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German troops cross the border into Austria and take control. Britain and France don’t react because of the policy of appeasement
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Hitler demanded that an area of Czechoslovakia known as the “Sudetenland’ be returned to Germany. In order to appease Hitler and avoid war, British Prime minister, Neville Chamberlain agreed to let him take the land.
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Hitler breaks the Munich pact and invaded Czechoslovakia
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HItler wanted to invade poland. In order to prevent any soviet interference Hitler negotiated a non-aggression pact in late august 1939. The two nations agreed not to attack each other.
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Adolf Hitler invaded Poland.
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Britain and France declared war on Germany. Neville Chamberlain broadcast the announcement that the country was at war.
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Hitler invaded and occupied Denmark and Norway to safeguard supply routes of Swedish ore and also to establish a Norwegian base from which to break the British naval blockade on Germany.
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Neville Chamberlain resigned after pressure from Labour members for a more active prosecution of the war and Winston Churchill became the new head of the wartime coalition government. Chamberlain gave Churchill his unreserved support. Ernest Bevin was made minister of labour and recruited workers for the factories and stepped up coal production. Lord Beaverbrook, minister of Aircraft Production increased production of fighter aircraft.
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The British commander-in-chief, General Gort, had been forced to retreat to the coast at Dunkirk. The troops waited, under merciless fire, to be taken off the beaches. A call went out to all owners of sea-worthy vessels to travel to Dunkirk to take the troops off the beaches of Dunkirk. More than 338,000 men were rescued, among them some 140,000 French who would form the nucleus of the Free French army under a little known general, Charles de Gaulle.
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Italy entered the war on the side of the Axis powers.
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The French, Marshall Petain, signed an armistice with Germany taking France, which had been devastated, out of the war and into German occupation.
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The Battle of Britain comprised four phases:
1. During July Hitler sent his Luftwaffe bombers to attack British ports. His aim was also to assess the speed and quality of response by the RAF.
2. During August the attacks on shipping continued but bombing raids were concentrated on RAF airfields.
3. The Blitz
4. Night Bombing -
This pact of mutual alliance was signed by Germany, Italy and Japan.
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German and Italian troops attacked Yugoslavia, Greece and the island of Crete.
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Hitler sent 3 million soldiers and 3,500 tanks into Russia. The Russians were taken by surprise as they had signed a treaty with Germany in 1939. Stalin immediately signed a mutual assistance treaty with Britain and launched an Eastern front battle that would claim 20 million casualties. The USA, which had been supplying arms to Britain under a ‘Lend-Lease’ agreement, offered similar aid to USSR.
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The Japanese, who were already waging war against the Chinese, attacked the US pacific fleet at Pearl Harbour, Hawaii, as a preliminary to taking British, French and Dutch colonies in South East Asia.
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Britain and the United States declared war on Japan.
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The USA defeated the Japanese navy at the Battle of Midway. Following this victory, the US navy was able to push the Japanese back.
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The Russians won the fight against Germany at the Battle of Stalingrad.
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British and US forces invaded Sicily.
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Mussolini had been thrown out of office and the new government of Italy surrendered to the British and the USA. They then agreed to join the allies. The Germans took control of the Italian army, freed Mussolini from imprisonment and set him up as head of a puppet government in Northern Italy. This blocked any further allied advance through Italy.
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The allies launched an attack on Germany’s forces in Normandy, Western France. Thousands of transports carried an invasion army under the supreme command of general Eisenhower to the Normandy beaches. The Germans who had been fed false information about a landing near Calais, rushed troops to the area but were unable to prevent the allies from forming a solid bridgehead. For the allies it was essential to first capture a port.
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Paris liberated The French capital of Paris was liberated from the Germans.
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The Russians reached Berlin shortly before the US forces.
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The German leader, Adolf Hitler committed suicide in his bombproof shelter together with his mistress, Eva Braun, who he had, at the last minute, made his wife.
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German forces in Italy surrendered to the Allies.
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Victory in Europe is celebrated
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Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
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The US dropped an atomic bomb on the island of Nagasaki as the Japanese had not surrendered following Hiroshima.
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The Japanese unconditionally surrendered to the allies ending the second world war.
