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Germany Invades Poland
German forces bombard Poland on land and from the air, as Hitler seeks to regain lost territory and ultimately rule Poland. Although one million strong, the Polish forces were severely under-equipped and attempted to take the Germans head-on with horsed cavaliers in a forward concentration, rather than falling back to more natural defensive positions. Great Britain would respond with bombing raids over Germany three days later. -
Germany Invades France and Captures Paris
Parisians awaken to the sound of a German-accented voice announcing via loudspeakers that a curfew was being imposed for 8 p.m. that evening-as German troops enter and occupy Paris. By the time the United States could offer France aid, German tanks rolled into Paris, 2 million Parisians had already fled, with good reason. In short order, the German Gestapo went to work: arrests, interrogations, and spying were the order of the day, as a gigantic swastika flew beneath the Arc de Triomphe. -
Germany Bombs London, and the Battle of Britain Begins
Hitler, frustrated by the RAF's superiority over the Luftwaffe and enraged by its bombing of German cities, vowed to destroy the British capital and the spirit of its people. Almost 1,000 German aircraft - over 300 bombers escorted by 600 fighters - crossed the Channel. 430 civilians were killed and 1600 seriously injured. Firestorms ravaged the city, acting as beacons for the second wave of bombers that evening. Although no-one knew at the time, this was the beginning of the Blitz. -
Lend Lease Act
The Lend-Lease Act was the principal means for providing U.S. military aid to foreign nations during World War II. By allowing the transfer of supplies without compensation to Britain, China, the Soviet Union and other countries, the act permitted the United States to support its war interests without being overextended in battle. Lend-Lease brought the United States one step closer to entry into the war. Isolationists, such as Republican senator Robert Taft, opposed it. -
Germany Invades Soviet Union
Adolf Hitler launched his armies eastward in a massive invasion of the Soviet Union;three great army groups with over three million German soldiers, 150 divisions and three thousand tanks smashed across the frontier into Soviet territory. The invasion covered a front from the North Cape to the Black Sea, a distance of two thousand miles. Barbarossa was a turning point in WW2 for its failure forced Nazi Germany to fight a two-front war against a coalition possessing immensely superior resources. -
Japan Bombs Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise, but Japan and the United States had been edging toward war for decades. At about 8 a.m., Japanese planes filled the sky over Pearl Harbor. Bombs and bullets rained onto the vessels moored below. At 8:10, a 1,800-pound bomb smashed through the deck of the battleship USS Arizona and landed in her forward ammunition magazine. The ship exploded and sank with more than 1,000 men trapped inside. Next, Congress approved Roosevelt’s declaration of war on Japan. -
United States Declares War on Japan
On December 8, 1941, the United States Congress declared war on the Empire of Japan in response to that country's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor the prior day. It was formulated an hour after the Infamy Speech of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Japan had sent a message to the United States to its embassy in Washington earlier, but because of problems at the embassy in decoding the very long message, it was not delivered to the U.S. Secretary of State until after the Pearl Harbor attack. -
Germany Declares War on the United States
Adolf Hitler declares war on the United States, bringing America, which had been neutral, into the European conflict. He was convinced that the United States would soon beat him to the punch and declare war on Germany. The U.S. Navy was already attacking German U-boats, and Hitler despised Roosevelt for his repeated verbal attacks against his Nazi ideology. On December 11, the German charge d’affaires in Washington handed American Secretary of State Cordell Hull a copy of the declaration of war. -
Battle of Midway
Six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States defeated Japan in one of the most decisive naval battles of World War II. Thanks in part to major advances in code breaking, the United States was able to preempt and counter Japan’s planned ambush of its few remaining aircraft carriers, inflicting permanent damage on the Japanese Navy. An important turning point in the Pacific campaign, the victory allowed the United States and its allies to move into an offensive position. -
D-Day
Codenamed Operation Overlord, the battle began on June 6, 1944, also known as D-Day, when some 156,000 American, British and Canadian forces landed on five beaches along a 50-mile stretch of the coast of France’s Normandy region. Prior to D-Day, the Allies conducted a large-scale deception campaign designed to mislead the Germans about the intended invasion target. By late August 1944, all of northern France had been liberated, and by the following spring the Allies had defeated the Germans. -
United States drops 2 atomic bombs on Japan
n American B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more would later die of radiation exposure. Three days later, a second B-29 dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. Japan’s Emperor Hirohito announced his country’s unconditional surrender in World War II in a radio address on August 15.
