Transcript File - 20th Century History

World War II: In Europe
The War in Europe in Forty Minutes
September 1939
• September 1: Germany invades
Poland
• September 3: Britain, France,
Australia, NZ declare war on
Germany
• Superior airpower and armor
(tanks) quickly surround Polish
forces and eliminate them
• Soviets attack from the East
• September 27 Warsaw
surrenders
Scandinavia
• In response to British and
French plans for an
occupation of Denmark and
Norway
• Germany needs to protect
iron ore shipments from
Sweden
• April 9, 1940: Germany
invades and conquers
Denmark in less than 4 hours
• April 9: Germany invades
Norway
• May 10: Norway surrenders
The Phony War and the Low
Countries
• What have the Allies been doing since
Sept of 1939?
• Raising armies, blockading Germany,
and the French have been in their
fortresses on the French border, the
famous, impervious…Maginot Line!
• What could the Germans
do?..Schlieffen Plan Part II
• May 10, 1940- Germany attacks
Belgium, Luxembourg, and the
Netherlands
• May 15, The Netherlands surrenders
• May 26 Germans surround British and
French forces at Dunkirk. British
miraculously escaped.
Fall of France and
Vichy
• May 27 Belgium surrenders
• June 10: Italy declares war on
Britain and France
• June 14: Germans enter Paris
• June 22: France and German
Armistice. New French
government established. Called
Vichy France and declared
neutral
• June 28 Charles DeGaulle
recognized as head of Free
French
Battle of the Atlantic
• Britain again blockaded Germany
• Germany responded by submarine warfare..sound familiar?
• In 1942, 452 ships were sunk by the Germans and England was almost starved
into surrender
• By the end of the war Germany had sunk 2,177 ships and killed more than 30,000
sailors
• By 1944, destroyers, planes, greater ship production and the breaking of the
German code, had mostly ended the battle with a victory for the Allies
War in North Africa
• August 1940: Italy attacks British colonies in Africa (Egypt)
• After brief successes Italians are pushed back, losing half of Libya and
all of Ethiopia
• In 1941 Hitler sends Rommel
• British pushed out of Libya and far back into Egypt
• By 1942, Germans had out run their supplies (British control of the
Mediterranean) and are forced out of Egypt and Libya and back into
Tunisia
Battle of Britain
• After the fall of France, Hitler’s next
goal was the invasion of Britain
• To do so he needed to defeat the
British air force (RAF)
• Beginning in July of 1940 Germans
began bombing campaign of Britain and
all Allied ships in the English Channel
• German bombing killed more than
43,000 civilians
• Britain eventually wins due to superior
radar and fewer pilot losses (shot down
British pilots live to fly again)
• Beginning in 1940, Britain responded by
bombing German cities
Yugoslavia and
Greece
• 1940 and 1941 Romania,
Hungary, and Bulgaria join the
Axis
• Oct. 1940: Italy declares war
on Greece, invades and then is
drive far back into Albania
• British troops arrive in Greece
• March 1940 Yugoslavia joins
Axis, then coup overthrows
the govt. Yugoslavia quits Axis
• Germany invades Yugoslavia
and Greece
Operation
Barbarossa
• June 22, 1941: German
surprise attack on the USSR
• Most of the Soviet air force
is destroyed on the ground
• By late July Germans were
bombing Moscow
• By August they had
surrounded Leningrad (St.
Petersburg)
• In September the first
snows begin to fall slowing
further German advances
Operation Torch
• Nov 1942: British, American and Free French forces land
in North Africa
• Some Vichy French forces fight them, others surrender
• Germany invades Vichy France
• By May of 1943 all Axis forces in North Africa have been
neutralized
Leningrad & Stalingrad
• Leningrad was surrounded by German
forces for 900 days
• 632,000 people died including
soldiers and civilians
• Germans were finally stopped at
Stalingrad
• Hitler and Stalin both refused to allow
their armies to retreat and poured as
many resources as possible
• Battle of attrition which Stalin won
• Germans lost 841,000 men
• Soviets lost 1.1 million
• It was the first major battle the
Germans lost in World War II
The Soviet Advance-Kursk to the Ukraine 1943
• After Stalingrad the German
army was in retreat
• In an attempt to stop the
advancing Soviets they met
at Kursk
• Germans lost
• Casualties: German 170,000,
Soviets unknown
• The Germans were to never
regain the initiative as the
Soviets pushed them back
into the Ukraine and beyond
The Invasion of Italy and Italy switches
sides…imagine that!
• July 1943 US, British, and
Canadian forces invade
Sicily (the football of Italy)
• Allied forces made it
about half way up the
boot
• King Victor Emmanuel
deposed Mussolini and
Italy joined the Allies
• Mussolini was imprisoned
The Rescue of Mussolini and
the Gustav line
• September 1943 Mussolini
was rescued from prison in a
raid by German special forces
led by Otto Skorzeny
• Mussolini was placed in
charge of northern Italy a
new country called the Italian
Social Republic
• Strong German resistance in
the mountains, especially at
Monte Casino, kept the Allies
from advancing further
North.
D-Day
• June 6, 1944
• US, British, and
Canadian forces landed
on the beaches of
Normandy in France
• Had the Allies failed the
war might have turned
out differently
• By August the Allies
were approaching Paris
Liberation of Paris
• By August 25, Paris was liberated
• The Allies allowed DeGaulle to
lead the entry
• By the beginning of September
Brussels and Antwerp had been
liberated
Battle of the Bulge
• German final last gasp
• Attempt to break Allied
lines and recapture the
Low Countries and make a
treaty with the Allies
• Germans expected to be
able to join the Allies to
fight the Soviets
• Lack of fuel and airpower
leads to German defeat
Soviets in Poland and
the Warsaw Uprising
• August 1944: Allies ask Polish
Resistance to stage an uprising
in Warsaw to help the
advancing Soviet army
• Soviet army stops its advance
and allows Germans to deal
with Polish Uprising
• This allows Soviets to put in
place a pro-Communist
government since all the other
resistance fighters had been
dealt with by the Germans
Hitler’s Suicide and
the End of the War
• August 1944: Romania and
Bulgaria fall to the USSR
• January 1945 Hungary falls to
USSR
• April 1945 Soviets enter Berlin
• Hitler commits suicide in his
bunker
• Soviet and Allied forces meet
at the Elbe River
• May 8, 1945 War in Europe
ends