-
Hitler invades Poland on September first. Britain and France declare war on Germany two days later.
-
Rationing starts in the UK.
-
Adolf Hitler takes neutral Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg.
-
Britain forces retreat from France and Adolf Hitler's armies defeat French forces.
-
France, crushed, surrenders to Germany and signs an armistice. Great Britain now stands alone against the Axis powers.
-
British victory in Battle of Britain forces Hitler to postpone invasion plans.
-
United States Naval Intelligence cryptographers crack Japan's secret communications code and learn that Japan intends to conquer China.
-
President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Coast Guard to seize German ships that sail into American ports. 65 Axis ships are held in "protective custody."
-
Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, and the US enters the war.
-
Germany invades the Soviet Union violating the Nonaggression Pact. U.S. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson estimates that it will take Hitler less than three months to conquer the Soviet Union.
-
Allied forces invaded northern France by means of beach landings in Normandy.
-
A formal surrender ceremony is conducted in Tokyo Bay on the U.S. battleship Missouri. World War II officially ends.