As you can imagine, life has been a bit hectic around here. Mother and baby are healthy and well, and we are all adjusting to our newest addition as best we all can. Since I did not make these posts on the days that I had intended, I am writing this entry to cover some key events marked in the month of February. Obviously, many, many events happened during the last month, so I am focusing on events that mark special anniversaries.
February 4th, 1945 - The 70th Anniversary of the beginning of the Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference was held during the ending days of World War II at the Livadia Palace near Yalta in the Crimea. It was attended by the heads of the key Allied Powers - President Franklin Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Premier Josef Stalin. This conference was to determine the post-war reorganization of Europe, and more specifically, Germany.
Many points were discussed between the three leaders, but the reason this event is so important to our history is that it created the division between the (then) U.S.S.R. and the Western Powers. Germany was divided between the two, and the creation of East and West Berlin was a direct result of this conference - which led to the creation of the Berlin Wall, and a Cold War that lasted 50 years, ending with the fall of the Soviet Union in December of 1991. It could be argued that the Korean and Vietnam wars (as well as several smaller battles) could be directly attributed to the division of Europe at the end of the war.
A small meeting between 3 men that had repercussions as a Cold War for 50 years, but smaller ripples that are ongoing today.
February 9th, 1965 - The 50th Anniversary of the First Combat Troops to Viet Nam
It was the first step in a long campaign that would cost more than 50,000 American lives, and millions of Vietnamese. The first of thousands of American troops were sent to Vietnam - in this first case, a battalion of Marines serving Hawk Air Defense Missiles to protect the key American Air Base at Da Nang. By sending in the Marines, President Johnson gave a very clear message that the U.S. would be backing the South Vietnamese against Communist Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army forces (who were backed by China and the Soviet Union) - which lead to protests in Moscow by Vietnamese and Chinese students numbering over 2,000 and leading to an attack on the U.S. Embassy there.
Britain and Australia supported the action, while France (who had suffered heavy loses fighting the Viet Minh during the late 40's through the 1950's) called for negotiations.
February 19th, 1945 - 70th Anniversary of the Invasion of Iwo Jima
Operation Detachment began in the early morning as Marines loaded into their landing craft and headed for a small strip of rock in the middle of the ocean. To the Marines it was another island that needed to be taken from the Japanese - to the American military, it was the best place to build a landing strip to launch strikes against the home islands of Japan - a mere 660 miles away.
By the end of the first day, 550 Marine lives would be lost, and another 1,800 would wounded. One of the lost Marines was GSgt. John Basilone of Raritan, New Jersey. A veteran of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba as well as Guadalcanal where he earned the CMH, he was killed while landing at Iwo Jima, leading a platoon of Marines. He was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for his heroism.
Two key events that were a direct result from the battle: the raising of the American flag on Mount Suribachi, which created the famous picture taken by Joe Rosenthal, and in doing so lead to the 7th War Bond drive in the U.S., allowing American servicemen to finish the job in the Pacific. Iwo Jima was also used as an emergency landing strip for the bombers carrying the atomic weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It also served as an example for invading the Japanese home islands - of the 22,000 Japanese Imperial Army soldiers on the island, only 216 were taken alive. All others were either killed or committed suicide. For the Americans, 26,000 casualties were taken; 6,800 of which were killed in action.
In the end, the loss of life for a small piece of rock became a controversial subject in Washington. By the time the B-29 bombers with the atomic weapons were headed to Japan, the island of Okinawa (considered to be a part of the main Japanese island chain) had been liberated and was used as a staging area. The Army and Navy had no strategic use for the island, and in the end it became one more island that the Marines had liberated for the war effort.
The island had an elaborate tunnel system where the IJA forces were fighting from; because of this, the last troops to surrender came walking out in 1949.
February 21st, 1965 - The 50th Anniversary of the Assassination of Malcolm X
from History.com:
In New York City, Malcolm X, an African American nationalist and religious leader, is assassinated by rival Black Muslims while addressing his Organization of Afro-American Unity at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights.
Born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1925, Malcolm was the son of James Earl Little, a Baptist preacher who advocated the black nationalist ideals of Marcus Garvey. Threats from the Ku Klux Klan forced the family to move to Lansing, Michigan, where his father continued to preach his controversial sermons despite continuing threats. In 1931, Malcolm’s father was brutally murdered by the white supremacist Black Legion, and Michigan authorities refused to prosecute those responsible. In 1937, Malcolm was taken from his family by welfare caseworkers. By the time he reached high school age, he had dropped out of school and moved to Boston, where he became increasingly involved in criminal activities.
In 1946, at the age of 21, Malcolm was sent to prison on a burglary conviction. It was there he encountered the teachings of Elijah Muhammad, the leader of the Nation of Islam, whose members are popularly known as Black Muslims. The Nation of Islam advocated black nationalism and racial separatism and condemned Americans of European descent as immoral “devils.” Muhammad’s teachings had a strong effect on Malcolm, who entered into an intense program of self-education and took the last name “X” to symbolize his stolen African identity.
After six years, Malcolm was released from prison and became a loyal and effective minister of the Nation of Islam in Harlem, New York. In contrast with civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X advocated self-defense and the liberation of African Americans “by any means necessary.” A fiery orator, Malcolm was admired by the African American community in New York and around the country.
In the early 1960s, he began to develop a more outspoken philosophy than that of Elijah Muhammad, whom he felt did not sufficiently support the civil rights movement. In late 1963, Malcolm’s suggestion that President John F. Kennedy’s assassination was a matter of the “chickens coming home to roost” provided Elijah Muhammad, who believed that Malcolm had become too powerful, with a convenient opportunity to suspend him from the Nation of Islam.
A few months later, Malcolm formally left the organization and made a Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, where he was profoundly affected by the lack of racial discord among orthodox Muslims. He returned to America as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz and in June 1964 founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity, which advocated black identity and held that racism, not the white race, was the greatest foe of the African American. Malcolm’s new movement steadily gained followers, and his more moderate philosophy became increasingly influential in the civil rights movement, especially among the leaders of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee.
On February 21, 1965, one week after his home was firebombed, Malcolm X was shot to death by Nation of Islam members while speaking at a rally of his organization in New York City.
February 23rd, 1945 - 70th Anniversary of the Raising of the Flag on Iwo Jima
It had taken 4 days, but finally the Marines had made their way to the summit of Mount Suribachi. There, they found an old drainage pipe, and affixed an old and worn U.S. flag to it and raised their makeshift flag pole into the top of the mountain. From there it could be seen all over the island, and by the Naval flotilla just off shore. Despite the fighting, Marines cheered and saluted, and the ships at sea sounded their horns.
While Marine photographer Louis Lowery captured the original flag being raised, later that day another, larger flag was brought up and the smaller one was replaced. This is the flag that is in the image and newsreel footage. Five Marines and one Navy Corpsman raised the second flag fighting the weight of the pole and wind atop the mountain to do so. Captured the second time by Joe Rosenthal, the picture went on to become the most reproduced image in history, and earned Rosenthal a Pulitzer Prize. Sadly, of the original 6 men to raise the flag, 3 would be lost to enemy fire before the battle for Iwo Jima was over.
