The Burning Sand
January 2, 1974
The uniform speed limit was signed into law by President Gavin on January 2, 1974 and became effective 60 days later, by requiring the 55 mph limit as a condition of each state receiving highway funds.
The legislation required 55 mph speed limits on all 4 lane divided highways unless the road had a lower limit before November 1, 1973. In some cases, like the New York Thruway, the 50 mph speed limit had to be raised to 55 mph to comply with the law. The law capped speed limits at 55 mph on all other roads.
January 6, 1974
Year-round daylight saving time was implemented on January 6, 1974 as an energy conserving measure. The move spawned significant criticism because it forced many children to commute to school before sunrise
January 9, 1974
Henry Kissinger formally confirmed by the U.S. Senate in the rank of Ambassador-at-large.
President Gavin announces that he is nominating Thomas S. Gates Jr., a former Deputy Secretary of Defense and Secretary of Defense under President Eisenhower, to serve as Ambassador to the Republic of Vietnam. Asked why the United States needs an Ambassador to a country that is being administered by another American – General Earle Wheeler – the President points out:
“General Wheeler’s post is temporary, and of an administrative nature. Ambassador Gates will be fulfilling a diplomatic role with the South Vietnamese government which speaks of our commitment to permanent relations with a sovereign and free Republic of Vietnam whose leaders will be elected by their people. General Wheeler’s job will be done once the next South Vietnamese President is elected, whereas Ambassador Gates and his successors will continue the process of our long and abiding friendship with a close, sovereign ally and equal partner in international affairs.”
January 23, 1974
A Provisional IRA unit, which included Rose Dugdale and Eddie Gallagher, hijacked a helicopter and used it to drop bombs on Strabane RUC station.
February 2, 1974
After a series of closed-door meetings with various Congressional leaders, televised hearings for the confirmation of former Governor William Scranton to the office of Vice President of the United States begin.
February 4, 1974
Twelve people were killed in the M62 Coach Bombing, when a bomb exploded on a coach as it was travelling along the M62 motorway at Birkenshaw. The dead included nine soldiers, and two young children.
February 5, 1974
US Mariner 10 returns 1st close-up photos of Venus' cloud structure.
Rep. Barry Goldwater Jr. (R-CA) announces that he will seek the Republican nomination for Governor of California.
The Grand Jury in the District of Columbia returns a true bill indictment of former President Richard Nixon on the charges of obstructing justice, conspiracy to obstruct justice, interstate activity meant to further an on-going conspiracy, violations of the Federal Elections Act, conspiracy to violate provisions of the Federal Telecommunications Act, tax evasion, perjury and abuse of official authority to obstruct the investigation of federal crimes.
February 8, 1974
After a record 84 days in orbit, the crew of Skylab 4 returns to Earth.
House debate begins on the McKeithen Act (allowing individual taxpayers to be refunded (at no tax penalty) their payroll deductions for the tax year 1973, and the last six months of 1972), the Long-Dole Act ( a proposal for an Earned Income Tax credit into the Tax Code) and a federal stimulus proposal (The 1974 Economic Revival Act) .
February 10, 1974
A border skirmish between Iran and Iraq erupts into a full-scale war between the two countries.
Former California Lieutenant Governor Robert Finch announces that he will seek the Republican nomination for Governor of California.
The Senate votes to confirm Ambassador Thomas S. Gates by a vote of 71 – 28.
February 12, 1974
Confirmation hearings begin for the nomination of Senator Stuart Symington (D-MO) to the position of Secretary of Defense.
Preliminary proceedings begin in the trial for Former President Richard Nixon (United States v. Nixon). The former President has some top-flight lawyers working on his behalf, including Edward Bennett Williams. The preliminary arguments and motions tie up the courts for much of the remainder of 1974 before a trail can actually begin.
February 17, 1974
Robert K. Preston, a disgruntled U.S. Army private, buzzes the White House with a stolen helicopter.
February 19,1974
After a divisive House debate the End the Vietnam War Resolution of 1974 fails to pass the House by a vote 221 – 214 against.
Instead a compromise resolution, the Vietnam Oversight Act is passed by a vote of 291 – 144; this act gives Congress the power to oversee the Vietnam conflict and to limit U.S. military actions it determines are excessive, such as “incursions into third countries.”
Attempts by Senators Edward Kennedy, Birch Bayh, Walter Mondale and William Proxmire to introduce a similar bill into the Senate have been blocked by the Senate leadership. The Senate version of the resolution fails to make it past the Senate Armed Services and the Senate Judiciary Committee, the committees where two efforts are made to push it through to the full Senate, but fail.
Senator John Tunney (D-CA) introduces a modified version of the Vietnam Oversight Act into the Senate.
February 23, 1974
Heiress Patricia Hearst killed during a botched kidnapping attempt. This sets-off an intensive manhunt for the Symbonise Liberation Army, a self-styled domestic revolutionary group responsible for the kidnap attempt.
February 27, 1974
The Senate adopts the Vietnam Oversight resolution by a vote of 68 – 32.
February 28, 1974
In the British General Election the Conservative government retains a slim majority by winning 321 seats in the House Commons. Edward Heath is returned for a second term as Prime Minister.
Total Seats: 635 (318 needed to form a Majority)
Conservatives: 330 (-9) 321 seats: majority government retained
Labour: 288 (+7) 295 seats
Liberals 6 (+3) 9 seats
Others: 10 seats
The relative strength of the British economy and an abatement of labour unrest in late 1973 are seen as factors contributing to the Heath Government’s re-election. The vote is seen not as an overwhelming endorsement of Heath’s Conservatives as much as a reflection of the even division of support between the Conservative s and Labour among British voters.
The United States and Egypt resume formal diplomatic relations.
President Gavin vetoes the Vietnam Oversight Act, citing it as an unconstitutional intrusion by the Congress into the President’s constitutional responsibility for managing foreign affairs and commanding U.S. military forces.
(From Gerald R. Ford A Time of Crisis)
During the spring of 1974 there was a strange kind of seesaw in the Congress between the Gavin Administration and the more extreme ends of both parties.
Most of us, Democrat and Republican, came together to back the President’s economic proposals. With a few notable exceptions, the majority on both sides of the aisles in the House and the Senate wanted to be seen to address the rising unemployment and lack of productivity in the country. The McKeithen, Long-Dole and 1974 Recovery Act all seemed to address some of those concerns, so building a consensus to get the through and onto the President’s desk wasn’t very hard.
Senators Fanin and Goldwater did lead a charge from the right arguing that the acts involved too much government tampering with the economy, a charge that was quickly picked-up by Governor Reagan and the group of supporters that was gathering around him with an eye toward the next Presidential election.
To my surprise Representative Barry Goldwater junior, who was seeking the Republican nomination for California Governor on the platform that he was Governor Reagan’s ideological heir, backed away from that extreme rhetoric and supported the program, though I suspect he did so only after some hard swallowing. Like most of us he must have seen the level of desperation that was building out there, and he didn’t want to alienate the voters in California, a state which was being hard-hit by economic times.
At the same time Senators Kennedy, Bayh, Mondale and Proxmire, joined by Representatives Dellums and Chisholm, among others on the Democrat left, were coming at the Administration with arguments that the measures weren’t going far enough. They seemed to want a second New Deal which would have effectively transformed the United States into a European style welfare state – perhaps going farther with socialized medicine and a guaranteed income floor. While the economy was in dire straights, and unemployment was high, this by no means appealed to many among the Congressional leadership as a good answer. This route only threatened to damage the economy for good, while their proposed solutions were more the intellectual play things of a narrow leftist elite.
Guardedly, we had to give the nod to the President on walking the middle road and attempting to manage the economy, while not over-stepping himself in attempting to replicate the New Deal in trying to meet this crisis. Even so, none of us had any sense how well the measures would work, or how far we would be go before we turned the corner.
On issues of foreign affairs though, specifically Vietnam and the Syrian crisis, the Administration and the Congress came to philosophical – and very close to literal - blows. We managed to round-up support for the Syrian action mainly because it was backed by United Nations Security Council resolution and would be an international effort. In light of Vietnam, there was much resistance on both sides of the aisles to another international adventure, especially with the economy being in a poor state.
I, along with Mr. McFall, Speaker Albert and Senators Mansfield and Scott – in part because we received the top secret briefings from the CIA and the Pentagon - agreed that the situation with the Bayanounni regime was an extreme danger to our allies in our region, especially Israel. Equally steps had to be taken to prevent this from growing into a clash between the Turks and the Syrian military – and possibly between the Turks and the Soviets – with all that could mean.
Involving the Soviets was quite controversial with the more conservative wing of our party, but even hawks like Senator Goldwater saw the need for the expediency of the crisis to trump whatever ill-feeling he may have had about Soviet involvement. As the President pointed out in his meeting with the five of us (McFall, myself, Speaker Albert, Senators Mansfield and Scott) before this came to a vote, involving the Soviets was the only way to tamp down the possibility of a Turkish-Soviet clash, and at the same time get the Soviets on-side with a stabilization plan they would not feel compelled to undermine. This was not a perfect solution, but it had the virtue of united action in getting rid of the main threat.
The leadership pushed it thorough, mainly with Republican support, on that basis and on the understanding that this was no Gulf of Tonkin resolution: rather we were endorsing a limited police action to re-stabilize a tense situation which, if left to its own could easily lead to World War III.
On Vietnam, forging any consensus was hopeless. Many members were tired of that war – Sprio Agnew’s re-opening of that wound had opened many of my members’ eyes to the nature of his administration. Yet we were stuck with it, and with voters who were angry that this had been allowed to happen when that war seemed all but over in January 1973.
President Gavin wanted us to stay the course until a stable South Vietnam could be created, but staying the course was too much to ask, especially in light of the tremendous amount of political will power it took to endorse the Syrian operation with all of its perils.
The Vietnam Oversight resolution was born of the desire by members of Congress to have some control over the flow of events in Southeast Asia, and as a more practical answer than Ron Dellums’ End Vietnam Act. As with the War Powers Act at the end of 1973, the passage of the Oversight Act over the President’s veto (the Senate had failed to do so with the War Powers Act) set-up an inevitable clash with the Administration that could only be resolved in the courts. Whichever way that went, we were destined for a new era of tension between the Executive and Legislative Branch over the whole Southeast Asia policy.
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March 3, 1974
Turkish Airlines Flight 981 travelling from Paris to London crashes in a wood near Paris, killing all 346 aboard.
A proposed UN Security Council Resolution condemning the Iran-Iraq war and calling for a ceasefire is vetoed by the United States acting on behalf of its Iranian ally.
March 6, 1974
The Senate votes 61 – 38 to confirm Senator Symington’s nomination as the next Secretary of Defense. He is sworn into office later that same day.
The UN Security Council votes to declare the Muslim Brotherhood regime in Syria an “outlaw regime” (Resolution 346) and reconfirms the Aleppo government as the legitimate, sovereign government of Syria. Res. 346 leaves open the possibility of the use of UN or multi-national forces to assist the Syrian government in restoring order.
(from Henry Kissinger The October War and The Pursuit of Peace in the Middle East)
The immediate crisis between the United States and the Soviet Union over the Middle East had been defused, but the on-going political crisis in Syria was a lit fuse burning down to another bomb.
In the early phase the Israelis had treated Bayanouni and his followers as a joke; but by the end of February we were getting definite signals that this attitude had changed. We knew Turkey (in particular the Generals who were the power behind the politicians in that country) were very exorcised over the crumbling of the Syrian state at the hands of religious extremists, and there was a great worry that their brand of disruptive fanaticism would spread across the border into Turkey as it had already done into Lebanon. Word reached us by mid-February that Ankara and Tel Aviv (the Turks and Israelis having enjoyed a co-operative relationship before this) had entered into discussions which we took to be some kind of military planning; perhaps preparation for a joint incursion into Syria.
For Israel to re-enter Syria at this point would be calamitous for all we hoped to achieve through the peace process. The Arab world would be up in arms over such a move; Sadat could well regard as being duplicitous in our dealings with him if we allowed such a thing to happen. The worst case – which wasn’t so far off the inconceivable – was that an Israeli military incursion into Syria, even if it was to remove a firebrand who stirred-up panic among other Arab leaders, could start a new general war in the Middle East which might have grave consequences for everyone.
Sounding out the Soviets through Dobrynin, I quickly learned that they had much the same feeling about it. Sir Alec Douglas-Home, the British Foreign Secretary, who had recently been in Moscow for meetings with the Soviet leadership, reinforced this point when I spoke with him. He also made me aware of another curious change in Moscow. Leonid Brezhnev had, to Sir Alec’s impression – been opposed to any kind of joint action, but he now seemed to be overruled by others in the Politburo, and Gromyko appeared to be largely acting on their instructions, not the General Secretary’s. This suggested to both of us that Brezhnev’s days as the leader of the pack in the Soviet Union were numbered.
The clash between the Soviets and the Turkish was part of ongoing regional rivalry that extended from the days of the Tsars and Ottoman Sultans, and had more to do with a clash of cultures and religions than the usual Cold War causes. Our main concern had to be that the Soviets would not use a military intervention in Syria, which used Turkish territory as an excuse to carve off a slice of Turkey for themselves. Much of mine and Sir Alec’s early negotiations with the Soviets were aimed at making clear that while we would wave the NATO mutual defense provision to allow their troops transit through Turkey, we could not at any time countenance a long-term presence in Turkey. There seemed to be an understanding of this on the Soviet side along with an understanding that they would transit Turkey under the eye of our troops as well as those of the Turkish Army. I didn’t fool myself for a minute to think that they wouldn’t find a way to cheat on the agreement and exploit whatever openings presented themselves for political and intelligence purposes, but it was enough to proceed.
The Turks were very apprehensive of this arrangement, though they wanted to see Bayanouni’s regime gone as quickly as possible. Even so, they couldn’t just put behind them centuries of animosity with the Russians. The thought of giving transit to Soviet troops through their territory, much less providing training grounds drove them to near hysterics, even when it was put to them that the Soviet troops would be accompanied by allied troops through Turkish territory. Turkish Prime Minister Bulen Ecevit and the Turkish Chief of the General Staff, General Semih Sancer were both opposed to the idea in principle and (as I later found out) lobbied against it with sympathetic figures in Washington.
However, they were also felt pressured to do something about Bayanouni. After their proposed joint operation with Israel proved to be in vain, they relented, especially in face of the added pressure from ourselves, the British and the French. Turkish forces would participate in the operation, and that gave them a measure of comfort in as much as they would be able to keep a close guard on the Soviets participating in the operation. Nonetheless their participation wasn’t guaranteed to the last minute, and then they still had to be dragged to it by persistent lobbying on our part.
Sir Alec, myself and (with some reluctance) George Bush brought together the alliance which could carry this off. Once we drew in the Soviets and the Turks, the French proved willing to participate – President Pompidou was particularly exorcised about the implications of Bayanouni’s “caliphate” and wanted it destroyed as quickly as possible. The Soviets supplied support from countries behind the Iron Curtain as well, though we sought to keep that participation limited, as we didn’t want Soviet proxies adding to their intelligence capability in Turkey.
We sought and received a UN Security Council resolution in March endorsing the action, which provided essential legal and diplomatic cover for the operation. With the Chinese chair at the Security Council vacant we weren’t concerned about a veto and Resolution 346 received the necessary support. To assuage the Turkish, it contained a provision that foreign forces not already stationed in Turkey would be withdrawn the minute the crisis ended.
After the Turks, the British were the most substantial problem from our side. While Sir Alec had been an enthusiastic supporter of the mission, his Prime Minister Edward Heath was more reluctant. This was in part because he was scheduled to face the British electorate in an election at the end of February 1974, and Heath did not want word of this operation to get out before that time. His advisors felt it might sink his re-election chances if word got out before the British people went to the polls, so he had Sir Alec operating in secret, under the guise of other business. Twice, when word of the effort being lead by us to gather together an international alliance against Bayanouni leaked into the press, Heath, then on the campaign trail, denied Britain had any part in it. While preserving his electoral chances, it also had the long-term impact of making him appear as a blatant liar when, after the election, British participation became public.
Heath also ran a tremendous risk because he didn’t brief-in his opponent, former Prime Minister Harold Wilson, the leader of Britain’s Labour Party, on what was going on. The risk was that if Heath’s Conservatives lost at the polls, then Wilson would come into office without any prior knowledge or consent to the operation. As with the election of Mitterand further on, this could prove a serious weakness to the long-term viability of our operation. As it was, it also served to undercut Heath’s government (which was re-elected) with his own people once it became known.
The other challenge was achieving consensus on this policy within our own government; where the idea was treated with a great deal of scepticism.
At the National Security Council principals meeting on March 1 – with the President not in attendance – the resistance came out into the open.
“We have to consider the advantage this will give to the Soviets, Henry,” Caspar Weinberger, the President’s Chief of Staff, remarked.
“Frankly, I’m concerned that if we give the Russians a way in, they’ll try to leverage this into a permanent presence in Turkey, as a corridor to their Syrian puppet. This is the thinking in Ankara, which is why the Turks are still considering the Israeli option. If the Soviets show the least sign of setting-up a permanent base in Turkey, or in Syria, close to the Turkish border, then we can kiss Turkish participation good-bye,” General Brent Scowcroft, the National Security Advisor, warned. “What’s worse, it could help to precipitate the very conflict we’ve been trying to avoid.”
“We have to concern ourselves with the longer view,” said Secretary of State George Bush. “In trying to solve this crisis, we don’t want to lay the groundwork for the next one. Brent is right in saying that this places the Turks in a no-win position. Their government is under a lot of pressure from the military over any co-operation deal with the Soviet Union.”
The tag-team approach of Scowcroft and Bush did not surprise me, and their level of knowledge of the Turkish position lead me to believe that the Turks had been lobbying the two for support. My relations with Bush, which had been close during the previous autumn amidst the Middle East crisis, had soured since the New Year. Mainly, it was the anomalous role that I had as the President’s supernumerary for Global relations, a role which the Secretary of State was supposed to fulfill. Bush saw me as a potential rival. He had witnessed for himself how my role as National Security Advisor had eclipsed that of William Rogers as Secretary of State in the Nixon Administration, and Bush was unwilling to undergo the same isolation from policy making which Rogers had accepted.
At the same time, Scowcroft was left in a diminished position as National Security Advisor, a position which had been in the first rank of policy making since the Kennedy Administration, but which my current role also eclipsed in many ways. That motivated him to side with Bush.
“We have to remind ourselves that Bayanouni and his followers present as great a danger to Turkey as the Soviets do, perhaps more. They are a menace to the Middle East as well, and we can’t afford to bow to the paranoia of one corner of the region on this,” argued Ted Sorenson, the Deputy Chief of Staff. “We have to deal with the problem in Syria, and then use NATO as leverage to protect Turkey, after the Bayanouni threat is dealt with.”
“The Soviets are concerned with internal political problems, and while they have the military wherewithal to enforce a permanent presence in Turkey, even they must understand that any attempt to do that would lead to war,” offered Paul Nitze, the CIA Director. “I believe they will use the occasion to build-up their networks in Turkey, and get a better look at our facilities there, I don’t see them as being ready to press this beyond re-securing their Syrian puppet regime and restoring some of their influence in the Middle East. Don’t forget, they lost a lot of face with the Arabs when Sadat kicked them out of Egypt and their military hardware didn’t do the job against Israel. This is as much about face saving for the Kremlin.”
“While allowing Soviet forces to operate from Turkey might give them a tactical advantage,” opined Admiral Moorer, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “we could also use the opportunity of a joint operation to study the Soviet military at first hand, even see some of their doctrines in operation. That could prove useful.”
“And they’ll be doing the same,” Scowcroft added.
“The Israelis and the Turks are already cooking-up their own operation,” I said, looking directly across the table at Bush. “If they act alone, the uproar in the Arab world will destroy any chance we have of a peace process now or for the next twenty-five years.”
“I think that’s an exaggeration,” Bush said. “We have other channels to the Arab capitals, at least those Arabs willing to engage with us, and through us Israel.”
There were nods of agreement to that, while others like Sorenson saw the need for us to act. We continued to muddle our way through, with Bush and Scowcroft holding the hardest line against, with Weinberger sometimes supporting them, sometimes keeping an enigmatic silence. Most, like Nitze, Moorer and Symington seemed to sit on the fence, couching their neutrality in strategic arguments, while they awaited a Presidential decision to determine which way we would go.
“You know, Henry, this is the classical damned if you do, damned if you don’t kind of situations,” the President said to me in one of our private meetings in the Oval Office. I could already see that the burdens of the office had begun to deepen the lines in his face. “Was it always like this for Nixon?”
“At times,” I conceded.
“There are ample reasons not to do this – the economy, Vietnam, the people’s reluctance not to get involved in another war. All of those are very good reasons not to do this.”
“Yes they are, Mr. President,” I said. “But when Israel acts…”
“The decision will be taken from us,” the President said. “George Bush was in here arguing strongly against this, mainly because he doesn’t want to see the Soviets gain any leverage in Turkey. He argues that we can pressure Israel into not acting…”
“He is wrong on that,” I said.
The President got-up and walked over to the windows which overlook the White House lawn.
“Henry, we can’t let this Bayanouni stand. We do that, the threat to the Middle East, to the world is too great. I may be reviled for it, but I didn’t take this job just to be the most popular man. We have to deal with this and restore order to the situation.”
That was the Presidential opinion, and his commitment to that never wavered. From that point our policy was set.
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March 8, 1974
Charles de Gaulle Airport opens in Paris, France.
March 10, 1974
A Japanese World War II soldier, Second Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda, surrenders in the Philippines.
March 12, 1974
Serial killer Ted Bundy is seriously injured in a traffic accident in Olympia, Washington. Subsequent investigation from evidence found in the wrecked car connects Bundy to three murders of female College students in the state of Washington. In November 1974 he sentenced to serve three life sentences in the Washington state penitentiary.
Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Munir Ahmad Khan called a meeting to initiate a work on an atomic bomb. The meeting was attended by Muhammad Hafeez Qureshi, Ishfaq Ahmad, Riazuddin and Dr. Abdus Salam. Dr. Abdus Salam and his noted students Riazuddin and Masud Ahmad started to work on the mathematical and theoretical designs of an atomic bomb.
March 14, 1974
The Senate votes to confirm former Gov. William Scranton in the office of Vice President of the United States by a vote of 98 – 2. (Senators James Buckley (C-NY) and Jesse Helms (R-NC) voting against).
The House votes 292 – 143 to override the President’s veto of the Vietnam Oversight Act.
March 17, 1974
Operation Vicksburg launched. This is a strategy developed by MACV to attack and harass North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and Khmer Rouge supply lines in Cambodia, using U.S. and South Vietnamese ground forces and U.S. air power, integrated with Cambodian Army operations.. The overall U.S. – South Vietnamese effort is aimed at securing pro-western control of Cambodia as a necessary flank to sustaining an independent South Vietnamese state. The overall commander, General Emerson, has devised several strikes in force which will disrupt communication and supply lines, thus reliving pressure on the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh. The ultimate goal is to drive the enemy forces into retreats in northern Cambodia and Laos (an unspoken assumption of the Cambodian operation is that Laos will be left to fall to the North Vietnamese-Pathet-Lao forces).
March 18, 1974
After a series of contentious meetings OPEC agrees to continue the oil embargo against the United States, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands and extends the embargo to Turkey. The embargo is to be reviewed again in July. Many Arab states want to appear to be acting “firmly” against the United States in order to counter propaganda from the Muslim Brotherhood regime in Damascus that they are puppets of the west.
The price of oil peaks at $ 19.50 per barrel. The cost of a gallon of gasoline in most major American cities has risen from around 36 cents a gallon in 1972 to an average 93 cents a gallon by mid-1974. For the average American consumer this translates to the cost of a gas fill-up going from $ 7 to $ 19 in about a year-and-one half, without a matching rise in income. This trend also affects the cost-of-living overall, giving rise to continuing inflation amidst declining production and rising unemployment.
Inflation: average 17.9%
Prime Rate: around 9% (fluctuates)
Unemployment rate: 18 – 21 %
Dow Jones Average: Opens 1974 at 597; closes 1974 at: 504
Average Cost of new house $28,500.00 (sales declining; existing property values decreasing, adding to a sense of fear and uncertainty).
Average Income per year $13,100.00 (not matching the rate of inflation and declining)
Average Monthly Rent $245.00 (demand for rental property spikes as people seek rental accommodations over mortgaged homes).
Cost of a gallon of Gas 80 - 93 cents
Average cost new car $3,750.00, but sales remain very low: the Big Three in Detroit are beginning to suffer; imports with greater fuel efficiency are becoming more popular, but their sales are also offset by a general reluctance to spend. The sales of used cars increases, and many more, older cars begin to dominate American roads over newer cars. This visual image has a direct psychological impact on how people perceive the direction of the economy and the future of the nation.
March 20, 1974
Princess Anne is killed by a stray bullet during a kidnap attempt by a deranged man named Ian Ball. Attempts to link Ball to the IRA prove ineffective and expose a case of opportunism by the British police and intelligence services to exploit public grief over the Princess’ murder. An inquiry determines that it was a stray shot from a police weapon which killed Princess Anne. No charges are laid; however Inspector James Beaton (the Princess’ bodyguard) resigns from the police over the incident.
The House of Representatives votes 397 – 38 to confirm former Gov. William Scranton in the office of Vice President of the United States. Those opposed include Rep. John Ashbrook (R-OH), Rep. Ron Dellums (D-CA) and Rep. Shirley Chisolm (D-NY). Dellums and Chisholm lead a group of liberal Democrats in lodging a protest vote against the on-going operations in Vietnam.
March 21, 1974
William Scranton is sworn in as the 40th Vice President of the United States.
The Senate votes 68 – 32 to override President Gavin’s veto of the Vietnam Oversight Act. The Act becomes law.
March 22, 1974
The Kissinger-Gromyko accord based on UN Resolution 346 is signed in Moscow. This marks the beginning of a joint, ad-hoc US-Soviet coalition to oust the Muslim Brotherhood forces from Syria. The governments of Turkey, the UK and France are co-signatories.
Vice President Scranton is assigned the task of developing – with input from industry leaders, Congressional leaders and state Governors – a domestic energy production program which will reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil (The Scranton Energy Task Force).
The Vice President also undertakes a series of meetings with representatives of various OPEC states and other oil producers in order to attempt to negotiate a price decline.
March 24, 1974
Princess Anne receives a state funeral service at Westminster Abbey. Much of the UK is revolted by her murder. Although her murder was caused by the random act of a madman Prime Minister Heath uses the feelings and occasions surrounding the Princess’ murder to justify a tough new anti-terrorist campaign in Northern Ireland.
A potential agreement between Iran, Mexico, Nigeria and Venezuela to increase oil production to offset the OPEC embargo collapses as the participants cannot agree on an alternate production quota. All three states begin to sell oil according to strategies which will maximize their individual profits.
Donald Rumsfeld withdraws from the Illinois Republican U.S. Senate primary because he cannot raise enough funds, largely because of his association with the Agnew Administration.
March 26, 1974
Attorney-General Clifford Wallace files notice with the Federal District Court that the U.S. government seeks petition for a permanent injunction from enforcing the Vietnam Oversight Act on the grounds that it is unconstitutional. The Court grants a temporary injunction against enactment of the statute while the case is heard in the federal courts.
George Foreman TKOs Ken Norton in 2 for heavyweight boxing title
The Romanian communist party names party leader Nicolae Ceausescu president
March 31, 1974
The Iraqi Army inflicts a significant defeat on the Iranian Army at the Battle of Abadan. To everyone’s surprise, the Soviet equipped Iraqi Army proves superior on the battlefield to the American equipped, technically superior Iranian Army of the Shah. Analysts blame the defeat on poor leadership in the Iranian Army and insufficient maintenance of American equipment by the Iran. Some also believe the Iraqis have benefitted from combat experience against the Israelis.
April 1, 1974
Ayatollah Khomeini calls for an Islamic Republic in Iran. Declares that the defeat of the Shah’s Army by a Sunni-led Arab force is a sign of the Shah’s weakness and disfavour in the eyes of Allah.
April 2, 1974
French President Georges Pompidou dies. His successor, interim President Alain Poher, and Prime Minister Pierre Messmer pledge their support to the Moscow agreement of March 22.
The House passes the Long-Dole and McKeithen Acts by votes of 350 – 85, with most dissent coming from conservative Republicans (who object to the underlying premise of the acts in adjusting taxation, and argue for a repeal of the Income tax) and liberal Democrats (who think the measures are insufficient for working class Americans).
Operation Trigger (a component of Vicksburg) successfully dislodges NVA and Khmer Rouge forces, relieving pressure on Phom Penh. A summer offensive into the North is planned involving U.S., Cambodian and south Vietnamese forces.
April – May 1974
A build-up of allied forces begins in Lebanon, Jordan and Northern Turkey. The multinational force is composed mainly of Soviet and American heavy armoured and support forces from Europe, together with American air power. Armour and infantry is supplemented by the Turkish Army, while some specialist forces and additional air power is provided by the French and the British.
The overall plan is a three-pronged offensive against Bayanouni’s forces from Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon.
In one of the most unusual scenes of the period, Time publishes a front-page cover showing American and Soviet tank units cross training with each other to develop a working familiarity with each other’s operational tactics.
April 3, 1974
148 tornadoes are reported over an area covering a dozen states
Gold hits record $265 an ounce in Paris. The US Dollar is at its lowest value since the end of the Second World War.
Tornadoes in the East, South and Midwest killed approximately 315
The Super Outbreak occurs, the biggest tornado outbreak in recorded history. The death toll is 315, with nearly 5,500 injured.
April 4, 1974
Hank Aaron ties Babe Ruth's home-run record by hitting his 714th
April 5, 1974
Last day of Test cricket for Garry Sobers and Rohan Kanhai
The World Trade Center opens in NYC (110 stories)
April 6, 1974
200,000 attend rock concert "California Jam"
April 7, 1974
After fractious debate The Senate and he House of Representatives each approve a resolution (based on UN Resolution 346) which supports President Gavin’s announced action to use U.S. forces as part of a multi-national security force in Syria.
The votes are 52 – 48 in the Senate (39 Republicans and 13 Democrats voting in favour) and 219 – 216 in the House (142 Republicans and 75 Democrats in favour). In both chambers the Democrats supporting the Administration are Southern and Western conservatives. Liberal Democrats and some moderate Republicans have argued against the mission. Among the leading opponents are Senators Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Walter Mondale and Hubert Humphrey (D-MN), Edward Brooke (R-MA), James Buckley (C-NY), Barry Goldwater sr. (R-AZ) and William Proxmire (D-WS). In the House Rep. Ron Dellums (D-CA) and Rep. Shirley Chisholm (D-NY) lead the anti-war movement.
April 8, 1974
The unemployment rate is announced to be 19%. Job growth has declined since the start of 1974. At the same time inflation has decreased and the prime rate has dropped to 9% (from a high of 13% the previous October), but consumer demand has continued to drop with a negligible rise in civilian GDP. Companies are resisting hiring in the uncertain climate, and many sales that are occurring are the liquidation of existing inventory which is not being replaced with new orders from manufacturers.
Mortgage foreclosure rates remain at around 4%, which is lower than the previous fall, but still amounts to one family loosing their home every day somewhere in the United States. This statistic, reinforced by news stories on the topic, has the effect of creating fear among other homeowners, leading many to curtail their spending in the effort to paydown or payoff their mortgage. New housing starts are at a bare minimum in the United States at this point.
The Dow Jones index falls sharply on the news, further aggravating worries about the weak state of the economy.
Economist John Kenneth Galbraith is the most influential figure to date to call the current situation “the second Great Depression.”
The Gavin Administration immediately denies this is the case, referring to the situation as (according to Treasury Secretary George Schultz) “a downturn caused by reaction to the international situation. We anticipate growth in the coming year. To use the term depression now is reckless and irresponsible.”
The House passes the stimulus bill by a vote of 292 – 141 with two abstensions.
An Iranian offensive along the Southwestern front in Busheir and Khuzestan succeeds in dislodging Iraqi forces and driving them back across the border. Iranian forces retake Abadan after intensive fighting. For the next four months the war settles down into a stalemate which drains both sides, neither side can gain the initiative. Some foreign observers believe that the Shah’s American equipped military could inflict a more devastating blow but that he is holding back forces from the front, fearful of possibly instability in his own country. The Iranian air force does significantly crippled the Iraqi air force, and Baghdad and other major Iraqi centers are bombed several times.
The British, French and the Indian Prime Minister Indira Ghandi all prevail upon the Shah of Iran to seek peace talks, while representatives of the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference do the same in Baghdad.
(from James M. Gavin A Call to Duty: A Memoir)
The decision to send our troops into Syria as part of an international mission in 1974, at the depths of an economic crisis, wasn’t easily understood by the American people. They were nervous about economic prospects, and with high unemployment, mortgage foreclosures and persistent shortages due to oil crisis, they had plenty to worry about. We managed to get a package of economic assistance measures through the Congress without too much trouble, due in large part by the fact that both the Democratic Party and Republican Party rank-and-file, with a few notable exceptions, wanted to be seen acting to help the average American family in the time of trouble. Many, no doubt, had their eyes on the mid-term elections coming that November, but I believe, in working with the leadership and various members, that there was a genuine desire to prevent a crisis such as had gripped the nation in the early 1930’s.
For long past the 1970’s economists would argue over whether or not we entered a second Great Depression in 1974. The consensus of the many who lived through it was that it was worse than an average recession, and that comparisons to the 1930’s weren’t unwarranted. From a gross statistical standpoint the economic crisis that began in late 1973 and showed itself in the first half of 1974 was the worst downturn since the 1930’s. As to whether that constituted a depression, I reflect on it with the words Governor Reagan made so famous during those years: “If your neighbor loses his job, then it is a recession. If you lose your job, then it is a depression.” What you call it depended on where you stood.
I stood for bringing our economy back by providing targeted stimulus, and looking at a long-term strategy which would make us less dependant on foreign oil. This was the first task I assigned to Vice President Scranton once he was sworn in, and he took the job with a certain relish and acumen that he brought from his years as governor of large industrial state.
Treasury Secretary George Schultz and I clashed on the stimulus approach: George felt that the we should allow the markets to right themselves and that too much government interference would only make matters worse. Cap Weinberger – who had been OMB Director under President Nixon – agreed. Both George and Cap were businessmen, and that formed their classically conservative approach to the question. Having recently been in business myself, I understood their position, and did have some sympathy for it.
Yet, I didn’t think leaving things alone would be good in the long run, especially when jobs were disappearing, people were losing their homes and money wasn’t being spent on goods and services. Left to its own devices, I was sure we were in for a long, hard road. As President I felt that I had a greater responsibility to act, and that the lesson of the early part of the 1930’s was that inaction only made matters worse. In 1974 our very wealth as a nation was disappearing, be it in the form of savings being eaten-up to combat a declining dollar and inflation which was still present, or in the form of capital flowing out of our country to more congenial markets overseas. Ted Heath may have won re-election because his government was able to stabilize the British economy on that, but I was unwilling to let America grow weaker economically as a consequence. That is why I worked with Congress – not just to stimulate the economy – but to build-up the confidence of our people in the future.
Syria – specifically the crisis of that country’s near collapse at the hands of some thugs whose world-view remained focused on the Dark Ages – came at the middle of this, which could not have been a worse time. Yet we, along with much of the civilized world, had to act to prevent chaos from spreading in the Middle East. Henry Kissinger forged an understanding that immediate action was required with a number of our traditional allies. He even signed-up the Russians who, having been long-time patrons of the faltering Syrian regime, and with a large and restive Muslim population within their borders to consider, were just as eager as we were to see the back of Bayanouni’s uprising. With the Soviets on side we were able to get a resolution which supported our action through the UN Security Council very quickly, and with that international sanction Henry put together the international collation which, to his credit, not only solved the Bayanouni problem, but which also forestalled the possibility of an outbreak of hostilities between the Turks and the Soviets, the second real danger in this situation. Had Turkey and the Soviet Union gone to war over Syria, the NATO mutual defence clause would have been triggered, and we would have faced World War III. The Syrian coalition forestalled that.
Not everyone saw that point: we barely got the supporting measure through Congress, and that was largely due to the work of Congressional leaders like Jerry Ford, Bob Dole and Carl Albert. The Congress, especially on the Democratic Party side, was giving us a hard time over Vietnam, and they did not understand that this was different. They saw this only as yet another administration seeking approval to traipse-off into another conflict in another corner of the world. I had vetoed the War Powers Act – which the House overrode but the Senate did not – so the whole issue was a touchstone of conflict between the two branches. The passage of the articles of support for the Syrian intervention with slim majorities, supported mainly by Republican Party members, drew bitter remarks from the other side.
The American people were distracted by the economy, and what they understood of the Syrian operation was filtered through the noise of the anti-war movement and the loud opposition we raised in Congress, especially from the left wing of the Democratic Party. So the issue was not that well understood. I made several attempts to make the point, as did many members of my administration, but we still had a hard time convincing the people.
Sometimes I am asked if it was worth it, given the effect it had on my popularity and effectiveness as President. My only reply is that it was necessary, that the peace of the world depended upon it, more so than with our on-going conflict in Vietnam. If I hadn’t backed the Syrian initiative, I am convinced that the economy would have become the least of our problems, and that our very survival might have been at stake. That was my call as President and Commander-in-Chief.
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April 11, 1974
NBC Television interview of President James Gavin.
David Brinkley: Mr. President, with the economy doing so poorly, and American sons being committed to one war in Vietnam, many Americans are asking if it is wise for us to take on this burden, especially in light of our history in Vietnam. Should we really be doing this? Don’t we have enough problems?
President: Should we be doing this, no David, we shouldn’t. But, unfortunately we must. Let me explain why. Let me first say I understand the arguments against engaging our military in another potential armed conflict, with our wok in Vietnam unfinished. I hear the voices of dissent on the issue very clearly. But we must act now to prevent an even greater disaster in Syria.
What’s going on in Syria right now is direct challenge to the security of all states in that region. And, as the recent Middle East war showed, any conflict in the Middle East can and will quickly escalate to becoming a world crisis. That makes what is happening a threat to all of us. By proposing to send a joint force – one involving Great Britain, France, Turkey and even the Soviet Union – even the Soviets clearly see the danger here – we want to put an end to the chaos in Syria – this out of control thug state that’s developed there has to be stopped before it spreads violence to its neighbors and threatens all our allies in the region.
Brinkley: You’ll forgive me, Mr. President, but that has echoes of the original justification for sending our soldiers into Vietnam. What’s the risk that we are making the same mistake here?
President: None, David. For one thing we are completing this mission as part of a wider international consensus with a broad support from every bordering government – and that of the legal Syrian government itself, which in the past has not been friendly to the interests of the United States, but is nonetheless the necessary and legal government of that country. Let’s be clear this is not Vietnam, where our adversary has the broad support of hostile powers in the region. Bayanouni is an isolated extremist, and our mission is clear. Remove him, restore a stable government to Syria and then we can leave with our mission done. Unlike Korea or Vietnam there are no open-ended goals or long-term plans. We recognize that we cannot change Syria, or make its government more likable to us. But we must act to remove this mortal threat to our friends throughout the region, including to Israel.
Brinkley: About the time of the Tonkin incident in 1964, you wrote “no land power can contemplate a land war in Asia without being ready to commit a sizeable force for a long period time and to bear the inevitable crush of bodies coming home. I believe that the American people are not ready for this, not unless the cost is clearly made necessary by the peril we face. The situation in Vietnam does not meet this standard.” How do you apply that advice to the current situation?
President: The situation in Syria does. I do not look forward to sending our sons into harms way. I have seen war and what it costs, and every instinct in my being abhors sending our young men into such a situation, but the peril is too grave. If we allow SB to continue without intervening, we are putting-off an inevitable conflagration which, in terms of human lives, will be ten times worse.
Brinkley: What would that inevitable conflagration be?
President: If we do not act then Israel will, I believe, act to protect itself from the danger of the chaos in Syria spilling over its border or threatening its security. That will draw in other Arab states, who will feel compelled to defend Syrian sovereignty from the Israelis. That could re-start the recent war, and likely bring us back into confrontation with the Soviets. Our policy is to pre-empt this, and to involve the Soviet Union in a co-operative, constructive way – as a partner that will further anchor peaceful co-operation between our nations in the Middle East, and hopefully lead to breakthroughs on other fronts.
But let me be clear, David. Our military commitment is limited strictly to establishing a secure environment in Syria – we are not going there for a long-term presence. We will help to restore the rule of law and then leave it to the Syrians to sort it out.
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April 14, 1974
After much debate the Senate passes the McKeithen Act and the Long-Dole Act by votes of 59 – 40. President Gavin signs both into law.
Seven members of the Symbionese Liberation Army, including its leader Donald DeFreeze, are killed in a shoot-out with police and FBI agents in Redlands, California.
April 15 – June 27, 1974
The North Vietnamese attempt another offensive into the central highlands and plains of South Vietnam, patterned after the 1972 Easter offensive. The objective of the North appears to be to draw-off U.S. forces from Cambodia and the northern border. At the same time U.S. forces in Tchepone, Laos and Prek Sandek, Cambodia come under intensive attack. Casualties are 3,215 U.S troops, 6,100 South Vietnamese, and around 12-15,000 NVA and Khmer Rouge forces.
(from Colin Powell My American Journey)
General Wheeler had his work cut out for him trying to find a South Vietnamese leader to replace Thieu. While there certainly were a number of competent leaders in the South Vietnamese military (the most practical place to find a Vietnamese leader who was going to have to be both a political leader and something of a military strongman in the mould of Thieu – if the South Vietnamese government was to succeed in the near term in rebuilding itself) not many of them could easily translate that competence into a political following sufficient to stitch the country back together. There were a number of political types who were ready to step into the void, but their credentials as effective leaders – let alone as anything approaching a democratic leader – were suspect at best. As General Emerson would often grumble Wheeler and Ambassador Whitehouse were trying to find another Thieu or Diem, and they kept coming-up with Ky wanna-bes, none of whom were adequate to the job.
After an initial grumbling born out of hurt nationalism, South Vietnam settled down quickly under General Wheeler’s administration, in part I think because Wheeler wisely left the existing bureaucracy in place and tried to restrict himself to playing a role as referee. As the President had indicated, Wheeler wasn’t there to assume a role as a long-term colonial governor, and many in the existing South Vietnamese regime seemed to appreciate his hands-off approach to the actual running of the government. His presence in turn seemed to spark a clean-up effort that germinated in the ranks of the bureaucracy, and over which General Wheeler became an arbiter – but only at the request of the South Vietnamese mandarins. A number of South Vietnamese officers I worked with over this period told me that they felt that their government was functioning in a more efficient and encouraging fashion that at any time that they could remember. These remarks would always be couched in a statement that the U.S. administration was temporary, and our officers (under General Emerson’s strict instructions to this effect) were always solicitous of this nationalist sentiment. The theme for the American interim administration was that the South Vietnamese were putting their own house in order, as we always knew they could, and our role was arbiter and ally, never that overlord or patron. There continued to be pockets of nationalist resistance (not connected to the North Vietnamese communists) and an expressed desire for national independence, but from our standpoint we were enjoying a period of increasingly productive collaboration with our South Vietnamese military allies.
Marshall Ky, after going on the run from the authorities in Saigon, tried to start-up a nationalist resistance and even tried to make common cause with the North Vietnamese on the issue. The Communists wouldn’t have him, and his influence among the population wasn’t very strong. In the early part of 1974 we, along with the ARVN, fought a number of skirmishes against units nominally pledged to Ky, but many of them gave-up quickly, having no heart for the fight.
After his attempt at an insurrection collapsed, Ky eventually turned-up in France, were the government gave him sanctuary. From Paris he continued to blast the American colonial regime, but his voice had no impact on the domestic situation.
While the political situation continued to sort itself out, our concentration at MACV was on the military situation. In April the North, together with its Khmer Rouge allies, attempted to repeat its 1972 Easter offensive (almost two years to the day afterward), which had been aimed at cutting South Vietnam in two, with the objective of forcing us to pull back our forces from Laos and Cambodia to meet the threat. Our ground force and airpower position had improved by then to the point that we were able to push back the attacking forces and reinforce our position, although it cost us heavily in casualties.
After some furious meetings in Washington – and at least one confrontation between the Administration and Congress – a decision was made to expand our operations into Cambodia. The main objective here was to preserve the pro-American Lon Nol government from being overrun by the North Vietnamese backed Khmer Rouge. Apart from our strong point in Tchepone, near the South Vietnamese border, we had pretty much abandoned Laos to the North Vietnamese. In the case of Cambodia, we were going to secure the southern half of South Vietnam’s flank, to prevent South Vietnam from being encircled by the Communists.
Although our forces did much of the fighting, backed by air power, we also relied heavily on our ARVN allies, both in defeating the North’s offensive in South Vietnam, but also in defending Cambodia at major battles such as Prek Sandek along the Mekong River. Our principle mode of operation was to strike at key junctions and passes, to bottle-up the enemy and where possible establish our own strong points from where we could disrupt enemy logistics to the greatest degree possible. Our relative success in Cambodia was demonstrated not only by the re-claiming of territory by Cambodian government forces, but also by the decline in activities and effectiveness of North Vietnamese forces in South Vietnam. As we had expected, our success in Cambodia had cut North Vietnamese logistical lines, forcing them to pull back further toward Laos and North Vietnam. This gave us wider control of the battlefield in our area, and allowed us to press an advantage in securing and controlling what had been the main enemy infiltration and supply points in the South.
While some officers in the ARVN were not happy with General Wheeler’s administration of their government – nationalist resentment was understandable – I did note that the ARVN units working with us in both South Vietnam and Cambodia had improved their performance. Part of this dated back to the improvements President Thieu had been instituting in 1972 and 1973, which included better training, better pay, and promotion of officers based on merit and not political connections. But, in meeting with my South Vietnamese counterparts and in observing their operations, I also came to see that our control of their logistical systems – freeing them of political control by various mandarins and province chiefs – had improved the capability of the ARVN in the field. This in turn led to more successful outcomes and from that came higher morale. The latter was also encouraged by the identification and promotion of officers and NCO’s who demonstrated their capability. This essential professionalism was beginning to transform the ARVN into an even more capable Army, which in turn contributed to our overall success in the theater.
The Cambodian Army, like the Khmer Republic state, was far behind their South Vietnamese counterparts, which showed in their dismal performance in the field, and was recognized by the fact that we used them largely as auxiliaries to our own and ARVN troops during the fighting. We also began working on a proposal to have capable ARVN officers and NCO’s work with their Cambodian counterparts in a training and operational improvement program which would be overseen by U.S. advisers, but from which we would stay in the background. This we believed would serve the purpose of building-up the Cambodian Army, while at the same time allowing both the Cambodians and the South Vietnamese the crucial face saving measure of not being too directly reliant on American troops for their training. We also thought that this would communicate our confidence in the ARVN’s capabilities to our South Vietnamese allies.
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April 16, 1974
USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
The Senate passes the stimulus bill by a vote of 57 – 42. President Gavin signs this into law, promoting the package of financial assistance to States, municipalities and other public works as the “helping hand to prosperity.”
Governor Ronald Reagan criticizes the stimulus as excessive government spending and an effort to “control the economy through central planning. This is not a hand-up, or even a hand-out, this bill is a hand around the throats of every working American. The administration has used your money to make you poorer and more dependent on the federal government. This is not a bill which will create jobs or start new business; this bill will kill business, which kills jobs, which will kill our economy and, my friends, it is this Democrat Congress and this Democrat-in-all-but-name President who are wielding the shovel over our economic grave.”
Senator Edward Kennedy admonishes: “the States need our help; the municipalities need our help, but so too does the average American who is struggling to put food on the table for his family and keep a roof over their heads. Every day he must worry if he will lose his job, lose his home and lose his way of life. Where is the help for him and his struggling family? Where is the mortgage relief provision? Where is the guaranteed income which will end poverty forever? Where is the emergency extension of unemployment insurance so that his children will not starve or be forced out into the street? They are not in this bill, which is why I say that this bill is not for the average American who is suffering the brunt of this crisis.”
(from Ronald Dellums Doing What’s Right)
The real problem was unemployment and people suffering: every time I went back to Oakland I met with constituents who were being thrown out of their homes and who couldn’t feed their children. The usual cause was job loss and inadequate support from the State or the Federal government for the unemployed and newly homeless. These weren’t aggregate statistics that the economists liked to quote as if they were just numbers on a chalkboard; they weren’t pieces of George Schultz’s “general trend toward recovery”. These were flesh-and-blood people caught-up in events out of their control whose pain was real.
It was the same in any city or town around the country, even Washington DC. If anyone doubted it all they had to do was go out into the street – two blocks along Third street from the Capitol - and they could see it with their own eyes. I dared more than one of my more conservative colleagues to go two blocks to the welfare office at Third and C streets and give the same speech that they gave on the floor of the House about weathering the storm or preserving the American way of life by tampering as little as possible with the economy. To my knowledge, none of them did it: they didn’t have the guts to blow smoke and platitudes on people who were really suffering.
President Gavin inherited Vietnam from that Agnew fiasco, so at the start he was trying to fix the last guys mess. Okay, but that didn’t justify his expanding it back into Cambodia and sending more troops. That – especially the Cambodia part – smelled like Nixon, who’d told us he was going to end the war and then expanded it. By April 1974 it began to look like President Gavin was going further than Agnew, and I along with a lot of others in the anti-war movement, felt it had to be stopped.
The first two attempts, the War Powers Act and the End Vietnam in 1974 resolution both went down. War Powers fell to President Gavin’s veto, which we tried to override, but were stymied by the leadership. The same leadership killed End Vietnam and replaced it with the weaker Vietnam Oversight Act, which would have done nothing more that make Congress complicit in the war. That made it past the veto, but got tied-up in the courts.
There was a lot of chest thumping over the success of VOA: some people --Ted Kennedy and John Tunney for example – treated that as a big victory, but it missed the point completely. Senator McGovern, who’d been championing our cause on the Senate side got when he called the VOA “a sop that gives us the ability to complain but do little else.” The point was this: the Vietnam War, which had been going on for close to ten years now, through four administrations, had to be stopped. The only way we were going to do that was to take away the President’s power to make war. Four Presidents – Johnson, Nixon, Agnew and now Gavin – proved that they couldn’t be trusted with the power on their own; all they seemed to do was send more and more of our kids – especially ones from poor and under-serviced communities – to die in a pointless blood bath. By the spring of 1974 there didn’t seem to be any hope that the Vietnam War would ever end, and the misery just kept on going for our troops and for the Vietnamese, and now the Cambodians. It left me with a feeling of frustration, which flared into anger at times. I can understand how it drove others over the edge into confrontational and violent action – the situation seemed so hopeless.
That frustration just got worse when we were told that American troops were going to be sent to Syria to restore order. Order? A thuggish military government like Syria’s so called “legitimate government” might be orderly, but I’d hardly call that progress. Not that this Bayanouni guy was much better; he seemed hell-bent on bringing back the Middle Ages. But that wasn’t, or shouldn’t have been our problem. It was time for someone else to step-up. We didn’t need another war; not with Vietnam still going on and the American people suffering under bad economic policies. The cities were seething with rage and fear, and this did nothing to help that. I didn’t care that this action was endorsed by the UN and the Soviet Union; the President and Henry Kissinger arranged that anyway so it wasn’t much of an ‘independent endorsement”, not like its supporters tried to make it out. It was just the wrong thing at the wrong time and someone had to stand-up and say so.
Congressional ratification for the Syrian operation barely got through because of heavy Republican and boll-weevils support in the House and the Senate; the Gavin Administration and the military-industrial types snowed them over with the usual flag waving show. Personally I was disgusted; the least we could have demanded of the Administration was one war at a time. It was the lowest point in my public career when that went through and the President got his blank check for the Middle East.
Obviously too few people had been paying attention over the last ten years.
It was about this time, May 1974, that Shirley Chisholm, Charlie Rangel, John Kerry of Veterans Against the Vietnam War and I started talking with George McGovern about reviving his 1972 Presidential platform. He was reluctant at first; he seemed to think of the whole thing as a bad experience – what had started out as a good idea had turned into an unorganized, out of control mess. There was some merit to that; he and Gary Hart had run that thing in a very loose way. What Shirley, John and I were interested in was a poor people’s and anti-war slate for the 1974 mid-terms, with George acting as the figurehead and spokesman. The way we saw it we had to get our voice into the debate if we were ever going to get heard. Plus, if we could form a coherent block in Congress, we might be in a position to exert influence, especially if the numbers in Congress were close. Some have accused us of planning European style coalition politics – wielding it like it’s some kind of evil thing in itself – and that was some of what we had in mind. But, we didn’t necessarily want to split the Democratic Party as much as make the leadership understand that we couldn’t continue on the path we were on because all it was doing was killing our own citizens and destroying our own country. If we had to make a third party of it, that wasn’t the first choice, but it had worked for the Republicans once, so who knew?
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April 17, 1974
Islamist fundamentalists assault military academy in Heliopolis Egypt
April 18, 1974
Red Brigade kidnaps Italian attorney general Mario Sossi
April 24, 1974
Stephen King publishes his first novel, Carrie, under his own name. The book does not sell very well; poor sales are blamed on the economy.
April 25, 1974
Carnation Revolution: A coup in Portugal restores democracy.
Chancellor Willy Brandt’s secretary Gunther Guillaume found to be an East German (Soviet) spy.
May – August 1974
Low scale attrition combat continues between U.S., South Vietnamese and
Cambodian forces and the NVA and Khmer Rouge forces; with U.S. strategy largely aimed at interdiction and disruption of enemy logistical infrastructure. U.S. airpower continues to play a significant role in overall control of the battlefield during this period.
(from Henry Kissinger Years of Crisis: Why America Failed in Asia)
I welcomed the opportunity to re-engage my old negotiating partner Le Douc Tho in Paris. I found him to be as strident and determined as ever, which was reassuring, to a degree. My hope was to bring us back to where we had been in the fall of 1972; I reasoned that if we had reached an agreement then, we could do so again - although it wouldn’t be easy.
The truth was that both of our country’s relative positions had changed. Our military efforts in Vietnam in 1973, and the Cambodian operations in the Spring of 1974 had strengthened our hand. So had the fact that we had checked several attempts by Congress to curtail our war making powers in Southeast Asia. Although the Vietnam Oversight Act had been enacted by overriding the President’s veto, the Administration had tied it up in the Courts, and through legal injunctions had prevented it from coming in force. For someone like Le Douc Tho and his confederates, whose ideology lead them to believe that we controlled the courts, this must have come as a sign of the political strength of the Administration’s position. He could not expect Congress to undermine us. This gave me some cards to play when we met in Paris.
On the North Vietnamese side, they had to confront the loss of support from China which had totally withdrawn from world affairs under the leadership of Mao’s eccentric nephew. Our intelligence had picked-up reports of skirmishes with between Chinese and North Vietnamese forces along their border, and in Laos, where the Chinese appeared to be bracing their frontier. This must have come as quite a shock in Hanoi, along with the realization that their war machine was now wholly dependent on a narrow sea channel through the Gulf of Tonkin which we largely controlled. Although we allowed Soviet and East Bloc ships through – as a good will gesture after the Agnew Administrations provocative moves the previous summer – the flow had diminished, and our analysts suspected that the Soviets were limiting the weapons flow.
The persistent weakness on our side was the inability of General Wheeler, Ambassador Gates or our experts at the State Department to identify a figure with enough wide support from all sectors of South Vietnamese society who could become their next President. Our preference was to move away from a military officer, although we recognized that whoever was elected the next President of the South Vietnamese government would have to have a strong hand with the military, as Thieu had had. A number of the officers in consideration were deficient because of either questionable personal activities (including involvement in the drug trade in some cases) or because they had for one reason or another alienated too many factions within the South Vietnamese political environment to be successful.
This caused General Wheeler to further postpone elections, creating a wedge opportunity for the North Vietnamese to exploit by claiming that we were extending colonial rule over South Vietnam. Le Douc Tho would repeatedly raise the question in our talks, often lapsing into an anti-colonial rant about how the French had been defeated as a colonial power, and the United States would suffer the same at the hands of Vietnamese patriots. He then went on in a more general rant about how the tide of liberation was sweeping away the old colonial powers, and that one-day the oppressed peoples of the world would march into Washington and topple the oppressors from power. How much of this was sincere, how much was for effect, and how much (a lot I suspect) was just to irritate me, I don’t know.
Though his rants were formalistic and filled with Lennist ideological nonsense, Le did have a point about our image with the average Vietnamese as long as we held on to control of the Saigon government. Unfortunately, as Ambassador Gates pointed out to me, paraphrasing Lincoln on the question of a commanding general, we couldn’t choose just anybody to be South Vietnamese President, we had to choose somebody, and each of the somebodies under consideration had serious drawbacks associated with them.
Before meeting with Le Douc Tho I met with Gromyko and we discussed the situation in general terms; there seemed to be a genuine consensus on the Soviet side for a scaling down of the hostility in Asia, in part I suspect because the Vietnam War was starting to cost the Soviets more than they felt they were getting from it. I suspected they were looking for a European style regularization. To that end we discussed guarantees of North Vietnamese sovereignty and a guarantee of their influence in Laos; in return we insisted on a recognition of South Vietnam’s sovereign rights and recognition of a non-Communist Cambodia. The latter was strategically essential to protecting the viability of the South Vietnamese state. Gromyko grumbled at length about the “colonial outpost” in the South, but he did not stand in the way of a general agreement.
When I met Le Douc Tho in Paris he was equally strident about South Vietnam being “a colonial outpost,” but we proceeded into negotiations along the lines I had discussed with Gromyko. Both of us were looking for the same thing, security for our halves of Vietnam, together with strategic viability (with Le having one eye to his North as well as his South I think) which meant we had common ground for the question of deal over relative influences in Laos and Cambodia.
One sticking point remained the nine prisoners which the North Vietnamese had tried as war criminals, one of whom was the son of our Secretary of State. Importantly, although the North Vietnamese had handed out death sentences, none of the nine had been executed. I extracted from Le an agreement that no harm would come to these men while we negotiated. He in return insisted that we take seriously a list of his side’s “comrades” in South Vietnamese jails who they wanted back. Like a pair of carpet merchants in a Turkish bazaar we were haggling our way toward a deal, which I took as a sign of progress.
As these negotiations were going on, I couldn’t help but notice the changes going on in the Soviet Union, and I wondered if they might be influencing the Soviet policy with respect to Vietnam. Unlike the fall of his predecessor (Khruhschev in 1964), the political demise of Leonid Brezhnev took on a more subtle flavour, which was meant to disguise from the world what was happening, but also to protect the USSR’s image of stability. Our intelligence people studying the Soviet press noted that Sulsov. Kosygin, the KGB chief Yuri Andropov and a party functionary named Arvids Pelse were receiving increased attention, while Brezhnev all but dropped from sight. This in itself was a signal that he had fallen from favour, otherwise Brezhnev – who was known for his vanity – would have been directing the Communist press to continue its focus on him. News that Mikhail Suslov had replaced him as Chairman of the State Military Commission, and that Kosygin had been promoted to Deputy Party General Secretary spoke volumes. Pelse, a background figure before now, became Finance Minister and Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers (Deputy Prime Minister). While not conclusive, the shifts suggested a re-distribution of power away from Brezhnev and toward these men, a signal that a change of leadership was coming.
Le Douc Tho and his comrades would have been well aware of this too, and I couldn’t rule out that in the background this was pushing them to be more co-operative with us. Perhaps they were working to salvage a deal before their situation deteriorated further.
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May 2, 1974
Spiro Agnew is formally disbarred by the Maryland State Bar Association.
Up to 40 members from the Provisional IRA East Tyrone Brigade attacked a British Army/ Ulster Defense Regiment base at the Deanery in Clogher, County Tyrone with machine gun and RPG fire resulting the death of one UDR soldier.
May 4, 1974
An all-female Japanese team summits Manaslu in Nepal, becoming the first women to climb an 8,000 metre peak.
The Expo '74 World's Fair opens in Spokane, Washington.
The DC Federal Court rules that the Vietnam Oversight Act is Constitutional. The Gavin Administration appeals; the restraining order is kept in place.
May 6, 1974
A demonstration of unemployed workers seeking jobs outside the World’s Fair entrance in Spokane degenerates into a riot as police move in to arrest the demonstrators. Network news programs focus on the unemployment problem for the next three nights. This causes a noticeable decline in President Gavin’s approval rating to 48%, largely in reaction to the poor economy.
May 7, 1974
West German Chancellor Willy Brandt resigns as a result of the Guillaume spy scandal.
May 8, 1974
In Canada the Liberal party government of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau falls over the issue of the economy and public spending.
(from Anonymous Behind the Fortress Walls)
There is no one event which can be identified as the beginning of the end for the Comrade General Secretary Brezhnev. Rather, his gentle fall was precipitated by a series of events, mixed with the combined impatience and ambitions of the men of the Central Committee. The repeated clashes with the Americans over Vietnam and the handling of the Middle East humiliation, which while avoiding a World War, nonetheless had served to make many feel that the international prestige of the Soviet Union had been weakened.
When the opportunity arose for the Soviet Union to gain advantage, by working with the Americans and the Turkish over the Syrian problem, Comrade Brezhnev balked. A number of others, including Comrades Suslov, Kosygin, Pelse and Gromyko all saw this as an opportunity to regain Soviet prestige, and they came to view the General Secretary’s reluctance to get involved – in other words to let the Soviet humiliation stand – as counterproductive and perhaps a sign that he had lost some subtle edge in this thinking.
For his part Comrade Brezhnev saw the Syrian situation as a quagmire, and he was more than willing to let the Americans, the Turkish and their allies step into it and allow themselves to become trapped like flies in amber. Equally, he wished to continue the bleeding of the Americans in Vietnam – where they had proved so willing to be the victims – and did not regard the mysterious withdrawal of the rice eaters from the world as an impediment. For some reason he welcomed it, as if it would magically eliminate China as a potential threat. Sure, it would weaken China to isolate itself, but in such a position, the rice eaters could be more dangerous than ever. Now was a time to consolidate our power around their borders, and this – according to Suslov and Kosygin – informed by Gromyko – meant resolving the Vietnam problem.
What Comrade Brezhnev saw as a policy of bleeding the Americans with little cost (and no blood) on the part of the Soviet Union, the others regarded as half-hearted and even cowardly. Comrades Suslov and Kosygin wanted to end the war in Vietnam while an advantageous deal could be had which would secure North Vietnam’s borders and control in Laos. A socialist liberation of Cambodia and the South of Vietnam could be affected later, especially if the United States became distracted in the Middle East. A negotiated settlement at this point would remove the American’s focus from this war which many of their people were eager to forget. The North Vietnamese comrades may have been resistant at first, but they too had to concern themselves with security on their northern border now that Mao’s mercurial nephew had gained pre-eminence. After a series of negotiations with Hanoi – negotiations which Comrade Brezhnev was not informed about – the comrades in Hanoi came to understand their position, and their Le Douc Tho began speaking with his American counterpart, Kissinger, again.
Comrade Arvids Pelse emerged from relative obscurity to have an increasingly influential voice within the Central Committee. He had previously overseen the discipline of Party cadres, but under Kosygin’s influence he was moved into the position of Minister of Finance (where his real duties were to implement Kosygin’s planned reforms). Comrade Yuri Andropov, the chairman of the State Security Committee, also gained in influence. He and Pelse (who retained his directorship of the Party control committee) oversaw an anti-corruption campaign in the spring of 1974. Corruption had long been a hallmark of the Comrade General Secretary’s decade long tenure, and had been the constant source of complaint and dissatisfaction, which Pelse had had to address within the party. Since many of the most corrupt of party members were acolytes of Comrade Brezhnev himself, the anti-corruption campaign had the effect of further weakening Comrade Brezhnev’s support network within the Party and the State. Since defending corruption and those who practiced it was an untenable position, Comrade Brezhnev found himself in a position to do little but look on and grumble in his humiliation.
That humiliation became clear when Comrade Brezhnev lost the chairmanship of the State Military Commission to Comrade Suslov in June. This was a clear indication to all that his power was broken and that as General Secretary and Chairman of the Presidium he was increasingly becoming a figurehead. Soon Comrade Suslov, who was now Deputy General Secretary, functioned as the actual General Secretary, and the General Secretary’s office became symbolic, a trend that was to continue for many years. So was Comrade Brezhnev eased into semi-retirement. Although he resisted this loss of power, he found himself increasingly isolated as the Party cadres came to see the future in the Suslov-Kosygin-Andropov-Pelse movement. No doubt the support of the State Security Committee informed the attitudes of many Party members when they considered where their future interests lay.
By the time the American President, James Gavin, arrived in Moscow for his state visit in late June, the process had all but completed himself. The American leader – the first to visit the Soviet Union since Franklin Roosevelt’s visit to Yalta in 1945 – had only one symbolic meeting with Comrade Brezhnev at the Kremlin, at which nothing of substance was discussed. The true discussions of substance were between the American President and Suslov and Kosygin.
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May 12, 1974
The United States Senate defeats a proposal by Senator Robert Dole to raise the national speed limit to 60 mph.
May 16, 1974
Helmut Schmidt becomes West German chancellor. He quietly endorses the Moscow accord.
The USSR performs nuclear Test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
May 18, 1974
Under Project Smiling Buddha, India successfully detonates its first nuclear weapon, becoming the 6th nation to do so.
In reaction to this, Pakistan Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto announces: “ If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass and leaves for a thousand years, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own. The Christians have the bomb, the Jews have the bomb and now the Hindus have the bomb. Why not the Muslims too have the bomb?”
The Warsaw radio mast is completed; at the time it is the tallest structure ever built.
May 19, 1974
Stanley Cup: Philadelphia Flyers beat Boston Bruins, 4 games to 2.
Socialist candidate Francois Mitterand wins the second round vote in the French presidential election (13,272,604 (50.3%) to 13,096,203 (49.7%)).
The unpopularity of the Syrian military action is credited with his narrow defeat of National Federation of the Independent Republicans candidate Valery Giscard d’Estaing who supported France’s role in the action.
May 23, 1974
Alice Moore, the wife of a fundamentalist minister and the member of a local school board in Kanawha County, West Virginia, becomes a leading figure in a protest against school text books which she believes are "filthy, disgusting trash, unpatriotic and unduly favoring blacks". She generated much publicity for her cause and won the support of the local Parent-Teacher Association.
Morre's complaint is part of a growing backlash among fundamentalists and other conservatives against "liberal values." Reverend Marvin Horan, a local activist, blames school text books which he claims promote those values for "the political and economic troubles in America today."
May 26, 1974
Allied operations begin in Syria. The coalition is composed of forces from the United States, the UK, France, Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Czechoslovakia, Poland and the Soviet Union. The allied coalition states its mission as an effort to restore law and order in Syria and to return sovereignty to the “lawful” Syrian government.
The Helms Act, an attempt to make sodomy a federal crime, is defeated in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
May 27, 1974
Francois Mitterand inaugurated as the 20th President of France. He announces he will withdraw French forces from Syria by September 1, 1974.
May 28, 1974
Italians fascist bomb demonstrators in Brescia, 6 killed
May 29, 1974
Northern Ireland is brought under direct rule from Westminster.
Allied forces re-take Damascus. The Aleppo government is quickly moved into quarters in the old Syrian capital, which is largely in ruins.
UN Security Council Resolution 349 extends the mandate of the UN peacekeeping forces in Cyprus.
May 30, 1974
NASA's ATS-6 satellite is launched.
June 1, 1974
The Heimlich manoeuvre for rescuing choking victims is published in the journal Emergency Medicine.
June 2, 1974
Ali Sadreddine Bayanouni is killed while leading a suicide attack against US forces. He becomes a Sunni martyr.
June 4, 1974
California Secretary of State Jerry Brown wins the Democratic Party nomination for the California Gubernatorial election.
Rep. Barry Goldwater Jr. wins the Republican nomination for California Governor, edging out the two moderates and other conservative candidates in the race.
June 8, 1974
A proposed US-Saudi military and economic agreement is put on hold by the Gavin Administration due to Saudi Arabia’s continuing support for the oil embargo against the United States. Secretary of State Bush is known to disagree with the President over this.
June 13, 1974
The 1974 FIFA World Cup begins in West Germany.
June 14, 1974
President Gavin becomes the first sitting U.S. President to visit Egypt.
(from Thomas L. Friedman Sleeping in Sand: American Policy and the Jihad Wars)
The collapse of Ali Sadreddine Bayanouni’s short-lived Caliphate in Syria at the hands of a western force by no means quashed the nationalist fires which he had kindled throughout the Arab world. Bayanouni himself became a martyr throughout the Sunni world. Many Arabs regarded the western and Soviet lead intervention that restored a secularist, military government to Syria as a modern extension of the foreign colonial occupations which had humiliated much of their culture in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Added to that was unique, Islamist character of the state Bayanouni and his Muslim Brotherhood followers had tried to set-up. The western intervention in May 1974 became an anti-Islamic crusade – an extension of the crusades of the Middle Ages – and as such opened some very deep cultural wounds throughout the Middle East.
Bayanouni’s short lived success at defying the West had inspired a generation of young, displaced Palestinians, disaffected with the lack of similar success by the PLO and other, older, secular revolutionary movements. Equally, in many Arab countries, a generation of young men dissatisfied with their pro-western or quasi-secular societies (and the failure of Nasser-like Arab nationalism to redress their cultural grievances) were equally emboldened by the example. The fact that the Syrian Caliphate ended with Bayanouni and many of his lieutenants martyred only served to stiffen the appeal of his attempt; it was a real life example of a classical Islamic parable of the martyr sacrificing himself to defend the faith in jihad. This was heady stuff that inspired true believers, and hardened them against the “infidels” who had struck him down.
The action also discredited the Cold war paradigm among many Arabs. For nearly a generation they had been preached to by outsiders about the importance of resisting Soviet communism to preserve their freedom. Yet, in their eyes, the Americans had collaborated with the Soviet communists to put down an expression of that religious faith. This stood as blatant hypocrisy to many throughout the Middle East, and suggested that when the chips were down whatever differences the United States and Soviet Union might have among themselves, both superpowers were united in their disregard – if not outright contempt – for the Arabs which trumped the divides of cold war ideology.
Over the next decade, the leaders of the various Jihad Wars would emerge from this environment. Sayyid Musa as Sadr, Hasim Nasrallah, Subi al-Tufayli, Juhayman al-Otaibi, Mohammed al Qahtani, Ayman al Zahwhiri, Yunus al-Astal – all to become infamous names in the west, and the heroes of Jihad throughout the Sunni Arab world – all experienced an epiphany from the event of 1974 which set them on a course that would clash with the western “infidels” and with the pro-western interests in their society.
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini drew his own lessons from the experience of Bayanouni. As a Shi’ite cleric he had little sympathy for Bayanouni’s Sunni revolution. He did however see the influence it was having among young Shi’ites, an experience which he increasingly hoped to capture for his own focus on Iran. Unlike Bayanouni, Khomeini wasn’t interested in a Middle East wide revolution, or even a wider pan-Shi’ite rising, not in 1974. Khomeini’s sole focus remained on overthrowing the Shah and transforming his native Iran into an Islamic state. To the degree that he had any use for Bayanouni’s Syrian caliphate, it was only to be used as an example of what young Iranians should strive to create in their own state – with himself and the Iranian Shi’ite clerical establishment firmly in-charge of the movement, of course.
During the Iran-Iraq War of 1974 Khomeini co-operated with the Sunni Ba’ath Party government in Baghdad by recording anti-Iranian regime sermons which were smuggled into Iran, and which encouraged Iranian soldiers to desert and admonished the population not to provide support to the Shah’s war effort. In part he did this because he was living in exile in Basra, and as such was subject to the grim influences of the Iraqi secret police – an organization known for their propensity to torture and kill opponents of the regime (or even those the Iraqi regime thought were not sufficiently zealous in supporting it). But Khomeini also saw the war as an opportunity to weaken the Shah, especially after the Shah’s western equipped Army suffered early and embarrassing defeats at the hands of the Iraqis. Khomeini grabbed on to these as an opportunity to demonstrate to Iranians that the Shah was weak and vulnerable. This meant he couldn’t protect Iranians as he claimed, and by implication that force could be used to topple him since his Army appeared as something of a paper tiger. In a society where many younger Iranians were fuming under the Shah’s self-aggrandizing and corrupt administration, this was like pouring fuel on the fire.
Khomeini may personally have thought that Bayanouni was a fool and an apostate, but he had no problem in using him to inspire Iranian youth to rise-up their own version of the Syrian revolutionary. Unlike the chaotic Syrian situation though, Khomeini was laying the ground to take control of the revolution when it happened in Iran.
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June 17, 1974
A bomb explodes at the Houses of Parliament in London, causing extensive damage and injuring 11 people. The Provisional IRA are believed to be responsible.
June 26, 1974
The Universal Product Code is scanned for the first time, to sell a package of Wrigley's chewing gum at the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio.
June 27, 1974
President Gavin begins the first state visit of a sitting United States President to the Soviet Union since the Yalta Conference of February 1945. Tellingly, the President is greeted by Suslov, Kosigyn and Andropov, and not Brezhnev.
The school board in Kanawha County, West Virginiamet again, with over 1,000 local residents observing, and voted to approve school text books. This was met with much consternation from conservative groups. Reverend Marvin Horan called for a boycott of all public schools. Fliers were distributed around the county which purported to demonstrate the lewdness of the books, but were actually quotations from completely different books like Sexual Politics that were not part of the curriculum. When parents could not find these passages in their children's own textbooks, they accused the teachers of hiding the real books from them.
"At a time when decent people are suffering because of the liberal values being jammed down their throats, when government is failing the average American, when our President would rather have supper with Communists in Moscow instead of helping ordinary, decent folk, then I say somethings wrong with America. It's time we heeded the call of the Lord to be vigilant in defending our faith from the temptations of Satan." Reverend Horan declares.
Violent incidents are recorded in reaction to the situation.
June 30, 1974
Soviet ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov arrested by Soviet authorities while attempting to defect to west. He is taken to the Soviet Embassy in London. British friends of Baryshnikov stage a demonstration outside the Embassy demanding the dancer’s release. British authorities decline to let the Soviets move Baryshnikov from the Embassy to the airport until they can speak with him. The Soviets refuse to allow this, leading to a summer-long stand-off in which the dancer is held hostage inside the Soviet Embassy.
July 3, 1974
Soyuz 14 carries 2 cosmonauts to space station Salyut 3; returns to Earth on July 19, 1974.
The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia reverses the lower court’s ruling on the Vietnam Oversight Act and rules that it violates the separation powers provision by assigning to Congress control over policies which the Constitution, in Article II, has given control of to the President (direction of the Armed Forces; issues of foreign relations). The lawyers representing Congress appeal to the United States Supreme Court. The case will not be heard until September, leaving the injunction in place through the summer.
July 4, 1974
An anti-war protest in Washington turns violent as several police cars are burned and a number of protesters and police are injured. DC police are accused of shooting at protesters without provocation.
(from Abbie Hoffman - America: Burn it Down and Piss On It! )
War! War! They were burning down Vietnam and now they wanted to burn down Syria. War was all they wanted in Washington! Well, man the war was in the streets – here in the streets, where people were starving and being called on to give their blood for big capital and big oil.
Ok. They wanted war. Well, we gave them one!
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July 7, 1974
The Netherlands beats West Germany 3–2 to win the 1974 FIFA World Cup.
July 8, 1974
Robert Stanfield’s Progressive Party wins the Canadian federal election, forming a minority government after winning 123 seats in the House of Commons.
Total Seats: 264 (133 needed to form a Majority)
Liberals: 109 (-19) 90 seats
Progressive Conservatives: 107 (+16) 123 seats - minority government
New Democrats: 31 (+8) 39 seats
Social Credit: 15 (-4) 11 seats
Independent: 0 (+1) 1 seat
The major breakthrough comes in Ontario, where the poor economy has created job losses in the manufacturing sector. Voters move away from the Liberals to the NDP and the PC in many Southern and Central Ontario ridings, contributing to Stanfield’s gain in seats.
July 10, 1974
OPEC divides on the issue of continuing the oil embargo. Iraq, Lybia and Algeria (the hardliners) argue for maintaining the embargo. Saudi Arabia, Iran, Nigeria and Venezuela (the moderate four) argue for an end to the embargo. Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (the pack of three) argue for a middle ground, largely concerned that appearing too conciliatory over punishing the west for the invasion of Syria will inflame domestic public opinion. Production quotas are increased, while the moderate four privately agree to ignore the symbolic embargo. The pack of three also find ways to work with the moderate four to export oil, while officially continuing to endorse the embargo.
Over the course of the summer the price of oil drops to $ 14.50 per barrel. The seven producer states collaborate to keep the price higher that pre-embargo levels both to enhance their profit but also to exploit the situation as diplomatic leverage in their dealings with western nations and Japan.
July 15, 1974
A military coup occurs on Cyprus. Archbishop - President Makarios flees. The Greek government is widely seen as having been behind the coup.
July 17, 1974
1st quadrophonic studio in UK is open by Moody Blues.
France performs nuclear Test at Muruora Island. (President Mitterand is showing that he is not going to abandon France’s independent nuclear policy).
John Lennon is ordered to leave US in 60 days.
A terrorist bomb planted in the Tower of London has left one person dead and 41 injured. (No organization has claimed responsibility but the PIRA is suspected).
Prime Minister Heath replaces Francis Pym as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland with Margaret Thatcher, the Secretary of State for Education and Science. The PM’s private brief to Thatcher is to “show the bastards no mercy.” This is a reference to his desire to see the PIRA routed by combined police and military action, while he envisions a tough regime on PIRA supporters.
In his memoirs Heath confides: “Margaret liked to act tough, and she didn’t shirk from a tough job. Well, I thought, all well in good. This will either make her or break her.” Heath does not say which outcome he preferred, but many observers thought he did it to break Thatcher.
Mrs. Thatcher later commented: “He gave me the toughest job there was at the time, hoping I’d make an ass of myself in the position. Well, I was determined – as Mr. Heath put it – to show the bastards no mercy: all the bastards involved.”
July 19, 1974
While addressing the UN Security Council, Archbishop Makarios III accused Greece of having invaded Cyprus: “The coup of the Greek junta is an invasion, and from its consequences the whole people of Cyprus suffers, both Greeks and Turks.”
July 20, 1974
Turkey launches its Intervention in Cyprus, however their force is diluted by the on-going operation in Syria. The original contingency plan for this Operation Attila had called for 40,000 Turkish troops and 160 tanks. Due to the Syrian situation, the Turkish are compelled to invade with only 45% of that number (approx 19,000 men and 73 tanks).
Two Cyprus Navy motor torpedo boats, the T1 and the T3, are sent out from Kyrenia to engage the Turkish naval flotilla approaching the shore. One ship is sunk by a combined Turkish air and naval attack, while the other returns to port with serious damage.
Greek Cypriot forces launch an organised counter-attack against the Turkish beachhead at Kyrenia, supported by T-34 tanks, and inflict serious damage on the smaller Turkish landing force. Much of tThe Turkish landing force captured or killed, with the remainder being forced to return to their ships, which come under attack from Cypriot Air Force units.
The Cypriot National Guard, supported by all available T-34 tanks, as well as Greek ELDYK forces, launch a massive attack against the Turkish Cypriot enclave at Kioneli, attempting to prevent amphibious Turkish forces from forming a bridgehead to Nicosia. This attack succeds.
Cypriot National Guard commando and infantry forces launch a coordinated attack against the Turkish enclave of Agyrta-Nicosia, encircling the northern flanks in an effort to isolate it. Turkish parachutists are dropped in and around the enclave in order to reinforce it, leading to heavy infantry losses at Mia Milia, where they are accidentally dropped on Greek Cypriot defensive lines.
Turkish action in Cyprus causes a serious rift in the international alliance currently operating in Syria.
July 21, 1974
The United Nations Security Council passes Resolution 353, demanding immediate withdrawal of Turkish military personnel and urges negotiations between Greece, Turkey and United Kingdom to take place.
General Dewan Prem Chand, the Indian General commanding the UN Peacekeeping forces, orders his troops to quarters in areas of relative safety as he determines that the UN force can do nothing and is in direct danger.
The Turkish destroyer D-354 Kocatepe is subjected to friendly fire from Turkish warplanes and sunk after being mistaken for a Greek ship. Two other destroyers are also damaged in the attack.
Cypriot National Guard forces deploy around Kyrenia and begin to form defensive lines on the Kyrenia-Karavas road, and also at Trimithi.
Heavy fighting takes place in the Pentedaktylos mountains between Greek Cypriot mountain commando forces and Turkish airborne forces. The Greek Cypriots take Aspri Moutti, and overwhelm the remaining Turkish units.
The Greek Cypriot government declares martial law on the island.
An attempt is made to assassinate the Greek Cypriot Naval Commander as he travels to Karavas on the Mirtou-Asomatou road. The attempt, mounted by a unit of Turkish paratroopers, fails.
The Ba’ath regime in Baghdad brutally suppresses a coup attempt by dissatisfied military officers.
July 22, 1974
A flight of Greek Nortalas planes, bringing reinforcements form Greece, encounter friendly fire from defenders at Nicosia International Airport, causing heavy Greek casualties.
July 23, 1974
The Cyprus coup regime under Nikos Sampson remains in office due to the victories over the Turkish forces. Sampson and his partners establish a military junta to govern on the same model as the ruling junta in Greece. A general ceasefire is declared, but in many parts of the island, this is not adhered to as guerrilla type operations continue between government (Greek) forces and Turkish resistance.
45th All Star Baseball Game: NL wins 7-2 at 3 Rivers Stadium, Pitts
Due to its success in defending Cyprus, and despite controversies over the move, the Greek military dictatorship survives a challenge by democrats to oust it from office. General Phaedon Gizikis remains President of Greece while Adamantios Androutsopoulos remains as Prime Minister.
July 25,1974
The first Geneva talks begin between the foreign ministers of the guarantor powers, to discuss the Cyprus crisis. Greece attempts to block all efforts at outside intervention. The Sampson government in Cyprus, supported by the Greek government, demands that the UN withdraw its forces from the island.
July 29, 1974
The Episcopal Church ordains female priests
St Louis Cardinal Lou Brock steals his 700th base
July 29 - 30, 1974
The PIRA devastated the commercial centre of Bangor town, County Down, in an overnight firebomb attack
July 31, 1974
The Turkish government falls as a result of the failure of the Cyprus operation. The Constitution is suspended and direct Presidential rule is instituted under an emergency powers provision. President Fahri Korutürk, backed by the military, establishes direct executive rule. While Turkey attempts to scale back its military commitment in Syria (to prepare a new invasion force for Cyprus) the fact is that Turkey cannot disengage from the Syrian action because of the direct security challenges to Turkey’s border security (and its strategic position relative to the Soviet Union), creating a dilemma for Turkish war planners.
August 4, 1974
Turkish irregulars detonate a bomb inside a Greek orthodox church in Morphou, Cyprus, killing seventeen include five children, and wounding forty others, all Greek Cypriots. The government imposes harsh police measures on the islands Turkish population in response, creating further unrest.
Pro-Turkish propaganda begins to appear in the Turkish enclaves on Cyprus likening their struggle against the Greeks to the “Jihad” in Syria.
A bomb explodes in an Italicus Expressen train between Italy and West Germany. Italian neo-fascist terrorists take responsibility.
Peace talks between the Iranians and Iraqis, brokered by the OIC and the UN, begin in Geneva.
August 5, 1974
The Greek Ambassador in Rome, Italy is shot and killed by a Turkish student in protest over events in Cyprus.
August 7, 1974
Philippe Petit walks a tightrope strung between the twin towers of the WTC in New York.
UN forces begin their withdrawal from Cyprus.
The Sampson government begins negotiations in Athens for Greek support troops in the event of another invasion threat from Turkey.
(from James M. Gavin A Call to Duty: A Memoir)
I was urged to pardon President Nixon from a number of quarters. House Minority Leader Gerald Ford seemed to be a particularly strong advocate of a pardon. Many of those advocating a pardon for the former President seemed to feel that trying Nixon would only exacerbate the political wounds inflicted by the Watergate scandal, and that the best way to put it behind us and begin to heal was for me to use the pardon to preempt a trial.
There was considerable merit to the argument, especially now that Richard Nixon was no longer President and there seemed little to be gained from digging around in the Watergate mess. A Presidential pardon would close the door on that seamy episode, and prevent it from being a wedge which some could use in our current political problems.
Had not my predecessor brought the issue of a Presidential pardon into disrepute, I may have considered it. However, the fact was that in the summer of 1973 a Presidential pardon had been used in a shamelessly blatant way to preserve in the office of the President an individual who was guilty of several serious crimes. That affair had seriously tainted the whole process in the public’s mind. Given that, I thought a second use of the pardon in a manner which could be seen to resemble the first would only further erode the people’s confidence in the judicial process and perhaps in the Presidency itself. No matter the merit of the arguments of pardoning Richard Nixon on the strength of putting an end to the Watergate matter, I believed that the cost of doing so was just to high.
In the end I chose not to pardon him, but to let the judicial process complete its function. I did not rule out a future pardon of commutation – to be issued in recognition of President’s Nixon service to the nation as both President and Vice President – but that would have to wait for the final outcome of the legal process. If that did not complete itself in my term, it would be the recommendation I would leave for my successor.
That way, I believed, the power of the pardon, along with the people’s wider faith in the rule-of-law, would be vindicated.
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August 9, 1974
Portions of the transcripts of former President Nixon’s Oval Office tapes from June and July 1972 are published in The Manchester Guardian. The verbatim transcripts make clear that the then President and his aides were directly and knowingly involved in efforts to cover-up the Watergate break-in.
An immediate investigation begins into the leak. Although some of the facts have already leaked-out (the tapes and their transcripts were to be held under seal by a special master appointed by the federal court until the courts determined their evidentiary value and if admitting them as evidence violated the fifth amendment rights of the people heard speaking on the tapes) the verbatim transcripts in the British newspaper confirms much of what has been to this point speculation.
American newspapers are barred by court order from reprinting the transcript (a ruling which they at once challenge in Court under the First Amendment), but many major American newspaper and television outlets skirt the law by reporting extensively on the debate over their publication in Europe. In the United States black market editions of European papers re-printing the Guardian coverage sell for as much as $ 10.00 per newspaper.
Former President Nixon’s lawyers argue that he is the victim of a conspiracy and even go so far as to allege that the Guardian manufactured the transcripts. However, Nixon does not sue the Guardian over the issue, which would be easy for him to do under Britain’s tight liable laws, suggesting to many on the fence that there is substance to what the Guardian has printed.
Meanwhile, in the DC District Court, Nixon’s lawyers argue that this revelation has denied their client the chance of a fair trial, a point that the judge presiding over the case seems wiling to consider.
Nixon’s supporters rally to his defense, accusing the Guardian of printing lies and “communist propaganda.”
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