British Empire: Twentieth Century Timeline

1900 Boer War (1899 - 1902); Rising in Asante, West Africa; Cook Islands annexed by NZ Labour Party formed Boxer Rebellion; German Naval law; Russian annexation of Manchuria Freud publishes his interpretations of Dreams; first Zeppelin built

1901 Federated Commonwealth of Australia formed; Britain gains control over Tonga's external affairs; British protectorates in Nigeria Queen Victoria dies; Edward VII becomes King Roosevelt takes over from assasinated McKinley Picasso's Blue period Invention of Vacuum cleaner

1902 Treaty of Vereeniging ends Boer War; Anglo Japanese Alliance; Ashanti territory incorporated into Gold Coast; Ibn Saud captures Riyadh Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is published

1903 Britain takes Sokoto and ends Fulani Empire; Great Coronation Durbar in Delhi; Curzon sends an expedition to Tibet Suffragettes established Panama secedes from Columbia First powered flight by the Wright brothers

1904 First Empire day celebrated Entente Cordiale with France Russon Japanese War (1904-5) Chekhov's Cherry Orchard

1905 Bengali terrorism begins; British New Guinea transferred to Australia; Alberta and Saskatchewan become Provinces in Canada Revolution in Russia; Maji Maji rebellion in German East Africa; Norway breaks from Sweden Struass' Salome Einstein's Special theory of relativity

1906 Muslim league established in India; Britain and France rule New Hebrides Reforming Liberals win election; Campbell Bannerman PM; First Dreadnought launched Cuba occupied by US; Revolution in Iran Vitamins discovered by Hopkins; first sound radio broadcasting

1907 NZ gains Dominion status; Anglo Russian entente Rudyard Kipling receives Nobel prize

1908 Universal adult suffrage in Australia Asquith PM Balkan problems; Belgium takes over Congo Free state

1909 Canberra becomes Australian capital Lloyd George's battle with House of Lords begins Franco German agreement in Morocco Ford Model 'T'

1910 Union of South Africa George V King Japan annexes Korea; Portugese revolution Palace of Knossos excavated Seaplane invented

1911 Coronation Durbar at New Delhi (New Capital) Constitutional crisis resolved Chinese revolution, Sun Yat Sen first President; President Diaz of Mexico overthrown Rutherford's Nuclear model of atom; First air mail

1912 ANC forms in South Africa Titanic sinks Wilson president of US; Balkan wars; French protectorate of Morocco; Italy conquers Libya Jung's Psychology of Unconscious Stainless steel

1913 Crisis in Ireland; Ulster volunteers formed; Land reforms in favour of whites in South Africa Turkey loses most of European lands; Coup D'etat in Turkey; Opening of Panama canal D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers

1914 Imperial troops assembled for war; Egypt becomes British Protectorate; Cyprus annexed; occupation of German West African colonies Emergency laws implemented World War I (1914-18); Panama canal opens Zip, Traffic lights and 35mm camera are all invented

1915 Gallipoli landings; Gilbert and Ellice islands annexed Zeppelin raids Japan imposes 21 demands on China Einstein's General Theory of Relativity

1916 Mesopotamia campaign; Easter rising in Dublin; Troops enter Yaounde in Cameroons; Drive Germans out of Kenya Somme; Jutland Verdun; Arab revolt against Ottomans Dada movement First Tank developed

1917 Balfour declaration promises Palestine to the Jews; Capture Baghdad Passchendale US enters war; Russian revolution Kafka's Metamorphisis; first Jazz recordings

1918 Troops take Syria and Palestine; Rhodesian native congress formed Women get the vote Armistice Holst's the planets performed

1919 Amritsar massacre in India; Arab rebellion in Egypt; IRA formed; German African colonies acquired; ANC demonstrates against pass laws Nancy Astor the first Woman MP Treaty of Versaille; League of Nations formed; Flu epidemic Rutherford splits the atom

1920 Mahatma Gandhi becomes leader of Congress; British East Africa becomes Kenya; Palestine becomes British mandate Prohibition in US (1920 - 33) Nazis formed by Hitler

1921 Irish Civil War (1921 - 24); Australia given mandate over German New Guinea Spanish war against Berbers (1921 - 26) Charlie Chaplin's The Kid Marconi makes first Radio Broadcast

1922 Transjordan and Palestine administered by Britain; Egyptian Independence BBC founded USSR formed Joyce's Ulysses; Tutankhamun's tomb opened

1923 Iraq to be administered by Britain; Rhodesian Self-government Baldwin PM; First FA Cup (won by Bolton) German Hyper inflation First 'Talkie' Movie

1924 Northern Rhodesia becomes a protectorate First Labour victory Dawes plan; Death of Lenin Insecticide developed

1925 Cyprus becomes a colony Treaty of Locarno Eisentstein's Battleship Potemkin; Mofolo's Chaka

1926 Imperial conference gives Dominion status to settler colonies General Strike T.E. Lawrence's. Seven Pillars of Wisdom First Television

1927 Stalin comes to power; Lindbergh flies Atlantic; Chiang Kai Shek establishes in Nanking

1928 Flying Doctor service in Australia Women over 21 given vote Kellogg Briand pact Ravel's Bolero; Mickey Mouse Discovery of Penicillin; Colour TV

1929 Secretary of State for Dominions instituted; Uprising of Mau in Samoa Wall Street Crash

1930 Nehru's declaration of Indian Independence; Gandhi's second disobedience campaign; First Round Table conference between Britain and Indian parties (1930 - 32) Coward's Private lives Jet engine; Pluto discovered

1931 Statute of Westminster gives Dominions control over own parliaments Great Depression; National government formed Japanese occupation of Manchuria Electron Microscope

1932 Ottawa agreement promotes Imperial trade Union of Fascists formed Saudi Arabia and Iraqi Independence London Philharmonic formed

1933 Australian Antarctic Territory established; Bodyline Cricket tour of Australia Nazis come to power in Germany Radar

1934 Purified National Party advocates Apharteid in South Africa; Suppression of Ghanese radicals (1934 - 36) Night of the Long Knives in Germany; Stalin's purges Nylon developed

1935 Government of India act allowing limited local government British Council established; Death of T.E. Lawrence Italian invasion of Ethiopia

1936 Restriction of representation of Black South Africans Abdication of Edward VIII, George VI King Spanish Civil War (1936 - 39); Reoccupation of Rhineland Dali's Premonition of Civil War; Prokoviev's Peter and the Wolf Helicopter

1937 Arab Jewish conflict in Palestine Chamberlain PM Japanese invasion of China (1937 - 45) Picasso's Guernica; Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier Photocopier

1938 IRA bombings in England Munich peace accords German Anschluss of Austria

1939 Mobilisation of Dominion and Imperial forces World War II breaks out' Nazi Soviet Pact Gone with the Wind DDT insecticide developed

1940 Blitz; Churchill PM; Evacuation of British forces from Dunkirk Fall of France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark and Norway to Germans

1941 Fall of Hong Kong; Ethiopia captured by Commonwealth troops; Atlantic Charter Invasion of USSR; Lend Lease; Pearl Harbour Wells' Citizen Kane Aerosol can

1942 Fall of Singapore, Malaya and Burma; Dieppe raid Beveridge report Midway; El Alamein Fermi builds Nuclear reactor

1943 Commonwealth troops invade Italy Battle of Kursk Aqualung by Cousteau and Gagnan

1944 Burma recaptured; Education Act D - Day

1945 Pan-African conference Atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; End of War; United Nations formed Britten's Peter Grimes

1946 Transjordan becomes independent; Sarawak ceded; North Borneo becomes a colony National Health Service started Cold War begins Sartre's Existensialism and Humanism Development of Computers

1947 Indian Independence; partition of India and Pakistan Marshall plan and Truman Doctrine First Edinburgh Festival Transistor invented

1948 Afrikaner National Party win power in South Africa; Ceylon and Burma become Independent; Communist insurgency in Malaya; Israel created Berlin airlift LP's invented

1949 Ireland leaves the Commonwealth; Newfoundland and Labrador join Canada Nato created; China becomes Communist Orwell's 1984

1950 Korean war (1950 - 53); Schumann plan First Kidney transplant

1951 Cyprus bids for Independence Churchill PM; Festival of Britain ANZUS pact in Pacific

1952 Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya (1952 - 59) Queen Elizabeth; Britain's first atomic bomb Beckett's waiting for Godot

1953 Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland Death of Stalin; McCarthy era in US; Mount Everest climbed DNA unravelled

1954 Withdrawal from Sudan; troops removed from Egypt Dien Bien Phu forces French out of Vietnam; Algerian crisis begins Fortran developed; first oral contraceptives

1955 EOKA terrorist campaign in Cyprus Eden PM Warsaw Pact signed Hovercraft

1956 Suez crisis Castro and Guevara land in Cuba; Hungarian revolt Videotape

1957 Gold Coast becomes independent Ghana; Malay states become independent Macmillan PM EEC formed Keruoac's On the road Soviet Sputnik flight

1958 West Indies Federation formed China's Great Leap Forward Presley joins the army Silicon chip

1959 Cyprus joins Commonwealth North Sea gas discovered Antarctic treaty Integrated circuits developed

1960 British Somaliland and Nigeria become Independent; end of Malayan emergency OPEC formed; Belgian Congo gains independence Lady Chatterley's lover ban removed after loss of court case Lasers developed

1961 Sierra Leone, Tanganyika and British Cameroons become independent; South Africa leaves Commonwealth; Saudis take over defence of Kuwait from Britain Berlin wall erected; Bay of pigs Britten's War requiem Yuri Gagarin becomes first man in space

1962 Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda and Western Samoa all become independent Commonwealth immigrants act Cuban missile crisis The Beatles Communications Satellites

1963 Kenya and Zanzibar become independent Profumo affair Kennedy assassination Hitchcock's The Birds Cassette tape recorder

1964 Northern Rhodesia becomes Zambia; Nyasaland becomes independent Malawi; Malta becomes independent Wilson PM Brezhnev ousts Krushchev Word Processor

1965 Southern Rhodesia declares unilateral independence (UDI) US forces to Vietnam; Indo Pakistan war Miniskirts

1966 Botswana, Lesotho and Gambia all gain independence England wins World Cup Cultural revolution in China

1967 Aden independence Six day war; Biafran war (1967 - 70) Satellite navigation

1968 Mauritius and Swaziland gain Independence Tet in Vietnam; Czechoslovakia invaded by Warpac

1969 Ulster troubles Open University Woodstock First man on the moon; Concorde

1970 Fiji and Tongan Independence Floppy disk

1971 N. Ireland Internment policy: Bahrain and Qatar become independent Decimalisation of currency

1972 Asians expelled from Uganda; Bangladesh leaves Pakistan; Detente Home video games

1973 Bahamas become Independent Britain joins European Community Oil Shock Skylab

1974 Grenada Independent; IRA bombing of mainland Three day week Watergate; Cyprus invaded by Turkey

1975 Papua New Guinea gains Independence IMF assists Britain End of Vietnam war; Khmer Rouge take over Cambodia Altair 8800 is the first personal computer

1976 Seychelles Independent Callaghan PM Death of Mao Zedong

1977 Deng Xiaoping leads China Pompidou center opens in Paris

1978 Dominica Independent Camp David Accords First test tube baby; First Apple computer

1979 Rhodesian settlement reached; Gilbert Islands becomes Independent Kiribati Thatcher PM USSR invades Afghanistan; Shah if Iran overthrown Arts Sciences

1980 New Hebrides becomes Independent Vanunu; Zimbabwean Independence Iran Iray war (1980 - 8) Golding's Rites of passage Smallpox officially eliminated

1981 Belize independent SDP formed from split in Labour Sadat assassinated in Egypt Space shuttle Columbia; first reports of AIDS

1982 Falkland war Israel invades Lebanon CD's on sale

1983 Grenada invaded by US US Cruise missiles installed Attenborough's Gandhi

1984 Brunei Independent; Hong Kong handover agreement reached Miners' strike Genetic fingerprinting

1985 Britain isolated in Commonwealth over South African sanctions Anglo-Irish agreement Live Aid Desk Top Publishing

1986 Peak Unemployment of 3.5m US bombing of Libya Chernobyl

1987 Fiji leaves Commonwealth Stock Market crisis

1988 Liberal Democrats formed Rushdie's Satanic Verses Hawking's Brief History of Time

1989 Berlin Wall crumbles; Tiananmen square

1990 South West Africa becomes Independent Namibia Poll Tax riots Nelson Mandela freed; Iraq invades Kuwait

1991 Gulf War

1992 Break up of Yugoslavia

1993 Palestinian Israeli peace accords

1994 Multi racial elections in South Africa

1995 Nigeria suspended from Commonwealth Rabin assassinated

1996 South Africa rejoins Commonwealth Rise and rise of the Internet

1997 Hong Kong handed back to Chinese Blair PM Mars landing

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1900	Boer War (1899 - 1902); Rising in Asante, West Africa; Cook Islands annexed by NZ	Labour Party formed	Boxer Rebellion; German Naval law; Russian annexation of Manchuria		Freud publishes his interpretations of Dreams; first Zeppelin built
1901	Federated Commonwealth of Australia formed; Britain gains control over Tonga's external affairs; British protectorates in Nigeria	Queen Victoria dies; Edward VII becomes King	Roosevelt takes over from assasinated McKinley	Picasso's Blue period	Invention of Vacuum cleaner
1902	Treaty of Vereeniging ends Boer War; Anglo Japanese Alliance; Ashanti territory incorporated into Gold Coast;		Ibn Saud captures Riyadh	Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is published
1903	Britain takes Sokoto and ends Fulani Empire; Great Coronation Durbar in Delhi; Curzon sends an expedition to Tibet	Suffragettes established	Panama secedes from Columbia		First powered flight by the Wright brothers
1904	First Empire day celebrated	Entente Cordiale with France	Russon Japanese War (1904-5)	Chekhov's Cherry Orchard
1905	Bengali terrorism begins; British New Guinea transferred to Australia; Alberta and Saskatchewan become Provinces in Canada		Revolution in Russia; Maji Maji rebellion in German East Africa; Norway breaks from Sweden	Struass' Salome	Einstein's Special theory of relativity
1906	Muslim league established in India; Britain and France rule New Hebrides	Reforming Liberals win election; Campbell Bannerman PM; First Dreadnought launched	Cuba occupied by US; Revolution in Iran		Vitamins discovered by Hopkins; first sound radio broadcasting
1907	NZ gains Dominion status;	Anglo Russian entente		Rudyard Kipling receives Nobel prize
1908	Universal adult suffrage in Australia	Asquith PM	Balkan problems; Belgium takes over Congo Free state
1909	Canberra becomes Australian capital	Lloyd George's battle with House of Lords begins	Franco German agreement in Morocco		Ford Model 'T'
1910	Union of South Africa	George V King	Japan annexes Korea; Portugese revolution	Palace of Knossos excavated	Seaplane invented
1911	Coronation Durbar at New Delhi (New Capital)	Constitutional crisis resolved	Chinese revolution, Sun Yat Sen first President; President Diaz of Mexico overthrown		Rutherford's Nuclear model of atom; First air mail
1912	ANC forms in South Africa	Titanic sinks	Wilson president of US; Balkan wars; French protectorate of Morocco; Italy conquers Libya	Jung's Psychology of Unconscious	Stainless steel
1913	Crisis in Ireland; Ulster volunteers formed; Land reforms in favour of whites in South Africa		Turkey loses most of European lands; Coup D'etat in Turkey; Opening of Panama canal	D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers
1914	Imperial troops assembled for war; Egypt becomes British Protectorate; Cyprus annexed; occupation of German West African colonies	Emergency laws implemented	World War I (1914-18); Panama canal opens		Zip, Traffic lights and 35mm camera are all invented
1915	Gallipoli landings; Gilbert and Ellice islands annexed	Zeppelin raids	Japan imposes 21 demands on China		Einstein's General Theory of Relativity
1916	Mesopotamia campaign; Easter rising in Dublin; Troops enter Yaounde in Cameroons; Drive Germans out of Kenya	Somme; Jutland	Verdun; Arab revolt against Ottomans	Dada movement	First Tank developed
1917	Balfour declaration promises Palestine to the Jews; Capture Baghdad	Passchendale	US enters war; Russian revolution	Kafka's Metamorphisis; first Jazz recordings
1918	Troops take Syria and Palestine; Rhodesian native congress formed	Women get the vote	Armistice	Holst's the planets performed
1919	Amritsar massacre in India; Arab rebellion in Egypt; IRA formed; German African colonies acquired; ANC demonstrates against pass laws	Nancy Astor the first Woman MP	Treaty of Versaille; League of Nations formed; Flu epidemic		Rutherford splits the atom
1920	Mahatma Gandhi becomes leader of Congress; British East Africa becomes Kenya; Palestine becomes British mandate		Prohibition in US (1920 - 33) Nazis formed by Hitler
1921	Irish Civil War (1921 - 24); Australia given mandate over German New Guinea		Spanish war against Berbers (1921 - 26)	Charlie Chaplin's The Kid	Marconi makes first Radio Broadcast
1922	Transjordan and Palestine administered by Britain; Egyptian Independence	BBC founded	USSR formed	Joyce's Ulysses; Tutankhamun's tomb opened
1923	Iraq to be administered by Britain; Rhodesian Self-government	Baldwin PM; First FA Cup (won by Bolton)	German Hyper inflation	First 'Talkie' Movie
1924	Northern Rhodesia becomes a protectorate	First Labour victory	Dawes plan; Death of Lenin		Insecticide developed
1925	Cyprus becomes a colony		Treaty of Locarno	Eisentstein's Battleship Potemkin; Mofolo's Chaka
1926	Imperial conference gives Dominion status to settler colonies	General Strike		T.E. Lawrence's. Seven Pillars of Wisdom	First Television
1927			Stalin comes to power; Lindbergh flies Atlantic; Chiang Kai Shek establishes in Nanking
1928	Flying Doctor service in Australia	Women over 21 given vote	Kellogg Briand pact	Ravel's Bolero; Mickey Mouse	Discovery of Penicillin; Colour TV
1929	Secretary of State for Dominions instituted; Uprising of Mau in Samoa		Wall Street Crash
1930	Nehru's declaration of Indian Independence; Gandhi's second disobedience campaign; First Round Table conference between Britain and Indian parties (1930 - 32)			Coward's Private lives	Jet engine; Pluto discovered
1931	Statute of Westminster gives Dominions control over own parliaments	Great Depression; National government formed	Japanese occupation of Manchuria		Electron Microscope
1932	Ottawa agreement promotes Imperial trade	Union of Fascists formed	Saudi Arabia and Iraqi Independence	London Philharmonic formed
1933	Australian Antarctic Territory established; Bodyline Cricket tour of Australia		Nazis come to power in Germany		Radar
1934	Purified National Party advocates Apharteid in South Africa; Suppression of Ghanese radicals (1934 - 36)		Night of the Long Knives in Germany; Stalin's purges		Nylon developed
1935	Government of India act allowing limited local government	British Council established; Death of T.E. Lawrence	Italian invasion of Ethiopia
1936	Restriction of representation of Black South Africans	Abdication of Edward VIII, George VI King	Spanish Civil War (1936 - 39); Reoccupation of Rhineland	Dali's Premonition of Civil War; Prokoviev's Peter and the Wolf	Helicopter
1937	Arab Jewish conflict in Palestine	Chamberlain PM	Japanese invasion of China (1937 - 45)	Picasso's Guernica; Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier	Photocopier
1938	IRA bombings in England	Munich peace accords	German Anschluss of Austria
1939	Mobilisation of Dominion and Imperial forces		World War II breaks out' Nazi Soviet Pact	Gone with the Wind	DDT insecticide developed
1940		Blitz; Churchill PM; Evacuation of British forces from Dunkirk	Fall of France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark and Norway to Germans
1941	Fall of Hong Kong; Ethiopia captured by Commonwealth troops;	Atlantic Charter	Invasion of USSR; Lend Lease; Pearl Harbour	Wells' Citizen Kane	Aerosol can
1942	Fall of Singapore, Malaya and Burma; Dieppe raid	Beveridge report	Midway; El Alamein		Fermi builds Nuclear reactor
1943	Commonwealth troops invade Italy		Battle of Kursk		Aqualung by Cousteau and Gagnan
1944	Burma recaptured;	Education Act	D - Day
1945	Pan-African conference		Atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; End of War; United Nations formed	Britten's Peter Grimes
1946	Transjordan becomes independent; Sarawak ceded; North Borneo becomes a colony	National Health Service started	Cold War begins	Sartre's Existensialism and Humanism	Development of Computers
1947	Indian Independence; partition of India and Pakistan		Marshall plan and Truman Doctrine	First Edinburgh Festival	Transistor invented
1948	Afrikaner National Party win power in South Africa; Ceylon and Burma become Independent; Communist insurgency in Malaya; Israel created		Berlin airlift		LP's invented
1949	Ireland leaves the Commonwealth; Newfoundland and Labrador join Canada		Nato created; China becomes Communist	Orwell's 1984
1950			Korean war (1950 - 53); Schumann plan		First Kidney transplant
1951	Cyprus bids for Independence	Churchill PM; Festival of Britain	ANZUS pact in Pacific
1952	Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya (1952 - 59)	Queen Elizabeth; Britain's first atomic bomb		Beckett's waiting for Godot
1953	Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland		Death of Stalin; McCarthy era in US; Mount Everest climbed		DNA unravelled
1954	Withdrawal from Sudan; troops removed from Egypt		Dien Bien Phu forces French out of Vietnam; Algerian crisis begins		Fortran developed; first oral contraceptives
1955	EOKA terrorist campaign in Cyprus	Eden PM	Warsaw Pact signed		Hovercraft
1956	Suez crisis		Castro and Guevara land in Cuba; Hungarian revolt		Videotape
1957	Gold Coast becomes independent Ghana; Malay states become independent	Macmillan PM	EEC formed	Keruoac's On the road	Soviet Sputnik flight
1958	West Indies Federation formed		China's Great Leap Forward	Presley joins the army	Silicon chip
1959	Cyprus joins Commonwealth	North Sea gas discovered	Antarctic treaty		Integrated circuits developed
1960	British Somaliland and Nigeria become Independent; end of Malayan emergency		OPEC formed; Belgian Congo gains independence	Lady Chatterley's lover ban removed after loss of court case	Lasers developed
1961	Sierra Leone, Tanganyika and British Cameroons become independent; South Africa leaves Commonwealth; Saudis take over defence of Kuwait from Britain		Berlin wall erected; Bay of pigs	Britten's War requiem	Yuri Gagarin becomes first man in space
1962	Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda and Western Samoa all become independent	Commonwealth immigrants act	Cuban missile crisis	The Beatles	Communications Satellites
1963	Kenya and Zanzibar become independent	Profumo affair	Kennedy assassination	Hitchcock's The Birds	Cassette tape recorder
1964	Northern Rhodesia becomes Zambia; Nyasaland becomes independent Malawi; Malta becomes independent	Wilson PM	Brezhnev ousts Krushchev		Word Processor
1965	Southern Rhodesia declares unilateral independence (UDI)		US forces to Vietnam; Indo Pakistan war	Miniskirts
1966	Botswana, Lesotho and Gambia all gain independence	England wins World Cup	Cultural revolution in China
1967	Aden independence		Six day war; Biafran war (1967 - 70)		Satellite navigation
1968	Mauritius and Swaziland gain Independence		Tet in Vietnam; Czechoslovakia invaded by Warpac
1969	Ulster troubles	Open University		Woodstock	First man on the moon; Concorde
1970	Fiji and Tongan Independence				Floppy disk
1971	N. Ireland Internment policy: Bahrain and Qatar become independent	Decimalisation of currency
1972	Asians expelled from Uganda;		Bangladesh leaves Pakistan; Detente		Home video games
1973	Bahamas become Independent	Britain joins European Community	Oil Shock		Skylab
1974	Grenada Independent; IRA bombing of mainland	Three day week	Watergate; Cyprus invaded by Turkey
1975	Papua New Guinea gains Independence	IMF assists Britain	End of Vietnam war; Khmer Rouge take over Cambodia		Altair 8800 is the first personal computer
1976	Seychelles Independent	Callaghan PM	Death of Mao Zedong
1977			Deng Xiaoping leads China	Pompidou center opens in Paris
1978	Dominica Independent		Camp David Accords		First test tube baby; First Apple computer
1979	Rhodesian settlement reached; Gilbert Islands becomes Independent Kiribati	Thatcher PM	USSR invades Afghanistan; Shah if Iran overthrown	Arts	Sciences
1980	New Hebrides becomes Independent Vanunu; Zimbabwean Independence		Iran Iray war (1980 - 8)	Golding's Rites of passage	Smallpox officially eliminated
1981	Belize independent	SDP formed from split in Labour	Sadat assassinated in Egypt		Space shuttle Columbia; first reports of AIDS
1982	Falkland war		Israel invades Lebanon		CD's on sale
1983	Grenada invaded by US	US Cruise missiles installed		Attenborough's Gandhi
1984	Brunei Independent; Hong Kong handover agreement reached	Miners' strike			Genetic fingerprinting
1985	Britain isolated in Commonwealth over South African sanctions	Anglo-Irish agreement		Live Aid	Desk Top Publishing
1986		Peak Unemployment of 3.5m	US bombing of Libya		Chernobyl
1987	Fiji leaves Commonwealth		Stock Market crisis
1988		Liberal Democrats formed		Rushdie's Satanic Verses	Hawking's Brief History of Time
1989			Berlin Wall crumbles; Tiananmen square
1990	South West Africa becomes Independent Namibia	Poll Tax riots	Nelson Mandela freed; Iraq invades Kuwait
1991			Gulf War
1992			Break up of Yugoslavia
1993			Palestinian Israeli peace accords
1994			Multi racial elections in South Africa
1995	Nigeria suspended from Commonwealth		Rabin assassinated
1996	South Africa rejoins Commonwealth				Rise and rise of the Internet
1997	Hong Kong handed back to Chinese	Blair PM			Mars landing