1991: The White House and the Defence Department contradicted General Norman Schwarzkopf’s comments on a presidential decision to stop the Gulf War in a sudden row that seemed to add up to a humbling of the outspoken, immensely popular general. A brief rebuttal by US President George Bush and a stern official statement from Defence Secretary Dick Cheney avoided a direct rebuke of Schwarzkopf, but they made plain he had talked himself into hot water by saying he wanted to annihilate Iraqi armies when opportunity knocked but Bush had stopped him. “I have full confidence in General Schwarzkopf but all I know is there was total agreement in terms of when this war should end,” Bush said. Schwarzkopf said in a television interview with David Frost, he wanted to annihilate Iraq’s armies as Hannibal once crushed the Romans but President pulled him up short. Later Schwarzkopf said he had apologised to President George Bush for saying the President’s halting of the Gulf War had saved the Iraqi army.
Other important events
1865 Independent British colony of Kaffaria is incorporated with Cape Colony in South Africa.
1899 Italian Guglielmo Marconi sends the first radio signals across the English Channel.
1941 Yugoslavia’s Prince Paul is deposed in coup.
1958 Nikita Khrushchev becomes Soviet premier.
1960 Iraqi Premier General Kassem establishes Palestine Army.
1964 Earthquake in Alaska kills 114 people.
1968 Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin is killed in crash of training plane.
1970 Severe earthquake strikes western Turkey, killing at least 1,087.
1976 South Africa withdraws its military forces from Angola.
1977 A KLM Boeing 747 crashes into a Pan Am 747 on the Canary Island of Tenerife, killing 583 people.
1989 Saudi Arabia signs a non-aggression pact with Iraq.
1991 Black commandos storms a Singapore Airlines jet and shot dead four Pakistani hijackers who had threatened to burn their hostages to death.
1993 Multiparty elections are held to end military rule in Lesotho.
1993 Jiang Zemin becomes president of China.
1994 The first test flight of the Eurofighter Typhoon took place in Germany
1995 South African President Nelson Mandela fires his estranged wife, Winnie, from the government for insubordination.
1996 A group of Egyptians hijack an Egypt Air jetliner from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia to Libya when it is about to land in Cairo
1996 Cigar wins the inaugural Dubai World Cup horse race at Nad Al Sheba.
2000 Vladimir Putin is elected Russian President.
2001 An empty train riding on the wrong side of the tracks crashes into a crowded commuter train in central Belgium, killing eight.
2007 Mitsubishi Heavy Industries launches a $1 billion project to build Japan’s first passenger jet.
2008 The Terminal 5 building at Heathrow Airport in west London is opened.
2010 India successfully test-fires two nuclear-capable medium-range ballistic missiles, Prithvi-II and Dhanush.
2011 Pakistan releases an Indian prisoner Gopal Das, after he spent 27 years in jail.
2013 North Korea cuts military hotline with South Korea, breaking the last direct communication link between the two countries.
2014 The Philippines seals a historic peace deal with Muslim rebel group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, ending 45 years of conflict.
