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Japanese Invasion of Manchuria
The Kwantung Army of the Empire of Japan invaded Manchuria immediately following the Mukden Incident. At war's end in February 1932, the Japanese established the puppet state of Manchukuo. -
Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany
Following several backroom negotiations between industrialists, Hindenburg's son, former chancellor Franz von Papen, and Hitler himself; Hindenburg acquiesced and on 30 January 1933, he formally appointed Adolf Hitler as chancellor. Although he was chancellor, Hitler was not yet an absolute dictator. -
Nanking Massacre/ Rape of Nanking
The Nanjing Massacre or the Rape of Nanjing was the mass-scale random murder, wartime rape, looting and arson committed by the Imperial Japanese Army against the residents of Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China, immediately after the Battle of Nanjing in the Second Sino-Japanese War. -
Munich Conference
Munich Agreement, (September 30, 1938), a settlement reached by Germany, Great Britain, France, and Italy that permitted German annexation of the Sudetenland, in western Czechoslovakia. -
Kristallnacht
Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom, was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's Sturmabteilung paramilitary forces along with civilians throughout Nazi Germany on 9–10 November 1938. -
Non aggression Pact is signed
On August 23, 1939–shortly before World War II (1939-45) broke out in Europe–enemies Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union surprised the world by signing the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, in which the two countries agreed to take no military action against each other for the next 10 years. -
Germany's invasion of Poland/Blitzkrieg
The invasion of Poland, also known as the September campaign, 1939 defensive war and Poland campaign, was an attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. -
Fall of Paris
Paris fell to Nazi Germany on June 14, 1940, one month after the German Wehrmacht stormed into France. Eight days later, France signed an armistice with the Germans, and a puppet French state was set up with its capital at Vichy. -
Dunkirk
Dunkirk evacuation, (1940) in World War II, the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and other Allied troops from the French seaport of Dunkirk (Dunkerque) to England. ... When it ended on June 4, about 198,000 British and 140,000 French and Belgian troops had been saved. -
The blitz
The Blitz was a German bombing campaign against the United Kingdom in 1940 and 1941, during the Second World War. The term was first used by the British press and originated from the term Blitzkrieg, the German word for 'lightning war'. Most notable was a large daylight attack against London on 15 September. -
Selective Training and service act is passed
On September 6, 1940, Congress passed the Selective Training and Service Act, and on September 16, 1940, President Roosevelt signed it into law. Also known as the Burke-Wadsworth Act, the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 required that men between the ages of 21 and 35 register with local draft boards. -
Japanese attack on Pearl harbor
On December 7, 1941, Japan staged a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, decimating the US Pacific Fleet. ... On December 7, 1941, Japan staged a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, decimating the US Pacific Fleet. When Germany and Italy declared war on the United States days later, America found itself in a global war. -
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa, original name Operation Fritz, during World War II, code name for the German invasion of the Soviet Union, which was launched on June 22, 1941. The failure of German troops to defeat Soviet forces in the campaign signaled a crucial turning point in the war. -
Bataan Death March
The Bataan Death March was the forcible transfer by the Imperial Japanese Army of 60,000–80,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war from Saysain Point, Bagac, Bataan and Mariveles to Camp O'Donnell, Capas, Tarlac, via San Fernando, Pampanga, where the prisoners were forced to march until they died. -
Battle of midway
The Battle of Midway was a major naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II that took place on 4–7 June 1942, six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea. -
Battle of Stalingrad
In the Battle of Stalingrad, Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in Southern Russia. -
D-Day
D-Day - 6 June 1944 - was the largest amphibious invasion in the history of warfare. On D-Day, 6 June 1944, Allied forces launched a combined naval, air and land assault on Nazi-occupied France. The 'D' in D-Day stands simply for 'day' and the term was used to describe the first day of any large military operation. -
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Offensive, was a major German offensive campaign on the Western Front during World War II which took place from 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945. -
Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference was a meeting of three World War II allies: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin. The trio met in February 1945 in the resort city of Yalta, located along the Black Sea coast of the Crimean Peninsula. -
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps and Navy landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II. -
Adolf hitler commits suicide
Hitler announced that he would stay in Berlin until the end and then shoot himself. Later that day, he asked SS physician Werner Haase about the most reliable method of suicide. Haase suggested the "pistol-and-poison method" of combining a dose of cyanide with a gunshot to the head. -
VE day
Victory in Europe Day is the day celebrating the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II of Germany's unconditional surrender of its armed forces on Tuesday, 8 May 1945, marking the end of World War II in Europe. -
Battle of Okinawa
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by United States Army and United States Marine Corps forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. -
Dropping the Atomic bombs
On August 6, 1945, during World War II (1939-45), an American B-29 bomber dropped the world's first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. ... Three days later, a second B-29 dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. -
VJ day
Victory over Japan Day is the day on which Imperial Japan surrendered in World War II, in effect bringing the war to an end.