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The Invasion of Poland
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, or the 1939 Defensive War in Poland, was an invasion by Nazi Germany which some idenitfy as the begining of the second world war. As stated his Hitler’s infamous book, Mein Kamf; Hitler and the Nazi regime wanted ‘living space’ for the Germans to grow larger and prosper. One reason for this was German agriculture. German agriculture was insufficient and not well organised at the time, to be more self-sufficient they needed more land. -
Britain & France declare war on Germany
The Declaration of war by France and the United Kingdom was given on 3 September 1939. After German forces invaded Poland with the blitzkrieg tactic the two countries sent ultimatums to Hitler demanding Nazi withdrawal from Poland. Hitler declined to respond.British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gave a speech in in Westminster, London in which he said "against them I am certain that the right will prevail." -
Churchill becomes Prime Minister of Britain
Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty, replaced Neville Chamberlain as British prime minister following the Chamberlain's resignation after losing a confidence vote in the House of Commons. Churchill would prove to be a good leader who was able to inspire his people with his speeches and lead them through those dark times. -
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Evacuation of Dunkirk (Operation Dynamo)
The Dunkirk evacuation, code-named Operation Dynamo, also known as the Miracle of Dunkirk, was the evacuation of Allied soldiers from the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk, France, between 27 May and 4 June 1940, during World War II. The operation was decided upon when large numbers of Belgian, British, and French troops were cut off and surrounded by the German army during the Battle of France. -
Italy enters war on side of Axis powers
On this day in 1940, after withholding formal allegiance to either side in the battle between Germany and the Allies, Mussolini the fascist dictator of Italy, declared war on France and Great Britain.Although no super nation, Italy's involvement in the war would make them one nation to fight the Allies on many fronts and increase the death toll. -
France signs armstice with Germany
On June 22, 1940, France signed an armistice with Germany. Hitler insisted that it be done in the same railway car in which Germany had surrendered to France in 1918, at the end of World War I. -
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Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain is the name given to the Second World War defence of the United Kingdom by the Royal Air Force against an onslaught by the German Air Force which began at the end of June 1940. -
Operation Sea Lion
Operation Sealion was the name given by Hitler for the planned invasion of Britain in 1940. Operation Sealion was never carried out during the war as the Germans lost the Battle of Britain and it was believed that Hitler was more interested in the upcoming attack on Russia as opposed to invading Britain. -
Tripartite Pact signed
Germany, Italy, and Japan become allies with the signing of the Tripartite Pact in Berlin. The Pact provided for mutual assistance should any of the Axis nations suffer an attack by any nation not already involved in the war. -
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Siege of Tobruk
Besieged by General Irwin Rommel, 14 thousand Australian troops supported by Polish, Czechoslovakian, India and British men fought against German and Italian troops. The allies faced a force twice their size, which had tanks and easy access land access to additional supplies of men,food and equipment; the 'rats' could obtain supplies via sea, which was a dangerous task which generally resulted in aerial attacks on them. This was a significant event because it marked Germanys first major setback. -
Operation Barbossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union. The Nazi offensive would invovle the use of the blitzkrieg tactic and sieges and operations against Soviet locations such as eg Smolensk, Leningrad, Uman, Kiev. This would result in high amounts of deaths and causalities on both side and the eventual counter-strike and invasion into Nazi territories by Soviet Russia. -
Bombing of Pearl Habour
Just before 8 a.m. hundreds of Japanese fighter planes attacked the American naval base at Pearl Harbor near Honolulu, Hawaii. The barrage lasted just two hours, but it was devastating: The Japanese destroyed nearly 20 American naval vessels, including eight battleships and more than 300 airplanes. More than 2,000 Americans soldiers and sailors died in the attack and another 1,000 were wounded. A reason for this attack was due to the trade embargo America imposed on Japan. -
Britain and US declare war on Japan
The United States Congress declared war upon the Empire of Japan in response to that country's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor the previous day. It was contrived an hour after the Infamy Speech of Franklin D. Roosevelt. This bombing of Pearl Habor is considered one of the reasons why the United States went through with the dropping of the atomic bombs. The bombings united many Americans under one cause and production increased greatly and a rallying cry for revenge was created. -
Japan take Singapore
The Battle of Singapore, also known as the Fall of Singapore was a battle which involved British, Indian, Malayan, Australian troop against Japan. With Japanese victory came: renaming Singapore to Syonan-to(Light of the South), many Chinese, India and Malayan were massacred:Sook Ching, lack of resources to citizens and the populus was made to speak Japanese tongue.When the war was to be over all these things would lead many living in Singapore to go and participate in revenge killing. -
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Battleof Midway
The United States knew Japan were staging a battle, in a place coded "AF"; the location was found when a false message was sent out and Japan responded. The battle ended with a decisive American victory; this was a turning point in the Pacific war in which it was the first time the Japanese fleet had not emerged victorious. -
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First Battle of El Alamein
The First Battle of El Alamein was a battle of the Western Desert Campaign of the Second World War, fought in Egypt between Axis forces of Germany and Italy commanded by General Irwin Rommel against Britain, British India, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand; commanded by General Claude Auchinleck. The British prevented a second advance of the Axis forces into Egypt. -
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Battle of Stalingrad
It stopped the German advance into the Soviet Union and marked the turning of the tide of war in favor of the Allies. The Battle of Stalingrad was one of the bloodiest battles in history, with combined military and civilian casualties of nearly 2 million, This victory gave the Soviet Union much confiedence and attributed to their confidence as well as a symbol of their strength that could further be used to push through into and obtain victory in Nazi territory. -
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Second Battle of El Alamein
The Allied forces consisting of Australia, Britain, India, South Africa, New Zealand, France and Greece faced off against Axis Germany and Italy. The Allies had superiority in numbers and equipment which would lead them to having a decisive victory. -
D-Day Landings
Also known as the Normandy landings and operation Neptune was of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. The largest seaborne invasion in history, the operation began the liberation of German-occupied northwestern Europe from Nazi control, and contributed to the Allied victory on the Western Front. -
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Battle of the Buldge
By orders of Adolf Hitler, the Germans were to launch the last major offensive of the war, Operation Mist, also known as the Ardennes Offensive and the Battle of the Bulge( to describe the way the Allied front line bulged inward on battle maps), an attempt to push the Allied front line west from northern France to northwestern Belgium. During this battle weather attributed to making vechicle movement difficult, frostbite and soliders freezing to death. Ruses invovled Germans pretending to be... -
Mussolini captured an executed
With the war to be coming to an end in Europe, Benito Mussolini had decided to flee. While going to cross the Switzerland border with other Fascist leader and his mistress; a group of local communist partisans led by Pier Luigi Bellini delle Stelle and Urbano Lazzaro were able to capture the group.He later was executed by a firing squad and later hanged upside down along with other executed fascists in Piazzale Loreto, Milan. -
Hitler commits suicide
Adolf Hitler, along with his new spouse Eva Braun, holed up in a bunker under his headquarters in Berlin, Adolf Hitler commits suicide by swallowing a cyanide capsule and shooting himself in the head and his wife commits sucide by Eva Braun. -
German forces surrender
With Russia's series of victories over Nazi Germany and the mass murdering, pillaging, raping of Berlin followed by and continued after the symbolic fall of the Third Reich with the raising of the soviet flag of the Reichstag and being attack from all sides with heavy loses; Dönitz the successor of Adolf Hitler as the head of state of Germany, signed an unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany at the Allie Headquarters in Reims, France. -
V.E day
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 to mark the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II of Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender of its armed forces. A significant event as it reminds all of the sacrifice that had happened and all the wrong-doing that had occured. -
Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
On August 6, 1945, an American B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb(Little Boy) over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more would later die of radiation exposure. -
Soviet Union declares war on Japan
Stalin knew the end of the fight against Germany would free up his vast armed forces to invade Japanese-held territory in Asia, such as resource-rich Manchuria. The USSR declared war after the Hiroshima bombing but before the Nagasaki bombing. It's intention was clearly to grab territory before Japan surrendered. -
Atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki
Three days after the bombing of Hiroshima, a second B-29 dropped another atomic bomb (Fat Man) on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people and leaving survivors with radiation sickness. -
Japanese surrender- End of WW II
With the loss of the battle of Midway, lose of teritory eg Okinawa, the dropping of the atomic bombs and Russia declaring war, Japan's victory was essentially impossible.The United States immediately accepted Japan's surrender. President Truman appointed MacArthur to head the Allied occupation of Japan as Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers, this would mark the end of the second World War. -
United Nations is born
In 1945, representatives of 50 countries met in San Francisco at the United Nations Conference on International Organization to draw up the United Nations Charter. A reason it was made was because the league of Nations failed; It is also meant as a sort of world governing body, although its true powers are somewhat limited.
