Phạm Ngọc Thảo (1922–1965), a major provincial leader in South Vietnam and infiltrator of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), was a communist agent of the Vietminh and later the Vietnam People's Army. As the overseer of Ngo Dinh Nhu’s Strategic Hamlet Program in the early 1960s, he deliberately forced the program forward at unsustainable speeds, constructing poorly equipped and poorly defended villages, in order to foster rural resentment against the regime of President Ngo Dinh Diem, Nhu's elder brother. Thao was posthumously promoted by the ARVN to the rank of one-star general and awarded the title of Heroic war dead (Vietnamese: Liệt sĩ). After the Fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War, the communist government awarded him the same title and paid war pensions to his family, claiming him as one of their own. (more...)

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• ... that Juan Manuel de Rosas killed 3,200 indigenous people during the First Conquest of the Desert (pictured)?
• ... that Milo Yiannopoulos arranged a moonwalking flash mob at Liverpool Street station as a tribute to Michael Jackson shortly after his death?
• ... that Ivan Strez Balšić was recognized by the Republic of Venice as Skanderbeg's successor?
• ... that Albert C. Baker was the only person to serve on both the Arizona Territorial Supreme Court and the Arizona Supreme Court?
• ... that St Mary's Church, Gosforth, Cumbria, is associated with "a unique Viking-age assemblage" of carved stones?
• ... that if Seattle Sounders FC wins the 2012 U.S. Open Cup final on August 8, 2012, they will be the first club in the tournament's 99-year history to win four consecutive titles?
• ... that Lengberg Castle has a vault which contained 600-year-old brassieres described as a "'missing link' in the history of women's underwear"?
  
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• At least 107 people are killed and more than 250 others wounded in a string of bombings and attacks in Iraq.
• In golf, Ernie Els wins the Open Championship.
• In cycling, Bradley Wiggins (pictured) becomes the first British cyclist to win the Tour de France.
• Pranab Mukherjee is elected President of India.
• A gunman kills 12 people and injures 58 others during a midnight film screening in the U.S. state of Colorado.
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July 24: Pioneer Day in Utah (1847)

• 1910 – Ottoman forces captured the city of Shkodër to put down the Albanian Revolt of 1910.
• 1938 – A combined German–Austrian team became the first team to climb the north face of the Eiger, one of the six great north faces of the Alps.
• 1959 – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon held an impromptu debate (pictured) at the opening of the American National Exhibition at Sokolniki Park in Moscow.
• 1980 – At the Moscow Olympics, Australia's Quietly Confident Quartet swimming team won the gold medal in the men's 4 x 100 metre medley relay, the only time that the United States, who were boycotting these games, has not won the event at Olympic level.
• 2009 – The MV Arctic Sea, reportedly carrying timber, was allegedly boarded by hijackers off the coast of Sweden, but much speculation remains as to the actual cargo and events.

More anniversaries: July 23 – July 24 – July 25

The Bassian Thrush (Zoothera lunulata) is a medium-sized mostly insectivorous thrush found predominantly in shrubland, forests, and rainforests of southeastern Australia and Tasmania. It grows to about 28 cm (11 in) in length and about 100 g (3.5 oz) in weight. Photo: JJ Harrison Recently featured: Fields Medal – Simulated depth of field – Johnny Evers Archive – More featured pictures...