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Japan's Invasion of China
Between 1931 and 1932, Japan invaded Manchuria in Northeast China and created the state of Manchukuo. There, they started creating a military and this caused resistance among both Chinese communists and Nationalists and hostility between the two countries. This aversion towards each other grew evem worse after the Marco Polo Bridge incident in 1937, when Chinese and Japanese forces battled on the outskirts of Peking. -
Germany Invades Poland
Officially staring World War II, German forces attack Poland from the air as well as on land. Adolf Hitler wanted to get back lost territory and rule Poland. He used the "blitzkrieg" strategy to attack, using bombing early on to undermine the enemy's railroads, communication lines, and air capacity. Poland was also very under-equipped and tried to take offensive positions, which caused their fall to Germany. -
Battle of Britain
After the fall of France, Great Britain successfully defended themselves from continuous air raids from the German air force, the Luftwaffe. Because losing meant an invasion by the German army, the victory of the Britains allowed great Britain to survive for until the end of the war. -
Tripartite Pact
Germany, Italy, and Japan officially became allies with the signing of the Tripartite Pact in Berlin. The pact assured assistance between the three nations. -
Lend-Lease Act
A system in which the US aided its allies with weapons, such as ammunition, tanks, airplanes, and truckes, and with food and other raw materials. Because, Great Britain started to realize that they were running out of money to purchase these materials, President Roosevelt agreed to trade these materials for "property, or any other direct or indirect benefit which the President deems satisfactory." This mainly applied for Great Britain but was extended to China and the Soviet Union later on. -
German Blitzkrieg on Soviet Union
The Germans invaded the Soviet Union using the Blitzkrieg technique. It was set for the annihilation of the Soviets and no mercy was shown on either side. After a week, 150,000 Soviet soldiers had died or were wounded. Keiv fell in October and Stalin was ready to organize a route out out of the Soviet Union just so he himself could get to safety as the Germans started pounding Moscow but he decided to stay to the end. -
Leningrad Blockade
The German seige of Leningrad led to the cut-off of supply lifeline in Leningrad, Russia's capital. THe daily ration for civilians was 125 grams of bread, and people began cannibalizing the dead as well as murdering for flesh. Books were burned to stay warm, leather was boiled and eated, wallpaper paste was scraped off the wall and eaten. -
Bombing of Pearl Harbor
On this Sunday morning, the Japanes conducted a surprise attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor on Oahu Island, Hawaii. Causing the US entry into the war, the bombing of Pearl Harbor killed more than 2300 US soldiers and fewer than 100 Japanese soldiers. It seriously severed US naval strength in the Pacific but 3 aircraft carriers were not at Pearl Harbor at the time, so they were saved. The Japanese also did not destroy oil storages on the island, so much of the resources was saved. -
Wannsee Conference
Nazi officials met in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee to discuss a final solution to the "Jewish question." They originally planned to deport all Jews to Madagascar, but then they changed their plans to rounding up all the Jew around Europe and putting them in labor gangs. The terrible living conditions would sufficiently kill off many of the Jews while those who lived would be killed or "treated accordingly." -
Battle of Midway
Fought almost entirely with aircraft, the Battle of Midway ended any threat of more Japanese iinvasions in the Pacific. The United States destroyed most of Japan's best trained naval pilots and its first-line carrier strength. First, the Japanese attempted to invade Midway Island, but Americans were ready. The battle began on June 3rd and ended on June 6th. -
D-Day
156,000 American, British, and Canadian troops attacked France's Normandy reagion. This invasion was one of the largest militay assults in history. These attacks are also called the beginning of the end of war in Europe. By August of 1944, northern France had been liberated, and the next year, the Allies successfully defeated the Germans. -
Iwo Jima/Okinawa
In need of a base near Japan so that soldiers would not have to return to the Marianas, the US invaded Iwo Jima. US marine divisions landed in Febuary 1945 while Iwa Jima had about 23,000 Japanese soldiers defending it. After a month of fighting, the US forces successfully defeated the defending forces. Though the attack was successful, the US was bogged down in costly attritional warfare. -
Yalta Conference
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Premier Joseph Stalin all met at Yalta in Crimean to plan a final defeat of Nazi Germany. They agreed that the German military industry would be abolished and that war criminals would be tried in front of an international court at Nurnberg. They also discussed what to do with defeated or liberated countries in eastern Europe. -
Hitler Commits Suicide
Paranoid about being captured by the Russians, Hitler decided to commit suicide by consuming a cyanide capsule and then shooting himself in his bunker on April 30th. Hitler had married Eva, a long companion, the day before and they both swallowed cyanide capsules while HItler shot himself for good measure. -
V-E Day
This day marked the surrendering of Nazi Germany of its armed forces. More that 13,000 British prisoners of war were returned back to Britain. In Moscow, V-E Day was not celebrated until May 9th, when Stalin himself publicly broadcasted that the war was officially over. -
Potsdam Conference
An allied conference of World War II, the Potsdam Conference took place in Potsdam, Germany and the main participants were harry S. Truman, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin. While they did not try to write peace treaties, the conferees tried to create procedures of peace settlements in Europe, -
Atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
In 1941, the US Office of Scientific Research and Development was given the job of creating an atomic bomb. Truman thought that the atomic bomb would be a more effective way to defeat Japan compared to losing many US lives in an invasion. Bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6th and August 9th respectively. -
V-J Day
On August 14, 1945, Japan surrendered from WWII. On September 2, 1945, Japan formally surrended aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay. President Truman declared September 2 VJ Day. This brought 6 years of hostilities between the US and Japan to an end. -
Korean War
Korea, which was annexed to Japan since 1910, did not have a government set when Japan surrendered after World War II. The claimants to power were of two groups, the Marxists revolutionaries and the nationalists. Ultimately, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) and the Republic of Korea (South Korea) fought. The Soviet Union and China assisted the North while the United Nations and the United States assisted the South. In the end, Korea was still divided into 2 hostile states. -
Formation of the UN
The United Nations was the second internation organization created after the League of Nations, which was disbanded in 1946. It was created to maintain peace and security as well as develop friendly relations among countries. -
Truman Doctrine
Pronounced by US President Harry S. Truman, the Truman Doctrine declared aid to the governments of Greece and Turkey who was threatened by Communism and who was under pressure of Soviet expansion respectively. Although Great Britain was reluctant in helping these two countries, Truman took out $400,000,000 for this purpose. -
Marshall Plan
A plan that was for rehabilitating the economies of 17 European countries to create stable conditions for democracy to survive. Many people feared that the poverty and unemployment caused by WWII would cause the rise of more communist parties. -
NATO
After World War II, the connection between European Allies and Russia was severed and both sides indulged in their own sides of Germany, the west side as democratic and the east side as communist. NATO was creted to counterweight Soviet armies in central and eastern Europe after World War II. -
Mao Zedong and the People's Republic of China
After years of battle between Mao's communist forces and Jiang Jieshi's regime of Nationalist Chinese, Mao Zedong proclaims the existence of the People's Republic of China. This action was a blow to the United States. -
Joseph Stalin Dies
On March 5, 1953, Joseph Stalin died of a massive heart attack. He is still remembered for saving his nation from Nazi domination but also for being the the mass murderer, killing 8-10 million of his own people. -
Vietnam War
Lasting until 1975, the Vietnam war was a war between North and South Vietnam. Like North and South Korea, the north was communist and was aided by the Soviet Union and China while the south was non-communist and was aided by the United States. The North wanted to unite all of Vietnam under a single communist regime. In 1973, the US withdrew and by 1975, South Vietnam fell to a full-scale invation by the North. -
Warsaw Pact
The Warsaw pact created mutual-defenses between the Soviet Union, Albnia, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. The treaty declared for the maintenance of Soviet military units in each of the territories of the other participating states. This pact was mainly to strengthen Soviet hold over its satellites, but it also created hostility in Poland and Hungary. -
Sputnik
Earth satellites that were launched into space by the Soviet Union beginning on Oct. 4, 1957. The first satellite was Sputnik 1. Weighting 83.6 kg, it completed a circle of the Earth in 96 minutes, but in early 1958, it fell back towards Earth and burned in Earth's atmosphere. There were 9 other satellites that were released afterwards. Sputnik 2 was launched with Laika, the first living creature to be shot into space and to orbit Earth, in it. -
Bay of Pigs
Wanting to push Fidel Castro from power, the CIA launched a full-scale invasion of Cuba in April 1961. 1,400 American Cubans who had fled heir homes when Castro took over attackekd their homeland. Unfortunately, Castro's troops outnumbered the invaders and they surrendered in less than 24 hours. -
Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was a barrier that surrounded West Berlin to prevent access to East Berlin from 1961 to 1989. West Berlin was democratic while East Germany was communist. In the years before, many Germans fled from East to West Berlin, and in return, the Soviet Union built the wall so that East Germans could not get over to West Berlin. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
After finding out that the Soviet Union was installing nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba, the United States and the Soviet Union was on the verge of war. President Kennedy decided to blockade Cuba to prevent any more Soviet shipments, but the Soviet Union evaded the quarantine sites and the tension between the two countries increased. Finally, on October 28, the Soviet Union agreed to halt the work on the missile sites in Cuba. -
Gorbachev
As the president of the Soviet Union from 1990-1991, Gorbachev attempted to democratize the Soviet Union's political system, which led to the downfall of communism and the Soviet Union itself in 1991. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990 for his ending of the Soviet Union' postwar domination of eastern Europe. -
Fall of the Soviet Union
Due to the large number of reforms that the Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev implemented during his rule, the Soviet Union fell. A few days before, representatives from 11 Soviet republics gathered to say that they would no longer be a part of the Soviet Union.
