, long term. Right now this has driven oil prices through the roof, and had a slowing effect on our economy...
Nichols: Which we need like a hole in the head...
McNichols: ... but a long term projection could see a head-to-head competition between the Iraqis and the Russians to grab market share put a downward pressure on the oil price; it could – possibly – undue a lot of the damage going as far back as seventy-three.
Vance: But can we countenance an invasion and conquest of a sovereign nation by Iraq without putting up some sort of resistance? Anything less could be like Munich all over again.
Veliotes: It will make Iraq into a regional bully, and frankly this Saddam Hussein is the worst possible sort to be in charge of something like this. This character is an Arab Stalin.
President: That bad? Doesn’t his President – what’s his name –
Jackson: Al-Bakr; he’s Hussein’s uncle –
President: Doesn’t his uncle have some control over him?
Ickle: Our confidential sources indicate that Saddam Hussein was planning a coup against his uncle, but it was sidetracked by this operation.
Vance: Your Israeli sources?
Ickle: They know the territory – their survival depends on it.
Allen: We’ve sounded out our Arab sources, and so have our British friends. There’s agreement that Hussein is an aggressive, strongman sort – he is the unofficial head of the secret police in Iraq – and there have been rumors of a coup against al-Bakr.
President: Why don’t we inform al-Bakr, have him get rid of this ingrate?
Jackson: We lack a reliable channel to carry such a message and guarantee that it is given any credibility. President al-Bakr may view something like that as a provocation, or an attempt by us to divide his government.
President: Can we deal with this Saddam character? Maybe we can tame him?
Veliotes: That might come at a high price, as we can’t be sure he would keep his word.
Nichols: He’s a bottom dealer?
Veliotes: The guy once was a thug and an assassin. Now he’s the Vice President and a military hero, but deep down, he’s still the thug. He’ll probably do a deal he considers advantageous to him and keep it, for as long as he has the advantage.
President: A military fight, to push him out, would have heavy casualties?
Wilson: That’s always difficult to predict, Mr. President, but we would be looking at something around a thousand dead, at least, in the first phase of land operations.
Claytor: General Wilson is being conservative with his numbers.
President: Can we blockade his oil output?
Admiral Thomas B. Hayward (Chief of Naval Operations): We can close him off at the straights of Homuz, the Red Sea and Suez. The Navy can seal him up tight.
Allen: Iran won’t let him export oil through their territory – heck, an embargo of Iraqi oil would be a boon to their industry.
McNichols: Turkey might be a weak link here. The Turkes regime has really destroyed their economy, and even if they agreed on an embargo officially, the black market would be rife.
Nitze: If we could identify pipelines and transport routes, they would all have to go through Kurdish territory along the border, right?
McNichols: Yes. The Turks are still fighting an insurgency along their border with Iraq – in fact their military has been co-operating with the Iraqi Army on this.
Nitze: What if we armed the Kurds as a buffer force; made it possible for them to close that border – maybe even recognized a Kurdish state up there, then –
Jackson: Hold on. Admittedly our relations with Turkey have been strained the last few years, but they are still – at least technically – an ally. You start this up and we could open ourselves up to a serious charge of meddling in Turkish internal affairs which Ankara won’t take sitting down.
Allen: I would like to add that the Kurdish issue extends into Iran too. If we start meddling with Kurdish autonomy in that region we could upset the balance in Iran as well.
President: So what we got is, a big and maybe bloody war to throw them out; an embargo that’s got a hole in it, unless we meddle in Turkey’s problems, which could turn Turkey and maybe Iran against us; or we make deal with this pole cat and let him keep what he snatched. Does that about cover it?
(No one responds to the President’s question).
President: What if we drop a nuke on the bastard?
McNichols: Excuse me, Mr. President, do you mean a nuclear weapon?
President: What else have we got the things for, except to use ‘em in tight places?
Claytor: We use them to counter a nuclear threat from a nuclear equipped power, like the Soviet Union or China. Our policy has never been to use them against a non-nuclear force, and especially not as an alternative to ...
President: The Hell you say, Graham. FDR and Truman were both ready to use nukes on non-nuclear forces to end the War – give ‘em Hell Harry did just that. Nixon tried to use a nuclear alert in sixty-nine to try and scare the Russians into backing off their support for North Vietnam. Ike threatened to go nuclear in Korea –
Claytor: That last one is an urban legend, and the sixty-nine alert brought us the closest to a real war with the Soviet Union since the Cuban Missile Crisis. It was a freshman mistake by President Nixon.
Jackson: If we take this thing nuclear, the Soviets won’t sit still for it. That’s a whole new order of threat, beyond just the oil question.
President: What will they do? Attack us?
Nitze: I doubt it, that would mean the end.
Veliotes: Since we are talking about using a nuclear weapon on an Arab army, it will cause an uproar throughout the Arab world – and especially if we do it in the home of Islam’s holy places. We could literally be staring down the face of anti-western Jihad from Morocco to Pakistan if we did that.
Allen: The Soviets will respond in some way, they won’t just sit around. At worst they could decide to go tit-for-tat and use a nuke to support Portugal or Cuba or North Korea as retaliation. Almost certainly I would think that they would try to get Baghdad to accept tactical nukes as a defensive measure – as a sign of Soviet support for Iraq – and that would not be in our interests at all.
Jackson: Taking this nuclear would be a very bad thing. We should end that discussion right now.
President (laughs): You gentlemen need to learn how to take a joke. I was just askin’ about what it could do. For now, General Wilson you prepare a conventional force plan, Admiral Hayward, let’s put in place a plan for a sea blockade. Let’s look at what we can do with the Kurds along the border, and any way we can bring Turkey and Iran on board. Henry, see who we’ve got who can open a channel to al-Bakr and this Hussein guy, maybe we can cut a deal.
Vance: What is our position on Kuwait?
President: Official U.S. policy is that we oppose the invasion of a sovereign nation, but we’ll give the UN time to work something out. Someone might want to communicate to the Iraqis is that half-a-loaf is better than none.
Vance: Trade Kuwait for Saudi Arabia?
President: Well, these Arabs, they like a good bargain, right?
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Henry Jackson, Cyrus Vance and Nicolas Veliotes get into an elevator after the meeting.
Veliotes: Do either of you think he was really joking?
Jackson and Vance offer no response.
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March 7, 1979
The largest Magnetar (Soft gamma repeater) event is recorded.
Hu Jiao-mu, one of the few members of the pre-Lesser Mao PRC leadership to have escaped from China, now lives in exile in Moscow. Hu (who was Mao Tse-tung’s main secretary from 1941 to 1966) is a bitter opponent of the Lesser Mao and his eccentric leadership in Peking. Hu, who once directed the propaganda organs of the PRC, is a vocal proponent of the theory that the Lesser Mao has in fact murdered the old Chairman and hijacked the Chinese Revolution; he also proclaims that Mao Yuan-jin is insane and should be removed from office for the sake of all Chinese. Under Soviet patronage in Moscow he has formed an exile government for the People’s Republic of China with himself as Acting General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. His exile government is recognized as the legitimate government of the People’s Republic of China by the Soviet Union, the Warsaw Pact states, Mongolia, the Democratic Progressive Republic of Portugal, Cuba and North Korea. It is accorded observer status at the non-aligned movement, and Soviet and Cuban influence is brought to bear to gain it recognition from a number of African states. North Vietnam remains the only Communist nation not to recognize Hu’s government, due in part to North Vietnam’s growing interdependence with the United States and South Vietnam – and also because of increasing ties with the Taiwanese government. However, North Vietnam has “informal” relations with Hu’s government facilitated by the Soviets.
The Democratic National Committee announces it will use the same calendar of presidential primaries in 1980 as was used in 1976 (with a Democratic incumbent in the White House the Democratic primaries are not expected to be significant – although a challenge to President Wallace is not out of the question).
March 8, 1979
Philips demonstrates Compact Disc publicly for the first time.
Los Angeles Times contributor Robert Scheer publishes a book called A Hope and a Prayer: How we are one mishap away from a Nuclear Disaster, which is an indictment of the civilian nuclear power industry in the United States. Scheer’s thesis is that in the speed to build civilian nuclear power plants as a policy choice for reducing oil dependency in the United States, the NRC and DOE have overlooked slipshod safety standards at many nuclear power plants around the country and that in others safety concerns and minor accidents have been downplayed in order not to damage the reputation of the nuclear industry.
In his book Scheer charges that the nuclear lobby managed to kill a movie script written by James Bridges, Mike Gray, and T.S. Cook to be called The China Syndrome about an accident at a nuclear power plant. Scheer details how one of the project’s early backers, actor Michael Douglas, was blackmailed into backing out of the project while the studio interested in doing the film, Columbia Pictures, saw a sustained drop in its stock with a threatened boycott over a film that would “kill jobs” (construction in the nuclear industry being a big opportunity at this time for unemployed workers) and which was set to feature the “unpatriotic” Jane Fonda. The Wall Street pressure on Columbia’s stock (which couldn’t be traced to a specific source, yet seemed to involve a number of the street’s leading investment houses – all of whom had varying stakes in nuclear energy providers) left the studio vulnerable to a takeover, which caused the Columbia board to back away from the project, and then see its stock value rebound.
Bridges told Scheer how he and his life partner actor Jack Larson were the subject of campaign of harassment, smears and “outing” until he withdrew from the project.
Scheer also notes that a science fiction project named Star Wars created by the late George Lucas was smothered because its climax featured an exploding reactor (although an animated version with just that ending was in wide release by 1979).
Scheer’s book became all the more eerie in its prescience because it was released to the market (and had trouble getting shelf space in many book retailers due to pressure from “outside” on the companies in the distribution channel) three weeks before the Three Mile Island disaster, which seemed to be the fulfilment of Scheer’s warning.
It was the publicity that A Hope and a Prayer received in the weeks after the Three Mile Island incident which propelled it onto the bestseller list, which in term overcame the resistance in distribution channels to it.
It is worth noting that A Hope and a Prayer was banned as “dangerous” by Japanese authorities.
A Hope and a Prayer won the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting.
Price of oil: $ 33.00 (94.00)
Inflation: 4.3%
Unemployment: 7.2%
March 9, 1979
Carlos Humberto Perette of the Radical Civic Union Party is elected as President of Argentina. He is inaugurated for a six year term on April 12, 1979.
Michael Stewart, the former Foreign Secretary in the Wilson Labour government, is appointed to head a high level British delegation which resumes talks with Sinn Fein in Rambouillet, France.
March 13, 1979
Maurice Bishop leads a successful coup in Grenada.
March 15, 1979
Hayao Kinugasa joins the Japanese government as Minister without portfolio responsible for Combined Defence and Industrial Strategy. He is in fact responsible for the nuclear weapons and submarine programs. Kinugasa's inclusion in the Cabinet represents the first inclusion of a military man (although Kinugasa is retired) in a Japanese cabinet since 1945. This draws some attention and criticism in Japan, where this move is explained as a "measured reaction" to the growing danger from China.
Tapes – Camp David - March 15, 1979
Denis Healey (British Prime Minister): Surely George, Henry, one principle we must stand-by here is that we cannot allow Kuwait’s sovereignty to be undermined by Iraqi aggression. No matter how we come out of this, we must stand firm for a complete restoration of Kuwait’s independence.
Henry Jackson (Secretary of State): That’s where we may have to differ. The fact of the situation is we may stand a better chance of getting Iraq to quit Arabia if we let them hold onto what they are calling province nineteen.
James Callaghan (British Foreign Secretary): Just because they are calling it that, does not make it so, anymore than the fact of the Anchluss made Austria’s eradication acceptable.
President Wallace: Point is, we got have some bargaining room in this. Look, Henry’s already laid it out, we have a chance to make a real difference here.
Healey: Rewarding aggression is hardly a difference I’d like to put my name to.
Callaghan: I would venture to say that the other Gulf Kingdoms will look at this and, frankly, wonder how long until you decide to a deal with their existence. This is a very slippery slope, gentlemen.
Jackson: We respect your point, and our military build-up in the Gulf has been designed to re-assure the other Kingdoms, as well as Iran, of our resolve. They have nothing to worry about.
Healey: So what has poor Kuwait done to earn your undying wrath?
President: I guess it’s like building a highway. Some poor farmer’s gonna get caught in the way, and he’s gonna lose his farm, but that’s the sad fact o’ life cause the highway has got to be built.
Healey: What?
Jackson: It’s a historical fact that we now call Kuwait was part of the Ottoman province of Basra, so in essence we are restoring an older order in the region.
Callaghan: That can be disputed, not least by Ottoman treaties with the Emirs of Kuwait recognizing them as equals with the Turkish Sultan. I don’t believe at all that Kuwait was subject to the Ottomans in that way, and I do know the current Emir will adamantly reject such an interpretation. You need to get some better historians to look at this, Henry.
President: We’re not here for a history lesson. Like I said a minute ago, no one likes taking away a man’s farm, but that highway has got to be built. We’re talking about a post-Opec reality here, and I think that’s gonna be good for your country too, right gentlemen?
Healey: It is abjectly cynical in my view, and smacks of imperial arrogance on our part.
President: So, you want to say that next time you go out looking for votes? Or you want to have your British voters happy with the price of oil comin’ down and them lookin’ at the Labour Party as the ones that helped make it happen?
Healey: For the record, we do not make policy – especially something of this consequence – on that basis.
Callaghan: We can, however, see the point of a post-OPEC reality, not just in electoral terms, but in terms of creating greater global stability.
President: You see now, building that highway ain’t so bad after all, is it?
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March 16, 1979
The committee headed by the English judge Harry Bennett, which was set up to investigate allegations of ill-treatment of people held in interrogation centres in Northern Ireland, published its report (Bennett Report, Cmnd 7497). The report found that there were instances where there was medical evidence of injuries sustained in police custody which were not self-inflicted. The report made a number of suggestions and the Labour government undertook to implement two major recommendations. The first that closed-circuit television cameras should be installed in interview rooms and the second that those being detained should have access to their solicitor after 48 hours in custody. Most of the other recommendations were implemented over the next two years by the Labour government.
President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr of Iraq arrives in Moscow for talks with Soviet officials. It is believed in these meetings that Yuri Andropov and KGB Chairman Fedorchuck warned al-Bakr of a forthcoming coup attempt by his Vice President and now Governor of Arabia and Kuwait. The Soviets did this likely as they considered al-Bakr a more reliable partner in Baghdad than the mercurial Saddam Hussein. Al-Bakr reportedly agreed to coordinate oil production with the Soviets in return for their assistance.
The Lebanese Central government begins to re-assert authority over the nation; however dangerous schisms between the Christian and Muslim communities remained unresolved. The Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon is also a point of contention. For the moment the various militias are exhausted after years of battle and apart from local skirmishes, 1979 sees an overall decrease in violence.
On board an RAF Vickers VC-10, en route to London from Washington
David Owen (Defence Secretary): He said that? Building a highway?
Callaghan: He has a point with the analogy, even if it is a little...ah...
Owen: Sounds like a home counties politician at a local council, not the President of the United States.
Healey: He is their version of a local councillor; he was governor of an unimportant state – Alabama – rather like West Yorkshire, before this. Pity of their system is that you can go from that straight into being head of state.
Owen: But still, can we countenance selling out Kuwait like that, even for a prospect of getting a handle on the oil situation? I mean, even forty years after Munich, can we ...
Callaghan: The rather more pertinent point David, what can we do about it? Certainly, we don’t have the military capability to do it ourselves, and the French are quite happy to go about business as usual with the Iraqis no matter what they do. If Wallace wants to play the great game and try and re-align the Middle East, what good does it do us to make too much of a fuss?
Healey: No need for us holding the knife for him while he stabs one of our oldest friends in the region in the back.
Callaghan: I quite agree with both of you, on an emotional level. The trouble is, we can’t let emotion run away with us here. Wallace is going to do whatever he wishes, no matter our objection.
Owen: Plain as that may be, it’s still hard to stomach. But Jim has a point, what with our commitments in Madeira, Cyprus, Syria and Hong Kong, frankly we can’t do much on our own. Not unless you’d like to go on a huge re-armament program, Prime Minister.
Healey: Very droll, David.
Callaghan: One has to wonder about the President’s health, though. He looked very pale and drawn, and did you notice his hands were shaking.
Healey: Yes, but that may not mean anything. Roosevelt ran the equivalent of two wars from a wheelchair, and people said he had an unhealthy pallor.
Owen: Only at the end. He was quite robust up until the last months.
Callaghan: My point, David. I had a strong sense that we were seeing a replay of FDR at Yalta.
Healey: Henry Jackson seems to be running the show on this anyway. This is his misbegotten brainchild. Time will come when the Americans will rue this, if not today, someday. Jim, one thing we should do is give the Emir and his people asylum in the UK. If we must go along, let them at least see that we are reluctant.
Callaghan: Yes, Prime Minister.
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March 17, 1979
The Penmanshiel Tunnel in the U.K. collapses, killing 2 workers.
The Republican National Committee announces that for the 1980 Presidential Primaries and Caucuses that Iowa (Jan 21), Puerto Rico (Feb 17) and New Hampshire (Feb 26) will allocate delegates on a winner take all basis. The next set of primaries and caucuses beginning with Massachusetts and Vermont on March 4 through to Pennsylvania on April 22 will use a proportional system to allocate delegates. Starting with Texas on May 3 through to a Super Tuesday on June 3, which includes California and Ohio, delegates will be allocated on a winner take all basis. Each state will receive a number of Super Delegates equal to its Congressional Representation (i.e. one super delegate for each Congressional District, plus two for its Senators) and one for its Governor (535+3+50=588). The District of Columbia will be allocated 3 super delegates (to be chosen by the RNC). Where a Congressional district, Senate seat or a Governor’s office is filled by a Republican, that elected official will serve as a super delegate. State Republican conventions will choose the people to fill those super delegate slots where the current office holder is not a Republican: super delegates for Congressional districts must be residents of the districts; super delegates for Senatorial and Gubernatorial slots must be residents of the State in question. The total number of voting delegates for 1980 will be 2258 + 588 = 2846 (1424 needed for the nomination).
This new system is weighted to weed out (or in fact discourage) any nuisance candidates as early as possible in the first two months, then provide an opportunity for serious contest between surviving contenders, before choosing a nominee in some of the large delegate contests in May and June. The super delegate concept has been added to act as a party control or break should the nomination be a tight contest, and unlike a pure primary and caucus system, the super delegate model will (the RNC hopes) give the party establishment some input into who the nominee will be. It also aims to give representation to Republicans who reside in areas where Democrats or third party members hold elected office. The RNC is concerned with keeping outsiders or odd-ball candidates (and/or Ronald Reagan) from achieving and early lead and hijacking the nominating process (there is some concern being expressed that a Republican Wallace or a charismatic irregular like Pete McCloskey could use Wallace-like populist techniques to win the nomination). Above all the system is designed to produce a nominee-designate before the Republican National Convention, so that the Convention can act as uniting event rather than a brokering event.
The Iraqi Army occupies much of urban Saudi Arabia, driving the revolutionaries out into the desert and south toward Yemen, where they are given hiding places and support from various tribes.
March 18, 1979
Ten miners die in a methane gas explosion at Golborne Colliery near Wigan, Lancashire.
March 20, 1979
Yonaguni Island is evacuated by Japanese authorities. The official (and widely questioned) reason given is mercury poisoning of the waters.
March 22, 1979
Members of the Irish Republican Brigade (IRB) killed Richard Sykes (58), then British Ambassador to the Netherlands, and also his Dutch valet Krel Straub (19), in a gun attack in Den Haag, Netherlands.
The IRB carried out a series of attacks across Northern Ireland with 24 bombs exploding on same day.
March 24, 1979
The Muslim Brotherhood stages a three day protest in Cairo and Alexandria against the military regime headed by President al-Gamsay. The former Army Doctor and militant Ayman al-Zawahiri is present and involved in the Cairo protests.
The House Judiciary Committee votes 10 – 7 to delay hearings on Gov. Lamm’s candidacy “until the Nicaraguan affair can be fully investigated.” Attempts in May, June and September to overturn this stop fail to gain majority support, even after the Senate Judiciary Committee approves Lamm’s nomination. Many Democrats begin to voice the concern that Republican Speaker Lott is trying to preserve his position as next in line to the Presidency as the question of impeachment becomes more of a reality.
March 25, 1979
The first fully functional space shuttle orbiter, Columbia, is delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center, to be prepared for its first launch.
March 26, 1979
Marshall Hyung-ju, “The Eternal Marshall” of North Korea, dies in unexplained circumstances (a factory roof collapsed while he was inspecting the facility- forty six engineers and builders are later executed for this). He is replaced as North Korean leader by a politburo of four men, composed of colourless party bureaucrats few in the west have ever heard of before.
The Egyptian military cracks down the Muslim Brotherhood, arresting a number of its members. Ayman al-Zawahiri flees into exile in Mali.
Efforts to impose UN sanctions on Iraq are frustrated by vetoes at the Security Council by the Soviet Union and by France.
March 28, 1979
Crisis at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania begins.
The accident began at 4 a.m. on Wednesday, March 28, 1979, with failures in the non-nuclear secondary system, followed by a stuck-open pilot-operated relief valve (PORV) in the primary system, which allowed large amounts of nuclear reactor coolant to escape. The mechanical failures were compounded by the initial failure of plant operators to recognize the situation as a loss-of-coolant accident due to inadequate training and human factors, such as human-computer interaction design oversights relating to ambiguous control room indicators in the power plant's user interface. In particular, a hidden indicator light led to an operator manually overriding the automatic emergency cooling system of the reactor because the operator mistakenly believed that there was too much coolant water present in the reactor and causing the steam pressure release. The scope and complexity of the accident became clear over the course of five days, as employees of Met Ed, Pennsylvania state officials, and members of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) tried to understand the problem, communicate the situation to the press and local community, decide whether the accident required an emergency evacuation, and ultimately end the crisis. The NRC's authorization of the release of 40,000 gallons of radioactive waste water directly in the Susquehanna River led to a loss of credibility with the press and community.
In the end, the reactor was brought under control, although full details of the accident were not discovered until much later, following extensive investigations by both a presidential commission and the NRC. One report concluded that "there will either be no case of cancer or the number of cases will be so small that it will never be possible to detect them. The same conclusion applies to the other possible health effects". Several epidemiological studies in the years since the accident have supported the conclusion that radiation released from the accident had no perceptible effect on cancer incidence in residents near the plant, though these findings are contested by one team of researchers. Cleanup started in August 1979 and was projected to take in close to two decades to complete, with a total cost projection of about $1 billion. The incident was rated a five on the seven-point International Nuclear Event Scale: Accident With Wider Consequences.
This incident causes the NRC and the Department of Energy to conduct a closer review of the nuclear power plants that have been constructed (or are under construction) over the past decade.
March 29, 1979
Sultan Yahya Petra of Kelantan, the 6th Yang di-Pertuan Agong (Head of State) of Malaysia, dies in office. He is replaced by Sultan Ahmad Shah of Pahang.
Quebecair Flight 255 was a scheduled flight from Quebec City to Montreal. On March 29, 1979, a Fairchild F-27 registered CF-QBL flying the route crashed after an engine exploded shortly after take off, killing all three crew and 14 out of 21 passengers. The crash occurred minutes after it took off.
Lt. General Alexander Haig, previously commanding the multi-national force in Syria is placed on overall charge of the U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf and North-eastern Africa. His headquarters is located in Iran.
The U.S. moves ships, men and equipment into bases in Oman, the United Arab Emirates, North Yemen and Ethiopia, ringing the Arabian peninsula with U.S. forces. The British, the Canadians, the Australians and the Dutch also contribute to the multi-national force being put in place to threaten the Iraqis if required.
The Soviets step up their naval presence in Kuwait, South Yemen and Somalia in an effort challenge the U.S. push against the Iraqis.
March 30, 1979
Airey Neave, then Conservative Party spokesperson on Northern Ireland, was injured by a booby-trap bomb attached to his car as he left the car park at the House of Commons. The Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) claimed responsibility for the attempted murder. Neave survived the blast, losing his left foot and suffering sustained shrapnel damage to both legs which had to be repaired through a series of surgeries. The bomb, which should have been powerful enough to kill him, fizzled, creating a much smaller explosion. The likely reason was inferior or contaminated explosives (later revealed to have come from a secret joint MI6-British military covert action to sell the IRB and INLA defective weapons and explosives
Less than three years after the murder of the Queen, questions were immediately raised about government security, given that an INLA strike team had gotten into the HofC car park. Enoch Powell MP rose in the House on April 5 to claim (with much rhetoric and not much proof) that it had been American Special Forces and not the INLA which had tried to do away with Neave, to prevent him from becoming Opposition Leader. (Neave was by now a contender to replace Geoffrey Howe as permanent leader of the Conservative Party).
The government of Quebec proposes a referendum to give it the power to negotiate sovereignty with Canada. The referendum is to take place in 1979. The Lougheed government in Ottawa denounces this moves and begins a anti-referendum campaign. Canadian Justice Department lawyers immediately go to court in attempts to challenge the constitutionality of the referendum.
March 31, 1979
The last British soldier (belonging to the Royal Navy) leaves the Maltese Islands, after 179 years of presence. Malta declares its Freedom Day (Jum il-Helsien).
March – October, 1979
Between March and October 1979 the war in Rhodesia continues to deteriorate. After the use of more mustard gas and other chemical weapons, the Rhodesians beat off another ZPLF attack.
The Rhodesians then press the attack against ZPLF bases in Zambia, and in the process inflict significant damage on the Zambian air force and on Zambian military units.
This forces Zambia into a war with Rhodesia. The combined Zambian and ZPLF invasion of Rhodesia compels South Africa to come to Rhodesia’s aid in what is the long term strategic defence of South Africa from the encroachment of Soviet backed radicalized African armies on its border.
By mid-October the sides have clashed in Rhodesia, destroying much of the northern half of that country. The Zambians and ZPLF, while inflicting heavy casualties, are unable to defeat the South African and Rhodesian forces in the field. The Rhodesian and South African Air Forces gain air superiority and inflict heavy damage on Zambia and ZPLF support facilities. Soon there are instances of Zambian civilians turning on the ZPLF and civil war breaking out between pro-ZPLF and anti-ZPLF factions in Zambia.
Civilian casualties are very high and the warfare is reportedly brutal.
The war, although reported on, goes largely underreported in the West because of events in Arabia, the Iberian Peninsula and Italy compete for attention and immediacy.
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April 1, 1979
The Pinwheel Network changes its name to Nickelodeon and begins airing on various Warner Cable systems beginning in Buffalo, New York, expanding its audience reach.
President Wallace signs into law a Defense authorization for the development of Stealth technology aircraft.
April 1 – April 18, 1979
Police lock Andreas Mihavecz in a holding cell in Bregenz, Austria, and forget about him, leaving him there without food or drink for eighteen days, until he is rescued by chance by another officer who is curious about the strange sounds and revolting smell coming from the supposedly empty cell. (Mihavecz survives by licking dampness off the walls of his basement cell).
April 2, 1979
Sverdlovsk Anthrax leak: A Soviet biowarfare laboratory at Sverdlovsk accidentally releases airborne anthrax spores, killing 66 plus an unknown amount of livestock.
U.S. Fifth fleet units begin deploying in Oman, the United Arab Emirates and in the Persian Gulf. Fifth and Sixth Fleet units also take control of the sea lanes leading to the Suez canal.
April 5, 1979
The Senate Judiciary Committee votes to recommend the nomination of Gov. Lamm for the office of Vice President.
April 6 – 8, 1979
The Metz Congress was the seventh national congress of the French Socialist Party (PS) which took place on 6, 7 and 8 April 1979. The debate was influenced by five years of President Mitterrand’s administration, with a great deal of division over his “pragmatic” versus “party driven” policies during his tenure. This included debates over nuclear energy and foreign policy programs and whether or not the Common Programme with the French Communist Party (PCF) should be abandoned in the face of forthcoming legislative elections scheduled for October 1979.
Eight years after his establishing control of the party, and five years after his election as President, François Mitterrand faced internal opposition. Michel Rocard, who joined the PS in 1974, led the right-wing of the party. He criticized the Common Programme, and decried it as being "archaic" and "unrealistic". He advocated an alignment with contemporary European social-democracy and an acceptance of the market economy. For Mitterrand, these propositions threatened to split the "Union of Left". (Despite the fact that Mitterrand and the PS government had quietly been doing that in small, incremental changes to the economy which had fallen under the bland – and largely [and deliberately] unclarified – term of “co-operative alignment”)*.
Rocard was supported by Pierre Mauroy. He had been number 2 of the party since 1971. He represented the survivors of the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) who denounced the hegemony of Mitterrand's supporters in the party.
Jean-Pierre Chevènement and his left-wing CERES faction advocated a return to closer relations with the PCF.
Despite the division between the wings of the PS, no one was ready to create an open schism in advance of the 1979 elections, although this unity may not have been as strong when the 1981 Presidential election was considered, specifically the idea of an inter-party challenger to Mitterrand for re-election was not ruled out. Mitterrand’s ally, Lionel Jospin, was nonetheless re-elected First Secretary of the PS with only token opposition.
*Famously characterised as the “round about” policy from Mitterrand’s 1978 comment – “We will co-operate with our European counterparts on the alignment of important sectors of our economy; while alignment shall be directed to improving our economic relations through co-operation, this does not mean that we shall surrender those essential values of our policies which protect the rights and protections of French workers, nor will co-operation be a formula to harm French well-being to the benefit of foreign interests.”
April 10, 1979
A tornado hits Wichita Falls, Texas, killing 42 people (the most notable of 26 tornadoes that day).
The Italian government proposes a bill (The Security Law 1979 [SL-79]) which would outlaw “conspiratorial association” by government officials with “outlawed organizations.” The measure is widely seen as an effort by the Berlinguer government as a tool to crack down on right wing organizations and certain businesses which have been conspiring with – variously – the Mafia and what are seen as front organizations for right wing terror groups. At the same time Prime Minister Berlinguer wants to create a legal pre-text for clamping down on hard left organizations giving assistance and support to groups like the Red Brigades, and to expand Italian law so that the Justice system can prosecute Italians who involve themselves with foreign terror organizations.
A number of right wing political groups, many with ties to the police, military and intelligence service (and some with Vatican connections as well) react with outrage to SL-79 which they see as being aimed at shutting them down.
April 10 -12, 1979
Soyuz 33 launched into Earth orbit. Returned to Earth on April 12 after failing to dock with the Salyut 6 station. The Soyuz craft suffered engine failure, which prevented it from docking.
Israeli jets destroy a Syrian National Police arms bunker near the Israeli border. Further Israeli flights over Syria are challenged by the US Navy and US Air Force.
April 11, 1979
British and Canadian troops invade Grenada and remove the revolutionary government of Maurice Bishop. In Britain the Healey government cites the extra – legality of the undemocratic coup in a Commonwealth nation as grounds for the military intervention. Prime Minister Lougheed of Canada uses similar arguments to justify the involvement of Canadian support troops. Although Eric Gairy, the former Prime Minister, returned to the Island, he was discouraged buy the British from standing for another term. New elections were called under British supervision.
April 13, 1979
The La Soufrière volcano erupts in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
Silvio Berlusconi, the owner of Telemilano and the media company Finivest, begins to harangue the government’s SL-79 law as an attack on press freedom. In a fitting irony, SL-79 is openly compared to Mussolini’s Acerbo Law, which suppressed opposition press fifty-six years earlier. (SL-79 was not an attempt to change the Italian political system like the Acerbo Law had been, but Berlusconi’s media outlets shaded the lines to evoke bitter memories of the Mussolini regime and hope that they were transferred to Berlinguer’s government).
April 15, 1979
Montenegro Earthquake: A major earthquake (7.0 on the Richter scale) strikes Montenegro (then part of Yugoslavia) and parts of Albania, causing extensive damage to coastal areas and taking 136 lives; the old town of Budva is devastated.
The MEK (People's Mujahedin of Iran) organizes a series of strikes throughout Iran. The strikers demand better wages and elections.
President Mitterrand visits President al-Bakr in Baghdad. They jointly announce a deal whereby Iraq will evacuate Arabia once “stability has been restored” and a “government with wide domestic support in Arabia” can be organized. The French President’s visit, highly criticized by many as a “sell-out” to aggression, includes a commercial side deal for a number of French industries, including arms manufacturers and the civil nuclear energy field.
Of note, the Iraqi deal is criticized from the right but not as much from the left. Many leftists welcome the liberation of the former Saudi Arabia from a medieval theocracy by a nominally socialist Arab entity. The Soviets also command support for Iraq from those groups they control or influence. There is also an element that is anti-corporate and sees the Iraqi move as frustrating western corporations, and as such lends a voice of radical support to the invasion.
The House Judiciary Special Select Sub-Committee Inquiry into Legal Questions Pertaining to the Conduct of the U.S. Military and the Wallace Administration with regard to Covert Policy in Nicaragua (the Harsha Committee after its Chairman Rep. Bill Harsha (R-OH)) begins hearings in Washington. Over the course of its mandate, the Harsha Committee hears testimony from U.S. military personnel, CIA operatives, foreign nationals, reporters and Nicaraguan representatives from both the government and the Sandinista movement.
April 16, 1979
During the Senate debate on the nomination of Gov. Lamm, Sen. Gary Howard (Bible-LA) attempts to filibuster the nomination of “a homicidal abortionist to the second highest office in this land. God will curse this Senate if we elect such a man, with blood on his hands, to the Vice Presidency.” Sen. Howard attempts to read the Bible into the Congressional Record as part of his filibuster, which is finally stopped after four hours.
Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ): “What is this, the United States Senate or a revival meeting?”
Sen. Jacob Javits (R-NY): “No, this has become the Gong Show.”
April 17, 1979
Four Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officers were killed when the IRB exploded an estimated 1,000 pound van bomb at Bessbrook, County Armagh. [This was believed to be the largest bomb used by the IRA to this date.]
April 19, 1979
Agnes Wallace (40), a Prison Officer, was shot dead and three of her colleagues injured when the Irish Republican Army (IRA) carried out a gun and grenade attack outside Armagh women's prison.
The Iranian Army forces crack down on the strikers.
April 21, 1979
Amid the turmoil General Hamid arrests the remaining members of the National Salvation Counsel. The same day the figurehead Shah Reza appoints Hamid as the new Prime Minister. In his first statement as the new Prime Minister, General Hamid outlaws the MEK and other “pro-communist” groups.
April 22, 1979
The Albert Einstein Memorial is unveiled at The National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC.
The body of Martin McConville (25), a Catholic civilian, was found in the Bann River, at Portadown, County Armagh. McConville had been abducted by Loyalists one month earlier and had been beaten to death.
April 23, 1979
Fighting in London between the Anti-Nazi League and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group results in the death of protestor Blair Peach.
Soviet Communist Party General Secretary Mikhail Suslov dies after a serious illness. His death is not announced until after the May Day celebrations in the Soviet Union.
After several months of intensive fighting PRC forces withdraw into the highlands of Laos adjacent to the PRC border with Laos. The last of the PRC forces also withdraw from North Vietnamese territory as their position there is tactically difficult under sustained action by North and South Vietnamese ground and air units.
From March through October 1979 the main focus of North and South Vietnamese forces, along with Lao national forces (the Lao government [Republic of Laos]) now largely under the influence of the Pathet Lao Green (or Nationalist) forces, is to suppress on-going guerrilla activities by the Pathet Lao Red (or Maoist) forces. In addition to operations in Laos, the Maoist Pathet Lao also stage cross border raids into North Vietnam.
The PRC itself begins training a contingent of anti-Hanoi Vietnamese Maoists to act as an insurgent force in the border area and to penetrate into North Vietnam.
In Vientiane the Nationalist Pathet Lao consolidates its hold on the post-royal government, declaring the country to be the Republic of Laos and promising a platform of national development and agrarian reform. Elections are put off until “development has reached a level to sustain proletarian education prior to mass involvement in balloting.” Code: The Pathet Lao Nationalists want to “train” the population how to vote while indoctrinating them with Pathet Lao ideology.
While North Vietnam and India recognize the new government in Laos, the United States and the South Vietnamese government continue to recognize the now exiled Royal government which takes refuge in Switzerland.
May 1, 1979
Greenland gets home rule.
At the invitation of Berlusconi and other Italian private financiers former American President and right-wing media personality Spiro Agnew gives a series of speeches in Rome, Milan, Turin and Genoa all denouncing the Communist government as a danger to Italians and the security of all of Europe.
Kremlinologists note the absence of General Secretary Suslov at any of the May Day celebrations in Moscow. Yuri Andropov and Premier Pelse lead the official delegation which watches the parade from the top of Lenin’s tomb. Also notable by his absence is Konstantin Chernenko. The Defence Minister, General Viktor Kulikov and the Deputy Premier Grigory Romanov, and the Party Central Committee Secretary Nikolai Ryzhkov are noted as standing close to Andropov and Pelse, indicating that they may have gained more prominence in the hierarchy. Also prominent with the senior leadership is Moscow Party boss Viktor Grishin. Hu Juan-ju is also given a place of honour in the official line-up with other foreign Communist dignitaries.
In Peking, Mao Yuan-jin is formally proclaimed the “Guardian of the Chinese Revolution,” “First messenger of the Eternal Chairman” and “the Guide of Heaven.” In his May Day address he proclaims the “Chinese Revolution” as “the master of all” and anything outside of it “below the value of dung.” Many China watchers conclude that this is the formal coronation of the Lesser Mao as the great Helmsman’s successor in public (the transfer of power having occurred in secret many years before). Although Mao Yuan-jin – “the Guardian” – maintains the fiction that his aging Uncle is alive and in seclusion, passing messages to the masses through his “First messenger”, most experts are in agreement that Mao Tse-tung is most likely dead.
May 2, 1979
The Senate votes 58 – 40 (1 absence, 1 abstention*) to approve the nomination of Gov. Lamm to the office of Vice President. (* Sen. Ronald Galtieri (Lib.-MT) argues that the 25th Amendment violates the spirit of the Constitution because it was not included in the Constitution by the Founders (on this principle he rejects all amendments incorporated after the end of the first generation [13th amendment on]; his argument is that all of the amendments written after the passing of the founders either tinker with their design for limited government or have been designed to increase government power over the individual. In the case of the 25th amendment he argues that the amendment has, against the designs of the founder, removed a power from the states (electing a Vice President by electors chosen at the state level) and arbitrarily given that power to Congress (appointing a Vice President)).
Even after the Senate vote the House Judiciary Committee, citing the Harsha Committee hearings, still refuses to conduct hearings on Gov. Lamm’s nomination.
Keith Joseph (MP – Cons. (Leeds North East)): In conclusion, I would like the honourable Foreign Secretary to explain why this government has allowed the Iraqi aggression to go unchecked, and in effect allowed Iraq through the use of military muscle to swallow-up two sovereign nations? Are we to conclude Kuwait is the Rhineland and Arabia somehow approximates the Sudatenland?
Hecklers (Conservative benches): Peace in our time!
Hecklers (Labour benches): Heil Howe!
James Callaghan (Foreign Secretary): Were the honourable member to consult a map, I’m sure he would find that the sands of Arabia are at some considerable distance from the Sudatenland, just as this affair is at some distance both in strategic and diplomatic terms from the long past crisis he alludes to. Oh, and to our friends who chant ‘Peace in our time’ as a barb, I would remind them that they are the words of a Tory Prime Minister spoken over the corpse of a free nation for which he chose the role of undertaker.
Hecklers: (Jeers; Boos)
Speaker: Order! Order! The Honourable Foreign Secretary.
Callaghan: Thank-you, Mr. Speaker. To the substance of the honourable members question, let me say that His Majesty’s government is working in close concert with our allies through diplomatic and other means to assert our case that this action by Iraq is contrary to all international law and that it shall not be allowed to stand as is. Diplomacy being a complicated and at times delicate process, I cannot give the full content of on-going talks in this house, but I can assure you that the policy we have chosen will both express our national outrage, without closing the doors to peaceful settlement, and that, Mr. Speaker, stands in stark preference to one of war which can only bring bloodshed and ruin.
Michael Hesletine (MP - Cons. (Henley)): Will this government give this house and the world its assurance that it will demand nothing less than the restoration of the Emir of Kuwait to his rightful throne, and will this government commit to the restoration of a free and independent Kuwait to her people as a minimum and necessary condition for any agreement. And if not, will this government commit itself, with our allies, to liberating Kuwait by force, if needs be?
Barbara Castle (Deputy Prime Minister): My honourable friend is quick to have us make so many commitments; one wonders if his portfolio is fully invested in Kuwaiti dinars.
Hecklers (Conservative benches): Foul! Foul!
Hecklers (Labour benches): You certainly are!
Castle: This government has undertaken to give the Emir of Kuwait and as many of his people as can reach us shelter, and we will continue our efforts to see a peaceful and equitable resolution. We have full faith in our armed forces, should they be called upon, but that means we have no less faith in our diplomats, as should our honourable friends across the aisle. Sadly, to those who hope to make a quick killing on their BA or Rolls Royce stock over a war scare, I can only say we are not in the business of making munitions dealers happy. Sorry, you’ll have to give peace a chance.
Enoch Powell (MP – UU (South Down)): “When will this government take heed of British interests and stop being the lap dog of the United States? Can the Minister rise in this House and in all candour tell us that British interests are promoted somehow in all this chicanery in Arabia? Can we not say that while we disapprove of what has happened, and the government that has replaced the Saudi King, we can also say that it is not in our national interest to become involved in this mire? If the United States wishes to dictate to the Arab world what path it should follow then let it, but let it not use British blood and British treasure in pursuit of this goal.”
James Callaghan (Foreign Secretary): “The honourable member speaks of the matter as if we can stand by and look upon it with the dispassionate distance of an Oxford Tutor considering some particularly complex but utterly academic problem. The fact is that the situation on the Arabian peninsula is central to the security of the world, and to the energy security of the United Kingdom. Let’s not forget that point – our economic and military security is directly tied into this matter. Far from being a lap dog, Britain acts in concert with our allies, including the United States, to ensure not only our security, but to ensure the spirit of international law is enforced.”
Powell: “Arabia today is occupied by an Arab dictatorship, an offensive blood thirsty tyranny to be sure, but one not as vile as the mindless fanatics who so recently terrorized the Arab peninsula. While it is true that Britain suffers from the resulting high oil prices, I must ask if our military involvement, which if it comes to conflict will only reduce – not increase – the flow of oil, I must ask if this is truly in our interest, or solely in the interest of the United States, which seeks for itself the role of hegemon and global policeman. In the days of Britain’s Empire we would have acted to stop this without hesitation. The result might well have been a lingering war that would have slowly bled the British Empire and returned only more bodies to the lament of British mothers and to fill the ground with the spent remains of our young and brave. We in Britain, with a little discipline, can survive this distant conflict. It is only oil hungry, power hungry America that sees the need to intervene, and they are more than ready to squander as many British lives in that interest as they deem necessary. To this, let us say instead, good luck but do not involve us. Let America fight in the Arab sands, and let Britain instead determine a path of energy self-sufficiency that will release us from the grip of these oil potentates and America’s imperial hubris for good.”
Denis Healey (Prime Minister): “Our government is taking every measure to avoid war and to resolve the Arabian dispute peacefully. President Wallace himself has assured us that his last option is to fight the Iraqi occupier. Rather we show force to back-up owe willingness to use force if required, but not out of necessity. Great Britain and the United States wish the Iraqis and all other parties to know that we will negotiate from strength, and we will not accept being dictated to on a matter so vital not only to our security, but to the peace of the world. It is crucial that order and stability is returned to the Arabian Peninsula, and all of our moves are aimed at this principle.”
Powell: “I take no comfort in President Wallace’s assurances? I am rather minded to believe that by following this policy Great Britain will be co-opted into Manifest Destiny Today, Manifest Destiny Tomorrow and Manifest Destiny Forever. Is that not where our current path will lead?”
Callaghan: “Many honourable members of this house have found fit to use the Munich analogy to disparage what they perceive as the lack of our government’s resolve on a number of occasions with regard to our conduct of foreign affairs. Now, when we are faced with a dictator acting with force to take neighbouring territory, and now that we contemplate action to stop this aggression, from where do we hear the echo of Munich? It seems to be coming from South Down. Perhaps the honourable member would decamp himself to Baghdad and there acquire President al-Bakr’s signature on a document guaranteeing peace in our time. This, it seems to me, are the implications of his words in this House.”
May 3, 1979
Airey Neave leaves hospital.
Margaret Thatcher, the former Conservative MP from Finchley, organizes the advocacy group “Justice in Ireland.” JII opposes any settlement with Sein Fein that does not involve total disarmament and prosecution of all armed militants.
The Soviet Union officially announces the death of Mikhail Suslov.
Yuri Andropov is announced as Suslov’s successor as General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party. Viktor Grishin is named as Second Secretary, or Andropov’s party deputy. A previously obscure figure, Vladimir Pavlovich Orlov is named to replace Andropov as Interior Minister while an even more obscure figure, Vitaly Ivanovich Vorotnikov, succeeds Grishin as Moscow Party boss. Vitaly Fedorchuk becomes the General Secretary of the Ukranian Communist Party, while Filipp Bobkov succeeds Fedorchuk as Chairman of the KGB, with Vladimir Alexandrovich Kryuchkov as his Deputy. Ruslan Imranovich Khasbulatov and Yevgeny Maksimovich Primakov begin to gain prominence as advisors to Andropov on economic and foreign affairs, and are both made candidate members of the Politburo. Marshall Sergei Leonidovich Sokolov becomes Deputy Defence Minister (noted as an odd arrangement that puzzles western observers because in terms of military rank he is Defence Minister Kulikov’s superior, yet in his current post he reports to Kulikov as a subordinate).
May 4, 1979
General Hamid reaches a bargain with Ayatollah Taleghani and Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri to gain clerical support for this crackdown on the MEK. Hamid’s cabinet is to include a clerical advisor whose role is to advise, not to impose. The government becomes more solicitous of the clerical establishment as a result.
May 6, 1979
An undercover member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) and an undercover member of the British Army were both shot dead by the IRB at Lisnaskea, County Fermanagh.
The Credolo incident. Pietro Credolo, an assistant to the Italian Defence Minister Sandro Pertini, is arrested in a “love nest” with several call girls. Found in the “love nest” with Credolo are state papers on Italian security and NATO related papers. Two of the prostitutes are known to receive frequent trade from the Soviet Embassy in Rome, and among their clients are listed the Military attaché and the suspected chief of the KGB residency.
Pietro Credolo’s plight becomes a sensation as the right wing media tries to spin it not as an accident, but as a situation where Credolo was caught deliberately making top-secret state papers available to “agents of the Soviet government.” When the government at first defends Credolo, its media opponents spin that into something more sinister – along the lines of “we always warned you Berlinguer and the Communists were a tool of the Soviets and here is the proof.” Berlusconi personally accuses the Prime Minister of treason and espionage and calls for his removal.
Under intensive questioning in the Italian Parliament, Berlinguer says that the Credolo matter will be looked into completely, but he expresses the opinion that Credolo was foolish rather than treasonous, and he refuses to call for Minister Pertini’s resignation. This produces more denunciations on the right.
Foreign observers, and British ones in particular, are stuck with the similarities between this and Britain’s 1963 Profumo scandal, which brought down the MacMillan government over a similar sort of scandal (although no state papers were involved in the Profumo case). More than a few commentators wonder if Credolo was set-up, as this crisis seems to have a staged quality.
May 8, 1979
The Woolworth's store in Manchester city centre in England is seriously damaged by fire; 10 shoppers die.
A state funeral is held in Moscow for Mikhail Suslov.
May 9, 1979
A Unabomber bomb injures Northwestern University graduate student John Harris.
Lech Wałęsa, then a Polish dissident and trade union activist, is arrested for “agitation” by the Polish authorities. As his punishment he is sent to a “fraternal, volunteer labour center” along the Soviet border with the People’s Republic of China. As an electrician, Walesa’s job is to maintain the power grid along the wall built by the Soviets on their border with China.
A car bomb explodes near the Abdeen Palace as President al-Gamsay is driving by. He and several of his bodyguards are injured by shrapnel.
May 10, 1979
The Federated States of Micronesia becomes self-governing.
In the United States a judge ruled that a group of men, believed to be members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) and also considered to be responsible for bombing the Ripon Barracks in North Yorkshire, should be extradited to Britain.
May 12, 1979
The Japanese, South Korean and French governments negotiate an agreement for the Japanese and Koreans to quietly lease space on Moruroa, a French owned South Pacific Island, where the French have conducted nuclear weapons tests. In a related agreement the Japanese reach agreement with the French to license produce two variants of the French Redoutable class ballistic missile submarine. Japan is intending to use the submarines to carry a nuclear missile force aimed at China.
In the years since there has been much debate as to who knew what and when they knew it about the South Korean-Japanese (and the associated Taiwanese) nuclear weapons program. Officially, the Wallace Administration claimed to know nothing about it, but this flies in the face of the obvious intelligence coming into Washington that the Japanese were testing weapons and buying ballistic missile submarine designs from the French. While Paris may not have sought explicit U.S. permission to do this, it is unlikely that they would have done the deal with the Japanese without at least a tacit nod of approval from some official quarter in Washington as the question of proliferation remained central to both governments. The Asians were developing their own Force frappe to protect themselves from the increasingly unstable regime in Peking which threatened them all with nuclear weapons. The French understood this.
It is likely that senior figures in Washington looked the other way (and did not communicate the extent of this activity to President Wallace and his senior advisors) in order to maintain a wilful ignorance of this activity, and avoid the associated risks of either extending an American nuclear umbrella to Asia or risk relations with Tokyo and Seoul over the question. This preserved America’s flexibility of response should any of these nuclear weapons actually be used in combat. (It should be noted that the majority of Japanese and South Korean citizens were kept in the dark about this activity; secrecy was an important shield from political criticism at home for both governments, and so U.S. silence may have been a deliberate act not to provoke a domestic political crisis in either country. The Taiwanese program was not as secret, as the Taipei government wanted the Peking rulers to know that they had their own nuclear deterrence force, and received less resistance to the idea from the Taiwanese population). In August 1979 the U.S. government sold Taiwan the former U.S.S. Sam Houston, an Ethan Allen class ballistic missile submarine which had been decommissioned from the U.S. Navy for this exact purpose. It is unlikely that Washington could have been as ignorant as they later claimed to be about what the Taiwanese were going to do with this operational sea-launching missile platform.
May 13, 1979
Progress 6, an unmanned rocket with no return capability, is launched to deliver additional supplies to the Salyut 6 crew.
May 14, 1979
Skylab VIII launches, with a crew: Vance Brand (Commander), Don Lind (CSM pilot), William B. Lenoir (Mission Engineer specialist). The mission of the SkylabSkylab A vehicle, whose orbit is disintegrating, and to dismantle sections of it, so that when it re-enters Earth's atmosphere it will be in smaller pieces, which will be more likely to burn-up in the atmosphere and not hit the ground. De-orbiting the Skylab A vehicle had been considered by NASA but abandoned as not being cost effective. VIII is to visit the old
May 17, 1979
Portuguese units, supported by Cuban, East German and Czech units, invade Spain on a mission to “secure the border from the fascist attempts to undermine the people’s revolution in Portugal.”
May 19, 1979
Andrei Gromyko officially retires as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (the ceremonial Soviet head of state or “President”) to become the President of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. Yuri Andropov assumes the office of Chairman of the Presidium, which effectively makes the formerly ceremonial office more powerful when combined with Andropov’s Party leadership. In protocol terms this places Andropov on par with other world leaders as an official head of state.
The United States begins separate bilateral talks with Saddam Hussein about the future of Saudi Arabia and the development of an oil export deal. Any oil export from Arabia is for the future, as the oil infrastructure in Arabia has been all but destroyed by the Iraqi invasion. This enhances the influence of Iraq as its own oil export capability, plus the Kuwaiti export capability, acquire more importance on the international oil market.
The United States floats offers to trade Kuwait for Iraqi withdrawal from Arabia.
May 21, 1979
Dan White receives a light sentence for killing San Francisco City Supervisor Harvey Milk and wounding Mayor George Moscone. Gay men in the city riot, leading to violent confrontations between them and San Francisco Police and California National Guard units.
The Montréal Canadiens defeat the New York Rangers 4 games to 1 in the best-of-seven series, winning the Stanley Cup.
The United States government offers to send the Skylab IX mission to Salyut 6 with Dr. Kerwin aboard to check on the two Cosmonauts stranded on the Salyut 6. The Soviet Union turns down the offer.
The U.S. House of Representatives passes an airline de-regulation bill by a vote of 231 – 204. The Bill becomes mired in the Senate for the remainder of 1979. It becomes a particular target of Sen. Edward Kennedy who is trying to line-up union support for Democratic primary challenge to President Wallace. The President has indicated that he will sign the bill once it reaches his desk.
May 23, 1979
Questioning of Major Oliver North USMC – Harsha Committee
Rep. Del Latta (R-OH): Major North, from where did your orders come?
North: I received orders from my superiors, which included the military attaches at our Embassy.
Latta: And your mission was to support the Somoza regime?
North: My mission was to help Nicaraguan people to fight the Cuban and Soviet backed Communist forces who wanted to imprison that country. My mission was to preserve freedom.
Rep. Morris K. Udall (D-AZ): What right did you have get involved at all? This Congress specifically passed a ban prohibiting direct U.S. military involvement in the Nicaraguan Civil War.
North: That was no civil war. It was funded from outside, from Moscow.
Udall: In what capacity were you involved?
North: Adviser.
Udall: Did you kill anyone?
North: I defended myself if required.
Udall: I see. What were you doing at the Nicaraguan parliament the day it was stormed by Somoza troops? Advising?
North: I was there as a tourist that day, sir.
Udall: A tourist?
North: Yes sir.
Udall: Isn’t it true that you were directly in command of that operation?
North: No.
Udall: Then how do you account for reports of you giving orders to Nicaraguan National Guard troops as they operated against FSLN guerrillas who had seized the parliament building?
North: They were wrong.
Udall: And the film of you there, that day, is it wrong too when it shows you giving orders to a Major Bermudez.
North: We were having a discussion.
Udall: About what?
North: He wanted to know if Notre Dame had a chance of making the play-offs that year.
Udall: Do you know what the term civil contempt means, Major North?
North: I can say, with all civility Congressman, that I’m getting a lesson in it now.
Udall: You think you’re funny?
North: I think I’m a patriot working for his country, following the rightful orders of his President in combating our enemies – freedom’s enemies.
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Agnew on Point
“Here again we see the nasty, know nothings of negativity casting their evil spell of liberal loathing over the patriotic protectors of our great land. Morris Udall and his cowardly clutch of Castroites should be ashamed for their conduct before a fine example of our brave American heroism.
“As you well know my friends, I have no kind words for General Secretary Wallace and his Sovietized Administration; however, in this case I must give my support to the effort to preserve a free government in Nicaragua from the pervasive penetration of perfidious communism. Had noble young patriots such as Major North not stood-up and done their duty, today Nicaragua might well be under the iron clasp of Moscow and Havana tyranny. General Secretary Wallace may have given the order to stop this, but it was the noble service of Major North and his brothers-in-arms, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with President Somoza’s brave National Freedom Guard, which threw the red tide back into the sea, and sent Castro’s welps skulking back to Havana with their tails between their legs.
“For Morris Udall to now call that service into question is nothing short of treason. Udall has shown his cowardly colors, and he plans to use them to destroy a noble solider. I have no doubt that he is not alone in this; that General Secretary Wallace is in back of this. You see, my friends, the General Secretary doesn’t want Major North around to tell the truth, so he and his commissar Udall have conspired to blacken his name.
“Why? Because Major North, a true patriot, did his duty too well and foiled General Secretary Wallace’s plan to see Nicaragua fall to the Communists and then to blame the military for his evil deeds. You see, Major North was meant to be the fall guy to cover their pernicious tracks. But instead Major North outfoxed them, proved himself a loyal patriot, and saved freedom in Nicaragua. This they cannot stand, and this is why Commissar Udall must now destroy him.
“I encourage Major North to resist this vicious attack by the cowardly curs of conciliation. I call on you my friends, to send your support to the true patriot, Major North. And I call on you to tell your Congressman to remove this General Secretary and place a true patriot – a true servant of this country and its people – in the White House.”
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May 25, 1979
American Airlines Flight 191 was a regularly scheduled passenger flight in the United States from O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois, to Los Angeles International Airport. On May 25, 1979, the McDonnell Douglas DC-10-10 operating the route crashed moments after takeoff from Chicago. All 258 passengers and 13 crew on board were killed, along with two people on the ground. It was the deadliest air disaster in the history of the United States, as well as the second deadliest involving a DC-10, after Turkish Airlines Flight 981.
Sen. Kennedy uses this disaster to help stall the airline deregulation bill.
Investigators found that as the jet was beginning its takeoff rotation, engine number one on the left (port) wing separated and flipped over the top of the wing. As the engine separated from the aircraft, it severed hydraulic fluid lines and damaged the left wing, resulting in a retraction of the slats. As the jet attempted to climb, the left wing aerodynamically stalled while the right wing, with its slats still deployed, continued to produce lift. The jetliner subsequently rolled to the left and reached a bank angle of 112 degrees (partially inverted), before impacting in an open field near a trailer park located near the end of the runway. The engine separation was attributed to damage to the pylon rigging structure holding the engine to the wing caused by inadequate maintenance procedures at American Airlines.
While maintenance issues and not the actual design of the aircraft would ultimately be found responsible for the crash, the accident and subsequent grounding of all DC-10s by the Federal Aviation Administration added to an already unfavorable reputation of the DC-10 aircraft in the eyes of the public caused by other unrelated accidents.
John Spenkelink is executed in Florida, in the first use of the electric chair in America after the reintroduction of death penalty in 1976.
British spy Oleg Gordievsky has been promoted to KGB liaison with the Central Committee, which in practice means that he manages many of Andropov’s intelligence briefings. This gives him (and his British handlers) rare access into the inner core of Soviet thinking and intelligence. Gordievsky in turn passes on a report which causes consternation and debate within the British and American military establishment for years to come. Gordievsky’s report – called “the Leningrad Catalogue” to obscure it’s source (and attributed to a Leningrad source to all but a few top intelligence officials) – jars western nerves on these two points:
1] He claims that Soviet military construction (in particular naval, missile and nuclear programs) are pushing the Soviet industrial economy to the breaking point. Specifically, Gordievsky is advising the west that Andropov knows that the Soviet economy is nearing the breaking point, and that he and Romanov will have to act in some fashion to remedy this. While this is accepted in London, it flies in the face of the “Team B” theories of CIA Director Ickle, National Security Advisor Paul Nitze and SNICO Lew Allen. This causes them to dismiss Gordievsky as a disinformation agent.
2] Gordievsky claims that Suslov, who contracted a serious flu after his trip to Cuba at the beginning of 1979, was poisoned while convalescing. Gordievsky does not point directly at Andropov and Fedorchuk, but the implication is between the lines of his report on what he calls “a whisper making the rounds in Moscow.” The allegation, which ironically is considered more acceptable in Washington than in London, leads many to question Gordievsky’s reliability.
May 26, 1979
The Nicaraguan National Guard scores a significant victory against the remaining FSLN forces, which are forced to scatter after their defeat. Daniel Ortega, their political leader, flees into exile in Havana.
Speilberg Film announces that actor G.W. Bush will play the lead character, an adventurer-archaeologist called Montana Jones, in an up-coming spoof of 1930’s B-serials to be called Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Skylab IX launches to the Skylab B laboratory with crew: Alan L. Bean (Commander), Owen K. Garriott (Science Pilot), Joseph P. Kerwin (Physician). Their mission is to fire a booster to raise Skylab B's orbit in addition to conducting a number of other tests and experiments. During the mission the Skylab VIII visits the SkylabSkylab IX crew in firing the orbital raising booster. With six astronauts at the Skylab B over four days, this represents the largest manned space mission to date by NASA. B and assists the
May 27, 1979
Indianapolis 500: Rick Mears wins the race for the first time, and car owner Roger Penske for the second time.
The PJO backs Malian General Sekou Bamako who leads a coup against President Moussa Traoré. As President Bamako gives the PJO greater access to Malian state resources. He also cracks down on “westernism” in Mali and declares Sharia law to be the law of the land. The Bamako government also forges close relations with Col. Qaddafi in Lybia.
May 28, 1979
The Portuguese and allied forces penetrate into Spain as far as front line running approximately from Salamanca to Seville before entrenched Spanish defenders manage to hold them. In the north Portuguese troops make little progress beyond Ponteverda and Monfote de Lemos ; here they face not only Spanish troops but also exiled Portuguese troops which have been fighting the DPRP Communist forces in the mountains since 1975.
The Portuguese are assisted by a rising in the Basque region against the central government, which diverts Spanish military and security forces.
May 29, 1979
A substantial seismic disturbance is detected in the area of Yonaguni Island, but which to many scientists seems uncharacteristic of an earthquake. It is in fact a top secret underground nuclear weapons test being conducted by the Japanese.
In a historic public meeting in Hue (the ancient capital of the Vietnamese Empire) President Ton Duc Thang of North Vietnam, Prime Minister Pham Van Dong of North Vietnam and President Truong Quang Ngô of South Vietnam sign an agreement of “Mutual Respect and Dialogue” between the two regimes. Though not advertised as such, the agreement is effectively a diplomatic recognition by each regime of the other. Among other things it allows Saigon and Hanoi to explore a status of forces agreement involving the Southern troops currently deployed in the North and along the North’s border with Laos. The agreement also delineates “spheres of operations” between the two in Laos. “Information offices” are established in Hanoi and Saigon which are, effectively, embassies between the two regimes. At the request of the Saigon government the United States recognizes the agreement as well.
The United States opens a consulate in Hanoi.
May 30, 1979
The UN Security Council votes for a series of sanctions against the Democratic Progressive Republic of Portugal, but these are vetoed by the USSR.
June 1, 1979
The Vizianagaram district is formed in Andhra Pradesh, India.
The Seattle SuperSonics win the NBA Championship against the Washington Bullets.
The UN Security Council votes for a series of sanctions against Spain, but these are vetoed by the United States, with Great Britain abstaining.
June 2, 1979
Soviet spy John A. Walker is tasked by his Soviet handlers to obtain the complete blueprints and specifications of a Nimitz class nuclear powered aircraft carrier.
Nicaraguan President Anastasio Somoza Debalye announces that he will not step down as previously agreed, but will seek another term in office in an election to be held on September 2, 1979.
Skylab VII returns to the Earth.
June 3, 1979
A blowout at the Ixtoc I oil well in the southern Gulf of Mexico causes at least 600,000 tons (176,400,000 gallons) of oil to be spilled into the waters, the worst oil spill to date. Some estimate the spill to be 428 million gallons, making it the largest unintentional oil spill until to date.
Ron Dellums and Ralph Nader announce that they will run a joint ticket for the New Progressive Movement, with Dellums as Presidential candidate and Nader as Vice Presidential candidate. Not facing primaries, Dellums and Nader will instead work to sign-up voters in key states (i.e. build a grassroots network) and make the effort to get on as many state ballots as possible.
The Pope condemns the war in the Iberian Peninsula. He is disregarded in his own country, where the regime considers him to be an enemy. Meanwhile conservative clerics in Spain, many of whom are still closely associated with the regime, suspect that the Pope has leftist tendencies, so they too counsel the Falangist government of Prime Minister Milans del Bosch to disregard him.
The Spanish government at first rallies its people behind the call to defend the nation against an invader. However, with the constant bombardment of Portuguese propaganda which aims to convince the Spanish people – and the leftists among them in particular – that the goal of the Portuguese is to liberate their oppressed brothers and not gain territory in Spain, some resistance begins to surface to the Spanish regime from within the Spanish population.
The Basque region of Spain officially declares its independence from Spain. The Soviet Union immediately recognizes the new Basque Republic.
June 4, 1979
Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings takes power in Ghana after a military coup in which General Fred Akuffo is overthrown.
Italian President Norberto Bobbio offers his support to the “elected government.”
June 5, 1979
Anatoly Dobrynin, the Soviet Ambassador to the United States, is named to replace the retiring Valerian Zorin as the new Soviet Foreign Minister. Unlike Zorin, Dobrynin is made a candidate member of the Politburo at the time of his appointment. The former Soviet Ambassador the UN Nikolai Fedorenko is named as the new Soviet Ambassador to the United States.
Morocco attempts a military intervention to remove President Bamako’s government from office. Bamako’s forces are backed in fighting the Moroccans by the PJO. Algeria also intervenes on the side of Mali, largely to prevent Morocco from gaining the upper hand in Mali, creating a tense stand-off in the area.
The United States offers support to Spain, and begins airlifting and sea lifting supplies.
The United States and the Royal Navy begin blockading Portuguese mainland ports.
June 6, 1979
Soyuz 34 launched into Earth orbit. An unmanned craft, the Soyuz 34 returned the Soyuz 32 crew from the Salyut 6 to the Earth on August 13, 1979.
June 7, 1979
The first direct elections to the European Parliament begin, allowing citizens from across all then-9 European Community member states to elect 410 MEPs. It is also the first international election in history.
Northern Ireland was treated as a single constituency with three seats being contested by 13 candidates. The election was by Proportional Representation using the Single Transferable Vote (STV) system while the rest of the United Kingdom (UK) continued to use the 'first past the post' system . Ian Paisley, then leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), topped the poll with 29.8 per cent of the first preference votes and was elected on the first count. John Hume, then deputy leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), got 24.6 per cent of the vote and narrowly missed the quota but was elected on the third count. John Taylor, Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), got 11.9 per cent of the first preference vote and was elected on the sixth count.
June 8, 1979
Questioning of Secretary of State Henry Jackson – Harsha Committee
Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX): The question I want answered Mr. Secretary is, did the President authorize the expenditure of taxpayer funds on a military assistance project in Nicaragua which Congress had barred by law.
Jackson: This administration followed a policy of supporting an ally in the struggle against Communism, mainly through technical and non-lethal aid. Was some of that converted to military use? Possibly. Unfortunately we can’t control every aspect or activity in a foreign nation.
Paul: But that’s exactly your responsibility Mr. Secretary, as a steward of the public trust, to watch over what is done with our money. So, I’m asking again, did the President authorize an illegal use of tax payer money.
Jackson: Since the Constitution gives to the President the authority to decide on matters of foreign affairs, I can’t judge what an illegal use might be.
Paul: Was money ear-marked for non-military support transferred over to support military operations?
Jackson: Money that was allocated for peaceful aid was used accordingly. I can’t answer for what happened on the military side, and frankly I won’t. The fact that you have granted to yourself, without a firm Constitutional basis, the right to dictate what is, and what is not illegal in foreign policy, does not necessarily give to this or any Congress that right.
Paul: We allocate the money – the taxpayers money, we have the right.
Jackson: You need to examine what occurred in all of this. Nicaragua was spared from going down the Cuban path to tyranny and subjugation. The Cubans and Soviets were deprived of a foothold on the North American continent, from which they could have furthered their subversion of other allied democracies. That, Mr. Paul, is a significant victory for our side, and I might add it was our obligation to the other nations of this hemisphere under the terms of the Rio treaty.
Paul: If you trespass on my land, I don’t care how many skunks you kill, you’re still trespassing on my land, Mr. Secretary. Not to put too a fine a point on it, but if this money was misallocated from peaceful use to military operations, then I have to ask if the President is guilty of ordering an embezzlement of public funds.
Jackson: Don’t be ridiculous.
Paul: I kinda find it ridiculous that the hard-working American taxpayer has to put-up with his money being handed over to ruthless dictators – gangsters in uniform really – just appease the anti-Communist lobby here. Where is it written in the Constitution that we have to be savior of every tin pot dictator? Our imperial power in the last thirty years has made us arrogant, so arrogant that now the President thinks he can violate the laws of Congress and misappropriate public money for a purpose it was never intended.
Jackson: Is there a question, or are you making a statement, Congressman?
Paul: Actually, I think it is you and the President who are making a big statement about what is wrong with this country.
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June 10, 1979
The Iranian Army and armed MEK guerrillas clash in Isfahan, which leads to a street battle. Air Force jets are called in to pummel urban blocks where the MEK hold-up, leading to a large number of civilian deaths as a result of bombing.
Israeli jets over-fly Arabian air space, offering an apparent show of force against the Iraqi occupiers.
US combat jets based in Syria and on the Mediterranean fly missions to warn off Israeli aircraft.
June 11, 1979
Hollywood Actor John Wayne (Marion Morrison) dies from cancer.
June 12, 1979
Bryan Allen flies the man-powered Gossamer Albatross across the English Channel.
Israeli jets stage a “mock attack” on the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk carrier group as it transits the Mediterranean off the coast of Israel. Israel later claims that it was an exercise and that the proper notification to the U.S. was “lost in transmission.”
While the center in the Spanish-Portuguese war bogs down into trench warfare and stalemate, a Portuguese offensive in the north manages to attain a link-up with the Basque nationalist forces.
Spanish forces, supplied from the sea by the United States Navy, continue to hold a pocket of northwest Spain from Oviedo to St. Eugenia.
June 13, 1979
The Soyuz 32 capsule was returned unmanned to Earth. (Soyuz 32 had the same kind of faulty engine design as Soyuz 33, while Soyuz 34 had received a technical upgrade based on findings from an examination of the data from Soyuz 33. Soviet space flight authorities decided not to risk the crew's life by returning them in the Soyuz 32 capsule and thus sent a new one to retrieve them).
June 18, 1979
The Soviet Navy begins escorting supply ships sailing into Portugal, in effect daring the US Navy and the Royal Navy to challenge them. The Soviets also begin convoying more supplies and troops across the Atlantic from Cuba to Portugal, again demonstrating that they have power in the Atlantic and defying the U.S. blockade around Portugal.
While the Wallace Administration and the Healey government agree to keep all third country and unescorted ships out of Portuguese ports, the British adamantly refuse to challenge the Soviet escorted ships directly, as Britain does not want to escalate the crisis into a war. The U.S. reluctantly concedes to this point for now, hoping that its reinforcement of Spain will over time win out. In the meantime the CIA continues to feed support to anti-regime elements in the DPRP.
California Proposition 12 is approved for the June 3, 1980 primary ballot. The proposition will ask California voters if they will approve of the secession of the northern counties of California to form a new State.
June 20, 1979
American Airlines Flight 293 was a domestic American Airlines flight which was hijacked by Nikola Kavaja, a Serbian nationalist and anti-communist, on June 20, 1979. During the hijacking Kavaja demanded and received another airplane with the intent of crashing it into the headquarters of the Yugoslav Communist Party.
Nikola Kavaja was one of six Serbs convicted in May 1979 for the November 1975 bombing of the Yugoslav consul’s home in Chicago (He later claimed to have also tried to assassinate Tito with a rifle in Catoctin Mountain Park, Maryland during the Yugoslav Marshall's 1971 visit to Camp David). On June 20, 1979, Kavaja, already released on bail, took over the Boeing 727 shortly before it landed in Chicago from New York by threatening the pilots with a homemade bomb. He demanded the release of Stojilko Kajevich, a Serbian Orthodox priest and accomplice in the consul home bombing who remained in jail. After letting the passengers and most of the crew members go, Kavaja forced what was left of the crew to fly back to New York, where he demanded a Boeing 707 to fly him to Ireland. At the direction of President Wallace, FCTB Special Anti-Hijack Units stormed the aircraft at this point, killing Kavaja and one of the crew.
June 23, 1979
In Sydney, Australia, New South Wales Premier Peter Coleman officially opens the Eastern Suburbs Railway. It operates as a shuttle between Central & Bondi Junction until full integration with the Illawarra Line in 1980.
French President Francois Mitterrand attempts to intervene and negotiate a cease fire by the Portuguese, but is rebuffed by Goncalves.
June 24, 1979
Bologna: founding of the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal, an international opinion tribunal, at the initiative of Senator Lelio Basso.
The MEK reaches an agreement with the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) to share operational facilities in the Kurdish areas of Iran and along the Iran-Iraq border.
June 25, 1979
Mons, Belgium: The NATO Supreme Allied Commander General Frederick C. Weyand USA is assassinated by the Red Army Faction terrorist organization. A land mine blew up under the bridge on which Weyand’s car was traveling, killing the General and two of the three bodyguards in a following car (the third was seriously wounded).
As a result of this action the United States put further pressure on the Kohl Government to take a harder line against the terrorist networks operating in Germany. (Something the Kohl government was doing anyway, but the murder of a high profile American General helped to galvanize some political support). RAF member Rolf Clemens Wagner was assassinated in October 1979 (it was believed by U.S. Special Forces in retaliation for this attack).
General Henry E. “Gunslinger” Emerson, the hero of Vietnam, replaces Weyand as NATO Supreme Allied Commander.
June 28, 1979
The unmanned Progress 7 rocket is launched to bring more supplies and equipment to Salyut 6.
The Spanish Air Force briefly obtains air superiority thanks to the support from the United States, however this is soon countered by supplies of SAMs and other anti-aircraft weapons from the Soviet Union.
July 1, 1979
Sweden outlaws corporal punishment in the home.
The Mandarin Restaurant chain begins operation in Brampton, Ontario.
The Sony Walkman goes on sale for the first time in Japan.
July 8, 1979
Los Angeles passes its gay and lesbian civil rights bill.
July 9, 1979
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.
The MEK opens a liaison office in Moscow. MEK guerrillas also receive training in the Soviet Union and North Korea.
July 11, 1979
NASA's first orbiting space station Skylab A begins its return to Earth, after being in orbit for 6 years and 2 months. Most of it burns up in the Earth’s atmosphere, however several pieces make impact in the Pacific Ocean.
The 1979 Garuda Fokker F28 crash occurred on 11 July 1979 when a Garuda Indonesia Fokker F28 airliner on a domestic flight in Indonesia from Sultan Mahmud Badaruddin II Airport, Palembang, to Polonia International Airport, Medan, struck Mount Sibayak at 5,560 feet (1,690 m) on approach to landing. There were no survivors.
July 12, 1979
Kiribati declares independence from the United Kingdom.
Carmine Galante, boss of New York City’s Bonanno Crime Family, was assassinated just as he finished eating lunch at Joe and Mary's Italian-American Restaurant in Bushwick, Brooklyn along with Leonard Coppola, a Bonanno capo and restaurant owner/cousin Giuseppe Turano, a family soldier. At 2:45 pm, three ski-masked men came into the restaurant and opened fire with shotguns and handguns. Cigar still clenched in his mouth, Galante was shot dead along with Coppola and Turano.
A fire at a hotel in Saragossa, Spain leaves 72 dead. This is the worst hotel fire in Europe in decades.
British Prime Minister Denis Healey criticised the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) after it had broadcast an interview with a member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA).
The U.S. uses its naval power to interdict the flow of construction material and resources into Iraq, Kuwait and Arabia in order to pressure Iraq into compliance.
July 14, 1979
Questioning of Director of Central Intelligence Dr. Fred Ickle – Harsha Committee
Paul Boutelle (SWP-NY): Did you know about the death squads operating in Nicaragua? And did you try to stop them?
Ickle: We were, of course, aware that this activity was going on, and on several occasions the Ambassador spoke to President Somoza about cutting it out. But we had no direct control or knowledge.
Boutelle: Did the President know?
Ickle: There was mention of some related activities in his briefings, but it was a minor point.
Boutelle: So Wallace knew Tacito was murdering thousands of his own people – the poor, the outcasts of his plantation – and yet our President did nothing. In fact, our President knew what was going on and signed-off on aid to the guy anyway? Is that what you are saying here?
Ickle: No, it’s what you’re saying, Congressman.
Chairman (Rep. Bill Harsha (R-OH)): I don’t think this is getting us to the point...
Boutelle: The Hell it isn’t! Man, this is the point. Wallace helped this monster kill thousands, and now he’ll kill thousands more, and they call it a minor point? Hell, we need to impeach George Wallace for ten thousand murders.
Chairman: That’s enough, Mr. Boutelle! This is not a...
Boutelle: Not a what? Courtroom? It’s exactly that. Its where we call them to account for the results of their policies. Look at what they’re doin’ to the people of Portugal. We should be asking how much money they’re pouring into fascist Spain.
Chairman: Mr. Boutelle, you have been warned.
Ickle: Gentlemen, do I need to be here for this?
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July 16, 1979
A coup attempt against Iraqi President Hassan al-Bakr fails. Mass arrests of a number of senior Ba’ath Party officials and Army officers follow.
July 17, 1979
Ian Paisley, then leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), interrupted the opening proceedings of the European parliament to protest that the Union flag was flying the wrong way up on the Parliament Buildings.
July 18, 1979
Ian Paisley, then leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), tried to interrupt Paddy Donegan, then Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) and President of the European Council, but was shouted down by other Members of the European Parliament (MEPs).
July 19, 1979
Maritza Sayalero of Venezuela wins the Miss Universe Pageant; the stage collapses after contestants and news photographers rush to her throne.
July 20, 1979
Vice President Saddam Hussein re-affirms his loyalty to President al-Bakr.
Sen. Howard Baker (R-TN) announces that he will seek the Republican Presidential nomination in 1980.
July 21, 1979
It was announced that Pope Pius XIII would pay a visit to Ireland on 29 September 1979. Ian Paisley, then leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), and the Orange Order warned that he should not visit Northern Ireland.
Gov. Donald Rumsfeld (R-IL) announces that he will seek the Republican Presidential nomination in 1980.
July 31, 1979
Dan-Air Flight 0034 was a fatal accident involving a Hawker Siddeley HS 748 series 1 turboprop aircraft operated by Dan Air Service Limited on an oil industry charter flight from Sumburgh Airport, Shetland Islands, to Aberdeen Airport. The crash, which occurred on 31 July 1979 50 m (160 ft) offshore following the aircraft's failure to take off, resulted in the aircraft's destruction and 17 deaths of 47 on board (15 of 44 passengers and both pilots).
August 1, 1979
An initiative by Senator Edward Kennedy and Governor Hugh Carey of New York to stop the sale of arms to the RUC by US manufacturers is undercut when the Wallace Administration green-lights the sale. The aim of Kennedy and Carey and other of their supporters had been to try to bring pressure on the British government to reach a settlement in the Northern Ireland conflict. President Wallace and Secretary of State Jackson however had sided with the British, who had placed the order for the RUC, and in so doing had continued the US official policy of not interfering with Britain’s policies in the conflict.
August 3, 1979
Dictator Francisco Macías Nguema of Equatorial Guinea is overthrown in a in a bloody coup d'état lead by Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.
French troops are mobilized along the border between France and Spain to prevent incursions from Spain and to add extra protection to the land border. French air force jets no fly into border areas, keeping Spanish and Portuguese air force jets away from the French border.
August 4, 1979
Opening game of the American Football Bundesliga played between Frankfurter Löwen and Düsseldorf Panther, first-ever league game of American football in Germany.
The infamous “Bad Brother” operation begins in Khartoum, Sudan. A senior Iraqi General, Mushad al-Quami, tries to defect to the Americans, by entering the U.S. Embassy and asking to see the CIA station chief. While he waits, an American man approaches him, tells him to leave the Embassy, and meet him and his associates at another part of town.
General al-Quami leaves the Embassy, to the puzzlement of the local staff. He meets his CIA contacts at a food packing plant in Khartoum and agrees to spy for the United States inside the Iraqi regime.
What al-Quami doesn’t realize at the time is that the CIA officers who diverted him are in fact Israeli Mossad who have taken over the General as an agent in a “false flag” recruitment. The U.S. Embassy is not aware of what happened, so the brief encounter with al-Quami is never properly reported to the U.S. intelligence authorities.
The recruiter who sat down beside al-Quami in the Embassy waiting area and spoke with him briefly is a Mr. Walter Parton, a business man from Wilmington, Delaware who proceeds to his scheduled meeting with the Trade Counsel to discuss export opportunities – and thus not arousing suspicion at the time. (The real Walter Parton is tracked down years later in Wilmington and found to be truck driver whose identity was appropriated: most importantly the real Parton had never applied for a passport in his life).
The Israelis had been watching al-Quami, who was in Sudan supposedly on a military assistance mission, and had worked out that he was planning a discreet visit to the U.S. Embassy during his stay. Six Walter Parton type figures (three, including Parton, used U.S. identities, two used British identities and one used a Canadian identity) had appointments with assorted officials at the U.S. Embassy, so that the Israelis had coverage for intercepting al-Quami when he decided to drop in.
August 5, 1979
As the Spanish war bogs down into a stalemate, and the United States and Soviet Union continue to warily circle one another at sea, there are several risings by leftists in Spain. The Spanish government is now forced to deal with an insurrectional element that is starting an urban guerrilla war in its rear.
The Moroccan military destroys what is left of the Polisario Liberation Front in Mauritania.
Agnew On Point
“My friends, we are clearly at a moment of history, a defining moment for Christian civilization, one when we could permanently enshrine Western and Christian values as the first principles of this Earth. We have in our hands today the power to end the curse of Islam and its threat to western civilization forever. We could safeguard Israel and our nations vital strategic interests by instructing our great military to take Arabia and expel the unbelievers from the peninsula.
“For centuries the Mohammedans have sat atop the sea of oil and arrogated to themselves the right to determine the price of oil and hold the destiny of western enterprise – the very foundation of your job and well being – to their pleasure. Well, no more! Today we can act to place the single largest supply of oil on this planet under our wiser, more enlightened care, and throw the infidels and god haters from the sands of Arabia for good.
“What stands in the way of our fulfilling this glorious, God anointed destiny? What wishy-washy weakling would dare pass-up the opportunity to stand firm for western Christian values against the infidel?
“General Secretary Wallace, that’s who. He, who has the power, has elected to stand aside at this critical hour of civilization. General Secretary Wallace would rather bow before the Arab sword than take measures to ensure your energy security. General Secretary Wallace believes it is all right for you to pay three, even four dollars a gallon for gas when, with but one stroke of his pen, General Secretary Wallace could reduce the cost of gas to thirty or forty cents. Wouldn’t that help your family?
“Why doesn’t General Secretary Wallace act? Could it be that his show of extorting money from the oil companies was an act, and that he has been captured by the oil lobby? Could it be that Wallace is throwing you, your family, your well being and the future of Christian civilization under the bus in return for a fat check from the oil lobby, a check made out in the funds extorted from you every time you go to the pump.
“Could that be why General Secretary Wallace does not act?”
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August 6, 1979
Technicians at Thames Television go on strike following a long-running dispute.
An MEK taskforce successfully detonates three bombs at Iran’s Bandar Abbas oil processing facility, causing a fire and damaging Iran’s oil exporting capability.
Charles J. Wright, the Mayor of Davenport, Iowa, officially enters the 1980 Democratic Party Iowa caucuses. The event goes largely unnoticed at the time.
August 7, 1979
Eamon Ryan (32), a civilian in the Republic of Ireland, was shot dead by the IRB during a bank robbery in Strand Street, Tramore, County Waterford.
August 9, 1979
A nudist beach is established in Brighton, UK.
Raymond Washington, co-founder of the Crips street gang is killed in a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles (his killers were not identified).
August 10, 1979
Michael Jackson releases his first breakthrough album Off the Wall. It sells 7 million copies in the United States alone, making it a 7x platinum album.
The whole of the ITV network except the Channel Islands is affected by a technicians' strike for eleven weeks.
Pat Robertson announces that he will seek the Democratic nomination for President in 1980.
Robertson: “You see here my membership card in the West Virginia Democratic Party. Some of you may wonder why I choose to seek the Democratic nomination and not the Republican one. Well, to begin with, my father was a Democratic Senator from West Virginia for many years, and as the bible commands that we should honor our father, so I honor him in my choice of parties. Secondly, I find in the Democratic party a flock that has strayed furthest from the path of the righteous one and into the inequity of sin and division. So it is here, to those in greatest need of spiritual as well as temporal leadership, that I offer myself-up as leader and future President.”
August 11, 1979
The former Mauritanian province of Tiris al-Gharbiyya in Western Sahara is annexed by Morocco.
The 1979 Dniprodzerzhynsk mid-air collision occurred on 11 August 1979 when two Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-134s collided over the Ukrainian SSR, near Dniprodzerzhynsk. All aboard both aircraft were killed. The Head of Ukranian civil aviation was removed from his post and later shot over this incident.
Representatives from the Irish National Caucus paid a visit to Northern Ireland and said that the Caucus intended to make the conflict in the region a major issue during the 1980 US Presidential election.
Former Senator Strom Thurmond (R-SC) announces that he will seek the Republican Presidential nomination in 1980.
Thurmond: “Governor Reagan can’t win; he had his chance in seventy-six but couldn’t make it, and quite frankly, when his voice was needed most, he went soft on the true conservative values I will fight to bring to the White House.”
August 13, 1979
The two Soyuz 32 Cosmonauts return to Earth on the Soyuz 34 capsule. Their mission had lasted 175 days, a new endurance record surpassing the 139-day mission by the Soyuz 29 crew in 1978. Both Cosmonauts had some trouble speaking for a time after landing, Lyakhov lost 5.5 kg during the flight (Ryumin's weight was the same) and both experienced a 20 per cent reduction in lower leg volume. They recovered in seven days, several days faster than expected.
At the behest of his controllers, General al-Quami begins feeding disinformation about Saddam Hussein to Iraq’s Secret Police.
August 14, 1979
A freak storm during the Fastnet Race results in the death of 15 sailors.
August 18, 1979
President al-Gamsay of Egypt visits Moscow in order to solicit military assistance and aid. He also wants supplemental training by the KGB for his internal security forces.
August 22, 1979
Terence Boston, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, rejected a proposal that Hugh Carey, then Governor of New York, should chair talks in New York between Boston and Patrick Cooney, then Irish Foreign Minister.
August 24, 1979
Former Gov. Ronald Reagan, the 1976 Republican presidential nominee, announces that he will seek the Republican Presidential nomination in 1980.
August 27, 1979
An effort to assassinate Earl Louis Mountbatten of Burma (the King’s uncle) by certain members of the IRB is foiled when the Irish Gardia intervene and defuse a bomb aboard Lord Mountbatten’s fishing boat. (Earl Mountbatten was in County Sligo in the Republic at the time). Apparently, the PIRA and Sinn Fein arranged the tip-off to the Irish police. In a latter statement the PIRA noted that “killing one royal didn’t do much good” and “killing a second will only hurt the people.” The PIRA statement also referred to the irresponsible action of “hot-heads” who “think with their rifles and bombs instead of their heads,” an obvious swipe at their break-away cadres who formed the IRB.
On the same day, the Warrenpoint ambush occurs: Irish Republican Brigade members attack a British convoy at Narrow Water, County Down, killing 18 British soldiers.
August 28, 1979
John Hardy (43), a Catholic civilian, was shot dead by the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) at his home in Ashton Street, New Lodge, Belfast. The UVF later claim the murder is in retaliation for the attempt on Earl Mountbatten’s life.
August 29, 1979
A national referendum is held in which Ethiopian voters approve a new liberal constitution, promulgated by President Aman Mikael Andom to placate the United States.
British Prime Minister Denis Healey paid a visit to Northern Ireland to hold discussions on security.
The Vatican announced that Pope Pius XIII would, at his insistence, travel to Armagh, Northern Ireland during his forthcoming visit to Ireland on 30 September 1979.
August 30, 1979
As a part of Prime Minister Healey’s consultations a decision was taken by the British government to increase the size of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) by 1,000 officers to 7,500. This reflected a continuation of the policy of 'Ulsterisation' or 'police primacy'. There was some continuing friction between the British Army (BA) and the RUC over this policy.
U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Rep. Trent Lott (R-MS) announces that he has established an exploratory committee for a possible run for the Republican Presidential nomination in 1980.
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