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Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev was the Soviet Unions first president of the Soviet Union and was elected in 1990. -
Japan's Invasion of China
The Japanese army launched a full scale invasion on China in 1937 after they claimed that Chinese troops fired on them at the Marco Polo Bridge near Beijing. The Japanese eventually surrendered in August 1945 but the invasion left 4 million Chinese dead and 60 million homeless. -
Germany invades Poland
On September 1st, 1939 Germany invaded Poland from land and from the air and ultimately this was the event that began WW2. This invasion was also the primer for Hitler's "blitzkrieg" strategy. -
Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain began with the Germans begining a long series of bombing runs against the British which lasted appoximately three and a half months. When it was all over the British successfully defended Britian from German control. -
Tripartite Pact
The Tripartite Pact was the agreement signed in September 27th, 1940 in Berlin which formed the Axis powers of Italy, Germany, and Japan. -
Lend-Lease Act
The Lend Lease Act provided the means of why the U.S military should provide military aid to foriegn countries in WW2. It also allowed for the president to transfer arms to any country that needed them provided that by giving that country arms it would benefit the U.S. -
German Blitzkrieg on the Soviet Union
On June 22nd, 1941 Germany invaded the Soviet Union under the codename "Barbarossa". Even though the German push was intially successful, they didn't expect for it to last as long as it did and when winter came the Germans were unprepared and the Soviets were able to drive them back into Moscow. -
Leningrad Blockade
The Leningrad Blockade was also known as the Siege of Leningrad and it lasted 900 days. The city was surrounded by German troops but the citizens refused to surrounder and the life in the city was harsh as the food supplies were minimum -
Bombing of Pearl Harbor
On December 7th, 1941 hundreds of Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor which was a American naval base in Hawaii. During this attack the Japanese destroyed 20 naval vessels, almost 200 airplanes, and killed 2,000 American soldiers and sailors. -
Wannsee Conference
The Wannsee Conference was a meeting of high ranking Nazi officials to discuss what they called "Final Solution of the Jewish Question". -
Battle of Midway
After the Japanese bombed the U.S military base at Midway then U.S then attacked the Japanese carriers around the base forcing the Japanese to bring all carriers back to Japan. -
D-Day
On June 6th, 1944 the Allied forces launched an attack on Normindy, France. The attack was eventually successful although there was over 2,000 American causalties when they stormed the beach. -
Hitler's Suicide
On this date Adolf Hitler commited suicide when he was infomed that the Allies were about a day away from capturing the chancellory where he was hiding out. It was believed that he consumed cyanide and also shot himself with a service pistol -
Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference took place in a Russian Resort town from February 4 to February 11 in 1945. At this conference President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Premier Joseph Stalin discussed the progress of the war. -
Iwo Jima/Okinawa
By February in 1945 the U.S only had two islands remaining before they had a chance to invade Japan and those islands were Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The Allies were victorious at both islands although it came with a large price almost 19,000 allied soldiers died and thousands more were wounded -
VE Day
VE Day was also known as Victory in Europe Day and it was the day in which the German troops layed down their weapons and the war in Europe was over. -
Potsdam Conference
A conference in Potsdam, Germany from July 17 to August 2 with Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin, and Harry Truman to negotiate terms for the end of the war. -
Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
The United States droppped the first atomic bombs the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing 70,000 Japanese citizens immediately on impact and 70,000 from radiation poisoning in the next 5 years. -
VJ Day
VJ Day also known as Victoryover Japan Day was the day in which Japan officially surrendered to the U.S. -
Formation of the U.N
The U.N was established when 26 nations fighting the Axis powers met in Washington to discuss and alliance which ended up being the United Nations. -
Truman Doctrine
On March 12th, 1947 President Truman delivered a speech to convince congress to aid Greece and Turkey. The man point of his speech was that if Greece and Turkey didn't get the aid they needed they would fall to communism. -
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was also known as the European Recovery Program and its main idea was to channel money into Europe to refinance their economy. -
NATO
NATO was a treaty signed by 12 Western nations to provide a collective defense against the Soviet agression -
Mao Zedong and the People's Republic of China
Mao Zedong announced the People's Republic of China which caused an immediate civil war between the Nationalist party and the Communist Party. -
Korean War
The Korean War began when the North Korean's People army poured into the Western Republic of Korea. -
Stalin's death; Khrushchev
Joseph Stalin died on March 5th, 1953 from a massive heart attack which lead to Nikita Khrushchev becoming the leader of Russia. Khrushchev began a large movement to destalinize Russia, -
Warsaw Pact
The Warsaw Pact was a treaty in which the Soviet Union and 7 of its allies signed in Warsaw, Poland. The treaty stated that if any of the countries in the treaty was attacked the other countries would fight for that country. -
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a war between the Republic of South Vietnam against the North Vietnam Army. This caused unrest in the U.S because the U.S joined the fight for the Republic of South Vietnam. -
Sputnik
Sputnik was launched by the Soviet Union and was the first artificial satellite. Sputnik transmitted signals back to earth via radio waves and eventually burned up in the atmosphere in 1958. -
Bay of Pigs
On April 17th, 1961 about 1,200 Cuban men armed with American weapons waded ashore in the Bay of Pigs in Cuba in hopes of overthrowing Castro. This attack didn't work and many of these men were captured. -
Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was constructed in order to seperate East and West Berlin. The wall was eventually destroyed in November 1989. -
Cuban Missle Crisis
On this date President Kennedy announced to the public the presence of missles in Cuba. This announcement then lead to the building of bomb shelters and other defenses from these missiles. -
Soviet Union Falls
On Christmas 1991 the 11 Soviet republics met in Alma-Ata and decided that they were all going to break apart from the Soviet Union to form their own countries.
