World War ii
European Theatre
In August of 1939, Hitler and Joseph Stalin signed a nonaggression pact in which they agreed not to go to war and to divide Poland. In September of ‘39 Germany’s army advanced quickly into Poland utilizing a strategy that would, by 1941, facilitate the German conquest of most of Europe - the blitzkrieg. In the blitzkrieg Germany airplanes and tanks advanced quickly surprising the enemy before they could mount an effective defense. A massive infantry force followed and secured German control of the territory. Britain and France declared war on Germany after the invasion of Poland but little happened until April of 1940 when Germany invaded Denmark and Norway. With this invasion, full scale war erupted in Europe.
German forces moved quickly, by 1941 all of continental Europe with the exception of the neutral countries of Sweden, Switzerland and Spain were under Axis control. Axis armies also controlled most of North Africa. While Britain remained free, the Nazi air force began a devastating bombing campaign of British infrastructure and cities. While the Battle of Britain was terrible for British civilians it was unsuccessful in forcing a British surrender. In May of 1941, Hitler called off the attacks deciding instead to focus on Eastern Europe. In June of 1941, Germany violated the non-aggression pact and invaded the Soviet Union.
Pacific Theatre
In the Pacific, the Japanese navy advanced quickly through the islands of the South Pacific. While the United States was officially neutral, it was aiding the Allies in Europe with war material through the Lend-Lease Act and attempting to slow the Japanese advance in the Pacific with an oil embargo. On December 7, 1941 the Japanese attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, bring the US into the war. The Japanese followed this attack with invasions that brought virtually all of Southeast Asia under their control.
Victory in Europe
The Allies focused on the defeat of the Axis powers in Europe first. Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union proved to be the first step in his defeat. The vastness of territory, massive manpower, and extreme cold gave the Soviets an advantage that allowed them to stop the German advance along a front that ran from Leningrad to Moscow to Stalingrad. By fall of 1942 the Axis powers of Europe faced defeats in North Africa and by the winter of ‘43 the Soviets began to push Axis armies back in the Battle of Stalingrad.
North Africa was liberated from Axis control in May and an Allied invasion of Italy began in July of 1943. In May of 1944, a massive force made up of British, American, Canadian and French troops landed on the coast of Normandy in France. This D-Day invasion surprised the Germans who expected the invasion to come 300 km to the northeast near the French port of Calais. From Normandy the Allies moved south and liberated Paris then turned east moving toward Germany. Meanwhile Soviet troops moved into Poland and Romania. The Allied advance from the west was slowed briefly by a German offensive in the Ardennes Forest leading to the Battle of the Bulge. But, by early spring of 1945 the Allies entered Germany from both the east and west and on May 7, 1945 Germany surrendered unconditionally. In the midst of this defeat, Hitler committed suicide in his underground bunker in Berlin.
Victory in Japan
Allied success in the Pacific came in May of 1942 at the Battle of Coral Sea where they stopped the Japanese advance to the south. In June the Allies stopped the Japanese advance east at the Battle of Midway. After Midway the Allies began an offensive against the Japanese using a strategy called island-hopping. The allies would bypass islands on which the Japanese had established extensive defenses and focus instead on poorly defended islands close to the Japanese mainland. While this strategy worked it was slow and brutal leading to many casualties on both sides. By the fall of 1944 the Japanese navy was severely weakened leaving Japan’s defense to the army. In desperation the Japanese deployed kamikaze pilots who flew suicide missions to crash bomb laden planes into American ships. American forces continued their advance toward the Japanese homeland, taking Iwo Jima in March 1945 and Okinawa in June. America advisors told President Truman that a land invasion of Japan would lead to massive causalities. Truman decided instead to use the recently developed atomic bomb. On July 26, 1945 President Truman issued the Potsdam Declaration in which he told Japan to surrender or face "prompt and utter destruction." Japan refused and on August 6, 1945 the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing more than 70,000 people. On August 9 the US dropped a second bomb on Nagasaki, killing 70,000 more. Japan surrendered on September 2, 1945.
Nazi Ideology
In Mein Kompf Hitler defined Nazi racial ideology. According to the Nazi party, the Germanic people of Europe were the only pure descendants of the ancient Aryans. Nazism argued that the success of the Aryans in spreading their language across Eurasia was proof of their superiority. Modern Germanic peoples inherited this superiority and as a result were entitled to become a master race.
Non-Aryan peoples were ranked. Some groups were considered tolerable, while groups like the Slavs were considered naturally inclined to slavery, the Roma were considered genetically criminal, and the Jews were considered dangerous. Germanic people who threatened the purity and security of the race were also viewed as a danger. Germans with severe congenital disabilities, mental illness, and criminal backgrounds were considered a pollutant to the German bloodline. Homosexuals were viewed as a threat to the virility of the race. Over the course of Nazi rule a variety of policies were put into action in response to these ideas.
Approximately 100,000 German men were arrested for homosexuality between 1933 and 1945. While most homosexuals were held in traditional prisons between 5,000 and 15,000 were interned in concentration camps where they were used as forced labor. Starting in 1934, 300,000 to 400,000 people were forced to undergo sterilization procedures either because of a disability or their ethnicity. Around 200,000 disabled and mentally ill Germans were executed between 1940 and 1942 during Nazi euthanasia programs. In the mid-1930s, Roma populations in Germany were corralled by police and forced into government camps. Around 1940 the Nazis began sending the Roma to concentration camps where they were used as forced labor, subjected to bizarre research by Nazi doctors or executed. By the end of the war, as many as 200,000 European Roma were dead. When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 they began to systematically execute Polish Catholic professionals, teachers, and government leaders. The Nazis believed that without leadership, the Polish people would easily submit to slavery. Approximately 3 million Polish Catholics were dead by the end of the war. Several thousand German and Austrian Jehovah's Witness were arrested in the late 1930s for refusing to swear loyalty to the state. Many of these Witnesses were subjected to forced labor in concentration camps, more than 1,000 died in these camps.
Holocaust
While the Nazis targeted many groups in the Holocaust, the Jewish population of Europe was targeted with particular fanaticism. Hitler exploited long held anti-Semitic feelings in Europe, arguing that the Jewish population was at fault for most of the country’s hardships including defeat in World War I and the financial crisis of the Great Depression. Hitler argued that Jewish people were dangerously clever and worked in collusion to exploit the non-Jewish population of Europe. When Hitler took power in the 1930s he planned to drive the Jewish population out of Germany. In 1935 the Nuremberg Laws revoked German citizenship from the Jewish population. Subsequent laws restricted Jewish business activities and tightly regulated financial transactions. Hitler and the Nazi Party hoped this would pressure the Jewish population to leave Germany, many did; but by 1940 most of the world refused to accept any more German Jewish immigrants. In November of 1938 Nazi party members systematically attacked Jewish owned property all over Germany. The windows of Jewish businesses, homes, and synagogues were smashed leading to the name Kristallnacht or the night of broken glass. The following year, Nazi party officials began forcing the Jewish population into walled ghettos in German and Polish cities. As the ghettos became overcrowded and the war raged on, Nazis built massive concentration camps in Germany and Poland where Jews from all over Europe were sent to work as slave laborers. In 1942, Nazi leadership decided to carry out the “final solution to the Jewish problem,” the systematic execution of the Jewish population of Europe. Before ‘42 Nazi SS units killed Jews with firing squads and mobile gas chambers in box trucks but these methods were deemed too slow. In 1942 massive complexes were built designed to kill and incinerate of up to 12,000 people per day. Most of these were in Poland. Inmates arrived from all over Europe, those deemed fit enough to work became slave labor, the weak were sent to gas chambers. By the end of the war 6,000,000 Jewish people were dead.
Tehran Conference
The first significant meeting between the leaders of Great Britain, the USSR, and the US took place in 1943 in the city of Tehran. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin discussed plans for the invasion of northern France and another Soviet offensive in the east. The Soviet Union agreed to join the war against Japan following the defeat of the Axis Powers in Europe.
Yalta Conference
Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin met again in February of 1945 in the Soviet resort town of Yalta. By this time, the allies were confident that the defeat of the European Axis Powers was within reach. At this conference the allies discussed the future of Germany, Austria and Eastern Europe. The allies agreed to divide Germany and Austria into four occupational zones, the Soviet Union, America, Britain or France would each take responsibility for one of the zones. The capital of Berlin would likewise be divided. The Soviet Union agreed to allow free elections in all of the Eastern European countries that it liberated from Nazi control. Further, the Allies agreed to the basic structure of the United Nations. The US, Britain, France, the Soviet Union and China would each be given a permanent seat on the Security Council and the power to veto any UN action. Stalin also reaffirmed the Soviet Union’s commitment to declare war on Japan.
Potsdam Conference
The final major meeting of the leaders of the US, Britain, and the Soviet Union was held in Potsdam, Germany in July of 1945 after the Nazi surrender. Roosevelt died in April of 1945 so he was replaced by Harry Truman and Churchill was replaced after an election by Clement Attlee. At this meeting the allies implemented their plans for the division of Germany into occupied zones and agreed to the demilitarization of Germany. Further they developed a plan to purge Nazi elements from German society with a system of courts (the Nuremberg Trials) designed to identify, try, and punish war criminals. However, Stalin reneged on his promise to allow free elections in Eastern Europe kicking off the Cold War. Britain, the US and China issued the Potsdam Declaration in which they threatened Japan with “prompt and utter destruction” if they did not surrender immediately.
In August of 1939, Hitler and Joseph Stalin signed a nonaggression pact in which they agreed not to go to war and to divide Poland. In September of ‘39 Germany’s army advanced quickly into Poland utilizing a strategy that would, by 1941, facilitate the German conquest of most of Europe - the blitzkrieg. In the blitzkrieg Germany airplanes and tanks advanced quickly surprising the enemy before they could mount an effective defense. A massive infantry force followed and secured German control of the territory. Britain and France declared war on Germany after the invasion of Poland but little happened until April of 1940 when Germany invaded Denmark and Norway. With this invasion, full scale war erupted in Europe.
German forces moved quickly, by 1941 all of continental Europe with the exception of the neutral countries of Sweden, Switzerland and Spain were under Axis control. Axis armies also controlled most of North Africa. While Britain remained free, the Nazi air force began a devastating bombing campaign of British infrastructure and cities. While the Battle of Britain was terrible for British civilians it was unsuccessful in forcing a British surrender. In May of 1941, Hitler called off the attacks deciding instead to focus on Eastern Europe. In June of 1941, Germany violated the non-aggression pact and invaded the Soviet Union.
Pacific Theatre
In the Pacific, the Japanese navy advanced quickly through the islands of the South Pacific. While the United States was officially neutral, it was aiding the Allies in Europe with war material through the Lend-Lease Act and attempting to slow the Japanese advance in the Pacific with an oil embargo. On December 7, 1941 the Japanese attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, bring the US into the war. The Japanese followed this attack with invasions that brought virtually all of Southeast Asia under their control.
Victory in Europe
The Allies focused on the defeat of the Axis powers in Europe first. Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union proved to be the first step in his defeat. The vastness of territory, massive manpower, and extreme cold gave the Soviets an advantage that allowed them to stop the German advance along a front that ran from Leningrad to Moscow to Stalingrad. By fall of 1942 the Axis powers of Europe faced defeats in North Africa and by the winter of ‘43 the Soviets began to push Axis armies back in the Battle of Stalingrad.
North Africa was liberated from Axis control in May and an Allied invasion of Italy began in July of 1943. In May of 1944, a massive force made up of British, American, Canadian and French troops landed on the coast of Normandy in France. This D-Day invasion surprised the Germans who expected the invasion to come 300 km to the northeast near the French port of Calais. From Normandy the Allies moved south and liberated Paris then turned east moving toward Germany. Meanwhile Soviet troops moved into Poland and Romania. The Allied advance from the west was slowed briefly by a German offensive in the Ardennes Forest leading to the Battle of the Bulge. But, by early spring of 1945 the Allies entered Germany from both the east and west and on May 7, 1945 Germany surrendered unconditionally. In the midst of this defeat, Hitler committed suicide in his underground bunker in Berlin.
Victory in Japan
Allied success in the Pacific came in May of 1942 at the Battle of Coral Sea where they stopped the Japanese advance to the south. In June the Allies stopped the Japanese advance east at the Battle of Midway. After Midway the Allies began an offensive against the Japanese using a strategy called island-hopping. The allies would bypass islands on which the Japanese had established extensive defenses and focus instead on poorly defended islands close to the Japanese mainland. While this strategy worked it was slow and brutal leading to many casualties on both sides. By the fall of 1944 the Japanese navy was severely weakened leaving Japan’s defense to the army. In desperation the Japanese deployed kamikaze pilots who flew suicide missions to crash bomb laden planes into American ships. American forces continued their advance toward the Japanese homeland, taking Iwo Jima in March 1945 and Okinawa in June. America advisors told President Truman that a land invasion of Japan would lead to massive causalities. Truman decided instead to use the recently developed atomic bomb. On July 26, 1945 President Truman issued the Potsdam Declaration in which he told Japan to surrender or face "prompt and utter destruction." Japan refused and on August 6, 1945 the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing more than 70,000 people. On August 9 the US dropped a second bomb on Nagasaki, killing 70,000 more. Japan surrendered on September 2, 1945.
Nazi Ideology
In Mein Kompf Hitler defined Nazi racial ideology. According to the Nazi party, the Germanic people of Europe were the only pure descendants of the ancient Aryans. Nazism argued that the success of the Aryans in spreading their language across Eurasia was proof of their superiority. Modern Germanic peoples inherited this superiority and as a result were entitled to become a master race.
Non-Aryan peoples were ranked. Some groups were considered tolerable, while groups like the Slavs were considered naturally inclined to slavery, the Roma were considered genetically criminal, and the Jews were considered dangerous. Germanic people who threatened the purity and security of the race were also viewed as a danger. Germans with severe congenital disabilities, mental illness, and criminal backgrounds were considered a pollutant to the German bloodline. Homosexuals were viewed as a threat to the virility of the race. Over the course of Nazi rule a variety of policies were put into action in response to these ideas.
Approximately 100,000 German men were arrested for homosexuality between 1933 and 1945. While most homosexuals were held in traditional prisons between 5,000 and 15,000 were interned in concentration camps where they were used as forced labor. Starting in 1934, 300,000 to 400,000 people were forced to undergo sterilization procedures either because of a disability or their ethnicity. Around 200,000 disabled and mentally ill Germans were executed between 1940 and 1942 during Nazi euthanasia programs. In the mid-1930s, Roma populations in Germany were corralled by police and forced into government camps. Around 1940 the Nazis began sending the Roma to concentration camps where they were used as forced labor, subjected to bizarre research by Nazi doctors or executed. By the end of the war, as many as 200,000 European Roma were dead. When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 they began to systematically execute Polish Catholic professionals, teachers, and government leaders. The Nazis believed that without leadership, the Polish people would easily submit to slavery. Approximately 3 million Polish Catholics were dead by the end of the war. Several thousand German and Austrian Jehovah's Witness were arrested in the late 1930s for refusing to swear loyalty to the state. Many of these Witnesses were subjected to forced labor in concentration camps, more than 1,000 died in these camps.
Holocaust
While the Nazis targeted many groups in the Holocaust, the Jewish population of Europe was targeted with particular fanaticism. Hitler exploited long held anti-Semitic feelings in Europe, arguing that the Jewish population was at fault for most of the country’s hardships including defeat in World War I and the financial crisis of the Great Depression. Hitler argued that Jewish people were dangerously clever and worked in collusion to exploit the non-Jewish population of Europe. When Hitler took power in the 1930s he planned to drive the Jewish population out of Germany. In 1935 the Nuremberg Laws revoked German citizenship from the Jewish population. Subsequent laws restricted Jewish business activities and tightly regulated financial transactions. Hitler and the Nazi Party hoped this would pressure the Jewish population to leave Germany, many did; but by 1940 most of the world refused to accept any more German Jewish immigrants. In November of 1938 Nazi party members systematically attacked Jewish owned property all over Germany. The windows of Jewish businesses, homes, and synagogues were smashed leading to the name Kristallnacht or the night of broken glass. The following year, Nazi party officials began forcing the Jewish population into walled ghettos in German and Polish cities. As the ghettos became overcrowded and the war raged on, Nazis built massive concentration camps in Germany and Poland where Jews from all over Europe were sent to work as slave laborers. In 1942, Nazi leadership decided to carry out the “final solution to the Jewish problem,” the systematic execution of the Jewish population of Europe. Before ‘42 Nazi SS units killed Jews with firing squads and mobile gas chambers in box trucks but these methods were deemed too slow. In 1942 massive complexes were built designed to kill and incinerate of up to 12,000 people per day. Most of these were in Poland. Inmates arrived from all over Europe, those deemed fit enough to work became slave labor, the weak were sent to gas chambers. By the end of the war 6,000,000 Jewish people were dead.
Tehran Conference
The first significant meeting between the leaders of Great Britain, the USSR, and the US took place in 1943 in the city of Tehran. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin discussed plans for the invasion of northern France and another Soviet offensive in the east. The Soviet Union agreed to join the war against Japan following the defeat of the Axis Powers in Europe.
Yalta Conference
Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin met again in February of 1945 in the Soviet resort town of Yalta. By this time, the allies were confident that the defeat of the European Axis Powers was within reach. At this conference the allies discussed the future of Germany, Austria and Eastern Europe. The allies agreed to divide Germany and Austria into four occupational zones, the Soviet Union, America, Britain or France would each take responsibility for one of the zones. The capital of Berlin would likewise be divided. The Soviet Union agreed to allow free elections in all of the Eastern European countries that it liberated from Nazi control. Further, the Allies agreed to the basic structure of the United Nations. The US, Britain, France, the Soviet Union and China would each be given a permanent seat on the Security Council and the power to veto any UN action. Stalin also reaffirmed the Soviet Union’s commitment to declare war on Japan.
Potsdam Conference
The final major meeting of the leaders of the US, Britain, and the Soviet Union was held in Potsdam, Germany in July of 1945 after the Nazi surrender. Roosevelt died in April of 1945 so he was replaced by Harry Truman and Churchill was replaced after an election by Clement Attlee. At this meeting the allies implemented their plans for the division of Germany into occupied zones and agreed to the demilitarization of Germany. Further they developed a plan to purge Nazi elements from German society with a system of courts (the Nuremberg Trials) designed to identify, try, and punish war criminals. However, Stalin reneged on his promise to allow free elections in Eastern Europe kicking off the Cold War. Britain, the US and China issued the Potsdam Declaration in which they threatened Japan with “prompt and utter destruction” if they did not surrender immediately.