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The Battle of the Bulge was Germany's last major offensive on the Western Front during World War II, a surprise attack launched through the Ardennes Forest in December 1944 to split the Allied armies and force them to negotiate -
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 -
Japan invaded Manchuria primarily to secure vital natural resources like coal and iron for its industrial economy, to expand its imperial power and create a buffer against the Soviet Union, and to find a solution to its growing population and economic hardship caused by the Great Depression -
The Holocaust was the state-sponsored, systematic persecution and murder of six million European Jews by the Nazi German regime and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945. -
Italy invaded Ethiopia on October 3, 1935, beginning the Second Italo-Ethiopian War to establish an empire and avenge a previous defeat. Despite superior technology and brutal tactics like poison gas, the conflict was prolonged by Ethiopian resistance. -
One of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles was that the Germans would not be able to keep military forces in a 50 km stretch of the Rhineland. Hitler resented this term as it made Germany vulnerable to invasion. He was determined to enlarge his military capability and strengthen his borders. -
In July 1938, delegates from 32 countries met in Evian, France for a conference on the refugee crisis. The delegates expressed sympathy for the Jews who were seeking to flee Nazi persecution. Most countries, however, refused to admit more refugees. -
Anschluss is a German word for "connection" or "annexation" and refers specifically to the political union of Austria with Germany in 1938. This forceful annexation was a major step in Adolf Hitler's plan to create a "Greater German Reich" encompassing all ethnic Germans, and it signaled a direct challenge to the post-World War I order in Europe. -
The Munich Conference concluded that the Sudetenland territory would be ceded to Germany. In addition, Hitler would take over portions of Czechoslovakia provided he would not seek further expansion. The Czechoslovakian government was told that it could challenge Hitler to war, but it would do so without any support. -
A "cash and carry" is a wholesale business model where customers, typically small businesses or retailers, purchase goods in bulk, pay for them immediately, and transport the items themselves -
The Wagner-Rogers Bill was a failed 1939 legislative proposal to admit 20,000 German refugee children to the United States outside of 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 Nazi-Soviet Pact, signed on August 23, 1939, was a non-aggression treaty between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, notable for its accompanying secret protocol that divided Eastern Europe, including Poland, into spheres of influence. While the public aspect was a promise of neutrality, the secret protocol allowed Hitler to invade Poland -
Blitzkrieg, or "lightning war" in German, was a military tactic characterized by concentrated, rapid, and deep attacks by armored (Panzer) units, supported by mobile infantry and tactical air power, to quickly defeat an enemy by dislocating and disrupting their lines of communication and command rather than through prolonged attrition -
Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, to initiate World War II, driven by Hitler's expansionist policies aiming to conquer territory in the east and secure Germany's "living space". Hitler fabricated pretexts, such as Polish mistreatment of ethnic Germans, and staged a false attack on a German radio station to justify the invasion. -
The Battle of the Atlantic was a World War II campaign where German U-boats tried to sink Allied merchant ships to starve Britain, but the Allies countered with convoys, radar, and code-breaking to secure their supply lines and project power across the ocean -
The Battle of Britain was a decisive aerial campaign from July to October 1940 where the Royal Air Force (RAF) successfully defended the United Kingdom against Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe. -
The "Destroyers-for-Bases" deal was significant because it marked a major shift in U.S. foreign policy from neutrality toward supporting the Allies, provided crucial naval and air bases to the U.S. for defending the Western Hemisphere, and created a strong Anglo-American wartime partnership that led to further cooperation like the Lend-Lease Act -
The Lend-Lease Act was signed into law on March 11, 1941. The act authorized the President of the United States to sell, lease, lend, or otherwise dispose of arms and other military supplies to any country whose defense was considered vital to the security of the United States. -
Adolf Hitler was ecstatic and surprised by the Pearl Harbor attack, viewing it as a strategic godsend that would divert American resources to the Pacific, relieving pressure on the struggling Eastern Front. -
The Battle of Midway in June 1942 was a decisive U.S. naval victory that turned the tide of the war in the Pacific by destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers and crippling their offensive capabilities, while the U.S. lost only one carrier, the Yorktown. -
The Atlantic Charter was a 1941 joint declaration by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill outlining their vision for a post-World War II world, establishing common goals such as self-determination, freedom from fear and want, open trade, and international cooperation to achieve lasting peace and disarmament of aggressor nations -
The Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942 was the first naval battle in history fought entirely by aircraft carriers, resulting in a strategic Allied victory by halting the Japanese invasion of Port Moresby, despite both sides suffering heavy losses, including the U.S. carrier USS Lexington. -
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 -
On June 6, 1944, in Operation Overlord, Allied forces landed troops on the beaches of Normandy, France, for the largest amphibious assault in history. -
The Nuremberg Trials were a series of military tribunals in post-World War II Germany that prosecuted high-ranking Nazi leaders for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and crimes against peace. Held from 1945 to 1949 in the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany, the trials presented overwhelming evidence of Nazi atrocities and resulted in the conviction and sentencing of numerous Nazi officials, though some escaped punishment -
The Battle of Okinawa was a brutal World War II battle from April to June 1945, featuring intense fighting, massive casualties for American, Japanese, and Okinawan forces (exceeding 250,000 total), and a heavy reliance on Japanese kamikaze suicide attacks -
The Buchenwald concentration camp was liberated on April 11, 1945, by the U.S. Third Army. An inmate resistance organization had taken control of the camp from the fleeing SS guards shortly before the American troops arrived, an act that saved thousands of prisoners. -
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, after the Trinity nuclear test. -
The name Fat Man refers to the wide, round shape. Fat Man was an implosion-type nuclear weapon with a solid plutonium core, and later with improved cores. -
V-J Day, or Victory over Japan Day, is the day in 1945 that marks the surrender of Japan and the end of World War II. Due to the complex sequence of events surrounding Japan's capitulation, the date of commemoration varies by country. -
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a milestone document in the history of human rights. Drafted by representatives with different legal and cultural backgrounds from all regions of the world, it set out, for the first time, fundamental human rights to be universally protected.