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Approaching Total War
History 323 / April 12, 2013
The MolotovRibbentrop Pact
(Aug. 23, 1939)
The Pact divides Poland…
… and acknowledges a Soviet sphere of influence
Sept. 1, 1939: Germany invades Poland
Sept. 3, 1939: Britain & France declare war on Germany
“Phony War”: after Poland falls, Britain & France hesitate
Here: French prime minister Éduard Daladier consults warily with officers
Hitler seizes the initiative
April 1940: German occupation of Denmark & Norway
Hitler seizes the initiative
May 1940: the offensive against the Netherlands, Belgium, France
The German advance through the Ardennes forest (right)…
… and the British retreat (left)
The Battle of Britain (summer 1940): the RAF prevails
Ethnic Germans brought “home to the Reich”
Jewish ghettoes created in Polish cities (here: Lodz)
Count Clemens August
von Galen
(1878-1946)
Bishop of Münster, 19331946
Operation Barbarossa: Hitler
re-orients the war
(June 1941)
Sept. 1, 1941: the Yellow Star required for German Jews
German Jews deported from the Reich (1942)
Stalingrad: Germany’s Sixth Army encircled
Heaps of German soldiers at Stalingrad
Goebbels at the Berlin Sports Palace, Feb. 1943:
“Do you want total war?”