October 23:
2002: Hostage crisis in Moscow theater
On October 23, 2002, about 50 Chechen rebels storm a Moscow theater, taking up to 700 people hostage during a sold-out performance of a popular musical.
The second act of the musical "Nord Ost" was just beginning at the Moscow Ball-Bearing Plant's Palace of Culture when an armed man walked onstage and fired a machine gun into the air. The terrorists-including a number of women with explosives strapped to their bodies-identified themselves as members of the Chechen Army. They had one demand: that Russian military forces begin an immediate and complete withdrawal from Chechnya, the war-torn region located north of the Caucasus Mountains.
Chechnya, with its predominately Muslim population, had long struggled to assert its independence. A disastrous two-year war ended in 1996, but Russian forces returned to the region just three years later after Russian authorities blamed Chechens for a series of bombings in Russia. In 2000, President Vladimir Putin was elected partly because of his hard-line position towards Chechnya and his public vow not to negotiate with terrorists.
After a 57-hour-standoff at the Palace of Culture, during which two hostages were killed, Russian special forces surrounded and raided the theater on the morning of October 26. Later it was revealed that they had pumped a powerful narcotic gas into the building, knocking nearly all of the terrorists and hostages unconscious before breaking into the walls and roof and entering through underground sewage tunnels. Most of the guerrillas and 120 hostages were killed during the raid. Security forces were later forced to defend the decision to use the dangerous gas, saying that only a complete surprise attack could have disarmed the terrorists before they had time to detonate their explosives.
After the theater crisis, Putin's government clamped down even harder on Chechnya, drawing accusations of kidnapping, torture and other atrocities. In response, Chechen rebels continued their terrorist attacks on Russian soil, including an alleged suicide bombing in a Moscow subway in February 2004 and another major hostage crisis at a Beslan school that September.
American Revolution
1777 : British fleet suffers defeat at Fort Mifflin, Pennsylvania
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/british-fleet-suffers-defeat-at-fort-mifflin-pennsylvania
Automotive
1983 : U.S. Embassy in Beirut hit by massive car bomb
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/us-embassy-in-beirut-hit-by-massive-car-bomb
Civil War
1864 : Yankees and Rebels clash at the Battle of Westport
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/battle-of-westport-missouri
Cold War
1956 : Hungarian protest turns violent
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hungarian-protest-turns-violent
Crime
1998 : An abortion-performing doctor is murdered
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/an-abortion-performing-doctor-is-murdered
Disaster
1989 : Gas leak kills 23 at plastics factory
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gas-leak-kills-23-at-plastics-factory
General Interest
42 B.C. : Brutus commits suicide
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/brutus-commits-suicide
1855 : Rival governments in bleeding Kansas
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/rival-governments-in-bleeding-kansas
1983 : Beirut barracks blown up
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/beirut-barracks-blown-up
Hollywood
1925 : Johnny Carson is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/johnny-carson-is-born
Literary
1942 : Michael Crichton is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/michael-crichton-is-born
Music
1976 : Chicago has its first #1 hit with "If You Leave Me Now"
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/chicago-has-its-first-1-hit-with-quotif-you-leave-me-nowquot
Old West
1813 : American fur traders turn over Astoria, Oregon, to the British
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/american-fur-traders-turn-over-astoria-oregon-to-the-british
Presidential
1890 : President Benjamin Harrison extends borders of Nebraska
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-benjamin-harrison-extends-borders-of-nebraska
Sports
1993 : Carter homers to win World Series
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/carter-homers-to-win-world-series
Vietnam War
1965 : 1st Cavalry Division launches Operation Silver Bayonet
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/1st-cavalry-division-launches-operation-silver-bayonet
1972 : U.S. negotiators ask for further talks in Paris
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/us-negotiators-ask-for-further-talks-in-paris
World War I
1921 : Unknown Soldier is selected
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/unknown-soldier-is-selected
World War II
1941 : Soviets switch commanders in drive to halt Germans
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/soviets-switch-commanders-in-drive-to-halt-germans
----------------------
October 22:
1962: Cuban Missile Crisis
In a televised speech of extraordinary gravity, President John F. Kennedy announces that U.S. spy planes have discovered Soviet missile bases in Cuba. These missile sites-under construction but nearing completion-housed medium-range missiles capable of striking a number of major cities in the United States, including Washington, D.C. Kennedy announced that he was ordering a naval "quarantine" of Cuba to prevent Soviet ships from transporting any more offensive weapons to the island and explained that the United States would not tolerate the existence of the missile sites currently in place. The president made it clear that America would not stop short of military action to end what he called a "clandestine, reckless, and provocative threat to world peace."
What is known as the Cuban Missile Crisis actually began on October 15, 1962-the day that U.S. intelligence personnel analyzing U-2 spy plane data discovered that the Soviets were building medium-range missile sites in Cuba. The next day, President Kennedy secretly convened an emergency meeting of his senior military, political, and diplomatic advisers to discuss the ominous development. The group became known as ExCom, short for Executive Committee. After rejecting a surgical air strike against the missile sites, ExCom decided on a naval quarantine and a demand that the bases be dismantled and missiles removed. On the night of October 22, Kennedy went on national television to announce his decision. During the next six days, the crisis escalated to a breaking point as the world tottered on the brink of nuclear war between the two superpowers.
On October 23, the quarantine of Cuba began, but Kennedy decided to give Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev more time to consider the U.S. action by pulling the quarantine line back 500 miles. By October 24, Soviet ships en route to Cuba capable of carrying military cargoes appeared to have slowed down, altered, or reversed their course as they approached the quarantine, with the exception of one ship-the tanker Bucharest. At the request of more than 40 nonaligned nations, U.N. Secretary-General U Thant sent private appeals to Kennedy and Khrushchev, urging that their governments "refrain from any action that may aggravate the situation and bring with it the risk of war." At the direction of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. military forces went to DEFCON 2, the highest military alert ever reached in the postwar era, as military commanders prepared for full-scale war with the Soviet Union.
On October 25, the aircraft carrier USS Essex and the destroyer USS Gearing attempted to intercept the Soviet tanker Bucharest as it crossed over the U.S. quarantine of Cuba. The Soviet ship failed to cooperate, but the U.S. Navy restrained itself from forcibly seizing the ship, deeming it unlikely that the tanker was carrying offensive weapons. On October 26, Kennedy learned that work on the missile bases was proceeding without interruption, and ExCom considered authorizing a U.S. invasion of Cuba. The same day, the Soviets transmitted a proposal for ending the crisis: The missile bases would be removed in exchange for a U.S. pledge not to invade Cuba.
The next day, however, Khrushchev upped the ante by publicly calling for the dismantling of U.S. missile bases in Turkey under pressure from Soviet military commanders. While Kennedy and his crisis advisers debated this dangerous turn in negotiations, a U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba, and its pilot, Major Rudolf Anderson, was killed. To the dismay of the Pentagon, Kennedy forbid a military retaliation unless any more surveillance planes were fired upon over Cuba. To defuse the worsening crisis, Kennedy and his advisers agreed to dismantle the U.S. missile sites in Turkey but at a later date, in order to prevent the protest of Turkey, a key NATO member.
On October 28, Khrushchev announced his government's intent to dismantle and remove all offensive Soviet weapons in Cuba. With the airing of the public message on Radio Moscow, the USSR confirmed its willingness to proceed with the solution secretly proposed by the Americans the day before. In the afternoon, Soviet technicians began dismantling the missile sites, and the world stepped back from the brink of nuclear war. The Cuban Missile Crisis was effectively over. In November, Kennedy called off the blockade, and by the end of the year all the offensive missiles had left Cuba. Soon after, the United States quietly removed its missiles from Turkey.
The Cuban Missile Crisis seemed at the time a clear victory for the United States, but Cuba emerged from the episode with a much greater sense of security. A succession of U.S. administrations have honored Kennedy's pledge not to invade Cuba, and the communist island nation situated just 80 miles from Florida remains a thorn in the side of U.S. foreign policy. The removal of antiquated Jupiter missiles from Turkey had no detrimental effect on U.S. nuclear strategy, but the Cuban Missile Crisis convinced a humiliated USSR to commence a massive nuclear buildup. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union reached nuclear parity with the United States and built intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of striking any city in the United States.
American Revolution
1775 : Peyton Randolph dies
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/peyton-randolph-dies
Automotive
1965 : President Lyndon Johnson signs the Highway Beautification Act
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-lyndon-johnson-signs-the-highway-beautification-act
Civil War
1864 : Confederates arrive at Guntersville, Alabama
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hood-at-guntersville-alabama
Cold War
1962 : Kennedy announces blockade of Cuba during the Missile Crisis
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/kennedy-announces-blockade-of-cuba-during-the-missile-crisis
Crime
1934 : Pretty Boy Floyd is killed by the FBI
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/pretty-boy-floyd-is-killed-by-the-fbi
Disaster
1913 : Coal mine explodes in New Mexico
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/coal-mine-explodes-in-new-mexico
General Interest
1797 : The first parachutist
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-first-parachutist
1975 : Gay sergeant challenges the Air Force
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gay-sergeant-challenges-the-air-force
Hollywood
1952 : Jeff Goldblum born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/jeff-goldblum-born
Literary
1964 : Sartre wins and declines Nobel Prize
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/sartre-wins-and-declines-nobel-prize
Music
1811 : Pianist and composer Franz Liszt is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/pianist-and-composer-franz-liszt-is-born
Old West
1903 : Tom Horn is hanged in Wyoming for the murder of Willie Nickell
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/tom-horn-is-hanged-in-wyoming-for-the-murder-of-willie-nickell
Presidential
1962 : JFK announces a blockade of Cuba
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/jfk-announces-a-blockade-of-cuba
Sports
1992 : Baseball Hall of Fame announcer Red Barber dies at 84
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/baseball-hall-of-fame-announcer-red-barber-dies-at-84
Vietnam War
1957 : American forces suffer first casualties in Vietnam
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/american-forces-suffer-first-casualties-in-vietnam
1965 : 173rd Airborne trooper saves comrades
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/173rd-airborne-trooper-saves-comrades
1972 : President Thieu turns down peace proposal
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-thieu-turns-down-peace-proposal
World War I
1914 : Germans capture Langemarck during First Battle of Ypres
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/germans-capture-langemarck-during-first-battle-of-ypres
World War II
1942 : Allies confer secretly about Operation Torch
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/allies-confer-secretly-about-operation-torch
2002: Hostage crisis in Moscow theater
On October 23, 2002, about 50 Chechen rebels storm a Moscow theater, taking up to 700 people hostage during a sold-out performance of a popular musical.
The second act of the musical "Nord Ost" was just beginning at the Moscow Ball-Bearing Plant's Palace of Culture when an armed man walked onstage and fired a machine gun into the air. The terrorists-including a number of women with explosives strapped to their bodies-identified themselves as members of the Chechen Army. They had one demand: that Russian military forces begin an immediate and complete withdrawal from Chechnya, the war-torn region located north of the Caucasus Mountains.
Chechnya, with its predominately Muslim population, had long struggled to assert its independence. A disastrous two-year war ended in 1996, but Russian forces returned to the region just three years later after Russian authorities blamed Chechens for a series of bombings in Russia. In 2000, President Vladimir Putin was elected partly because of his hard-line position towards Chechnya and his public vow not to negotiate with terrorists.
After a 57-hour-standoff at the Palace of Culture, during which two hostages were killed, Russian special forces surrounded and raided the theater on the morning of October 26. Later it was revealed that they had pumped a powerful narcotic gas into the building, knocking nearly all of the terrorists and hostages unconscious before breaking into the walls and roof and entering through underground sewage tunnels. Most of the guerrillas and 120 hostages were killed during the raid. Security forces were later forced to defend the decision to use the dangerous gas, saying that only a complete surprise attack could have disarmed the terrorists before they had time to detonate their explosives.
After the theater crisis, Putin's government clamped down even harder on Chechnya, drawing accusations of kidnapping, torture and other atrocities. In response, Chechen rebels continued their terrorist attacks on Russian soil, including an alleged suicide bombing in a Moscow subway in February 2004 and another major hostage crisis at a Beslan school that September.
American Revolution
1777 : British fleet suffers defeat at Fort Mifflin, Pennsylvania
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/british-fleet-suffers-defeat-at-fort-mifflin-pennsylvania
Automotive
1983 : U.S. Embassy in Beirut hit by massive car bomb
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/us-embassy-in-beirut-hit-by-massive-car-bomb
Civil War
1864 : Yankees and Rebels clash at the Battle of Westport
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/battle-of-westport-missouri
Cold War
1956 : Hungarian protest turns violent
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hungarian-protest-turns-violent
Crime
1998 : An abortion-performing doctor is murdered
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/an-abortion-performing-doctor-is-murdered
Disaster
1989 : Gas leak kills 23 at plastics factory
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gas-leak-kills-23-at-plastics-factory
General Interest
42 B.C. : Brutus commits suicide
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/brutus-commits-suicide
1855 : Rival governments in bleeding Kansas
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/rival-governments-in-bleeding-kansas
1983 : Beirut barracks blown up
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/beirut-barracks-blown-up
Hollywood
1925 : Johnny Carson is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/johnny-carson-is-born
Literary
1942 : Michael Crichton is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/michael-crichton-is-born
Music
1976 : Chicago has its first #1 hit with "If You Leave Me Now"
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/chicago-has-its-first-1-hit-with-quotif-you-leave-me-nowquot
Old West
1813 : American fur traders turn over Astoria, Oregon, to the British
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/american-fur-traders-turn-over-astoria-oregon-to-the-british
Presidential
1890 : President Benjamin Harrison extends borders of Nebraska
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-benjamin-harrison-extends-borders-of-nebraska
Sports
1993 : Carter homers to win World Series
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/carter-homers-to-win-world-series
Vietnam War
1965 : 1st Cavalry Division launches Operation Silver Bayonet
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/1st-cavalry-division-launches-operation-silver-bayonet
1972 : U.S. negotiators ask for further talks in Paris
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/us-negotiators-ask-for-further-talks-in-paris
World War I
1921 : Unknown Soldier is selected
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/unknown-soldier-is-selected
World War II
1941 : Soviets switch commanders in drive to halt Germans
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/soviets-switch-commanders-in-drive-to-halt-germans
----------------------
October 22:
In a televised speech of extraordinary gravity, President John F. Kennedy announces that U.S. spy planes have discovered Soviet missile bases in Cuba. These missile sites-under construction but nearing completion-housed medium-range missiles capable of striking a number of major cities in the United States, including Washington, D.C. Kennedy announced that he was ordering a naval "quarantine" of Cuba to prevent Soviet ships from transporting any more offensive weapons to the island and explained that the United States would not tolerate the existence of the missile sites currently in place. The president made it clear that America would not stop short of military action to end what he called a "clandestine, reckless, and provocative threat to world peace."
What is known as the Cuban Missile Crisis actually began on October 15, 1962-the day that U.S. intelligence personnel analyzing U-2 spy plane data discovered that the Soviets were building medium-range missile sites in Cuba. The next day, President Kennedy secretly convened an emergency meeting of his senior military, political, and diplomatic advisers to discuss the ominous development. The group became known as ExCom, short for Executive Committee. After rejecting a surgical air strike against the missile sites, ExCom decided on a naval quarantine and a demand that the bases be dismantled and missiles removed. On the night of October 22, Kennedy went on national television to announce his decision. During the next six days, the crisis escalated to a breaking point as the world tottered on the brink of nuclear war between the two superpowers.
On October 23, the quarantine of Cuba began, but Kennedy decided to give Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev more time to consider the U.S. action by pulling the quarantine line back 500 miles. By October 24, Soviet ships en route to Cuba capable of carrying military cargoes appeared to have slowed down, altered, or reversed their course as they approached the quarantine, with the exception of one ship-the tanker Bucharest. At the request of more than 40 nonaligned nations, U.N. Secretary-General U Thant sent private appeals to Kennedy and Khrushchev, urging that their governments "refrain from any action that may aggravate the situation and bring with it the risk of war." At the direction of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. military forces went to DEFCON 2, the highest military alert ever reached in the postwar era, as military commanders prepared for full-scale war with the Soviet Union.
On October 25, the aircraft carrier USS Essex and the destroyer USS Gearing attempted to intercept the Soviet tanker Bucharest as it crossed over the U.S. quarantine of Cuba. The Soviet ship failed to cooperate, but the U.S. Navy restrained itself from forcibly seizing the ship, deeming it unlikely that the tanker was carrying offensive weapons. On October 26, Kennedy learned that work on the missile bases was proceeding without interruption, and ExCom considered authorizing a U.S. invasion of Cuba. The same day, the Soviets transmitted a proposal for ending the crisis: The missile bases would be removed in exchange for a U.S. pledge not to invade Cuba.
The next day, however, Khrushchev upped the ante by publicly calling for the dismantling of U.S. missile bases in Turkey under pressure from Soviet military commanders. While Kennedy and his crisis advisers debated this dangerous turn in negotiations, a U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba, and its pilot, Major Rudolf Anderson, was killed. To the dismay of the Pentagon, Kennedy forbid a military retaliation unless any more surveillance planes were fired upon over Cuba. To defuse the worsening crisis, Kennedy and his advisers agreed to dismantle the U.S. missile sites in Turkey but at a later date, in order to prevent the protest of Turkey, a key NATO member.
On October 28, Khrushchev announced his government's intent to dismantle and remove all offensive Soviet weapons in Cuba. With the airing of the public message on Radio Moscow, the USSR confirmed its willingness to proceed with the solution secretly proposed by the Americans the day before. In the afternoon, Soviet technicians began dismantling the missile sites, and the world stepped back from the brink of nuclear war. The Cuban Missile Crisis was effectively over. In November, Kennedy called off the blockade, and by the end of the year all the offensive missiles had left Cuba. Soon after, the United States quietly removed its missiles from Turkey.
The Cuban Missile Crisis seemed at the time a clear victory for the United States, but Cuba emerged from the episode with a much greater sense of security. A succession of U.S. administrations have honored Kennedy's pledge not to invade Cuba, and the communist island nation situated just 80 miles from Florida remains a thorn in the side of U.S. foreign policy. The removal of antiquated Jupiter missiles from Turkey had no detrimental effect on U.S. nuclear strategy, but the Cuban Missile Crisis convinced a humiliated USSR to commence a massive nuclear buildup. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union reached nuclear parity with the United States and built intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of striking any city in the United States.
American Revolution
1775 : Peyton Randolph dies
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/peyton-randolph-dies
Automotive
1965 : President Lyndon Johnson signs the Highway Beautification Act
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-lyndon-johnson-signs-the-highway-beautification-act
Civil War
1864 : Confederates arrive at Guntersville, Alabama
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hood-at-guntersville-alabama
Cold War
1962 : Kennedy announces blockade of Cuba during the Missile Crisis
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/kennedy-announces-blockade-of-cuba-during-the-missile-crisis
Crime
1934 : Pretty Boy Floyd is killed by the FBI
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/pretty-boy-floyd-is-killed-by-the-fbi
Disaster
1913 : Coal mine explodes in New Mexico
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/coal-mine-explodes-in-new-mexico
General Interest
1797 : The first parachutist
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-first-parachutist
1975 : Gay sergeant challenges the Air Force
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gay-sergeant-challenges-the-air-force
Hollywood
1952 : Jeff Goldblum born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/jeff-goldblum-born
Literary
1964 : Sartre wins and declines Nobel Prize
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/sartre-wins-and-declines-nobel-prize
Music
1811 : Pianist and composer Franz Liszt is born
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/pianist-and-composer-franz-liszt-is-born
Old West
1903 : Tom Horn is hanged in Wyoming for the murder of Willie Nickell
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/tom-horn-is-hanged-in-wyoming-for-the-murder-of-willie-nickell
Presidential
1962 : JFK announces a blockade of Cuba
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/jfk-announces-a-blockade-of-cuba
Sports
1992 : Baseball Hall of Fame announcer Red Barber dies at 84
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/baseball-hall-of-fame-announcer-red-barber-dies-at-84
Vietnam War
1957 : American forces suffer first casualties in Vietnam
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/american-forces-suffer-first-casualties-in-vietnam
1965 : 173rd Airborne trooper saves comrades
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/173rd-airborne-trooper-saves-comrades
1972 : President Thieu turns down peace proposal
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-thieu-turns-down-peace-proposal
World War I
1914 : Germans capture Langemarck during First Battle of Ypres
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/germans-capture-langemarck-during-first-battle-of-ypres
World War II
1942 : Allies confer secretly about Operation Torch
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/allies-confer-secretly-about-operation-torch
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