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World War II
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Adolf Hitler became chancellor (head of state)
Elected president of Germany -
Adolf Hitler violated the Versailles Treaty
Nazi leader Adolf Hitler violates the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Pact by sending German military forces into the Rhineland, a demilitarized zone along the Rhine River in western Germany. -
Munich Conference, Appeasement
Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Neville Chamberlain sign the Munich Pact. The Munich pact was basically giving Czechoslovakia to Germany. -
Kristallnacht
"Night of Broken Glass"
The wave of violent anti-Jewish pogroms which took place on November 9 and 10, 1938, throughout Germany, annexed Austria, and in areas of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia recently occupied by German troops. -
Nazi-Soviet Pact
the two countries agreed to take no military action against each other for the next 10 years -
World War II begins
The German battleship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on a Polish fortress on the Westerplatte Peninsula as assault troops hidden aboard the vessel stormed the shoreline. This begins the most brutal war the world has faced. -
Blitzkrieg
A military tactic designed to create disorganization among enemy forces through the use of mobile forces and locally concentrated firepower -
French Surrendered
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Battle of Britain
German and British air forces clashed in the skies over the United Kingdom. A significant turning point of World War II, the Battle of Britain ended when Germany’s Luftwaffe failed to gain air superiority over the Royal Air Force despite months of targeting Britain’s air bases, military posts and, its civilian population. -
Lend Lease Act
The Lend-Lease Act was the principal means for providing U.S. military aid to foreign nations. It authorized the president to transfer arms or any other defense materials for which Congress appropriated money to “the government of any country whose defense the President deems vital to the defense of the United States.” -
Operation Barbarossa
The code name for Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union. -
The "Final Solution"
the Nazi plan to exterminate the Jewish people -
Atlantic Charter
The Atlantic Charter was a joint declaration released by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The Atlantic Charter provided a broad statement of U.S. and British war aims. -
The Japanese Attack Pearl Harbor
In responce to American attempts to limit Japanese expansion and support her enemies, Japan decided to attack the US base Pearl Harbor in Hawaii with hopes of keeping the Americans out of the war. -
Battle of Midway
World War II naval battle, fought almost entirely with aircraft, in which the United States destroyed Japan’s first-line carrier strength and most of its best trained naval pilots. -
Battle of Stalingrad
A major battle of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad. -
Operation Torch
the British-American invasion of French North Africa; allied victory -
D-Day
Allied troops landed along the beaches of Normandy; Dwight D. Eisenhower called the operation a crusade in which, “we will accept nothing less than full victory.” By day’s end, the Allies gained a foot-hold in Continental Europe. -
Battle of the Bulge
The Germans launch the last major offensive of the war. An attempt to push the Allied front line west from northern France to northwestern Belgium. -
Fall of Berlin (German Surrender)
After one of the most intense battles in human history, the guns at last stopped firing amongst the ruins of Berlin. -
Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
The United States becomes the first and only nation to use atomic weaponry during wartime when it drops an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan marked the end of World War II -
Atomic bomb dropped on Nagaski
A second atom bomb is dropped on Japan by the United States, at Nagasaki, resulting finally in Japan’s unconditional surrender. -
United Nations
The United Nations is an intergovernmental organization established to promote international co-operation. The organization was created following the Second World War to prevent another such conflict.
