Her name is Kim Phuc Phan. She survived, and after over a year in the hospital lived in continual pain and with limited mobility. The photo won a Pulitzer. It, and other photos and reporting helped to show the horrors of war, the reality of war, what it really was and was all about to that portion of the US populace that had the capacity to see and comprehend it. A lot of US civilians learned a lot and opposition to that war continued to grow.
The US government and the military also learned a lot. They learned to never let the US public see such scenes again. Not that such horrors would be prevented, they would continue to occur, but they would not be photographed or the photos would not be disseminated. Those of the press not reading press releases back home or back at base camp HQ would henceforth be "embedded". The only way such images would see the light of day is if somebody leaked gun camera images and the like to Wikileaks and paid a price steep enough to deter others from following suit. Any journalist receiving such photos would also pay a very heavy price if they published them. Accordingly, war's dirty little secrets will henceforth remain just that, secret.
Meanwhile, in the fullness of time, that war did come to something of an end and on this day in 1973, the Paris Peace Accords were signed, bringing it to a close. Of course those accords only applied to that installment of the ongoing endless war against all peoples, political parties, and governments who displease and/or disobey the exceptional, indispensable, self-appointed arbiter of what all mankind and all governments shall be permitted to do and think and have and be.
On this day in history:
1343 – Pope Clement VI issued the papal bull Unigenitus to justify the power of the pope and the use of indulgences.
1785 – The first public university in the US, the University of Georgia, was founded, y'all.
1820 – A Russian expedition discovered the Antarctic continent
1825 – The U.S. Congress approved the "Indian Territory", paving the way for the "Trail of Tears".
1874 – Modest Mussorgsky's opera Boris Godunov premiered
1880 – Thomas Edison received a patent for his incandescent lamp.
1944 – The 900-day Siege of Leningrad ended.
1945 – The Soviet 322nd Rifle Division liberated the remaining inmates of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
1951 – Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site began
1967 – Astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee were killed in a fire during a test of their Apollo 1 spacecraft
1967 – The USSR, the US, and the UK signed the Outer Space Treaty. Treaty, Heh
1973 – The Paris Peace Accords officially ended the Vietnam War.
1983 – The pilot shaft of the Seikan Tunnel, broke through.
2010 – Porfirio Lobo Sosa became the "official" President of Honduras after the 2009 coup d'etat .
2011 – The Yemeni Revolution began with over 16,000 protestors demonstrating in Sana'a.
2023 – Protests broke out across the U.S. after the release of videos of Memphis Police violently mistreating Tyre Nichols which resulted in his death.
Some people who were born on this day:
If you limit your actions in life to things that nobody can possibly find fault with, you will not do much.
~~ Charles Lutwidge Dodgson
1621 – Thomas Willis, physician and anatomist 1756 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, pianist and composer 1775 – Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, philosopher and academic 1795 – Eli Whitney Blake, engineer, invented the Mortise lock 1803 – Eunice Hale Waite Cobb, writer, public speaker, and activist 1821 – John Chivington, colonel and pastor responsible for the Sand Creek Massacre 1832 – Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, novelist, poet, logician, essayist, proto-existentialist, and mathematician. 1850 – John Collier, painter and author 1850 – Samuel Gompers, labor leader 1878 – Dorothy Scarborough, author 1885 – Jerome Kern, composer and songwriter 1885 – Seison Maeda, painter 1895 – Harry Ruby, composer and screenwriter; friend of Groucho 1908 – William Randolph Hearst, Jr., yellow journalist, propagandist, and publisher 1912 – Arne Næss, philosopher and environmentalist 1912 – Francis Rogallo, engineer and inventor 1918 – Skitch Henderson, pianist, composer, and conductor 1918 – Elmore James, singer, songwriter, and guitarist 1924 – Harvey Shapiro, poet 1926 – Fritz Spiegl, flute player and journalist 1930 – Bobby "Blue" Bland, singer and songwriter 1941 – Beatrice Tinsley, astronomer and cosmologist 1944 – Nick Mason, drummer, songwriter, and producer 1946 – Nedra Talley, singer (Ronette) 1948 – Mikhail Baryshnikov, dancer, choreographer, and actor 1948 – Jean-Philippe Collard, pianist 1951 – Seth Justman, keyboard player and songwriter 1952 – G. E. Smith, guitarist and songwriter 1957 – Janick Gers, guitarist and songwriter 1959 – Keith Olbermann, journalist and author
Some people who died on this day:
Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy; it is absolutely essential to it.
~~ Howard Zinn
1596 – Francis Drake, captain and explorer (b. 1540) 1731 – Bartolomeo Cristofori, instrument maker, invented the Piano 1851 – John James Audubon, ornithologist and painte 1860 – János Bolyai, mathematician and academic 1901 – Giuseppe Verdi, composer 1910 – Thomas Crapper, plumber 1922 – Nellie Bly, journalist and author 1967 - Roger B. Chaffee, Gus Grissom, and Ed White, astronauts 1972 – Mahalia Jackson, singer 2006 – Gene McFadden, singer. songwriter, and producer 2009 – John Updike, novelist, short story writer, and critic 2010 – J. D. Salinger, author 2010 – Howard Zinn, historian, author, academic, and activist 2014 – Pete Seeger, singer, songwriter, musician, and activist
Some Holidays, Holy Days, Festivals, Feast Days, Days of Recognition, and such: International Holocaust Remembrance Day/Auschwitz Liberation Day Vietnam Peace Day International Port Wine Day National Chocolate Cake Day
Today's Tunes
Mozart
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson
Jerome Kern
Harry Ruby
Skitch Henderson
Elmore James
Bobby "Blue" Bland
Nick Mason
Nedra Talley
Seth Justman
G.E. Smith
Mahlia Jackson
Gene McFadden
Pete Seeger
I won't be here when this posts
Ok, it's an open thread, so it's up to you folks now. What's on your mind?
Cross posted from http://caucus99percent.com Open Thread, Vietnam, Auschwitz, Leningrad, Mozart, Lewis Carroll, Elmore James, Bobby Blue Bland, Mahalia Jackson, Pete Seeger, Howard Zinn