Transcript Hitler

WWII Part I
The Road to War
There were SEVEN world superpowers
by the 1930s
France
United Kingdom
Soviet Union
Japan
The United States
Germany
Italy
In 1932, Japan invaded a part of China
called Manchuria with huge success
The League of Nations sent a group of
officials to study the problem in Manchuria
After a year of study, the League of
Nations asked Japan to leave China
Japan refused and left the League
of Nations in 1933
Mussolini noticed this, and in 1935, his Italians
invaded Abyssinia (now Ethiopia and Somalia)
The African soldiers fought bravely under
their leader Haile Selassie but only had old
guns and arrows
They could not stop the Italian tanks and
planes, and Italy easily conquered Abyssinia
Even though Selassie had called on the
League for help, they secretly made a pact
with Italy and gave them Abyssinia instead
Mussolini decided in 1937 to leave the
League of Nations completely, which
showed how useless the League had
become
Germany had left the League in 1933, and
once Italy left in 1937, they formed their
own alliance
Japan also joined the alliance, and
the Axis Powers were formed
In 1937, Hitler
demanded that
Germany’s
Western land,
which the Treaty
of Versailles
gave to France,
be returned
France and the UK agreed and returned
the land, hoping to satisfy Hitler
Hitler then set
his sights on
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia's army was strong, and
its president wanted to fight against
the NAZIS with the help of France, the
UK, and Russia
Instead, the leaders of the UK and
France met with Hitler
They made a deal and gave Hitler
half of Czechoslovakia
(Sudentenland)
The process of making deals with an
aggressor in order to stop war is called
appeasement
The United Kingdom’s Prime Minister,
Neville Chamberlain, returned home and
said….
"My good friends,
this is the second
time in our history
that there has come
back from Germany
to Downing Street
peace with honor. I
believe it is peace in
our time.”
In 1939, Hitler took over the rest of
Czechoslovakia, and the rest of the world
began to realize that appeasement was not
going to work.
WWII Part II
New Alliances and the Beginnings of
War
France and Britain believed that the
Soviet Union would help them if war
broke out against Germany
Instead, the leader of the Soviet
Union, Joseph Stalin, signed a
peace treaty with Germany
Hitler and Stalin had secretly
agreed to split Eastern Europe
Britain and Poland signed a “Mutual
Assistance Pact” on August 25, 1939,
promising to help each other if attacked
Five days later, on September 1,
1939, Germany invaded Poland
Great Britain, France, New Zealand,
and Australia declared war on Germany
World War II Began….
Hitler and his generals developed a
new style of war called the blitzkrieg
Blitzkrieg means “Lightning War.” This
is where bombers and tanks attack
together against one target.
Blitzkrieg
The war happened so fast that Great Britain
and France were unable to send any help
Poland’s army was crushed in two
weeks, and Warsaw was in ruins.
Stalin was stunned
by how fast the
Germans defeated
Poland, and he
quickly sent the
Soviet army into
Eastern Poland
Stalin and Hitler divided Poland
Stalin then invaded Finland on
November 30, 1939
Finland expected that the Soviets would
attack it, so Finland set up a huge
landmine field for protection
Eventually the Soviet Union defeated
Finland
The Nazi war machine’s next targets were
Denmark and Norway, which they invaded
on April 9, 1940
They were easily crushed and
conquered by Germany
WWII PART III
France’s Defeat, Churchill’s Victory
By April 1940, France and Great Britain
had still not sent a single soldier to fight
the Germans, and Hitler was now turning
his attention to France.
France’s army was the largest and
most advanced in the world
France planned on fighting a defensive
war with trenches, like in World War I
The bulk of the French army was sent
to the border of Belgium and France
France believed that the Ardennes Forest
in Luxembourg was not crossable with
tanks and did not defend it
The Nazis secretly passed through
it in days and crushed the French
army. Next, they headed for Paris.
Italy also entered the war and started
to attack France from the south
The Allies were surrounded in their
positions at the Belgian border and
were forced to evacuate from Dunkirk,
across the English Channel
French armies
were crushed
by blitzkrieg –
Germany
conquered
Paris
In six weeks, Hitler’s army had
defeated the largest and most
powerful country in the world
France was Hitler’s by June 22, 1940
Embarrassingly, France surrendered in
the same railcar where Germany signed
the WWI armistice
Only the United Kingdom stood in the
way of complete Nazi control of Europe
Hitler did not want to fight Britain and
believed that Britain would beg
Germany for peace
The new Prime Minister of the United
Kingdom was Winston Churchill
Churchill made it clear that Britain
would NEVER SURRENDER!
Part IV
Aerial War, Territory Take Over, Betrayal of
Alliances
Britain is an island country, and in
order for Germany to get its soldiers to
Britain, they needed to use ships
The problem was that Britain’s
navy was the best in the world
In order for Germany to defeat Britain’s
navy, they would need to use their
air force, the Luftwaffe.
In order for Germany to destroy the
UK’s navy, they first had to destroy the
RAF and control the air
Hitler ordered the Luftwaffe to
destroy the RAF – This is known as
the Battle of Britain
The battle lasted for months over
London. While the fighters fought, the
German bombers bombed London
London’s people hid in the
underground subways
The RAF put up a great fight, and Hitler
was forced to admit that the Luftwaffe
could not defeat Britain
London was in ruins, but Britain did
NOT SURRENDER!
The battle was the United
Kingdom’s finest hour!
Hitler ordered most generals in the
Luftwaffe to be hanged
The German blitzkrieg had been
motionless for months, and Hitler grew
impatient
The Nazi armies invaded Hungary,
Yugoslavia, Romania, and Bulgaria
The Germans easily won with their blitzkrieg
Mussolini and his Italian army
invaded Greece
The Greek army fought well, and the
Italians were embarrassed. They were
forced to retreat
Hitler was furious because his soldiers
now had to go to Greece and save
Mussolini
The Germans crushed the Greek army
But the fighting cost Hitler three
precious weeks….
Because Hitler had now decided to
invade the Soviet Union
It was now early September, and Hitler
knew that he had to completely destroy
the Soviet Union before winter
Stalin’s generals warned him that Hitler
was going to betray the Soviet Union
and attack
Stalin refused to believe this and
did nothing
The Soviet Union had untrained and
poorly equipped soldiers, but they
had huge amounts of them, and they
were able to defeat the Nazis
Part V
America Enters the War
On December 7, 1941, Japan
bombed the USA at Pearl Harbor
The US declared war on Japan
Germany and Italy honored their
alliance to Japan and declared war on
the United States
Roosevelt thought that Germany was
the greater threat and should be
defeated first
The USA and UK invaded Sicily
The Allies defeated the Italians in Sicily
and then invaded the Italian mainland
The Italian army was crushed, and the
Allies took control of Southern Italy
American soldiers captured Mussolini
Hitler quickly sent his best soldiers into
Italy; they found and freed Mussolini
Part VI
Hitler put Mussolini back in charge of
Italy, but the Nazis entered Italy to
fight the US and Britain
The Nazi army was able to stop the
Allies. Britain and the US waited for
more soldiers
Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill met
several times
They were known as the Big Three
Stalin demanded that Britain and the
US launch a major attack on Western
Europe at the same time that he
attacked Eastern Europe
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The US and Britain agreed, and on
June 6, 1944, they invaded France
This attack was known as D-Day – it
was the Day of Decision in Europe
D-Day was a major success, and
the Nazis were forced to retreat
Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was
gaining huge amounts of ground, but
Hitler refused to send reinforcements
The Allies continued to march up
through Italy
The Italian people had a revolution. They
captured Mussolini and hanged him, along
with many other fascist leaders.
Italy was out of World War II
Hitler knew that he could no longer win
the war, but he chose to fight until the
bitter end
Britain and the US stormed towards
Berlin from the west, and the USSR
stormed towards Berlin from the east
The Soviet Union reached Berlin first,
and Hitler had children as young as 13
fighting to defend it….
The Soviets took over Berlin with huge
losses. They began to search for Hitler
Hitler then committed suicide rather than
allowing himself to be captured by the
Soviet Army
Without Hitler ruling over the German
armed forces, Germany was finally free
to surrender to the Allied forces
Finally, on May 8, 1945, the War in
Europe was over!