history at a glance

TODAY is Sunday November 14 the 318th day of the year. There are 47 days left in the year.

Highlights in history on this date: 1916 – World War I: The Battle of the Somme ends.

1918 – Czechoslovakia becomes a republic.

1965 – Vietnam War: The Battle of Ia Drang begins – the first major engagement between regular American

and North Vietnamese forces.

1969 – Apollo program: NASA launches Apollo 12, the second crewed mission to the surface of the Moon. 1973 – In the United Kingdom, Princess Anne marries Captain Mark Phillips, in Westminster Abbey. 1975 – Spain abandons Western Sahara.

1979 – Iran hostage crisis: US President Jimmy Carter issues Executive order 12170, freezing all Iranian assets in the United States in response to the hostage crisis.

1982 – Lech Walesa, the leader of Poland’s outlawed Solidarity movement, is released after eleven months

of internment near the Soviet border.

1984 – Zamboanga City mayor Cesar Climaco, a prominent critic of the government of Philippine President

Ferdinand Marcos, is assassinated in his home city.

1991 – American and British authorities announce indictments against two Libyan intelligence officials in

connection with the downing of the Pan Am Flight 103.

1991 – Cambodian Prince Norodom Sihanouk returns to Phnom Penh after thirteen years of exile. 2001 – War in Afghanistan: Afghan Northern Alliance fighters take over the capital Kabul.

2008 – The first G-20 economic summit opens in Washington, D.C.

2010 – Germany’s Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull Racing wins Formula One’s Drivers Championship to become

the sport’s youngest champion.

2012 – Israel launches a major military operation in the Gaza Strip, as hostilities with Hamas escalate.