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The Treaty of Versailles was the peace settlement ending World War I, signed by Germany and the Allied powers on June 28, 1919, in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles. Its terms forced Germany to accept responsibility for the war (the "War Guilt Clause"), pay heavy reparations, cede territory, and severely limit its military. -
Seeking raw materials to fuel its growing industries, Japan invaded the Chinese province of Manchuria in 1931. By 1937 Japan controlled large sections of China, and war crimes against the Chinese became commonplace. -
The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. -
Italy invaded Ethiopia under Benito Mussolini's Fascist regime, using modern weaponry and chemical gas in a war that lasted until 1936, ending with Ethiopia's annexation and incorporation into Italian East Africa. The invasion was driven by Mussolini's imperial ambitions, a desire to recreate the glory of the Roman Empire, and a strategic need for colonial expansion. -
The remilitarization of the Rhineland on March 7, 1936, was Adolf Hitler's violation of the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Treaties, where German troops re-entered the demilitarized Rhineland, a strip of German land bordering France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. -
The Anschluss occurred on March 12, 1938, when German troops crossed the border into Austria, annexing it into the German Reich. The annexation followed the resignation of Austrian Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg on March 11th under pressure from Nazi Germany. -
Delegates from 32 countries held the Evian Conference, discussing the refugee crisis of German and Austrian Jewish refugees wishing to flee persecution by Nazi Germany. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was hoping that some of the delegates would agree to accept more refugees, but this ultimately failed. -
The Munich Agreement was reached in Munich by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy. The agreement provided for the German annexation of part of Czechoslovakia called the Sudetenland, where three million people, mainly ethnic Germans, lived. -
The Wagner-Rogers Bill was a proposed 1939 U.S. law that aimed to admit 20,000 German refugee children into the United States, bypassing existing immigration quotas. -
The MS St. Louis was a German ocean liner that, in 1939, carried over 900 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution. Denied entry to Cuba and the United States, the ship was forced to return to Europe. The incident is known as the "St. Louis incident" and serves as a powerful symbol of the failure of many nations to offer refuge to those escaping the Holocaust. -
The Nazi-Soviet Pact, also known as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, was a non-aggression treaty signed by Germany and the Soviet Union in August 1939, which included a secret protocol to partition Eastern Europe. -
Blitzkrieg, or "lightning war," was first effectively used by Germany to invade Poland. This new form of warfare used tanks, motorized infantry, and air power to create a rapid breakthrough, destroy enemy lines, and envelop their rear, a tactic that proved devastatingly effective in the invasion of Poland -
The German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, initiated World War II in Europe, employing the new Blitzkrieg (lightning war) tactic of rapid armored and air assaults. This was followed by a Soviet invasion from the east on September 17, as per a secret agreement between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. -
The Battle of the Atlantic, the longest continuous military campaign in World War II, ran from 1939 to the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945, covering a major part of the naval history of World War II. At its core was the Allied naval blockade of Germany, announced the day after the declaration of war, and Germany's subsequent counterblockade. The campaign peaked from mid-1940 to the end of 1943. -
The "cash-and-carry" policy was a provision of the American Neutrality Act of 1939 that allowed nations at war to purchase U.S. goods and military supplies, provided they paid immediately in cash and transported the goods on their own ships. -
The Battle of Britain was a military engagement of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force and the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy defended the United Kingdom against large-scale attacks by Nazi Germany's air force, the Luftwaffe. It was the first major military campaign fought entirely by air forces. -
The destroyers-for-bases deal was an agreement between the United States and the United Kingdom, according to which 50 Caldwell, Wickes, and Clemson-class US Navy destroyers were transferred to the Royal Navy from the US Navy in exchange for land rights on British possessions. -
The Lend-Lease Act allowed the U.S. to provide military aid, including war supplies, to foreign nations whose defense was deemed critical to the U.S. national interest -
The Atlantic Charter was a joint statement by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill outlining their shared goals for the post-World War II world, which included no territorial expansion, self-determination, free trade, economic and social cooperation, and collective security. -
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Empire of Japan on the United States Pacific Fleet at its naval base at Pearl Harbor on Oahu, Hawaii -
The Battle of the Coral Sea, from 4 to 8 May 1942, was a major naval battle between the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) and naval and air forces of the United States and Australia. Taking place in the Pacific Theatre of World War II, the battle was the first naval action in which the opposing fleets neither sighted nor fired upon one another, attacking over the horizon from aircraft carriers instead. It was also the first military battle between aircraft carriers. -
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. The Japanese Combined Fleet under the command of Isoroku Yamamoto suffered a decisive defeat by the U.S. Pacific Fleet near Midway Atoll, about 1,300 mi (1,100 nmi; 2,100 km) northwest of Oahu. -
The War Refugee Board (WRB) was a U.S. government agency created in January 1944 by President Roosevelt to rescue Jews and other victims of Nazi persecution during World War II. Led by officials from the Treasury Department, the Board coordinated efforts to provide relief, establish safe havens, and facilitate the rescue of approximately 200,000 people -
Operation Overlord was the codename for the Battle of Normandy, the Allied operation that launched the successful liberation of German-occupied Western Europe during World War II. The operation was launched on 6 June 1944 (D-Day) with the Normandy landings (Operation Neptune). A 1,200-plane airborne assault preceded an amphibious assault involving more than 5,000 vessels. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel. -
The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Offensive, was the last major German offensive campaign on the Western Front during the Second World War, taking place from 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945. It was launched through the densely forested Ardennes region of eastern Belgium and northern Luxembourg. -
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by the United States Army and United States Marine Corps forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. -
As the Sixth Armoured Division of the Third US Army approached, prisoners stormed watchtowers and took control of the camp. The US Army liberated 21,000 prisoners from Buchenwald. -
Little Boy was a type of atomic bomb created by the Manhattan Project during World War II. The name is also often used to describe the specific bomb (L-11) used in the bombing of the Japanese city of Hiroshima by the Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay on 6 August 1945, making it the first nuclear weapon used in warfare, and the second nuclear explosion in history -
Fat Man was the design of the nuclear weapon that the United States used for seven of the first eight nuclear weapons ever detonated in history. It is also the most powerful design to ever be used in warfare.
A Fat Man device was detonated over the Japanese city of Nagasaki on 9 August 1945. It was the second and larger of the only two nuclear weapons ever used in warfare. -
The day on which Imperial Japan surrendered in World War II, in effect bringing the war to an end. -
The United Nations is a global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the articulated mission of maintaining international peace and security -
The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries across Europe and committing atrocities against their citizens in World War II. -
The Truman Doctrine was a U.S. foreign policy, announced by President Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947, that pledged American support to "free peoples" resisting subjugation by authoritarian forces or "outside pressures". Its primary goal was to contain the spread of communism by providing political, military, and economic assistance to nations -
The Marshall Plan was a U.S. foreign aid program from 1948–1951 that provided over $13 billion to help Western European countries rebuild after World War II, aiming to stabilize economies, restore industries, and counter the spread of communism. -
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an international document adopted by the United Nations General Assembly that codifies some of the rights and freedoms of all human beings. -
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 32 member states—30 in Europe and 2 in North America. Founded in the aftermath of World War II, NATO was established with the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in 1949.