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Mussolini's march on Rome
The March on Rome was an organized mass demonstration in October 1922, which resulted in Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party ascending to power in the Kingdom of Italy. -
Stalin becomes dictator of USSR
Upon Lenin's death, Stalin was officially hailed as his successor as the leader of the ruling Communist Party and of the Soviet Union itself. -
Hitler writes Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf is a 1925 autobiographical manifesto by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler. The work describes the process by which Hitler became antisemitic and outlines his political ideology and future plans for Germany. -
The 1st "five year plan" in USSR
The first five year plan was created in order to initiate rapid and large-scale industrialization across the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). Having begun on October 1st, 1928, the plan was already in its second year when Harry Byers first set foot in the Soviet Union. -
Japan invades Manchuria
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 accusations of war crimes against the Chinese became commonplace. -
Holodomor
The Holodomor, also known as the Terror-Famine and sometimes referred to as the Great Famine, was a famine in Soviet Ukraine from 1932 to 1933 that killed millions of Ukrainians. This suggests that the famine was caused by a combination of a severe drought, chaotic implementation of forced collectivization of farms, and the food requisition program carried out by the Soviet authorities. -
Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany
Paul von Hindenburg took direct control of the German government in 1931 using the emergency powers allowed under the Weimar Constitution. He feared a seizure of power by Hitler, but came to believe he could control him and appointed him chancellor in 1933, with three other Nazis in the Cabinet and Goering controlling some police forces. -
"Night of the Long Knives" in Germany
Night of the Long Knives, in German history, purge of Nazi leaders by Adolf Hitler on June 30, 1934. Fearing that the paramilitary SA had become too powerful, Hitler ordered his elite SS guards to murder the organization’s leaders, including Ernst Röhm. Also killed that night were hundreds of other perceived opponents of Hitler. -
Nuremburg Laws enacted
The Nuremberg Race Laws consisted of two pieces of legislation: the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor. These laws institutionalized many of the racial theories underpinning Nazi ideology and provided the legal framework for the systematic persecution of Jews in Germany. The Nuremberg Race Laws did not identify a “Jew” as someone with particular religious convictions but instead as someone with three or four Jewish grandparents. -
Italian invasion of Ethiopia
The aim of invading Ethiopia was to boost Italian national prestige, which was wounded by Ethiopia's defeat of Italian forces at the Battle of Adowa in the nineteenth century, which saved Ethiopia from Italian colonisation. ... This was used as a rationale to invade Abyssinia. -
The Great Purge and Gulags
The Great Purge, also known as the “Great Terror,” was a brutal political campaign led by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin to eliminate dissenting members of the Communist Party and anyone else he considered a threat. The Gulag was a system of forced labor camps established during Joseph Stalin's long reign as dictator of the Soviet Union. -
Spanish Civil War
The main cause of the Spanish Civil War, was the failure of Spanish democracy. This was because there was a refusal by the Spanish parties and groups to compromise and respect democratic norms. -
The Rape of Nanking
The Nanjing Massacre or the Rape of Nanjing was an episode of mass murder and mass rape committed by Imperial Japanese troops against the residents of Nanjing, at that time the capital of China, during the Second Sino-Japanese War. -
Kristallnacht
On November 9 to November 10, 1938, in an incident known as “Kristallnacht”, Nazis in Germany torched synagogues, vandalized Jewish homes, schools and businesses and killed close to 100 Jews. -
Nazi Germany invades Poland
Germany invaded Poland to regain lost territory and ultimately rule their neighbor to the east. The German invasion of Poland was a primer on how Hitler intended to wage war–what would become the “blitzkrieg” strategy. -
Japan bombs Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii. Japan intended the attack as a preventive action to prevent the United States Pacific Fleet from interfering with its planned military actions in Southeast Asia against overseas territories of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and those of the United States.