Timeline: 1 May 1960: An American U-2 spy plane being flown by CIA pilot Captain Francis Gary Powers is shot down by a Soviet surface-to-air missile. It crashes near the Ural Mountains. 5 May 1960: A statement released by...
Political Archive
Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic – 1922-1923
During World War I prices in Germany had doubled, but the real trouble started afterwards. The new German Weimar government was bound by the Treaty of Versailles – designed to ensure that the grandees of the now defunct German...
Afghan Election – 2009
The fiasco of the Afghan presidential election of 2009 is an object lesson in the consequences of blithely marching into alien territory and attempting to impose by force Western notions of liberal democracy on an ancient and complex kinship...
Scandal of the September Dossier – 2002-2003
When British Prime Minister Tony Blair agreed to support America’s invasion of Iraq he was on shaky ground – under international law there was no casus belli. But in September 2002 the government published a dossier based on British...
Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp – 2002 onwards
Guantanamo Bay on the southern tip of Cuba has been an American naval base ever since 1898, used from the 1970s as a detention camp for Cubans and Haitians caught attempting to slip into America by sea. After the...
Labor Party Rally in Sheffield – 1992
As the 1992 general election approached, Britain was sliding into recession. The electorate were more than ready for change after 13 years of Tory rule, but not entirely convinced by Neil Kinnock’s Labour Party. In the weeks leading up...