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Treaty of Versailles

History of WW2
06/1919
Hang the Kaiser!
Popular British newspaper slogan during the negotiation of the Treaty of Versailles
On 28 June 1919, the peace treaty that ended World War I was signed by Germany and the
Allies at the Palace of Versailles near Paris. Allied interests were represented by the Big
Three: British Prime Minister David Lloyd George, French Premier George Clemenceau and
US President Woodrow Wilson. The Great War had devastated Europe. Vast areas of
north-western Europe were reduced to moonscapes; French and Belgian villages and towns
had disappeared without trace. The conflict decimated Europes male population. Both sides
suffered casualties on an almost incomprehensible scale. France had suffered more than 1.4
million dead, and more than 4 million wounded. In total, 8.5 million men had perished.
Many voices at Versailles held Germany responsible for the war, calling for the country to be
crushed economically and militarily, rendered incapable of future aggression. Clemenceau
was the most ardent advocate of this view. Backed by the French public, he wanted to bring
Germany to her knees. He called for Germany to pay huge sums of money, known as
reparations. Lloyd George was aware of Britains appetite for vengeance, and publicly
promised to make Germany pay. Yet privately, anxiety produced by the Russian Revolution
convinced him that Germany needed to be a bulwark against Bolshevism. If Germany was
left destitute, extreme left wing politics would find support among the population. Germany
should not be treated leniently, but neither should she be destroyed.
Wilson believed that Germany should be punished in a way that would lead to European
reconciliation rather than revenge. Although the US public increasingly supported
isolationism, Wilson called for the creation of an international peacekeeping organisation.
Wilsons Fourteen Points, his blueprint for the post-war world, called for self-determination
for all European peoples, an end to secret treaties and European disarmament.
On 7 May, the treaty was presented to Germany. She was stripped of 13 per cent of her
territory and ten per cent of her population; the border territories of Alsace and Lorraine were
returned to France. Germany lost all of her colonies, 75 per cent of her iron ore deposits and
26 per cent of her coal and potash. The size of the army and navy was drastically cut, and
an air force and submarines were forbidden. The Germans also had to officially accept war
guilt and pay reparations to the tune of 6,000 million.
For the Allies, the treaty had created a just peace which weakened Germany, secured the
French border against attack and created an organisation to ensure future world peace, to
be called the League of Nations. Yet the backlash in Germany against the Versailles Diktat
was enormous. Territorial losses to the new Polish state on the Eastern Front (where
Germany had actually been victorious) outraged many Germans. The demilitarisation of the
Rhineland and the incorporation of large numbers of Sudeten Germans into the new state of
Czechoslovakia provoked similar feelings. Perhaps the greatest resentment, however, was
caused by the War Guilt Clause, which forced Germany to accept full responsiblity for

causing the war. In a nation that had lost 2 million men, and was quickly developing a myth
that it had not been militarily defeated in the war, but stabbed in the back by its own
politicians, this was difficult to bear.
As Germany sought revisions to the treaty, the US Senate rejected the Versailles settlement
and vetoed US membership of the League of Nations. This was to contribute to its failure as
an international peacekeeping organisation in the unstable and dangerous years leading up
to World War II. It was instability that the Versailles Treaty had done much to avoid and in
the end created.
Did you Know
The Treaty of Versailles was signed on 28 June 1919 - the date was the fifth anniversary of
the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife, the event which
sparked the outbreak of World War I
Nazi Germany
History of WW2
01/1933 to 05/1945
At the risk of appearing to talk nonsense, I tell you that the Nazi movement will go on for
1,000 years!
Adolf Hitler to a British Journalist
At the beginning of the 1930s, Adolf Hitlers Nazi Party exploited widespread and
deep-seated discontent in Germany to attract popular and political support. There was
resentment at the crippling territorial, military and economic terms of the Versailles Treaty,
which Hitler blamed on treacherous politicians and promised to overturn. The democratic
post-World War I Weimar Republic was marked by a weak coalition government and political
crisis, in answer to which the Nazi party offered strong leadership and national rebirth. From
1929 onwards, the worldwide economic depression provoked hyperinflation, social unrest
and mass unemployment, to which Hitler offered scapegoats such as the Jews.
Hitler pledged civil peace, radical economic policies, and the restoration of national pride and
unity. Nazi rhetoric was virulently nationalist and anti-Semitic. The subversive Jews were
portrayed as responsible for all of Germanys ills.
In the federal elections of 1930 (which followed the Wall Street Crash), the Nazi Party won
107 seats in the Reichstag (the German Parliament), becoming the second-largest party.
The following year, it more than doubled its seats. In January 1933, President von
Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor, believing that the Nazis could be controlled from
within the cabinet. Hitler set about consolidating his power, destroying Weimar democracy
and establishing a dictatorship. On 27 February, the Reichstag burned; Dutch communist
Marianus van der Lubbe was found inside, arrested and charged with arson. With the
Communist Party discredited and banned, the Nazis passed the Reichstag Fire Decree,
which dramatically curtailed civil liberties.
In March 1933, the Nazis used intimidation and manipulation to pass the Enabling Act, which

allowed them to pass laws which did not need to be voted on in the Reichstag. Over the next
year, the Nazis eliminated all remaining political opposition, banning the Social Democrats,
and forcing the other parties to disband. In July 1933, Germany was declared a one-party
state. In the Night of the Long Knives of June 1934, Hitler ordered the Gestapo and the SS
to eliminate rivals within the Nazi Party. In 1935, the Nuremburg Laws marked the beginning
of an institutionalised anti-Semitic persecution which would culminate in the barbarism of the
Final Solution.
Hitlers first moves to overturn the Versailles settlement began with the rearmament of
Germany, and in 1936 he ordered the remilitarisation of the Rhineland. Hitler became bolder
as he realised that Britain and France were unwilling and unable to challenge German
expansionism. Between 1936 and 1939, he provided military aid to Francos fascist forces in
the Spanish Civil War, despite having signed the Non-Intervention Agreement. In March
1938, German troops marched into Austria; the Anschluss was forbidden under Versailles.
Anglo-French commitment to appeasement and peace for our time meant that when Hitler
provoked the Sudeten Crisis, demanding that the Sudetenland be ceded to Germany,
Britain and France agreed to his demands at September 1938s Munich conference.
Germanys territorial expansion eastwards was motivated by Hitlers desire to unite
Germanspeaking peoples, and also by the concept of Lebensraum: the idea of providing
Aryan Germans with living space.
At the end of the year, anti-Jewish pogroms erupted across Germany and Austria.
Kristallnacht a state-orchestrated attack on Jewish property resulted in the murder of 91
Jews. Twenty thousand more were arrested and transported to concentration camps. In
March 1939, Germany seized the remainder of Czechoslovakia; in August Hitler signed the
Nazi-Soviet Pact of non-aggression with the USSR. The next step would be the invasion of
Poland and the coming of World War II.
Did you Know
When Adolf Hitler was a struggling, poverty stricken artist in Vienna, he did not show any
signs of anti-Semitism. Many of his closest associates in the hostel where he lived were the
Jewish men who helped him to sell his pictures.
During the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Hitler refused to shake the hand of African-American Jesse
Owens, who won four gold medals. However, when questioned about this Owens said:
"Hitler didn't snub me - it was FDR who snubbed me. The president didn't even send me a
telegram."
Appeasement
History of WW2
01/1930 to 03/1939
Our Government is much more afraid of Communism than it is of Fascism.
British journalist John Langdon-Davies, 1936
Appeasement, the policy of making concessions to the dictatorial powers in order to avoid
conflict, governed Anglo-French foreign policy during the 1930s. It became indelibly
associated with Conservative Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. Although the roots of

appeasement lay primarily in the weakness of post-World War I collective security


arrangements, the policy was motivated by several other factors.
Firstly, the legacy of the Great War in France and Britain generated a strong public and
political desire to achieve peace at any price. Secondly, neither country was militarily ready
for war. Widespread pacifism and war-weariness (not too mention the economic legacy of
the Great Depression) were not conducive to rearmament. Thirdly, many British politicians
believed that Germany had genuine grievances resulting from Versailles. Finally, some
British politicians admired Hitler and Mussolini, seeing them not as dangerous fascists but as
strong, patriotic leaders. In the 1930s, Britain saw its principle threat as Communism rather
that fascism, viewing authoritarian right-wing regimes as bulwarks against its spread.
The League of Nations was intended to resolve international disputes peacefully. Yet the
Leagues ineffectiveness soon became apparent. In 1931, when Japan invaded Manchuria,
the League condemned the action. However, without either the weight of the US or the
power of its own army, it was unable to stop Japan. By 1937, Japan had launched a
full-scale invasion of China. In October 1935, the League imposed economic sanctions but
little more when Mussolini invaded Abyssinia. In March 1936, a cautious Hitler remilitarised
the Rhineland, forbidden under Versailles. The feared Anglo-French reaction never came. In
the Leagues council, the USSR was the only country to propose sanctions. British Prime
Minister Stanley Baldwin ruled out the possibility.
Germany and Italy now realised that the democracies were seeking to avoid confrontation,
so both countries continued to test the limits. During the Spanish Civil War, Hitler and
Mussolini contravened the Non-Intervention Agreement, sending troops, equipment and
planes to back the rebels. Their intervention was ignored by the international community.
When Chamberlain became Prime Minister in May 1937, the pattern of appeasement had
already been set. In March 1938, Hitlers Anschluss (union) with Austria was once again met
with Anglo-French impotence and inaction.
Czechoslovakia had been created under Versailles, and included a large German minority
mostly living in the Sudetenland on the border with Germany. In mid-September 1938, Hitler
encouraged the leader of the Sudeten Nazis to rebel, demanding union with Germany. When
the Czech government declared martial law, Hitler threatened war.
On 15 September, Chamberlain met Hitler at Berchtesgaden. Without consulting the Czech
authorities, he pledged to give Germany all the areas with a German population of more than
50 per cent. France was persuaded to agree. Hitler then altered his criteria, demanding all
the Sudetenland. At the Munich Conference on 30 September, Britain and France agreed to
his demands. Chamberlain was confident that he had secured peace for our time.
Appeasement was not without its critics. Churchill believed in a firm stand against Germany,
and Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden resigned in February 1938 over Britains continued
acquiescence to fascist demands. The left-wing also attacked Chamberlains blindness. In
March 1939, when Germany seized the remainder of Czechoslovakia, it was clear that
appeasement had failed. Chamberlain now promised British support to Poland in the case of

German aggression. A misguided belief in peace in our time was replaced by a reluctant
acceptance of the inevitability of war.
Did you Know
In 1940, three British journalists anonymously published the book Guilty Men. It called for the
removal from public office of 15 politicians and labelled appeasement as deliberate
surrender of small nations in the face of Hitlers blatant bullying.
Poland
History of WW2
09/1939
There were no crowds shouting Heil Hitler . . . people were scared of the future.
Albert Speer on Berlin after the attack on Poland
On 1 September 1939, 62 German divisions supported by 1,300 aircraft began the invasion
of Poland. At 8pm on the same day, Poland requested military assistance from Britain and
France. Two days later, in fulfilment of their April 1939 pledge to support the country in the
event of an attack, Britain and France declared war on Germany. World War II had begun.
The Anglo-French declaration of war may have been unexpected, but Hitlers prediction that
the campaign against Poland would be short and victorious was correct.
At 6am on 1 September, as Warsaw was battered by the first in a succession of bombing
raids, two German army groups invaded Poland from Slovakia in the south and Prussia in
the north. The German air force, which had much more advanced aircrafts than the Poles,
quickly established air supremacy by attacking and destroying the Polish air force in the air
and on the ground. This allowed German bombers to attack road and rail junctions, as well
as concentrations of Polish troops. Towns and villages were bombed to spread terror among
civilians and generate a fleeing mass of refugees which would block the roads and prevent
reinforcements from arriving at the front. Junkers Ju-87 dive-bombers destroyed any strong
points in the German path. By 8 September, German tanks were already on the outskirts of
Warsaw. A week later, the capital was completely surrounded.
A Polish counterattack on 9 September led to the Battle of Bzura, the largest engagement of
the campaign. Despite some limited early Polish success, massive German air superiority,
and their ability to quickly redirect forces to meet the Polish attack, led to a crushing German
victory.
Poland had been overrun in four weeks, long before any meaningful Anglo-French military
aid could reach Poland, and proving Hitlers conviction that Polish armed forces would be no
match for the Blitzkrieg (lightening war) unleashed by Germany.
The Soviet Union which had spent the 1930s searching for a collective security
agreement in Europe and had signed a non-aggression pact with Germany on 28 August
1939 also profited from the invasion. On 17 September the Red Army crossed the Polish
border in the east, seizing a third of all Polish territory. Some Poles fled across the border

into Romania, eventually reaching the west and continuing the war as the Free Polish
Forces. Warsaw finally surrendered at 2.00pm on 27 September.
Did you Know
On paper, the Polish and German armies did not seem badly mismatched: 30 Polish
divisions faced 40 German ones. However, twelve of the Polish divisions were cavalry. While
the Germans deployed 3,200 tanks, the Polish only had 600
Fall of France
History of WW2
05/1940 to 06/1945
If the tanks succeed, then victory follows.
Heinz Guderian
By May 1940, Europe had been at war for nine months. Yet Britain and France, despite
having declared war on Germany in September 1939 following Hitlers attack on Poland, had
seen little real fighting. This tense period of anticipation which came to be known as the
Phoney War met an abrupt end on 10 May 1940, when Germany launched an invasion of
France and the Low Countries.
The German plan of attack, codenamed Case Yellow, entailed an armoured offensive
through the Ardennes Forest, which bypassed the strong French frontier defences of the
Maginot Line. The advance would then threaten to encircle French and British divisions to
the north, stationed on the Belgian frontier.
The German offensive quickly overwhelmed Dutch forces, and the bombing of Rotterdam
persuaded the Netherlands to surrender on 15 May. And although German forces in the
north encountered strong French and Belgian resistance, the main German thrust through
the Ardennes met with tremendous success. French second-rate divisions in the area were
not prepared or equipped to deal with the major armoured thrust that developed (the forest
and poor roads were thought to make this impossible), and were hammered by incessant
attacks by German bombers.
Just four days into the invasion German troops crossed the Meuse river, and had broken
through the French lines. Attempts by the Allies to launch counterattacks by air and land
either failed with heavy losses, or were thwarted by the pace of events. The British
Expeditionary Force, along with the best units of the French army, were still in the north and
had seen little fighting. But the German breakthrough to the south now forced them into rapid
retreat to avoid being cut off with their backs to the sea. On 20 May German tanks reached
Amiens and effectively trapped the British, who now made for Dunkirk and an unlikely
attempt at evacuation to England.
In these desperate circumstances, an evacuation plan known as Operation Dynamo was
hastily prepared in Dover by Vice Admiral Bertram Ramsay. His strategy included an appeal
for all civilian vessels that could cross the Channel to help ferry the troops from the beaches
to larger ships offshore, or to evacuate them entirely. Between 26 May and 4 June - a period

during which Hitler halted the advance of his troops on Dunkirk - 200,000 British and
140,000 French troops were evacuated to England. Nine allied destroyers and
approximately 200 civilian vessels were lost during the evacuation, and the RAF suffered
severe casualties covering the operation from the air.
On 5 June, the Germans swung southwards and French resistance finally collapsed,
although not without heavy fighting. On 10 June, Italy opportunistically entered the war on
Germanys side. Four days later, the French capital fell, provoking the flight of the French
Government to Bordeaux. The Government capitulated on 25 June, just seven weeks after
the beginning of the invasion.
The British 51st Highland Division - stationed in the Maginot Line when the fighting started
was forced to surrender at St Valry. During the final evacuation of British troops from St
Nazaire on the Atlantic coast, the troopship Lancastria was sunk with the loss of around
4,000 refugees, British troops and crew. Reluctant to take the risk that the French Navy
would end up under German control, Churchill ordered the Royal Navy to present French
warships at Mers-el-Kebir with an ultimatum to sail to Britain or to a neutral port for
internment. When this offer was rejected on 3 July, British ships bombarded the fleet, killing
1,600 people. Although this operation did much to assure America of the strength of the
British purpose, it and the evacuation of Dunkirk did immeasurable damage to Franco-British
wartime relations.
Did you Know
Ironically, Germanys Blitzkrieg tactics were based partly on the theories of Charles de
Gaulle, French General and expert in the concentration of armour and air planes. De Gaulle
was a grand symbol of French antifascism; he became President in 1945
Battle of Britain
History of WW2
06/1940 to 09/1940
Never, in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.
Sir Winston Churchill on the RAF after the Battle of Britain
WATCH BATTLE OF BRITAIN VIDEOS
The Battle of Britain was a struggle between the German Luftwaffe (commanded by
Hermaan Gring) and the British Royal Air force (headed by Sir Hugh Dowdings Fighter
Command) which raged over Britain between July and October 1940. The battle, which was
the first major military campaign in history to be fought entirely in the air, was the result of a
German plan to win air superiority over Southern Britain and the English Channel by
destroying the British air force and aircraft industry. Hitler saw victory in the battle as a
prelude to the invasion of Britain (codenamed Operation Sealion).
In May 1940, German forces had overrun Belgium, the Netherlands and northern France
using Blitzkrieg (Lightening War) tactics. With the USA and the Soviet Union both still mired
in hesitant isolationism, and the French ally toppled, Britain now stood alone against Nazi

Germany. Yet as Hitler turned his attention to the British Isles in the summer of 1940,
directing a force of over 1,350 bombers and 1,200 fighters first against shipping, airfields,
and finally against towns, it became apparent that the Luftwaffe had the odds stacked
against it.
The Luftwaffes first disadvantage was that it was neither trained nor equipped for the long
range operations which became part of the battle. Its tactics were based upon the concept of
close air support for ground forces; they were therefore ill-suited to the circumstances of the
new campaign. The technical differences between the fighter aircraft employed by two sides
were negligible: the RAFs main fighter planes were the Spitfire and the Hurricane, whilst the
Germans relied primarily on Messcherschmitt fighters and Junkers dive bombers. Yet to
swing the odds in Britains favour, the tactical advantage that German fighters had
developed in earlier conflicts was negated once fighter aircraft were ordered to provide close
escort to the German bomber formations. These formations had discovered to their own
extreme cost that they were unable to defend themselves.
During the battle, the RAF enjoyed the advantage of defending against attacks launched
from widely separated airfields, thus profiting from what strategists call interior lines. This
advantage was optimised by Britains system of radar tracking and guidance. Furthermore,
the added comfort of fighting over friendly territory meant that pilots who crash-landed or
parachuted out of their aircrafts could return to battle. British fortunes were also helped by
the fact that the Luftwaffe had never subscribed to a concept of strategic bombing. British
anti-aircraft and civil-defence preparations were inadequate in the summer of 1940, yet the
Luftwaffe was unable to wreak the devastating effects feared by many.
The climax of the battle came on 15 September, a day in which the Luftwaffe lost 56 planes
and the RAF 28. During the twelve-week battle, 1,733 German aircraft had been destroyed,
compared with 915 British fighters. On 17 September, Hitler recognised the growing futility of
the campaign and postponed indefinitely the invasion of Britain. Yet this did not mean an end
to the bombing terror. German tactics were changed again and the Luftwaffe resorted to
indiscriminate bombing of larger cities, including London, Plymouth and Coventry.
Did you Know
Although the sleek Supermarine Spitfire became the iconic image of the Battle of Britain,
there were actually more Hawker Hurricane squadrons involved in the fighting, and they shot
down more German aircraft. This was because the faster Spitfire was often used to engage
German fighter escorts, while Hurricanes went after the bombers.
Barbarossa
History of WW2
06/1941 to 12/1941
Do you think that we deserved this?
Soviet foreign minister Molotov to the German ambassador in Moscow, on hearing news of
the invasion.
On 22 June 1941 Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Codenamed Operation Barbarossa, it

was the largest military operation in history, involving more than 3 million Axis troops and
3,500 tanks. It was the logical culmination of Hitlers belief that the German master race
should seek lebensraum (living space) in the east, at the expense of the subhuman native
Slav people, who were to be exterminated or reduced to serf status.
Planning for Barbarossa had begun over a year previously, in the wake of Germanys
stunning success against the western allies in France. The triumphalism that followed this
victory, combined with widely believed reports that the Soviet armed forces were weak and
deficient (evidence came from defeats by Finland in 1939) led to great optimism in the
German high command, with Hitler declaring, we have only to kick in the door and the whole
rotten structure will come crashing down.
The Soviet Union was unprepared for the onslaught that came in June. Stalin refused to
believe mounting evidence that an invasion was being prepared, and so his armies and air
force on the frontier were caught by surprise. As in their earlier victories, the Luftwaffe
quickly gained air superiority, and helped armoured columns and motorised infantry punch
holes through the Soviet front line. Barbarossa had three primary objectives the Baltic
states and Leningrad in the north, Moscow in the centre, and the economic resources of the
Ukraine and southern Russia in the south. This led to a division of focus for which Hitler and
his generals were later to be widely criticised.
Initially all went well for the Germans, some units advancing 50 miles on the first day,
although resistance was fiercer than expected in the south. With Stalin personally
intervening to forbid generals to retreat, large Soviet forces were encircled and destroyed or
taken prisoner. 250,000 were lost in a massive encirclement around Minsk at the end of
June, 180,000 were taken prisoner at Smolensk, while the Red Army suffered 500,000
casualties at the Battle of Kiev in September.
But despite the enormous casualties they had inflicted, the Germans had failed to land a
decisive blow. They had underestimated both the resources of the Soviet Union and its
willingness to accept massive losses. Now the German offensives were running out of
steam, as front-line units halted for resupply and replacements. At a crucial phase of the
operation, Hitler insisted that the panzer divisions of Army Group Centre, which were
advancing on Moscow, were diverted to overcome resistance in the north and south. With
this achieved, the drive on Moscow resumed on 2 October, codenamed Operation Typhoon.
Ten days later German units were within 90 miles of the Russian capital, but stubborn Soviet
resistance and heavy German casualties, combined with heavy rain which turned bad roads
into rivers of mud, slowed the advance to a crawl. By the beginning of December, German
troops were within sight of the spires of Moscow. However, a massive Soviet counterattack,
using fresh units brought in from the East, supported by T-34 tanks, drove the Germans
back. As the Russian winter set in, German offensive operations were abandoned.
Operation Barbarossa was one of the decisive moments of the war in Europe. Despite
enormous losses in territory, men and weaponry, the Soviets had fought on, and survived.
They would face fresh German offensives in 1942, but as the immense manpower and
resources of the Soviet Union were brought into play, time was on their side. The Eastern

Front would become a graveyard of the German armed forces, as men, tanks and aircraft
were thrown into an increasingly unwinnable conflict.
Did you Know
When the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union, they faced a Red Army which had been
decimated by the Anti-Trotskyite Stalinist purges of the 1930s, losing 400 of its generals.
This severely undermined its effectiveness on the battlefield
Collaboration and Resistance
History of WW2
07/1940 to 09/1945
Death to facism, freedom to the people!
Yugoslav Partisan slogan
In Occupied Europe, resistance and collaboration could take many forms. The Vichy regime
established in France in July 1940, led by Marshall Petain, is the most famous example of
official collaboration, but the governments of Denmark, the Low Countries, Norway,
Hungary, Yugoslavia and Greece all signed alliances with the Third Reich. In most cases,
these pacts were signed after German military occupation. In some (such as Austria, where
there was large public and political support for the Nazis), they had more to do with
ideological affinity than coercion. Collaboration in its most extreme form resulted in the
handing over of thousands of Jews to the Nazis by collaborationist administrations. In
France alone, the Vichy authorities deported 76,000 Jews to camps including Auschwitz.
The issue of collaboration was not always clear cut however. In Denmark, the government
accepted certain Nazi demands, such as arresting Communists, but refused others,
including passing laws against their Jewish community .
Collaboration by civilians in Occupied Europe ranged from a mere survival tool (for instance
doing the laundry of German soldiers to earn extra food for your family), to the denunciation
of enemies within the community (something which occurred across occupied Europe), to
the formation of paramilitary militias and participation in collective massacres. In occupied
Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, the SS controlled Einsatzgruppen recruited local
civilians and police to assist in mass killings. The most infamous example was at Babi Yar
near Kiev, where over 33,000 Jews were slaughtered in September 1941 by German
security forces, assisted by the Ukrainian police.
Thousands of Europeans opted to resist German and Italian occupiers. Peaceful resistance
included go slows at work, bureaucratic obstruction, the hiding of Jews or other fugitives, or
acts of casual, small-scale sabotage, as happened on the French railway network. All of
these actions formed a subtle network of solidarity, especially in countries such as Holland
where there was little armed resistance.
A much smaller group chose to take up arms against the occupier. The French maquisard,
the Italian and Yugoslavian partisans and Spanish, Polish Danish, Czechoslovakian, Greek
and Albanian guerrilleros formed part of the fight against international fascism. The largest
resistance armies were the Soviet and Polish guerrilla forces based in the Pripet Marshes,

between Belarus and the Ukraine. Their hit and run raids against German supply lines
incensed the Nazis to such a degree that at one stage they hatched a plan to drain the
thousands of square miles of marshes.
There was also resistance within Germany itself. The White Rose, a student youth
movement which called for active opposition to Hitlers regime, have gone down in history as
a result of their leaflet campaign between June 1942 and February 1943. Similarly, Dietrich
Boenhoffers Confessing Church represented a significant form of Christian opposition to the
Nazi government.
The Nazis pursued resistance leaders relentlessly. If captured they would face certain death,
with executions widely publicised to cow the local population into submission. In April 1944,
the Nazis plastered the walls of Paris with 15,000 copies of the famous Red Poster, which
bore the faces of ten of the 23 partisans they had assassinated in February that year. The
Nazis also used savage reprisals to discourage resistance. The Czech village of Lidice and
the French village of Oradour-sur-Glane were both obliterated, and their populations
murdered or sent to camps.
Although the resistance spanned a wide ideological spectrum, including Catholics, liberals,
and nationalists, the most active partisans were young Communists and other left-wingers.
Their mission supported in many cases by the British Special Operations Executive (SOE)
and the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was to harass the enemy, disrupt their
communications, assist fugitives including downed Allied airmen, and punish collaborators.
Sabotage and ambush was their most common action, and names such as Jean Moulin
(who united the French Resistance under the Conseil National de la Rsistance) and
Cristino Garca Granda (the Spainish communist Guerillero who set out to defeat fascism in
France after seeing his own country fall to Franco) passed into legend.
Did you Know
Perhaps the most famous act of resistance in wartime Europe was Operation Anthropoid,
the assassination of SS security chief Reinhard Heydrich, the Butcher of Prague. He was
killed in the street in Prague by a grenade, thrown by a British-trained Czech assassin. In
retaliation the Nazis arrested 13,000 people, and wiped out the village of Lidice
Genocide
History of WW2
09/1941 to 05/1945
I witnessed the gruesome workings of the machinery of death; gear meshed with gear, like
clockwork.
Adolf Eichmann's prison memoirs
The systematic policy of racial extermination carried out against Jews by the Nazis in Europe
during World War II stands out as one of historys most horrifying events. This assault upon
Europes Jewry began when Hitler came to power in 1933 and culminated in the terrible
orchestration of the Final Solution to the Jewish Question in Europe, in which six million
Jews were killed.

The Nazis targeted many groups for extermination, including Gypsies, Slavs, the disabled
and homosexuals, all of whom were labelled as undesirables with no future in the Nazi
state. However the scale of persecution and murder of Jews presented in Nazi ideology as
an insidious, lethal enemy of the Aryan master race was on a scale without comparison.
The Nazis drew on a deeply ingrained tradition of anti-Semitism which permeated much of
Europe in the 1930s. And although the Nazis adapted their rhetoric to meet the times, those
who collaborated in the extermination of Jews across Europe were often responding to much
older prejudices.
From 1933 onwards, the Nazis implemented discriminatory policies against German Jews,
most infamously under the 1935 Nuremburg Laws, which stripped them of German
citizenship. In November 1938, Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) an attack on
Jewish property engineered by Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels resulted in the
murder of 91 Jews, and the deportation to camps of more than 20,000.
After Germany conquered Poland in 1939, the persecution reached terrifying new levels.
Polish Jews were rounded up and forced to live in ghettoes, where disease and starvation
were constant threats. In Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, the Einsatzgruppen (special
operations groups) followed in the wake of advancing German forces. These paramilitary
death squads under SS command were made up of Nazi security forces and local
volunteers. They orchestrated mass killings of defenceless civilians: Communists,
intellectuals, gypsies, and above all Jews. At the ravine of Babi Yar near Kiev,
Einsatzgruppe C organised the wars most notorious massacre, killing 33,771 Jews on 29
and 30 September 1941.
The implementation of Death Camp Operations began in December 1941, at Semlin in
Serbia and Chelmno in Poland, where a total of over 400,000 Jews were killed by the
exhaust fumes of specially adapted vans. On 20 January 1942, at a conference in the Berlin
suburb of Wannsee, the Final Solution the annihilation of European Jews - was set up as
a systematic operation headed by Reinhard Heydrich. The Nazis began transporting Jews to
a network of concentration and extermination camps including Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka,
and the largest and most notorious, Auschwitz II-Birkenau, where Jews would be either
instantly killed or worked to death. A total of 1.1 million people (a million of them Jews) were
murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.
The horrific scenes of decaying corpses and emaciated prisoners which Allied troops found
as they liberated Nazi camps led to difficult questions about Allied wartime policy towards
Nazi genocide. Many felt that British and US politicians, aware of what was occurring in Nazi
German concentration camps in German-occupied Poland, failed to act decisively for
motives of political expediency.
In the aftermath of the Holocaust, many of the leading officials who manned the camps were
tried and executed, including Rudolf Hoess, commandant of Auschwitz, hanged in 1947. In
addition, the term genocide became part of international law, due to the 1948 UN
Convention on Genocide. Yet as events in Yugoslavia and Rwanda have demonstrated,

these steps failed to extinguish the tragic shadow of genocide from the world.
Collaboration and Resistance
British Home Front
Did you Know
Although the accepted figure for the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust is six million, an
exact figure is hard to reach because the Nazis destroyed their records. Recent research
suggests that the figure may be as high as eight million
British Home Front
History of WW2
09/1939 to 09/1945
The British regarded us [the GIs] as well-meaning but blundering intercessors whom they
rather preferred to have on their island than the Jerries.
Holmes Alexander
In May 1940, Winston Churchill entered Downing Street convinced that the war could only
be won through the complete mobilisation of Britains civilian population. The British home
front was as important as any battle ground. Throughout the war, the Ministry of Information
(under Alfred Duff Cooper and later Brenden Bracken) tried to boost public morale through
propaganda campaigns. It also frequently prevented (or at least delayed) the press from
publishing information that would damage public spirits, such as photographs of
bomb-damaged houses in poor parts of London.
The Home Guard, or Local Defence Volunteers, was formed on 14 May 1940, a response
to the Secretary of State for War Anthony Edens call for men of all ages who wish to do
something for the defence of their country. The Home Guard became a key plank of the
strategy of civilian mobilisation. 1.5 million men rushed to join, convinced by the bleak
international picture that a German invasion was on its way. Throughout June and July 1940
ordinary people made preparations for the expected onslaught, including the collection of
scrap iron to make armaments and the construction of concrete pillboxes in suburban parks.
Women also played a crucial role on the home front, fighting a daily battle of rationing,
recycling, reusing, and cultivating food in allotments and gardens. From 1941, women were
called up for war work, including as mechanics, engineers, munitions workers, air raid
wardens and fire engine drivers. More than 80,000 women joined the Womens Land Army,
enduring tough conditions and long hours in isolated rural outposts in order to prevent Britain
from being starved out. In cities, the Womens Voluntary Service prided itself on doing
whatever was needed, mainly providing support (and much needed tea and refreshments)
to victims of the Blitz and those sheltering in Underground stations.
From September 1940, the Blitz - the sustained bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany - hit
many towns and cities across the country, particularly London, Coventry and Hull. Beginning
with the bombing of London on 7 September 1940, which went on for 57 consecutive nights,
and lasting until 10 May 1941, more than 43,000 civilians were killed by bombing and over a
million houses were destroyed or damaged in London alone.

While the Blitz spread fear, it also engendered a strong feeling of community and collective
stoicism, through urban populations. As gas masks, air raid sirens and blackouts became
part of daily life for many Britons, 3.5 million children were evacuated to the countryside,
where they had very mixed experiences. As families waited nervously for news of loved ones
serving on the front lines, a telegram from the War Office which carried the news of the
death or capture of soldiers became a universally feared symbol of the tragedy and
arbitrariness of the war.
Rationing was another unwelcome yet necessary fact of life. Before the war, Britain had
imported 55 million tons of food each year; by October 1939, this figure had fallen to just 12
million. Not just food, but also clothing, furniture and petrol were rationed, helping to create a
booming black market, which traded items such as petrol coupons, eggs, nylon stockings
and cigarettes. Rationing would continue until 1954, when limits on the purchase of meat
and bacon were lifted.
One of the most popular items traded on the black market was SPAM, brought to Britain by
US soldiers. Yet the roughly two million American servicemen who arrived in Britain in
preparation for the Normandy landings became renowned for more than their dubious
canned meat. As the GIs became friendly with the local population, leaving a trail of broken
hearts and a significant number of pregnancies in their wake, the English comedian Tommy
Trinder famously referred to them as: overpaid, oversexed and over here.
Did you Know
In London, the people who ran the black market which emerged as a product of rationing
were known as Spivs . The Spivs most popular products were nylon stockings, car and
truck parts, alcohol, cigarettes, eggs and canned meat
Prisoners of War
History of WW2
09/1939 to 09/1945
This struggle has nothing to do with soldierly chivalry or the regulations of the Geneva
Conventions.
Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel
During the war, the treatment of prisoners of war was supposedly governed by the Geneva
Convention, a document formulated in 1929 in Switzerland and signed by the major western
powers including Britain, Italy, the US and Germany. The armies of the Western Allies were
under strict orders to treat Axis prisoners in line with the convention, something which
generally occurred. Some abuses, however, such as the shooting of German POWS by US
troops, did take place. A notorious example is the Dachau Massacre, when the soldiers who
liberated the camp shot several SS guards, allegedly as they attempted to surrender.
Germany and Italy generally treated prisoners from France, the US and the British
Commonwealth in accordance with the convention. The Germans were obliged to apply this
humane treatment to Jewish prisoners of war who wore the British Armys uniform, thus

sparing them the horrific fate meted out to other Jews. Although Allied prisoners of war
complained of the scarcity of food within German POW camps, they were treated
comparatively well. For example, ordinary soldiers who were made to work were
compensated, and officers were exempt from work requirements. The International Red
Cross eased conditions by distributing food packages and providing medical assistance.
Although escape from German camps was almost impossible for Allied POWs, inmates did
stage several famous breakouts. The Stalag Luft III camp for Airmen in Silesia (now aga
in Poland), was the site of two famous escapes by prisoners who used scavenged objects
and materials to dig a series of underground tunnels. In October 1942, a group of four
prisoners which included the Army Officer (and later author) Patrick Reid made a successful
breakout from Colditz Castle. They slipped out unnoticed through the kitchens into the yard,
through the cellar and then finally down to a dry moat and through a park. The group then
split into two pairs; all four men managed to reach the safe-haven of Switzerland.
Soviet prisoners of war were treated in accordance with their supposed subhuman Slavic
racial status by the Germans. Hiding behind the (legally invalid) pretext that the Soviet Union
had not signed the Geneva Convention, the Germans treated Soviet prisoners with appalling
brutality and neglect. Many died as slave labourers or ended up in death camps. Of the 5.7
million Soviet prisoners taken by the Axis powers, 3.3 million died in captivity. This figure,
when compared with the 8,348 Western Allied prisoners who died in German POW camps
(of a total of 232,000) starkly demonstrates the radically different treatment given to both
groups.
In late 1944, as the tide of the war turned against Germany, the Nazi authorities began to
move thousands of prisoners towards the interior of Germany, away from the advancing
Allied armies. Over the winter of 1944/45, thousands of prisoners who were already weak, ill
and malnourished were forced to walk miles to railway stations, and then taken in cattle
trucks to their new destinations. During these infamous Death Marches, many were shot or
died of exhaustion.
Prisoners of the Soviet Union also faced a grim fate. Thousands of Polish soldiers captured
following the Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939 were executed. More than 20,000
Poles were killed in the Katyn Forest Massacre. Of the almost 100,000 Germans captured
following the Battle of Stalingrad, only 5,000 survived the war. Many German captives were
sent to labour camps in the depths of Russia, where hunger, exhaustion and freezing
conditions killed thousands.
Did you Know
In 1939 there were only two Prisoner of War camps in Britain. By the end of the war, there
were more than 600. Although some were built from scratch, the majority were located in
disused factories or industrial buildings
US Entry and Alliance
History of WW2
12/1941

I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again: your boys are not going to be sent
into any foreign wars.
Roosevelt, 1940
/locations/italyIn September 1939, the ideological affinity between the USA and Britain was
unquestionable, yet large swathes of the US public, media and politicians were deeply
isolationist. With hindsight, many people resented Americas involvement in the First World
War. The desire to avoid foreign entanglements and focus on domestic issues was
widespread.
When war broke out in Europe, US President Franklin Roosevelt recognised that the conflict
threatened US security, and looked for ways to help the European democracies without
direct involvement in the war. This necessity increased in June 1940, when the Fall of
France left Britain as the only democracy standing between Nazi Germany and America. In
1939, the Fourth Neutrality Act authorised the US to trade arms with belligerents provided
that the countries paid in cash and collected them. In March 1941, Roosevelt moved further
towards making the US the arsenal of democracy with the Lend-Lease Act, which permitted
the lending, leasing, selling, or bartering of arms, ammunition and food to any country
whose defence the President deems vital to the defence of the US.
The US was sucked further towards the conflict when its navy and air force began to escort
British convoys which transported Lend-Lease material across the Atlantic, protecting them
from German submarines. Roosevelts announcement of a shoot on sight policy in
September 1941 following an attack on the USS Greer enraged isolationist senators; they
alleged that Roosevelt was deliberately provoking skirmishes with the Germans. Meanwhile,
Churchill repeatedly attempted to convince Roosevelt to enter the war. At the August 1941
Atlantic Conference, the two leaders composed a charter for the post-war world; Roosevelt
tackled the thorny issue of the British Empire, promoting the recognition of the right of all
peoples to choose the government under which they will live.
Churchill did not have to wait long. After the bombing of the US Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor
in December 1941, only one congressman opposed the declaration of war; the vote in the
senate was unanimous. Hitlers declaration of war on the US, which came four days later,
was actually a blessing in disguise for Roosevelt; it enabled him to legitimately pursue a
Germany first strategy. In November 1942, Operation Torch, the invasion of North Africa,
became the first US military offensive of the war in the West. Allied troops slowly cornered
German forces in North Africa, who surrendered in Tunisia in May 1943. The joint British-US
victory, costly and hard fought as it was, was invaluable in mobilising US public opinion
behind the war effort.
By the beginning of 1943, the opening of a second front was a pressing and divisive issue.
Although both leaders recognised the urgent need to relieve the pressure on Russia on the
Eastern Front, Churchill favoured an attack through Italy the soft underbelly of the Axis
while Roosevelt pushed for an assault on France. At the Casablanca conference in January
1943, Churchill effectively won the argument. It was decided that operations in the
Mediterranean would continue once victory was achieved in North Africa. The success of

Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily launched in July 1943, allowed the Allies to invade
the Italian mainland, capturing Rome on 4 June 1944.
Although various points of ideological and strategic difference arose between Britain and the
US during the war most notably regarding the British Empire, the British attitude in Burma
and India and the shape of the post-war world it is indisputable that Churchill and
Roosevelt enjoyed a deep personal bond. The two countries they led shared the same
fundamental commitment to cooperate in order to rid the world of international fascism.
Did you Know
In his 1941 Navy Day address, Roosevelt claimed to possess a secret Nazi map which
demonstrated Hitlers intention to conquer Central and South America, dividing it into five
vassal states under German domination and placing the US in direct danger

Code Breaking
History of WW2
09/1939 to 09/1945
It was thanks to ULTRA that we won the war.
Churchill to King George VI
During World War II, Germany believed that its secret codes for radio messages were
indecipherable to the Allies. However, the meticulous work of code breakers based at
Britains Bletchley Park cracked the secrets of German wartime communication, and played
a crucial role in the final defeat of Germany.
The Enigma story began in the 1920s, when the German military - using an Enigma
machine developed for the business market began to communicate in unintelligible coded
messages. The Enigma machine enabled its operator to type a message, then scramble it
using a letter substitution system, generated by variable rotors and an electric circuit. To
decode the message, the recipient needed to know the exact settings of the wheels. German
code experts added new plugs, circuits and features to the machine during the pre-war
years, but its basic principle remained the same.
The first people who came close to cracking the Enigma code were the Polish. Close links
between the German and Polish engineering industries allowed the Polish Cipher Bureau to
reconstruct an Enigma machine and read the Wehrmachts messages between 1933 and
1938. In 1939, with German invasion looming, the Poles shared their information with the
British, who in turn established the Government Code and Cipher School at Bletchley Park in
Buckinghamshire. Mathematicians and intelligence experts, with the help of primitive early
computers, began the complex and urgent task of cracking the Enigma code.
The Germans, convinced their Enigma messages were unbreakable, used the machine for
battlefield, naval, and diplomatic communications. Although the experts at Bletchley first
succeeded in reading German code during the 1940 Norwegian campaign, their work only
began to pay off meaningfully in 1941, when they were able to gather evidence of the

planned invasion of Greece, and learn Italian naval plans for the Battle of Cape Matapan. In
the autumn, the Allies gained advantage in North Africa from deciphering coded messages
used by Rommels Panzer Army. Information obtained from such high-level German sources
was codenamed ULTRA.
The Germans also enjoyed some noteworthy code breaking successes. The B-Dienst
(surveillance service) broke British Naval code as early as 1935, which allowed them to
pinpoint Allied convoys during the early stages of the Battle of the Atlantic. Although the US
altered its naval code in April 1942, the change came too late to prevent the havoc wreaked
by Operation Paukenschlag, the German U-boat campaign off Americas east coast early
that year. The Germans also managed to crack Soviet and Danish code systems. But their
efforts fragmented and divided between rival cryptology departments - lacked the
consistent success achieved at Bletchley Park.
From 1941 onwards, Bletchleys experts focused upon breaking the codes used by German
U-boats in the Atlantic. In March 1941, when the German armed trawler Krebs was
captured off Norway complete with Enigma machines and codebooks, the German naval
Enigma code could finally be read. The Allies could now discover where U-boats were
hunting and direct their own ships away from danger.
The German Navy, rightly suspicious that their code had been cracked, introduced a fourth
wheel into the device, multiplying the possible settings by twenty six. The British finally broke
this code that they called Shark in December 1942. Using ULTRA always presented
problems to the Allies, because any too blatant response to it would cause the Germans to
suspect their messages were being read. But neverthless Bletchley Park and its staff made
a crucial and groundbreaking contribution to the defeat of the Axis.
Did you Know
The British tried hard to conceal their code breaking success from the Axis. In 1942, when
five Italian ships bound for Africa were sunk due to ULTRA information, Churchill sent a
telegram to Naples congratulating a fictitious spy and awarding him a bonus.
Battle of the Atlantic
History of WW2
09/1939 to 05/1945
. . . the only thing that ever really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril.
Winston Churchill
The Battle of the Atlantic, which lasted from September 1939 until the defeat of Germany in
1945, was the wars longest continuous military campaign. During six years of naval warfare,
German U-boats and warships and later Italian submarines were pitted against Allied
convoys transporting military equipment and supplies across the Atlantic to Great Britain and
the Soviet Union. This battle to control the Atlantic shipping lanes involved thousands of
ships and stretched across thousands of perilous square miles of ocean.
Early in the war German warships made a number of forays into the shipping lanes, aiming

to catch and destroy Allied convoys. These had limited success, and led to the loss of major
ships including Graf Spee and Bismarck. From 1940 onwards, the German navy focused on
escalating the U-boat war. Attacking on the surface at night (where they could not be
detected by Allied sonar, or ASDIC), U-boats had great success against Allied convoys,
sinking merchant ships with torpedoes and then submerging to evade the counterattack by
escorting warships. They were also benefitting from decoded communications of the British
Admiralty. In 1941 they inflicted huge losses, sinking 875 Allied ships.
During 1941, tactical advantage began to shift towards the British. They had received 50
American destroyers in exchange for US access to British bases. Canadians increased their
escort missions, and RAF Coastal Command was able to increase its air cover. The capture
of U-110 (complete with Enigma machine and codes) in March 1941 helped the Allies track
the movement of German U-boats. From April 1941, US warships began escorting Allied
convoys as far as Iceland, sparking a number of skirmishes with U-boats. This provoked
controversy as the US had not officially entered the war. Technological developments,
including radar for escorting warship from August 1941 (which could detect a U-boat
periscope at a range of one mile) also worked in the Allies favour.
Yet convoys were still very vulnerable in the Atlantic Gap, a black pit in the mid-Atlantic
which was not covered by anti-submarine aircraft. The gradual improvement of
antisubmarine techniques, and the increased use of improvised aircraft carriers like HMS
Audacity, led to a marked decrease in sinkings towards the end of the year. This contributed
to Hitlers decision carried out against Dnitzs wishes - to transfer submarines to the
Mediterranean.
In 1942 the balance tilted once again in favour of the Germans. New submarines were
entering service quickly, at a rate of 20 per month. Although the US Navy entered the war at
the end of 1941, it was unable to prevent the sinking of almost 500 ships between January
and June 1942. Allied losses in the Atlantic reached their peak in 1942. As 1,664 ships were
sunk, supplies of petrol and food to Britain reached critically low levels.
In 1943, advantage shifted to the Allies once again. By now, the Allies had sufficient escort
aircraft carriers and long-range aircraft to cover the Atlantic Gap. The battle reached its peak
between February and May 1943. The hedgehog depth-charge mortar was just one
innovation that was making life more and more dangerous for U-boat crews. By Black May
of 1943, U-boat losses were unsustainable one quarter of their strength in one month, and
almost at the same rate as Allied shipping. U-boats were withdrawn from the Atlantic, and
the battle was won. Although new German submarines arrived in 1945, they came far too
late to affect the course of the battle.
Historians estimate that more than 100 convoy battles took place during the war. They cost
the Merchant Navy more than 30,000 men, and around 3,000 ships. The equally terrible cost
for the Germans was 783 U-boats, and 28,000 sailors.
Did you Know
The Wolf pack tactic began with widely-dispersed German U-boats searching for an Atlantic

convoy. When one U-boat spotted a target, a radio message sent its location to all other
U-boats, who converged for the kill
North Africa
History of WW2
09/1940 to 05/1943
Before Alamein we never had a victory - after Alamein we never had a defeat.
Winston Churchill
When Italy entered World War II in June 1940, the war quickly spread to North Africa, where
her colony of Libya bordered the vital British protectorate of Egypt. On 7 September 1940,
Marshall Grazianis troops began a land offensive. Their numerical supremacy won them
initial success. They captured the port of Sidi el-Barrini and established a chain of fortified
camps. The British counterattack, launched in December 1940 and led by General Wavell,
quickly flattened the Italians. As British armaments grew daily, Italian supplies dwindled.
Italian forces retreated in chaos, and the human tide of surrendering soldiers impeded the
Allied advance, making movement of tanks difficult. With Italian positions crumbling, Hitler,
shocked by the Italian failure, dispatched the German Afrika Korps commanded by the
brilliant General Erwin Rommel.
The Desert Fox rapidly adapted his formations and tactics to a Desert War fought in the
open, with few natural obstacles and a small civilian population. Rommel launched his first
blow against the Allies in February 1941, taking the British by surprise and carrying out an
audacious triple attack on the Sollum-Halfaya line on the Egyptian border. The Germans
captured the key port of Benghazi, moving on to besiege the other major port of Cyrenaica,
Tobruk.
In June 1941, Operation Battleaxe, the British attempt to liberate Tobruk, was stopped in its
tracks by well-prepared defences. In November, with General Auchinleck having replaced
Wavell, the Allies launched Operation Crusader, catching Rommels forces by surprise.
Although German 88mm guns wreaked havoc among the British ranks, Axis forces under
the pressure of huge losses and dwindling supplies were forced to retreat to El Agheila their starting-point in March. At the end of 1941, Tobruk was liberated and Benghazi
returned to British hands.
Supplies were a crucial element of the war in North Africa. While the British received
material from depots in nearby Alexandria, German supplies had to arrive from Tripoli.
Furthermore the island of Malta, Britains unsinkable aircraft carrier, allowed attacks to be
made on Axis convoys crossing the Mediterranean. At the beginning of 1942, British supply
lines were now overextended, and Rommel counter attacked, forcing the British to retreat to
the defensive positions known as the Gazala Line. The Battle of Gazala - one of the fiercest
of the Desert War resulted in the retreat of Auchinlecks men to Alam Halfa. Tobruk, cut-off
once again, this time fell rapidly to Axis forces.
A disconsolate Churchill reshuffled the military command, placing Montgomery at the head
of the Eighth Army. The battle-hardened general, conscious that the mobile tank battle was

Rommels forte, unleashed the Battle of El Alamein as a battle of attrition, using his huge
advantages in artillery, infantry and supplies. After two weeks of intense fighting,
Commonwealth forces had reduced the German tank force to 35, pressuring the remnants of
Axis forces into retreat.
For the Axis, the nail in the coffin came in November 1942 with Operation Torch - the
American-led landings in Algiers, Oran and Casablanca. After sporadic fighting against Vichy
French forces, the Allies took possession of the Moroccan and Algerian coasts. The
beleaguered Axis forces were now encircled, and in May 1943, more than 230,000 troops
surrendered to the Allies in Tunisia, marking the end of the campaign.
Battle of the Atlantic
Stalingrad
Did you Know
Rommels Afrika Korps arrived in Egypt with grey-green tanks unsuited to desert conditions.
The Desert Fox adapted to the new situation by sticking sand to them and making
camouflage nets out of the spiky desert undergrowth
Stalingrad
History of WW2
08/1942 to 02/1943
Surrender is forbidden. Sixth Army will hold their positions to the last man and the last round.
Hitler to General Paulus, January 24, 1943
In the spring of 1942, the German offensive against the Soviet Union was nearly a year old.
Hitler, believing that he could win in the East by staging a decisive offensive in the south
aimed at the Soviet Unions economic resources, launched a two-pronged attack on 28
June. Army Group A pushed towards the oil-rich area of Baku, and Army Group B advanced
towards Stalingrad and the Volga. Stalingrad was a key strategic target. It was an important
industrial centre, communications hub, and sat astride the Volga River. Capturing Stalingrad
would cut this waterway the principal supply route from south to central and northern
Russia.
The Red Army, demoralised and disheartened by a year of bitter and costly defeats, began
to employ a new strategy: the fighting retreat. Instead of defending their positions at all costs
a strategy which had led to heavy losses during the first year of the war Soviet units were
now ordered to withdraw in the face of strong German attacks. This tactic would turn the vast
expanse of the Russian steppe against the Germans, and put huge strain on their supply
lines.
The German Sixth Army, commanded by General Friedrich Paulus, advanced quickly,
assisted by the Fourth Panzer Army. By the summer of 1942 they had reached the suburbs
of Stalingrad on the west bank of the Volga. Here the Soviet retreat ended, and Vasily
Chuikov prepared to lead a determined defence of the city. As the battle began in earnest,
the Luftwaffe dropped 1,000 tons of bombs on Stalingrad, a misjudgement that created a
rubble-strewn landscape perfect for defence.

German troops were taken aback by the fierce street fighting they found themselves
engaged in during their advance to the city centre. For soldiers accustomed to the
well-choreographed mobile warfare, ferocious close-quarter fighting in the citys ruins was a
new and terrifying experience.
The Soviets had their own problems. Reinforcements had to be ferried into the city across
the Volga, often under heavy shelling and bombing. Many units suffered large casualties
before even going into action. Soviet Penal Units, several containing political prisoners, were
used for suicidal charges. The average life expectancy of a Soviet soldier during the height
of the battle was just 24 hours.
In 19 November 1942, the Soviets used one million men to launch a counterattack,
Operation Uranus, encircling the city and trapping the German Sixth Army within it. For
Paulus and his men, the situation was desperate. Winter was setting in, and they were
running out of food, ammunition and medical supplies. Despite the Luftwaffes efforts, it was
not possible to get enough supplies in by air. In December, a relief operation mounted by
General von Manstein narrowly failed to break through to the city. It was the last hope for the
Sixth Army.
On 2 February 1943, General Paulus surrendered with the 91,000 troops that remained. The
tremendous human cost of the battle is difficult to comprehend. The Axis forces (comprised
of German, Italian, Romanian and Hungarian troops) suffered 800,000 casualties, the
Soviets more than one million. The battle marked the furthest extent of the German advance
into the Soviet Union, and is seen by many historians as a key turning point in the war.
North Africa
Italy
Did you Know
In the narrow streets of Stalingrads suburbs, the Germans had to fight for every house.
During the fighting, it was not uncommon to find houses in which the basement and ground
floor were occupied by the Soviets, and the top floors by the Germans
Italy
History of WW2
07/1943 to 05/1945
I expected to see a wild cat roaring into the mountains - and what do I find? A whale
wallowing on the beaches!
Winston Churchill on the Anzio landings
The Allied invasion of Sicily began on 10 July 1943. The US Seventh Army commanded by
General Patton, and the British Eighth Army under Montgomery, landed respectively at the
Gulf of Gela and south of Syracuse. While Montgomerys forces encountered stubborn
resistance in the hills around Mount Etna, Pattons troops advanced northwest towards
Palermo and directly north to sever the northern coastal road. They then moved eastwards
supported by a series of amphibious landings along the north coast, reaching Messina

ahead of the British. By the end of August, Sicily was under Allied control and could be used
as a base to invade Italy.
On 3 September 1943, the Eighth Army landed at Reggio (on the toe) and began its slow
slog up the boot of Italy. Five days later, the US Fifth Army landed at Salerno, encountering
heavy German resistance. At this point the Italian government agreed to an armistice with
the Allies (publicly announced on 8 September). Mussolini was dismissed by King Victor
Emmanuel III and placed under arrest by his successor, Badoglio, but was rescued by
Hitlers airborne commandos. Mussolini became head of the Salo Republic in
German-occupied Gargagno in northern Italy. Badoglio, who had escaped to Pescara,
established a government under Allied protection. On 13 October, the Italian government
declared war on Germany.
British Commonwealth forces now advanced up the east coast, capturing the port of Bari
and the airfields around Foggia. The US, meanwhile, inched up the western side of the boot,
encountering increasingly difficult terrain and strong defences. A series of mountains, ridges
and rivers prone to sudden flooding presented a formidable natural barrier which
complicated Allied commanders plans.
German forces withdrew to the Gustav Line south of Rome, which included the
heavily-defended hilltop monastery of Monte Cassino. In January 1944, the Allies launched
an amphibious assault on the western port of Anzio. Operation Shingle, launched on 22
January, took the Germans by surprise. Allied troops, however, failed in their attempt to
thrust inland and cut off German troops on the Gustav Line, instead becoming bottled up in
the beach-head they had established.
Between January and May, four major offensives were launched to break the Gustav Line.
The objective was finally achieved by a combined assault of the Fifth and Eighth Armies
(including British, US, French, Polish, and Canadian troops) along a twenty mile front
between Monte Cassino and the western coast. Monte Cassino was captured on 18 May. As
the German defences disintegrated, forces at Anzio broke out of their beachhead and moved
up the coat towards Rome. Following the liberation of the capital on 4 June, Badoglio
resigned and a new anti-fascist government was formed under Bonomi.
German troops now retreated to the Gothic Line. Their resistance condemned the Allies to
another harsh year of campaigning. Many Allied units had been withdrawn to be used in
Operation Dragoon (the invasion of the South of France launched in August 1944), and
progress was slow. It was not until April 1945 that the Allies launched an overwhelming
offensive that broke through German positions, and forced the surrender of German Army
Group C on 29 April. Four days earlier, Mussolini had been caught by Italian partisans as he
tried to escape north to Switzerland. Along with his mistress, he was shot and his corpse put
on public display in Milan. Hostilities formally came to an end in Italy on 2 May 1945.
Stalingrad
Eastern Front
Did you Know

Monte Cassino, on the road to Rome, was a strong German defensive position that held up
the Allied advance for four months. The mountain was dominated by a 1,400 year old
monastery founded by St.Benedict. The Allies took the controversial decision to bomb it, and
on 15 February 1944 it was attacked by more than 200 bombers, and obliterated. The failure
to co-ordinate the bombing with ground troops led to no real gain.
Eastern Front
History of WW2
02/1943 to 01/1945
The battle of Kursk . . . the forcing of the Dnieper . . . and the liberation of Kiev, left Hitlerite
Germany facing catastrophe.
General Vasili I. Chuikov - Commander of the 8th Guards Army - (Speaking after the war)
After the Soviet victory at Stalingrad in February 1943, German generals were convinced
that a massive offensive on the Eastern Front would still allow them to regain the upper
hand, and knock Russia out of the war. They planned a two pronged assault aimed at
pinching off the Kursk Salient created by the defeat at Stalingrad. The advance was to be
launched from the Orel Salient to the north of Kursk and from Belgorod to the south. Both
prongs would surround Kursk, restoring the lines of Army Group South to their winter
1941-1942 position.
When the offensive finally began on 5 July, it had already been delayed countless times
while the Germans waited for tanks and weapons to be supplied. The Soviets, acting on
intelligence information, had massively reinforced the salient, also mobilising reserves to
prepare a counterattack. By 13 July, the Germans had been forced into retreat. The attack
cost Hitler over 500,000 troops and 1,000 tanks, and spelt the end of the Wehrmachts
large-scale offensives. As strategic initiative passed to the Soviets, Hitlers insistence on
holding territory at all costs hugely undermined Germanys ability to mount an effective
defence. It was not the first or the last time that Hitlers inflexibility contributed to military
failure.
Throughout the remainder of 1943, the Soviets continued pushing the Germans back. In
August 1943, they retook Orel; in the south, fierce battles throughout July and August
culminated in the recapture of Kharkov. In the centre, Soviet troops took Bryansk, Smolensk
and Gomel. In the south, the Germans' retreat to the River Dneiper forced them to abandon
captured farmland and industrial resources. The Germans found it impossible to hold this
line, which was broken in October. Kiev, the Ukrainian capital and the USSRs third largest
city, was retaken the following month.
1944 began as 1943 had ended: with unstoppable Soviet success. At the end of January,
the 900 day siege of Leningrad was lifted; almost a million of the northern citys inhabitants
had perished. In the south, southern Ukraine and Galitzia were captured in March. The
Germans were forced to evacuate the hard-won Crimean Peninsula. April and May saw the
liberation of Odessa and Sevastapol. On 9 June, Operation Bagration was launched to
retake Belarus. 166 Soviet divisions and 2,700 Soviet tanks crushed the 38 German
divisions of Army Group Centre, taking Minsk on 2 July.

The Soviet troops now broke through on the Balkan Front and advanced towards Vistula.
With the Soviet homeland secure, Stalin announced that the Red Army had begun a march
of liberation. Sadly, this liberation did not extend to Poland. On 5 August, the Polish Home
Army, encouraged by the Soviet advance, rose against the Nazis in Warsaw. In an act which
did unspeakable damage to Allied relations, Stalin offered no military or material assistance
to the Poles. He also denied permission for Allied aircraft carrying aid to land in Soviet
airfields. Stalin cynically calculated that it was in his interest to see Polish patriots destroyed
by the Nazis, as they would stand in the way of his post-war plans for Poland. On 5 October,
General Komorowskis Army surrendered. The Nazis levelled Warsaw in reprisal and
300,000 Poles including many innocent civilians were slaughtered. The Soviets would
finally enter Warsaw in January 1945, after its abandonment by the Germans.
Italy
D-Day
Did you Know
In Nazi Germany, propaganda referred to the war on the Eastern front as the Crusade
against Bolshevism. In the USSR it was dubbed the Great Patriotic War, as Stalin reversed
years of Communist policy to revive traditional Russian heroes, such as Alexander Nevsky
who fought German invaders in the 13th century
D-Day
History of WW2
06/1944
Do you realise that by the time you wake up in the morning 20,000 men may have been
killed?
Churchill to his wife the night before D-Day
WATCH D-DAY VIDEOS
VIEW D-DAY PHOTOS
On 6 June 1944, just after midnight, the Allied assault upon Hitlers Fortress Europe began.
The operation caught the German military high command unaware. Low tides and bad
weather combined with Allied deception plans had convinced the Germans that an attack
was unlikely at that time. As more than 1,000 British bombers began to pummel Normandys
coastal defences, Rommel, commanding German defences in France, was in Germany
celebrating his wifes birthday.
The initial Allied assault was made by airborne infantry, who secured key bridges and
crossroads on the flanks of the landing zone. Some of their most important and celebrated
achievements included the capture of Pegasus Bridge and the town of Sainte-Mre-Eglise.
Commandos also attacked key targets ahead of the main landings. One remarkable feat was
the attack by US Rangers on Pointe-Du-Hoc, a headland which housed a coastal battery
that threatened the landing beaches. The successful assault involved scaling a 30 metre cliff
face under German fire.
Early Allied success was aided by the confused German reaction. The first confirmation of a

large-scale attack did not arrive until 2:15 am; that an invasion was in progress was not
confirmed until 4:15. It was only at 6 am, when Normandys defenders saw the horizon
obscured by an unbroken line of Allied ships, that all doubt was removed. Along nearly 100
kilometres of coast, Allied warships and aircraft pounded German defences. At 6:30, US
soldiers went ashore by landing craft at Utah and Omaha beaches. An hour later, the British
and Canadians arrived at the beaches of Gold, Juno and Sword. Fortuitously, troops at Utah
accidently landed two kilometres from their target, on a virtually unguarded beach. The
landing zone was quickly secured with few losses.
On Omaha Beach, where aerial bombardment had done little to dent German defences, the
Americans met fierce resistance. From cliff-top bunkers, the defenders pummelled US troops
with machine gun fire and shells as soon as landing craft ramps were lowered. Those who
made it ashore found it impossible to advance across 200 metres of open beach.
Amphibious tanks intended to cover the infantrys advance had sunk in the rough seas. The
news from Omaha was so bad that the landings there were almost called off, but eventually
small groups of American infantry worked their way around the German defences,
outflanked and stormed them, allowing the beachhead to be secured. But Omaha cost the
Americans more than 2,000 casualties.
When British and Canadian troops landed at 7.30, supported by tanks, the tide was high,
leaving fewer metres of beach to traverse. Although mines sunk a number of boats, soldiers
succeeded in silencing German machine guns within half an hour. At the days end, although
they had not yet taken their objective of Caen, the soldiers had penetrated six kilometres
inland, and their foothold in Normandy was secure. At 6pm, when Churchill addressed the
House of Commons, it was to announce the astounding success of an operation which
would go down in military legend.
Catch D-Day: The Soldiers' Story weeknights 8pm on H2
Eastern Front
The Bombing Offensive
Did you Know
The Normandy landings were the largest amphibious operation in history. In one day,
175,000 troops landed on the Normandy coast, with the help of more than 5,000 ships,
crewed by 195,700 personnel from the Allied navies and merchant navies
The Bombing Offensive
History of WW2
08/1940 to 04/1945
In the burning and devastated cities, we daily experienced the direct impact of war. It
spurred us to do our utmost . . . the bombing and the hardships that resulted from them (did
not) weaken the morale of the populace.
Albert Speer - Chief of the German War Economy (Speaking after the War)
In the first months of the war, British strategic bombing (aerial attacks on the enemys
industry and infrastructure) were bound by the belief that deliberate attacks on civilians and

private property were illegal and unjustifiable. By 1945, RAF Bomber Command was
obliterating historic German cities overnight. It was a terrifying transformation in the nature of
war, that saw industrial towns across Europe smashed to pieces and hundreds of thousands
of civilians killed.
When Luftwaffe night-bombers unintentionally (and against orders) attacked London in
August 1940, Churchill ordered a retaliatory raid on Berlin. This caused an enraged Hitler to
order intensified bombing of targets in and around London.
Both sides thus claimed that their attacks on enemy cities were in retaliation for what had
been begun by the enemy. In reality, the bombing of cities and their civilian population had
been a reality of warfare since the First World War. In 1940, both sides were intent on
attacking the enemys economic resources. These were mostly concentrated in cities, and
given the inaccurate nature of bombing in World War Two (especially at night), this policy
would inevitably lead to the destruction of houses and many civilian deaths.
In February 1942, RAF Bomber Command explicitly began to focus its attacks on the enemy
civilian population, when it shifted from strategic bombing to the night-time area bombing of
cities, designed to break enemy morale. Arthur Bomber Harris, the new head of Bomber
Command, saw civilian death (or the dehousing of the German workforce) as entirely
necessary. He felt that despatching 1,000 aircraft each night against German objectives,
destroying great industrial cities in hours, would render the invasion of Europe unnecessary.
He pointed to the Cologne raid of May 1942 as an example of what could be achieved: in
one night, 1,046 aircraft rained more than 2,000 tons of bombs on the city, reducing 13,000
houses to rubble.
The US Army Air Force, flying raids from British bases from 1942, remained faithful to the
concept of precision daylight bombing (with variable accuracy). Around the Clock offensives
began - RAF by night , USAAF by day.
Early daylight raids by the USAAF, without the protection of long-range fighter escorts, could
lead to terrible losses. The Schweinfurt raid, an attack on ball-bearing factories designed to
create choke-points in German industry, led to the loss of 77 B-17 bombers, about one
quarter of the attacking force. Such long-distance raids were then abandoned until 1944,
when long-distance fighter escorts were available.
In May 1943, RAF Bomber Command was able to pull off one stunning piece of precision
bombing, in the famous Dambusters raids against dams in the Ruhr Valley, in the German
industrial heartland. Although the economic impact of the raid was negligible, it was a skilful
and courageous operation that had a great impact on public morale.
Meanwhile, area bombing continued. In June 1943, in Operation Gomorrah, British and
American bombers attacked Hamburg day and night for an entire week; half the city was
levelled, and 40,000 were killed. In January 1944, the RAF pummelled Berlin. On 11
December, Frankfurt, Hanau and Giesson were levelled by 1,600 American planes. In
January 1945, the USAAF dropped almost 40,000 tons of bombs on Berlin, Cologne and

Hamm, while the RAF hit Bochum, Munich and Stuttgart.


By the wars last months, virtually every important German industrial town had been
destroyed. Yet the bombing continued. Churchill, convinced that destroying East German
communication centres would aid the Red Armys advance on Berlin, authorised the
bombing of Dresden. On 13-14 February 1945, around 30,000 civilians were killed in attacks
by the RAF and the USAAF.
The effectiveness of the bombing campaign is still debated. There was terrible destruction of
the German economy, although output still rose during the war as the economy was geared
more and more towards wartime needs. Public support in Germany for the Nazi regime, and
civilian morale, was not obviously affected. The bombing campaign did force Germany to
devote huge resources to the defence of the homeland, and the German air force suffered
significant losses at the hands of Allied fighter escorts. The US Eighth Air Force and RAF
Bomber Command paid a high price. Six in ten British bomber aircrew were killed, one of the
highest casualty rates of any service in the war.
D-Day
Disintegration
Did you Know
By the end of the war, RAF Bomber Command had dropped nearly one million tons of
bombs in the course of 390,000 operations. No major German city was not bombed, and
many were more than half-destroyed, including Cologne, Hamburg, Frankfurt and Dresden.
German civilian deaths are estimated in the region of 400,000
Disintegration
History of WW2
09/1944 to 05/1945
In the Schultheiss brewery that morning, a young Luftwaffe helper asked what was going on
when he heard shots. 'Come around to the back,' a comrade said. 'The SS are shooting
themselves.
Antony Beevor, Berlin: The Downfall 1945
By the end of 1944, the writing was on the wall for Germany. The Normandy landings had
penetrated Fortress Europe, and the Third Reich now faced an unwinnable war on two
fronts. Nevertheless, a bold attempt by the Western Allies to cross the Rhine in September
1944, codenamed Operation Market Garden, was defeated with heavy casualties inflicted on
Allied airborne forces, particularly around Arnhem.
On 16 December, a cornered Germany launched the Ardennes Offensive, a desperate
attempt to split Allied forces in the West, and capture Antwerp, the main Allied supply port.
The Battle of the Bulge, as it became known, saw early German success thanks to the
element of surprise. But inevitably the Allies massive advantage in men and materiel turned
the tide. The offensive was a desperate gamble, which cost the Germans irreplaceable men
and weaponry. Germanys dwindling reserves led to the mass mobilisation of all capable
men between sixteen and 60 by the end of 1944. The oldest and youngest joined the

Volksturm (home guard).


On 12 January 1945, the USSR launched the Vistula Offensive into Poland, driving the
Germans from Warsaw and Silesia. East Prussia was encircled and overrun. Meanwhile, on
4 February, Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met at Yalta to discuss the post-war plans,
agreeing on the post-war division of Germany. In February and March, in the face of the Red
Armys relentless advance, the German population in its path fled west. In mid March, Hitler
ordered the destruction of all military, industrial, communication, transport and supply
installations. On 12 April 1945, he ordered all German cities to be defended to the last.
On 16 April, the Soviets launched a massive offensive from the Oder River, beginning the
Battle for Berlin. Berlin was soon surrounded, and from 20 April came under Soviet artillery
fire. Berlins defenders were comprised of depleted Wehrmact and Waffen SS divisions and
many Volksturm and Hitler Youth members. Diehard fascists from countries including
Holland and France, organised into SS units, also fought alongside the defenders. On 30
April, following intense fighting, the Soviet flag was hoisted over the Reichstag. Hitler, who
had pledged to stay in Berlin until the last day, committed suicide in his bunker. Berlins
defenders surrendered on 2 May.
The Western Allies, who linked up with Soviet forces on the Elbe in late April, had also been
advancing into the Reich. In March, US forces had captured an intact bridge over the Rhine
at Remagen. On 26 March, British troops crossed the Rhine at Wessel. In the centre, Allied
armies surrounded the Ruhr region (Germanys industrial heartland), taking huge numbers of
prisoners. In the south, the US Third Army advanced from Maguncia towards line of
demarcation previously agreed with the Soviets. While the left flank of the Seventh Army
invaded Salzburg, the right flank advanced to Bremmer, uniting with US troops arriving from
Italy on 4 May.
Soviet troops continued towards Prague, provoking a Czech uprising against German
occupation on 5 May. Two days later, General Jodl and Admiral von Friedeburg surrendered
unconditionally at Eisenhowers headquarters in Reims. On the following day, 8 May, the
Allied leaders announced Victory in Europe.
The Bombing Offensive
Nuremberg
Did you Know
The final battle for Berlin was one of the most brutal and bloody of the war. The fanatical but
futile German defence is thought to have cost 250,000 lives, of whom more than 100,000
were German civilians. Much of the city was reduced to rubble. One element of Russian
retribution was the rape of an estimated 100,000 German women
Nuremberg
History of WW2
09/1945 to 10/1946
If Hitler falls into our hands we shall certainly put him to death. This man is the mainspring of

evil.
Winston Churchill, 1942
In November 1945, the first international war crimes trial began in the German city of
Nuremberg. For much of the western public who intently followed the proceedings between
21 November 1945 and 1 October 1946, the 22 defendants who stood in the dock were seen
as the living embodiments of a repressive and warmongering system which had propelled
the world into six years of war, causing the deaths of fifty million people. The location was
chosen for both practical and symbolic reasons. Firstly, the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg
and its adjoining prison had emerged intact from the Allied bombing of Germany. Secondly,
Nuremberg was considered the spiritual birthplace of the Nazi state, and had hosted the
partys elaborate annual rallies.
The defendants had widely varying levels of seniority within the Nazi party and responsibility
for war crimes. While the involvement and complicity of some, such as Hitlers
second-in-command, Hermann Gring, was clear, some defendants were deputies or juniors
of senior men like SS leader Heinrich Himmler, or head of propaganda Joseph Goebbels.
These men substituted their superiors, who had committed suicide in order to escape being
captured and brought to justice.
The defendants were charged with an array of crimes: crimes against peace, which included
conspiring to, planning and waging a war of aggression, war crimes, and crimes against
humanity. This last was newly-defined to include "Murder, extermination, enslavement,
deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or
during the war.
The defendants attitudes to the trial also varied widely. Robert Ley, former head of the
Strength through Joy movement, hanged himself in his prison cell just weeks before the trial
began. While Hermann Gring was prepared to defend the honour of the deceased Fuhrer
and the Nazi party, irritating the American prosecutor with his sharp comebacks and defence
of German patriotism, official Nazi architect Albert Speer meekly accepted the defendants
collective responsibility from the beginning. Hitler's deputy and head of the party chancellery
Rudolf Hess, faced with the enormity of the situation, appeared to suffer (or feign) almost
total memory loss.
When the final verdicts were announced, only three were acquitted while the rest were found
guilty and sentenced either to death or significant terms in prison. Gring was found guilty of
all the charges brought against him and condemned to death. The night before his supposed
execution, he managed to commit suicide in his cell. Albert Speer succeeded to some extent
in his attempt to distance himself from Hitler, portraying himself as a harmless technocrat,
willing to supply the prosecution with information and statistics, while also admitting to his
share of collective responsibility for Nazi crimes. Speer escaped the death sentence,
receiving instead a twenty year prison sentence for his role in the exploitation of forced
foreign slave labour. Rudolf Hess, who spent the entire trial in a state of paranoid delirium,
was sentenced to life imprisonment. He killed himself in prison in Berlin in 1987.
The trials at Nuremberg were not the first or the last hearings of Nazi war criminals. Nearly

200 other prominent Nazis were tried at Nuremberg before US Military Tribunals from 1946
until 1949. Other prominent Nazis stood trial elsewhere in Europe, particularly in Austria and
Poland; Rudolf Hoss, the camp commandant of Auschwitz, was tried in Warsaw and hanged
in Auschwitz in 1947. Indeed, the quest for redemption continued for decades, as evidenced
by the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Israel in 1961.
Disintegration
Imperial Japan
Did you Know
As early as 1943, the Big Three had discussed how to punish Nazi war criminals. At the
Tehran Conference, Stalin proposed executing 50,000 to 100,000 German staff officers.
Franklin Roosevelt joked that perhaps 49,000 would be sufficient
Imperial Japan
History of WW2
12/1926 to 09/1945
It is Japan's mission to be supreme in Asia, the South Seas and eventually the four corners
of the world.
General Sadao Araki
When Emperor Hirohito ascended to the throne in 1926, Japan was enveloped in a struggle
between liberals and leftists on one side, and ultraconservatives on the other. In 1925,
universal male suffrage was introduced, increasing the electorate from 3.3 to 12.5 million.
Yet as the left pushed for further democratic reforms, right-wing politicians pushed for
legislation to ban organisations that threatened the state by advocating wealth distribution or
political change. This resulted in 1925s Peace Preservation Law, which massively curtailed
political freedom.
As the left disintegrated, ultra-nationalism began to loom large. Japanese nationalism was
born at the end of the nineteenth century. During the Meiji period, industrialisation,
centralisation, mass education and military conscription produced a shift in popular
allegiances. Feudal loyalties were replaced by loyalty to the state, personified by the
Emperor.
Although early ultra-nationalists called for a tempering of Japans westernisation, through
limits on industrialisation, their focus changed after the First World War. Western politicians
criticised Japans imperial ambitions and limited Japanese military expansion (in 1922s Five
Power Naval Limitation Agreement). The 1924 Japanese Exclusion Act prohibited Japanese
immigration into the US. Ultra-nationalists saw these actions as provocative; they moved
towards xenophobic, emperor-centred and Asia-centric positions, portraying the ABCD
Powers (America-British-Chinese-Dutch) as threatening the Japanese Empire.
Between 1928 and 1932, Japan faced domestic crisis. Economic collapse associated with
the Great Depression provoked spiralling prices, unemployment, falling exports and social
unrest. In November 1930, the Prime Minister Hamaguchi Osachi was shot by an
ultra-nationalist. In summer 1931, as control slipped away from the civilian government, the

army acted independently to invade Manchuria. Troops quickly conquered the entire border
region, establishing the puppet state of Manchukuo. Though the League of Nations
condemned the action, it was powerless to intervene, and Japan promptly withdrew its
membership. International isolation fed ultra-nationalism. Mayors, teachers and Shinto
priests were recruited by ultra-nationalist movements to indoctrinate citizens.
In May 1932, an attempt by army officers to assassinate Hamaguchis successor stopped
short of becoming a full-blown coup, but ended rule by political parties. Between 1932 and
1936, admirals ruled Japan. Within government, the idea of the Greater East Asian
Co-Prosperity Sphere emerged. This plan called for Asian unification against western
imperialism under Japanese leadership, leading to Asian self-sufficiency and prosperity. In
reality, it meant an agenda of Japanese imperial domination in the Far East.
In July 1937, Japanese soldiers at the Marco Polo Bridge on the Manchuria border used
explosions heard on the Chinese side as a pretext to invade China. The offensive developed
into a full scale war, blessed by Hirohito. Japan enjoyed military superiority over China. The
army advanced quickly and occupied Peking. By December, the Japanese had defeated
Chinese forces at Shanghai and seized Nanking. There Japanese troops committed the
greatest atrocity of an incredibly brutal war: the Rape of Nanking, in which an estimated
300,000 civilians were slaughtered.
By 1939, the war was in stalemate; Chinese Communist and Nationalist forces continued to
resist. Yet Japanese imperial ambitions were undimmed. In 1940, Japan signed the
Tripartite Pact, creating the Rome-Tokyo-Berlin Axis, building on the alliance created in 1936
by the Anti-Comintern Pact. Japan now looked hungrily towards the oil-rich Dutch East
Indies to fuel its Co-Prosperity Sphere. In 1941, when Imperial General Headquarters
rejected Roosevelts ultimatum regarding the removal of troops from China and French
Indochina, the US President announced an oil embargo on Japan. For Japan, the move was
the perfect pretext for war, unleashed in December 1941 with the Pearl Harbor attack.
Nuremberg
Sino-Japanese War
Did you Know
Born April 29 1901, Michinomiya Hirohito was Japan's longest-reigning emperor. His reign
lasted from 1926 until his death in 1989
Sino-Japanese War
History of WW2
07/1937 to 09/1945
There were about 800 Japanese present, some of whom were in sedan chairs . . . the
binding of prisoners and shooting kept up until 2 o'clock in the morning.
Captain Liang Ling-fang testimony to Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal on the Nanking Massacres
In the 1930s, China was a divided country. In 1928 Chiang Kai-Shek had formed a
Nationalist Government the Kuomintang (the KMT), but his dictatorial regime was opposed
by Mao Tse Tungs Communists (CCP). Civil war between the Communists and Nationalists

erupted in 1930 the period of Maos legendary Long March.


In 1931, Japan, eager for the vast natural resources to be found in China and seeing her
obvious weakness, invaded and occupied Manchuria. It was turned into a nominally
independent state called Manchukuo, but the Chinese Emperor who ruled it was a puppet of
the Japanese. When China appealed to the League of Nations to intervene, the League
published the Lytton Report which condemned Japanese aggression. The only real
consequence of this was that an outraged Japanese delegation stormed out of the League
of Nations, never to return.
In the 1930s the Chinese suffered continued territorial encroachment from the Japanese,
using their Manchurian base. The whole north of the country was gradually taken over. The
official strategy of the KMT was to secure control of China by defeating her internal enemies
first (Communists and various warlords), and only then turning attention to the defence of the
frontier. This meant the Japanese encountered virtually no resistance, apart from some
popular uprisings by Chinese peasants which were brutally suppressed.
In 1937 skirmishing between Japanese and Chinese troops on the frontier led to what
became known as the Marco Polo Bridge Incident. This fighting sparked a full-blown conflict,
the Second Sino-Japanese War. Under the terms of the Sian Agreement, the Chinese
Nationalists (KMT) and the CCP now agreed to fight side by side against Japan. The
Communists had been encouraged to negotiate with the KMT by Stalin, who saw Japan as
an increasing threat on his Far Eastern border, and began supplying arms to China. China
also received aid from western democracies, where public opinion was strongly
anti-Japanese. Britain, France and the US all sent aid (the latter including the famous Flying
Tigers fighter-pilot volunteers). Because of historic ties, China also received aid from Nazi
Germany for a short period, until Hitler decided to make an alliance with Japan in 1938.
Although the Japanese quickly captured all key Chinese ports and industrial centres,
including cities such as the Chinese capital Nanking and Shanghai, CCP and KMT forces
continued resisting. In the brutal conflict, both sides used scorched earth tactics. Massacres
and atrocities were common. The most infamous came after the fall of Nanking in December
1937, when Japanese troops slaughtered an estimated 300,000 civilians and raped 80,000
women. Many thousands of Chinese were killed in the indiscriminate bombing of cities by
the Japanese air force. There were also savage reprisals carried out against Chinese
peasants, in retaliation for attacks by partisans who waged a guerrilla war against the
invader, ambushing supply columns and attacking isolated units. Warfare of this nature led,
by the wars end, to an estimated 10 to 20 million Chinese civilians deaths.
By 1940, the war descended into stalemate. The Japanese seemed unable to force victory,
nor the Chinese to evict the Japanese from the territory they had conquered. But western
intervention in the form of economic sanctions (most importantly oil) against Japan would
transform the nature of the war. It was in response to these sanctions that Japan decided to
attack America at Pearl Harbor, and so initiate World War II in the Far East.
Imperial Japan

Pearl Harbor
Did you Know
The second Sino-Japanese War made up more than 50 per cent of the casualties in the
Pacific War if the 1937-1941 period is taken into account
Pearl Harbor
History of WW2
12/1941
Yesterday, Dec. 7, 1941 - a date which will live in infamy - the United States of America was
suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Shortly before 8am on Sunday 7 December 1941, the first of two waves of Japanese aircraft
launched a devastating attack on the US Pacific Fleet, moored at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.
The raid, which came with no warning and no declaration of war, destroyed four battleships
and damaged four more in just two hours. It also destroyed 188 US aircraft. While 100
Japanese perished in the attack, more than 2,400 Americans were killed, with another 1,200
injured.
The causes of the attack on Pearl Harbor stemmed from intensifying Japanese-American
rivalry in the Pacific. Japans imperial ambitions had been evident from as early as 1931,
when she invaded Manchuria. The conquered regions bountiful resources were then used to
supply Japans war machine. Leaving the League of Nations in 1933, Japan pursued an
aggressive foreign policy aimed at creating the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, a
euphemism for a Japanese empire modelled on European ones of the 19th century.
Japan became seen as a serious threat to the economic interests and influence of the US
and European powers in Asia. By July 1937, with Japan engaged in all-out war with China,
relations plunged to new lows. US President Roosevelt imposed economic sanctions, and
Japan turned to the Axis powers, signing the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy in
September 1940.
When Japan occupied French Indochina in July 1941, Roosevelt continued to avoid direct
confrontation. But Japans imperial ambitions in the Pacific had placed her on a collision
course with the United States, which controlled the Philippines and had extensive economic
interests throughout the region. When the US imposed an oil embargo on Japan, threatening
to suffocate her economy, Japans response was to risk everything on a massive
pre-emptive strike which would knock the US out of the Pacific, clearing the way for a
Japanese conquest of resource-rich South East Asia.
The Japanese achieved complete surprise at Pearl Harbor, something that can largely be
attributed to failures in US intelligence. Although the US had cracked Japanese radio codes,
in this case the raw data was not interpreted correctly by army and navy. Although the attack
pummelled American battleships, US aircraft carriers escaped unscathed. This was critical
because the Pacific Fleet would have been virtually incapable of operating without them.

The following day, the US declared war against Japan, where a shared sense of outrage and
hatred had united the countrys bitterly divided media and public behind Roosevelt. On 11
December 1941, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States, thus bringing
America into World War II.
Pearl Harbor appeared to be a huge success for Japan. It was followed by rapid Japanese
conquests in Hong Kong, Singapore, Burma, the Philippines, Malaya and New Guinea. Yet
in the long term, the attack was strategically catastrophic. The sleeping giant had been
awoken, and in America, a sense of fury now accompanied the mobilisation for war of the
worlds most powerful economy. The losses at Pearl Habor would soon be more than made
good, and used to take a terrible vengeance on Japan.
Sino-Japanese War
Singapore and Hong Kong
Did you Know
When news of the Pearl Harbor attack arrived at Hitlers headquarters, one of the assembled
Nazi generals embarrassedly asked the rest of the group where Pearl Harbor was. Nobody
was able to answer him and a world map had to be consulted
The Japanese had rehearsed the attack for a year practising on a model mock up until they
achieved an 80% hit rate.
Now we cant lose the war! We have an ally that has not been defeated in 3,000 years of
history! Hitler after Pearl Harbor
Singapore and Hong Kong
History of WW2
12/1941 to 02/1942
The worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history.
Churchill on the fall of Singapore
December 1941 was a black month for the Allies. Following the attack on Pearl Harbour on 7
December, the seemingly unstoppable Japanese steamed their way through the Pacific and
South East Asia, attacking the islands of Wake and Guam, the Philippines, Malaysia,
Thailand and Burma. For Britain, the most severe material, strategic and psychological blow
came with the loss of two of the jewels in its imperial crown: Hong Kong and Singapore.
Just eight hours after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, 52,000 Japanese troops attacked Hong
Kong. British, Canadian and Indian forces, commanded by General Maltby and supported by
the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Force, were outnumbered three to one. On the first day of
the battle, the Japanese wreaked destruction upon RAF aircraft, achieving immediate air
supremacy. On 10 December, they breached the recently constructed defences of Gin
Drinkers Line, causing the evacuation of Kowloon and forcing Maltbys forces to retreat onto
Hong Kong Island. On Christmas Day, following a week of bombardment and fierce fighting,
the beleaguered Allied forces surrendered. It was the first time in history that a British crown
colony had surrendered to an invading force. It became known as Black Christmas.
Yet the worst blow to British imperial pride was still to come. Singapore, situated at the end

of the Malayan Peninsula, was known as the Gibraltar of the East, and was a powerful
symbol of British power in Asia.
When the Japanese arrived in February 1942, Singapores defenders were woefully
underprepared. The head of the British Army in Malaysia, General Arthur Percival, had
repeatedly delayed the reinforcement of Singapores defences. He was convinced that no
army would be capable of crossing the dense jungle which protected the colony in the north.
He also saw the construction of defences as dangerous to civilian and military morale. To
make matters worse, the two biggest British warships in the Far East, Repulse and Prince of
Wales, had been sunk by Japanese air attack on 10 December 1941, which destroyed any
hope for the naval defence of Singapore.
In the ensuing battle, Japanese forces were commanded by General Tomuzuki Yamashita,
who became known as the Tiger of Malaysia. His troops had essentially entered by the
back door, crossing Thailand and moving down the east coast of Malaya. Japanese forces
began landing on Singapore Island on 8 February. In some areas there was fierce
resistance, but thanks to Japanese air cover, and the poor preparations and deployment of
Commonwealth troops, the Japanese soon made critical inroads into the defences. General
Percival surrendered the islands garrison after 7 days of fighting. It was the largest
surrender of British-led troops in history. 80,000 British, Australian and Indian soldiers
became prisoners of war. The defenders lost 138,000 men in the battle; the invaders 10,000.
For Churchill, the fall of Singapore was the worst disaster in British history. In the mentality
of the time, the easy defeat of the white man by Asiatic forces represented a huge loss of
face for the British. Many historians argue that the defeats fuelled the confidence and
strength of the post-war anti-British movements. Both Hong Kong and Singapore were
occupied by the Japanese until the end of the war.
Pearl Harbor
Occupation and POWs
Did you Know
40,000 soldiers of the Indian Army were taken prisoner at Singapore. As many as
three-quarters may have volunteered to fight in the Indian National Army, an anti-British
force seeking independence for India. It fought (with little success) alongside the Japanese
Army in Burma, and although some of its members were tried for treason after the war, they
became popular heroes in India for their stand against British rule
Occupation and POWs
History of WW2
07/1937 to 09/1945
The Japanese started selecting prisoners and every day one was taken out and killed and
eaten by the soldiers.
Indian POW, New Guinea
During the Second World War, Japan invaded and occupied vast swathes of territory in
Southeast Asia and the Pacific. In some countries, the invaders established puppet

governments. In China, invaded in 1937 but never fully conquered, the Japanese recruited
Wang Ching Wei a deserter from Chiang Kai-Sheks army to head the Nanking
Government. Wangs collaborationists had no real power. Treated with disdain by the
Japanese, they were basically a tool to impose social control and curb the power of local
warlords. In Burma, occupied from 1942, the Japanese capitalised upon anti-imperialist
sentiment among the local population, granting nominal independence in 1943 and
establishing a puppet government under Ba Maw. The Japanese also used captured Indian
troops to form a National Indian Army commanded by Subhas Chandra Bose, which fought
alongside the Japanese in the cause of Indian independence from Britain.
Other occupied territories were controlled by military governments and subject to martial law.
Hong Kong was ruled by a military government under General Rensuke Isogai which
controlled every area of political and public life. The Pacific island of Guam was also ruled
directly by an army which ruthlessly imposed Japanese cultural practices upon the
population. The Chamorros were forced to learn Japanese customs. Yen became the
currency. People suspected of hiding friends or family members wanted by the authorities
were harassed, beaten, tortured and executed.
These regimes were all characterised by a brutality that had become ingrained in the
Japanese Imperial Army. The occupation of Hong Kong began with the bayoneting of
wounded Allied soldiers in St. Stephens Hospital; it continued in the same bloody manner.
Roughly 10,000 women were raped in the month following Japanese victory. The occupiers
recruited former members of the Hong Kong Police to orchestrate public executions. In
Indonesia, occupied in 1942, civilians were arbitrarily arrested, tortured and sexually abused.
Thousands were interned in concentration camps or used as slave labour for Japanese
military projects.
Prisoners of War taken by the Japanese originated from many different countries: China,
India, Burma, Britain and the Commonwealth, the USA, the Netherlands and the Philippines.
Japanese military culture did not subscribe to the idea of surrender; becoming a POW was
to disgrace oneself and ones country. Prisoners taken by the Japanese were brutally
treated; the 1927 Geneva Convention was flagrantly ignored. The Red Cross was denied
access to camps; beatings, executions, medical experiments, poor sanitation, starvation
rations, disease and torture were part of everyday life. Prisoners such as Philip Meninsky
visually chronicled their experiences using human hair, plant juice, blood and toilet rolls.
Their work was later used as evidence at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.
The Bataan Death March is one of the most infamous example of Japanese brutality towards
POWs. Following the fall of Bataan in the Philippines, 75,000 American and Filipino
prisoners were marched from the Bataan peninsula to prison camps; they suffered physical
abuse, murder, torture and starvation. The construction of the Burma-Thailand Railway, a
horrific slave labour project which killed around 90,000 Asian labourers and 16,000 Allied
POWs (mainly through overwork, malnutrition and disease) is another. According to the
figures of the Tokyo Tribunal, 27.1% of all western prisoners taken by the Japanese died;
the Chinese figure is much higher. While just over 80,000 Western Allied POWS were
released after the Japanese surrender, the Chinese figure was just 56. The Tribunal

condemned the Japanese Prime Minister Tojo and six others to death for their responsibility
for these crimes; sixteen more were sentenced to life imprisonment.
Singapore and Hong Kong
Battle of Midway
Did you Know
When the Japanese Army marched into Indonesia in 1942, they were initially greeted by the
population with flags, enthusiasm and chants of Japan is our brother; they were seen as
liberators from Dutch oppression
Battle of Midway
History of WW2
06/1942
Perhaps we will be forgiven if we claim we are about midway to our objective!
Admiral Chester Nimitz after the victory at Midway
The Battle of Midway was a decisive episode in the struggle for naval hegemony in the
Pacific Ocean, fought in June 1942. As a result of the Battle of the Coral Sea, which had
taken place a month earlier, Japanese Pacific expansion had been temporarily halted. Now
Japanese admiral Isoruko Yamamoto wanted to force a decisive clash in the Pacific before
US industrial power was fully mobilised against Japan. His chosen location was Midway
Atholl, a small and solitary archipelago northeast of Hawaii. Yamamoto knew that the US
would defend Midway to the bitter end. If the archipelago fell, Hawaii would fall within range
of Japanese aircraft, allowing Japan to invade within a matter of weeks.
Yamamoto knew that the USs Pacific aircraft carriers would be despatched to protect the
islands; he hoped to lure them into a trap and destroy them. The Japanese occupation of
Midway was also part of a plan to push out her defensive perimeter after the Doolittle Raid: a
dramatic propaganda air attack on Tokyo launched from the carrier USS Hornet.
Furthermore, the Japanese hoped a decisive, humiliating and demoralising defeat in the
Pacific would force America to negotiate an end to the war on terms beneficial to Japan.
Yamamotos plans were scuppered by two principle factors. Firstly, the Japanese
underestimated the USs naval strength. They were unaware that the US Yorktown - which
had been badly damaged during the Battle of the Coral Sea - had been repaired and was
back in action. Secondly, American code breakers were able to determine the exact date
and location of the attack. This allowed US Admiral Chester Nimitz to weave an elaborate
web of decoy tactics and to plan a deadly pre-emptive ambush. This main US attack, which
began at 10:26 on the morning of 4 June, took the Japanese by surprise and succeeded in
destroying four aircraft carriers in a matter of hours.
The US Navy inflicted irreversible and debilitating damage upon the Japanese fleet. In
contrast, the US lost just one aircraft carrier and a destroyer. Although a number of
Japanese pilots did survive, many of the highly trained maintenance teams who ensured the
efficiency of ships and aircraft perished in the battle. These heavy losses permanently
weakened the Japanese armed forces. While the US continued to construct ships and train

new pilots at a huge rate, Midway inflicted losses on the Japanese from which she could not
recover. From this point on, the US enjoyed indisputable naval superiority in the Pacific.
Occupation and POWs
Guadalcanal
Did you Know
The US could read Japanese code; they discovered the attacks location before it began. A
fake message was sent outlining water supply problems on Midway. The US then
intercepted a Japanese message about water problems on the invasion island
Guadalcanal
History of WW2
08/1942 to 02/1943
Goddam it, you'll never get the Purple Heart hiding in a foxhole! Follow me!
Captain Henry P. Jim Crowe - 13th January 1943
At dawn on 7 August 1942, 10,000 US soldiers landed at Guadalcanal, the easternmost
island of the Solomon archipelago. The island, which had formed part of the British Empire
from 1568 until the Japanese occupied it in May 1942, would take on immense strategic
importance. The Solomon Islands were the gateway to northern Australia, which was now
vulnerable to Japanese invasion. And when the Japanese began building an airfield on
Guadalcanal, from which they could attack supply routes between the US, Australia and
New Zealand, it became vital for the Allies to retake the island.
The Guadalcanal Campaign was the first major Allied offensive against Imperial Japan.
Lasting from August 1942 until February 1943, it consisted of a series of fiercely contested
battles at sea, in the air, and on the ground. In the latter arena, US Marine and Army troops
with little combat experience faced an enemy which hid in the jungle, launched attacks at the
dead of night and obeyed a strict code of honour in which death was preferable to surrender.
US landings on Guadalcanal met with great initial success. The outnumbered Japanese
defenders were quickly overwhelmed, and the airfield under construction (which would be
named Hendersons Field) was captured. Between August and November 1942, the
Japanese, who were taken aback by the speed and strength of the Allied offensive, made
several attempts to recapture the airfield. They used fast ships to ferry reinforcements and
supplies to the island by night, so avoiding Allied air attack from Hendersons Field. These
nightly deliveries were known to the Allies as the Tokyo Express.
The struggle for the island culminated in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal: the decisive
moment in the Guadalcanal Campaign and a key turning point in the Pacific War. Between
12 and 15 November 1942, the Japanese staged a last ditch attempt to recapture the
airfield, organising a transport convoy to ferry 7,000 troops to Guadalcanal, and sending
several warships to shell the airfield. US forces, having learnt of Japanese plans, sent their
own naval forces to intercept them.
Although the US suffered more losses than the Japanese, they succeeded in turning back

Japanese warships send to attack the airfield. Air attacks carried out by Allied aircraft also
managed to sink a great number of Japanese troop transports, preventing the bulk of the
Japanese troops and equipment from reaching Guadalcanal. Although the Japanese did not
finish evacuating their forces until February 1943, the Allies effectively won their victory in
December 1942, when the Japanese abandoned any further attempt to recapture
Guadalcanal.
Battle of Midway
Burma
Did you Know
Cultural differences between US and Japanese soldiers were evident during the battle. US
Marines looked on uncomprehendingly as defeated Japanese soldiers refused to board US
ships, preferring to remain in the water and be eaten by sharks
Burma
History of WW2
12/1941 to 08/1945
The dominant feeling on the battlefield is one of loneliness.
Viscount Slim, Commander of the Burma Corps, 1941
In December 1941, the Japanese invasion of Burma opened what would be the longest land
campaign for Britain of the entire war. It began with defeat and pell-mell retreat, as Rangoon
fell to the invader in March 1942. British, Indian and Chinese forces were driven back into
India. The fighting would stretch on, over a varied terrain of jungles, mountains, plains and
wide rivers, stopping only for the monsoon, until Japanese surrender in 1945.
After the initial retreat, the British began to rebuild their army and resources from Assam in
north-eastern India. This process was slow because priority was given to the war against
Germany. The British position was also complicated by discontent in India, the result of
British failure to clearly address the issue of post-war independence. The Japanese
capitalised on this anti-British sentiment, recruiting captured Indian troops into the 40,000
strong Indian National Army, commanded by Subhas Chandra Bose, that fought alongside
the Japanese.
With most of the Chinese coast under Japanese control, the Burma Road was the main
supply route available to the Chinese Nationalists, fighting the Japanese in China. This gave
the Burmese campaign great strategic importance. In December 1942, a limited British
offensive to capture the Arakan coastal region met with failure. The only glimmer of hope
came from the Chindits, long range penetration groups which waged guerrilla war in the
Burmese jungle. Despite limited military success, their exploits boosted public morale.
Throughout 1943, the horizon looked bleak for the British, who lacked the resources and
organisation to recapture Burma. In November 1943, the South East Asia Command was
formed to centralise and organise Allied forces. General Slim slowly rebuilt morale and
forged an efficient offensive combat force: the cosmopolitan Fourteenth Army, made up of
British, Indians, Gurkhas, and East and West Africans.

The Japanese had also been regrouping. On 7 March, Operation U-Go was launched.
Although this bold attempt to invade India surprised the Fourteenth Army, new tactics and
growing confidence ensured that they maintained their positions on the crucial roadways to
India. When Slims forces found themselves surrounded at Imphal and Kohima, an epic
struggle ensued. The British Commonwealth forces, thanks to air resupply, managed to drive
the Japanese into retreat, causing the largest defeat ever suffered by the Japanese army. Of
the 85,000 soldiers, 30,000 were killed.
The Fourteenth Army now went on the offensive. By October 1944, it had crossed the river
Chindwin and was approaching Mandalay and Meiktila. After two months of arduous combat
in a coastal zone of reservoirs and river deltas, Meiktila was taken on 4 March 1945. Two
months later, an ambitious amphibious operation allowed Slims army to re-enter Rangoon
on 6 May 1945. Although this was effectively the end of the campaign, the remaining
Japanese forces in Burma did not surrender until 28 August 1945.
Guadalcanal
Pacific and Philippines
Did you Know
In the epic struggle between British Commonwealth forces and the Japanese at Imphal and
Kohima, the lines were extremely close together. In Kohima, the fight took place for two
months across the tennis courts of the commissioner of the district
Pacific and Philippines
History of WW2
08/1942 to 04/1945
No man must die until he has killed at least ten Americans.
Japanese General Kuribayashi Tadamichi before the battle of Iwo Jima
In June 1942, the US emerged from the Battle of Midway with naval superiority in the Pacific.
General MacArthur and Admiral Chester W. Nimitz seized the initiative, launching an Island
Hopping campaign. Their strategy was to capture the Pacific islands one by one, advancing
towards Japan and bypassing and isolating centres of resistance. Macarthur and Nimitz
planned a two pronged attack: MacArthur would push northwest along the New Guinea
coast and into the Bismarck Archipelago with the eventual aim of liberating the Philippines;
Nimitz would cross the central Pacific, hopping through the Gilbert, Marshall, Caroline and
Marianas islands. The execution of the plan would place Japan within the range of US
bombers, and eventually allow the Americans to launch a mainland invasion.
The offensive against the island of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Archipelago marked the
beginning of Island Hopping. The Guadalcanal Campaign, fought between August 1942
and February 1943, eventually succeeded in forcing Japan to relinquish the island. With the
great Southwest Pacific offensive firmly underway, Admiral William Bull Halsey landed his
troops on New Georgia on 1 July while MacArthur moved his forces to Nassau Bay, New
Guinea. In the face of perilous reefs, heavy rains and high winds, and heavily dug-in
Japanese troops, MacArthurs men succeeded in taking the Munda Airfield on 5 August,

forcing the Japanese into retreat. MacArthurs next strike was against Bougainville on 1
November; where the invaders pummelled the occupiers, inflicting heavy casualties. New
Britain was attacked on 15 December; Halseys carrier strike against Rabaul inflicted huge
damage upon Japanese planes and isolated the port; the last Japanese naval forces would
eventually withdraw in March 1944.
Meanwhile, in the Central Pacific, Nimitz set out to recapture the Aleutian Islands, defeating
the Japanese in a campaign fought between May and August 1943. On 20 November,
landings on Makin and Tarawa marked the beginning of the Gilbert Islands offensive.
Nimitzs troops secured Makin after four days. Tarawa, with its network of pillboxes, mines
and coastal gun emplacements proved more difficult; after a bloody landing operation, US
troops inched inland, slowly crushing the Japanese defences and receiving some hard
lessons in amphibious operations.
The victory paved the way for the invasion of the Marshall Islands. During January and
February 1944, the US wrestled control of Kwajelein, Majuro and Einwetok from the
Japanese. They also succeeded in neutralising Truk, the formidable Japanese naval base
on the Caroline Islands. Now able to move its fleet and air units forward, the US captured
Saipan, Tinian and Guam in the Marianas in June and July. Crucially, the capture of the
Marianas provided a fixed base from which to launch B-29 air attacks on the Japanese home
islands. Between September and October 1944, the US Navy crushed the Japanese fleet as
it tried to halt the US advance in the First Battle of Philippine Sea; the unstoppable island
hoppers then took Ulithi in western Caroline Islands and Peleliu in the Palau Islands.
Between October 1944 and February 1945, MacArthur fulfilled his famous promise to return
to the Philippines. Between October and December, a fierce naval battle raged in Leyte Gulf.
As the US slowly gained control, Manila and Luzon were occupied in February 1945. The
next step was the first American landing on Japanese territory, at Iwo Jima. US troops
invaded in February 1945, following ten weeks of relentless aerial bombardment. As the
Japanese emerged from tunnels and underground bunkers, a bloody 36 day combat began.
While the US lost 6381 men, 20,000 Japanese soldiers perished. The invasion of Okinawa
followed in April 1945. The Japanese launched massive kamikaze attacks on the US
invasion fleet in the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War. In August 1945, the dropping of two
atomic bombs on Japan forced the country to surrender, rendering an invasion of the
Japanese mainland unnecessary.
Burma
China
Did you Know
When US forces landed on the Japanese Island of Iwo Jima in February 1945, the US
Military high command predicted that the island could be taken in ten days. In reality, the
bloody battle dragged out for 36 days; 6,821 marines were killed
China
History of WW2
12/1941 to 08/1945

When the KMT exists, the nation exists, I shall exist; When the KMT vanishes, the nation
vanishes, I shall vanish too.
Chiang Kai-Shek
With the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Second Sino-Japanese War,
which had been rumbling on since 1937, was transformed into a major theatre of World War
II.
By 1941, the Chinese position was precarious. The largest forces opposing the Japanese
were the Nationalists led by Chiang Kai-Shek, but the foreign military aid they had been
receiving in the 1930s had dried up because of the war in Europe. Chiangs forces were
badly trained, badly disciplined and badly equipped. Their loyalty was questionable. The
truce with their Communist rival, the CCP, was fragile. Both sides seemed more intent on
maintaining control in their own territory than in fighting the Japanese. Both were expecting
and preparing for a fresh civil war as soon as Japan was defeated. Many of Chiangs men
also held allegiances to local warlords.
In February 1942, when Congress approved a 500 million dollar loan to China, Roosevelt
described China as the USs main ally against Japan. Chiang Kai-Shek was enchanted to
now be described as one of the Big Four Allied war-leaders. General Vinegar Joe Stillwell
became Chiangs Chief of Staff, as well as commander of US forces in China, Burma and
India. Chiang believed China would be the centre of US efforts against Japan.
The reality was different. Difficulties in sending supplies, British reservations, general
concern about Chiangs motives, and the urgency of operations in the Pacific and elsewhere
meant that China did not become a theatre of main effort for the Allies. Stillwells mission to
improve the efficiency of Chiangs forces and turn the tide against the Japanese proved
difficult. Chiang, Stillwell and Chennault disagreed fiercely over how to use the limited aid
that could be flown in from India across the Hump (the Himalayan mountains). To the
frustration of Chinese Communists and Nationalists, the beginning of Pacific offensives in
1943 meant that US strategy ceased to depend upon China. The priority given to aid for
China plummeted.
By 1944, with the air defence situation improving, more supplies began arriving across the
Hump. The Ledo Road (later christened the Stillwell Road) reopened, having been closed
by Japanese conquests in Burma. In April 1944, the Ichi-Go offensive saw the Japanese
invade the airfields of Kiangsi and Kwangsi; by June the Peking-Hankow Railway was under
Japanese control. Despite US concerns that defeat was looming, Chinese forces resisted,
repelling two Japanese offensives during summer 1945. Two events brought the war in
China to a swift conclusion: on 6 August, the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.
Three days later Stalin, honouring his promise to the Western Allies, declared war on Japan,
and Soviet forces overran the Japanese army in Manchuria. Japanese forces in China,
Formosa and French Indochina surrendered to Chiang. As many as 20 million Chinese had
died in the eight year-long conflict. Fighting between the KMT and the CCP resumed almost
immediately.

Pacific and Philippines


Atomic Bomb
Did you Know
Although the Chinese front of World War II is often treated as secondary in the west, of the
2,300,000 Japanese soldiers stationed overseas, 1,200,000 were in China
Atomic Bomb
History of WW2
08/1945
Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds
Oppenheimer quoting the Bhagavad Gita, after the successful atomic bomb test at Los
Alamos
At approximately 8.15am on 6 August 1945 a US B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb on
the Japanese city of Hiroshima, instantly killing around 80,000 people. Three days later, a
second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, causing the deaths of 40,000 more. The dropping
of the bombs, which occurred by executive order of US President Harry Truman, remains the
only nuclear attack in history. In the months following the attack, roughly 100,000 more
people died slow, horrendous deaths as a result of radiation poisoning.
Since 1942, more than 100,000 scientists of the Manhattan Project had been working on the
bombs development. At the time, it was the largest collective scientific effort ever
undertaken. It involved 37 installations across the US, 13 university laboratories and a host
of prestigious participants such as the Nobel prizewinning physicists Arthur Holly Compton
and Harold Urey. Directed by the Army's chief engineer, Brigadier General Leslie R. Groves,
the Manhattan Project was also the most secret wartime project in history. At first, scientists
worked in isolation in different parts of the US, unaware of the magnitude of the project in
which they were involved. Later, the project was centralised and moved to an isolated
laboratory headed by physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer in Los Alamos, New Mexico. On 16
July 1945, scientists carried out the first trial of the bomb in the New Mexico desert.
President Truman received news of the successful test whilst negotiating the post-war
settlement in Europe at the Potsdam Conference.
Although voices within the US Military expressed caution regarding the use of the new
weapon against Japan, Truman was convinced that the bomb was the correct and only
option. Six months of intense strategic fire-bombing of 37 Japanese cities had done little to
break the Hirohito regimes resolve, and Japan continued to resolutely ignore the demand for
unconditional surrender made at Potsdam. In such circumstances, the use of the atom bomb
was seen as the best means of forcing Japan to surrender, and ending the war. The
alternative, of an Allied invasion of the Japanese home islands, was expected to cost
hundreds of thousands of casualties.
The effects of the attack were devastating. The predicted Japanese surrender, which came
on 15 August - just six days after the detonation over Nagasaki - ended World War II. Yet the
shocking human effects soon led many to cast doubts upon the use of this weapon. The first
western scientists, servicemen and journalists to arrive on the scene produced vivid and

heartrending reports describing a charred landscape populated by hideously burnt people,


coughing up and urinating blood and waiting to die.
As questions regarding the ethical implications of the attacks grew, the US Air Force and
Navy both published reports which claimed (respectively) that the conventional bombing and
submarine war against Japan would have soon forced her to surrender. Joseph Grew,
Americas last ambassador to Japan before the war started, also publicly alleged that the
Truman administration knew about (and ignored) Japanese attempts to open surrender
negotiations with the US using the USSR as a mediator. At this time, another interpretation most famously espoused in 1965 by political economist Gar Alperovitz in his book Atomic
Diplomacy - emerged: the atomic bombing of Japan had been motivated by a desire to
demonstrate the USs military might to the Soviet Union, about whom the Americans were
increasingly nervous.
The moral aspect of the attacks upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki continues to divide historians.
While some argue that the terrible long term human cost to the Japanese population can
never justify the use of such weapons, others maintain that in the context of total war, it
would have been immoral if atomic weapons had not been used to end the war as quickly as
possible.
China
Did you Know
The B-29 bomber that dropped the A-Bomb on Hiroshima was christened the Enola Gay by
its pilot Paul Tibbets in honour his mothers name. The two bombs dropped on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki were called Little Boy and Fat Man

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