military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker) (06/02/90)
Monday, 27 May, 1940 A U-boat sinks the Argentine SS Uruguay off Cape Finisterre. Argentina files a protest, and then bans its merchant ships from entering European waters. Near the town of La Paradis in the Pas-de-Calais, a unit of the 3rd SS "Totenkopf" motorized division massacres 90 British prisoners. King Leopold dispatches an envoy to the German forces with an offer of capitulation; he is told that only unconditional surrender is acceptable. President Roosevelt attempts to keep Italy out of the war by offering to mediate discussions between Italy, France, and Britain. Edwin McMillan and Philip Abelson mail their paper reporting the first production of an artificial element heavier than uranium, "Radioactive element 93," to the /Physical Review/. The substance (later named neptunium) is of no military importance but its production lays the groundwork for the creation of plutonium. The significance of the McMillan-Abelson paper is well-recognized in England, and its open publication sparks an official protest from the British Embassy. (1) Reporter: Mark Jackson (MJackson.Wbst@Xerox.COM) Reference: (1) Richard Rhodes, /The Making Of The Atomic Bomb/ -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- Bill Thacker military@cbnews.att.com Send submissions for "50 Years Ago" to military-request@att.att.com "Unless we regain in this democracy the conviction that there are final things for which democracy will fight - unless we recover faith in the expression of these things in words - we can leave our planes unbuilt and our battleships on paper, for we shall not need them." - Archibald MacLeish, in a speech before the Adult Education Association, calling for an end to anti-war writings.