Today in History

The Persian Gulf War begins. The massive U.S.-led offensive against Iraq — Operation Desert Storm — ends on February 28, 1991, when President George Bush declares a cease-fire, and Iraq pledges to honor future coalition and U.N. peace terms.

The Shah leaves Iran.

The Irish Republican Army calls an end to a 25-day cease fire in Belfast.

Eighteen are arrested in Mississippi for the murder of three civil rights workers.

The Egyptian government makes Islam the state religion.

The U.S. First and Third armies link up at Houffalize, effectively ending the Battle of the Bulge.

Eisenhower assumes supreme command of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe.

Japan’s advance into Burma begins.

Hitler cancels an attack in the West due to bad weather and the capture of German attack plans in Belgium.

Franklin D. Roosevelt asks for an extension of the Social Security Act to include more women and children.

Susan Sontag, American essayist and novelist (The Style of Radical Will, Illness as a Metaphor).

Allies lift the blockade on trade with Russia.

Maxim Gorky is authorized to return to Russia after an eight year exile for political dissidence.

Ethel Merman, U.S. singer and actress, the “Queen of Broadway.”

The U.S. Senate recognizes the Anglo-German Treaty of 1899 by which the UK renounced its rights to the Samoan Islands.

General William T. Sherman begins a march through the Carolinas.

John C. Fremont, the famed “Pathfinder” of Western exploration, is appointed governor of California.

John C. Breckinridge, 14th U.S. Vice President, Confederate Secretary of War.

The Council of Virginia guarantees religious freedom.

Samuel McIntire, architect of Salem, Massachusetts.

Vittorio Alfieri, Italian tragic poet (Cleopatra, Parigi shastigliata).

Ivan IV crowns himself the new Czar of Russia in Assumption Cathedral in Moscow.