-
Nazis take the Sudetenland
The Sudetenland was part of Germany until World War I, when it became part of Czechoslovakia. Adolf Hitler wanted the Sudetenland to belong to Germany again and decided to take it by force. The Czechoslovakian government resisted, but its allies Britain and France, determined to avoid war at all costs, were willing to negotiate with Hitler. This was supposed to bring peace, but the nazis eventually seized the rest of Czechoslovakia. -
Ribbentrop/ Molotov Pact
Representatives from Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union met and signed the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. This stated the two countries would not attack each other. By signing this pact, Germany had protected itself from having to fight a two-front war in the soon-to-begin World War II; the Soviet Union was awarded land, including parts of Poland and the Baltic States. The pact was broken when Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union less then two years later. -
German Blitzkrieg
Germany did not want a long war. Their strategy was to defeat their opponents with a series of short attacks. Blitzkrieg tactics required the concentration of offensive weapons (such as tanks, planes, and artillery) along a narrow front. Germany sucessfully used the Blitzkrieg tactic against Poland, Danmark, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, Yugoslavia, and Greece. -
Germany's invasion of Poland
On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland.The Polish army was defeated within weeks of the invasion. From East Prussia and Germany in the north and Silesia and Slovakia in the south, German units, with more than 2,000 tanks and over 1,000 planes, broke through Polish defenses along the border and advanced on Warsaw in a massive encirclement attack.After heavy shelling and bombing, Warsaw surrendered. Nazi Germany occupied the remainder of Poland when it invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941. -
Battle of Britain
The French quit World War II because they had been defeated. Britain now stood alone against Germany’s military forces. A combination of bad intelligence and British attacks on Berlin led the Luftwaffe to change its approach to massive attacks on London. The first attack on London was quite successful; the second, failed not only with heavy losses, but also with a collapse of morale among German bomber crews. As a result, Hitler suspended the Battle of Britain. -
Nazi Invasion of the Soviet Union
For months the Soviet Union heeded warnings of the German troop buildup along its western border. Thus, Germany attacked with the element of surprise. Despite catastrophic losses in the first six weeks of the war, the Soviet Union failed to collapse. Germany kept up their attacks and eventually made it to Stalingrad, their furthest geographical extension. -
Pearl Harbor
In September of 1940, the U.S. placed an embargo on Japan prohibiting exports of steel, scrap iron, and aviation fuel to Japan, due to Japan's takeover of northern French Indochina. Japan’s greatest concern was the U.S. Pacific fleet based in Pearl Harbor. They thought it could foil their plans. As insurance, the Japanese navy surprised America with an air attack. On December 7, 1941, the Japanese bombed the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. This was the turning point for America. -
Wannsee Conference
15 high-ranking Nazi Party and German government officials gathered in Wannsee to discuss the use of what they called the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." The “Final Solution” was a deliberate physical annihilation of the European Jews. SS General Reinhard Heydrich indicated that approximately 11,000,000 Jews in Europe would fall under the provisions of the "Final Solution” in labor camps or through natural reduction. -
Battle of Stalingrad
Stalingrad was an important target for their oil fields in the Caucasus. In early September 1942, the German army advanced into the city. The Germans took a great deal of the city during the day, but at night, the Russians regained it. The bulk of the Russian army (lead by Zhukov) was in the city. Zhukov, with his men around the city, had trapped the German. Hitler ordered them to stay; therefore, the Germans had to face the winter. Resources were scarce. The Germans surrendered. -
Allied Invasion of Africa
The military forces of the U.S. and the U.K. launched an attack against French North Africa. The U.S.-British landings at Algiers were met by little French resistance. The simultaneous landings near Oran met stiffer resistance, and on November 9 the whole U.S. plan of operations was dislocated by a French counterattack. Soon the fighting was called off; and the next day the French authorities concluded an armistice with the Americans. This operation inevitably postponed the landing in France. -
Operation Gomorrah
British bombers raid Hamburg, Germany, while Americans bomb it by day. British aircrafts drops 2,300 tons of bombs on Hamburg in just a few hours. The raids continued all throughout November, but the number of British bombers lost increased with each raid. Operation Gomorrah was devastating to Hamburg. More than 30,000 people were killed and 280,000 buildings were destroyed. The effect on Hitler, too, was significant. He refused to visit the burned-out cities. -
Normandy Invasion
The Western Allies landed in northern France, opening the long-awaited "Second Front" against Adolf Hitler's Germany. Though they had been fighting in mainland Italy for some nine months, the Normandy invasion was in a strategically more important region. Hundreds of ships and crafts crossed the English Channel behind dozens of minesweepers. They arrived off the beaches before dawn. Three divisions of paratroopers (two American, one British) had already been dropped inland. -
Normandy Invasion pt2
Soldiers of six divisions stormed ashore in five areas. After fighting hard, a foothold was well established. With the Soviets advancing from the east, Hitler's armies were shoved back toward their homeland. The Second World War had entered its climactic phase. -
Battle of the Bulge pt2
On December 16, three German armies (more than a quarter-million troops) launched the deadliest and most desperate battle of the war in the west in the poorly roaded, rugged, heavily forested Ardennes. As the German armies drove deeper into the Ardennes in an attempt to secure vital bridgeheads west of the River Meuse quickly, the line defining the Allied front took on the appearance of a large protrusion or bulge. -
Battle of the Bulge pt3
A crucial German shortage of fuel and the gallantry of American troops fighting in the frozen forests of the Ardennes proved fatal to Hitler's ambition to snatch, if not victory, at least a draw with the Allies in the west. -
Battle of the Bulge
In December 1944, in an all-out gamble to compel the Allies to sue for peace, Adolf Hitler ordered the only major German counteroffensive of the war in northwest Europe. Its objective was to split the Allied armies by means of a surprise blitzkrieg from the Ardennes to Antwerp, marking a repeat of what the Germans had done three times previously. -
Liberation of Concentration Camps
As Allied troops moved across Europe in a series of offensives against Nazi Germany, they began to encounter tens of thousands of concentration camp prisoners. Soviet forces were the first to approach a major Nazi camp. Surprised by the rapid advance, the Germans attempted to hide the evidence of mass murder by setting the camp on fire. On April 11, 1945, U.S. forces liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp. More than 20,000 prisoners were freed. -
Liberation of Concentration Camps pt2
Only after the liberation of these camps was the full scope of Nazi horrors exposed to the world. The small percentage of inmates who survived resembled skeletons because of the demands of forced labor and the lack of food, compounded by months and years of maltreatment. -
VE Day
VE day officially announced the end of World War 2 in Europe. This is the day German troops throughout Europe finally laid down their arms: In Prague, Germans surrendered to their Soviet antagonists, after the latter had lost more than 8,000 soldiers and the Germans considerably more. The main concern of German soldiers was to elude from being taken prisoner, but the Russians took approximately 2 million prisoners in the period just before and after the German surrender. -
VE Day pt2
Meanwhile, more than 13,000 British POWs were released and sent back to Great Britain.
