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Holocaust
The Holocaust was the state-sponsored, systematic persecution and annihilation of European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators, between 1933 and 1945. Roma (Gypsies), physically and mentally disabled people and Poles were also targeted for destruction or decimation for racial, ethnic, or national reasons. Millions more, including homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war, and political dissidents also suffered grievous oppression and death under Nazi tyranny. -
USSR in WW1
Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union engaged in a cataclysmic struggle on World War II’s Eastern Front. The resulting war was one of the largest and deadliest military duels in all of human history, and ultimately turned the tables on the Nazi conquest of Europe. It was also a conflict marked by strategic blunders, mass atrocities and human suffering on a previously unimaginable scale. Explore eight facts about the brutal and often overlooked Russian front of World War II. -
Invasion of Poland
The Invasion of Poland in 1939 marked the start of World War II. It was led by the Nazis, a small contingent of Slovaks, and the Soviet Union. The invasion from Germany started on September 1, 1939 following the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, while the invasion from the Soviet Union started slightly later on September 17th. The campaign was short lived and ended on October 6, 1939 with the division of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union. -
German Blitzkrieg
The word blitzkrieg is German for 'lightning war.' It was a tactic that was based on speed and surprise. In order for it to work successfully, a military was constructed around tank units, air support, and soldiers. Blitzkrieg relied on a military force be based around light tank units supported by planes and infantry (foot soldiers). The tactic was based on Alfred von Schlieffen’s ‘Schlieffen Plan’. -
German Blitzkrieg
This was a doctrine formed during WWI that focused on quick military victory. It was later developed in Germany by an army officer called Heinz Guderian who looked at new technologies, namely dive bombers and light tanks, to improve the German army’s maneuverability. -
Auschwitz
In April 1940, Rudolph Höss, who become the first commandant of Auschwitz, identified the Silesian town of Oswiecim in Poland as a possible site for a concentration camp. The function of the camp initially was planned as an intimidation to Poles to prevent resistance their to German rule and serve as a prison for those who did resist. The first transport of prisoners, almost all Polish civilians, arrived in June 1940 and the SS administration and staff was established. -
Fall of Paris
The Battle of France began in 1940 and consisted of two operations. The first one was Case Yellow or Fall Gelb and is when the armored units of Germany cut off allied units which had advanced into the country of Belgium at the Ardennes. When the British and the French saw themselves pushed back by the operation, the British evacuated their BEF or British Expeditionary Force with other French divisions in Operation Dynamo. -
Wannsee
On January 20, 1942, a meeting was held in Wannsee, Reinhard Heydrich with the participation of 15 officials and representatives of the Reich authorities. At this meeting, the Reich Security Main Office coordinated the extermination plans regarding the relevant ministries and authorities. Heydrich spoke about the inclusion of 11,000,000 Jews in the Nazi program for the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.” -
Bataan Death March
The Bataan Death March was when the Japanese forced 76,000 captured Allied soldiers (Filipinos and Americans) to march about 80 miles across the Bataan Peninsula. The march took place in April of 1942 during World War II. After bombing Pearl Harbor, Japan quickly began to take over much of Southeast Asia. As the Japanese troops approached the Philippines, U.S. General Douglas MacArthur moved the U.S. forces from the city of Manila to the Bataan Peninsula. -
Battle of Midway
Japan’s Navy wanted to remove the U.S. out of the picture in the Pacific operations at Midway. Just like in their prior attack on Pearl Harbor that pushed the U.S. into war, the Battle of Midway was not part of a campaign for the take-over of America instead, it was geared at its removal as a strategic Pacific power in order to give Japan complete freedom to launch its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. On June 9th, two survivors were rescued from a sunken heavy Japanese cruiser Mikuma. -
Battle of Midway
Slightly over a week after, thirty five Japanese survivors who were members of the engineering department who had been left for dead were rescued by the seaplane tender USS Ballard AVD-10. -
Battle of Stalingrad
The Battle of Stalingrad, was the successful Soviet defense of the city of Stalingrad in the U.S.S.R. during World War II. Russians consider it to be the greatest battle of their Great Patriotic War. It stopped the German advance into the Soviet Union and marked the turning of the tide of war in favor of the Allies. The Battle of Stalingrad was one of the bloodiest battles in history, with combined military and civilian casualties of nearly 2 million. -
Allied invasion of Italy
The Allied Invasion of Italy was the Allied landing on mainland Italy on 3 September 1943, by General Harold Alexander's 15th Army Group during the Second World War. The operation followed the successful invasion of Sicily during the Italian Campaign. The main invasion force landed around Salerno on the western coast in Operation Avalanche, while two supporting operations took place in Calabria and Taranto. -
D-Day (Normandy Invasion)
The terms D-Day and H-Hour are used for the day and hour on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated.More than 160,000 Allied troops landed along a 50-mile stretch of heavily-fortified French coastline, to fight Nazi Germany on the beaches of Normandy, France. More than 5,000 Ships and 13,000 aircraft supported the D-Day invasion, and by the end, the Allies gained a a foot-hold in Continental Europe. -
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge (December 16, 1944–January 16, 1945), also known as the Ardennes Offensive, was the largest battle fought on the Western Front in Europe during World War II; it is also the largest battle ever fought by the United States Army. It was a German offensive intended to drive a wedge between the American and British armies in France and the Low Countries and recapture the port of Antwerp in The Netherlands to deny the Allies use of the port facilities. -
Dropping of the atomic bombs
On 6 August 1945 a US B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, instantly killing around 80,000 people. Three days later, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, causing the deaths of 40,000 more. The dropping of the bombs, which occurred by executive order of US President Harry Truman, remains the only nuclear attack in history. In the months following the attack, roughly 100,000 more people died slow, horrendous deaths as a result of radiation poisoning. -
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in WWII Veterans
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder estimates one of every 20 World War II veterans suffered symptoms such as bad dreams, irritability and flashbacks. According to Department of Veterans Affairs' statistics in 2004, 25, 000 World War II veterans were still receiving disability compensation for PTSD-related symptoms.
