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View Historical Events by Day: What Happened on July 12 in History?

Explore the historical events that shaped our world on July 12th. From major milestones to cultural achievements, see what happened on this day in history. Dates for earlier events may be approximate.

1920 CE, July 12

The independent republic of Lithuania, successfully expels invading Soviet troops and gains full recognition as an independent country from Soviet Russia.

1943 CE, July 12

Battle of Kursk: Russia's counteroffensive stops the German advance and results in a Soviet victory. The Battle of Kursk is the single largest battle in the history of warfare. It's generally estimated that the Soviet Union suffered around 800,000 casualties, with the German forces suffering around 200,000. These casualties include killed, wounded, and missing in action. More

1957 CE, July 12

Surgeon General Leroy E. Burney announces that the official position of the U.S. Public Health Service is that there is a causal relationship between smoking and lung cancer. His warning had little effect on cigarette consumption but it did elicit the ire of the Tobacco industry. Burney was an American physician and public health official and the eighth Surgeon General of the United States from 1956 to 1961.

1957 CE, July 12

Dwight D. Eisenhower became the first US President to utilize a helicopter for official travel. Eisenhower took his first flight aboard a Bell H-13J Sioux helicopter from the White House lawn as part of a simulated nuclear alert exercise. This event marked a significant shift in presidential transportation, paving the way for the routine use of helicopters like Marine One for short-range trips. The decision to embrace this new mode of transport was driven by a desire for greater flexibility and efficiency in navigating Washington's traffic, as well as the need for rapid relocation in the event of a national emergency during the Cold War. More

1970 CE, July 12

Portuguese São Tomé and Príncipe (or Portuguese Central Africa) gains independance from Portugal. It had been a colony of the Portuguese Empire since 1470 when the Islands were discovered. São Tomé and Príncipe became a major global cocoa production area for several generations, and in the first decades of the 20th century it was frequently the world's annual number one cocoa producer.

1979 CE, July 12

Kiribati, officially the Republic of Kiribati Independence Day from the United Kingdom. Kiribati is an island country in the Micronesia subregion of Oceania in the central Pacific Ocean. Its permanent population is over 119,000 as of the 2020 census and more than half live on South Tarawa. The state comprises 32 atolls and Banaba, a remote raised coral island.

1994 CE, July 12

Germany's Constitutional Court ended the ban on sending German troops to fight outside the country which had been in effect since the end of World War II. The ruling allowed German troops to join in United Nations and NATO peace-keeping missions. On July 14, German military units marched in Bastille Day celebrations in Paris, the first appearance of German troops there since World War II.

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