Hubbry Logo
search
logo
August 1968 avatar
August 1968
August 1968
current hub
234982

August 1968

logo
Community Hub0 Subscribers
Read side by side
August 1968
View on Wikipedia
from Wikipedia
<< August 1968 >>
Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa
1 2 3
4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17
18 19 20 21 22 23 24
25 26 27 28 29 30 31
August 20–21, 1968: Soviet Union and 750,000 Warsaw Pact troops invade Czechoslovakia

The following events occurred in August 1968:

August 1, 1968 (Thursday)

[edit]

August 2, 1968 (Friday)

[edit]
  • Ahmed Sékou Touré, President of Guinea, spoke at the city of Kankan and announced his plans for a West African version of China's Cultural Revolution, with plans "to attack fetishism, charlatanism, religious fanaticism, any irrational attitude, any form of mystification, and any form of exploitation".[7] In order to further instruction in his concept of Socialist Cultural Theory, Touré ordered the creation of Centres d'Education Revolutionnaire to educate the next generation of leaders, and ordered citizens to join Pouvoir Revolutionnaire Locales to force change in towns and villages, as well as monopolizing all media.[8]
  • A suicidal pilot stole a Cessna-180 airplane from an airstrip at Jean, Nevada, then flew to Las Vegas and crashed into the top of what was, at the time, the tallest building in the metropolitan area, the 30-story tall Landmark Hotel and Casino in Paradise. The wreckage then fell onto the adjacent Las Vegas Convention Center. The pilot was killed, but nobody on the ground was injured.[9]
  • The five-story tall Ruby Towers apartment building, located in the Santa Cruz district of Manila, collapsed during a 7.6 magnitude earthquake that struck the Philippines island of Luzon at 4:21 in the morning, killing 204 people. The quake, with an epicenter at the city of Casiguran, 140 miles (230 km) away, killed 10 people in rural areas outside Manila.[10][11]
  • Colonel Abdallah Salih Sabah al-Awlaqi, the commander of the national security forces of the relatively new People's Republic of Southern Yemen (South Yemen), defected along with 200 of his soldiers to the older Yemen Arab Republic in North Yemen, taking with him most of South Yemen's fleet of armored cars.[12]
  • Eighty-two of the 95 people on board Alitalia Airlines Flight 660 survived despite the DC-8's crash into a tree-covered hillside as it was approaching Milan following a flight from Rome.[13][14]
  • Sirhan Sirhan pleaded not guilty to charges of murdering Senator Robert F. Kennedy in June.[15]
  • Born:
  • Died: Melitón Manzanas, 59, Spanish police superintendent and director of the Brigada Político-Social secret police force in San Sebastián, was assassinated by the Basque separatist group, Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA), at his home in Irún.[17]

August 3, 1968 (Saturday)

[edit]
  • The Bratislava Declaration was signed by the leaders of the Communist parties of host nation Czechoslovakia, and neighboring Communist-ruled regimes in the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Hungary, East Germany and Poland. Officially, the meeting in Czechoslovakia was called the "Declaration of Six Communist and Labor Parties of the Socialist Countries".[18] Specifically, the parties agreed to the Brezhnev doctrine (from Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev) that the Communist nations should agree on common policies and to "firmly and resolutely set their unbreakable solidarity and their high degree of vigilance against each and every effort by imperialism and also by all other anti-communist forces to weaken the leading role of the working class and the communist parties" and pledging that "They will never allow anyone to drive a wedge between socialist States or to undermine the foundations of the socialist social system." The six nations agreed to work together for "the interests of all fraternal countries and parties, the cause of the unbreakable friendship of the peoples of our countries, and the interests of peace, democracy, national independence, and socialism."[19] The last Soviet Army troops departed from Czechoslovakia on the same day, more than a month after the end of Warsaw Pact military exercises on June 30.[20] Troops would return 17 days later in an invasion of Czechoslovakia.
  • During the meeting, five conservative members of the Czechoslovak Communist Party Politburo signed and had delivered a "letter of invitation" that Brezhnev would refer to as the pretext for invasion, but which would not be revealed until almost 24 years later. Vasil Bilak, Alois Indra, Drahomir Kolder, Oldrich Svestka and Antonín Kapek [cs] signed the letter, typewritten and written in Russian, that "The very essence of socialism in our country is in danger," and added "In such complex conditions we are addressing you, Soviet Communists... with a plea to provide support and help with all the means available. Take our declaration as an urgent request for your intervention and general help."[21] On July 16, 1992, after the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe, Russian President Boris Yeltsin would deliver the original letter to Czechoslovakia's President Vaclav Havel, who would disclose it the next day.[22]
  • Born: Rod Beck, American baseball relief pitcher and 1994 award winner; in Burbank, California (d. 2007)[23]
  • Died: Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky, 71, Soviet Army commander and World War II hero

August 4, 1968 (Sunday)

[edit]

August 5, 1968 (Monday)

[edit]

August 6, 1968 (Tuesday)

[edit]
  • The United States Air Force made the first unannounced satellite launch from Cape Kennedy in almost five years, although many local reporters learned about the plan anyway, and were present for the 7:08 a.m. liftoff. Although the secret launch was no secret, the nature of the payload – referred to only as "Agent 817" – remained classified and was thought to be intended to gather intelligence from the Soviet Union and China. The last attempt at a secret launch had been on October 16, 1963; the Associated Press commented, "That shot received such wide publicity that the Pentagon de-classified the project and opened all future launchings to newsmen."[29] In 1990, "Agent 817" would be revealed to have been the first of the USAF's CANYON project of seven spy satellites sent up between 1968 and 1977.[30]
  • The United Kingdom submitted a comprehensive proposal at the meeting of the Eighteen Nation Committee on Disarmament in Geneva, that would ultimately become the basis of the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. The "Working Document on Microbiological Warfare" pointed out six shortcomings of the Geneva Protocol of 1925, including that it was limited to bacteriological and chemical weapons, that it applied only during declarations of war, that it prohibited the use, but not the manufacture of weapons and that it allowed their use against nations that were not party to the agreement.[31]

August 7, 1968 (Wednesday)

[edit]
  • More than 1,000 people drowned in the Gujarat State of India, after heavy rains during the monsoon season caused the Tapti River to overflow its banks.[32] The state capital, Surat, was submerged beneath 10 feet of water for a week.[33] After the floodwaters receded, at least 1,000 more people died in Gujarat state during a cholera epidemic from the contamination of the drinking water.[34] In the years after the flood, the Ukai Dam (which would open in 1972) would be constructed to bring the Tapti's waters under control and to provide hydroelectric power.
  • Former U.S. Vice-president Richard M. Nixon completed a dramatic political comeback by being nominated for president at the Republican National Convention on the first ballot. Needing 667 delegate votes, Nixon clinched the nomination when the roll call reached the 49th of the 50 state delegations and was given all 30 of Wisconsin's votes. He finished with 692. New York Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller was second with 287, and California Governor Ronald Reagan received 182.[35]
  • Nine coal miners were killed in an explosion and subsequent slate fall at Peabody Coal Company's River Queen Mine, near Greenville, Kentucky.[36]

August 8, 1968 (Thursday)

[edit]
  • Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew was selected by Richard Nixon to be his choice for vice-presidential running mate. Agnew was nominated on the first ballot, receiving 1,128 of the 1,333 delegate votes, while Michigan Governor George Romney, a proposal advanced by some liberal Republican delegates, got 178 votes, and another 27 votes were scattered among several other nominees. Following the roll call, Governor Romney made a successful motion that Agnew's nomination be accepted unanimously by acclamation.[37] Almost a year later, in the publication of The Making of the President, 1968, author Theodore H. White would reveal that Nixon had offered the vice presidential job first to Robert Finch, the incumbent Lieutenant Governor of California at the time, and that Finch had declined (Nixon, at the time, was a resident of New York).[38]
  • East Germany's Premier and Communist Party First Secretary Walter Ulbricht sent a proposal to his West Germany counterpart, Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger, seeking a summit for economic cooperation between the two German nations. Ulbricht's note was viewed in the west as a signal of "the failure and abandonment" of störfreimachen, a 1960 program to make East Germany independent of West German products. The next day, Ulbricht spoke at the East German parliament, the Volkskammer, and offered to normalize relations with the West.[39]
  • Died:

August 9, 1968 (Friday)

[edit]

August 10, 1968 (Saturday)

[edit]
  • The International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants, signed on December 2, 1961, went into effect after its ratification by just three nations.[44] Referred to as "The UPOV Convention" for its creation of the enforcement agency, the Union internationale pour la Protection des Obtentions Végétales, the treaty gave intellectual property rights to the creators of new strains of existing products through plant breeding.
  • The Politburo of the Soviet Union's Communist Party voted to accept a proposal to begin discussions with the United States to limit and reduce the number of offensive and defensive antiballistic missiles (ABMs), though not the nuclear warheads carried by the missiles. The Soviet decision set the way for the signing of the 1972 ABM Treaty.[45]
  • Piedmont Airlines Flight 230 crashed short of the runway while approaching Charleston, West Virginia at the end of its flight from Cincinnati, killing 35 of the 37 people aboard.[46][47]

August 11, 1968 (Sunday)

[edit]
  • A referendum was conducted in the Spanish colony of Equatorial Guinea for approval of a constitution that provided for a republican government. The West African colony comprised the territories of the island of Fernando Pó (now Bioko) and the mainland territory of Río Muni. In voting supervised by United Nations observers, the referendum passed by a 63% to 37% margin (72,458 yes and 41,197 no).[48] Approval by the voters in Río Muni was more significant than on Fernando Pó, where the approval came by just 377 votes (4,763 to 4,486).[49]
  • The last steam passenger train service in Britain came to an end. A selection of British Railways steam locomotives made the 120-mile (190 km) journey from Liverpool to Carlisle and back in what is now called the Fifteen Guinea Special.[50] The £15 price of the ride was equivalent at the time to more than US$40 per person, and more than £240 in 2018.
  • The Deep Sea Drilling Project began operations as the D/V Glomar Challenger began its first core-drilling operation under the planning of the Joint Oceanographic Institutions for Deep Earth Sampling.[51]
  • The Soviet Union, East Germany and Poland began military maneuvers near their nations' borders with Czechoslovakia.[52]
  • Born: Noordin Mohammad Top, Malaysian-born Indonesian terrorist; in Kluang (killed by police, 2009)

August 12, 1968 (Monday)

[edit]
  • Israel was able to obtain two intact and fully working MiG-17 jet fighters, after two Syrian Air Force pilots mistook an airstrip at Betzet in Israel for a runway in Latakia in southern Lebanon . Lieutenant Walid Adham and 2nd Lieutenant Radfan Rifai came in for a landing, and climbed out, then were stunned when local residents told them that they were on Israeli territory.[53] The Israeli Air Force was soon able to use the two MiG-17s for training missions in maneuvers against its own Shahak 32 jet fighters, and discovered that the MiG-17 could outmaneuver the Israeli fighter jets at low altitudes. Within a year, Israel was able to regain an advantage over the fighter jets of its neighboring enemies.[54]
  • At Nanning, the capital of China's Guangxi Province, political leaders began a seven-week public "Beast and Fowl Exhibit" of Chinese citizens who were branded as enemies of the Cultural Revolution. The prisoners were tied up, placed in a wooden cage for display, and made to wear signs that identified what they were accused of, including treason, espionage, war crimes, or membership in the fictitious "Anti-Communist Party Patriotic Army". Over a period of 52 days, almost half a million (489,365) spectators filed through the Chinese Red Army military headquarters for a "Class-Struggle Education" presentation.[55]

August 13, 1968 (Tuesday)

[edit]
  • Greece's prime minister and dictator, Georgios Papadopoulos, escaped an assassination attempt when a bomb exploded while his car was still 45 feet (14 m) away. Papadopoulos was on his way back to Athens after a stay at his summer villa in Lagonisi. Former Greek Navy Lieutenant Alexandros Panagoulis, who had been part of an underwater demolition team, misjudged the speed of the premier's car, and detonated the explosive just as the vehicle was entering a tunnel. Panagoulis was caught by police while trying to run toward a getaway motorboat which had been unable to reach the shore due to the sea being crowded with swimmers; the boat sped away and was the subject of a massive search.[56] During the next 24 hours, Greek security police arrested more than 100 people suspected as being part of the conspiracy, including three retired Greek officers, air force major general Elias Deros, army brigadier general Ioannides Koumanakos, and Navy Captain Constantine Loundras.[57] Panagoulis would spend five years in Greek prisons before being exiled in 1973.[58] After the overthrow of Papadopoulos in 1974, Panagoulis would be elected to parliament, but would be killed in an automobile accident in 1976.
  • An unprecedented number of students and protesters marched to the Zócalo, the main square in Mexico City, to protest against Mexico's president, Gustavo Diaz Ordaz. At 5:00 in the afternoon, a crowd of 50,000 students, professors and supporters started from the university campus of the Instituto Politécnico Nacional and began the 8-mile (13 km) walk to the capital. By the time they reached the city center, their number had increased to 150,000. The demonstration remained peaceful, and the police did not intervene, despite the traffic jams created by the protests.[59] An even larger demonstration would take place two weeks later.
  • East Germany's Communist Party leader, Walter Ulbricht, arrived in Czechoslovakia as the guest of Alexander Dubček, and the two leaders conferred at the resort town of Karlovy Vary.[60] Ulbricht was unsuccessful in his last attempt to convince the Czechoslovak leaders to reverse their attempts to introduce "socialism with a human face".[61]
  • Born: Masaneh Kinteh, Gambian military officer and commander of the Gambian Armed Forces from 2009 to 2012 and again from 2017 to 2020; in Sankwia, Jarra West, the Gambia
  • Died: Rene d'Harnoncourt, 67, who had retired six weeks earlier from being Director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, was struck and killed by a drunk driver while walking along the side of a road in New Suffolk, New York.[62]

August 14, 1968 (Wednesday)

[edit]
  • All 21 people on a Los Angeles Airways helicopter were killed when the Sikorsky S61 broke apart while flying the group of vacationers from the Los Angeles International Airport to Disneyland.[63] The wreckage fell onto a playground at Lueder's Park in Compton. One of the victims was the teenage grandson of the L.A. Airways shuttle director. Moments before the crash, a group of children who had been playing at the site had been led to safety by a 14-year-old National Youth Corps volunteer. The crash was the second in less than three months for the Disneyland shuttle service; 23 people had been killed on May 22.
  • Born:

August 15, 1968 (Thursday)

[edit]

August 16, 1968 (Friday)

[edit]
  • In one of his last official acts as Prime Minister of Portugal and dictator of the Iberian nation, António de Oliveira Salazar fired seven of his 15 cabinet ministers, including his longtime Interior Minister and head of law enforcement, Alfredo Dos Santos. Salazar, who would suffer a fatal stroke less than three weeks later, also dismissed his Finance Minister, the ministers for the Portuguese Army and the Portuguese Navy, the Health Minister, the Education Minister and the Communications Minister.[67]
  • The United States launched two different multiple warhead missile systems on the same day, firing (for the first time) a UGM-73 Poseidon (capable of carrying 10 separately targeted warheads) from a surface ship, the USNS Observation Island, followed a few hours later by a Minuteman 3 (which could carry 3 warheads) from a U.S. Air Force missile silo.[68]
  • Romania's President and Communist Party leader, Nicolae Ceaușescu, signed a 20-year "treaty of friendship, cooperation and mutual assistance" with Czechoslovakian President Ludvik Svoboda at a meeting in Prague.[69]

August 17, 1968 (Saturday)

[edit]
  • Meeting in a closed session, the 170 members of the Soviet Communist Party's Central Committee decided "by a narrow majority" to authorize the invasion of Czechoslovakia. The decision to intervene in the domestic affairs of another Communist nation would be described later by historian Mary Heimann as "a decision that was to return to haunt subsequent Soviet administrations."[70] The Party's Politburo then approved the Central Committee decision unanimously.[71]
  • Hungary's Communist leader, János Kádár, visited Prague and met with Czechoslovak party leader Alexander Dubček, "presumably with the consent of the Kremlin".[72] According to one account, Kadar, who had been brought to power by the Soviet invasion of his country in 1956 and who was aware that an invasion of Czechoslovakia was likely, asked Dubček, "Do you really not know the kind of people who you are dealing with?"[73]
  • The third and final phase of the Tet Offensive— Phase III— began with a massive attack by the North Vietnamese Army and the Viet Cong on 27 South Vietnamese cities and towns, as well as 47 airfields and 100 outposts.[74] The fighting would continue for more than six weeks, finally ending on September 28.
  • Czechoslovak Premier Oldřich Černík told an Austrian television interviewer that his nation was considering loans from the World Bank and from other foreign banking firms. Unlike aid from the Soviet Union, loans from capitalist nations were not dependent on political preconditions.[75]
  • Actress Mia Farrow flew from New York to El Paso, Texas, then went across the border to the neighboring city of Ciudad Juárez in Mexico. Thirty minutes later, she was granted a divorce from singer Frank Sinatra, whom she had married in December.[76]

August 18, 1968 (Sunday)

[edit]
  • In Moscow, the Soviet Union's Leonid Brezhnev convened an emergency meeting with his counterparts from four other Warsaw Pact neighbors of Czechoslovakia, Todor Zhivkov (Bulgaria), Wladyslaw Gomulka (Poland), Walter Ulbricht (East Germany) and János Kádár (Hungary),[77] and read to them the August 3 "invitation letter" handed to him in Bratislava, then discussed and approved Brezhnev's plans for a joint military invasion.[21]
  • U.S. President Lyndon Johnson informed Presidential hopefuls Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey that the North Vietnamese government had refused to allow the Pope to visit Hanoi on a mission of peace. During telephone conversations which were recorded between LBJ, Nixon and Humphrey the decision by Hanoi to deny the Pope's visit was described as yet another example of how little the North Vietnamese wanted peace.[78][79]
  • A landslide killed 104 people after sweeping two charter buses into the rain-swollen Hida River on National Highway Route 41 in Japan. The two vehicles were part of a caravan of 15 buses that were on an early morning trip to Mount Norikura to watch the sunrise.[80]
  • All 40 people on a United Arab Airlines (now EgyptAir) flight were killed when the Antonov 24B crashed into the Mediterranean Sea while en route from Cairo to Damascus.[81][82]
  • Ronald Duff, a 19-year-old guitarist for an Irish pop music band, The First Edition (unrelated to a similarly named American band), was electrocuted while the band was playing a set for a dance at the ballroom of the Barry Hotel in Dublin. Witnesses said that Duff had hugged his electric guitar to his chest when the instrument short-circuited.[83][84]

August 19, 1968 (Monday)

[edit]
  • U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General Samuel C. Phillips, Director of NASA's Apollo lunar landing program, announced that it was "clearly possible" for a crewed landing on the Moon to happen in 1969, fulfilling the goal announced by the late President Kennedy in 1962 to land a man on the Moon, and return him to Earth, "before the end of the decade". Speaking in Washington, Lt. Gen. Phillips said that the launch date for the first orbital flight of the Apollo program, Apollo 7, had been set for October 11. Apollo 11 would land on the Moon 11 months and one day after Phillips's announcement.[85]
  • President Johnson signed the Wholesome Poultry Act into law, providing for all states to implement minimum standards for inspection of chicken and other poultry products within two years. The law was enacted eight months after the Wholesome Meat Act. Johnson commented that dirty chicken processing plants would have to "clean up or close down".[86]
  • Anatoly Dobrynin, the Soviet Union's ambassador to the U.S., informed U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk that the Soviet Union was ready to negotiate an arms limitation treaty to stop the further production of ballistic and anti-ballistic missiles.[87]
  • Died: George Gamow, 64, Ukrainian-born American theoretical physicist and author known for the popular science book for young readers, One Two Three... Infinity

August 20, 1968 (Tuesday)

[edit]
  • At 11:00 p.m. local time (2000 UTC), the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia began as troops and tanks from the Soviet Union, Poland, East Germany, and Hungary came across Czechoslovakia's borders. Bulgarian troops came in from the Soviet side, and Antonov troop and tank carrier airplanes of the 24th Soviet Tactical Air Armyat landed at the airports in Prague, Bratislava, Brno, Kosice, Ostrava, Karlovy Vary, Pardubice, Poprad, and other Czechoslovak cities.[88][89] The Prague Spring of political liberalization had come to an end as 500,000 Warsaw Pact troops, 6,300 tanks and 550 combat aircraft and 250 transport planes[18] carried out the largest Soviet attack in peacetime and the biggest operation in Europe since World War II had ended.
  • Earlier in the day, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) Presidium held its weekly meeting at 2:00, where Vasil Bilak and the other hardline members had planned to read a position paper regarding chaos in the KSČ and were prepared to force a vote of no-confidence in Alexander Dubček's management of KSČ affairs, then request the intervention of the Warsaw Pact to set up a "revolutionary workers' and peasants' government" with Alois Indra as Premier; Dubček was discussing the position paper when news of the invasion was received.[88] Earlier in the meeting, plans for the KSČ's 14th Party Congress were approved, along with a resolution rescinding all restrictions on the teaching of religion in schools.[90]
  • The wreckage of the Soviet nuclear submarine K-129, which had sunk along with its crew of 98 on March 8, was located by the USS Halibut northwest of Oahu at an approximate depth of 4,900 metres (16,000 ft).[91]

August 21, 1968 (Wednesday)

[edit]
  • A riot at the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus was brought to an end at 2:45 in the afternoon, and nine guards were rescued after having been held hostage for 30 hours. More than 300 of the 2,500 inmates had seized control of the prison after a guard was overpowered by a prisoner and had his keys taken. After a spokesman for the inmates threatened to burn the hostages to death if more demands were not met, prison warden Marion J. Koloski delivered an ultimatum at 2:30 and told the rebels that he was giving them "one last chance" to release the guards, and that they had 15 minutes to respond. When the hostages were not released after 15 minutes, officers detonated dynamite outside the cell walls and, seconds later, in the roof over the cell block. Five inmates were shot and killed by the SWAT team during the rescue.[92]
  • Three hours after the invasion of Czechoslovakia the night before, at 2:00 in the morning local time, when most of Czechoslovakia's residents were asleep, Radio Prague broadcast an announcement "to the entire people of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic", and said that troops from five nations had crossed the nation's frontiers. "This happened without the knowledge of the President of the Republic, the Chairman of the National Assembly, the Premier or the First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party Central Committee," the announcer explained, and urged citizens to "maintain calm and not offer resistance to troops on the march," adding that "Our army, security corps and People's Militia has not received a command to defend the country."
  • Members of the KSC Presidium adjourned their meeting after the broadcast at 2:15 and remained at the KSC offices. At 8:30, as recounted later by Josef Smrkovský's secretary, a Soviet Army colonel arrived with soldiers and two Czechoslovak State Security agents and informed Party First Secretary Dubček, Prime Minister Černík, and KSČ Presidium members Josef Smrkovský, František Kriegel, Josef Špaček, and Bohumil Šimon that they were under arrest[93] by order of the "Revolutionary Security Committee" headed by another KSC Presidium member, Alois Indra.[88] The group was flown to the Soviet military base in Poland at Legnica, then to a base located in Zakarpattia Oblast, territory that had been annexed from Czechoslovakia by the Soviets in 1946.[94][95][96]
  • Romanian Communist Party (RCP) General Secretary Nicolae Ceaușescu surprised the non-Communist world by publicly condemning the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia while speaking to a crowd in Bucharest from a balcony. "The incursion in Czechoslovakia of troops belonging to the five socialist countries represents a big mistake," he told the crowd, "and a serious threat to peace in Europe and for the destiny of socialism in the world... There can be no excuse, and there can be no reason to accept, even for a single moment, the idea of a military intervention in the domestic affairs of a fraternal socialist state."[97]
  • U.S. President Lyndon Johnson canceled a press conference during which he would have announced his plans to travel to the Soviet Union for a September 30 summit meeting in Leningrad.[88] The evening before, Johnson had been visited by Soviet Ambassador Dobrynin at the White House at 8:15 to discuss Soviet and American discussions on missile limitations, without any mention of the invasion of Czechoslovakia that was already in progress, and Johnson had accepted Dobrynin's invitation to come to the USSR in the autumn.[98]
  • Born:

August 22, 1968 (Thursday)

[edit]
  • The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia moved up the September 9 start date of its 14th Party Congress, and 1,192 of the 1,543 delegates assembled at the CKD factory in Vysočany, a suburb of Prague.[99] The delegates selected a new party central committee and a new presidium, whose leaders unanimously re-elected Alexander Dubček (who had been arrested by the Soviets the day before) as the KSČ First Secretary. An economist, Venek Šilhán, was selected to be the Acting First Secretary during Dubček's absence.[100] At the same time, 11 of the KSČ's 22 Presidium members met at the Soviet Embassy in Prague and, at about 5:00, selected Alois Indra to be the Premier of a new government; but when they sought approval, President Ludvik Svoboda refused to accept a puppet government, and reaffirmed that Oldřich Černík would continue to be the Prime Minister. President Svoboda then met with Soviet Ambassador Stepan Chervonenko and asked to be allowed to fly to Moscow to join the other Czechoslovak leaders who had been arrested. Permission was granted, on the condition that Svoboda be accompanied by a collaborationist, Vice-Premier Gustáv Husák.[101]
  • The 1968 Democratic National Convention opened in Chicago and would continue until August 30. During the event, riots would break out as police clashed with anti-war protesters. The Democratic Party nominated Hubert Humphrey for president, and Edmund Muskie for vice president. The riots and subsequent trials would become an essential part of the activism for the Youth International Party, but would also taint the image of the Democrats in the November elections.
  • Ringo Starr briefly quit The Beatles after frustrations with the recording session of the song Back in the U.S.S.R. for the White Album, and arguments with Paul McCartney; during Starr's absence, McCartney played the drums for the studio recording and overdubbing.[102] While Starr was on vacation with his wife and children during the absence, he would be inspired to write the song Octopus's Garden.[103]
  • Pope Paul VI made the first papal visit ever to South America, landing at Bogotá, Colombia, at 10:27 in the morning after an 11-hour and 45-minute flight from Rome on a chartered Avianca Airlines 707.[104][105]

August 23, 1968 (Friday)

[edit]
  • Caswell County, North Carolina, which had the last remaining racially segregated school system in the United States, was ordered by U.S. District Judge Edwin M. Stanley to integrate its schools after years of getting deferments for submitting a desegregation plan. In granting a writ of mandamus in a suit by the NAACP against the Caswell County Schools, Judge Stanley wrote that although it was too late to desegregate in time for the start of school, the school system had until November 1 to file a plan to bring together white and black students, teachers and administrative personnel in time for the 1969–70 school year.[106] School superintendent Thomas H. Whitley would recount later that the NAACP attorney (Julius L. Chambers) told Judge Stanley that the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled that "the time for procrastination is over". Judge Stanley then conceded that Chambers was correct, and told the school officials that "The Supreme Court has made its statement. You don't have any further choice. You have to get on with integration."[107]
  • With photographs by Alfred Eisenstaedt, the American newsweekly Life magazine brought national and worldwide attention to the industrial pollution of America's Great Lakes, particularly Lake Erie, Lake Ontario and Lake Michigan.[108] The photo essay, "Blighted Great Lakes" (subtitled "Shocking case of our inland seas dying from man-made filth"), was written by Richard Woodbury, who concluded "The pictures on these pages point to the appalling conclusion that water pollution has brought the U.S. to a point of no return: either we curb the slatternly despoiling of our environment, or we accept the death of lakes and rivers and a denigration of the quality in our life."[109]
  • Czechoslovakia's Prime Minister Dubček was brought from a prison in the Ukrainian SSR to Moscow, where Soviet First Secretary Brezhnev, Premier Alexei Kosygin and President Nikolai V. Podgorny discussed the invasion with him. A larger meeting, involving the incarcerated Czechoslovak party officials and the Soviet leadership, began later in the day.[99]
  • Nigeria launched its final assault on the secessionist republic of Biafra under the command of Colonel Benjamin Adekunle, who reportedly instructed the Third Nigerian Army Division to "Shoot anything that moves"; thousands of Ibo civilians would be killed in their villages in the months that followed.[110]
  • Born: KK (stage name for Krishnakumar Kunnath), Indian playback singer (d. 2022); in Delhi

August 24, 1968 (Saturday)

[edit]

August 25, 1968 (Sunday)

[edit]

August 26, 1968 (Monday)

[edit]
  • The reforms of the Prague Spring were rolled back with the execution of the Moscow Protocol between the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia after Alexander Dubček, Oldřich Černík, Josef Smrkovský and other officials of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) signed a document repealing the KSČ's enactments, reimposed censorship, and agreed that Soviet Army troops could remain on Czechoslovak soil until further notice. In return, Leonid Brezhnev and other leaders of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union agreed to release the Czechoslovak leaders, allow them to remain in office temporarily, and to dismiss charges of counterrevolution.[118]
  • Hey Jude, the best-selling single ever recorded by The Beatles (as well as the most popular single of 1968 in the U.S. and the UK, and half a century later, still the 10th best-seller worldwide of all recorded songs), was released for sale in the United States, followed four days later by its debut in the United Kingdom. It was the first Beatles release for their new company, Apple Records.[119]
  • Died: Kay Francis, 63, American film actress who was the leading actress for Warner Brothers during the 1930s

August 27, 1968 (Tuesday)

[edit]
  • Allowed by the Soviet Union to return to Czechoslovakia with his post as KSČ Party First Secretary intact, Alexander Dubček made a nationwide radio address hours after his return and urged citizens to accept the terms of surrender in the Moscow Protocol; by then, 84 Czechoslovaks and four Soviet soldiers had been killed in the first eight days of the invasion.[120] Several times during the broadcast, Dubček choked, paused at length and could be heard crying as he asked his compatriots not to resist the occupation and to forgive him for capitulating, commenting at one point, "I think you know why it is"; Dubček would retain his post, albeit without any real power, for eight more months.[121] The subsequent "normalization", a rollback of reforms in late 1968 and 1969, is referred to as the normalizace in Czech and the normalizácia in Slovak.[122]
  • Raman Raghav, a serial killer who was suspected in the murders of 12 people in the city of Bombay (now Mumbai) during the month of August, was arrested by Bombay police. Raman, who had killed his victims with knives or crowbars, initially said that his motive was robbery, but would later confess to 41 murders and claim that he had been motivated by religious beliefs.[123][124]
  • In Mexico City, a crowd of 300,000 students and their supporters staged a peaceful antigovernment demonstration, the largest up to that time in Mexican history,[125] to protest against the administration of President Diaz Ordaz.[126]
  • Died:

August 28, 1968 (Wednesday)

[edit]
Humphrey
  • U.S. Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey was nominated as the Democratic Party's candidate for President on the first ballot at the national convention in Chicago. Needing 1,312 ballots to capture the nomination, Humphrey received 1,761¾. U.S. Senator Eugene McCarthy, also from Humphrey's home state of Minnesota, was a distant second with 601, and U.S. Senator George S. McGovern, from Humphrey's native state of South Dakota, was third with 164½.
  • On the same day, after different speakers at Chicago's Grant Park addressed a crowd of 15,000 antiwar protesters, a crowd of about 1,500 people marched along Michigan Avenue toward the convention site at the International Amphitheatre where the convention was taking place, protesting Humphrey's nomination. The Chicago police confronted and attacked the protesters with billy clubs and tear gas at various places between the park and the convention center as violence reached its peak. Seven months later, a group of protest leaders designated as the Chicago Seven, and an eighth leader, Bobby Seale, would be indicted on federal charges of crossing state lines in an attempt to incite a riot.[127] As one historian would note later, "Millions of Americans turned on their televisions expecting to see Hubert Humphrey win the Democratic presidential nomination," but saw the networks cut away to live coverage of the riots;[128] recognizing what was happening, the protesters began to chant "The whole world is watching!".[129]
  • Selections were made for the all-England test cricket team scheduled to tour South Africa, and cricket fans were surprised and outraged when the selectors for the Marylebone Cricket Club declined to include Basil "Dolly" D'Oliveira, a brown-skinned native of South Africa who had become a naturalized British citizen.[130] D. J. Insole, the chairman of the selection commission, defended the MCC's choices by saying "We think we have got rather better players in the side", and an editorial for The Guardian responded "Anyone prepared to swallow that would believe that the moon is a currant bun", pointing out that D'Oliveira had been the top scorer in the first Test against Australia, and the second highest scorer in the rematch, and concluding that the only explanation was that the MCC had caved to South Africa's apartheid policy. After more public outcry, and South Africa's refusal to grant D'Oliviera a visa to enter that country, the MCC would cancel the planned tour in September.
  • John Gordon Mein, the United States Ambassador to Guatemala, was assassinated while trying to escape his limousine during an ambush. At 3:05 p.m., Mein was on his way from his home to the American Embassy in Guatemala City, and when his car was on Avenida de la Reforma, another automobile pulled up in front and a truck closed in from behind. The chauffeur was pulled from the car, and when Mein opened the back door and tried to flee, he was shot to death with a machine gun.[131] Mein's killing marked the first time that an American ambassador had been murdered while in office.
  • The restructuring of Czechoslovakia as "a socialist federation of two national states" was announced, and would become effective on October 28.[132] A little more than 22 years later, the two states would peacefully separate into independent nations as the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
  • Born: Billy Boyd, Scottish stage and film actor known for playing Pippin Took in The Lord of the Rings trilogy; in Glasgow[133]
  • Died: Willie Narmour, 80, popular American musician who recorded numerous country music hits as part of the duo of Narmour and Smith

August 29, 1968 (Thursday)

[edit]
August 29, 1968: Prince Harald marries Sonja Haraldsen
  • Crown Prince Harald (who later became King Harald V) of Norway married Sonja Haraldsen, a commoner whom he had dated for nine years. The couple had been prohibited from marriage because the Norwegian government would not approve a waiver of a law requiring a member of the Norwegian royalty to marry another member of nobility or royalty, and Prince Harald had refused to marry until the rule was lifted.[134] Because Sonja's father was deceased, King Olav V accompanied her down the aisle in the "father of the bride" role.[135]
  • According to an urban legend which would begin circulating on the Internet around 2014, every television in America shut down for about 25 seconds on this date, during which a murmuring sound was heard. Snopes would rate this story as "False" in March 2023, stating that there was no historical or eyewitness evidence to support it.[136]
  • Born: Ricky Memphis (stage name for Riccardo Fortunati), Italian TV and film actor known for the long running police show Distretto di Polizia; in Corleone, Sicily
  • Died: U.S. Army Major General Ulysses S. Grant III, 87, American engineer and military officer. General Grant had been born four years before the 1884 death of his grandfather, former U.S. president and General of the Army Ulysses S. Grant.[137]

August 30, 1968 (Friday)

[edit]
  • Romanian Communist Party (RCP) General Secretary Nicolae Ceaușescu continued his public show of Romania's defiance of the Soviet Union during a mass rally at the city of Cluj, getting respect from the non-Communist Western nations and adding to his growing personality cult. For the first time Ceaușescu referred to the RCP (and by extension, himself) as the direct successor to three medieval Romanian rulers who fought the Ottoman Empire, Prince Mircea cel Bătrân of Wallachia and Prince Ștefan cel Mare of Moldavia, and Prince Mihai Viteazu, who unified Wallachia and Moldavia. "From that moment on," a historian would later note, "the cult of ancestors and the manipulation of national symbols became key ingredients of Ceaușescuism."[138]
  • African-American inmates rioted at the Long Bình Jail, the overcrowded military prison for U.S. servicemen near Saigon in South Vietnam.[139] The uprising would last for 9 days; one inmate was killed, and 52 inmates and 63 military policemen were injured.
  • Died: William Talman, 53, American actor best known for portraying "television's biggest loser" as Los Angeles prosecutor Hamilton Burger, who was bested every week by the title character on the popular mystery and courtroom series, Perry Mason. Six weeks before his death from lung cancer, Talman— who had smoked three packs of cigarettes a day— filmed a 60-second television commercial for the American Cancer Society, urging viewers to avoid cigarette smoking and would set a precedent for other such "warnings from beyond the grave".[140]

August 31, 1968 (Saturday)

[edit]
  • A 7.4 magnitude earthquake killed more than 15,000 people after striking the Khorasan province in northeastern Iran at 3:17 in the afternoon local time (1047 UTC). The hardest hit areas were in and around the towns of Ferdows, Kezri and Kakhk.[141] Kakhk lost 6,000 of its 7,000 residents as the earthquake destroyed all but one of its buildings, a mosque.[142]
  • Gary Sobers, a batsman for the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club, set a first-class cricket record by scoring 36 runs in one time at bat during a match against Glamorgan, hitting all six balls bowled to him by Glamorgan's Malcolm Nash during his over outside the pitch boundary for six consecutive sixes.[143][144] The feat has been repeated only once since then, by Ravi Shastri on January 10, 1985.[145] Nottinghamshire would go on to win the match, 394 to 254.
  • The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine released the last 12 people whom they had held captive for forty days after the July 22 hijacking of El Al Flight 426. Of the original 48 people originally board before the plane was diverted to Algiers, the seven crewmembers and five male passengers, all Israelis, remained and were flown to Rome to be handed over to Italian authorities. Israel, in turn agreed to release 12 Arab commandos being held in Israeli jails.[146]
  • The first multi-organ transplant was carried out as four different patients at Houston's Methodist Hospital received organs from a single donor, a 20-year-old woman who had been killed by a gunshot. Dr. Michael DeBakey led a team of 60 people (surgeons, nurses and support staff) in transplanting the woman's heart, lung, and each of her kidneys into four different men who ranged in age from 22 to 50 years old.[147][148]
  • Thirteen people were killed in an apartment fire in Gary, Indiana, in the worst disaster in the city's history.[149]
  • Born: Hideo Nomo, Japanese-born professional baseball pitcher who became the first Japan League star to have a long Major League Baseball career; in Osaka. After being the Pacific League in 1990 for the Kintetsu Buffaloes in 1990, he was the National League Rookie of the Year for the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1995, and played for seven MLB teams before retiring in 2008.
  • Died:
    • Joe Tracy, 83, American bank robber and the last member of the Ashley Gang that stole from 40 banks across Florida and Georgia between 1915 and John Ashley's death in a shootout in 1924. Tracy had been in prison since 1948 for robbing the Perkins State Bank in Williston, Florida, turning down a chance for parole by refusing to disclose where he hid $23,700 taken in the theft.[150]
    • Dennis O'Keefe (Edward Vance Flanagan), 60, American film actor

References

[edit]
Revisions and contributorsEdit on WikipediaRead on Wikipedia

August 1968

View on Grokipedia
from Grokipedia
August 1968 was a month defined by stark manifestations of Cold War authoritarianism and American political polarization, most notably the Warsaw Pact's invasion of Czechoslovakia on August 20–21 to suppress the Prague Spring's liberalization efforts, and the violent protests encircling the Democratic National Convention in Chicago from August 26–29 amid escalating divisions over the Vietnam War.[1][2][3] The invasion, spearheaded by the Soviet Union under Leonid Brezhnev, deployed approximately 200,000 troops and 5,000 tanks from allied Warsaw Pact states—including Hungary, Poland, East Germany, and Bulgaria—to occupy Prague and other major cities, motivated by fears that reforms under Alexander Dubček, such as ending censorship and promoting federalism, threatened communist control across the Eastern Bloc.[1][2] Czechoslovak resistance remained largely non-violent, with civilians using passive tactics like misinformation to delay occupiers, though the operation resulted in at least 108 civilian deaths—many from shootings or being struck by vehicles—and hundreds of injuries during the initial days.[2][4] Dubček and key leaders were detained and transported to Moscow for negotiations, leading to the gradual rollback of reforms and installation of a more orthodox regime by 1969.[1] Concurrently in Chicago, the Democratic convention nominated Vice President Hubert Humphrey as the presidential candidate despite intra-party strife following President Lyndon B. Johnson's withdrawal and assassinations earlier in the year, while outside the convention hall, thousands of anti-war demonstrators—organized by groups including Students for a Democratic Society and the Youth International Party—confronted a heavily militarized police force under Mayor Richard Daley, sparking clashes involving tear gas, billy clubs, and projectiles that injured hundreds and were televised live, amplifying perceptions of national chaos.[3][5] These events, though contained without fatalities, underscored causal tensions from prolonged U.S. involvement in Vietnam and broader cultural rebellions, prompting later reforms in party nomination processes to enhance primary voter influence.[6]

Background and Context

Geopolitical Tensions Leading into August

In January 1968, Alexander Dubček replaced Antonín Novotný as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, promptly initiating reforms that dismantled censorship and encouraged open public debate, garnering widespread domestic support.[1] These measures, formalized in the party's Action Program announced on April 5, sought to implement "socialism with a human face" through expanded freedoms of speech and assembly, legalization of non-communist political groups, reduction of secret police powers, and partial reintroduction of market mechanisms to address economic stagnation.[1][7] Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev and Warsaw Pact allies grew increasingly alarmed, perceiving the reforms as a direct challenge to bloc unity and a risk of "counterrevolutionary" contagion akin to the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, potentially inspiring unrest in other satellite states or even Soviet republics like Ukraine.[1] At a Warsaw Pact summit in Dresden on March 23–24, leaders from the USSR, Poland, East Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria confronted Dubček, demanding reassurances against any deviation from Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy; Dubček affirmed Czechoslovakia's commitment to socialism and the alliance but resisted rollback demands.[8][9] Tensions persisted into July, when the Soviet Union and four other pact members issued a formal letter to Dubček decrying the reforms' destabilizing effects, prompting his written pledge to maintain Warsaw Pact membership and alignment with Soviet foreign policy.[7] High-stakes bilateral negotiations followed from July 29 to August 1 at Čierna nad Tisou on the Czechoslovak-Soviet border, involving full Politburos from both sides, where Brezhnev pressed for removal of key reformers and stricter controls, yet accepted provisional agreements on continued alliance loyalty.[10][11] These were reiterated at a broader Warsaw Pact conference in Bratislava on August 3, but underlying Soviet distrust—fueled by ongoing Czech media openness and refusal to purge liberal elements—rendered the diplomacy fragile.[11][12] Parallel global strains, including the January Tet Offensive in Vietnam and the USS Pueblo seizure by North Korea on January 23, diverted U.S. attention and limited Western responses, reinforcing Moscow's calculation that intervention faced minimal external risk.[1] The impasse highlighted the Brezhnev Doctrine's insistence on suppressing deviations to preserve Soviet hegemony, with military maneuvers and troop buildups along borders signaling escalation by mid-August.[1][13]

United States Internal Divisions

The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1968, ignited widespread riots across the United States, exposing profound racial divisions and urban discontent despite legislative advances like the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In Washington, D.C., alone, four days of unrest resulted in 13 deaths, over 1,000 fires, and damage to more than 900 businesses, with federal troops deployed to restore order. Nationwide, similar violence affected at least 110 cities, fueled by long-standing grievances over poverty, housing discrimination, and police practices, as documented in contemporaneous reports from the period. These events underscored a shift toward militancy in some civil rights factions, contrasting with King's nonviolent philosophy, and highlighted the limitations of federal responses in bridging racial gaps.[14] Parallel to racial strife, opposition to the Vietnam War deepened generational and ideological rifts, with mass protests mobilizing hundreds of thousands by spring 1968. On April 27, demonstrations occurred in 17 cities, drawing over 100,000 in New York City alone, as activists decried escalating U.S. involvement following the Tet Offensive earlier that year, which had eroded public confidence in the war effort. Polls reflected this divide: while a "silent majority" of older Americans favored containment policies, younger demographics increasingly viewed the conflict as immoral and unwinnable, leading to campus takeovers and clashes with authorities. The Johnson administration's March 31 announcement declining renomination stemmed partly from these pressures, fracturing the Democratic coalition between hawks and doves.[15][16] The June 5 assassination of Robert F. Kennedy further intensified political fragmentation, coming amid primaries that pitted establishment figures like Hubert Humphrey against anti-war challengers, amplifying perceptions of national instability. Cultural tensions also simmered, with countercultural movements challenging traditional norms on authority, sexuality, and authority, often clashing with conservative backlash against perceived moral decay. These intersecting divisions—racial, anti-war, and partisan—created a volatile backdrop by August, as evidenced by rising crime rates in urban areas and declining trust in institutions, setting the stage for confrontations at party conventions.[17][18]

Major International Events

Warsaw Pact Invasion of Czechoslovakia

The Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia commenced in the early hours of August 21, 1968, when Soviet-led forces crossed the borders to halt the Prague Spring reforms initiated by Alexander Dubček earlier that year. Dubček, elected First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia on January 5, 1968, had pursued policies of liberalization, including the lifting of press censorship on March 29, 1968, expanded freedom of speech, and economic decentralization aimed at a "socialism with a human face," while maintaining commitment to the Warsaw Pact alliance. Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev, fearing the reforms could inspire similar movements across the Eastern Bloc and undermine Soviet control, issued ultimatums during bilateral meetings, culminating in failed negotiations at Cierna nad Tisou from August 29 to September 1, 1968, though the invasion preceded full breakdown.[1][8] Deploying approximately 500,000 troops—primarily Soviet, supplemented by contingents from Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, and East Germany—along with over 6,000 tanks and extensive air support, the invaders rapidly seized key infrastructure, including Prague's Ruzyně Airport via airborne assault and central government buildings. Romania refused participation, and Albanian forces had withdrawn from the Pact in 1968; East German troops were initially restricted to border areas due to historical sensitivities. Czechoslovak President Ludvík Svoboda and military leaders ordered minimal armed resistance to avoid escalation, resulting in primarily passive civilian opposition such as street sign removals, traffic disruptions, and distribution of anti-invasion leaflets. During the initial occupation phase through late August, 137 Czechoslovak civilians were killed and around 500 seriously wounded, with invading forces suffering minimal losses of about 12 dead.[19][4][20] Dubček and other reformist leaders were arrested on August 20 in Prague, transported to Moscow, and coerced into endorsing the intervention under the emerging Brezhnev Doctrine, which asserted the Soviet right to intervene in socialist states to preserve orthodoxy, formalized in a September 1968 Pravda article. By August 22, mass protests in Prague and other cities were suppressed, radio stations occupied, and reformist media silenced, though underground publications persisted. The invasion consolidated occupation by month's end, paving the way for the replacement of Dubček with Gustáv Husák in April 1969 and a period of "normalization" that reversed gains through purges and renewed orthodoxy. Internationally, the United Nations Security Council condemned the action on August 21 by a 6-2 vote (with four abstentions including the USSR), but no military countermeasures ensued due to Cold War deterrence dynamics.[21][1][22]

Other Global Developments

Heavy monsoon rains in early August led to severe flooding in Gujarat, India, with the Tapti River overflowing its banks and causing extensive waterlogging across regions between the Tapti and Narmada rivers.[23] The disaster disrupted rail communications between Gujarat and Bombay State and affected multiple villages along the riverbanks.[24] On August 31, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck northeastern Iran, resulting in approximately 12,000 deaths and the destruction of around 60,000 buildings. France conducted a nuclear test on August 3 at Mururoa Atoll in the Pacific, followed by another detonation on August 24 that marked its achievement as the world's fifth thermonuclear power. The Soviet Union performed underground nuclear tests on August 15 at Sary Shagan and August 20 at the Semipalatinsk Test Site in Kazakhstan. On August 1, Hassanal Bolkiah was crowned the 29th Sultan of Brunei, beginning a reign that continues to the present. Pope Paul VI arrived in Bogotá, Colombia, on August 22 for the first papal visit to Latin America, inaugurating the International Eucharistic Congress. On August 29, Crown Prince Harald of Norway married Sonja Haraldsen in Oslo Cathedral, a union that defied traditional royal protocol given her commoner background and drew significant public attention.[25]

United States Political Developments

Republican National Convention

The 1968 Republican National Convention convened from August 5 to 8 at the Miami Beach Convention Center in Miami Beach, Florida, where delegates nominated former Vice President Richard Nixon as the party's presidential candidate and Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew as his running mate.[26][27] Nixon entered the convention with a commanding delegate lead from the primaries, facing limited challenges from New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller and California Governor Ronald Reagan, who mounted late efforts but lacked sufficient support to alter the outcome.[28] The gathering emphasized party unity amid national divisions over the Vietnam War, urban unrest, and the recent assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, positioning the Republicans as a stabilizing force.[26] Nixon secured the presidential nomination on the first ballot on August 7, receiving approximately 692 votes out of 1,333 needed for a majority, with the remaining votes split among minor candidates and abstentions.[29] Agnew's vice-presidential nomination followed on August 8 after a brief contest, selected for his appeal to Southern conservatives disillusioned with national Democrats while maintaining a moderate image.[26] The proceedings unfolded with minimal internal discord, as pre-convention negotiations had resolved potential factional splits, allowing focus on policy platforms advocating law and order, fiscal restraint, and a negotiated end to the Vietnam War without dishonor. Key addresses included Washington Governor Dan Evans' keynote speech on August 5, which critiqued expanding federal government and called for addressing domestic decay and the Vietnam stalemate through pragmatic reforms.[30] Nixon's acceptance speech on August 8 invoked the "silent majority" of Americans weary of violence and division, pledging to "bring us together" by restoring respect for authority and pursuing peace with honor in Vietnam.[27][31] The convention maintained an orderly atmosphere, with security measures containing small-scale anti-war demonstrations outside the venue, avoiding the chaos that would later engulf the Democratic gathering in Chicago.[26] While the convention itself proceeded peacefully, concurrent unrest in Miami's Liberty City neighborhood from August 7 to 9—sparked by a police shooting of a Black motorist—involved arson, looting, and clashes resulting in three deaths and over 200 injuries, highlighting broader racial tensions but occurring separately from convention activities.[32] Local authorities deployed National Guard troops to contain the disturbances, which did not disrupt delegate proceedings.[33] This contrast underscored the Republican strategy of projecting stability in a turbulent election year.[26]

Democratic National Convention

The 1968 Democratic National Convention convened from August 26 to 29 at the International Amphitheatre in Chicago, Illinois, to select the party's presidential and vice-presidential nominees amid profound internal divisions.[34] Following President Lyndon B. Johnson's decision not to seek re-election and the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, Vice President Hubert Humphrey emerged as the frontrunner, relying on endorsements from party leaders, labor unions, and Southern delegations rather than primary victories.[35] Senator Eugene McCarthy's anti-war campaign had garnered significant primary support, but Humphrey secured the nomination on the first ballot, receiving approximately 1,894 delegate votes out of roughly 3,000 total, exceeding the required majority of 1,509.[36][37] Central to the proceedings were heated debates over the party platform's Vietnam War plank, reflecting the chasm between establishment figures aligned with Johnson's escalation policies and anti-war insurgents demanding unilateral bombing cessation and troop withdrawals.[38] The pro-administration plank, which affirmed continued military efforts until negotiation advances, prevailed by a vote of 1,576 to 1,419 after intense floor debate on August 28.[39] This outcome, influenced by Johnson's behind-the-scenes pressure on delegates, alienated McCarthy and Senator George McGovern supporters, some of whom staged protests inside the hall or abstained from full participation.[40] Credentials challenges from reform-minded factions failed to alter the balance, as party regulars maintained control over seating and rules.[38] On August 29, Humphrey accepted the presidential nomination in a speech emphasizing unity and progress, while announcing Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine as his running mate to balance the ticket with Northeastern appeal and moderate credentials.[41][42] Muskie's nomination passed overwhelmingly, with delegates viewing him as a stabilizing force amid the party's fractures.[43] The convention's platform otherwise highlighted domestic achievements like the Great Society programs but subordinated war dissent to pragmatic continuity, underscoring the dominance of Johnson's loyalists despite widespread public fatigue with the conflict.[40]

Vietnam War Escalations and Casualties

In August 1968, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces initiated the third phase of their post-Tet Offensive campaign, launching coordinated attacks across South Vietnam from mid-August through early September, targeting provincial capitals, district headquarters, and military installations to disrupt pacification efforts and demonstrate continued resolve.[44] These operations represented a tactical escalation following the earlier phases' heavy losses, with communist units employing infiltration, ambushes, and assaults on over 100 targets, though U.S. and South Vietnamese forces repelled most incursions through superior firepower and air support.[44] A notable engagement occurred on August 23, when approximately 167 North Vietnamese Army sappers and Viet Cong infantry overran Forward Operating Base 4 (FOB-4), a MACV-Studies and Observations Group (MACV-SOG) site near Da Nang, breaching wire obstacles with satchel charges and engaging in close-quarters combat that resulted in 16 U.S. Special Forces personnel killed—the highest single-day loss for Green Berets in the war—and over 50 wounded among American and indigenous defenders.[45] Enemy casualties exceeded 100 killed, as confirmed by body counts and interrogations, highlighting the sappers' high-risk infiltration tactics against a hardened special operations hub.[46] The Battle of Duc Lap, from August 24 to 27, saw North Vietnamese regulars assault a Civilian Irregular Defense Group camp defended by U.S. Special Forces and Montagnard militias in Đắk Lắk Province, with repeated human-wave attacks breaching the perimeter and prompting intense artillery and air interdiction that inflicted heavy enemy losses estimated at several hundred killed.[47] Allied forces suffered 114 killed, including seven U.S. Green Berets, and 238 wounded, but held the position after three days of fighting, underscoring the communists' aim to overrun highland outposts amid the Phase III push.[47] U.S. casualties in August reflected the sustained intensity of post-Tet operations, with one week alone recording 308 killed—the highest of the summer—contributing to the year's total of 16,899 fatalities amid ongoing ground sweeps and defensive actions.[48][49] Naval forces reported three sailors killed and 23 wounded in riverine and coastal engagements, while inflicting 88 enemy killed.[50] These losses, though lower than peak Tet months, strained troop morale and logistics as U.S. command shifted toward Vietnamization amid political pressures in the United States.[48]

Social Unrest and Controversies

Chicago Protests and Police Response

The protests in Chicago during the Democratic National Convention, held from August 26 to 29, 1968, were organized primarily by the National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam (MOBE) and the Youth International Party (Yippies), who sought to demonstrate against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War and the Democratic Party's support for President Lyndon B. Johnson's policies.[51][52] Organizers estimated up to 10,000 participants gathered in areas like Lincoln Park and Grant Park, though city officials under Mayor Richard J. Daley denied permits for large marches near the convention site at the International Amphitheatre, citing security concerns and leading to unauthorized street demonstrations.[52] Protesters engaged in tactics including chanting anti-war slogans, symbolic acts like nominating a pig for president, and occasional provocations such as throwing rocks, bottles, and other projectiles at police lines, which escalated tensions from August 23 onward.[53] Police response, directed by Daley, involved approximately 12,000 Chicago officers supplemented by 5,000 Illinois National Guard troops and federal agents, who were instructed to maintain order amid fears of disruption similar to earlier urban riots.[54] Clashes intensified on August 28 outside the Conrad Hilton Hotel along Michigan Avenue, where crowds surged toward delegates' accommodations; officers used tear gas, mace, and batons to disperse groups, charging into protesters and bystanders, including journalists, in what live television broadcasts captured as chaotic beatings amid chants of "The whole world is watching."[53][55] While some protesters initiated violence by hurling objects and attempting to breach barricades, police actions often extended to unresisting individuals, with reports of indiscriminate clubbing and gas deployment in crowded areas.[56] The Walker Report, commissioned by the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence and released in December 1968, documented over 600 arrests and concluded that the disturbances constituted a "police riot" in instances where officers lost discipline and employed excessive force without immediate provocation, though it acknowledged that most police acted responsibly under strain and that a minority of demonstrators sought confrontation.[56][57] Injuries numbered in the hundreds, with at least 100 protesters and 119 officers requiring medical treatment, primarily from blunt trauma and chemical agents; no fatalities occurred among participants or law enforcement during the convention protests themselves.[58] Daley defended the response as necessary to counter "professional anarchists" and protect public safety, disputing claims of overreach and attributing violence to agitators intent on chaos.[55] The events, televised nationally, highlighted divisions over war policy and law enforcement tactics, influencing public perception of urban protest management.[51]

Debates over Responsibility and Narratives

The clashes during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago sparked immediate debates over culpability, with city officials attributing the violence primarily to "outside agitators" and radical groups like the Youth International Party (Yippies) and Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), who were accused of deliberately provoking disorder through tactics such as taunting officers, throwing projectiles, and organizing disruptive events like the "Festival of Life."[59] [53] Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley defended the police response, stating on August 29, 1968, that officers had acted with restraint and that any criticism of their actions was unwarranted, emphasizing that the force used was necessary to prevent anarchy amid threats from "communist-inspired" protesters.[60] [61] A pivotal official inquiry, the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence's report known as the Walker Report (formally Rights in Conflict), released on December 1, 1968, shifted the narrative by labeling the events a "police riot," concluding that in most confrontations, police initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate attacks on protesters, bystanders, and journalists using clubs, tear gas, and mace, often exceeding legal bounds despite some protester provocations.[62] The report, directed by attorney Daniel Walker and based on over 20,000 pages of documents, eyewitness accounts, and film footage, documented specific incidents like the August 28 assault in Grant Park where officers charged peaceful crowds without warning, resulting in over 100 civilian injuries and 589 arrests.[63] Critics of the report, including Daley administration allies, dismissed it as biased toward anti-war elements, arguing it ignored evidence of organized protester aggression, such as SDS calls for "creative disruption" and Yippie staging of mock events to incite media coverage.[64] Subsequent legal proceedings reinforced divided narratives: the federal trial of the "Chicago Eight" (later Seven after one defendant's removal)—including Yippie leaders Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, and SDS figures Tom Hayden and Rennie Davis—charged them with conspiracy to incite riot under the 1968 Anti-Riot Act, portraying the protests as premeditated chaos engineered by radicals to undermine the convention.[55] The jury acquitted them of conspiracy but convicted five on incitement charges in February 1970 (overturned on appeal in 1972 due to judicial bias), fueling claims from defense advocates that the government narrative exaggerated protester intent while downplaying police tactics ordered by Daley, who had mobilized 12,000 officers and National Guard troops preemptively.[55] Empirical reviews, including film analyses, indicate mutual escalations—protesters hurled bottles and insults, prompting baton charges—but the Walker Report's data emphasized disproportionate police force, with over 200 officers also injured, highlighting causal chains where permit denials and permit denials and dispersal orders amplified tensions.[64] [65] Media coverage intensified narrative splits, with live broadcasts on August 28 capturing chaotic scenes of gas clouds and beatings, leading anchorman Walter Cronkite to describe the events as a "nightmare" on CBS, which aligned with protester accounts of systemic repression but drew accusations from authorities of sensationalism that blamed law enforcement unfairly.[66] Conservative outlets and Daley supporters countered that networks like ABC and NBC amplified radical voices, ignoring prior provocations documented in police intelligence reports, such as Yippie plans for mass civil disobedience revealed in July 1968 meetings.[67] These debates underscored broader credibility issues, as establishment inquiries like Walker's faced skepticism for potentially underweighting agitator agency, while official defenses relied on internal logs that prioritized order restoration over de-escalation amid a national context of urban riots post-MLK assassination.[61]

Additional Notable Occurrences

Natural Disasters and Accidents

On August 2, 1968, a magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck off the east coast of Luzon in the Philippines, with its epicenter near Casiguran; the event caused widespread structural damage in Manila, including the total collapse of the six-story Ruby Tower apartment building, resulting in 271 deaths and 261 injuries overall, alongside $5 million in damages.[68] In the first week of August 1968, severe monsoon flooding affected South Gujarat in India, as heavy rains caused the Tapti and Narmada Rivers to overflow their banks and inundate towns including Surat and Broach; parliamentary records indicate approximately 1,000 fatalities from drowning and related causes.[23][69] On August 10, 1968, Piedmont Airlines Flight 230, a Fairchild Hiller FH-227B en route from Oneida County Airport in New York to Charleston, West Virginia, crashed into trees and a hillside during a localizer approach in heavy fog, killing all three crew members and 32 of 34 passengers aboard, with the aircraft destroyed by impact and post-crash fire; the National Transportation Safety Board attributed the accident primarily to pilot descent below safe altitudes without visual confirmation.[70] Four days later, on August 14, 1968, Los Angeles Airways Flight 417, a Sikorsky S-61L helicopter bound from Los Angeles International Airport to Disneyland Heliport in Anaheim, California, suffered a catastrophic main rotor spindle failure shortly after takeoff, causing it to crash in Leuders Park, Compton, and killing all 21 occupants (18 passengers and 3 crew); investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board identified fatigue cracking in the spindle as the initiating mechanical failure.[71] On August 23, 1968, the Canyon Fire ignited near Canyon Inn in the San Gabriel Mountains of California under extreme Santa Ana wind conditions, rapidly spreading southward and burning over 19,000 acres while destroying cabins and structures; the blaze trapped and killed eight firefighters from Los Angeles County Fire Department Crew 4-4 during suppression efforts.[72][73]

Cultural, Scientific, and Miscellaneous Events

On August 3 and 4, the Newport Pop Festival took place at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa, California, attracting an estimated 100,000 to 140,000 attendees and marking one of the earliest large-scale rock festivals in the United States.[74] The event featured performances by acts including the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Steppenwolf, and The Byrds, amid logistical challenges such as extreme heat and overcrowding that strained facilities.[75] This gathering preceded more famous festivals like Woodstock and highlighted the growing popularity of countercultural music events.[76] In music releases, James Brown issued the single "Say It Loud – I'm Black and I'm Proud" on August 7, a funk track co-written with Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis that emphasized racial pride through its chorus and children's backing vocals.[77] The Beatles followed with "Hey Jude" b/w "Revolution" on August 26 in the United States via their Apple Records label, a seven-minute ballad written by Paul McCartney that became one of the best-selling singles ever, topping charts for nine weeks.[78] Scientifically, Kīlauea Volcano on Hawaii's Big Island experienced an eruption from August 22 to 26 along its east rift zone, beginning in Hi'iaka Crater with fissures opening across the crater floor and walls, producing lava flows that advanced several kilometers.[79] United States Geological Survey monitoring recorded summit subsidence of over six inches during the event, which involved picritic melts indicative of deep mantle sourcing, contributing data to understanding rift zone dynamics.[80] Separately, on August 3, France conducted its tenth atmospheric nuclear test at Mururoa Atoll in the Pacific, part of its independent deterrent program.[81] In sports, the U.S. Open tennis championships commenced on August 29 at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, New York, inaugurating the "open era" by allowing professionals to compete alongside amateurs for the first time.[82] Arthur Ashe defeated Tom Okker in the men's final on September 8, becoming the first African American man to win a Grand Slam singles title.[83] Billie Jean King also advanced prominently in the women's draw, underscoring the tournament's shift toward inclusivity and higher prize money.[82]

Legacy and Consequences

Immediate Repercussions

The violence surrounding the Democratic National Convention in Chicago from August 26 to 29 severely damaged Hubert Humphrey's presidential campaign, portraying the Democratic Party as fractured and unable to maintain order. Contemporary polls reflected a sharp shift in public sentiment; by mid-September 1968, Richard Nixon led Humphrey 39% to 31% in voter preference, a gap attributed in part to the convention's chaos amplifying concerns over domestic unrest.[84] Nixon's campaign effectively leveraged footage of the clashes to reinforce his "law and order" platform, contrasting with the earlier orderly Republican National Convention in Miami Beach, which had nominated him without incident from August 5 to 8 and solidified perceptions of Republican stability.[26] The protests resulted in 668 arrests and hundreds of injuries, including over 100 hospitalized civilians and dozens of police officers, amid clashes that drew widespread media coverage.[85] Although the subsequent Walker Report labeled the police response a "police riot," public opinion polls immediately after the events showed strong support for law enforcement, with 66% of respondents viewing the actions as justified and only 11% deeming them excessive, indicating a disconnect between elite narratives and broader sentiment.[86] This backlash further eroded Democratic unity, complicating Humphrey's efforts to distance himself from the administration's Vietnam policies while addressing urban disorder. Internationally, the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia on August 20–21 abruptly ended the Prague Spring reforms, prompting immediate non-violent resistance such as traffic obstructions and sign-based protests, but leading to rapid Soviet consolidation of control through occupation by over 500,000 troops.[1] The United States issued verbal condemnations but took no military action, reflecting Cold War constraints, while the incursion temporarily stabilized Soviet influence in Eastern Europe by deterring similar liberalizations elsewhere.[87] In the U.S., ongoing Vietnam escalations, including intensified bombing campaigns, compounded war fatigue but saw no immediate policy shifts tied directly to August events.[17]

Long-Term Historical Impact

The clashes during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, broadcast nationally, alienated moderate voters from the anti-war movement and Democratic leadership, bolstering Richard Nixon's "law and order" platform that appealed to the silent majority disillusioned by urban unrest and political violence. This shift facilitated Nixon's electoral college victory of 301 to 191 over Hubert Humphrey, initiating a conservative realignment in U.S. politics that emphasized stability over radical change and contributed to Republican gains in the 1970s and beyond.[88][89] The Walker Commission's characterization of the police actions as a "police riot" spurred short-term scrutiny of crowd control tactics but ultimately reinforced narratives of excessive permissiveness toward protesters, diminishing the New Left's cultural influence and redirecting activist energy toward institutional reforms rather than street confrontation. In parallel, August's Vietnam War escalations, amid ongoing post-Tet Offensive operations with U.S. casualties exceeding 500 in preceding weeks and sustained combat intensity, deepened public war fatigue, pressuring subsequent administrations toward de-escalation policies like Vietnamization, which reduced direct U.S. ground involvement by 1973.[64][90] The Soviet Union's Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia on August 21, ending the Prague Spring's liberalization efforts, codified the Brezhnev Doctrine of limited sovereignty for socialist states, enabling further suppressions and entrenching authoritarian control that fueled underground dissidence, exemplified by Charter 77 in 1977 and culminating in the 1989 Velvet Revolution. This intervention exposed fractures in the communist bloc, prompting Western European parties to pursue Eurocommunism and distance from Moscow, while straining Sino-Soviet ties and underscoring the unsustainable rigidity of centralized planning, which eroded regime legitimacy over two decades.[91][92]

References

  1. Soviet Invasion of Czechoslovakia, 1968 - Office of the Historian
  2. Soviets invade Czechoslovakia | August 20, 1968 - History.com
  3. Chicago 1968: Law and Disorder - Chicago History Museum
  4. Historians pin down number of 1968 invasion victims
  5. What should we make of the '68 Chicago Democratic Convention ...
  6. Raucous 1968 convention led to changes in nomination process
  7. The Prague Spring - CCEA - BBC
  8. Crisis in Czechoslovakia - Seventeen Moments in Soviet History
  9. Prague Spring, 1968: "The Whole World is Watching"
  10. August 21, 1968: Soviet tanks crush the dreams of the Prague Spring
  11. [PDF] The 1968 Soviet-Led Invasion of Czechoslovakia - CIA
  12. [PDF] Summary of Alexander Dubček's Meeting - National Security Archive
  13. [PDF] UKRAINE AND THE SOVIET-CZECHOSLOVAK CRISIS OF 1968 ...
  14. 1968 riots: Four days that reshaped Washington, D.C.
  15. Anti-war demonstrations, April 27, 1968 - Fifth Estate Magazine
  16. 1968: The Year That Changed America Forever
  17. 1968: A Year of Turmoil and Change - National Archives
  18. The Revolution That Was 1968 - History.com
  19. Invasion: The Crushing Of The Prague Spring - RFE/RL
  20. 1968 - Invasion - Socialism Realised
  21. Brezhnev Doctrine - Seventeen Moments in Soviet History
  22. The 1968 invasion: When hope was crushed by Soviet tanks
  23. [PDF] 3109 Re flood situation [13 AUG. 1968] in the countiy 3110 SHORT ...
  24. [PDF] Vulnerability of Surat, Gujarat to Flooding from Tapi River
  25. The Royal Wedding in 1968
  26. Revisiting The 1968 Republican Convention - NPR
  27. Address Accepting the Presidential Nomination at the Republican ...
  28. Richard Nixon 1968 Presidential Campaign - 50th Anniversary
  29. Nixon is Nominated on the First Ballot; Support for Lindsay in 2d ...
  30. Dan Evans' Keynote Address at the 1968 Republican National ...
  31. Accepting the Republican Nomination, 1968 | American Experience
  32. How three violent days gripped a black Miami neighborhood as ...
  33. Long Time Coming: Miami's Liberty City Riot of 1968 - ucf stars
  34. 1968 Democratic Convention - CQ Almanac Online Edition
  35. Democrats Nominate Humphrey on First Ballot - CQ Press
  36. https://www.nytimes.com/1968/08/25/archives/humphrey-found-close-to-victory-on-first-ballot-delegate-check-puts.html
  37. Humphrey Nominated on the First Ballot After His Plank on Vietnam ...
  38. Divisions at the 1968 DNC | Miller Center
  39. 339. Telephone Conversation Between President Johnson and the ...
  40. Platform Approved After Landmark Debate on Vietnam - CQ Press
  41. Address Accepting the Presidential Nomination at the Democratic ...
  42. 'I'd Go with Muskie' | Miller Center
  43. Senator Edmund S. Muskie Remarks on Accepting the Vice ...
  44. U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive, 1968
  45. Deadly Assault on Special Forces in Vietnam Left 'Drag Marks and ...
  46. 23, August 1968 FOB-4 CCN - MACV-SOG
  47. DUCLAP COSTS FOE HUNDREDS OF DEAD; North Vietnamese ...
  48. Week's U.S. War Dead of 308 Highest of Summer; Wounded Are Put ...
  49. Vietnam War U.S. Military Fatal Casualty Statistics | National Archives
  50. [PDF] PDF Related to Monthly Summaries, 1968 August
  51. Chicago and the Democratic National Convention, 1968
  52. "We Are Living in a State of Anarchy": Radical Assessments and ...
  53. The Police and the 1968 Democratic National Convention
  54. Why 1968 still matters | MIT News - MIT News
  55. Aftermath of 'the whole world is watching': The Chicago 8 Trial
  56. The Walker Report Summary, excerpted from Rights in Conflict, the ...
  57. [PDF] The Chicago Seven: 1960s Radicalism in the Federal Courts
  58. Will the Chicago DNC have protests like 1968? - BBC
  59. How the Yippies 'Stuck It to the Man' at the 1968 DNC - History.com
  60. Violence Rocks 1968 Democratic Convention - History Channel
  61. Protests and Blaming the Media. Sound Familiar? That Was During ...
  62. U.S. STUDY SCORES CHICAGO VIOLENCE AS 'A POLICE RIOT'
  63. [PDF] 1968: A Time of Change
  64. Chicago DNC: How Lessons From 1968 Loom Over Police
  65. Chicago Riots Mar the Democratic National Convention - EBSCO
  66. CBS News 1968 Democratic National Convention Coverage - C-SPAN
  67. https://archives.ubalt.edu/bsr/articles/august%252026.pdf
  68. Significant Earthquake Information
  69. [PDF] Disastrous Weather Events 1967-1979 - IMD Pune
  70. [PDF] AIRCRAFT ACCIDENT REPORT
  71. [PDF] los angeles airways, inc. - s-61l helicopter, n300y - NTSB
  72. [PDF] FIRE WEATHER AND FIRE BEHAVIOR AT THE 1968 CANYON FIRE
  73. 51 Years Later, LACoFD Remembers the 1968 Canyon Fire
  74. Newport Pop Festival 1968 Setlists
  75. 8-3&4-1968 100,000 attend Newport Pop Festival in California
  76. The Newport Pop Festival of 1968 - I Found Some Blog - Cher Scholar
  77. When did James Brown release “Say It Loud - Genius
  78. Hey Jude | The Beatles
  79. [PDF] The August and October 1968 East Rift Eruptions of Kilauea ...
  80. Volcano Watch — Kīlauea's 1968 Hi'iaka Crater eruption was a ...
  81. Historical Events in August 1968 - On This Day
  82. U.S. Open 1968 Tennis Tournament - ITF
  83. This Day in US Open History: Aug. 29, 1968 - USOpen.org
  84. Nixon Leads Humphrey, 39-31, in Poll - The New York Times
  85. POLICE BATTLE DEMONSTRATORS IN STREETS
  86. The Whole World Was Watching: Public Opinion in 1968
  87. [PDF] Eastern Europe and the USSR in the Aftermath of the Invasion ... - CIA
  88. 1968 Democratic Convention - Protests, Yippies, Witnesses| HISTORY
  89. Chicago '68 recalls a Democratic convention and a political ... - NPR
  90. 1968: a timeline of events
  91. A Cold End to the Prague Spring - ADST.org
  92. The Consequences of the Prague Spring - CounterPunch.org
User Avatar
No comments yet.