November 10

This Day in History

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Lead Story
Sesame Street debuts, 1969
American Revolution
Birth of the U.S. Marine Corps, 1775
Automotive
Mary Anderson patents windshield wiper, 1903
Civil War
Confederate prison camp commander Henry Wirz is executed, 1865
Cold War
Leonid Brezhnev dies, 1982
Crime
Judge reduces sentence in nanny murder case, 1997
Disaster
Cargo ship suddenly sinks in Lake Superior, 1975
General Interest
Hirohito crowned in Japan, 1928
Edmund Fitzgerald sinks in Lake Superior, 1975
Playwright and activist hanged in Nigeria, 1995
Hollywood
Roy Scheider, star of Jaws, is born, 1932
Literary
Slaughterhouse-Five is burned in North Dakota, 1973
Music
Future country legend Conway Twitty earns a #1 hit as a rock-and-roll idol, 1958
Old West
Osage Indians cede Missouri and Arkansas lands, 1808
Presidential
Bush addresses the United Nations regarding terrorism, 2001
Sports
Maryland gets a miracle in Miami, 1984
Vietnam War
McNamara says that U.S. has no plans to send combat troops to Vietnam, 1964
No U.S. combat fatalities reported, 1970
Khmer Rouge forces attack Phnom Penh airport, 1971
World War I
Remarque publishes All Quiet on the Western Front, 1928
World War II
Germans take Vichy France, 1942

Cold War

Nov 10, 1982:

Leonid Brezhnev dies

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After 18 years as general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, Leonid Brezhnev dies on this day. His death signaled the end of a period of Soviet history marked by both stability and stagnation.

Brezhnev came to power in 1964 when, along with Alexei Kosygin, he was successful in pushing Nikita Khrushchev out of office. For the next 18 years, he brought a degree of stability to Soviet politics unknown since the Stalinist period. However, his time in office was also marked by forceful repression of political opponents and dissidents, a massive military buildup that bankrupted the Russian economy, and a foreign policy that seemed confusing at best.

During Brezhnev's reign political repression took on more and more ominous overtones. Dissidents such as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Andrei Sakharov were harassed and sometimes sentenced to internal exile. His program to bring the Soviet military to parity with the United States drove the Russian economy to the breaking point; by the late 1970s economic growth was almost at a standstill. His foreign policy was often confusing for U.S. officials. On the one hand, he seemed to approve of the idea of "peaceful coexistence," pushed for control of nuclear weapons, and helped the United States in its negotiations with North Vietnam. On the other, he unleashed Soviet forces against Czechoslovakia in 1968, became involved with revolts in Ethiopia and Angola in the 1970s, reacted in a threatening manner during the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1973, and ordered the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. By the end of his rule, discussions about nuclear arms control had almost completely lapsed.

Upon his death in November 1982, Yuri Andropov took control of the Soviet Union.

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This Week in History, Nov 10 - Nov 16

Nov 10, 1982
Leonid Brezhnev dies
Nov 11, 1973
Soviet Union refuses to play Chile in World Cup Soccer
Nov 12, 1982
Yuri Andropov assumes power in the Soviet Union
Nov 13, 1953
Indiana Textbook Commission member charges that Robin Hood is communistic
Nov 14, 1951
United States gives military and economic aid to communist Yugoslavia
Nov 15, 1957
Nikita Khrushchev challenges United States to a missile "shooting match"
Nov 16, 1945
German scientists brought to United States to work on rocket technology

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