1979
Khomeini returns to Iran
After fourteen years in exile, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini landed in Tehran from Paris to a crowd estimated at several million. The Shah had fled ten days earlier. Within weeks Iran was an Islamic republic. The first major theocratic revolution of the modern era had happened in a country everyone had assumed was on a Western trajectory.
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
Soviet airborne troops landed in Kabul on Christmas Day, killed the Afghan president, and installed a pliant client regime. Moscow expected a short intervention to stabilize its southern border. Instead it got a ten-year counterinsurgency against CIA-armed mujahideen in mountain caves. Fifteen thousand Soviet soldiers died, and the USSR's confidence, and eventually its treasury, cracked under the strain.
Thatcher becomes PM
Margaret Thatcher, the grocer's daughter from Grantham, walked into 10 Downing Street as Britain's first woman prime minister, quoting Saint Francis about harmony. Within months she was at war with her own cabinet, the unions, inflation, and the postwar consensus. She would remake Britain and, with Reagan, much of the world.
Three Mile Island
At a Pennsylvania nuclear power plant, a combination of equipment failure and operator error led to a partial meltdown of Reactor Two. The accident was contained but the release of radiation and the confusing press conferences destroyed American public confidence in nuclear energy. No new US reactor construction would begin for thirty years.
US embassy hostages taken in Tehran
Iranian students scaled the walls of the US embassy in Tehran and took fifty-two American diplomats hostage. They would hold them for four hundred and forty-four days, releasing them on the hour Ronald Reagan was inaugurated. Jimmy Carter's presidency foundered on the crisis. American relations with Iran have not recovered since.
Sandinistas take Managua
After years of guerrilla war in the mountains and barrios, the Sandinista National Liberation Front marched into the Nicaraguan capital as the Somoza dynasty fled to Miami with the national treasury. A new leftist government took power and promptly became a Cold War flashpoint. Reagan's CIA would spend the 1980s arming Contra rebels against it from Honduras.
Grand Mosque seized in Mecca
Hundreds of armed Saudi militants led by Juhayman al-Otaybi seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca, declaring his brother-in-law the Mahdi. Saudi forces, after two weeks of bloody siege, retook the holy site with help from French commandos. The event pushed the Saudi royal family toward a more conservative religious posture that would reshape global Islam.
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Frequently asked
What happened in the year 1979?
Saeculum lists 7 curated events from 1979. The most significant is Khomeini returns to Iran: After fourteen years in exile, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini landed in Tehran from Paris to a crowd estimated at several million.
What era was 1979 part of?
1979 falls within the Modern Era (1901-2000). World wars, cold war, and the splitting of the atom.
Which regions saw notable events in 1979?
The curated events from 1979 span Middle East, Central Asia, Europe and North America.