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Daring U-Boat commanders carried out torpedo attacks within the defensive screen, and when several submarines attacked at once, the defenders had little chance of striking back. In the end, the Battle of the Atlantic was eventually won by technology. Radar to detect U-Boats from the surface, radio interception, and code-breaking all played a part. By the end of the war more than 3,000 merchant ships had been sunk, as well as almost 800 U-Boats.
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By late 1940 Britain faced the threat of a German invasion, but the incursion would succeed only with air superiority. What followed was the first major campaign fought by opposing air forces. For four months the German Luftwaffe carried out attacks on British airfields, radar stations, and aircraft factories, and bombed British cities, too. But the Stukas proved too vulnerable to being intercepted and the Germans couldn't mass enough planes to defeat the fighter pilots.
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Operation Barbarossa, it sure looked insane on paper given the Russian numerical superiority and the ignominious history of enemy forces invading Russia. Hitler, however, believed the Blitzkrieg was unstoppable, and the Battle of Brody in western Ukraine would prove him right—for a time. Seven hundred and fifty German panzers faced four times as many Russian tanks. But the Russian air force had been annihilated on the ground and the German Stukas were able to dominate the area.
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The Siege of Leningrad, also known as “the 900 day siege” since it nearly lasted that long (in actuality, it lasted 872 days) occurred when German and Finnish forces surrounded Leningrad and took over the city. The Soviet government had its citizenry work on building fortifications throughout the city although the area was almost entirely encircled by invading forces by November. It claimed more than 650,000 Soviet lives in a single year alone due to starvation, disease, and shelling.
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After Pearl Harbor, the Japanese aimed to invade New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. U.S. forces, aided by some Australian ships, moved to intercept them. This produced the first naval battle fought at long range between aircraft carriers. Dive bombers and torpedo bombers attacked ships protected by screens of fighters. It was a novel and confusing form of warfare, with both sides struggling to find the enemy and unclear about what ships they had seen and engaged.
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Midway was a catastrophic defeat from which the Imperial Japanese Navy never fully recovered. Much of the credit goes to the codebreakers who revealed the Japanese plan to ambush U.S. forces in time for the Allies to plan a counter-ambush. The Japanese plan to split American forces also failed. The U.S. then launched a major air assault on the Japanese carriers.
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The Allied victory was the beginning of the end of the Western Desert Campaign, eliminating the Axis threat to Egypt, the Suez Canal and the Middle Eastern and Persian oil fields. The battle revived the morale of the Allies, being the first big success against the Axis since Operation Crusader in late 1941. The battle coincided with the Allied invasion of French North Africa in Operation Torch on 8 November, the Battle of Stalingrad and the Guadalcanal Campaign.
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Operation Citadel was the final German offensive on the Eastern front, and Kursk is considered the greatest tank battle of the war. At Kursk, the Nazis aimed to repeat their earlier successes by surrounding and destroying Russian forces. The Russians got advance warning and built up defensive lines of ditches and minefields to absorb the German attack. In the air, Stukas armed with 37mm gun pods faced Russian armored Sturmoviks dropping dozens of anti-tank bombs.
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In contrast to the great sweeping tank battles elsewhere on the Eastern Front, Stalingrad was protracted and bloody urban warfare fought from street to street, house to house, and room to room as the Red Army resisted German attempts to take the city. Russia's defenses were based on thousands of strongpoints, each manned by an infantry squad, in apartments, office buildings, and factories, all with strict orders forbidding retreat.
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The last great carrier battle of WWII, the Battle of the Philippine Sea happened as U.S. forces advanced across the Pacific. A Japanese force including five large fleet carriers and four light carriers, plus some land-based aircraft, fought seven U.S. fleet carriers and eight light carriers. The U.S. enjoyed not only numerical superiority but also vastly better aircraft. The new Grumman F6F Hellcats outclassed the old Japanese Zeroes.
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Following the D-Day invasion of June 1944, the Allies broke out of Normandy and advanced rapidly across France and Belgium. Hitler aimed to halt them by a surprise Blitzkrieg. Several armored divisions massed in the Ardennes with the goal of breaking through Allied lines. American forces held on stubbornly in spite of heavy casualties— more than 19,000 died.
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The Battle of Iwo Jima is an iconic event, thanks largely due to Joe Rosenthal's photograph of the American flag being raised. But military analysts still argue whether the island's limited strategic value justified the costly action. Twenty thousand Japanese defenders were dug in to an elaborate system of bunkers, caves, and tunnels. The attack was preceded by a massive naval and air bombardment lasting several days covering the entire island.
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To those in the West, the Battle of Berlin may seem like an afterthought, the death throes of a war already decided. In fact it was a massive and extreme bloody action as three quarters of a million German troops, under the personal command of Hitler, fought a desperate final defense against the encroaching Red Army. The Russians had the advantage in tanks, but armored vehicles were vulnerable to new portable anti-tank rockets that destroyed 2,000 of them.