TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
28 December
◆1793 Thomas Paine is arrested in France for treason.
◆1822 Confederate General William Taliaferro is born in Gloucester County, Virginia.
◆1846 Iowa became the 29th state to be admitted to the Union.
◆1856 Woodrow Wilson, 28th president of the United States (1912-1921), who brought the country into World War I, was born.
◆1867 U.S. claims Midway Island, first territory annexed outside Continental limits.
◆1872 A U.S. Army force defeated a group of Apache warriors at Salt River Canyon, Arizona Territory, with 57 Indians killed but only one soldier.
◆1936 Benito Mussolini sent planes to Spain to support Francisco Franco’s forces.
◆1941 In the Philippines, American and allied troops continue to fall back. They are now at the Tarlac-Cabanatuan line. Japanese attacks continue.
◆1941 Chief of Bureau of Yards and Docks requests that construction battalions be recruited. The need for a militarized Naval Construction Force to build advance bases in the war zone was self-evident.★
◆1943 On New Britain, the US 1st Marine Division begins advancing to attack the Japanese airfield at Cape Gloucester.
◆1944 The US 5th Army, fighting in the Italian Serchio valley, has pulled back from the town of Barga in response to German counterattacks.
◆1944 About 1200 B-17 Flying Fortress bombers, escorted by 700 fighters, attacked Coblenz and other targets. Late in the day, Bomber Command bombs Cologne.
◆1945 Congress officially recognized the "Pledge of Allegiance."
◆1946 The French declared martial law in Vietnam as a full-scale war appeared inevitable.
◆1950 Chinese troops crossed the 38th Parallel into South Korea.
◆1952 The Far East Air Force mounted its heaviest bombing attack since August 1952 with a 200-plane attack against targets southwest of Pyongyang.
◆1964 South Vietnamese troops retake Binh Gia in a costly battle.
◆1972 After 11 days of round-the-clock bombing (with the exception of a 36-hour break for Christmas), North Vietnamese officials agree to return to the peace negotiations in Paris.
◆1982 Recommissioning of USS New Jersey (BB-62), the first of four Iowa-class battleships that were returned to service in 1980s.
◆1990 LCDR Darlene M. Iskra becomes commander of USS Opportune, a salvage vessel.
◆1990 USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) and USS America (CV-66) Carrier Battle Groups deploy from Norfolk, VA, for Middle East to join Operation Desert Shield.
◆1992 Somalia's two main warlords, Mohamed Farrah Aidid and Ali Mahdi Mohamed, promised an end to their hostilities.
◆1998 American aircraft patrolling the no-fly zone in Iraq destroyed an air defense site after the battery opened fire on them.
◆2012 General H. Norman Schwarzkopf died at age 78.★