January 4 - Rose Heilbron becomes the first female judge to sit at the Old Bailey in London.
January 5 - U.S. President Richard Nixon orders the development of a space shuttle program.
January 7 - Iberia Airlines Caravelle 6-R crashes into Mont San Jose on approach to Ibiza Airport killing all 104 on board.
January 9 - The RMS Queen Elizabeth is destroyed by fire in Victoria Harbour, Hong Kong.
January 11 - East Pakistan renames itself Bangladesh.
January 13 - Prime Minister Kofi Busia and President Edward Akufo-Addo of Ghana are ousted in a bloodless military coup by Col. Ignatius Kutu Acheamphong.
January 14 - Queen Margrethe II of Denmark ascends the throne, the first Queen of Denmark since 1412 and the first Danish monarch not named Frederick or Christian since 1513.
January 21 - Tripura becomes a full-fledged state in India.
January 24 - Japanese Sgt. Shoichi Yokoi is found hiding in a Guam jungle, where he had been since the end of World War II.
January 30 - Bloody Sunday: British Paratroopers kill fourteen civil rights/anti internment marchers in Northern Ireland.
January 30 - Pakistan withdraws from the Commonwealth of Nations.
February 1 - Kuala Lumpur becomes a city by a royal charter granted by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
February 2 - The British embassy in Dublin is destroyed in protest over Bloody Sunday.
February 5 - Bob Douglas becomes the first African American elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
February 15 - Sound recordings are granted U.S. federal copyright protection for the first time.
February 17 - Sales of the Volkswagen Beetle model exceed those of Ford Model-T.
February 18 - The California Supreme Court in the case of People v. Anderson, 6 Cal.3d 628 invalidates the state's death penalty and commutes the sentences of all death row inmates to life in prison.
February 19 - The Asama-Sanso hostage standoff begins in Japan.
February 21 - President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations.
February 21 - The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.
February 26 - The Buffalo Creek Flood caused by a burst dam kills 125 in West Virginia.
February 28 - The Asama-Sanso incident ends in Japan.
February 28 - Sino-American relations: The United States and People's Republic of China sign the Shanghai Communiqué.
February 29 - Hank Aaron becomes the first player in the history of Major League Baseball to sign a $200,000 contract.
March 1 - The Thai province of Yasothon is created after being split off from the Ubon Ratchathani province.
March 2 - The Pioneer 10 space probe is launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida with a mission to explore the outer planets.
March 3 - Mohawk Airlines Flight 405 crashes in unexplained circumstances.
March 4 - Libya and the Soviet Union sign a cooperation treaty.
March 19 - India and Bangladesh sign a friendship treaty.
March 24 - The United Kingdom imposes "Direct Rule" over Northern Ireland.
March 30 - Vietnam War: The Easter Offensive begins after North Vietnamese forces cross into the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) of South Vietnam.
April 2 - Actor Charlie Chaplin returns to the United States for the first time since being labeled a communist during the Red Scare in the early 1950s .
April 2 - Vietnam War: The Easter Offensive begins
April 10 - 20 days after he was kidnapped in Buenos Aires, Oberdan Sallustro is executed by communist guerrillas.
April 10 - Vietnam War: For the first time since November 1967, American B-52 bombers reportedly begin bombing North Vietnam.
April 13 - The Universal Postal Union decides to recognize the People's Republic of China as the only legitimate Chinese representative, effectively expelling the Republic of China administering Taiwan.
April 16 - Apollo program: The launch of Apollo 16 from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
April 16 - Vietnam War: Nguyen Hue Offensive – prompted by the North Vietnamese offensive, the United States resumes the bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong.
April 22 - Vietnam War: Increased American bombing in Vietnam prompts antiwar protests in New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
April 25 - Vietnam War: Nguyen Hue Offensive – The North Vietnamese 320th Division forces 5,000 South Vietnamese troops to retreat and traps about 2,500 others northwest of Kontum.
April 27 - Constructive Vote of No Confidence against German Chancellor Willy Brandt fails under obscure circumstances.
May 4 - The Don't Make A Wave Committee, a fledgling environmental organization founded in Canada in 1971, officially changes its name to "Greenpeace Foundation".
May 6 - Deniz Gezmiş, Yusuf Aslan and Hüseyin İnan are executed in Ankara for attempting to overthrow the Constitutional order.
May 8 - Vietnam War – U.S. President Richard M. Nixon announces his order to place mines in major North Vietnamese ports in order to stem the flow of weapons and other goods to that nation.
May 13 - Faulty electrical wiring ignites a fire underneath the Playtown Cabaret in Osaka, Japan. Blocked exits and non-functional elevators cause 118 fatalities, with many victims leaping to their deaths.
May 15 - The island of Okinawa, under U.S. military governance since its conquest in 1945, reverts to Japanese control.
May 15 - In Laurel, Maryland, Arthur Bremer shoots and paralyzes Alabama Governor George Wallace while he is campaigning to be become President.
May 21 - Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome is damaged by a vandal.
May 22 - Ceylon adopts a new constitution, thus becoming a Republic, changes its name to Sri Lanka, and joins the Commonwealth of Nations.
May 26 - Willandra National Park is established in Australia.
May 26 - The United States and the Soviet Union sign the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
May 26 - The British state-owned travel firm Thomas Cook & Son is sold to a consortium of private businesses headed by the Midland Bank.
May 29 - 26 people are killed and dozens more injured when three Japanese gunmen open fire on crowds at Lod International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel.
May 30 - The Angry Brigade goes on trial over a series of 25 bombings throughout Britain.
May 30 - In Tel Aviv members of the Japanese Red Army carry out the Lod Airport Massacre, killing 24 people and injuring 78 others.
June 11 - Eltham Well Hall rail crash, caused by an intoxicated train driver, kills six people and injures 126.
June 16 - Red Army Faction member Ulrike Meinhof is captured by police in Langenhagen.
June 16 - The largest single-site hydro-electric power project in Canada starts at Churchill Falls, Labrador.
June 17 - Watergate scandal: five White House operatives are arrested for burglarizing the offices of the Democratic National Committee, in an attempt by some members of the Republican party to illegally wiretap the opposition.
June 23 - Watergate Scandal: U.S. President Richard M. Nixon and White House chief of staff H. R. Haldeman are taped talking about using the Central Intelligence Agency to obstruct the Federal Bureau of Investigation's investigation into the Watergate break-ins.
June 23 - 45 countries leave the Sterling Area, allowing their currencies to fluctuate independently of the British Pound.
June 29 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules the death penalty could constitute "cruel and unusual punishment".
June 30 - One leap second is added to the UTC time system.
July 1 - Andreas Baader, Jan-Carl Raspe and Holger Meins of the Red Army Faction are captured in Frankfurt after a shootout with the police.
July 1 - The first Gay Pride march in England takes place.
July 21 - Bloody Friday bombing by the Provisional Irish Republican Army around Belfast, Northern Ireland
July 23 - The United States launches Landsat 1, the first Earth-resources satellite.
July 24 - Bugojno group is caught by Yugoslav security forces.
July 27 - The F-15 Eagle flies for the first time.
August 3 - U.S. Senate ratifies the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
August 11 - Vietnam War: the last United States ground combat unit departs South Vietnam.
August 14 - An East German Ilyushin Il-62 crashes during takeoff from East Berlin, killing 156.
August 16 - The Royal Moroccan Air Force fires upon, in an unsuccessful coup d'état attempt, Hassan II of Morocco's plane while he is traveling back to Rabat.
August 22 - Rhodesia is expelled by the IOC for its racist policies.
September 1 - In Reykjavík, Iceland, American Bobby Fischer beats Russian Boris Spassky and becomes the world chess champion.
September 4 - Thieves steal 18 paintings from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in what was at the time the largest art theft in North America.
September 4 - Mark Spitz wins his seventh swimming gold medal at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany, becoming the first Olympian to do so. Spitz set world records in all seven events in which he competed.
September 5 - Munich Massacre: A Palestinian terrorist group called "Black September" attack Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympic Games.
September 10 - The United States loses its first international basketball game in a disputed match against the Soviet Union at Munich, Germany.
September 11 - Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) in San Francisco, California begins regular service.
September 15 - A magnitude 4.5 earthquake shakes Northern Illinois.
September 15 - An SAS domestic flight from Gothenburg to Stockholm was hijacked and flown to Malmö-Bulltofta Airport.
September 18 - First Ugandans expelled by Idi Amin arrive in the United Kingdom.
September 19 - A parcel bomb sent to Israeli Embassy in London kills one diplomat.
September 21 - Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos signs Proclamation No. 1081 placing the entire country under martial law.
September 23 - Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos announces over television and radio the implementation of martial law and signs General Order No. 1 ordering the arrest of opposition leaders, media censorship, banning travel to other countries except for diplomatic missions, abolishing the Philippine Congress, establishing dictatorial government, take-over or sequestering of public and private corporations and suspension of classes for one week.
September 25 - In the Norwegian EC referendum, 1972, the people of Norway reject membership.
September 28 - Canada defeats the USSR in the eighth and final game of the ice hockey Summit Series.
September 29 - Sino-Japanese relations: Japan establishes diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China after breaking official ties with the Republic of China.
October 12 - En route to the Gulf of Tonkin, a racial brawl involving more than 100 sailors breaks out aboard the United States Navy aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk
October 13 - An Aeroflot Ilyushin Il-62 crashed outside Moscow killing 176.
October 13 - Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 crashes in the Andes mountains, in between the borders of Argentina and Chile. By December 23, 1972 only 16 out of 45 people lived long enough to be rescued.
October 22 - Vietnam War: In Saigon, Henry Kissinger and South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu meet to discuss a proposed cease-fire that had been worked out between Americans and North Vietnamese in Paris. Thieu rejects the proposal and accused the United States of conspiring to undermine his regime.
October 25 - The Washington Post reports that White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman was the fifth person to control a secret cash fund designed to finance illegal political sabotage and espionage during the 1972 presidential election campaign (see also Watergate scandal).
October 30 - A collision between two commuter trains in Chicago, Illinois kills 45 and injures 332.
November 10 - Southern Airways Flight 49 from Birmingham, Alabama is hijacked and, at one point, is threatened with crashing into the nuclear installation at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. After two days, the plane lands in Havana, Cuba, where the hijackers are jailed by Fidel Castro.
November 14 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 1,000 (1,003.16) for the first time.
November 22 - Vietnam War: The United States loses its first B-52 Stratofortress of the war.
November 29 - Nolan Bushnell (co-founder of Atari) releases Pong (the first commercially successful video game) in Andy Capp’s Tavern in Sunnyvale, California.
November 30 - Vietnam War: White House Press Secretary Ron Ziegler tells the press that there will be no more public announcements concerning American troop withdrawals from Vietnam due to the fact that troop levels are now down to 27,000.
December 2 - Gough Whitlam becomes the first Australian Labor Party Prime Minister of Australia for 23 years.
December 7 - Apollo 17, the last Apollo moon mission, is launched. The crew takes the photograph known as "The Blue Marble" as they leave the Earth.
December 8 - United Airlines Flight 553 crashes near Chicago Midway Airport, killing 45 people.
December 11 - Apollo 17 becomes the sixth mission to land on the Moon.
December 13 - Apollo program: Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt begin the third and final Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) or "Moonwalk" of Apollo 17. This was the last manned mission to the moon of the 20th century.
December 14 - Apollo program: Eugene Cernan is the last person to walk on the moon, after he and Harrison Schmitt complete the third and final Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) of Apollo 17. This was the last manned mission to the moon of the 20th century.
December 16 - Vietnam War: Henry Kissinger announces that North Vietnam has left private peace negotiations, in Paris.
December 18 - Vietnam War: President Richard Nixon announces that the United States will engage North Vietnam in Operation Linebacker II, a series of Christmas bombings, after peace talks collapsed with North Vietnam on the 13th.
December 19 - Apollo program: The last manned lunar flight, Apollo 17, crewed by Eugene Cernan, Ron Evans and Harrison Schmitt, returns to Earth.
December 23 - The Nicaraguan capital of Managua is struck by a 6.5 magnitude earthquake, killing more than 10,000.
December 23 - The 16 survivors of the Andes flight disaster are rescued after 73 days, having survived by cannibalism.
December 29 - An Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 (a Lockheed "Tristar") crashes on approach to Miami International Airport, Florida, killing 101.
December 30 - Vietnam War: The United States halts heavy bombing of North Vietnam.
