August 20 Events |
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| August 20th, 2002 (August 20 2002) | Event | A group of Iraqis opposed to the regime of Saddam Hussein take over the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin for five hours before releasing their hostages and giving up. | Saddam Hussein Quotes |
| August 20th, 1998 (August 20 1998) | Event | The Supreme Court of Canada states Quebec cannot legally secede from Canada without the federal government s approval. | |
| August 20th, 1998 (August 20 1998) | Event | U.S. embassy bombings: The United States military launches cruise missile attacks against alleged al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan and a suspected chemical plant in Sudan in retaliation for the August 7 bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. The al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum is destroyed in the attack. | |
| August 20th, 1997 (August 20 1997) | Event | Souhane massacre in Algeria; over 60 people killed, 15 kidnapped. | |
| August 20th, 1993 (August 20 1993) | Event | After rounds of secret negotiations in Norway, the Oslo Peace Accords were signed, followed by a public ceremony in Washington, D.C. the next month. | |
| August 20th, 1991 (August 20 1991) | Event | Collapse of the Soviet Union, August Coup: More than 100,000 people rally outside the Soviet Union s parliament building protesting the coup aiming to depose President Mikhail Gorbachev. | |
| August 20th, 1991 (August 20 1991) | Event | Estonia secedes from the Soviet Union. | |
| August 20th, 1988 (August 20 1988) | Event | "Black Saturday" of the Yellowstone fire in Yellowstone National Park | |
| August 20th, 1988 (August 20 1988) | Event | Peru becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty. | |
| August 20th, 1988 (August 20 1988) | Event | Iran-Iraq War: A cease-fire is agreed to after almost eight years of war. | |
| August 20th, 1986 (August 20 1986) | Event | In Edmond, Oklahoma, U.S. Postal employee Patrick Sherrill guns down 14 of his co-workers and then commits suicide. | |
| August 20th, 1982 (August 20 1982) | Event | Lebanese Civil War: A multinational force lands in Beirut to oversee the PLO withdrawal from Lebanon. | |
| August 20th, 1979 (August 20 1979) | Event | The East Coast Main Line rail route between England and Scotland is restored when the Penmanshiel Diversion opens. | |
| August 20th, 1977 (August 20 1977) | Event | Voyager Program: The United States launches the Voyager 2 spacecraft. | |
| August 20th, 1975 (August 20 1975) | Event | Viking Program: NASA launches the Viking 1 planetary probe toward Mars. | |
| August 20th, 1974 (August 20 1974) | Event | Congress votes to reduce aid to South Vietnam from $1 Billion to $700 Million. Majority of the cuts were for military supplies. | |
| August 20th, 1969 (August 20 1969) | Event | All four Beatles were together in the recording studio for the final time as they finished the Abbey Road LP. | |
| August 20th, 1968 (August 20 1968) | Event | 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 5,000 tanks invade Czechoslovakia to end the "Prague Spring" of political liberalization. | |
| August 20th, 1960 (August 20 1960) | Event | Senegal breaks from the Mali federation, declaring independence. | |
| August 20th, 1955 (August 20 1955) | Event | In Morocco, a force of Berbers from the Atlas Mountains region of Algeria raid two rural settlements and kill 77 French nationals. | |
| August 20th, 1953 (August 20 1953) | Event | The Soviet Union publicly acknowledged it had tested a hydrogen bomb. | |
| August 20th, 1944 (August 20 1944) | Event | World War II: The Battle of Romania begins with a major Soviet offensive. | |
| August 20th, 1940 (August 20 1940) | Event | Exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky is fatally wounded in Mexico City by an assassin s ice axe. He dies the next day. | Leon Trotsky Quotes |
| August 20th, 1938 (August 20 1938) | Event | Lou Gehrig hits his 23rd career grand slama record that still stands. | |
| August 20th, 1926 (August 20 1926) | Event | Japan s public broadcasting company, Nippon Hoso Kyokai (NHK) is established. | |
| August 20th, 1920 (August 20 1920) | Event | The first commercial radio station, 8MK (WWJ), begins operations in Detroit, Michigan. | |
| August 20th, 1914 (August 20 1914) | Event | World War I: German forces occupy Brussels. | |
| August 20th, 1900 (August 20 1900) | Event | Japan s primary school law is amended to provide for four years of mandatory schooling. | Ovid Quotes |
| August 20th, 1888 (August 20 1888) | Event | Mutineers imprison Emin Pasha at Dufile. | |
| August 20th, 1882 (August 20 1882) | Event | Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky s 1812 Overture debuts in Moscow. | |
| August 20th, 1866 (August 20 1866) | Event | President Andrew Johnson formally declared the U.S. Civil War over. | Andrew Johnson Quotes |
| August 20th, 1804 (August 20 1804) | Event | Lewis and Clark Expedition: The "Corps of Discovery", exploring the Louisiana Purchase, suffers its only death when Sergeant Charles Floyd dies, apparently from acute appendicitis. | |
| August 20th, 1794 (August 20 1794) | Event | Battle of Fallen TimbersAmerican troops force a confederacy of Shawnee, Mingo, Delaware, Wyandot, Miami, Ottawa, Chippewa, and Potawatomi warriors into a disorganized retreat. | Tom Ze Quotes |
| August 20th, 1672 (August 20 1672) | Event | Former Grand Pensionary Johan de Witt and his brother Cornelis were brutally murdered by an angry mob in The Hague. | |
| August 20th, 1391 (August 20 1391) | Event | Konrad von Wallenrode becomes the 24th Hochmeister of the Teutonic Order. | |
| August 20th, 1000 (August 20 1000) | Event | The foundation of the Hungarian state, Hungary is established as a Christian kingdom by Stephen I of Hungary. | Stephen King Quotes |
| August 20th, 0917 (August 20 0917) | Event | Battle of Anchialus: Tsar Simeon I of Bulgaria invades Thrace and drives the Byzantines out. | |
| August 20th, 0636 (August 20 0636) | Event | Battle of Yarmouk: Arab forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid take control of Syria and Palestine away from the Byzantine Empire, marking the first great wave of Muslim conquests and the rapid advance of Islam outside Arabia. | |
