World War II Overview
In 1939 German Dictator Adolf Hitler had signed a pact with Soviet Dictator Joseph Stalin known as the non-aggression pact. This pact publicly stated that both Germany and the Soviet Union would not attack each other. However, Hitler and Stalin secretly agreed to divide Poland between the two of them and allow the USSR to take Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Now that Hitler had lost all threat from the Soviet powers, he was able to center his attention to his attack on Poland.
On September 1, 1939 Hitler attacked Poland by surprise, sending in War planes, tanks, and over 1.5 million soldiers. The war planes mercilessly dropped bombs over Poland and later over its capital city Warsaw, as German tanks roared along the border. Poland soon fell, and was now under German control. This was Hitlers first attempt at his new military strategy known as the blitzkrieg, in which he would send war airplanes, tanks and a large number of infantry forces to try and quickly take his enemy by surprise. Soon after the Germans had taken over Poland, on September 3, both France and Great Britain declared war on Germany. After Hitler's victory he annexed the Western half of Poland, and Stalin had sent in his Soviet troops to take over the Eastern half of Poland. Stalin also later sent his troops to begin annexing the other countries involved in the secret agreement; Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Finland. The Baltic countries (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) fell easily, but Finland was a challenge for the Soviets. The Soviets struggled with climate issues, but eventually was able to defeat the Finns in March of 1940. French and British armies had mobilized and stationed along the Maginot Line, which was located along the French and German border. While stationed there, the French and British waited for the Germans to attack, but nothing happened. The Germans and their enemies stared back and forth at each other from a few miles a way, without attack, giving this battle the name, the phony war. The phony war suddenly ended on April 9, 1940, when Hitler invaded Denmark and Norway in attempt to build bases along the Danish and Norwegian coasts. This would help in his later plans to strike Great Britain. Only a few hours after the attack Denmark fell, and two months later Norway fell. Hitler swept through Europe, passing through Luxembourg, Belgium and Holland, and soon reached France by sneaking over the Maginot Line. The Germans then joined forces with German troops in Belgium, and they were easily able to conquer Belgium. Some allies were able to escape to Dunkirk, where Great Britain came to their rescue by saving 338,000 escaped allies. Then on June 10, Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini joined forces with Hitler and helped him in his attempts to defeat France and Great Britain. France was attacked from the south by the Italians who then had lost Paris on June 14. On June 22, 1940, the French surrendered. Now it was time for Hitler to attack Great Britain, who now stood alone against the Nazi's after the loss of France. Hitler had planned to attack the Royal Air Force and then place 2,500 troops along the shores of England. This plan was called, Operation Sea Lion. The Royal Air Forces were outnumbered by the Luftwaffe with over 2,000 planes. Then starting on September 7, 1940 the Germans began focussing on the cities, and mainly focused on the city of London. Bombs went off daily in the town killing civilians and destroying buildings, but the British still fought. Two weapons during this time helped keep the British strong, the first weapon was radar and the second was Enigma. Radar allowed the British to know when where each plane was coming from, as well as the speed of the plane. The enigma allowed the British to read secret German messages. With these two weapons on Great Britain's side, it would be a much harder victory for the Germans then expected. The Battle of Britain ended on May 10, 1941 when Hitler called off all attacks, stunned by British resistance. He wasn't done with Great Britain, but had now turned his attention to the Mediterranean and the Balkans. Germany's most important Axis ally, Italy, Sent troops into Northern Africa in attempt to take over British controlled Egypt. The Italians failed horribly and the British had taken 130,000 Italian prisoners. Hitler later sent General Erwin Rommel, to try and help his Axis ally. The battle went back and forth between the Germans and the British, but eventually Germany took over Tobruk. This was a devastating loss for the allies. Hitler then moved to the Balkans where he got Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary to join the Axis powers, but Yugoslavia and Greece wouldn't cooperate. Hitler then invaded both countries and both surrendered. Now with the Balkans under Hitlers power he was ready to shockingly attack the Soviet Union who he had earlier signed a non-aggression pact with. The Germans began by attacking Leningrad which refused to fall, so Germany then attempted to attack Moscow. But Germans had to retreat because of the drop in temperature. President Roosevelt of the United States did not want to join another world war after the tragedies of the first, but had realized if the allies were defeated he would have to join. He then got congress to pass the Lend Lease Act, passed in March of 1941,which allowed him to supply his allies with weapons to help their war effort. As well President Roosevelt and Churchill signed the Atlantic Charter which allowed for free trade. Then on December 7th all plans changed for the United States staying out of the war when the Japanese unexpectedly bombed Pearl Harbor.
Japan wanted to build an empire, and began expanding in 1931. Japan wanted to gain control of China and the rich European colonies of Southeast Asia. The United States found out about these Japanese plans and were worried that Japan could also be threat to the U.S. controlled Philippine Islands and Guam. In order to stop chances of Japanese advance, the United States sent aid to China to help build Chinese resistance, Roosevelt also cut off oil shipments to Japan in 1941. Isoroku Yamamoto, a great Japanese naval strategist, wanted the U.S. fleet in Hawaii to be destroyed because he saw it as a threat. Then on December 7, 1941 American sailors at Pearl Harbor were attacked. Bombs exploded, killing 2,400 Americans, and injuring over 1,000 of them. The next day the Americans declared war on Japan. After this attack the Japanese received Guam and Wake Island and soon after had taken over 1 million square miles of land. The Japanese were on a roll until their first big defeat in The Battle of Midway. The Japanese had targeted Midway Island and was sending in 150 ships to take over. The United States were able intercept this Japanese code and were aware of the Japanese’s planes to conquer Midway. Nimitz sent American carrier planes to attack the Japanese ships coming into the island, and destroyed 332 Japanese planes, all of their air carriers and even their one Support ship. Yamamoto ordered his fleet to withdraw and on June 6, 1942, America had their revenge from Pearl Harbor. Then American General Douglas MacArthur came up with a plan to take down the powerful Japanese. He wanted to focus more on the less defensive Japanese Islands rather than their strong islands. The United States then invaded the Guadalcanal which was located in the Solomon Islands and was able again to defeat the Japanese, killing more than half of the Japanese men sent into battle. As Japan army slowly deteriorated, Hitler was deciding on what to do about his idea on the perfect race.
During 1933 Germany became very anti-Semitic and passed the Nuremberg Laws, which stripped jews of their property, rights to German citizenship, and jobs. Germans used every excuse they could possibly get to inflict terror on the jews, and in November of 1938 a seventeen year old jewish boy shot an employee of the German embassy, because his dad was deported after living in Germany for 27 years. The Germans used this incident as an excuse to go around and storm jewish homes, business's and synagogues. This night was remembered as the night as "the night of broken glass", because of all the glass the crowded the streets from the broken jewish shop windows. Many jews fled from Germany, because of all the anti-Semitic laws and punishment they faced, however many still remained in Germany. Hitler realized that he would not be able to rid Germany of all jews by emigration, so he forced jews to move into certain cities in Poland which were called ghettoes. The ghettoes were sealed off with stone walls and barbed wire, and Hitler planned on letting the jews starve to death while in the ghettoes. Hitler had become impatient waiting for the jews to starve and came up with the final solution, which was genocide. Hitler sent SS Units to round up jews and they would shoot them into pits. Jews that lived in communities that the SS Units wouldn't cover were sent to concentration camps, where the jews would work every day and were hardly fed. The Nazi 's equipped their concentration camps with gas chambers, which could exterminate up to 6,000 humans in a day. Over 6 million Jews died in concentration camps and the survivors lives were changed forever.
On December 22, 1941, Winston Churchill, President Roosevelt, and Stalin all discussed how they would defeat Germany. They had planned to weaken Germany on two fronts before their final attack. They had first planned to attack Germany in North Africa, and when they sent Bernard Montgomery to regain the city of Tobruk, they were successful. The Germans advanced to a village in Egypt called El Alamein. Montgomery then launched the Battle of El Alamein, where the British took the Germans by surprise firing over 1,700 British guns. Then on November 3, Rommel and his army were defeated and fell westward. The allies then launched operation torch led by Dwight D. Eisenhower, where they sent troops into Morocco and Algeria. After this attack Rommel and the Afrika Korps was destroyed. While Rommel suffered in his battles in Africa Hitler attacked the Soviet Union for the second time, Germany tried to take Stalingrad. The Battle of Stalingrad began with the Luftwaffe bombing the city, and by November 1942 Germans controlled the 90% of the city. Then, a counterattack was launched by the Soviets outside of the city. They had trapped the Germans inside of Stalingrad and cut off all of their supplies, resulting in 900,000 frostbitten and starved German troops who were forced to surrender to the Soviets. Although the Soviets didn't lose Stalingrad, 99% of it was destroyed. Next the Allies wanted to invade France and Italy, Roosevelt and Churchill made the decision to invade Italy first. On July 10, 1943, the allies captured Sicily from the German and Italian troops. The loss of Sicily cost Mussolini his role as dictator of Italy, and Italy surrendered. Hitler then was able to take back control of Northern Italy and put Mussolini back into power. On June 4, the allies entered Rome and defeated the Germans, who retreated Northward with Mussolini disguised as a German Soldier. Mussolini was later captured, shot and hung in the streets of Milan. The allies were close to victory in Europe and on May 1944 and Set up a fake army to attract attention to the French Seaport Calais, while the real threat was operation overlord (the invasion of Normandy) . This historic battle was won by the allies and was called D-Day. The allies after this incredible victory were also able to liberate the majority of Luxembourg, Netherlands, France and Belgium. Hitlers last attempt for success was the Battle of the Bulge, where he tried to break through the allied lines. Eventually the Allies pushed Germany back and won. The allies then attacked Germany and with the Axis powers destined to lose, Hitler and his wife committed suicide, resulting in the surrender of the Nazi's and the end of the war in Europe (V.E Day). Although the war was over in Europe their were still tensions between the allies and Japan. This all ended when President Truman came to power and dropped an atomic bomb over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 killing about 73,00 people. He then 3 days later dropped another atomic bomb on August 9 on Nagasaki killing approximately 37,000 people. The Japanese could not move on any longer after these two tragedies and surrendered on September 2 (V.J Day). The war was over and the allies were victorious in their second world war.
On September 1, 1939 Hitler attacked Poland by surprise, sending in War planes, tanks, and over 1.5 million soldiers. The war planes mercilessly dropped bombs over Poland and later over its capital city Warsaw, as German tanks roared along the border. Poland soon fell, and was now under German control. This was Hitlers first attempt at his new military strategy known as the blitzkrieg, in which he would send war airplanes, tanks and a large number of infantry forces to try and quickly take his enemy by surprise. Soon after the Germans had taken over Poland, on September 3, both France and Great Britain declared war on Germany. After Hitler's victory he annexed the Western half of Poland, and Stalin had sent in his Soviet troops to take over the Eastern half of Poland. Stalin also later sent his troops to begin annexing the other countries involved in the secret agreement; Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Finland. The Baltic countries (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) fell easily, but Finland was a challenge for the Soviets. The Soviets struggled with climate issues, but eventually was able to defeat the Finns in March of 1940. French and British armies had mobilized and stationed along the Maginot Line, which was located along the French and German border. While stationed there, the French and British waited for the Germans to attack, but nothing happened. The Germans and their enemies stared back and forth at each other from a few miles a way, without attack, giving this battle the name, the phony war. The phony war suddenly ended on April 9, 1940, when Hitler invaded Denmark and Norway in attempt to build bases along the Danish and Norwegian coasts. This would help in his later plans to strike Great Britain. Only a few hours after the attack Denmark fell, and two months later Norway fell. Hitler swept through Europe, passing through Luxembourg, Belgium and Holland, and soon reached France by sneaking over the Maginot Line. The Germans then joined forces with German troops in Belgium, and they were easily able to conquer Belgium. Some allies were able to escape to Dunkirk, where Great Britain came to their rescue by saving 338,000 escaped allies. Then on June 10, Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini joined forces with Hitler and helped him in his attempts to defeat France and Great Britain. France was attacked from the south by the Italians who then had lost Paris on June 14. On June 22, 1940, the French surrendered. Now it was time for Hitler to attack Great Britain, who now stood alone against the Nazi's after the loss of France. Hitler had planned to attack the Royal Air Force and then place 2,500 troops along the shores of England. This plan was called, Operation Sea Lion. The Royal Air Forces were outnumbered by the Luftwaffe with over 2,000 planes. Then starting on September 7, 1940 the Germans began focussing on the cities, and mainly focused on the city of London. Bombs went off daily in the town killing civilians and destroying buildings, but the British still fought. Two weapons during this time helped keep the British strong, the first weapon was radar and the second was Enigma. Radar allowed the British to know when where each plane was coming from, as well as the speed of the plane. The enigma allowed the British to read secret German messages. With these two weapons on Great Britain's side, it would be a much harder victory for the Germans then expected. The Battle of Britain ended on May 10, 1941 when Hitler called off all attacks, stunned by British resistance. He wasn't done with Great Britain, but had now turned his attention to the Mediterranean and the Balkans. Germany's most important Axis ally, Italy, Sent troops into Northern Africa in attempt to take over British controlled Egypt. The Italians failed horribly and the British had taken 130,000 Italian prisoners. Hitler later sent General Erwin Rommel, to try and help his Axis ally. The battle went back and forth between the Germans and the British, but eventually Germany took over Tobruk. This was a devastating loss for the allies. Hitler then moved to the Balkans where he got Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary to join the Axis powers, but Yugoslavia and Greece wouldn't cooperate. Hitler then invaded both countries and both surrendered. Now with the Balkans under Hitlers power he was ready to shockingly attack the Soviet Union who he had earlier signed a non-aggression pact with. The Germans began by attacking Leningrad which refused to fall, so Germany then attempted to attack Moscow. But Germans had to retreat because of the drop in temperature. President Roosevelt of the United States did not want to join another world war after the tragedies of the first, but had realized if the allies were defeated he would have to join. He then got congress to pass the Lend Lease Act, passed in March of 1941,which allowed him to supply his allies with weapons to help their war effort. As well President Roosevelt and Churchill signed the Atlantic Charter which allowed for free trade. Then on December 7th all plans changed for the United States staying out of the war when the Japanese unexpectedly bombed Pearl Harbor.
Japan wanted to build an empire, and began expanding in 1931. Japan wanted to gain control of China and the rich European colonies of Southeast Asia. The United States found out about these Japanese plans and were worried that Japan could also be threat to the U.S. controlled Philippine Islands and Guam. In order to stop chances of Japanese advance, the United States sent aid to China to help build Chinese resistance, Roosevelt also cut off oil shipments to Japan in 1941. Isoroku Yamamoto, a great Japanese naval strategist, wanted the U.S. fleet in Hawaii to be destroyed because he saw it as a threat. Then on December 7, 1941 American sailors at Pearl Harbor were attacked. Bombs exploded, killing 2,400 Americans, and injuring over 1,000 of them. The next day the Americans declared war on Japan. After this attack the Japanese received Guam and Wake Island and soon after had taken over 1 million square miles of land. The Japanese were on a roll until their first big defeat in The Battle of Midway. The Japanese had targeted Midway Island and was sending in 150 ships to take over. The United States were able intercept this Japanese code and were aware of the Japanese’s planes to conquer Midway. Nimitz sent American carrier planes to attack the Japanese ships coming into the island, and destroyed 332 Japanese planes, all of their air carriers and even their one Support ship. Yamamoto ordered his fleet to withdraw and on June 6, 1942, America had their revenge from Pearl Harbor. Then American General Douglas MacArthur came up with a plan to take down the powerful Japanese. He wanted to focus more on the less defensive Japanese Islands rather than their strong islands. The United States then invaded the Guadalcanal which was located in the Solomon Islands and was able again to defeat the Japanese, killing more than half of the Japanese men sent into battle. As Japan army slowly deteriorated, Hitler was deciding on what to do about his idea on the perfect race.
During 1933 Germany became very anti-Semitic and passed the Nuremberg Laws, which stripped jews of their property, rights to German citizenship, and jobs. Germans used every excuse they could possibly get to inflict terror on the jews, and in November of 1938 a seventeen year old jewish boy shot an employee of the German embassy, because his dad was deported after living in Germany for 27 years. The Germans used this incident as an excuse to go around and storm jewish homes, business's and synagogues. This night was remembered as the night as "the night of broken glass", because of all the glass the crowded the streets from the broken jewish shop windows. Many jews fled from Germany, because of all the anti-Semitic laws and punishment they faced, however many still remained in Germany. Hitler realized that he would not be able to rid Germany of all jews by emigration, so he forced jews to move into certain cities in Poland which were called ghettoes. The ghettoes were sealed off with stone walls and barbed wire, and Hitler planned on letting the jews starve to death while in the ghettoes. Hitler had become impatient waiting for the jews to starve and came up with the final solution, which was genocide. Hitler sent SS Units to round up jews and they would shoot them into pits. Jews that lived in communities that the SS Units wouldn't cover were sent to concentration camps, where the jews would work every day and were hardly fed. The Nazi 's equipped their concentration camps with gas chambers, which could exterminate up to 6,000 humans in a day. Over 6 million Jews died in concentration camps and the survivors lives were changed forever.
On December 22, 1941, Winston Churchill, President Roosevelt, and Stalin all discussed how they would defeat Germany. They had planned to weaken Germany on two fronts before their final attack. They had first planned to attack Germany in North Africa, and when they sent Bernard Montgomery to regain the city of Tobruk, they were successful. The Germans advanced to a village in Egypt called El Alamein. Montgomery then launched the Battle of El Alamein, where the British took the Germans by surprise firing over 1,700 British guns. Then on November 3, Rommel and his army were defeated and fell westward. The allies then launched operation torch led by Dwight D. Eisenhower, where they sent troops into Morocco and Algeria. After this attack Rommel and the Afrika Korps was destroyed. While Rommel suffered in his battles in Africa Hitler attacked the Soviet Union for the second time, Germany tried to take Stalingrad. The Battle of Stalingrad began with the Luftwaffe bombing the city, and by November 1942 Germans controlled the 90% of the city. Then, a counterattack was launched by the Soviets outside of the city. They had trapped the Germans inside of Stalingrad and cut off all of their supplies, resulting in 900,000 frostbitten and starved German troops who were forced to surrender to the Soviets. Although the Soviets didn't lose Stalingrad, 99% of it was destroyed. Next the Allies wanted to invade France and Italy, Roosevelt and Churchill made the decision to invade Italy first. On July 10, 1943, the allies captured Sicily from the German and Italian troops. The loss of Sicily cost Mussolini his role as dictator of Italy, and Italy surrendered. Hitler then was able to take back control of Northern Italy and put Mussolini back into power. On June 4, the allies entered Rome and defeated the Germans, who retreated Northward with Mussolini disguised as a German Soldier. Mussolini was later captured, shot and hung in the streets of Milan. The allies were close to victory in Europe and on May 1944 and Set up a fake army to attract attention to the French Seaport Calais, while the real threat was operation overlord (the invasion of Normandy) . This historic battle was won by the allies and was called D-Day. The allies after this incredible victory were also able to liberate the majority of Luxembourg, Netherlands, France and Belgium. Hitlers last attempt for success was the Battle of the Bulge, where he tried to break through the allied lines. Eventually the Allies pushed Germany back and won. The allies then attacked Germany and with the Axis powers destined to lose, Hitler and his wife committed suicide, resulting in the surrender of the Nazi's and the end of the war in Europe (V.E Day). Although the war was over in Europe their were still tensions between the allies and Japan. This all ended when President Truman came to power and dropped an atomic bomb over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 killing about 73,00 people. He then 3 days later dropped another atomic bomb on August 9 on Nagasaki killing approximately 37,000 people. The Japanese could not move on any longer after these two tragedies and surrendered on September 2 (V.J Day). The war was over and the allies were victorious in their second world war.