5 January 1976

The Khmer Rouge announce that the new Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea is ratified.

Democratic Kampuchea refers to the official name of Cambodia under the leadership of the Khmer Rouge regime, which ruled the country from 1975 to 1979. The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, aimed to establish a radical communist society by transforming Cambodia into an agrarian, classless society. During this period, the Khmer Rouge implemented extreme policies that resulted in widespread atrocities and human rights abuses.

The regime forcibly evacuated urban areas, abolished private property, and targeted perceived political enemies, intellectuals, professionals, and those associated with the previous government. The Khmer Rouge’s brutal policies led to the deaths of an estimated 1.7 to 2 million people through execution, forced labor, starvation, and disease. The infamous Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in Phnom Penh, formerly a high school turned into a prison and torture center by the Khmer Rouge, stands as a haunting reminder of this dark period in Cambodian history.

The regime came to an end in 1979 when Vietnamese forces invaded Cambodia, overthrowing the Khmer Rouge and establishing the People’s Republic of Kampuchea. The atrocities committed during the Democratic Kampuchea era have had a profound and lasting impact on Cambodia’s history and society. The country has undergone significant efforts to heal and rebuild since then, including the establishment of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), a tribunal to address the crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge regime.

5 January 1919

The German Workers Party is founded. It later becomes the Nazi Party.

On 5 January 1919, the German Workers’ Party was founded in Munich in the hotel Fürstenfelder Hof by Anton Drexler, along with Dietrich Eckart, Gottfried Feder and Karl Harrer. It developed out of the Freier Arbeiterausschuss für einen guten Frieden league, a branch of which Drexler had founded in 1918. Thereafter in 1918, Harrer, convinced Drexler and several others to form the Politischer Arbeiterzirkel. The members met periodically for discussions with themes of nationalism and antisemitism. Drexler was encouraged to form the DAP in December 1918 by his mentor, Dr. Paul Tafel. Tafel was a leader of the Alldeutscher Verband, a director of the Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nürnberg and a member of the Thule Society. Drexler’s wish was for a political party which was both in touch with the masses and nationalist. With the DAP founding in January 1919, Drexler was elected chairman and Harrer was made Reich Chairman, an honorary title. On 17 May, only ten members were present at the meeting and a later meeting in August only noted 38 members attending.

After World War I ended, Adolf Hitler returned to Munich. Having no formal education or career prospects, he tried to remain in the army for as long as possible. In July 1919, he was appointed Verbindungsmann of an Aufklärungskommando of the Reichswehr to influence other soldiers and to infiltrate the DAP. While monitoring the activities of the DAP, Hitler became attracted to founder Anton Drexler’s anti-Semitic, nationalist, anti-capitalist, and anti-Marxist ideas. While attending a party meeting at the Sterneckerbräu beer hall on 12 September 1919, Hitler became involved in a heated political argument with a visitor, Professor Baumann, who questioned the soundness of Gottfried Feder’s arguments against capitalism and proposed that Bavaria should break away from Prussia and found a new South German nation with Austria. In vehemently attacking the man’s arguments, he made an impression on the other party members with his oratory skills and, according to Hitler, Baumann left the hall acknowledging unequivocal defeat. Impressed with Hitler’s oratory skills, Drexler encouraged him to join. On the orders of his army superiors, Hitler applied to join the party. Although Hitler initially wanted to form his own party, he claimed to have been convinced to join the DAP because it was small and he could eventually become its leader.

In less than a week, Hitler received a postcard stating he had officially been accepted as a member and he should come to a committee meeting to discuss it. Hitler attended the committee meeting held at the run-down Altes Rosenbad beer-house. Normally, enlisted army personnel were not allowed to join political parties. In this case, Hitler had Captain Karl Mayr’s permission to join the DAP. Further, Hitler was allowed to stay in the army and receive his weekly pay of 20 gold marks a week. At the time when Hitler joined the party, there were no membership numbers or cards. It was in January 1920 when a numeration was issued for the first time and listed in alphabetical order Hitler received the number 555. In reality, he had been the 55th member, but the counting started at the number 501 in order to make the party appear larger. In his work Mein Kampf, Hitler later claimed to be the seventh party member and he was in fact the seventh executive member of the party’s central committee. After giving his first speech for the DAP on 16 October at the Hofbräukeller, Hitler quickly became the party’s most active orator. Hitler’s considerable oratory and propaganda skills were appreciated by the party leadership as crowds began to flock to hear his speeches during 1919–1920. With the support of Drexler, Hitler became chief of propaganda for the party in early 1920. Hitler preferred that role as he saw himself as the drummer for a national cause. He saw propaganda as the way to bring nationalism to the public.

The small number of party members were quickly won over to Hitler’s political beliefs. He organized their biggest meeting yet of 2,000 people for 24 February 1920 in the Staatliches Hofbräuhaus in München. Further in an attempt to make the party more broadly appealing to larger segments of the population, the DAP was renamed the National Socialist German Workers’ Party on 24 February. Such was the significance of Hitler’s particular move in publicity that Harrer resigned from the party in disagreement. The new name was borrowed from a different Austrian party active at the time, although Hitler earlier suggested the party to be renamed the Social Revolutionary Party. It was Rudolf Jung who persuaded Hitler to adopt the NSDAP name.

5 January 1968

The “Prague Spring” begins in Czechoslovakia.

On the 5th January 1968, the Prague Spring began when Alexander Dub?ek became the new First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. The Prague Spring lasted for just over seven months before the Soviet Union, along with other members of the Warsaw Pact, invaded Czechoslovakia to bring the reforms to a halt.

Dub?ek was a committed Communist, and had been First Secretary of the regional Communist Party of Slovakia since 1963. However he struggled to work with Antonín Novotný, the President of Czechoslovakia, under whose control the country experienced a slow and uneasy move towards destalinization while suffering a huge economic downturn. Frustrated by Novotný’s failure to effectively restructure the country, Dub?ek and other reformists challenged him at a meeting of the Central Committee in October 1967. In response Novotný secretly invited the Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev to visit Czechoslovakia to secure his support. However, this plan backfired when Brezhnev learned just how unpopular Novotný was and instead lent his support to remove him from power.

Consequently Dub?ek replaced Novotný as First Secretary on the 5th January 1968, and quickly began to introduce a series of political reforms. Known as “socialism with a human face” this political programme was intended to maintain Communist control of the government while allowing mild democratisation and political liberalisation. However, as the reforms took hold the government was faced with public demands to go even further. At the same time, the USSR and other Warsaw Pact countries began pressuring Dub?ek to bring the Prague Spring under control. On the 20th August they took matters in to their own hands and invaded Czechoslovakia.

5 January 1949

President Harry S. Truman announces his Fair Deal program.

On January 05, 1949, President Harry S. Truman announces, in his State of the Union address, that every American has a right to expect from our government a fair deal.

In a reference to Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies, Truman announced his plans for domestic policy reforms including national health insurance, public housing, civil rights legislation and federal aid to education. He advocated an increase in the minimum wage, federal assistance to farmers and an extension of Social Security, as well as urging the immediate implementation of anti-discrimination policies in employment. Truman argued for an ambitious liberal agenda based on policies first articulated by his predecessor, Franklin D. Roosevelt. However, the nation’s politics had shifted rightward in the years following World War II and inflation, economic conversion from wartime to peacetime industries and growing anti-communist sentiment provided major obstacles to Truman’s plan. To a growing contingency of conservatives and Southern Democrats in Congress, the Fair Deal smacked of socialism.