certified Gold by the RIAA. The later-released English translation, "99 Red Balloons", topped the charts in the UK, Canada and Ireland. In his 2010 book Music: What Happened?, critic and musician Scott Miller declared that the song possesses "one of the best hooks of the eighties" and listed it among his top song picks for 1984. Nonetheless, he cautioned: "It must be admitted that this song suffers from an embarrassingly out-of-place disco funk interlude, and the word Kriegsminister." Music video The promotional video, which was originally made for the Dutch music programme TopPop and broadcast on 13 March 1983, was shot in a Dutch military training camp, the band performing the song on a stage in front of a backdrop of fires and explosions provided by the Dutch Army. Towards the end of the video, the band are seen taking cover and abandoning the stage, which was unplanned and genuine since they believed the explosive blasts were getting out of control. VH1 Classic, an American cable television station, ran a charity event for Hurricane Katrina relief in 2006. Viewers who made donations were allowed to choose which music videos the station would play. One viewer donated $35,000 for the right to program an entire hour and requested continuous play of "99 Luftballons" and "99 Red Balloons" videos. The station broadcast the videos as requested from 2:00 to 3:00p.m. EST on 26 March 2006. Charts and certifications German version Weekly charts Year-end charts Certifications and sales English version Weekly charts Year-end charts Certifications and sales 2002 re-release See also List of anti-war songs Lists of number-one singles (Austria) List of number-one singles in Australia during the 1980s List of number-one singles of 1984 (Canada) List of Cash Box Top 100 number-one singles of 1984 List of Dutch Top 40 number-one singles of 1983 List of European number-one hits of 1983 List of number-one hits of 1983 (Germany) List of number-one singles of 1984 (Ireland) List of number-one singles from the 1980s (New Zealand) List of number-one singles and albums in Sweden List of number-one singles of the 1980s (Switzerland) List of UK Singles Chart number ones of the 1980s List of one-hit wonders in the United States References External links "99 Luftballons" at the official Nena website 1983 songs 1983 singles 1984 singles Nena (band) songs Songs written by Jörn-Uwe Fahrenkrog-Petersen Cashbox number-one singles Columbia Records singles Epic Records singles Dutch