1946 - Political Events

Political Events

An Austrian Republic gains recognition from the Western powers January 7 with frontiers as of 1937 (Marshal Ivan Stepanovich Konev has been supreme commissar for Austria since August of last year); Albania proclaims herself a People's Republic January 11, Yugoslavia adopts a new Soviet-model constitution January 31, and Hungary proclaims herself a republic February 1. Former premier Béla Imrédy is sentenced to death by a People's Tribunal and hanged as a war criminal at his native Budapest February 28 at age 55; U.S. troops captured wartime fascist leader Ferenc Szálasi in Germany last year, and he is hanged at Budapest March 12 at age 49 (see 1947).

The United Nations General Assembly opens its first session January 10 at London with former Belgian premier Paul-Henri Spaak, 46, as president; the UN Security Council meets for the first time January 17 at London, and Norwegian socialist Trygve Lie, 49, is elected United Nations Secretary-General February 1.

United Nations
The new United Nations struggled to find peaceful solutions to the issues that continued to divide the world. (AP/Wide World Photos.)

Seattle-born labor organizer Eugene Dennis (originally Francis Xavier Waldron Jr.) becomes general secretary of the U.S. Communist Party in February, replacing Earl Browder, who has been expelled. Now 40, Dennis has led demonstrations since the late 1920s, served time in prison for inciting to riot, attended the Lenin School at Moscow, and now aligns himself with William Z. Foster in a strategy of militant radicalism that is blatantly pro-Soviet (see 1947).

Milwaukee-born diplomat George F. (Frost) Kennan Jr., 42, sends home a long telegram from Moscow February 22, beginning, "The USSR still lives in antagonistic 'capitalist encirclement' with which in the long run there can be no permanent peaceful coexistence" (see 1947).

"From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent," says former prime minister Winston Churchill March 5 in an address at Westminster College in Fulton, Mo. President Truman is in the audience that hears the British statesman declare that Moscow's totalitarian dominance has produced a decline of confidence in "the haggard world."

The United Nations Security Council meets March 25 at New York's Hunter College, the League of Nations assembly dissolves itself April 18, the UN General Assembly meets at New York October 23, selects New York as the UN site December 5, and 9 days later accepts a gift of $8.5 million from John D. Rockefeller Jr. toward purchase of property on the East River for permanent headquarters.

Britain establishes the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), an outgrowth of the Government Code and Cipher School at Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, that broke the Nazi Enigma code during the war and now employs more than 7,000 people. Its mission is to eavesdrop on telephone calls of foreign diplomats, extract information from signals intelligence, and share that intelligence with other United Kingdom security and defense agencies as cold-war tensions escalate; the GCHQ will settle at two sites on the outskirts of Cheltenham in 1952, but Parliament will not formally acknowledge its existence until 1983 (see U.S. National Security Agency, 1952).

A Soviet defector in Canada hands over documents showing that British nuclear scientist Alan Nunn May worked for Moscow while employed on the Manhattan project, passed small amounts of enriched uranium to his Soviet handler on July 9 of last year in return for $200 and a bottle of whiskey, and later provided details of the bomb America dropped a month later on Hiroshima. Now 45, May has returned to Britain, he insists that he was merely sharing scientific knowledge, but a British court sentences him to 10 years' hard labor, and he will serve 6 before being released.

Geopolitics proponent and politician Karl Haushofer commits suicide at Pähl bei Weilheim March 13 at age 76 after being investigated for alleged war crimes. His wife is of Jewish extraction and swallows poison.

Partisans capture Chetnik leader Dragoljub Mihailovich March 13, sentence him to death for alleged collaboration with the Germans, and execute him at Belgrade July 17 at age 53. Former Yugoslavian government-in-exile prime minister Slobodan Jovanovic, now 76, is condemned in absentia to 20 years' hard labor.

Italy's Victor Emmanuel III abdicates May 9 at age 76 after a 46-year reign, his son Umberto, 41, proclaims himself king, a referendum June 2 rejects the monarchy 12.7 million to 10.7 million, Umberto II joins his family at Lisbon June 3, and the nation becomes a republic headed by Premier Alcide De Gasperi of the Christian Democratic Party (see 1945; 1948). Italy loses the Dodecanese Islands to Greece and parts of her northern territory to France June 27.

A Communist People's Court tries former Romanian dictator Ion Antonescu for war crimes, finds him guilty May 17, and executes him near Jilava June 1 at age 63.

Czechoslovakia's Communist Party wins 38.7 percent of the vote in the general election May 26 (see 1945). Noncommunist parties hold a decisive majority, but communist deputy premier Klement Gottwald, 49, takes office as premier (see 1948).

Bulgaria ousts her monarchy and becomes a People's Republic September 15 following a referendum. Bulgarian communist Georgi Dimitrov returns from Moscow November 21 to become premier (see Reichstag fire, 1933).

Greece's George II returns to Athens September 28 following a plebiscite favoring retention of the monarchy (see 1945), but the communists have gone underground and resumed full-scale guerrilla war, creating a situation that the British are unable to control (see 1949; Truman Doctrine, 1947).

The Nuremberg Tribunal returns verdicts September 30 (see 1945). It sentences Rudolf Hess, now 52, and Reichsbank president Walther Funk, 56, to life imprisonment (Hess will be the only inmate of Spandau Prison until his death); Franz von Papen, now 67, and Hjalmar Schacht, now 69, are acquitted, but a Bavarian de-Nazification court will impose an 8-year sentence on von Papen, who was expelled from the United States during the war on charges of espionage, and he will serve 2. Hitler Youth founder Baldur von Schirach is found guilty of participating in the mass deportation of Jews and given a 20-year prison term. Gen. Erich von Manstein is found guilty of war crimes and sentenced to 18 years' imprisonment (but will released in 1953 for medical reasons). Adm. Doenitz is found guilty of crimes against peace and sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment. Twelve leading Nazis are judged guilty of war crimes and sentenced to death, including Hermann Goering, who was Hitler's designated successor but cheats the gallows October 15 at age 53 by taking poison. Those hanged October 16 include former German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, 53; field marshal Wilhelm Keitel, 64; former German general Alfred Jodl, 56; Nazi ideologist Alfred Rosenberg, 53; anti-Semitic demagogue Julius Streicher, 61; and former Austrian Nazi leader Arthur Seyss-Inquart, 54, who served as German high commissioner of the Netherlands. Aircraft designer Ernst Heinkel has been arrested as a war criminal and charged with using slave labor in his factories, but the charges will eventually be reduced to "Nazi follower," and he will escape with a fine of 2,000 marks. Former Weimar Republic defense minister Gustav Noske dies at Hanover November 30 at age 78, having taken part in the unsuccessful coup against Hitler in July 1944 but escaped punishment.

Finland's president Marshal Mannerheim resigns for reasons of health in March (see 1944); Prime Minister Paasikivi, now 75, is elected president (see 1956).

British and French forces begin evacuating Lebanon March 10 (see 1943). The country gains full independence after 26 years of French colonial rule.

Transjordanian independence gains British recognition March 22. Transjordan proclaims herself a kingdom May 25, Emir Abdullah will rule until 1951 as King Abdullah (see 1949), but Moscow vetoes Jordanian admission to the United Nations.

Moscow agrees to withdraw troops from Iran April 25 on the promise of reforms in Azerbaijan; Soviet troops leave May 9 following protests by London, Washington, and Teheran.

The Irgun Tzvai Leumi led by Menachem Begin bombs Jerusalem's King David Hotel July 22, killing 91 in a protest against British rule in Palestine (see 1945; 1947).

Turkey rejects demands August 22 that Soviet military and naval forces be given rights to protect the entrance to the Black Sea.

Gen. MacArthur announces the establishment January 19 of an International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMTFF) with a prosecution team containing justices from Australia, Britain, Canada, China, France, India, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the Philippines, and the Soviet Union as well as the United States. The IMTFE begins trying war criminals May 3 at Tokyo; 1,128 officials have been imprisoned awaiting trials on charges of war crimes, some 210,000 others having simply been barred from holding public office. Of the 80 alleged war criminals held at the Sugamo prison since last year, 28 men (including nine civilians) will have their cases heard by the IMTFE, whose sessions will continue until November 12, 1948 (see 1948).

U.S. occupation authorities bar former Japanese minister of education Ichiro Hatoyama, 63, from holding any political office. A political opponent of Hideki Tojo 4 years ago, he spent most of the years from 1937 to 1945 in retirement at his country house and was about to take office as prime minister, but although he has become leader of the Liberal Party his association with the prewar government has raised suspicions about him and he will not be seated in the Diet until April 1952.

Gen. MacArthur resists suggestions that he encourage the emperor Hirohito's abdication as an acknowledgment of responsibility for the war; he resolves to protect the emperor as a way to maintain an orderly government, and in February he rejects a proposed constitution, calling it a rewording of the old Meiji constitution. He quickly has young lawyers on his staff draw up a progressive new constitution that establishes a bicameral legislature with a weak upper chamber; it has 39 articles dealing with what MacArthur calls "basic human liberties" (e.g. most of the U.S. Constitution's Bill of Rights, universal adult suffrage, marriage and property rights for women, labor's right to organize) and cannot be revised except by national referendum.

Former Japanese foreign minister Shigeru Yoshida, 67, becomes prime minister May 22; arrested in June of last year for trying to force an early surrender and not freed until September, he will remain in office with only brief intervals until 1954, forming five different cabinets. Former foreign minister Yusuke Matsuoka dies at Tokyo June 26 at age 65 while awaiting trial on war-crimes charges.

The new Japanese constitution promulgated in October has received imperial endorsement, and candidates who back it receive overwhelming approval in the fall elections. Read to the Diet by Emperor Hirohito November 3, it vests sovereignty not with the emperor (who is retained as symbolic leader) but with the people of Japan, who obtain a democratic government after centuries of absolutist rule (see 1889). The constitution's Article 9 states that Japan will "forever renounce war" and never maintain armed forces, but Japan's "Self-Defense Forces" will grow to become one of the world's largest militaries.

Singapore becomes a British crown colony April 1 with Sir Franklin Charles Gimson, 55, as governor (see 1945). The outpost of empire has been under military rule since September of last year (see 1959).

Paris recognizes Vietnamese independence within the French Union March 6, but hostilities with native communists continue as Viet Minh leader Ho Chi Minh tries to drive out the French and unite Indochina (see 1945). The French retaliate by proclaiming an autonomous Republic of Cochin China at Saigon June 1; nationalists found the Khmer Issarak (Independent Cambodians) to fight the French, but it quickly breaks into factions (see independence, 1953). Vietnam's newly created president Nguyen Van Thinh commits suicide at Saigon November 10; French naval vessels bombard Haiphong November 23, killing 6,000 civilians, the puppet Vietnamese emperor Bao Dai flees to Hong Kong, and Ho Chi Minh tries to overwhelm French troops at Hanoi in December, beginning an 8-year struggle (see 1949).

The Philippines gain independence from the United States July 4 under provisions of the 1934 Tydings-McDuffie Act. Former president José Laurel is charged with 132 counts of treason but will never be brought to trial; Manuel Roxas (y Acuna), now 54, was a member of the convention that drew up the constitution that was approved in 1935, he acquired supplies of rice for the Japanese Army while serving in the wartime government of José Laurel, and although a court was established to try collaborators he was defended by Gen. MacArthur (see amnesty, 1948). Nominated by the Nacionalista (later Liberal) Party, he is elected president of the Commonwealth and tries to subdue the communist-led Huks (Hukbalahaps) peasant party, which has appropriated most of the large estates in central Luzon, murdered rich Filipinos who collaborated with the Japanese, and set up a regional government that collects taxes and administers its own laws (see 1942). Huk leader Luis Taruc has been elected to the Philippine House of Representatives but has been charged by the Commission of Elections with using terrorism to gain votes and has been denied his seat. Roxas will succeed in obtaining reconstruction funds from Washington but at the cost of granting the United States 99-year leases on 23 military bases, accepting trade restrictions on Philippine citizens, and granting special privileges to U.S. property owners and investors (see 1948).

Chinese Nationalists release communist leader Ye Ting after 5 years' imprisonment, but he is killed in an airplane accident in Shanxi (Shansi) Province April 8 at age 48. China's civil war resumes April 14 after a truce of more than 3 months negotiated by Gen. George C. Marshall. The Nationalist government returns from Chongqing (Chungking) to Nanjing (Nanking) May 1, another truce stops hostilities for 6 weeks beginning May 12, Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung) broadcasts a radio message in August ordering all-out war against the Nationalists, and the Guomindang (Kuomintang, or KMT) reelects Chiang Kai-shek president October 10. Gen. Joseph W. "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell dies at the Presidio in San Francisco October 12 at age 63. A Sino-American treaty of friendship, commerce, and navigation is signed November 4, a national assembly meets November 15 without communist representation, and the Chinese adopt a new constitution December 25, but Mao Zedong has 1 million men in uniform plus 2 million guerrillas and dismisses threats to his communist insurgency as a "paper tiger."

Siamese (Thai) political leader Pridi Phanomyong becomes prime minister in March after the nation's first popular election. Now 45, he has served as regent for the boy king Ananda Mahidol (Rama VIII), who returns home from Europe to assume his constitutional duties but is found dead of a gunshot wound in his bed at Bangkok June 9 at age 21 after an 11-year reign (see 1950). The king's Massachusetts-born brother Bhumibol Aduldyedj, now 18, will return from school in Switzerland, marry Princess Sirikit Kityakara in April 1950, and be crowned May 5, 1950, but the circumstances of Rama VIII's death will remain a mystery, undermining constitutional government and helping to return the country to military rule. Premier Phanomyong resigns under pressure in August, having come under suspicion because of his reputed republican sympathies of involvement in the king's death. The Siamese accept a UN verdict October 13 that they restore to French Indochina the provinces acquired in 1941 as allies of Japan (see 1947; Thailand, 1949).

U.S. military authorities conduct the first Bikini Atoll atomic bomb tests in the Pacific July 1.

Mathematician John von Neumann and physicist Klaus Fuchs apply for a U.S. patent on a nuclear fusion (hydrogen) bomb (see 1944). Now 35, Fuchs worked on the Manhattan Project at Alamagordo, N.M., along with physicist Edward Teller and Polish-born mathematician Stanislaw Marcin Ulam, now 37, whose Teller-Ulam solution makes the hydrogen bomb possible (see Eniwetok, 1952; Fuchs, 1950).

Sarawak's rajah Sir Charles Vyner de Windt Brooke cedes his realm to the British crown July 1 (see 1941). Now 71, the country's last "white rajah" has reigned since 1917 (he proclaimed a constitution in September 1941 designed to establish self-government, but the Japanese took over Sarawak soon afterward).

Indonesian authorities suppress a left-wing revolt begun July 3 by followers of Ibrahim Datuk Tan Malaka who oppose negotiating with the Dutch; a communist revolt (the Madiun Affair) begins in September, but the Cheribon (Linggadjati) Agreement initialed by Dutch and Indonesian diplomats November 15 follows conclusion of a truce in the fighting between Indonesians and Dutch and British forces (see 1945). Prime Minister Sutan Sjahrir has arranged a meeting on Linggadjati Hill near Cheribon in western Java at which he persuades the Dutch to recognize the Indonesian Republic (Java, Sumatra, Madura) and agree to the establishment of the United States of Indonesia to be joined in equal partnership with the Netherlands under the Dutch crown. Only about half of the 13,667 islands in the sprawling equatorial archipelago are inhabited, and the new nation will include also the Celebes, the Sunda Islands, the Moluccas, and part of Borneo; the last British troops leave November 29, but Dutch troops remain (see 1947).

Former presidential "brain trust" member Harry L. Hopkins dies at New York January 29 at age 55; Supreme Court Chief Justice Harlan F. Stone at Washington, D.C., April 23 at age 73 after 5 years as head of the Court (he is succeeded June 24 by Kentucky-born secretary of the treasury Fred M. [Frederick Moore] Vinson, 56, who will preside until his own death in 1953); Sen. Carter Glass dies at Washington, D.C., May 28 at age 88; former mayor James J. "Jimmy" Walker at his native New York November 18 at age 65.

Republicans score large gains in the November congressional elections as labor unions, liberals, and other traditional supporters of the Democratic Party stay away from the polls in response to President Truman's anti-labor policies. The G.O.P. uses the slogans, "Had enough?" and "To err is Truman" to sweep its candidates into office as the president's popularity plummets.

Former Georgia governor Eugene Talmadge wins election to a 4-year term but dies of cirrhosis of the liver and hemolytic jaundice at Atlanta December 21 at age 62 before he can be sworn in (see 1932). Popular with rural voters, he has boasted that he never carried a county with a streetcar line. Gov. Ellis G. Arnall was elected in 1942 with support from the late President Roosevelt and has fought graft and corruption in a state dominated by special interests such as highway cartels and railroads; having abolished Georgia's notorious chain-gang system, increased the black voter franchise in the face of strident opposition, and made Georgia the first state to let 18-year-olds vote, he refuses to give up his position, and when he is locked out of the governor's office at Atlanta he takes over the information booth at the capital gates, running his administration from the kiosk (see 1947).

Former Argentine labor minister Col. Juan Perón wins election as president February 24 at age 50 with help from his wife, Evita, and begins a rule that will continue until 1955 (see 1943). Now 50, he defeats Jose Tamborini in a closely fought race, having gained the support of the "shirtless ones." Eva Duarte de Perón (née Maria Eva Ibaguren), now 26, met Col. Perón when she was 15 and trying to be a singer and actress; when he was arrested 2 years ago she went on the radio to plead with the people that they rally and free him; he married her that December, and she has gained widespread popularity (see human rights, 1947).

Former Guatemalan dictator Jorge Ubico dies at New Orleans June 14 at age 67.

Mexico elects her first civilian president July 7. PRI candidate Miguel Alemán Valdés, 43, managed the campaign of President Camacho 6 years ago and easily defeats his opponent, Ezequiel Padilla; he appoints a cabinet of economic experts and begins a program of industrialization, electrification, irrigation, and improvement of transportation. Alemán will have closer U.S. ties than his predecessors.

Haitian students and workers stage violent demonstrations and strikes to protest the policies of President Elie Lescot, who took office 5 years ago. Three military officers seize power and supervise elections that result in victory for politician Dumarsais Estimé, who will serve until 1950.

France gives her French Caribbean island of Martinique the status of a département, making it equal to any state in France proper. The island's colonial rulers were loyal to the Vichy government from 1940 to 1943 before switching allegiance to the cause of the Free French (see 1974).

Gen. Sir Harold R. L. G. Alexander, 1st Earl Alexander of Tunis, is appointed governor general of Canada, a position he will hold until 1952.

The Algerian Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Liberties (Mouvement pour le Triomphe des Libertés Démocratiques) emerges under the leadership of revolutionary nationalist leader Ahmed Messali Hadj, now 48, whose Algerian Popular Party (Parti Populaire Algérien) has been suppressed by French authorities (see 1929; 1954).