What happened in 1971

World13

• Feb 4The Nasdaq stock exchange is founded in New York City.
• Feb 11The US, UK, USSR and others sign the Seabed Treaty, outlawing nuclear weapons on the ocean floor.
• Feb 25A partial solar eclipse is visible from Europe, Africa and Asia, and is the 18th solar eclipse of Solar Saros 149.
• May 9Mariner 8 fails to launch.
• May 30Mariner program: Mariner 9 is launched toward Mars.
• Jun 17Representatives of Japan and the United States sign the Okinawa Reversion Agreement, whereby the U.S. will return control of Okinawa.
• Jul 22A partial solar eclipse is visible from Asia and North America, and is the 70th and final solar eclipse of Solar Saros 116.
• Aug 5The South Pacific Forum (SPF) is established.
• Aug 20A partial solar eclipse is visible from Southern Ocean, and is the 4th solar eclipse of Solar Saros 154.
• Nov 13Mariner program: Mariner 9 becomes the first spacecraft to enter Mars orbit successfully.
• Nov 15International Organization and System of Space Communications (Intersputnik) is founded (effective July 12, 1972).
• Dec 3The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 begins with Operation Chengiz Khan as Pakistan launches preemptive attacks on nine Indian airbases. The next day India launches a massive invasion of East Pakistan.
• Dec 24Juliane Koepcke survives a fall of 10,000 feet following disintegration of LANSA Flight 508.

Japan1

• Jul 30In Japan, an All Nippon Airways Boeing 727 collides with a Japanese fighter jet; 162 people are killed.

North America29

• Jan 31Apollo program: Apollo 14 (carrying astronauts Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, and Edgar Mitchell) lifts off on the third successful lunar landing mission.
• Feb 5Apollo 14 lands on the Moon.
• Feb 9Apollo program: Apollo 14 returns to Earth after the third human Moon landing.
• Mar 30Starbucks coffee shop is founded in the U.S. state of Washington.
• May 1Amtrak begins intercity rail passenger service in the United States.
• May 5FedEx, the logistics and delivery service, founded in Little Rock, Arkansas, United States.
• Jun 10Amtrak had its first fatal accident when 11 people were killed and 163 injured in the derailment of the City of New Orleans train near Tonti, Illinois.
• Jul 3Jim Morrison, lead singer of The Doors, dies of a heart failure at the age of 27 in the bathtub of his apartment on the 3rd floor of the Rue Beautreillis 17 in Paris, France.
• Jul 4Michael S. Hart posts the first e-book, a copy of the United States Declaration of Independence, on the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign's mainframe computer, the origin of Project Gutenberg.
• Jul 26Apollo 15 (carrying astronauts David Scott, Alfred Worden and James Irwin) is launched.
• Jul 31Apollo 15 astronauts David Scott and James Irwin become the first to ride in the Lunar Roving Vehicle, a day after landing on the Moon.
• Aug 7Apollo 15 returns to Earth.
• Aug 14The controversial Stanford prison experiment, led by Stanford University psychology professor Philip Zimbardo, began in Palo Alto, California
• AugNixon shockOn August 15, U.S. President Nixon announced that the dollar could no longer be exchanged for gold. Fixed exchange rates could not last, and in 1973 the major countries moved to floating rates. The era of 360 yen to the dollar was over.
• NovThe world's first microprocessorIntel's 4004. It was ordered for calculators by the Japanese company Busicom, and Busicom's Shima Masatoshi took part in its design. It put a computing brain on a single small chip.

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Europe16

• Jan 21971 Ibrox disaster: During a crush at a football match, 66 people are killed and over 200 injured in Glasgow, Scotland.
• Feb 15Decimal Day: The United Kingdom and Ireland both switch to decimal currency (see also decimalisation).
• Feb 21The Convention on Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
• Mar 5In Belfast, a Led Zeppelin show includes the first public performance of "Stairway to Heaven," a song from the band's fourth album.
• Apr 23The Rolling Stones release their ninth studio album Sticky Fingers.
• May 23Aviogenex Flight 130 crashes at Rijeka Airport, Yugoslavia, killing 78 people, mostly British tourists.
• Aug 9Internment in Northern Ireland: British security forces arrest hundreds of nationalists and detain them without trial in Long Kesh prison; 20 people die in the riots that follow.
• Aug 15Jackie Stewart becomes Formula One World Drivers' Champion in the Tyrrell 003-Cosworth.
• Sep 4The Free State of Christiania is founded.
• Oct 4Pink Floyd record their groundbreaking film, Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii at the Amphitheatre of Pompeii.
• Oct 14Greenpeace is founded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
• Oct 28The United Kingdom becomes the sixth nation successfully to launch a satellite into orbit using its own launch vehicle, the Prospero (X-3) experimental communications satellite, using a Black Arrow carrier rocket from Woomera, South Australia.
• Oct 30Rev. Ian Paisley founds the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland.
• Dec 4The McGurk's Bar bombing by the Ulster Volunteer Force in Belfast kills 15.
• Dec 20Two groups of French doctors involved in humanitarian aid merge to form Médecins Sans Frontières.

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USSR / Russia6

• Apr 19The Soviet Union launches Salyut 1.
• Apr 24Soyuz 10 fails to dock with Salyut 1.
• May 19Mars probe program: Mars 2 is launched by the Soviet Union.
• Jun 6Soyuz program: Soyuz 11 (Vladislav Volkov, Georgi Dobrovolski, Viktor Patsayev) is launched.
• Jun 30After a successful mission aboard Salyut 1, the world's first human-occupied space station, the crew of the Soyuz 11 spacecraft die after their air supply leaks out through a faulty valve.
• Dec 2The Soviet Mars 3 lander reaches the surface of Mars, transmits for a few seconds and then goes silent. It is the first spacecraft to reach the planet.

Asia18

• Jan 25Himachal Pradesh becomes the 18th Indian state.
• Feb 23Operation Lam Son 719: South Vietnamese General Do Cao Tri is killed in a helicopter crash en route to taking control of the faltering campaign.
• Mar 7Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, political leader of East Pakistan (modern day-Bangladesh), delivers a public speech at the Racecourse Field in Dhaka calling for masses to be prepared to fight for national independence.
• Mar 25Bangladesh Liberation War: The Pakistani army starts Operation Searchlight in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) at midnight after President Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan, a military ruler, voids election results that gave the Awami League an overwhelming majority in the parliament; start of the 1971 Bangladesh genocide. That ended the non-cooperation movement.
• Apr 5In Ceylon, a group calling themselves the People's Liberation Front begins a rebellion against the Bandaranaike government.
• Apr 17The People's Republic of Bangladesh forms under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman at Mujibnagor.
• Apr 19The government of Bangladesh flees to India.
• May 1The Ceylonese government promises amnesty for guerillas who surrender before May 5.
• May 2In Ceylon, left-wing guerillas launch a series of assaults against public buildings.
• May 6The government of Ceylon begins a major offensive against the People's Liberation Front.
• May 31The birth of Bangladesh is declared by the government in exile in territory formerly part of Pakistan.
• Aug 25Bangladesh and eastern Bengal are flooded; thousands flee the area.
• Oct 25The United Nations General Assembly admits the People's Republic of China and expels the Republic of China (or Taiwan).
• Dec 2Six of the seven Trucial States combine in an act of union to found the United Arab Emirates.
• Dec 16Victory Day of Bangladesh: The Pakistan Army in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) surrenders to the joint forces of India and the Bengali nationalist separatists, ending the Bangladesh Liberation War.

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Middle East6

• May 22An earthquake lasting 20 seconds destroys most of Bingöl, Turkey; more than 1,000 are killed and 10,000 are made homeless.
• Aug 14Bahrain declares independence as the State of Bahrain ( officially the Kingdom of Bahrain).
• Sep 3Qatar gains independence from the United Kingdom. Unlike most nearby emirates, Qatar declines to become part of either the United Arab Emirates or Saudi Arabia.
• Oct 14The largest state banquet in history is held at the ancient city of Persepolis in Iran, marking the symbolic Celebration of the 2,500th Anniversary of the Founding of the Persian Empire.
• Nov 18Oman gains independence from the United Kingdom.
• Nov 30Iranian forces occupy the Persian Gulf islands of Abu Musa (joint occupation by agreement with Sharjah) and the Greater and Lesser Tunbs (taken by force from Ras Al Khaimah).

Latin America1

• Jun 10Corpus Thursday: A student rally on the streets of Mexico City is roughly dispersed.

Africa6

• Jan 24The Guinean government sentences to death 92 Guineans who helped Portuguese troops in the failed landing attempts in November 1970; 72 are sentenced to hard labor for life; 58 of the sentenced are hanged the next day.
• Jan 25In Uganda, Idi Amin deposes Milton Obote in a coup, and becomes president.
• Apr 19Sierra Leone becomes a republic.
• Apr 21Siaka Stevens is sworn in as the first president of Sierra Leone.
• Jul 10Coup attempt in Morocco: 1,400 cadets take over the king's palace for three hours and kill 28 people; 158 rebels die when the king's troops storm the palace (ten high-ranking officers are later executed for involvement).
• Oct 27The Democratic Republic of the Congo is renamed Zaire.