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Invasion of Poland
This was when Germany invaded Poland. The Polish had no warning and the Germans attacked very quickly. This tactic was called Blitzkreig, or lighting war. Germany managed to destroy lots of the Polish airfroce that was on the ground, destroy the commnication and transport systems from the air. Finally, the Germans sent in tanks, foot soldiers and motorcycles to deal with anything that was left. -
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Start of the Battle of the Atlantic
September 3, hours after Britain declared war on Germany, a German submarine attacked a supposed British auxiliary cruiser; it was actually the passenger ship Athenia. 112 civilians were killed. The British and the French immeditatley started to block the German ports so no inports could reach them. The Royal Navy sent submarine hunting groups out to sea. A submarine saw the group first and lanched torpedoes at the ships, no harm was done as they detonated early. -
German Submarines Attack on Navel Base
A German submarine managed to sneak into the British Naval base at Scapa Flow, Scotland. They sank the old battleship HMS Royal Oak, killing 833. Two weeks later, two torpedoes were launched at the HMS Nelson, luckily, they failed to detonate. -
Battle of the Atlantic
A german plane was seen to be dropping something via parachute into the River Thames. Inside the package was a magnetic mine. -
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Battle of the River Plate
The German cruiser Admiral Graf Spee sailed towards the River Plate estuary between Uruguay and Argentina, having heard about a convoy leaving Montevideo, Uruguay. At the same time, Royal Navy G-Force was already going there, looking for the Admiral Graf Spee. 13th December, at the battle, three British cruisers damaged German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee, forcing her to enter the neutral port of Montevideo for repairs. 23rd February, the people of London cheered as the men returned. -
Altmark Incident
16 Feb - German freighter Altmark was found by Hudson aircraft in Jossingford, Norway. They captured the ship and rescued 299 British prisoners of war that were aboard.
17 Feb - Norway protested that Britain had violated the neutrality by attacking a German ship in Norwegian waters. -
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Invasion of Iceland
16 Apr - Iceland declared independance from Denmark.
9 May - British troops occupied Iceland.
7 Jul - Roosevelt intended to deploy a US Marine Corp brigade to Iceland.
10 Apr - An american destroyer attacked a German subamrine off Iceland, it escaped without any damage. It was the first shot fired between Germany and US.
9 Jul - American troops were to relieve the British in Iceland. Hitler thought that is was an act of agression against Germany but still didn't say to diectly attack US ships. -
War in Africa
British forces in North and East Africa are on alert a Italy declares war on Britain and France. -
War in Africa
British planes raid Italian bases in Libya. The Italian forces were clearly unprepared for Mussolini's declaration of war. -
War in Africa
62 more Italian soldiers were taken prisoner during the first major battle on the border of Libya and Egypt. -
War in Africa
To prepare for an Italian invasion, Spain conquer Tangiers, the international zone of Morocco. -
War in Africa
Italian forts of Capuzza and Madalena were captured by the 7th Hussars (they were calvalry in the British Army) with the 60th Rifles (foot soldiers with rifles). 220 Italian prisoners were captured. Whilst patroling the Egypt-Libya border, Britain began to prepare a line of defence at Mersa Matruh, about 300 miles west of the Suez Canal. -
War in Africa
The Naval War begins in the Mediterranean. At the same time, two British submarines were sunk, Grapus and Orpheus. -
War in Africa
Italo Balbo, the Italian governor-general of Libya was shot down in friendly fire whilst surveying Tobruk. -
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Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain started when France surrendered to Germany making Hitler able to invade Britain. The Lutwaffe attacked ships in the English Channel, coastal towns and defences. From 12 August, the German wanted to destroy the RAF and attack air fields and radar bases. 4 September, the tactics were changed again. The Germans started to try and destroy London and other major cities in Britain. 17 September, Hitler delays his plans to invade Britain and now wanted to invade the Soviet Union. -
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Operation Berlin
This was a successful commerce raid by the German battleships. The ships were spotted so Admiral Sir John Tovey sailed with a strong force hoping to interept the convoy. -
Operation Barbarossa
This was Germany's plan to invade Russia using the tactics of Blitzkrieg. It was the largest military attack of WWII and had huge consequences for Russian people, Hitler had been planning the attack since 1940. He had lost intereset in the Battle of Britain and now wanted Russia. Hitler wanted to put a massive attack on Moscow and smaller ones on other major cities. For the attack, the Germans used 3 million soldiers, 3580 tanks, 7184 artillery guns, 1830 planes and 750,000 horses. -
Pearl Harbour
The Japanese surprise attacked a US military base. The night before the attack, Japan moved 33 ships within 200 miles of Oahu, the location of Pearl Harbour. Over 300 Japanese planes stated dropping bombs on Pearl Harbour just before 8 o'clock in the morning. In the harbour there were 8 American battleships and over 90 naval vessels. The biggest loss was the sinking of the USS Arizona in less than 9 minutes. After the attacks, 2,300 people had been killed and roughly the same amount were injured -
D-Day
Up to this point, Germany had power of most of Europe. The plan was for a massive Allied force to go from England to France to overthrow Hitler. The forces landed on the beaches of Normandy and started to break through the German defences. The attack lasted 11 months and the allies managed to push the Germans all the way back to Berlin, the German capital. Right to the bunker that was Hitler's headquaters. -
Conclusion of the Battle of the Atlantic
Two British cruisers intercepted a group of German destroyers that were off France. By 4 o'clock, the German destroyers were all sunk and another submarine was sunk by the Royal Navy. HMS Asphodel was sunk by a German submarine. Another Japanese, formerly German submarine was sank, also, 3 more German submarines were sunk and 1 damaged. 3 Allied ships were sunk by German submarines. -
Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
On August 6, 1945, the USA dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. This bomb flattened the city, killing tens of thousands of innocent people. While Japan was still recovering three days later, the unimaginable happened, the USA dropped another bomb, this time on Nagasaki. The cities were chosen because they had been untouched previously in the war.
