Several cities claimed to host the 1996 Olympic Games: Athens, Belgrade, Manchester, Melbourne, Toronto and Atlanta. The favorites, of course, were Athens - the 100th anniversary of the first Olympics was planned and they wanted to hold it in Greece. But members of the Atlanta Bid Committee were able to convince the IOC of the excellent and highest preparedness of the city for Summer Games... As a result, on September 18, 1990, at the 96th session of the IOC, Atlanta was declared the capital of the 1996 Summer Olympics.

1996 Summer Olympics mascot in Atlanta

They decided to generate it on a computer. As a result, the creature came out strange: barefoot without a nose and mouth. The designers tried to give Izzy a more attractive look: a big mouth, a tail studded with Olympic rings, funny boots and white gloves. Then we added the eyes of a sparkle-star. The creature's name Izzy is short for Whatisit? ("What it is?"). He is considered one of the worst mascots of the Olympics.

Opening of the 1996 Olympics

The ceremony took place on July 19, 1996 at the Olympic Stadium in Atlanta. The broadcast was carried out by 170 TV companies, and was watched by about 3.5 billion viewers. The main themes of the performance were the history of Atlanta and the American South, as well as the 100th anniversary of the Olympic Movement.

The parade was attended by 10,700 athletes from 197 participating countries. The Russian Flag was carried at the ceremony by the wrestler Alexander Karelin, who later won his third Olympic gold medal.

Following a speech by IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch and Games Organizing Committee President Billy Payne, US President Bill Clinton declared the 1996 Olympics open. The Olympic flag was raised and the Fire was lit, the torch was brought by swimmer Janet Evans and boxer Evander Holyfield, and lit by former boxer Mohammed Ali.

The culmination was the Power of Dreams performed by the famous singer Celine Dion, followed by colorful fireworks.

Russia at the 1996 Olympics

The Russian national team at the Summer Olympics in Atlanta for the first time performed as a separate country. According to the results of the medal standings of the 1996 Olympics, the Russian team won the second place after the US team. The Russians received 63 medals: 26 gold, 21 silver and 16 bronze.

Most of the winners were among swimmers, wrestlers, fencers and athletes. Swimmer Alexander Popov was able to win 4 medals: 2 gold and 2 silver, and became a four-time Olympic champion.

Criticism of the organization of the 1996 Olympics

Sportsmen, journalists and officials were very dissatisfied with the organization of the Games. There are many traffic problems, numerous failures in the work of information systems, unpreparedness of volunteers, too strong commercialization of the Atlanta Olympics.

But the most serious incident was the explosion in the Olympic Park on July 27 at night, during which 2 people died during the mass celebrations, 111 people were injured of varying severity. After many reassurances from the organizers to strengthen security measures, the 1996 Summer Olympics decided to continue.

The offender was arrested only a year later after several more terrorist attacks and given four life sentences with the deprivation of the right to be released early.

Closing of the 1996 Summer Olympics

At the ceremony, Juan Antonio Samaranch, President of the IOC, for the first and last time did not say the phrase "These Games were the best in history."

The closing ceremony took place at the Olympic Stadium on August 4 and was attended by over 85 thousand people. Many American musicians took part in it. At the ceremony, the last Summer Olympics awards were presented to the winners in the men's marathon.

The final parade showed Olympic unity - all athletes walked together without division by country.

In his speech, Juan Antonio Samaranch called to remember the victims of the explosion in the Atlanta park and the Israeli athletes who died in Munich in 1972.

The Olympic flag was lowered, and the banner was handed the measure of Sydney, the capital of the next Games. It all ended with a magnificent fireworks display.

Doping scandal at the 1996 Games

On July 28, representatives of the IOC announced that tests of Russian athletes: swimmer Andrei Korneev, cyclist Rita Razmayte and wrestler Zafar Guliyeva tested positive for the banned drug bromantane.

Then they found bromantane: at the swimmer Nina Zhivanevskaya on July 30, at the runner Marina Trandenkova on August 1. All the athletes caught were disqualified and the won medals were taken away. But after the arbitration court in Lausanne, when they found out that the drug was banned during the Games, but not blacklisted, the athletes' results were restored and the medals returned.

The 1972 Summer Olympics were attended by 7134 athletes from 121 countries. For the first time, their athletes were sent by Albania, Upper Volta, Gabon, Dahomey, North Korea, Lesotho, Malawi, Saudi Arabia, Swaziland, Somalia, Togo. Sets of awards were played in 23 sports. For the first time during the Olympic Games, the official mascot of the event was presented, it was the multicolored Waldi dachshund.

According to the results of the competition, the leaders in the medal standings were athletes from the USSR, who won 50 gold, 27 silver and 22 bronze medals... Interestingly, Soviet athletes were tasked with winning at least 50 gold medals in honor of the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Olympians coped with the task. The second place was taken by the USA team, its athletes received 33 gold, 31 silver and 30 bronze medals. Third place went to the GDR with 20 gold, 23 silver and 23 bronze medals.

The track and field competitions were very stubborn. Soviet sprinter Valery Borzov managed to win two gold medals at once, breaking the undivided monopoly of the Americans. For domestic athletes, these were the first gold medals in the sprint. Viktor Saneev won his second gold medal in the triple jump. Leningrad student Yuri Tarmak became the champion in high jump, having overcome the height of 223 cm. Olga Korbut performed brilliantly, having won three medals of the highest standard and one silver at once.

Cuban boxers, trained by Soviet trainer Andrei Chervonenko, showed a sensational result in Munich, they won three gold medals. Boxers from the USSR with two gold medals were just behind them. All the gold medals, except one, went to Soviet rowers in kayaking and canoeing. In freestyle and classical wrestling, wrestlers from the USSR won 9 gold medals.

Not without sports sensations - in particular, American swimmer Mark Spitz achieved unprecedented success, winning seven gold medals at once and setting seven world records.

Unfortunately, Munich was overshadowed by the tragedy of the seizure of Israeli team athletes on September 5 by Palestinian terrorists. A very unprofessional police attempt to free the hostages resulted in the deaths of eleven athletes and one police officer. It was this tragedy that prompted the world's secret services to create special groups to fight terrorism.

It was decided to continue the Olympics. One of the reasons for this decision was the desire to show that the efforts of terrorists cannot break the spirits of athletes, and the Olympic Games are above any political differences.

Tip 2: Where the 1972 Summer Olympics were held

The 20th Summer Olympics of 1972 were held in Munich from 26 August to 10 September. A record number of athletes and national teams arrived in Germany. For the first time, representatives of Albania took part in the Olympic competitions, Saudi Arabia, The Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Somalia and several other countries. Unfortunately, the 1972 Olympics were remembered not only for their sporting achievements.

Before the start of the Olympics in Munich, the metro was built for the first time, the city center was completely reconstructed, and the road system was re-created. The new complex of sports facilities consisted of an Olympic village for 10 thousand inhabitants, an Olympic stadium for 80 thousand seats, a sports palace, a large swimming pool, a cycle track for 13 thousand seats and other gyms and grounds. Especially for the Games, a new Olympic stadium (Olympiastadion) was built, the unusual design of the roof of which resembled a spider web.

Most of the Olympic venues in Munich were equipped with modern means of urgent information for that time (electronic computers, scoreboards, laser measuring devices, duplicating equipment for printing press bulletins, etc.). Television was widely used, thanks to which the Olympic Games were able to see over a billion people on all continents.

September 5, 1972 is an unprecedented tragedy in the history of sports. The terrorists of the Palestinian organization managed to get into one of the pavilions of the Olympic village at 4:30. They took hostage several members of the Israeli delegation, 11 of whom were subsequently killed, and a German policeman was also killed. This incident shocked the whole world, but it was decided to continue the game.

The Soviet athletes faced a difficult task, they had to win 50 gold medals by the 50th anniversary of the USSR, surpassing the USA. They completed it, winning exactly 50 awards of the highest standard, the Olympians from the United States received 33 medals. In total, the participants of the USSR received 99 medals at the 1972 Summer Olympics, of which 27 were silver and 22 were bronze.

The men's basketball team of the Soviet Union won gold medals for the first time, beating the US team in a tense match. Two gold medals were won by Soviet boxers: Vyacheslav Lemeshev from Moscow and Boris Kuznetsov from Astrakhan. The freestyle wrestlers received five gold medals. Soviet gymnasts showed themselves at a very high level, having won several gold medals in various competitions. All the gold medals in canoeing and kayaking for both women and men went to Soviet rowers. Competitions of the XX Summer Olympic Games showed a high level of preparation of all participants. During these events, 94 Olympic and 46 world records were set.

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• Faster! Above! Stronger! From the history of the Summer Olympics

The first Olympic Games in post-war Germany took place 27 years after the end of World War II. In 1972, the XX summer olympics with the slogan "Happy Games" and a shining blue sun in the logo. Unfortunately, the mourning color of terrorism from the Palestinian "Black September" has also been added to the palette of games.

The location of the Summer Olympic Games with the jubilee - twentieth - serial number was determined in 1966 in Rome. After that, a large-scale program of preparation for the sports festival was launched in Munich. Dozens of sports facilities with the latest equipment were built, including a stadium with 80 thousand seats, a cycle track, a swimming pool, a sports complex, etc. In addition to sports facilities, an "Olympic village" was created for 15 thousand athletes, and by the XX Olympics, the city even had a metro.

The opening ceremony of the games, attended by almost 7,200 Olympians from 121 countries, took place on August 26, 1972. The very next day, the first two Olympic champions became known, and a total of 195 sets of awards were presented at these games. The undisputed hero of the Olympics was American Mark Spitz - the swimmer went to the start seven times and won a gold medal each time. Moreover, all heats ended with a new world record. In total, 46 world records and 94 Olympic records were broken in Munich. The athletes of the Soviet Union also took part in this. So Lyudmila Bragina improved the world achievement at a 1.5-kilometer distance among runners three times. Another runner, Valery Borzov, managed to win two gold and one silver medals. In general, the party and the government set the task for the Soviet team to win 50 gold awards for the 50th anniversary of the USSR and beat the Americans in the medal standings. The Olympians were able to solve the set problem, having climbed exactly 50 times to the highest step of the podium, and supplemented this number with 49 more awards of other dignity. The Americans received only five fewer awards, but were significantly behind in the number of gold medals (17 fewer).

On the 11th day of the Olympics, the largest terrorist attack in the history of the Games took place. Five Palestinian terrorists from Black September infiltrated the Olympic village and took nine members of the Israeli delegation hostage, killing two of the athletes in the process. The terrorists demanded to take them with the hostages to the airport and provide a helicopter, which the FRG authorities complied with. At the airport, an attempt was made to free the hostages, which failed - the terrorists killed the hostages, and only three of them remained alive. Olympic competition were stopped that day, but then the IOC decided to continue the games.

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Tip 4: What Happened at the 1972 Munich Olympics

The 1972 Summer Olympic Games were held in the German city of Munich, the capital of the federal state of Bavaria, in the south of Germany. In the six years that have passed since the choice of this city as the site of the Olympics, the organizers of the games have done a great job.

Colossal funds were invested in the improvement of Munich, having built a metro, many new hotels, and reconstructing the central part of the city. A huge Olympic stadium with 80 thousand seats was erected with an original roof resembling a spider web, as well as a number of other sports facilities where the participants of the games were to compete. Moreover, all these facilities were equipped with the most modern technical devices at that time.

The opening ceremony of the Olympics took place on August 26. The competition was attended by 7170 athletes who fought for 195 sets of medals. The USSR national team performed brilliantly, having won the most gold medals - 50. The USA team, which took second place, had 33.

Unfortunately, this wonderful sports event turned out to be overshadowed by tragedy. At dawn on September 5, Palestinian terrorists infiltrated the Olympic Village, killing two members of the Israeli sports delegation and taking nine others hostage. The terrorists demanded the release of several hundred prisoners, and a little later put forward an additional demand - to provide them with a plane to Cairo, as well as the ability to freely get to the airfield with the hostages. A hastily planned and insufficiently professional rescue operation killed all nine hostages, five terrorists and one police officer. Three terrorists were captured alive.

The members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) were faced with a very serious question: how to respond to this egregious incident, whether to continue the games or end them? In addition, many athletes, including the surviving members of the Israeli national team, announced their departure from Munich. After a difficult discussion and a one-day break, the IOC decided to continue the Olympics. The competition ended on September 10th.

This tragedy led to a dramatic increase in security measures at the subsequent Olympics, especially in the territory of the Olympic villages. Also, in many countries, special anti-terrorist units have been created.

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Tip 5: How the Munich Olympics terrorist attack ended

The 1972 Summer Olympics, held in Munich, were overshadowed by a tragic event - a terrorist attack organized by the radical Palestinian group "Black September". As a result, on September 5, 11 members of the Israeli delegation - athletes, coaches and judges - were taken hostage. During the operation to free the hostages, carried out by the German special services, all of them, as well as 5 terrorists, were killed. But the terrorist attack at the Munich Olympics did not end there.

Israel, for which the incident became a national tragedy, was not satisfied with the results of the investigation of the terrorist act. The surviving terrorists and those involved in organizing the attack were detained by the German police, but under the threat of new terrorist attacks, which the Palestinians promised to carry out, the detainees were released as a result of the exchange. The bodies of five dead Palestinians, at the insistence of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, were handed over to Palestine, where they were named national heroes and buried with great fanfare.

Of course, this state of affairs did not suit Israel at all, since those responsible for the deaths of the athletes were not punished either under state or international laws. The question of adequate retaliatory measures, or, more simply, of revenge, arose at the highest state level.

Operation "Wrath of God" began, which was carried out by the Israeli intelligence service "Mossad". Its goal was the physical elimination of all participants in the terrorist attack and people involved in it. There were 17 of them. The punishment for the terrorists was not long in coming - already in October 1972, one of the organizers of the terrorist attack was shot. 9 months after the tragedy, 13 people were already marked with crosses on the Mossad's list.

Two more Palestinians involved in the killing of the athletes died later. The other two from the Mossad list escaped punishment, one of them died in 2010, the second, the only survivor, is hiding in one of the African countries.

The London 2012 Olympics mark 40 years of events in Munich. Members of the IOC, athletes and residents of London honored the memory of the victims of the terrorist attack on 23 July. After the ceremony at the Armistice Wall, symbolizing the peacekeeping idea of ​​the Olympic Games, there was a minute of silence. More than 100 people took part in this event, including IOC Chairman Jacques Rogge, the head of the organizing committee of the London Olympics Lord Coe, as well as the mayor of the city B. Johnson.

On September 5, 1972, armed Palestinian terrorists from the Black September group entered the Olympics area unhindered and took 11 Israeli athletes hostage. This happened at 4:10 am. Munich was completely unprepared for such a development of events: unarmed guards, a decorative fence around the Olympic Village. Radical extremists demanded the release from Israeli prisons of 232 PLO members, two German terrorists and 16 prisoners in Western European prisons.

Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir refused to negotiate with terrorists. The Israeli secret services offered their help to free the hostages, but the Germans did not accept it. As a result, all 11 athletes were killed. 5 militants and one German policeman Anton Fligerbauer were also killed. As cynical as it may seem, the death of a policeman was useful for the perception of what had happened: both peoples suffered at the hands of extremists, and it was possible to express participation and sympathy to Israel without feeling guilty. The names of the killed Israelis: David Berger, Yosef Romano, Moshe Weinberg, Eliezer Khalfin, Zeev Friedman, Mark Slavin, Andrey Spitser, Kehat Shor, Amitsur Shapiro, Yaakov Springer.

The FRG authorities responded negatively to Israel's request to suspend the Olympic Games. They motivated this decision by the fact that "retreat" would mean the victory of world terrorism, submission to it. So, sports competitions were continued the next day. As a result, the Soviet Union took 50 gold medals, the USA - 33. It is interesting to note that every fifth "gold" of the American team belongs to the Jew Mark Spitz.

The German police’s security efforts are considered one of the most disastrous operations in the history of the special services. Is this an accident? The authoritative German edition Der Spiegel ("The Mirror") publishes some documents relating to the events of forty years ago. These documents indicate that the German special services were twice warned about the impending terrorist attack. However, they underestimated the importance of the information received and were sure that the Black September group was poorly prepared and would not be able to “turn around” in a city crowded with guests, therefore they let things go by themselves.

At the same time, it became known that the "Black September" was assisted by German neo-Nazis. Wolfgang Abramovski and Willie Pohl, members of the National Socialist Resistance Group for Greater Germany, worked closely with the terrorists. Perhaps these were echoes of the supposedly "fallen" National Socialism 27 years ago. By the way, the Bavarian capital Munich is geographically adjacent to the notorious Dachau concentration camp. Coincidence?

For the next 40 years, Germany has been trying to hide the traces of its mistakes. Meanwhile, Israeli intelligence Mossad is launching an operation called "The Wrath of God." "Israel will make every effort and ability that our people are endowed with to overtake terrorists wherever they are," Golda Meir said in the Knesset. A list of priority tasks was drawn up, aimed at neutralizing and eliminating not only "Black September", but the entire terrorist network in Europe. How long will extremists continue to “rape” public order?

Summer 2012 marks Olympic Games in London. Colossal security measures have been taken here. The Olympic village is surrounded by 18 kilometers of electric fences, protected by 13.5 thousand soldiers, many canine units, anti-aircraft guns and fighters are prepared. On the one hand, such pragmatism is justified, on the other, the holiday of "Peace and Friendship" turns into a tense expectation. Will the true atmosphere of the Olympics be a thing of the past? It is important to understand that extremism can only be defeated by the combined efforts of the entire world community.

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