The Michigan National Guard celebrates their 20-year partnership with Latvia with a look back at how the partnership started and and some milestones along the way.
Twenty three years ago, Nov. 9, 1989, I sat in my home in Maastricht, the Netherlands with tears of joy in my eyes. That evening I was witnessing on Dutch television something that I was not sure I was ever going to see happen - the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Following nearly two weeks of protest and political instability in Hungary, Soviet tanks and troops viciously crush the protests. Thousands were killed and wounded, and nearly a quarter-million Hungarians fled the country.
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.
Two months after signing an agreement to establish a 24-hour-a-day "hot line" between Moscow and Washington, the system goes into effect. The hot line was supposed to help speed communication between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union and help prevent the possibility of an accidental war.
A joke about "outlawing" the Soviet Union by President Ronald Reagan turns into an international embarrassment. The president's flippant remarks caused consternation among America's allies and provided grist for the Soviet propaganda mill.
Thirty-five nations, called together by the United States and the Soviet Union, begin a summit meeting in Helsinki, Finland, to discuss some pressing international issues. The meeting temporarily revived the spirit of detente between the United States and Russia.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower presents his "Open Skies" plan at the 1955 Geneva summit meeting with representatives of France, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. The plan, though never accepted, laid the foundation for President Ronald Reagan's later policy of "trust, but verify" in relation to arms agreements with the Soviet Union.
In a vindication of his sweeping economic and political reforms, Mikhail Gorbachev withstands severe criticisms from his opponents and is re-elected head of the Soviet Communist Party by an overwhelming margin.
On this day in 1948, U.S. and British pilots begin delivering food and supplies by airplane to Berlin after the city is isolated by a Soviet Union blockade.
On May 1, 1960, a United States U-2 spy plane was shot down in the airspace of the Soviet Union. The incident happened fifteen days before the scheduled opening of an East–West summit conference in Paris.
On Dec. 25, 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union. The next day, the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union meets and formally dissolves the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.