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Formation of Nazi Socialist Party
Under the leadership of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, or Nazi Party, grew into a mass movement and ruled Germany through totalitarian means from 1933 to 1945. Founded in 1919 as the German Workers’ Party, the group promoted German pride and anti-Semitism. Hitler became the official leader of the party in 1921. -
Anti-Semitism Advertisements
Anti-Semitism, hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious or racial group. The term anti-Semitism was coined in 1879 by the German agitator Wilhelm Marr to designate the anti-Jewish campaigns under way in central Europe at that time.The term is especially inappropriate as a label for the anti-Jewish prejudices. Nazi anti-Semitism, which culminated in the Holocaust, had a racist dimension in that it targeted Jews--even those who had been converted or had parents who converted. -
Holocaust
Holocaust is a word of Greek origin meaning "sacrifice by fire." The Nazis, who came to power in Germany in January 1933, believed that Germans were "racially superior" and that the Jews, deemed "inferior," were an alien threat to the so-called German racial community. Adolf HItler and Nazi collaboraters killed almost six million jews in the period of over three months. This was considered to be one of the largest national crimes of the century and even to this day, it is nutorious for cruelty. -
Book Burnings
Trade unions are closed. Books declared contrary to Nazi beliefs are publicly burned. -
Nuremburd Laws
The German Government enacts the Nuremburg Laws - codifying the "racial" definition of Jews depriving them of citizenship and fundamental rights. The Nazis intensify persecution of political dissidents and others considered "inferior" including Romanies ("Gypsies"), Jehovah's Witnesses, and homosexuals. Many are sent to concentration camps. -
Concentration Camps
The Nazis intensify persecution of political dissidents and others considered "inferior" including Romanies ("Gypsies"), Jehovah's Witnesses, and homosexuals. Many are sent to concentration camps. -
The Evian Conference
The Evian Conference: delegates from 32 countries are gathered at an international conference called by Franklin D. Roosevelt in Évian-Les Bains, a small French spa on Lake Geneva. Their purpose was to discuss the plight of the growing number of Jewish refugees who were fleeing Hitler's Europe. Germany has boycotted the conference, but secretly arranged to send an unofficial representative as Hitler wanted to sell his Jews to the nations of the world, for $250 per person, or $1,000 a family. -
Kristallnacht
Kristallnacht: "the Night of Broken Glass." Nazis attack Jews throughout Germany - 30,000 Jews arrested. 91 Jews killed. &,500 shops and businesses looted. More than 1,000 synagogues set afire. Jewish children are expelled from public schools. -
Beginning of World War 2
instability created in Europe by the First World War (1914-18) set the stage for another international conflict–World War II–which broke out two decades later and would prove even more devastating. Rising to power in an economically and politically unstable Germany, Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist (Nazi Party) rearmed the nation and signed strategic treaties with Italy and Japan to further his ambitions of world domination. -
Attack on Poland
At 4:45 a.m., some 1.5 million German troops invade Poland all along its 1,750-mile border with German-controlled territory. Simultaneously, the German Luftwaffe bombed Polish airfields, and German warships and U-boats attacked Polish naval forces in the Baltic Sea. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler claimed the massive invasion was a defensive action, but Britain and France were not convinced. On September 3, they declared war on Germany, initiating World War II. -
Pearl Hardor
Just before 8 a.m. on December 7, 1941, hundreds of Japanese fighter planes attacked the American naval base at Pearl Harbor near Honolulu, Hawaii.More than 2,000 Americans soldiers and sailors died in the attack, and another 1,000 were wounded. The day after the assault, President Franklin D. Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war on Japan; Congress approved his declaration with just one dissenting vote. Three days later, Japanese allies Germany and Italy also declared war on the United States -
Wannsee Conference
Wannsee Conference - The Nazis coordinate the "final Solution" - a plan to kill all European Jews through mass exterminations. Six death camps equipped with gas chambers soon begin full scale operation in Poland: Majdanek, Chelmno, Sobibor, Treblinka, Belzec, and Auschewitz -Birkenau. -
Battle of MIdway
Six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States defeated Japan in one of the most decisive naval battles of World War II. Thanks in part to major advances in code breaking, the United States was able to preempt and counter Japan’s planned ambush of its few remaining aircraft carriers, inflicting permanent damage on the Japanese Navy. An important turning point in the Pacific campaign, the victory allowed the United States and its allies to move into an offensive position. -
D-Day
During World War II (1939-1945), the Battle of Normandy, which lasted from June 1944 to August 1944, resulted in the Allied liberation of Western Europe from Nazi Germany’s control. Codenamed Operation Overlord, the battle began on June 6, 1944, also known as D-Day, when some 156,000 American, British and Canadian forces landed on five beaches along a 50-mile stretch of the heavily fortified coast of France’s Normandy region. The invasion was one of the largest military assaults in history. -
Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
The United States, with the consent of the United Kingdom as laid down in the Quebec Agreement, dropped nuclear weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, during the final stage of World War II. -
End of World War 2
instability created in Europe by the First World War (1914-18) set the stage for another international conflict–World War II–which broke out two decades later and would prove even more devastating. Rising to power in an economically and politically unstable Germany, Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist (Nazi Party) rearmed the nation and signed strategic treaties with Italy and Japan to further his ambitions of world domination.
