Key battles and Events of WWII

  • Germany Invades Poland

    Germany Invades Poland
    The invasion of Poland in 1939 marked the start of World War II. The invasion was led by the Nazis, a small contingent of Slovaks, and the Soviet Union. The invasion from Germany started on September 1st, 1939, following up the signings of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, while the invasion from the Soviet Union started later on September the 17th. The campaign ended on October the 6th,1939, with the division of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union.
  • Period: to

    key battles and events of WWII

  • Britain & France declare war on Germany

    Britain & France declare war on Germany
    In September the 3rd, 1939, Britain and France both declared war over Germany after Hitler’s action to invade Poland. Britain and France declared war over Germany honoring their commitment to Poland
  • Churchill becomes Prime Minister of Britain

    Churchill becomes Prime Minister of Britain
    is called to replace Neville Chamberlain as British prime minister following the latter’s resignation after losing a confidence vote in the House of Commons.
  • Period: to

    Evacuation of Dunkrik (Operation Dynamo)

    The British finally initiated Operation Dynamo–the evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk. During the next day, the Allies learned that the King Leopold III of Belgium was surrendering, the Germans resumed the land attack on Dunkirk. By then the British had fortified their defences, but the Germans wouldn’t be held for long, and the evacuation was escalated. There wasn’t enough ships to rescue the men from Dunkirk, so the British Admiralty called on all British citizens.
  • Italy enters war on side of Axis powers

    Italy enters war on side of Axis powers
    The invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, by the Germans, unleashed the European war. Italy entered the Second World War on the Axis side on June 10, 1940, as the defeat of the French became apparent. In July 1940, just weeks after the defeat of France, Hitler decided that Nazi Germany would attack the Soviet Union the following spring.
  • France signs armistice with Germany

    France signs armistice with Germany
    On June 22nd, 1940, the French Government signed the armistice with Nazi Germany just six weeks after the Nazis launched their invasion of Western Europe.
    With Paris falling and the Germans conquest of France reaching its conclusion, Marshal Henri Petain replaces Paul Reynaud as the Prime Minster and announces his intention to sign the armistice with the Nazis.
  • Period: to

    Battle of Britain

    On July 10, 1940, the Germans begin the first in a long series of bombing raids against the Great Britain, as the Battle of Britain lasted for three and a half mouth, begins. After the occupation of France by Germany, Great Britain knew it was only a matter of time before the Axis turned its sights across the Channel. On July 10, around 120 German members and fighters stuck the British shipping convoy.
  • Operation Sea Lion

    Operation Sea Lion
    OPeration Sea Lion was planed in the late 1940. Operation Sea Lion was Nazis Germany’s code name for a provisionally proposed invasion of the United Kingdom the Battle of Britain in the Second War (WWII)
  • Tripartite Pact signed

    Tripartite Pact signed
    On September 27, 1940, the Axis powers are formed as Germany and Italy, and Japan become allies with the signing of the Tripartite Pact in Berlin, which became known as the Axis alliance. Even before the Tripartite Pact, two of the three Axis powers had initiated conflicts that would be become theatres of the Second World War.
  • Period: to

    Siege of Tobruk

    The Siege of Tobruk lasted for 241 days in 1941, after the Axis force advanced through Cyrenaica from El Agheila in Operation Sonnenblume against the British Western Desert in Libya.
  • Operation Barbarossa

    Operation Barbarossa
    On June 22nd, 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Codenamed Operation Barbarossa, it was the largest military operation ever done in History, involving more than 3 million Axis troops and 3.500 tanks. It was the logical culmination of Hitler’s beliefs that the German ‘master race’ should seek ‘lebensraum’ (living space) in the east, of the expense of the ‘subhuman’ native Slav people, who were to be exterminated or to be reduced to serf status.
  • Bombing of Pearl Harbor

    Bombing of Pearl Harbor
    On December 7th, 1941, the President Franklin Roosevelt called this day, "a date which will live in infamy." On that day, Japan planes to attack the United States Naval Base at Parl Harbor, Hawaii Territory. The bombing that was committed killed more than 2,300 Americans. The attack completely destroyed the American battleship U.S.S.
  • Britain and US declare war on Japan

    Britain and US declare war on Japan
    On December 8, 1942, Britain and U.S. declare war on Japan. The United States declares war on Japan, entering the Second World War. Japanese troops land in Philippines, French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), and British Singapore. By April 1942, the Philippines, Indochina, and Singapore are under Japanese occupation.
  • Japan take Singapore

    Japan take Singapore
    On February 15, 1942, Singapore falls to the defeat of Japanese Army. On Feb 15, 1942, it is considered the greatest defeat in history if the British Army and probably Britain’s worst defeat in Second World War. The fall of Singapore in that year (1942) clearly illustrated the way Japan was to fight in the Far East- a combination of speed and savagery that ended with the use of a atomic bomb on Hiroshima in August 6, 1942.
  • Period: to

    Battle of Midway

    The Battle of Midway took place between 4th- 7th of June, 1942. The Battle of Midway was a battle between the U.S. and Japan. Japan’s main goal during WWII was to defeat the United States and to remove them as a Pacific power in order to gain territory in East Asia. Japan hoped to defeat the US Pacific Fleet and use Midway as a base to attack Pearl Harbor.
  • Period: to

    First Battle of El Alamein

    The first Battle of El Alamein started in July 1, 1942. On this day Filed Marshal Erwin Rommel is brought to standstill in the battle for control of North Africa. This battle took place with the hope of Erin Rommel putting a dent in the Allied defence near El Alamein.
  • Period: to

    Battle of Stalingard

    The Battle of Stalingrad started in July 17, 1942 and it ended in February 2, 1943, it was the successful Soviet defence of the city of Stalingrad in the U.S.S.R. during WW II. The Russians considered it to be the greatest battle of their Great Patriotic War. It stopped the German advance into the Soviet Union and marked the turning point of the tide of war. The Battle of Stalingrad was one of the bloodiest battles in history, with combined military and civilian casualties of nearly 2 million.
  • Period: to

    Second Battle of El Alamein

    The Battle of the El Alamein was marked the culmination of the Second World War North Africa campaign between the British Empire and the German-Italian army. The British commander Bernard Law Montgomery launched an attack at El Alamein on October. 23, 1942. Germany Field Marshal Erwin Rommel return to the battle from illness and tried to halt the tide, but the British had an advantage in personnel and artillery proved too overwhelming.
  • D-Day Landings

    D-Day Landings
    During WWII,the Battle of the Normandy, which lasted from June 1944 to August 1944,it resulted to the Allied liberation of the Western Europe from Nazi Germany’s control.The codename Operation Overlord, the battle that began on June 6, 1944, also known as the D-Day,when 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 most amphibious military assaults in history.
  • Period: to

    Battle of the Bulge

    The Battle of the Bulge (December 16, 1944–January 16, 1945), also known as the Ardennes Offensive, was the biggest battle fought on the Western Front in Europe during WWII. It was the biggest battle ever fought for United States. On this day, the Germans launched the last major offensive of the war, it was an attempt to push the Allied front line west from Northern France to norther western Belgium. The Battle of the Bulge, so-called because the Germans cons tucked a “bulge”.
  • Mussolini captured and executed

    Mussolini captured and executed
    On April 28, 1945, “Il Duce,” Benito Mussolini, and his mistress, Clara Petacci, where shot by Italian partisan who had captured the couple together as the couple attempted to flee to Switzerland.
  • Hitler commits suicide

    Hitler commits suicide
    On April 30, 1945, holed up in a bunker under his headquarter in Berlin, Adolf Hitler commits the unknown and kills himself by swallowing a cyanide capsule and shooting himself in the head. His wife killed herself by swallowing a cyanide capsule. Soon after the death of Hitler, Germany unconditionally surrendered to the Allied forces, ending Hitler’s dreams of a “1,000 –year” Reich.
  • German forces surrender

    German forces surrender
    On May 7, 1945, the Germans signed an unconditional surrender at Allied headquarters in Reims, France, to take effect of the following day, ending the horrific conflict of the European war of World War II
  • V.E. Day

    V.E. Day
    On May 8, 1945, both Great Britain and the United States celebrate Victory in Europe Day. Cities in both of the nations, as well as formerly occupied cities in Western Europe, put out flags and banners, rejoicing the defeat of the Nazi’s war machine. On May eighth spelled out a day where Germans troops throughout Europe laid down their arms.
  • Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima

    Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
    On August 6, 1945, during the Second World War, an American B-29 boomer dropped the world’s deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion that happened wiped 90% of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands would die later of radiation exposure. The bomb was dropped by Enola Gay.
  • Soviet Union declares war on Japan

    Soviet Union declares war on Japan
    On August 8, 1945, the Soviet Union officially declares war on Japan, pouring more than 1 Million Soviet Soldiers into Japanese- occupied Manchuria, north eastern China, to take on 700,000-strong Japanese army.
  • Atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki

    Atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki
    On August 9, 1945, a second atomic bomb was dropped on Japan by the United States of America, at Nagasaki, resulting Japan to surrender. Japans Japan’s Emperor Hirohito announced his country’s unconditional surrender in Second World War in a radio address on August 15, citing the devastating power of “a new and most cruel bomb.”
  • Japanese surrender- End of WWII

    Japanese surrender- End of WWII
    On September 2, 1945, Japan surrender and end of WWII happiness. Aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, Japan gives up and surrenders to the Allies, bringing the end of World War II. Japanese official have signed the act of unconditional surrender, finally bringing the six year war to an end. After they Germany surrendered the next task was to make Japan surrender so the war can end.
  • United Nations is born

    United Nations is born
    On October 24, 1945, the United Nations Charter, which was adopted and signed on June 26, 1945, is now effective and ready to be enforced. The United Nations was born od perceived necessity, as a means to a better arbitrating international conflict and negotiating peace than was provide for, by the old league of Nations.