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Rape of Nanking (1937)
The Nanking Massacre or Nanjing Massacre, also known as the Rape of Nanking or Rape of Nanjing, was an episode during the Second Sino-Japanese War of mass murder and mass rape by Japanese troops against the residents of Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China. The massacre occurred over six weeks starting December 13, 1937, the day that the Japanese captured Nanjing. During this period, soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army murdered an estimated 40,000 to over 300,000 Chinese civilians an -
Operation Barbarous (1941)
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II, commencing on 22 June 1941. Over the course of the operation, about four million soldiers of the Axis powers invaded Soviet Russia along a 2,900 km front, making it the largest invasion in the history of warfare. -
Germanys invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, or the 1939 Defensive War in Poland, and alternatively the Poland Campaign or Fall Weiß in Germany, was a joint invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the beginning of World War II in Europe. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, while the Soviet invasion commenced on 17 September following the Molotov-Tōgō agreement -
German Blitzkrieg (1939-1940)
On 1 September 1939, using a manufactured pretext, columns of German forces launched Blitzkeieg across the German-Poland border at more than ten points. The Germans had about 1 million men against about 600,000 Poles available for active duty. The Luftwaffe had 3 planes for every Polish aircraft, most of which were destroyed on the ground in the first few days, allowing the Wehrmacht to do its work with little to fear from the air. -
Fall of Pairs (1940)
In the Second World War, the Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the successful German invasion of France and the Low Countries, beginning on 10 May 1940, defeating primarily French forces. The battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb, German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes and then along the Somme valley to cut off and surround the Allied units that had advanced into Belgium. -
Pearl Harbor (1941)
The attack on Pearl Harbor[nb 4] was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941 (December 8 in Japan). The attack led to the United States' entry into World War II. -
Bataan Death March(1942)
Bataan Death March, march in the Philippines of some 66 miles (106 km) that 76,000 prisoners of war (66,000 Americans, 10,000 Filipinos) were forced by the Japanese military to endure in April 1942, during the early stages of World War II. -
Wannsee Conference (1942)
On January 20, 1942, 15 high-ranking Nazi Party and German government officials gathered at a villa in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee to discuss and coordinate the implementation of what they called the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." -
Allied Invasion of Italy (1943)
The Allied invasion of Sicily, codenamed Operation Husky, was a major World War II campaign, in which the Allies took Sicily from the Axis Powers (Italy and Nazi Germany). It was a large scale amphibious and airborne operation, followed by six weeks of land combat. It launched the Italian Campaign. -
Battle of Iwo Jima (1945)
was a major battle in which the United States Armed Forces landed and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II.The American invasion, designated Operation Detachment, had the goal of capturing the entire island, including the three Japanese-controlled airfields -
Operation Gomorrah (1943)
Operation Gomorrah destroyed a significant percentage of the city of Hamburg, leaving over 1 million residents homeless and killing 40,000-50,000 civilians. In the immediate wake of the raids, over two-thirds of Hamburg's population fled the city. The raids severely shook the Nazi leadership, leading Hitler to be concerned that similar raids on other cities could force Germany out of the war. -
D-Day (Normandy Invasion - 1944)
The Invasion of Normandy was the invasion by and establishment of Western Allied forces in Normandy, during Operation Overlord in 1944 during World War II; the largest amphibious invasion to ever take place.D-Day, the day of the initial assaults, was Tuesday 6 June 1944. Allied land forces that saw combat in Normandy on that day came from Canada, the Free French forces, the United Kingdom, and the United States. -
Potsdam Declaration (1945)
The Potsdam Declaration or the Proclamation Defining Terms for Japanese Surrender is a statement that called for the surrender of all Japanese armed forces during World War II. -
Battle of the Bulge (1945)
The Battle of the Bulge (16 December 1944 – 25 January 1945) was a major German offensive campaign launched through the densely forested Ardennes region of Wallonia in Belgium, France, and Luxembourg on the Western Front toward the end of World War II in Europe. Eric von Manstein planned the offensive with the primary goal to recapture the important harbor of Antwerp. -
Battle of Okinawa (1945)
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg,[11] was fought on the Ryukyu Islands of Okinawa and included the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific War during World War II.[ -
Dropping of the atomic bombs (1945)
In August 1945, during the final stage of the Second World War, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The two bombings, which killed at least 129,000 people, remain the only use of nuclear weapons for warfare in history. -
VJ Day (1945)
The holiday celebrates the conclusion of World War II and is related to Victory over Japan Day in the United Kingdom. -
VE Day (1945)
Victory in Europe Day, generally known as V-E Day, VE Day, or simply V Day was the public holiday celebrated on 8 May 1945 (7 May in Commonwealth realms) to mark the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II of Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender of its armed forces.[1] It thus marked the end of World War II in Europe.
