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Eighty years ago this week the US demonstrates the power of nuclear weapons

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  In order to test whether military ships could survive a nuclear explosion Operation Crossroads was staged at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. It might also have been intended to serve as a warning to the Soviet Union. The fourth nuclear bomb ever to be detonated exploded in the midst of some 95 warships. The test had been announced in advance and international observers including Soviet scientists were invited to attend. The bomb missed its aiming point and only five ships were sunk outright although nuclear contamination meant that almost all the survivors were useless. The Soviet Union made the first serious use of its veto at the UN Security Council when it turned down a statement on Franco's Spain which it deemed was too gentle. The Soviets sought an outright call on members to cease diplomatic relations with Spain. The resolution thus passed to the General Assembly. In response to the Night of the Bridges attacks the British authorities in Palestine launched Operation Agatha, th...
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Eighty years ago this week two long-standing French institutions arrive on the scene

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      Jean Monnet, the first commissioner of the "Plan", submitted proposals to implement the Plan's goal of re-establishing France's economy and improving standards of living. The Commission had been established by General de Gaulle. The Plan rested on collaboration between unions and businesses, guided but not controlled, by the state. It provided a model for the French economy which still functions today. Its unspoken goal to was to develop a lead over Germany; Monnet proposed a partial de-industrialisation of Germany with factories being transferred entirely to France and some being dismantled entirely.    Georges Bidault was elected as the first prime minister of the French Fourth Republic. His government was emblematic of the shifting focus of the Republic and the inherent instability of its institutions. It had Communists and Socialists in senior ministries as well as Bidault's own centre-right MRP. Bidault's government only lasted a few months (li...
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Eighty years ago this week insurgency in Palestine intensifies

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   Jewish insurgents responded to the British decision not to accept the recommendation of the Anglo-American Committee that 100,000  Jews should be allowed to settle in Palestine. In one night ten bridges carrying major transport links were severed. The attempt to destroy an eleventh bridge failed after a firefight in which 14 Haganah fighters were killed. Separately, five British officers were kidnapped with the threat that they would be killed if death sentences passed on two insurgents for their part in the raid on Sarafand Camp (in which there had been no fatalities) were carried out. The Labour Party conference came out decisively against the extreme left. A motion to block affiliation by the Communist Party of Great Britain was passed. The Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin emphatically defeated left-wing critics of his foreign policy who asserted that he was merely carrying out traditionally Conservative policies. They wanted him to purge the Foreign Office of anyone ...
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Eighty years ago this week Britain's formal celebration of victory in the Second World War marred by the cold war

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      22,000 servicemen and women and 500 military vehicles participated in the London Victory day parade which stretched for four miles.  There was a fly-past of 300 aircraft. Practically Britain's allies except for the Soviet Union were represented although the Polish involvement was held at a minimal level to appease Stalin.  The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem fled from France where he was being  kept under  surveillance. He was a leading opponent of Jewish settlement in Palestine and had been based in Germany throughout the war where he was highly paid to broadcast propaganda. He gave support to the Nazi recruitment of Muslims into the SS. He met Himmler and encouraged the killing of Jews. The British had requested his extradition from France as he was notionally a British subject but France had refused. He left France with the connivance of the government which hoped to curry favour with Arab nations. The young King of Thailand was shot dead. To this da...
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Eighty years ago this week Italian voters reject monarchy

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    The referendum on the  Italian m onarchy gave a clear vote in favour of a republic: 54.3% to 45.7%. The poll was skewed regionally with monarchist support concentrated in the poorer South with scattered support in the dynasty's home in Savoy. The abdication of Victor Emmanuel III, who was heavily tainted by association with Mussolini,  had failed to save the House of Savoy. Umberto II left the country for exile after a few days, having reigned for only 34 days. France held an election for the legislative assembly following the rejection of a proposed new constitution. The new assembly was set to draft a new constitution. The centre right MRP party won the largest share of the vote with 28% displacing the Communists whose vote shrank to 26%. The socialist SFIO vote dropped to 21% so the parties of the left could no longer command a majority in the assembly. The MRP had campaigned against  the new constitution, claiming that the the abolition of the Senate to ...
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Eighty years ago this week Britain gives the world another monarchy

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  Britain granted i ndependence to Jordan (then called Transjordan) as an absolute monarchy. Since 1921 it had been an emirate carved out of the Ottoman empire under British "protection " recognised by the League of Nations. The new king Abdullah was one of four sons of Hussain Bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca, the leader of the "Arab Revolt" against the Ottomans supported by the British in the First World War. Abdullah extended this loyalty into the Second World War. His grandson still rules as king. A nationwide strike in US coal mines led the President to bring them under state control so as to force a return to work. A similar move on strike-hit railways was averted with only minutes to spare when the rail unions accepted a government deal. Communist Klement Gottwald was appointed prime minister of Czechoslovakia. His party had emerged as the largest in the country with 38% of the vote in national elections held in March. He had supported vigorously the highly popular e...
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Eighty years ago this a system of generous support for university students is born

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  The British government announced that it was to introduce a system of financial support covering both tuition and maintenance costs for university students from families of modest means who had won scholarships. The level of the support was not disclosed but it would be available in full to students whose families earned less than £360 a year with diminishing amounts up to family income of £1500. Thus began the generous system from which generations of students benefited.  The bill nationalising the coal industry was finally passed after a prolonged and sometimes acrimonious debate. Opposition criticism focused on the proposed structured for controlling the industry once in state hands. Having an appointed board in charge was described as state capitalism; its members would be, at best, trustees, at worst, bureaucrats. Unspoken was the reality that coal mining would still be pursued as a business with the profits (such as they were) going to the workers rather than individua...
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