World War II
| World War II | |||||||
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| File:WW2 TitlePicture For Wikipedia Article.jpg Clockwise from top: Allied landing on Normandy beaches on D-Day, the gate of a Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz, Red Army soldiers raising the Soviet flag over the Reichstag in Berlin, the Nagasaki atom bomb, the 1936 Nuremberg Rally | |||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||
Allies: Soviet Union.svg){kind=small} United States United Kingdomand others |
Axis Powers:.svg){kind=small} GermanyFile:Flag of Japan - variant.svg Japan .svg){kind=small} Italyand others | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Josef Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill Chiang Kai-shek |
Adolf Hitler, File:Flag of Japan - variant.svg Hideki Tojo, Benito Mussolini | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
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Military dead: 17 million Civilian dead: 33 million Total dead: 50 million |
Military dead: 8 million Civilian dead: 4 million Total dead: 12 million | ||||||
The Second World War, also known as World War II (abbreviated WWII), was the largest and deadliest war in world history. It is generally regarded as taking place between 1939 and 1945, with roots in earlier conflicts. It was fought between the Allied Powers, led by the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States, who defeated the Axis Powers, led by Germany, Italy, and Japan.
The war was fought in response to the military aggression of Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler, and the imperial ambitions of Japan in Asia. The majority of the fighting took place in and around Europe, where Germany invaded and occupied much of Europe and later the Soviet Union, and in and around Asia and the Pacific, where Japan invaded many countries around the Northern and Western Pacific.
The main aim of the Nazi aggression was the conquest of Lebensraum (living space) for a greater German Empire at the expense of the peoples of Eastern Europe. During the war, Nazi Germany also pursued another aim, the elimination of European Jewry, which they believed had "biological base" in Eastern Europe, especially in Poland, Belarus and Ukraine. Although Nazi Germany failed in conquering Lebensraum, it was largely succesful in the destruction of the Jews.
It is believed that approximately 62 million people, or 2.5% of the world population, died in the war; estimates vary greatly. About 60% of all casualties were civilians, who died as a result of disease, starvation, genocide (in particular, the Holocaust), massacres, and aerial bombing.
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of the war represent the only time that nuclear weapons have been used in warfare.
After World War II, Europe was informally split into Western and Soviet spheres of influence. There was a shift in power from Western Europe and the British Commonwealth to the two new superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union. In Asia, the defeat of Japan led to its democratization. China's civil war continued through and after the war, resulting eventually in the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The former colonies of the European powers began their road to independence.
Causes
Commonly held general causes for WWII are the rise of nationalism, the rise of militarism, and the presence of unresolved territorial issues. Fascist movements emerged in Italy and Germany during the global economic instability of the 1920s, and consolidated power during the Great Depression of the 1930s. In Germany, resentment of the Treaty of Versailles — specifically article 231 (the "Guilt Clause"), the belief in the Dolchstosslegende, and the onset of the Great Depression — fueled the rise to power of the militarist National Socialist German Workers Party (the Nazi party) of which Adolf Hitler was a member. Meanwhile, the Treaty's provisions were laxly enforced from fear of another war. Closely related is the failure of the British and French policy of appeasement, which sought to avoid war but actually encouraged Hitler to become bolder and gave Germany time to re-arm, and the USSR's signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact which freed Germany of fear of reprisal from the Soviet Union when Germany invaded Poland. The League of Nations, despite its efforts to prevent the war, relied on the Great Powers to enforce its resolutions, and was unable to prevent the start of The Second World War.
Japan in the 1930s was ruled by a militarist clique devoted to becoming a world power. Japan invaded China to bolster its meager stock of natural resources. The United States and Great Britain reacted by making loans to China, providing covert military assistance, and instituting increasingly broad embargoes of raw materials against Japan. These embargoes would have eventually forced Japan to give up its newly conquered possession in China because the Japanese would not have enough fuel to run their war machine; Japan was faced with the choice of withdrawing from China or going to war with the United States in order to conquer the oil resources of the Dutch East Indies. It chose the latter, and went ahead with plans for the Greater East Asia War in the Pacific.
Chronology
War breaks out in Asia: 1937
The Second Sino-Japanese War began in 1937 when Japan attacked deep into China from its foothold in Manchuria. On July 7, 1937, Japan, after occupying Manchuria in 1931, launched another attack against China near Beijing. The Japanese made initial advances but were stalled in the Battle of Shanghai. The city eventually fell to the Japanese in December 1937, and the capital city Nanking (now Nanjing) also fell. As a result, the Chinese government moved its seat to Chongqing for the remainder of the war. The Japanese forces committed brutal atrocities against civilians and prisoners of war in the Rape of Nanking, slaughtering as many as 300,000 civilians within a month. By 1940, the war had reached a stalemate with both sides making minimal gains. In time, this regional war would merge with the wider World War.
War breaks out in Europe: 1939
Appeasement and Pre-war alliances
The main aim of Nazi aggression was the acquisition of Lebensraum (living space) for a greater German Empire at the expense of the peoples of Eastern Europe. During the war, Nazi Germany was also to pursue another aim, the elimination of European Jewry (please refer to the category "Casualties, civilian impact, and atrocities"). Although Nazi Germany failed in conquering Lebensraum, it was more successful in the destruction of the Jewish population.
In an attempt to avoid another disastrous world war, the British and the French followed a policy of appeasement, in order to placate Hitler. This policy eventually lead to the Munich Agreement, in which Czechoslovakia was partitioned in 1938. British PM Neville Chamberlain, with the backing of the United States' ambassador to Great Britain, Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., returned to Britain, having given the Sudetenland to Germany, whilst famously declaring "peace in our time". But he was wrong. Less than a year later, there would be war. In March 1939, Germany invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia, killing appeasement and moving the world closer to the brink of war.
The failure of the Munich Agreement showed that deals made with Hitler at the negotiating table could not be trusted and that his aspirations for power and dominance in Europe went far beyond anything that the western democracies could tolerate. Poland and France pledged on May 19, 1939 to provide each other with military assistance in the event either was attacked. The British had already offered support to the Poles in March. Then, on August 23, Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. The Pact included a secret protocol which would divide Central Europe into German and Soviet areas of interest, including a provision to partition Poland. Each country agreed to allow the other a free hand in its area of influence, including military occupation. Hitler was then ready to go to war with Poland and, if necessary, with Britain and France. He claimed there were German grievances relating to the issues of the "free city" of Danzig and the "Polish corridor", but he planned to conquer all Polish territory and incorporate it into the German Reich. The signing of a new alliance between Britain and Poland on August 25 did not significantly alter his plans.
- Enigma
On 25 July 1939 the Cipher Bureau revealed Poland's Enigma-decryption achievements to intelligence representatives of France and Britain. Former Bletchley Park mathematician-cryptologist Gordon Welchman has written: "Ultra would never have gotten off the ground if we had not learned from the Poles, in the nick of time, the details both of the German military... Enigma machine, and of the operating procedures that were in use."
Invasion of Poland
On September 1, Germany invaded Poland, using the pretext of a "Polish attack" on German border posts, even though the "attack" was staged by German operatives to create a (rather flimsy) justification for the all-out German "response". Two days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany. The French mobilized slowly, and then mounted only a token offensive in the Saar, which they soon abandoned, while the British could not take any direct action in support of the Poles in the time available (see Western betrayal). Meanwhile, on September 9, the Germans reached Warsaw, having slashed through the Polish defenses.
On September 17, the USSR, pursuant to its agreement with Germany, invaded Poland from the east, throwing Polish defences into chaos by opening the second front. A day later the Polish president and commander-in-chief both fled to Romania. On October 1, hostile forces, after a one-month siege of Warsaw, entered the city. The last Polish units surrendered on October 6. Poland never officially surrendered to the Germans, however. Some Polish troops evacuated to neighboring countries. In the aftermath of the September Campaign, occupied Poland managed to create a powerful resistance movement and contributed significant military forces to the Allies for the duration of World War II.
Phony War
After Poland fell, Germany paused to regroup during the winter of 1939-1940 until April 1940, while the British and French stayed on the defensive. The period was referred to by journalists as "the Phony War," or the "Sitzkrieg," because so little ground combat took place. During this period the British and French governments began to re-arm with the French completing the Maginot Line. British citizens were also prepared, as rations were brought in and bomb shelters were given to the public. After the war, General Alfred Jodl commented that the Germans survived 1939 "only because approximately 110 French and English divisions in the West, which during the campaign on Poland were facing 25 German divisions, remained completely inactive".
Battle of the Atlantic
Meanwhile in the North Atlantic, German U-boats operated against Allied shipping. The submarines made up in skill, luck, and courage what they lacked in numbers. One U-boat sank the British aircraft carrier HMS Courageous, while another U-boat managed to sink the battleship HMS Royal Oak in its home anchorage of Scapa Flow. Altogether, the U-boats sank more than 110 vessels in the first four months of the war. The most damaging effect of the U-boats was in sinking transatlantic merchant shipping.
The battle of the Atlantic lasted for the majority of the war and was a decisive theatre of conflict. If the Atlantic had not been won, then the United Kingdom would have been unable to continue the war. Without England to serve as a base, the invasion of mainland Europe would have been much more difficult for the Western Allies.
As well as the U-boat threat the German Navy fought with fast, lightly armored surface ships known as Pocket Battleships, examples of which included the Scharnhorst and Admiral Graf Spee. In the South Atlantic, the Graf Spee sunk a number of British Merchant Navy vessels. She was then engaged by British cruisers Ajax, Achilles and Exeter in the Battle of the River Plate, and forced into Montevideo harbor. Rather than face battle again, Captain Langsdorff made for sea, and scuttled his battleship just outside the harbor.
Unlike the U-boat threat, which had a serious impact later in the war, German surface raiders had little impact because their numbers were so small.
War spreads: 1940
Soviet-Finnish War and occupation of Baltic Republics
The Soviet Union demanded territory exchange from Finland including part of the Karelian Isthmus, a naval base at Hanko (Hangö) peninsula and some strategically important islands in the Gulf of Finland in exchange of larger, but lower populated Karelia. When Finland rejected these demands, the Soviet Union attacked on November 30, 1939, which started the Winter War. Despite outnumbering Finnish troops by over 2.5:1, the war proved embarrassingly difficult for the Red Army, although it concluded with the Soviet annexation of strategically important border areas, particularly those to the immediate north of Leningrad. The war triggered an international outcry and on December 14 the Soviet Union was expelled from the League of Nations. Finland surrendered in March 1940 and signed the Moscow Peace Treaty (1940) in which the Finns made the minor territorial concessions mentioned above.
Later that year, in June the Soviet Union occupied Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, and annexed Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from Romania.
Invasion of Denmark and Norway
Germany invaded Denmark and Norway on April 9, 1940, in Operation Weserübung, in part to counter the threat of an impending Allied invasion of Norway. Denmark did not resist, but Norway fought back, and was joined by British, French, and Polish (exile) forces landing in support of the Norwegians at Namsos, Åndalsnes, and Narvik. By late June, the Allies were defeated, German forces were in control of most of Norway, and what remained of the Norwegian Army had surrendered.
Invasion of France and the Low Countries
On May 10, 1940, the Germans invaded Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, and France, ending the Phony War. The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and the French Army advanced into northern Belgium and planned to fight a mobile war in the north while maintaining a static continuous front along the Maginot Line further south. The Allied plans were immediately smashed by the most classic example in history of Blitzkrieg.
In the first phase of the invasion, Fall Gelb (CACA), the Wehrmacht's Panzergruppe von Kleist raced through the Ardennes, a heavily forested region which the Allies had thought impenetrable for a modern, mechanized army. They broke the French line at Sedan, then drove west across northern France to the English Channel, splitting the Allies in two. Meanwhile Belgium (including the fortifications at Liege), Luxembourg, and the Netherlands fell quickly against the attack of German Army Group B.
The BEF, encircled in the north, was evacuated from Dunkirk in Operation Dynamo. The operation was one of the biggest military evacuations in history as hundreds of thousands of British and French troops were transported across the English Channel, not just on warships but also on civilian vessels including fishing and rowing boats.
On June 10 Italy joined the war, attacking France in the south. German forces then continued the conquest of France with Fall Rot (Case Red), advancing behind the Maginot Line and near the coast. France signed an armistice with Germany on June 22 1940, leading to the direct German occupation of Paris and two thirds of France, and the establishment of a puppet state in southeastern France known as Vichy France. (Vichy France would later be part of the Axis Powers)
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Battle of Britain
Following the defeat of France, Britain chose to fight on, so Germany began preparations in summer of 1940 to invade Britain in Operation Sea Lion, while Britain made anti-invasion preparations. The first step Germany saw necessary was to gain air control over Britain by defeating the Royal Air Force. The war between the two air forces became known as the Battle of Britain. The Luftwaffe initially targeted RAF Fighter Command, but the results were not as expected, so the Luftwaffe later turned to terror bombing London. These attacks were known as blitzkriegs, or lightning warfare. The Germans failed to defeat the Royal Air Force, and the Royal Navy was still firmly in control of the English Channel. Operation Sea Lion was postponed and eventually cancelled.
Italian Invasion of Greece
Italian dictator Benito Mussolini had grown jealous of Hitler's conquests and decided to show the world that he too could conquer. He chose to invade Greece as it seemed to him a weak nation which he can easily conquer. Italy invaded Greece on October 28, 1940, from Italian occupied Albania after the Greek Premier John Metaxas rejected an ultimatum to hand over Greek territory. The Italians launched their first attack with insufficient forces and the Greek Army forced the Italians into a massive retreat deep into Albania. By mid-December, the Greeks occupied one-fourth of Albania. Mussolini rushed in hundreds of thousands of reinforcements. The Italians eventually had 530,000 soldiers fighting the Greeks. In March 1941, with these new forces the Italians launched a full scale counterattack. The counterattack was a dismal failure and Mussolini left Albania with his repuatation and his prestige destroyed. The Greek army had inflicted upon the Axis Powers their first defeat in the war, and Germany would soon be forced to intervene. Although the Greek victories over the Italians are little talked about today, there is strong evidence to suggest they were the beginning of the end of the Axis Powers.
North African Campaign
The Italian declaration of war in June 1940, challenging the British supremacy of the Mediterranean, hinged on Gibraltar, Malta, and Alexandria. Italian troops invaded and captured British Somaliland in August. In September, the North African Campaign began when Italian forces in Libya attacked British forces in Egypt. The aim was to capture the Suez Canal, a vital link between the United Kingdom and India. British, Indian and Australian forces counter-attacked in Operation Compass, but this offensive stopped in 1941 when much of the Australian and New Zealand forces were transferred to Greece to defend it from German attack. German forces (known later as the Afrika Korps) under General Erwin Rommel, however, landed in Libya and renewed the assault on Egypt.
War becomes global: 1941
European Theater
Lend-Lease
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Lend-Lease Act on March 11. This program was the first major step away from American isolationism, providing for substantial assistance to the UK, the Soviet Union, and other countries.
Rudolph Hess is Captured
On May 10 1941 Rudolph Hess, Hitler's second in command parachuted into Renfrewshire, Great Britain to try and negotiate a truce between the United Kingdom and Nazi Germany. Many high level Germans including Rudolph Hess and Joseph Goebbels disliked fighting Britain due to the fact they saw it as a fellow Aryan superpower and saw it as a great ally. Hess's aircraft crashed when he attempted to parachute into Britain and was captured by British Forces. He was kept under arrest at the Tower of London and was brought to trial at the end of the war
German Invasion of Greece and Crete
See Main Article: Battle of Crete
On April 6 1941 Germany invaded Greece after the failure of the Italian invasion of Greece in 1940. Germany invaded through Bulgaria, which had joined the Axis Powers. Greek troops put up an incredibly brave and tenacious fight but the outnumbered and outgunned Greek army collapsed. British and Australian forces sent to aid them were forced to evacuate the country, with losses to the Royal Navy. The stubborn Greek resistance, however, delayed the German invasion of the Soviet Union by six weeks, which proved disastrous when the German army froze on the outskirts of Moscow as a result of the Russian winter. The occupation of Greece would also be costly and difficult as guerilla warfare plagued the Axis Powers.
A month after the occupation of the Greek mainland, Germany invaded the Greek island of Crete. Crete itself was defended by a force of about 40,000 Greek and Commonwealth troops. The Germans invaded the island through airborne attack. German losses were very high, but after a few days they gained control of an airfield and were able to reinforce their position. The Allies evacuated their remaining forces by June 1st, 1941. In view of the German losses Hitler forbade further airborne operations.
Invasion of Soviet Union
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From the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in August, 1939 through almost the end of the first half of 1941, Stalin and the USSR fed and equipped Hitler and Germany as Germany invaded Western Europe and then attacked Great Britain by air. Notwithstanding this support, Germany betrayed its partner. On June 22, 1941, Operation Barbarossa, the largest invasion in history, began. Three German army groups, an Axis force of over four million men, advanced rapidly deep into the Soviet Union, destroying almost the entire western Soviet army in huge battles of encirclement. Nevertheless, the Soviets dismantled as much industry as possible ahead of the advancing Axis forces, moving it to areas east of the Ural Mountains for reassembly to supply the Soviet armies which ultimately contributed mightily to the destruction of Germany. By late November, the Axis had reached a line at the gates of Leningrad, Moscow, and Rostov, at the cost of about 23 percent casualties. Their advance then ground to a halt as the harsh Russian winter set in. The German General Staff had underestimated the size of the Soviet army and its ability to draft new troops.
They were now dismayed by the presence of new forces, including fresh Siberian troops under General Zhukov, and by the onset of a particularly cold winter.
German forward units had advanced within distant sight of the golden onion domes of Moscow's Saint Basil's Cathedral, but then on December 5, the Soviets counter-attacked and pushed the Axis back some 150-250 kilometers (100-150 mi), which became the first major German defeat of World War II.
Meanwhile, on June 25, the Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union began with Soviet air attacks shortly after the beginning of Operation Barbarossa.
Allied conferences
The Atlantic Charter was issued as a joint declaration by Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt, at Argentia, Newfoundland, on August 14, 1941.
In December 1941, after America entered the war, Churchill met with Roosevelt again at the Arcadia Conference. They agreed that defeating Germany had priority over defeating Japan. The Americans proposed a 1942 cross-channel invasion of France which the British strongly opposed, suggesting instead a small invasion in Norway or landings in French North Africa. The Declaration by the United Nations was issued.
Mediterranean
In North Africa, Rommel's forces advanced rapidly eastward, laying siege to the vital seaport of Tobruk. Two Allied attempts to relieve Tobruk were defeated, but a larger offensive at the end of the year (Operation Crusader) drove Rommel back after heavy fighting.
In June 1941, Allied forces invaded Syria and Lebanon and captured Damascus on June 17. Later, in August, British and Soviet troops occupied neutral Iran in order to secure its oil and a southern supply line to Russia.
Hunt for the Bismarck
On May 24, the German battleship Bismarck left port, threatening British shipping in the Atlantic. After the British battlecruiser HMS Hood was sunk in the Battle of the Denmark Strait, the Royal Navy engaged in a massive hunt across the North Atlantic for the Bismarck. After an extensive chase, Fairey Swordfish torpedo bombers from the aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal struck the Bismarck, resulting in only minor damage to the ship, but causing her rudder to jam and allowing the pursuing Royal Navy Task Force to catch and sink her.
Enigma
On May 9, the British destroyer HMS Bulldog captures a German U-Boat and recovers a complete, intact Enigma Machine. This was a vital turn in favour of those Allies in the Battle of the Atlantic, and in their code-breaking efforts. The machine was taken to Bletchley Park where it was used to help decipher and understand German encryption techniques.
Pacific Theatre
Japan and United States enter the War
In the summer of 1941, the United States began an oil embargo against Japan, which was a protest of Japan's incursion into French Indo-China and the continued invasion of China. Japan planned an attack on Pearl Harbor to cripple the U.S. Pacific Fleet before consolidating oil fields in the Dutch East Indies. On December 7, a Japanese carrier fleet launched a surprise air attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The raid resulted in two U.S. battleships sunk, and six damaged but later repaired and returned to service. The raid failed to find any aircraft carriers and did not damage Pearl Harbor's usefulness as a naval base. The attack strongly united public opinion in the United States against Japan. The following day, December 8, the United States declared war on Japan. On the same day, China officially declared war against Japan. Germany declared war on the United States on December 11, even though it was not obliged to do so under the Tripartite Pact. Hitler hoped that Japan would support Germany by attacking the Soviet Union. Japan did not oblige, and this diplomatic move by Hitler proved a catastrophic blunder which unified the American public's support for the war.
Japanese offensive
Japan soon invaded the Philippines and the British colonies of Hong Kong, Malaya, Borneo, and Burma, with the intention of seizing the oilfields of the Dutch East Indies. Despite fierce resistance by American, Philippine, British, Canadian, and Indian forces, all these territories capitulated to the Japanese in a matter of months. The British island fortress of Singapore was captured in what Churchill considered one of the most humiliating British defeats of all time.
Deadlock: 1942
European Theatre
- Western and Central Europe
In May, top Nazi leader Reinhard Heydrich was assassinated by Czech resistance agents in Operation Anthropoid. Hitler ordered severe reprisals. (See Lidice).
On August 19, British and Canadian forces launched the Dieppe Raid (codenamed Operation Jubilee) on the German occupied port of Dieppe, France. The attack was a disaster but provided critical information utilized later in Operation Torch and Operation Overlord.
- Soviet winter and early spring offensives
In the north, Soviets launched the Toropets-Kholm Operation January 9 to February 6 1942, trapping a German force near Andreapol. The Soviets also surrounded a German garrison in the Demyansk Pocket which held out with air supply for four months (February 8 until April 21), and established themselves in front of Kholm, Velizh and Velikie Luki.
In the south, Soviet forces launched an offensive in May against the German Sixth Army, initiating a bloody 17 day battle around Kharkov which resulted in the loss of over 200,000 Red Army personnel.
- Axis summer offensive
On June 28, the Axis began their summer offensive, Operation Blue, a planned drive southeast from the Don river to the Volga river toward the Caucasus mountains. German Army Group B planned to capture the city of Stalingrad which would secure the German left flank while Army Group A planned to capture the southern oil fields. In the Battle of the Caucasus, fought in the late summer and fall of 1942, the Axis forces captured the oil fields.
- Stalingrad
After two months of bitter street fighting, the Germans captured 90% of Stalingrad by November. The Soviets, however, had been building up massive forces on the flanks of Stalingrad. They launched Operation Uranus on November 19, with twin attacks that met at Kalach four days later and trapped the Sixth Army in Stalingrad. The Germans requested permission to attempt a break-out, which was refused by Hitler, who ordered Sixth Army to remain in Stalingrad where he promised they would be supplied by air until rescued. About the same time, the Soviets launched Operation Mars in a salient near the vicinity of Moscow. Its objective was to tie down Army Group Center and to prevent it from reinforcing Army Group South at Stalingrad.
In December German relief forces got within 50 kilometers (30 mi) of the trapped Sixth Army before they were turned back by the Soviets. By the end of the year, Sixth Army was in desperate condition, as the Luftwaffe was only able to supply about a sixth of the supplies needed.
- Eastern North Africa
At the beginning of 1942, the Allied forces in North Africa were weakened by detachments to the Far East. Rommel once again attacked and recaptured Benghazi. Then he defeated the Allies at the Battle of Gazala, and captured Tobruk with several thousand prisoners and large quantities of supplies. Following up, he drove deep into Egypt.
The First Battle of El Alamein took place in July 1942. Allied forces had retreated to the last defensible point before Alexandria and the Suez Canal. The Afrika Korps, however, had outrun its supplies, and the defenders stopped its thrusts. The Second Battle of El Alamein occurred between October 23 and November 3. Lieutenant-General Bernard Montgomery was in command of Allied forces known as the British Eighth Army. The Eighth Army took the offensive and was ultimately triumphant. After the German defeat at El Alamein, the Axis forces made a successful strategic withdrawal to Tunisia.
Western North Africa
Operation Torch was launched by the United States and Free French forces on November 8, 1942. It aimed to gain control of North Africa through simultaneous landings at Casablanca, Oran and Algiers, followed a few days later with a landing at Bône, the gateway to Tunisia. The local forces of Vichy France put up minimal resistance before submitting to the authority of Free French General Henri Giraud. In retaliation, Hitler invaded and occupied Vichy France. The German and Italian forces in Tunisia were caught in the pincers of Allied advances from Algeria in the west and Libya in the east. Rommel's tactical victory against inexperienced American forces at the Battle of the Kasserine Pass only postponed the eventual surrender of the Axis forces in North Africa.
Pacific Theatre
Central and South West Pacific
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On February 19, 1942, Roosevelt signed United States Executive Order 9066, leading to the internment of thousands of Japanese, Italians, and German Americans for the duration of the war.
In April, the Doolittle Raid, the first U.S. air raid on Tokyo, boosted morale in the U.S. and caused Japan to shift resources to homeland defense, but did little physical damage.
In early May, a Japanese naval invasion of Port Moresby, New Guinea, was thwarted by Allied navies in the Battle of the Coral Sea. This was both the first successful opposition to a Japanese attack and the first battle fought between aircraft carriers.
A month later, on June 5, American carrier-based dive-bombers sank four of Japan's best aircraft carriers in the Battle of Midway. Historians mark this battle as a turning point and the end of Japanese expansion in the Pacific. Cryptography played an important part in the battle, as the United States had broken the Japanese naval codes and knew the Japanese plan of attack.
In July, a Japanese overland attack on Port Moresby was led along the rugged Kokoda Track. An outnumbered and untrained Australian battalion defeated the 5,000-strong Japanese force, the first land defeat of Japan in the war and one of the most significant victories in Australian military history.
On August 7, United States Marines began the Battle of Guadalcanal. For the next six months, U.S. forces fought Japanese forces for control of the island. Meanwhile, several naval encounters raged in the nearby waters, including the Battle of Savo Island, Battle of Cape Esperance, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, and Battle of Tassafaronga.
In late August and early September, while battle raged on Guadalcanal, an amphibious Japanese attack on the eastern tip of New Guinea was met by Australian forces in the Battle of Milne Bay.
Sino-Japanese War
Japan launched a major offensive in China following the attack on Pearl Harbor. The aim of the offensive was to take the strategically important city of Changsha which the Japanese had failed to capture on two previous occasions. For the attack, the Japanese massed 120,000 soldiers under 4 divisions. The Chinese responded with 300,000 men, and soon the Japanese army was encircled and had to retreat.
War turns: 1943
European Theatre
German and Soviet spring offensives
After the surrender of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad on February 2, 1943, the Red Army launched eight offensives during the winter. Many were concentrated along the Don basin near Stalingrad, which resulted in initial gains until German forces were able to take advantage of the weakened condition of the Red Army and regain the lost territory.
German summer offensive
On July 4, the Wehrmacht launched a much-delayed offensive against the Soviet Union at the Kursk salient. Their intentions were known by the Soviets, and they hastened to defend the salient with an enormous system of earthwork defenses. Both sides massed their armor for what became a decisive military engagement. The Germans attacked from both the north and south of the salient and hoped to meet in the middle, cutting off the salient and trapping 60 Soviet divisions. The German offensive was ground down as little progress was made through the Soviet defenses. The Soviets then brought up their reserves, and the largest tank battle of the war occurred near the city of Prokhorovka. The Germans had exhausted their armored forces and could not stop the Soviet counter-offensive that threw them back across their starting positions.
Soviet fall and winter offensives
In August, Hitler agreed to a general withdrawal to the Dnieper line, and as September proceeded into October, the Germans found the Dnieper line impossible to hold as the Soviet bridgeheads grew. Important Dnieper towns started to fall, with Zaporozhye the first to go, followed by Dnepropetrovsk.
Early in November the Soviets broke out of their bridgeheads on either side of Kiev and recaptured the Ukrainian capital.
First Ukrainian Front attacked at Korosten on Christmas Eve. The Soviet advance continued along the railway line until the 1939 Polish-Soviet border was reached.
Italy
The surrender of Axis forces in Tunisia on May 13, 1943 yielded some 250,000 prisoners. The North African war proved to be a disaster for Italy, and when the Allies invaded Sicily on July 10 in Operation Husky, capturing the island in a little over a month, the regime of Benito Mussolini collapsed. On July 25, he was removed from office by the King of Italy, and arrested with the positive consent of the Great Fascist Council. A new government, led by Pietro Badoglio, took power and declared that Italy would stay in the war. Badoglio had actually begun secret peace negotiations with the Allies.
The Allies invaded mainland Italy on September 3, 1943. Italy surrendered to the Allies on September 8, as had been agreed in negotiations. The royal family and Badoglio government escaped to the south, leaving the Italian army without orders, while the Germans took over the fight, forcing the Allies to a complete halt in the winter of 1943-44 at the Gustav Line south of Rome.
In the north, the Nazis let Mussolini create what was effectively a puppet state, the Italian Social Republic or "Republic of Salò", named after the new capital of Salò on Lake Garda.
Mid-1943 brought the fifth and final German Sutjeska offensive against the Yugoslav Partisans.
Atlantic
The turning point of the Battle of the Atlantic took place in early 1943 as the Allies refined their naval tactics effectively while making use of new technology to counter the U-Boats. Although two convoys suffered heavy losses, the U-Boats were also taking increasingly heavy casualties, and were forced to abandon their main offensive in the mid-Atlantic.
The Allies had also resumed running the Arctic convoys to Russia. In December the last major sea battle between the Royal Navy and the German Navy took place. At the Battle of North Cape, Germany's last battlecruiser, the Scharnhorst, was sunk by HMS Duke of York, HMS Belfast and several destroyers.
Pacific Theatre
Central and South West Pacific
On January 2, Buna, New Guinea was captured by the Allies. This ended the threat to Port Moresby. By January 22, 1943, the Allied forces had achieved their objective of isolating Japanese forces in eastern New Guinea and cutting off their main line of supply.
American authorities declared Guadalcanal secure on February 9. Australian and U.S. forces undertook the prolonged campaign to retake the occupied parts of the Solomon Islands, New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies, experiencing some of the toughest resistance of the war. The rest of the Solomon Islands were retaken in 1943.
In November, U.S. Marines won the Battle of Tarawa. This was the first heavily opposed amphibious assault in the Pacific theater. The high casualties taken by the Marines sparked off a storm of protest in the United States, where the large losses could not be understood for such a tiny and seemingly unimportant island. This led to the adoption of the "Island hopping" strategy, whe