Today in history

December 20

1946
Ho Chi Minh, leader of the Viet Minh, the group struggling to expel French colonial rule from Vietnam, issues the following statement: “All the Vietnamese must stand up to fight the French colonials to save the fatherland. Those who have rifles will use their rifles; those who have swords will use their swords; those who have no swords will use spades, hoes, or sticks. Everyone must endeavor to oppose the colonialists and save his country. Even if we have to endure hardship in the resistance war, with the determination to make sacrifices, victory will surely be ours.” The first Indochina War had begun.

1960
North Vietnam announced the formation of the National Front for the Liberation of the South and designed to replicate the success of the Viet Minh, the umbrella nationalist organization that successfully liberated Vietnam from French colonial rule.
Ho Chi Minh biography

1989
United States invades Panama.

1990
Kansas reservist Dr. Yolanda Huet-Vaughn refused orders to serve in the Gulf War and is later sentenced to prison. The Kansas medical board withdrew her her hospital privileges.
“The issue was not whether I belonged in the military but whether the military belonged in the Middle East waging war. I did not want to focus on the personal decision. I was trying to focus on the decision for which each and every American would have to be responsible.”
What if they gave a war and nobody came?

1999
The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that homosexual couples are entitled to the same benefits and protections as wedded couples of the opposite sex.