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Germany, Italy, Great Britain, and France sign the Munich agreement which forces the Czechoslovak Republic to cede the Sudetenland, including key Czechoslovak military defense positions, to Nazi Germany. -
The Germans occupy the dismantled Czech lands in violation of the Munich agreement and form the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. -
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Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union sign a non-aggression pact in secret and a secret protocol dividing eastern Europe into spheres of influence. -
This event was the final straw for Great Britan and France. -
WWII begins -
Germany and the Soviet Union divide Poland between them. -
Denmark surrenders on the day of the attack. Norway holds out until June 9. -
France and the neutral Low Countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg). Luxembourg is occupied on May 10; the Netherlands surrenders on May 14; and Belgium surrenders on May 28. On June 22, France signs an armistice agreement by which the Germans occupy the northern half of the country and the entire Atlantic coastline. In southern France, a collaborationist regime with its capital in Vichy is established. -
An air war ends in defeat for Nazi Germany. -
Germany and Italy arbitrate a decision on the division of the disputed province of Transylvania between Romania and Hungary. The loss of northern Transylvania forces Romanian King Carol to abdicate in favor of his son, Michael, and brings to power a dictatorship under General Ion Antonescu. -
Germany, Italy, and Japan sign the Tripartite Pact. -
Hungary (November 20), Romania (November 23), and Slovakia (November 24) join the Axis. -
The Germans send the Afrika Korps to North Africa to reinforce the faltering Italians. -
Together they dismember it. Yugoslavia surrenders on April 17. Germany and Bulgaria invade Greece in support of the Italians. Resistance in Greece ceases in early June 1941 -
Finland, seeking redress for the territorial losses in the armistice concluding the so-called Winter War, agrees to participate in the invasion. The Germans quickly overrun the Baltic states and, joined by the Finns, lay siege to Leningrad (St. Petersburg) by September. In the center, the Germans capture Smolensk in early August and drive on Moscow by October. In the south, German and Romanian troops capture Kiev (Kyiv) in September and capture Rostov on the Don River in November. -
A Soviet counteroffensive drives the Germans from the Moscow suburbs in chaotic retreat -
Japan bombs Pearl Harbor -
The United States declares war on Japan, entering World War II. Japanese troops land in the Philippines, French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), and British Singapore. The Japanese occupy the Philippines, Indochina, and Singapore by April 1942 and take control of Burma in May. -
German troops fight their way into Stalingrad (Volgograd) on the Volga River by mid-September and penetrate deep into the Caucasus after securing the Crimean Peninsula. With German forces in North Africa having penetrated Egypt, Germany was at the height of its military success in World War II.