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Japanese Invasion of China
On December 13th, the first Japanese troops entered the city. Before they even arrived the word of what the troops had done on their way through China. Entire families were massacred, and even the elderly and infants were targeted for execution. Tens of thousands of women were raped. Bodies littered the streets for months after the attack. Determined to destroy the city, the Japanese looted and burned at least one-third of Nanking’s buildings. -
Rape of Nanking
The Japanese general Matsui ordered that the city of Nanking be destroyed to break the spirit of resistance by the Chinese. Much of the city was burned, and Japanese troops launched a campaign of atrocities against civilians. The Japanese butchered an estimated 150,000 male "war prisoners", killed 50,000 male civilians, and raped 20,000 women and girls of all ages, many of them were mutilated or killed in the process. General Matsui was found guilty of war crimes and then executed. -
Germany's Invasion of Poland
Adolf Hitler wanted to regain lost territory and ultimately rule Poland. The Germans bombed early on to destroy the enemy’s air capacity, railroads, communication lines, and munitions dumps, followed by a massive land invasion with overwhelming numbers of troops, tanks, and artillery. After the Germans had moved their way through the infantry came in and picked off any remaining resistance. Concentration camps were then installed for slave laborers and the exterminations of the civilians. -
German Blitzkrieg
The Blitzkrieg was a military tactic designed to create disorganization among enemy forces through the use of mobile forces and locally concentrated firepower. The success in execution resulted in short military campaigns, which preserves human lives and limits the expenditures of artillery. -
Fall Of Paris
German invasion of France and the Low Countries during the Second World War. In the six weeks from 10 May 1940, German forces defeated Allied forces by mobile operations and conquered France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, bringing land operations on the Western Front to an end until 6 June 1944. Italy entered the war on 10 June 1940 and invaded France over the Alps. -
Pearl Harbor
Hundreds of Japanese fighter planes descended on the base, they managed to destroy/damage nearly 20 American naval vessels, eight battleships, and over 300 airplanes. More than 2,400 Americans died in the attack, including civilians, and another 1,000 people were wounded. The day after the attack President Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war on Japan. -
Bataan Death March
The U.S.-Filipino army surrendered at Bataan. They were then rounded up and forced to march 65 miles from Mariveles, on the southern end of the Bataan Peninsula to San Fernando. It is believed that thousands of troops died because of the brutality of their captors, who starved and beat the marchers, and bayoneted those too weak to walk. Survivors were taken to prisoner-of-war camps, where thousands more died from disease, mistreatment and starvation. -
Warsaw Ghetto uprising
The Warsaw Ghetto uprising was a violent revolt that occurred during World War 2. Residents of the Jewish ghetto in Nazi-occupied Warsaw, Poland, staged the armed revolt to prevent deportations to Nazi-run extermination camps. The Warsaw uprising inspired other revolts in extermination camps and ghettos throughout German-occupied Eastern Europe. -
Allied Invasion of Italy
Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery begins the Allied invasion of the Italian peninsula, crossing the Strait of Messina from Sicily and landing at Calabria the “toe” of Italy. On the day of the landing, the Italian government secretly agreed to the Allies’ terms for surrender, but no public announcement was made until September 8. Italian dictator Benito Mussolini envisioned building Fascist Italy into a new Roman Empire. -
D-Day
On D-Day around 156,000 American, British and Canadian forces landed on 5 beaches along a 50-mile radius. Around 4,000 allied troops were killed, with thousands more wounded. The D-Day invasion began to turn the tide against the Nazi's. On May 8, 1945, the Allies formally accepted the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany. -
Battle of the Bulge
The objective of the Battle of the Bluge was to split the Allied armies by means of a surprise blitzkrieg thrust through the Ardennes to Antwerp. -
Liberation of concentration camps
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Operation Thunderclap
The plan envisaged a massive attack on Berlin that would cause 220,000 casualties with 110,000 killed, many of them key German personnel, which would shatter German morale. It was decided that it was unlikely to work. It was reconsidered in early 1945 to be implemented in coordination with a Soviet advance. It was again rejected as impractical, instead a number of coordinated smaller attacks against cities in the communications zone of the Eastern Front , were chosen. -
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima was an epic military campaign between U.S. Marines and the Imperial Army of Japan. American forces invaded the island on February 19, 1945, and the ensuing Battle of Iwo Jima lasted for five weeks. It's believed that all but 200 or so of the 21,000 Japanese forces on the island were killed, as were almost 7,000 Marines. -
Battle of Okinawa
The Battle of Okinawa was the last major battle of World War II. Easter Sunday, the Navy’s Fifth Fleet and more than 180,000 U.S. Army and U.S. Marine Corps troops descended on the Pacific island of Okinawa for a final push towards Japan. The U.S. knew if Okinawa fell, so would Japan. The Americans knew securing Okinawa’s airbases was critical to launching a successful Japanese invasion. -
VE Day
Great Britain and the United States celebrate Victory in Europe Day. Cities in both nations, as well as formerly occupied cities in Western Europe, put out flags and banners, rejoicing in the defeat of the Nazi war machine. On the 8th of May, 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. -
Dropping of the Atomic Bomb
In late July, President Harry Truman called for Japan’s surrender with the Potsdam Declaration. The declaration promised “prompt and utter destruction” if Japan did not surrender. On August 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped its first atomic bomb from a B-29 bomber plane called the Enola Gay on Japanese city of Hiroshima. It exploded with about 13 kilotons of force, leveling five square miles of the city and killing 80,000 people instantly. Tens of thousands more would later die from radiation exposure. -
VJ Day
On August 14, 1945, it was announced that Japan had surrendered unconditionally to the Allies, effectively ending World War II. Images from V-J Day celebrations around the United States and the world reflected the overwhelming sense of relief and exhilaration felt by citizens of Allied nations at the end of the long and bloody conflict.
