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Japan invades Manchuria
The Japanese invasion of Manchuria began on 18 September 1931, when the Kwantung Army of the Empire of Japan invaded Manchuria immediately following the Mukden Incident. After the war, the Japanese established the puppet state of Manchukuo. -
Night of the Long Knives
The Night of the Long Knives, or the Röhm Purge, also called Operation Hummingbird, was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from June 30 to July 2, 1934 -
Italy invades Ethiopia
The Second Italo-Ethiopian War, also referred to as the Second Italo-Abyssinian War, was a colonial war fought from 3 October 1935 until 5 May 1936. The war was fought between the armed forces of the Kingdom of Italy and those of the Ethiopian Empire. -
Anschluss
Anschluss refers to the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany on 12 March 1938. The word's German spelling, until the German orthography reform of 1996, was Anschluß and it was also known as the Anschluss Österreichs. -
Appeasement (Chamberlain)
Appeasement, the policy of making concessions to the dictatorial powers in order to avoid conflict, governed Anglo-French foreign policy during the 1930s. It became indelibly associated with Conservative Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. -
Kristallnacht
Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November Pogrom, was a pogrom against Jews carried out by SA paramilitary forces and civilians throughout Nazi Germany on 9–10 November 1938. The German authorities looked on without intervening. -
Non Aggression Pact
A non-aggression pact or neutrality pact is a treaty between two or more states/countries that includes a promise by the signatories not to engage in military action against each other. -
Germany invades Poland
The invasion of Poland marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union. The Soviets invaded Poland on 17 September. -
Final Solution
the Nazi policy of exterminating European Jews. Introduced by Heinrich Himmler and administered by Adolf Eichmann, the policy resulted in the murder of 6 million Jews in concentration camps between 1941 and 1945. -
France surrenders to Germany
On This Day: France Surrenders to Nazi Germany. On June 22, 1940, the French government signed an armistice with Nazi Germany just six weeks after the Nazis launched their invasion of Western Europe. -
Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain was a military campaign of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force defended the United Kingdom against large-scale attacks by Nazi Germany's air force, the Luftwaffe. It has been described as the first major military campaign fought entirely by air forces. -
Japan Bombs Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise preemptive military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii on Sunday morning, December 7, 1941. The attack led to the United States' formal entry into World War II the next day. -
Battle of Stalingrad
The Battle of Stalingrad was the largest confrontation of World War II, in which Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in Southern Russia. -
Battle Of Midway
The Battle of Midway was a decisive naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II that took place between 4 and 7 June 1942, six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea. -
D-Day
the day in World War II on which Allied forces invaded northern France by means of beach landings in Normandy. -
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Counteroffensive, was the last major German offensive campaign on the Western Front during World War II and took place from 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945. -
Liberation of Auschwitz
January 2015 marks seventy years since the liberation of Auschwitz, the largest camp established by the Germans. A complex of camps, Auschwitz included a concentration camp, killing center, and forced-labor camps. It was located 37 miles west of Krakow (Cracow), near the prewar German-Polish border. -
V-E Day
the day (May 8) marking the Allied victory in Europe in 1945. -
Hiroshima & Nagasaki
The United States detonated two nuclear weapons over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, 1945, respectively, with the consent of the United Kingdom, as required by the Quebec Agreement. -
V-J Day
Victory over Japan Day is the day on which Imperial Japan surrendered in World War II, in effect bringing the war to an end.
