MEDIA
World War II was the bloodiest conflict in human history. Most sources agree that more than fifty million people lost their lives in the conflict. Most of these were civilians in the Soviet Union and China. We generally mark 1 September 1939, the day that Nazi Germany invaded Poland, as the beginning of the war, although the seeds of the conflict were sown long before. Many historians regard the harsh terms demanded by the victors of World War I in the treaty forced upon the defeated Germans as a major factor. Germany was devastated, physically, economically and politically. Massive hyperinflation and unemployment by 1923 may well have convinced many struggling German citizens that perhaps Adolf Hitler might be the hope they were looking for.
Under Hitler's leadership, the Nazi Party gained in popularity and power. By 1933, the Nazis had gained sufficient showing in the Reichstag that ailing President von Hindenburg was forced to appoint Hitler to the post of Chancellor. He consolidated power quickly, convincing the legislature to grant him extraordinary power. Within a very short time, Hitler acquired absolute power over the German nation and its people.
Under the guise of bringing ethnic Germans into a "Greater Germany", Hitler engineering the mostly peaceful annexation of Austria in 1938. In September of that year, European leaders, at a conference in Munich, sanctioned the German occupation of the Sudetenland, a region of Czechoslovakia that contained a larger percentage of Germans. When British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain returned to London after the conference, he assured his nation that he had secured "peace for our time". At this time, Hitler assured the other nations that he would make no further territorial claims on Europe. The following March, he ordered the invasion of Czechoslovakia and quickly subdued the rest of that nation.
In August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed a Treaty of Non-agression. Commonly called the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, this treaty provided for the division of Poland and other eastern Euopean nations between the two nations. This paved the way for the invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, which convinced the United Kingdom and France to declare war on Germany two days later.
There was very little military action in western Europe for several months following the declaration of war. This period, known as the Phoney
War, gave Britain and France some time to plan strategy and prepare for what was to come. In May 1940, the war began in earnest when German
forces invaded Belgium, the Netherlands and France.
The Germans advanced quickly, pushing Allied troops against the sea and charging toward Paris. Thousands of troops were
rescued from Dunkirk in an evacuation action utilizing hundreds of boats and ships, both military and private. Italy entered the war on 10 June and
also invaded France. On 22 June, France was forced to sign an armistice with Germany on the same spot where the Germans surrendered at the
end of World War I. Germany occupied most of France, leaving a small rump state in the southeast that was theoretically sovereign but was,
in reality, a puppet regime controlled by the Nazis.
In July, Germany turned its forces toward Britain. An air and sea blockade soon gave way to bomber attacks on Royal Air Force (RAF) fields and
other facilities. In September, civilians became targets at the German Luftwaffe began 57 consecutive days of intense bombing of London
and other key cities.
Air raid sirens sounded nightly and thousands of British citizens huddled in subway tunnels and other shelters while
their homes and businesses were reduced to rubble. However, civilians played key roles in the defense of their homeland. Volunteers were
recruited to provide guidance during air raids, perform fire reporting and firefighting duties, administer first aid and help with the
transportation of injured citizens and even man anti-aircraft guns. Although the intensity of the attacks lessened over time, the
bombing of British targets continued well into 1941.
The alliance between Germany and the Soviet Union didn't last long. Originally, Hitler had planned to keep the Soviets at bay while he completed domination of Western Europe. His treaty with Stalin was only meant to avoid fighting the war on two fronts simultaneously. However, Soviet advances in Eastern Europe brought their forces close to the oil fields in Romania, a resource Hitler needed badly. On 22 June 1941, Hitler launched a three prong attack on the USSR, code named Operation Barbarossa. By the middle of July, German forces had advanced to within two hundred miles of Moscow.
As winter approached, German leadership was split between wanting to take advantage of the momentum and push to defeat the Soviets and take up a defensive position for the winter. Those wanting to push onward won the argument and soon the two sides were fighting on the outskirts of Moscow. The German troops were tired and a long way from home. The weather turned brutally cold against the Germans, who were not clothed for the environment. The better equipped Red Army was eventually able to push the Germans back, although not without suffering massive casualties on both sides.
Although there was some desire in America to provide aid to Britain during this time, the United States was officially neutral. Isolationism was strong in the US. Many believed that the war was Europe's problem. Organizations such as the America First Committee and leaders like famed aviator Charles Lindburgh spoke out against involvement. Many Americans of German descent joined the German American Bund, a pro-Nazi organization that claimed more than 20,000 members by 1941. Much of this thought may be due to the fact that America was still trying to dig itself out of the Great Depression. There was a desire to heal the nation first before worrying about the rest of the world. Limited aid to Britain came through a "cash and carry" exception to the Neutrality Acts and the passage of a Lend-Lease law in 1940. Of course, the question of whether the US would enter the war was rendered moot on 7 December 1941, when Japanese aircraft attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii as well as target in the Philippines, Guam, Midway and other American territories. The next day, Congress, in joint session, declared war on Japan. A couple of days later, Germany declared war on the United States. America had officially joined the war.
Although the Japanese had gained dominance in the Pacific and Germany occupied much of Europe as the world moved through 1942, the Allies began to make progress. In April 1942, American air forces under the command of Lt Col James Doolittle, were able to bomb Tokyo and other locations on the island of Honshu. In June, American forces won a major victory in the Battle of Midway. In August, Allied troops invaded North Africa, which had been French territory, although it took most of the next year to dislodge the Germans and take the region.
In thie Pacific, Japan was clearly winning the war in late 1941 and into 1942. By summer, Japan occupied a big chunk of China, most of Southeast Asia and the Philippines. Many were shocked at the apparent ease with which the Japanese were able to conquer such a large territory in a matter of a few months. Many feared that Australia would be next, and much of that nation's military was busy in Europe. It was until 1943 that the US and its allies were able to regroup and turn the tide in their favor.
On the eastern front, Soviet forces took months to force a German surrender at Stalingrad. Although the German army was surrounded and its soldiers exhausted, hungry and with very little ammunition, Hitler insisted that they fight on. Finally, in February 1943, they remaining ninety thousands troops were forced to capitulate. In July 1943, Allied forced invaded Sicily, which lead to victory over Italy in September. In early 1944, the remaining Germans were forced out of Leningrad and Rome.
The most significant action of 1944 was the landing of more than 160,000 Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy on 6 June 1944. Thousands were killed, but in the end a foothold was established on the European mainland. Hitler was on the run, but he wasn't going to give up easily. In August, Paris was liberated after four years of German occupation. The Battle of the Bulge, fought in the Ardennes forest region of Belgium and Luxembourg in December 1944 and January 1945, was the last major German offensive operation of the war. It was also, for US forces, the bloodiest battle of the war. Although the Allies had the upper hand by early January, the Germans were slow to leave. It took another three weeks of fighting to confirm an Allied victory. In March, the western Allies crossed the Rhine River into Germany while the Soviets pushed toward Berlin from the east. Despite heavy resistance, Germany most overrun by the end of April, forcing what was left of the German armed forces to surrender. With Hitler's suicide on 30 April, the German government ceased to exist. In Italy, dictator Benito Mussolini was captured and executed. With Germany defeated, Allied attention turned toward beating the Japanese in the Pacific.
By 1945, it was clear that Japan could not win the war. However, that nation wasn't prepare to surrender, either. Plans were made to prepare for a large scale invasion of the Japanese home islands, an operation that would most probably result in house to house combat and a massive loss of life on both sides. However, the successful testing of an atomic bomb resulted in a change of plans. With the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japanese leaders were finally convinced that it was futile to continue fighting. They surrendered unconditionally on 6 August 1945