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Germany Invades Poland
Hitler announced he would do this in August 1939, breaking the munich conference. Great Britain, and France threaten to declare war if he goes through with this. He eventually does a month afterwards in September, invading with his new strategy called the blitzkrieg. -
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WWII
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The Battle of Britain
With France losing in a matter of 4 weeks to Germany, Germany was power hungry. Britain had no issue in surviving because of Britain being an island. Germany found that they could bomb Britain, and so they did from July to August 1940. Britain invented the RADAR to prevent suprise attacks durin this period. in August Germany realized Britain would not be defeated, so Germany simply gave up. -
Germany Starts To Invade The Soviet Union
Germany decided to invade Russia, breaking the Nazi-Soviet Pact. Russia almost lost quickly, but because of the cold weather the Nazis could not push as hard as they would have liked. Russia holds out for multiple months. -
Pearl Harbor
The US Navy was helping prevent imperialism in places like the Philippines, and Burma. Japan was not happy about this so it planned a sneak attack to destroy the entire US Navy in one go. This planned killed over 3000 and ended America's Nuetrality. -
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Battle of Stalingrad
Germany had finally made it to Stalingrad, the government capital of Russia at the time. Russia finally started gaining ground after 10 months of defending. Germany was out of Russia by 1944 and pushed out of Poland by 1945. -
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Island Hopping
The US was still not very happy about Pearl Harbor, rightfully so. So the US planned to bomb Japan since it was an island and they couldn't send many troops. Japan was too far away, so the US started taking over closer and closer islands until they got close enough to bomb. -
D-Day
US, Britain, and Canada attack Germany from Normandy, France in order to take France back. It was a very risky plan, attacking people on land with people on boats. Eisenhower led the plan and soon all 3 powers were attacking France. Germany was pushed out of France and all they had control of now was Germany itself. With the 4 powers all attacking with Russia to the East and US, Britain, and Canada to the West. Germany was about to lose WWII. -
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Division of Germany
France, Russia, US, and Britain all got a portion of Germany to remove Nazism. Russia of course enforced communism as well, when everyone else agreed to make it democratic. Russia also took anything of value including factory machinery. when it was time to return it to one country, Russia wanted it to be a communist country, so it stayed divided into East (democratic) and West (communist) Germany. This was argued throughout the Cold War. -
Yalta Conference
The US, Russia, and Britain met up in a city called Yalta in Russia. They planned on how they were going to split up Europe after the war was over. Stalin agreed to allow democratic elections in the land he had conquered during the war. -
V-E day
Mussolini, Hitler, and Germany as a whole were defeated. Hitler killed himself in April, so he was not able to stand for his trial. The only Axis member that remains is Japan. There is a slim chance that they would even bother with Europe, espcially with the US closing in on it. This is a celebratory day -
Potsdam Conference
the leaders met again, this time in Potsdam, Germany. The Germans have lost, and Roosevelt had died in April. In this meeting Churchill and Truman discovered that Stalin had broken his promise. Stalin would not allow democratic elections in his conquered countries. This broke trust with russia as a whole. This is what sparked the Cold War after WWII -
Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombing
on July 16th the US had successfully tested an atomic bomb. Truman asked that Japan unconditionally surrendered. The US did some estimates that came out that it would take 3-4 years to invade Japan. Truman decided to drop a bomb on it instead. Japan denied the bombs existence even after it dropped. So the US dropped a second on Nagasaki. Japan realized that they might have more to destroy the whole country. they surrendered to the US. -
Creation of the UN
Roosevelt had the idea that they needed a League of Nations that could enforce its rules. the winning nations created the UN, with headquarters in New York. The whole mission of the UN was to keep peace between all the countries. every country gets 1 vote, except the founding countries which can veto any decision within reason. -
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Nuremburg Trials
After the war, the Allies decided to try the Nazi leaders, and soldiers for war crimes. Out of the 20 that were put on trial, 17 were guilty ( 10 executed, 7 life in prison) 3 not guilty. This is the first time that a war crime trial held people who followed and created immoral orders responsible for what they did. -
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Rebuilding Japan
General MacArthur was put in charge of rebuilding Japan after they surrendered. He immidiatly signed the "Constitution of 1947" which made Japan a democracy, have a similar court system, made woman equal to men, get rid of their military, and agree to letting the US protect it. Japan was made a very successful and democratic country from this rebuilding, making Japan one of the most advanced countries up with America, China, ect.
