We explain what the stages of World War II, invasions and battles in chronological order were.
What was World War II?
World War II was a military conflict that began in September 1939, when Adolf Hitler (German Chancellor) decided the invasion of Poland. Then, the powers of the axis (Germany, Italy and Japan) faced with the allies (United Kingdom, France, the Soviet Union, the United States and China).
In the six years that the war lasted, various stages followed, characterized by changes in the positions of force and by modifications in the alliances formed.
The war concluded after the unconditional surrender of Germany (May 1945) and Japan (September 1945).
Synthesis: stages of World War II
- The European War. Germany began by invade Poland and continued with its expansion to various regions of Europe and Africa. He managed to occupy France and also attacked Great Britain but the British successfully rejected the attack.
- World War. Some powers chose not to intervene in the conflict, until Germany invaded the Soviet Union and Japan attacked a naval base in the United States. As a consequence, the USSR and USA. They allied with great Brittany And this alliance changed the course of war.
- The victory of the allies. Soviet and British resistance, and US industrial and military machinery managed to defeat the axis powers (Germany, Italy and Japan).
See also: Background of World War II
First stage: The European War (1939-1941)
On September 1, 1939, Hitler began his attack on Poland and demonstrated the effectiveness of German war machinery. Next, the Nazi regime directed its attention to the north and Denmark and Norway invaded.
The most important moment came in May 1940 when the Wehrmacht (German armed forces) He easily defeated France. The United Kingdom remained the only power that resisted the Nazi offensive. The Luftwaffe (German Air Force) failed in his aerial battle against England, so Hitler concentrated on two new fronts: North Africa and the Balkans.
Poland's German invasion
The German invasion of Poland in September 1939 was practically a military ride, because the German army was much superior to the Polish. The Wehrmacht developed a new tactic, the “lightning war” (Blitzkrieg), which was based on the use of aviation and combat cars to quickly weaken the enemy.
Meanwhile, The Red Army of the Soviet Union invaded the Baltic countries and the eastern part of Poland without resistance. On September 28, 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed a pact that recognized their respective areas of influence. Shortly after, the Soviet Union invaded Finland and, despite the resistance of the Finnish army, managed to annex various border territories.
The next German aggression was against Denmark and Norway. The conquest was fast and, in June 1940, both countries were fully under German control.
The German conquest of France and the entrance of Italy into the war
After several months of inactivity, Germany attacked France in May 1940. The divisions of combat cars, supported by aviation, launched into the conquest of the Netherlands and Belgium, which surrendered within a few days. Then, the French army collapsed. On June 22 the armistice was signed in Compiègne, in the same car where Germany had signed its defeat in 1918.
France was divided into two. The Northwest Zone was under German military occupation. To the southeast a collaborative government was established chaired by General Philippe Pétain and settled in the city of Vichy. Vichy's France broke relations with the United Kingdom, disarmed her army and initiated a pro-nazi policy.
However, not all French accepted defeat. General Charles de Gaulle organized from London the movement of free France that aligned against Germany.
On the other hand, despite lacking a conveniently prepared army, Benito Mussolini, leader of Hitler's fascist and ally Italy, entered the war on June 10, 1940after observing that Germany was defeating France.
The battle of England
Once France was defeated, only the United Kingdom resisted the German offensive. British naval superiority motivated the German attack from the air. The Luftwaffe In July 1940 began a systematic bombardment of industrial facilities and cities in the south and center of England.
A new British government, chaired by Winston Churchill, decided to resist by all media. British aviation (Royal Air Force) managed to dominate the air and succeed in the Air War. The British resistance forced Hitler to return his eyes to other fronts, in which Mussolini had intervened: North Africa and the Balkans.
War in North Africa and Balkans
In September 1940, Italian troops invaded Egypt (which was under British control) from the Italian colony of Libya, But soon the British recovered control. In February 1941, Germany sent an expeditionary army to North Africa, the Afrika Korps, and a new war front was opened there.
The Balkans front opened with another failed attempt to invasion of the Italian army, this time about Greece In October 1940. The Greeks soon were assisted by a British expeditionary army and expelled the Italians.
Hitler He forced Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and Bulgaria to join the tripartite pact (which had signed Germany, Italy and Japan in September 1940). In April 1941, The Germans launched a successful offensive against Yugoslavia and Greece.
Hitler dominated much of Europeand I longed to get the “vital space” that he claimed for the German people in his book “My struggle.” That space was in the east, in the huge territories of the Soviet Union.
Second stage: World War (1941-1943)
In 1941, Hitler dominated most of the European continent. Only England kept facing him. Japan continued to overcome in his war against China. However, both axis powers launched two attacks that turned the conflict into a World War.
Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, while Japan attacked the American Naval Base of Pearl Harbor in December 1941. The Soviet Union and the United States joined the United Kingdom on the side of the allies. This changed the course of war.
The German Invasion of the Soviet Union
In 1939, the Soviet Union and Germany had signed the Pact of German-Soviet aggression. However, on June 22, 1941, without prior declaration of war, The German army began the invasion of the Soviet Union. The so -called “Operation Barbarroja” was, in its first moments, a resounding success. The Red Army, decimated by Losif Stalin purges in the thirties, was unable to resist the German attack and undertook the withdrawal.
By the north, the German troops arrived to Leningrad (the current St. Petersburg). Through the center, they reached the doors of Moscow. However, neither cities fell. The German advance was deeper in the south and Ukraine was quickly conquered.
In 1942, the German army followed its operations with the aim of reaching the Caucasus and accessing its oil deposits. He arrived at Stalingrad (current Volgograd) in August. After very hard fighting, the German army was surrounded. Stalingrad's battle marked a decisive change in war. At the end of January 1943 The Germans surrendered in Stalingrad and the Soviet troops began a counterattack that leveled them little by little towards the heart of Germany.
The Pacific War
In Oriental Asia and the Pacific, the Japanese imperial expansion initiated in China was also directed against European possessions in Asia and against the Philippine Islands that were in the hands of the United States.
The president of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, had changed his initial isolationist posture for a growing involvement in war. The Loan and Lease Law, approved by the US Congress in March 1941, allowed us to provide help in armaments and other goods to the allied powers.
The Japanese attack on the American base of Pearl Harbor In Hawaii on December 7, 1941 determined the entrance of the United States into the war.
Initially, Japanese expansion by Asia and the Pacific had been successful. However, The deployment of American industrial and warlike machinery inclined the balance of the conflict in favor of the alliesas was demonstrated from the American triumph in the battle of Midway in June 1942.
The allied victory in North Africa
The decisive moment of war in North Africa arrived In October and November 1942when British general Bernard Montgomery defeated the troops of the German general Erwin Rommel in the Alamein (northern Egypt). From now on, Afrika Korps German suffered defeat after defeat.
A few days after the battle of El Alamein, American and British troops landed in Morocco and Algeria (November 8, 1942). A few months later, when German troops surrendered in Tunisia on May 12, 1943the axis was definitely expelled from North Africa.
Third stage: The victory of the allies (1943-1945)
The entrance to the United States War and the Soviet Union definitely changed the course of the conflict. Soviet resistance and American industrial and military machinery inclined the balance in favor of the allies.
After the stalingrad battles on the eastern front, Midway in the Pacific and the Alamein in North Africa, The war was directed towards the defeat of the axis powers.
The allied invasion of Italy and the fall of Mussolini
The expulsion of the axis of North Africa raised the allies the possibility of opening a new front in Europe, in line with the claim that Stalin had been making to lighten the pressure suffered by the Red Army in the Eastern Front.
In July 1943, English and American troops landed in Sicily. The proximity of the allied threat and the continuous failures of the Italian army caused the dismissal and arrest of Mussolini in Italy.
In early September, The allies landed in southern Italy and the Italian government signed the armistice on September 8. The German reaction was immediate: Troops of the Third Reich occupied the north and center of Italy, established a line of defense north of Naples, released Mussolini and allowed the establishment, in the occupied area, of the Italian Social Republic, governed by Mussolini under strict German control.
From then on, Allied troops began a slow conquest of the country from the southwhile in the north and center the German and fascist troops had to face a growing internal resistance starring communist partisans.
After episodes such as the Battle of Monteassino, the allied armies entered Rome on June 4, 1944. However, the last line of defense in northern Italy, the “Gothic line”, resisted until April 1945.
On April 27, 1945, Mussolini He was captured by a group of partisans when he tried to flee and was shot the next day.
The Soviet advance in the Eastern Front
After the battle of Stalingrad, the Battle of Kursk released between July and August 1943 defined the strategic initiative to the Soviet troops.
During 1944, the Red Army reaped continuous successes: It reached the old borders of the Soviet Union, occupied the territory of the former allies of the axis (Finland, Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary) and He expelled the powers of the Balkans axis by the Soviet military intervention or by the action of the communist guerrillas.
In Greece, the German withdrawal in August 1944 opened a period of civil war between communist guerrillas and monarchical troops supported by British military intervention. This situation exemplified the confrontation within the side of the allies that would arrive after the defeat of the axis.
Meanwhile, Soviet troops prepared to launch the definitive attack against Germany.
The landing of Normandy and the Western Front
Throughout 1943 Representatives of the “Great Alliance” (United States, the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom) met in various conferences in which they defined the strategy to follow. The result of these conversations was the allied landing in the French region of Normandy, long demanded by the Soviet Union to lighten German pressure on the eastern front.
On June 6, 1944 (known as the “Day D”), American, British and Canadian troops landed on the Normandy beaches and overcome the strong German resistance. Quickly the allied troops, under the direction of the American general dwight eisenhower, They went to Pariswhich was released on August 25. Ten days before, British, American and French troops had landed in Marseille, in southern France. After reconquering France, allied troops They headed towards Germany.
The Battle of Germany
In February 1945, RooseveltStalin and Churchill gathered in Yaltawhere they decided the details of the final attack on Germany and its subsequent cast in occupation areas.
The Anglo -American and Soviet joint attackdirected on Germany from the east, the south and the west, Easily defeated German resistance. On April 25, Soviet troops (from the east) and Americans (from the west) were found in the city of Torgau, together with the Elba River.
On April 30, with the Soviet troops in the Berlin neighborhoods, Hitler committed suicide In your bunker. May 7 and 8 the Germans signed unconditional surrender.
The Pacific Front and the end of World War II
While fighting on European fronts, The United States continued advancing in the Pacific Front. The American conquest of the Philippines in February 1945 and the British reconquest of Burma in May marked key moments of that advance. In addition, on February 19, 1945, US troops ranked for the first time Japanese territory, the small island of Iwo Jima.
Meanwhile, there were continuous air attacks on the cities and industrial centers of Japan. After the German defeat in May 1945, the United States decided to use a weapon that had been secretly developing.
On August 6, 1945, Inola Gay's plane launched an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The result were 100,000 dead and thousands of injured.
Two days later, The Soviet Union declared war on Japan and occupied Manchuria and part of Korea. The next dayThe United States launched a second atomic bombthis time about the city of Nagasaki.
The nuclear horror precipitated the surrender of Japan. On September 2, 1945, The representatives of the Japanese emperorHirohito, signed on the Missouri warship, anchored in the waters of Tokyo Baythe unconditional surrender ended World War II.
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References
- Beevor, A. (2012). World War II. Past and present.
- Hughes, Ta & Royde-Smith, JG (2022). World War II. Britannica Encyclopedia. https://www.britannica.com/
- Stone, N. (2013). Brief history of World War II. Ariel.
