TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
25 April
◆404 BCE Athens surrenders to Sparta, ending the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC).★
◆1283 Siege of Bere Castle: English defeat the Welsh.
◆1464 War of the Roses - Battle of Hedgeley Moor: Marquess of Montague's Yorkists defeat the Duke of Somerset's Lancastrians.
◆1591 The Moroccans take Timbuktu.
◆1607 Battle of Gibraltar Bay: the Dutch fleet defeats the Spanish & Portuguese.
◆1626 Battle of the Dessauer Bridge: Albrecht von Wallenstein defeats Graf von Mansfeld.
◆1707 Battle of Almansa: Borbonists defeat the Habsburgists to secure the control of Spain.
◆1781 Gen. Nathanael Greene engaged British forces at Hobkirk’s Hill, South Carolina, and was forced to retreat.1792 First execution by guillotine.★
◆1819 The Revenue cutter Active captured the pirate vessel Irresistible in the Chesapeake Bay.
◆1854 The Gadsden Purchase was ratified in the US.1861 Battle of Lavaca, TX
◆1862 Flag Officer Farragut's fleet, having silenced Confederate batteries at Chalmette en route, anchored before New Orleans.
◆1864 Confederate victory in the Red River Campaign.★
◆1898 The United States formally declared war on Spain.
◆1913 The formal charter of the Marine Corps Association was established.
◆1914 First combat observation mission by Navy plane, at Veracruz, Mexico.
◆1915 Gallipoli: 78,000 ANZAC troops land. ANZAC Day (Holiday).★
◆1927 Spain sends 20,000 reinforcements to Morocco to battle the Riffian Rebels.
◆1943 American bombers raid an airfield around Bari, Italy in the south.
◆1945 Delegates from some 50 countries met in San Francisco to organize the United Nations.
◆1945 Battle of Berlin: Soviet forces complete the encirclement of Berlin near Ketzin.★
◆1945 American planes strike Pilsen, Czechoslovakia, nominally the Skoda Works.
◆1945 Clandestine Radio 1212, used to hoax Nazi Germany, made its final transmission.
◆1951 Eighth Army was pushed back 20 miles. The volunteer battalion from Belgium and Luxembourg was cut off but fought its way to safety after a 20-hour siege. Members of the battalion had high praise for the support provided by U.S. Marine Corsairs.
◆1953 The magazine Nature published an article by biologists Francis Crick and James Watson, describing the "double helix" of DNA.
◆1954 Bell Labs in NYC announced the 1st solar battery.
◆1957 The 1st experimental sodium nuclear reactor operated.
◆1960 First submerged circumnavigation of the Earth was completed by a Triton submarine. In 1962 - Edward Latimer “Ned” Beach (b.19180, Navy captain authored “Around the World Submerged.”
◆1961 Robert Noyce patented the integrated circuit.
◆1961 Mercury-Atlas rocket lifted off with an electronic mannequin. An unmanned Mercury test exploded on launch pad.
◆1962 Christmas Island: US resumes above ground nuclear testing.
◆1962 U.S. Ranger spacecraft crash landed on the Moon.
◆1964 President Lyndon B. Johnson announces that Gen. William Westmoreland will replace Gen. Paul Harkins as head of U.S. Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) as of June 20.
◆1972 Hanoi's 320th Division drives 5,000 South Vietnamese troops into retreat and traps about 2,500 others in a border outpost northwest of Kontum in the Central Highlands.
◆1980 President Jimmy Carter announced the hostage rescue disaster in Iran.
◆1982 In accordance with Camp David agreements, Israel completed the Sinai withdrawal. Ariel Sharon, as defense minister, directed the dismantling of Israeli settlements in the Sinai Peninsula. Nearly 5,000 residents and many more sympathizers were dragged off roofs and bundled onto buses.
◆1983 The Pioneer 10 spacecraft crossed Pluto's orbit, speeding on its endless voyage through the Milky Way.
◆1988 NASA launched space vehicle S-211.
◆1999 On the third and final day of their Washington summit, NATO leaders promised military protection and economic aid to Yugoslavia's neighbors for standing with the West against Slobodan Milosevic. Pres. Yeltsin called Pres. Clinton to search for a solution to Kosovo.
◆1999 NATO airstrikes in Yugoslavia destroyed the last bridge in Novi Sad along with other targets in northern and central Serbia. The KLA staged a new conference in Kukes and pleaded anew for a battlefield alliance with NATO.
◆1999 In Iraq US warplanes struck air defense sites in the northern no fly zone after being threatened by radar.
◆2001 In unusually blunt terms, President Bush warned China that an attack on Taiwan could provoke a U.S. military response.
◆2003 Nuclear talks in Beijing ended after U.S. officials said North Korea claimed to have nuclear weapons and might test, export or use them.