What do you remember of the big events of fifty years ago?  That means this year it is the year 1970.

Although I flew many times on far away journeys with the Boeing 747 I wasn't aware that the first commercial flight was in 1970



and also, even as we had overhere also women's right  marches, I wasn't aware that in 1970 there was a highlight in the US  after it started in Britain with the sisters Pankhurst



And in Belgium we had in 1970 the start of the split of Belgium into regions based mostly on language differences. The first revision of the Constitution.

First State reform Belgium

https://www.the-low-countries.com/article/belgiums-catch-22

Paul,  I was still in school in the year you refer to.  I have never flown in a jet.  My first flight (which I cannot remember) was on a Douglas DC-3 (Dakota), from Newcastle to Dusseldorf.

 I am not planning any further flights.

brenogler wrote:

Paul,  I was still in school in the year you refer to.  I have never flown in a jet.  My first flight (which I cannot remember) was on a Douglas DC-3 (Dakota), from Newcastle to Dusseldorf.

 I am not planning any further flights.

 
brenogler, welcome to the boards again. And yes it was in my haste to take a parallel with the series that I saw during 12 years each week: "Histoire parallèle" (First on the French channel Sept and later on Arte) by Marc Ferro, the history of WWII each week the week of fifty years ago, that I forgot that among the regular contributors there are also some "youngsters" as you overhere...

I had to think what my memory about the highligts of historical moments in my youth would be then.
And one event, or at least a double event I remember, is the common action of Britain and France on Suez (I read a book about it, with the title Suez. I see now after some research that it was this one: https://www.amazon.com/Suez-Britains-Empire-Middle-East/dp/1848855338)

The second event done by the Soviets at the same time (while all eyes were focused on Suez) was the invasion of Hungary.
I guess in Britain Suez had much more resonance than in Belgium.
For some reason in our household the resistance of the Magyars against the oppressing Soviet Union had a lot more appeal than the Suez Crisis. And even among common Belgian people too.
My mother explained that there was a Belgian special link with Hungary from the Twenties (her childhood). Belgium receiving a lot of Hungarian refugees even in her town. (I thought, but thanks to your intervention I did some research and found out, what it all really was about. Quite some other thing than I had in memory, as these refugees seems to have been mostly children)

Kind regards, Paul.

I coincidentally read yesterday on the French site "Passion Histoire" about the commemoration of the death of Charles de Gaulle fifty years ago on 9 November 1970
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle

As I said about the 1956 double event Suez bombardement-Soviet invasion Hungary there is quite another memory for instance in Britain than in Belgium. 
And again I became aware how deficient my memory was concerning the French post war history. And I guess as most of my compatriots, certainly in the Dutch speaking north of Belgium. Even only living a rough 20 miles from France, we had nothing in the news about the commemoration and as I see in BBC world also nothing.  
Nevertheless, with all his flaws, he is as in my humble opinion as important a figurehead for France, as was Churchill for Britain.

Of course I don't have to speak about his role in Britain and the Free French known to nearly everybody I think. As his relation to Churchill and especially towards Roosevelt...
And his role in the Algerian War is also widely known among the general international public I suppose.


My remembrance is more from our first black and white television with only two posts to capture: The Dutch language Belgian radio-television and the French Lille channel,the nowadays 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_3_Nord-Pas-de-Calais
I remember his speeches to the nation from his armchair at Colombey les deux églises. But I don't find footage about it on the internet.

And there on that French Lille TV Channel with my French knowledge of that time I saw de Gaulle as in May 1968...when his country was on the brink of collapse...I read later that he went to Germany to order the French troops to interfere in the turmoil of the student and workers revolt...
But now I read quite some other thing about his visit to General Massu in Baden Baden...

Especially for MM as he understands French (LiR?)
First the normal version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_I4K7RwW6E
And the conspiracy one (perhaps interesting for Dirk Marinus too)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lf1l8HnMaM0
And the book:
https://www.amazon.com/LAccord-secret-Baden-Baden-French-HENRI-CHRISTIAN/dp/2268065006
And about the author:
https://peoplepill.com/people/henri-christian-giraud/
BTW: I see now that it is the grandson of General Giraud...
And a critique in English:
https://home.bt.com/news/on-this-day/may-30-1968-charles-de-gaulle-calls-frances-bluff-to-end-a-month-of-civic-strife-11363983846813
And the author:
Andy Jackson answered BT's call after stints with the Guardian, Sky and PA. Whilst not quite your grizzled hack, Andy clearly recalls reporting on a world where capitalism worked, notebooks were made of paper and tweets were the reserve of birds.

My preliminary conclusion after what I read: that it was a trick of de Gaulle to be absent for some hours and that he went to Baden Baden to start a movement to France of the French army if necessary...
After all it was the same Massu at Baden Baden of the 1958 miltary putsch...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Massu

Hi, Paul,

 I was born a few months before Suez so I obviously don't remember it.

 I've since learnt that it wasn't exactly a brilliant example of how the 'special relationship' between the US and UK worked.  (The US seemed to have equal contempt for the French.).

brenogler wrote:

Hi, Paul,

 I was born a few months before Suez so I obviously don't remember it.

 I've since learnt that it wasn't exactly a brilliant example of how the 'special relationship' between the US and UK worked.  (The US seemed to have equal contempt for the French.).

Yes brenogler, especially to France...and de Gaulle...
https://resources.saylor.org/wwwresources/archived/site/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/HIST351-10.2.1-Suez-Crisis.pdf
The source seems to be anonymous but it fits with all what I read till today...
From the article:
"Franco-American ties never recovered from the Suez crisis.[86] There were various reasons for this. "Prior to the Suez Crisis, there had already been strains in the Franco-American relationship triggered by what Paris considered U.S. betrayal of the French war effort in Indochina at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.[86] The incident demonstrated the weakness of the NATO alliance in its lack of planning and co-operation beyond the European stage. Mollet believed Eden should have delayed calling the Cabinet together until 7 November, taking the whole Canal in the meantime, and then veto with the French any UN resolution on sanctions. From the point of view of General de Gaulle, the Suez events demonstrated to France that it could not rely on its allies; the British had initiated a ceasefire in the midst of the battle without consulting the French, while the Americans had opposed Paris politically. The damage to the ties between Paris and Washington D.C. "culminated in President de Gaulle's 1966 decision to withdraw from the military integration of NATO."[87] According to the protocol of Sèvres agreements, France secretly transmitted parts of its own atomic technology to Israel, including a detonator.[88]"

PS: An Israelian soldier (I agree only one voice!) said to me recently that Israel would not exist if there wasn't the help of the US. That's perhaps true, but if they are now the biggest atomic might in the Middle-East isn't that due to the French ressentment of the time?

Kind regards, Paul.