In Super Bowl XVII, the Washington Redskins won 27–17 over the Miami Dolphins with the Redskins RB John Riggins, the MVP, setting a Super Bowl record for rushing. Tony Dorsett set the NFL record for longest run from scrimmage by rushing for a 99-yard touchdown. Paul “Bear” Bryant, noted Alabama football coach, died at the age of 70. The Penn State Nittany Lions won 27-23 over the Georgia Bulldogs to win the college football national championship in the Sugar Bowl. The Michigan Panthers won the new United States Football League Championship, 24-22, over the Philadelphia Stars. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) restored medals to the family of Jim Thorpe. Ireland’s Eamonn Coghlan set a new World Indoor Record for the mile, clocking 3:49.78 at East Rutherford, NJ. Brooks Robinson and Juan Marichal were elected to the MLB Hall of Fame. The Baltimore Orioles won the World Series 4 games to 1 over the Philadelphia Phillies, as Orioles catcher Rik Dempsey was named MVP. North Carolina State, coached by Jim Valvano, beat Houston, coached by Guy Lewis, 54-52, ending with a buzzer-beating dunk by Lorenzo Charles off a desperation shot from 30 feet out by Dereck Whittenburg. I remember Jim Valvano running all over the court after this win. In the NBA Finals, Billy Cunningham’s Philadelphia 76ers won 4 games to 0 over Pat Riley’s Los Angeles Lakers. The 76’s Hall of Fame four players, Maurice Cheeks, Julius Erving, Bobby Jones, and Moses Malone, the MVP, beat the Laker’s five HOF’s Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Michael Cooper, Magic Johnson, Bob McAdoo, and Jamaal Wilkes. For the first time ever, two world Heavyweight champions defended their titles the same night, at the same place. Larry Holmes retained the WBC title defeating future two-time world champion Tim Witherspoon, and Michael Dokes retained his WBA title with a 15-round draw (tie) against former world champion Mike Weaver. Roberto Durán won his third world title, while Marvin Hagler retained his unified world Middleweight title with a 15-round unanimous decision over Roberto Durán. In World Figure Skating Championships, USA’s Scott Hamilton and Rosalynn Sumners won, as did Jayne Torvill & Christopher Dean of Great Britain in the Ice dancing championships. The grand slam of golf was split four ways with Seve Ballesteros, Larry Nelson, Tom Watson, and Hal Sutton, with Sutton the PGA Tour money leader with $426,668. The Senior PGA Tour money leader was Don January with $237,571, while JoAnne Carner was the woman’s leaders with $291,404. There was no triple crown winner in horse racing as three different horses all won one leg. Wayne Gretzky of the Edmonton Oilers was the NHL’s leading scorer and MVP, but lost the Stanley Cup to the New York Islanders, 4-0. There was no grand slam in tennis because four players each picked up a leg, Mats Wilander, Yannick Noah, John McEnroe, and Jimmy Connors. Among the women, Martina Navratilova won three legs, but Chris Evert won the French Open. Australia II, of the Royal Perth Yacht Club, won America’s Cup over Liberty, from the New York Yacht Club, 4 races to 3, breaking a 132-year winning streak by the NYYC, the longest-running unbeaten streak in all of sports. British entrepreneur Richard Noble set a new land speed record of 633.468 mph, driving Thrust2 at the Black Rock Desert, Nevada. The overall season skiing champions were Phil Mahre and Tamara McKinney, of the USA. What do you remember about sports in 1983?
Deaths in 1983
The following somewhat famous people died in 1983: Nikolai Podgorny, Soviet politician, Chairman of the Presidium of the USSR from 1965 to 1977 (1903-1983); Meyer Lansky, American gangster (1902-1983); Stuart H. Ingersoll, American admiral (1898-1983); Maurice Bishop, Prime Minister of Grenada (1944-1983); Sid Daniels, British merchant marine worker, last surviving crewmember of the RMS Titanic (1895-1983); King Leopold III of Belgium (1901-1983); Buckminster Fuller, American architect (1895-1983); Suzanne La Follette, American libertarian feminist (1893-1983); Herman Kahn, American futurist (1922-1983); Ross Macdonald, American-Canadian writer (1915-1983); Heinz Warneke, American sculptor (1895-1983); Felix Bloch, Swiss-American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (1905-1983); Jon Brower Minnich, heaviest man who ever lived at 1,400 pounds (1941-1983); Earl Tupper, American businessman who invented Tupperware (1907-1983); Jimmy Demaret, American golf champion (1910-1983); Ruben Rausing, Swedish entrepreneur, founder of Tetra Pak (1895-1983); John Robinson, Anglican bishop theologian (1919-1983); Joan Miró, Spanish painter (1893-1983); George Cukor, American film director (1899-1983); Karen Carpenter, American singer, and drummer of the Carpenters, one of my favorites (1950-1983); Eubie Blake, American musician, and songwriter (1887-1983); Tennessee Williams, American playwright (1911-1983); Sir William Walton, English composer (1902-1983); Faye Emerson, American actress who was always on game shows in the 1950s (1917-1983); Maurice Ronet, French film actor and director (1927-1983); Arthur Godfrey, American radio and television broadcaster and entertainer famous for his TV show in the 1950s (1903-1983); Gloria Swanson, glamorous American actress (1899-1983); Dolores del Río, another Mexican actress of my youth (1904-1983); Walter Slezak, Austrian-born American actor, another of my childhood actor favorites (1902-1983); Buster Crabbe, American actor, and athlete, the original Tarzan (1908-1983); George Balanchine, Russian-American dancer, and choreographer (1904-1983); Muddy Waters, American musician (1913-1983); Jack Dempsey, American heavyweight champion boxer (1895-1983); Harry James, American musician, and big band leader (1916-1983); Raymond Massey, Canadian actor (1896-1983); David Niven, British soldier, and actor (1910-1983); Lynn Fontanne, British actress (1887-1983); Judy Canova, American actress (1913-1983); Ira Gershwin, American lyricist (1896-1983); Jan Clayton, American actress and singer (1917-1983); LeRoy Prinz, American choreographer, director, and producer (1895-1983); Joan Hackett, American actress (1934-1983); Pat O’Brien, American actor, another of my childhood favorites (1899-1983); Michael Conrad, American actor (1925-1983); Robert Aldrich, American film director (1918-1983); Lucienne Boyer, French singer (1901-1983); Slim Pickens, American actor (1919-1983); William Demarest, American actor (1892-1983); Dennis Wilson, American singer, songwriter, and drummer (1944-1983); Doodles Weaver, American comedian (1911-1983); Earl “Fatha” Hines, American musician (1903-1983); and Chris Wood, British rock musician, lead singer and guitarist of the band Traffic (1944-1983). Do you know anyone who died in 1983?
Disasters in 1983
The Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria and South Australia claimed the lives of 75 people, in one of Australia’s worst bushfire disasters. Heavy rain and mudslides in western Shimane Prefecture, Japan, killed 117. Hurricane Alicia hit the Texas coast, killing 22 and causing over $3.8 billion in damage. Heavy rain triggered flooding at Bilbao, Spain, and the surrounding areas, killing 44 people, and causing millions in damages. The Alcalá 20 nightclub fire in Madrid, Spain, injured 47 and killed 83 people. Over 2,000 people, mostly Bangladeshi Muslims, were massacred in Assam, India, during the Assam agitation. The Black July anti-Tamil riots began in Sri Lanka, killing between 400 and 3,000 Sri Lankan and Hill-country Tamils. A Sea of Japan earthquake shook northern Honshu with a maximum Mercalli intensity of 8 that generated a destructive tsunami that left about 100 people dead. Off the coast of Norway, 5 divers were killed and 1 severely wounded in an explosive decompression accident at the Byford Dolphin rig diving bell accident. A North Korean Ilyushin Il-62M jet, on route to Conakry Airport in Guinea, crashed into the Fouta Djall Mountains of Guinea, killing all 23 people on board. Two Spanish passenger planes collided on the foggy runway at a Madrid airport, killing 90 people. Colombian Avianca Flight 011 crashed near Barajas Airport in Madrid, Spain, killing 181 of the 192 on board. A helicopter crashed off the Isle of Scilly, causing 20 fatalities. Korean Air Lines Flight 007 was shot down by the Soviet Union Air Force near Moneron Island, as all 269 on board were killed, including U.S. Congressman Larry McDonald. The Soviet Union admitted shooting it down, but did not know it was a civilian aircraft, since it had violated Soviet airspace. Gulf Air Flight 771 crashed in the United Arab Emirates after a bomb exploded in the baggage compartment, killing 117. 13 people were killed in an attempted robbery in the Chinatown area of Seattle, in the Wah Mee massacre. A Provisional IRA car bomb killed 6 people and injured 90 outside Harrods department store in London. The Orly Airport attack in Paris left 8 dead and 55 injured. Two bombs exploded in France, one on a Paris train that killed 3 and injured 19, while the other at a Marseilles station killed 2 and injured 34. 13 Sri Lanka Army soldiers were killed during a deadly ambush by the militant Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, thus beginning the Sri Lankan Civil War, which would continue until 2009. 5 people were killed and 18 others injured when a road train was deliberately driven into a motel at Ayers Rock in the Northern Territory of Australia. The Rangoon bombing killed South Korea’s Foreign Minister, Lee Bum Suk, and 21 others. The perpetrators were believed to be North Koreans. A car bombing in Pretoria, South Africa, killed 19 people. An explosion at an unlicensed and illegal fireworks operation near Benton, Tennessee, killed 11 people. Iranian teenager Mona Mahmudnizhad and nine other women were hanged because they were members of the Baha’i Faith. Benigno Aquino Jr., Philippines opposition leader, was assassinated in Manila just as he returned from exile. What disaster do you remember from 1983?
Great events in 1983
In 1983, Ronald Reagan became the first American president to address Japan’s national legislature, the National Diet. The first USA cruise missiles arrived at RAF Greenham Common in the UK amid protests from peace campaigners. Saint Kitts and Nevis became an independent state. The Balearic Islands and Madrid became autonomous communities of Spain. Lebanon, Israel, and the United States signed an agreement on Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon. The ninth G7 summit began at Williamsburg, Virginia. The Second Sudanese Civil War began in Sudan. Britain’s Conservative government, led by Margaret Thatcher, was re-elected by a landslide majority. Neil Kinnock was elected leader of the British Labor Party. Argentina had its first democratic elections after seven years of military rule with Raúl Alfonsín’s first term as President of Argentina. South Africa approved a new constitution granting limited political rights to Coloreds and Asians as part of a series of reforms to apartheid. The government of Poland announced the end of martial law and amnesty for political prisoners, as the Noble Peace Prize went to Poland’s Lech Wałęsa. General elections were celebrated in Venezuela, as voter turnout was 87%. The Turkish part of Cyprus declared independence. The Zapatista Army of National Liberation was founded in Mexico. There was a battle at Tripoli between Arafat loyalists and PLO dissidents. The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP was officially completed, so that this was the beginning of the true Internet. The 3D printer was invented by Chuck Hull. The world’s first commercial mobile cellular telephone call was made in Chicago at Motorola, as the first worldwide mobile telephone, the Motorola DynaTAC, entered the market. Nintendo’s Family Computer, also known as the Famicom, went on sale in Japan. The GNU Project, a collaborative effort to create free software, was started by Richard Stallman. Word processor software Multi-Tool-Word, soon to become Microsoft Word, was released in the USA. Two separate research groups led by Robert Gallo and Luc Montagnier independently declared that a novel retrovirus may have been infecting people with HIV/AIDS, and published their findings in the same issue of the journal Science. The immunosuppressant cyclosporine was approved by the FDA, leading to a revolution in the field of transplantation. The Space Shuttle Challenger was launched on its maiden voyage. Pioneer 10 passed the orbit of Neptune, becoming the first human-made object to leave the vicinity of the major planets of the Solar System. Sally Ride’s place in history was assured, when she rocketed into space on Challenger’s STS-7 mission with four male crewmates. Stern magazine published “Hitler Diaries,” which were later found to be forgeries. On July 21, 1983, the lowest temperature on earth was recorded in Vostok Station, Antarctica, with −89.2 °C or −128.6 °F. Australian Dick Smith completed his solo circumnavigation of the world in a helicopter. The mass burial of around 700,000 unsold Atari video game cartridges, consoles, and computers happened in Alamogordo, New Mexico. There was a solar eclipse on December 4, 1983. Pope John Paul II visited Rebibbia prison to forgive his would-be assassin Mehmet Ali Ağca. What do you remember about 1983?
Michael Jackson and the Moonwalk
The moonwalk, or backslide, is a popping dance move in which the performer glides backwards but their body actions suggest forward motion. It became popular around the world when Michael Jackson performed this move on May 16, 1983, as he introduced his new song “Billie Jean.” This extraordinary moment changed dance history. The King of Pop was taking part in the TV program Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever, filmed to celebrate the record label’s greatest artists. A whopping 35% of all TV owners in the United States tuned in to see Michael and other stars perform. Thus, nearly 47 million people were watching as Michael Jackson danced to his song about Billie Jean, as he performed his first moonwalk. Michael Jackson invented this robot dance in 1983. This show was produced and directed by Don Mischer, who has broadcast other historical moments including the opening ceremony for the 1996 Olympic Games and many Oscar ceremonies. He vividly remembered the arguments about whether Michael Jackson would even be allowed to perform the song on this show. This was a commemorative show. No one was supposed to perform new music, but only the music standards of the last 25 years of Motown from 1958-1983. Thus, Michael Jackson with his top hat and white socks was allowed to do his famous “moonwalk” dance that everyone wanted to imitate, that was taped on March 25, 1983, before a live audience. The moonwalk was like being towed around on ice skates. The performer moves forward without appearing to move his feet at all, by manipulating his toes and heels rapidly. You moved each foot alternately backwards like a horse pawing the ground. This moonwalk goes back to Cab Calloway and Charlie Chaplin in the 1930s, but they called it “The Buzz.” In 1943, Bill Bailey performed the first on-screen backslide in the movie The Cabin in the Sky. In 1958, on the “Pat Boone Show,” Dick Van Dyke performed a similar variation of the moonwalk and camel walk in his comedy routine called “Mailing a Letter on a Windy Corner.” The French mime artist Marcel Marceau used it throughout his career from the 1940s through the 1980s, “Walking Against the Wind.” In the late 1970s, the long-running TV dance show “Soul Train” featured a dance troupe called “The Electric Boogaloos” which routinely performed popping and locking dance moves including the moonwalk. James Brown had also used this move. However, after 1983, it was Michael Jackson’s moonwalk. Singer Bobby Brown of New Edition was the one of those who taught Jackson this moonwalk dance step. Geron Casper Canidate claimed to have a copy of the check and original contract, since he spent one week privately instructing Jackson how to perform the moonwalk. Dressed in his signature black trousers, silver socks, silver shirt, black-sequined jacket, and rhinestone glove, Jackson spun around, posed, and began moonwalking on stage in 1983. Thus, Jackson encapsulated a long tradition of African-American dance movements in that one performance. Moonwalking received widespread attention, and from then on, the moonwalk became Jackson’s signature move for his song “Billie Jean.” I liked it because it looked simple and easy to do. There was nothing complicated about the moonwalk of Michael Jackson. He made it look so smooth. Have you ever tried to do a moonwalk dance step?
I Bought a Commodore 64 computer in 1983
The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, was an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International. It is the highest-selling single computer model of all time, selling between 12.5 and 17 million units. The C64 dominated the low-end computer market for most of the of the 1980s. For a substantial period (1983–1986), the C64 had between 30% and 40% share of the US market, annually selling two million units. Part of the Commodore 64’s success was its sale in regular retail stores instead of only electronics or computer hobbyist specialty stores. It has been compared to the Ford Model T automobile for its role in bringing a new technology to middle-class households via creative and affordable mass-production. In December 1984, the C64 was the overwhelming winner in the category of home computers under $500. At the C64’s price of less than $200, there was not another system with the same features. The C64 faced a wide range of competing home computers, but with a lower price and more flexible hardware, it quickly outsold many of its competitors. At one point, the company was selling as many C64s as all computers sold by the rest of the industry combined. Aggressive pricing of the C64 was a major catalyst in the video game crash of 1983. In June 1983, the company lowered the price to $300. Some stores sold the computer for $199. I think I bought one at Wards with my 10% discount. I knew nothing about computers. I tried to read the instructions but nothing was permanent. I always had to start over again every time that I used it. After about a year, I decided that I would stick to the computers at work with their printouts. Thus, my foray into computers was a failure on my part. I was going to stick to my typewriter. At least, I had something permanent when I finished typing it. This C64 was more like a typewriter that never produced anything that I could print. Did you ever have a computer that you could not use correctly?
The death of the Bear’s George Halas (1895-1983)
Papa Bear George Halas died in 1983 at the age of 88. George Halas was the founder and owner of the NFL Chicago Bears for 63 years, 40 of those years as their head coach. He won 324 games as a coach, and 8 NFL titles. He was also lesser-known as a baseball player for the New York Yankees, where he said that Babe Ruth took his place in the outfield in 1919. The NFC Championship trophy is named after him. Halas was one of the co-founders of the NFL in 1920. After graduating from Crane High School in Chicago, he attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, playing football for coach Bob Zuppke, as well as baseball and basketball. He earned a degree in civil engineering, as he helped Illinois win the 1918 Big Ten Conference football title. In 1920, Halas represented the A. E. Staley Company of Decatur, IL, in Canton, Ohio, at the meeting which formed the National Football League. After the first game of the 1921 season, company founder and namesake Augustus E. Staley turned over control of the team to Halas so he could move the team to Chicago, where the team had attracted its biggest gates of the 1920 season. The newly minted “Chicago Staleys” set up shop at Cubs Park, soon to be known as Wrigley Field. Halas had a good relationship with Chicago Cubs owner William Wrigley Jr. and president Bill Veeck Sr, so that Halas renamed his team the “Chicago Bears.” The baseball players were called baby Cubs. Thus, his big football players must be Bears or Big Cubs. Halas was not only the team’s coach but he also played both offensive and defensive end, as well as handled ticket sales, and the business of running the club. His playing highlight occurred in a 1923 game when he stripped Jim Thorpe of the ball, recovered the fumble, and returned it 98 yards, a league record which would stand until 1972. In 1925, Halas persuaded Illinois star player the “Galloping Ghost” Red Grange to join the Bears, establishing the league’s respectability and popularity. He continued as a coach when he retired as a player. In the late 1930s, Halas, with University of Chicago coach Clark Shaughnessy, perfected the T-formation system to create a revolutionary and overwhelming style of play which drove the Bears to an astonishing 73–0 victory over the Washington Redskins in the 1940 NFL Championship Game, led by Quarterback Sid Luckman from 1939 to 1950. His six NFL Championships as a head coach is tied for the most all time with Green Bay’s Curly Lambeau and New England’s Bill Belichick. A pioneer both on and off the field, Halas made the Bears the first team to hold daily practice sessions, analyze film of opponents, place assistant coaches in the press box during games, place tarp on the field, publish a club newspaper, and have the games broadcast by radio. He also offered to share the team’s substantial TV income with teams in smaller cities, firmly believing that what was good for the league would ultimately benefit his own team. A firm disciplinarian, Halas maintained complete control of his team and did not tolerate disobedience and insubordination by players. He was a charter member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. He was recognized as one of the ten most influential people in sports in the 20th century. The Pro Football Hall of Fame is located on George Halas Drive. One of Halas’s final significant ownership acts was to hire Mike Ditka as head coach in 1982. The Bears erected a statue and marker dedicated to Halas in 2019 near the south entrance to Soldier Field. His eldest daughter, Virginia Halas McCaskey, succeeded him as majority owner in 1983, until her death in 2025. What do you know about Papa Bear Halas?
Where can I get a Cabbage Patch doll?
At the peak of their popularity, between 1983 and 1986, the Cabbage Patch dolls were highly sought-after toys at the December Christmas shopping times. Cabbage Patch riots occurred, as parents literally fought to obtain the dolls for their children. The original Cabbage Patch Kids set every toy industry sales record for three years running, and was one of the most popular lines of children’s licensed products in the 1980s. It still is one of the longest-running doll franchises in the USA. Additional Cabbage Patch products included children’s apparel, bedding, infants’ wear, record albums and board games. The Cabbage Patch Kids were a line of cloth dolls with plastic heads that was first produced by Coleco Industries in 1982, inspired by the Little People soft sculptured dolls sold by Xavier Roberts, a 21-year-old art student in North Georgia, as collectibles. The brand was renamed “Cabbage Patch Kids” by Roger L. Schlaifer, when he acquired the exclusive worldwide licensing rights in 1982. These dolls came with a birth certificate and adoption papers. Roberts got a copyright, and told potential customers his Little People were not for sale, but they could be “adopted” for prices ranging from $60 to $1,000. Thus, these “Little People” were first sold at arts and crafts shows. Then they turned Babyland General Hospital, an old medical clinic, into a toy store, in Cleveland, Georgia. Fisher-Price owned the name “Little People” so the names of these dolls was changed to “Cabbage Patch Kids.” Schlaifer and his wife wrote the Legend of the Cabbage Patch Kids. He then created Roberts as a curious, ten-year-old boy who discovered the Cabbage Patch Kids by following a Bunny Bee behind a waterfall into a magical Cabbage Patch, where he found the Cabbage Patch babies being born in a neglected garden. Originally, the Cabbage Patch Kids dolls were comparatively inexpensive, between $18 to $28. Coleco cancelled all its advertising as they tried to keep up with demand. By 1984, they shipped 3.2 million dolls, as they generated $2,000,000,000 in retail sales. This frenzy died out in 1986, as the “Fur skins Bears” arrived. Hasbro took over the rights to produce Cabbage Patch dolls in 1988 after Coleco filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. In 1994, Mattel acquired the licensing rights to the dolls from Original Appalachian Artworks. Their first Cabbage Patch dolls hit the stores in 1995. Then Toys “R” Us Kids took over. Baby Land General moved to a new facility on the outskirts of Cleveland, Georgia, in 2010, and has been voted one of the Travel Channel’s top 10 toy lands. I know that Joy got a Cabbage Patch doll sometime in the 1980s. Margaret did a great job of getting a hold of one. What do you remember about the Cabbage Patch Kids?
The American Invasion of Grenada, October 25, 1983
Most people do not remember the American invasion of the tiny island of Grenada. I remember it because there were 600 American students studying at the medical school in Grenada. I was always concerned about American students studying in other countries, since I had spent ten years in the 1960s, studying at various places in Europe. The USA and a coalition of Caribbean countries (Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines) invaded the small island nation of Grenada, 100 miles north of Venezuela, at dawn on October 25, 1983. Grenada is an island country of the West Indies in the eastern Caribbean Sea, the southernmost of the Windward Islands, directly south of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and about 100 miles north of Trinidad and the South American mainland. Grenada consists of the island of Grenada itself, two smaller islands, Carriacou and Petite Martinique, and several small islands which lie to the north of the main island and are a part of the Grenadines, only 133 square miles, with an estimated population of 114,621 in 2024. Grenada is also known as the “Island of Spice” due to its production of nutmeg and mace crops. Christopher Columbus sighted Grenada in 1498 during his third voyage to the Americas. Since 1763, Grenada was under British rule until 1974, when it became independent. The new country became a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, with Queen Elizabeth II as the head of state. In March 1979, the Marxist–Leninist New Jewel Movement overthrew Eric Gairy’s government in a bloodless coup d’état and established the People’s Revolutionary Government (PRG), headed by Maurice Bishop as prime minister. Bishop was later arrested and executed by members of the People’s Revolutionary Army (PRA), which was used to justify a USA-led invasion in October 1983. Since then, the island has returned to a parliamentary representative democracy and has remained politically stable. The American government accused Grenada of constructing facilities to aid a Soviet-Cuban military buildup in the Caribbean. Code named “Operation Urgent Fury” by the U.S. military, it resulted in military occupation within a few days, since this invasion had a mere 7,600 troops. These invaders quickly defeated the Grenadian resistance after a low-altitude assault by the Rangers and 82nd Airborne at Point Salines Airport on the island’s south end, and a Marine helicopter and amphibious landing at Pearls Airport on the north end. Following the invasion there was an interim government appointed, and then general elections were held in December, 1984. This invasion date of October 25 is now a national holiday in Grenada, called Thanksgiving Day, commemorating the freeing of several political prisoners who were subsequently elected to office. At the time, this American invasion drew criticism from many countries. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher privately disapproved of this invasion mission, in part because she was not consulted in advance and was given very short notice of the military operation, but she supported it in public. The United Nations General Assembly condemned it as a flagrant violation of international law on November 2, 1983, by a vote of 108 to 9. America never took over this island. What do you know about the American invasion of Grenada in 1983?
Bombing in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983
On April 18, 1983, there was a suicide bombing at the USA Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, that killed 63 people, 32 Lebanese, 17 Americans, and 14 visitors. An additional 120 or so people were wounded in this bombing. The victims were mostly embassy and CIA staff members, but also included several US soldiers. This attack came after the Americans had intervened in the Lebanese Civil War. This was the deadliest attack on a USA diplomatic mission up to that time. Unlike the Iran hostage taking in 1979, this attack killed people. Many consider this to be the beginning of the many Islamist attacks on USA targets. The Islamic Jihad Organization, a pro-Iranian group claimed responsibility. This Islamic group said that this was part of the Iranian Revolution’s campaign against imperialist targets throughout the world, although the official Iran government denied any role in this attack. This group said that it would continue to strike at any crusader presence in Lebanon, including international forces. The Lebanese Civil War had been going on since 1975, almost eight years, and continued another eight years, until 1990. Following this attack, the embassy was moved to a supposedly more secure location in East Beirut, but there was another car bomb explosion at this embassy annex, on September 28, 1983, killing 20 Lebanese and 2 American soldiers. Then on October 23, 1983, two truck bombs were detonated at buildings in Beirut, Lebanon, housing American and French service members of the Multinational Force in Lebanon (MNF), a military peacekeeping operation during the Lebanese Civil War. This attack killed 307 people: 241 USA military and 58 French military personnel, 6 civilians, and 2 attackers. This incident was the deadliest single-day death toll for the United States Marine Corps since the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II and the deadliest single-day death toll for the United States Armed Forces since the first day of the Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War. Another 128 Americans were wounded in the blast. 13 later died of their injuries. Minutes later, a second suicide bomber struck the nine-story Drakkar building, a few miles away, where the French contingent was stationed. 55 paratroopers from the 1st Parachute Chasseur Regiment and 3 paratroopers of the 9th Parachute Chasseur Regiment were killed and 15 injured. It was the single worst French military loss since the end of the Algerian War. A group called Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the bombings and said that their aim was to force the MNF out of Lebanon. These attacks eventually led to the withdrawal of the international peacekeeping force from Lebanon, where they had been stationed following the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) withdrawal in the aftermath of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Suicide bombings were becoming common in the Middle East. This was the start of a new kind of terrorist war. I had heard about the American University of Beirut in the 1960s when I was in Louvain, Belgium. Were you familiar with the attack on the American Embassy in Beirut and these other bombings in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983?
Gene Finnegan Remembers Living Eighty Wonderful Years 