1941 - President Franklin Roosevelt appointed General Douglas MacArthur as Commander of U.S. Forces in the Far East.
1945 - Britain, China, and the United States issued the Potsdam Declaration, threatening Japan with "prompt and utter destruction" if it did not surrender unconditionally to end World War II.
1952 - King Farouk abdicated the throne in Egypt and ordered his departure from the country three days after a coup led by General Naguib.
1952 - The famous First Lady of Argentina during Juan Perón's populist government, Eva Perón, died of cancer at the age of 33.
1965 - The Maldives gained independence in the Indian Ocean after 78 years as a British protectorate.
2002 - An Indonesian court sentenced former President Suharto's son, Tommy, to 15 years in prison for hiring a hitman to kill a Supreme Court judge and other crimes.
2005 - NASA successfully launched the Space Shuttle Discovery, marking the first shuttle flight since the deadly Columbia incident in 2003.
2007 - India confirmed that the latest outbreak of bird flu in poultry in the remote northeastern region was strain H5N1, the first case reported in the densely populated Asian country in a year.
2008 - At least 16 small bombs exploded in the Indian city of Ahmedabad, resulting in the deaths of at least 45 people and injuring 110, following a previous set of explosions in the country's IT center.
2016 - Hillary Clinton became the first female nominee for President of the United States.
2016 - The Solar Impulse aircraft completed its first fuel-free flight around the world.
