World War II

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World War II

• The War In Europe

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Germanys Early Success

• Hitler signed a non-aggression pact with Russia
• Hitler invaded Poland on September 1, 1939

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Germanys Early Success

• Hitler stunned Europe with the Speed of
  Blitzkrieg
• Armored columns of Panzer tank divisions
• Supported by airplanes
• Tanks and planes broke through enemy divisions
  and support infantry then held the positions

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Germanys Early Success

• After a phony war Hitler resumed his attack in
  1940
• Invaded Denmark and Norway
• One month later attacked Netherlands, Belgium,
  and France
• Forced British 338,000 troops to evacuate on the
  beach at Dunkirk

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Germanys Early Success

• France Surrendered in June 1940
• German troops occupied 3/5 of France
• The rest of France was controlled by an
  authoritarian regime known as Vichy France
• Vichy France lead by French WWI hero Marshal
  Henri Petain
• Germany controlled all of Central and Western
  Europe, but Britain still stood

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The Battle of Britain

• Germany began its invasion of Britain in August
  1940
• Germany first needed control of the air
• Hitler launched a major offensive
• Targeted air bases
• Harbors
• Communication centers
• War industries

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The Battle of Britain

• After inflicting critical losses on the British,
  Hitler changed strategies to bomb civilian
  targets
• The change allowed the British to rebuild their
  air force and turn the tide of the battle
• By the end of September 1940, Germany had lost
  the Battle of Britain

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Germany in the East

• Hitler briefly considered a Mediterranean
  strategy
• Hitler turned his attention to Russia
• Invaded in 1941
• Swept through the Ukraine, Leningrad and within
  25 miles of Moscow
• An early Russian winter and fierce resistance
  halted the attack
• Russia launched a counter attack in December

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A New World Order

• By 1942 The Nazi Empire stretched across
  continental Europe from the English Channel to
  Moscow

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A New World Order

• Race played an important role in how conquered
  people were treated
• Norway, Denmark, and the Netherlands received
  more lenient treatment
• Inferior Latin people such as the French were
  given military administration
• Eastern European Slavs were treated the worst

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A New World Order

• Heinrich Himmler was put in charge of the German
  resettlement plans
• One million Poles relocated to south Poland
• Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Germans were
  brought in to colonize German provinces of Poland
• Labor shortages led to foreign worker policy

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A New World Order

• Hitlers plans were to re-colonize all of eastern
  Europe (Lebensraum)
• Poles, Ukrainians, and Russians would be removed
  from their lands and become slave labor while
  German peasants settled int eh abandoned lands
• Himmler estimated that 30 million Slave might
  have to be killed to carry out the plan
• All European Jews would be killed

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The Holocaust

• The deliberate attempt to exterminate the Jewish
  people of Europe

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The Holocaust

• Background
• 1935 Nuremburg Laws
• 1938 Kristallnacht
• At the start of WWII Jews were collected and put
  in concentration camps
• Forced to live in ghettos
• Some were labor camps others were death camps

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The Holocaust

• The Final Solution
• SS death squads rounded up Jews, executed them,
  buried them in mass graves
• Specially built death camps were used
• The victims goods were used for economic gains
• The German killed between 5 and 6 million Jews

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The Holocaust

• The Germans were responsible for the deliberate
  death by shooting, starvation, or overwork of at
  least another 9 to 10 million people

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The Turning Point in the War

• The United States entry into the war created a
  Grand Alliance (the Allies)
• The United States sent large amounts of military
  aid to Great Britain and the Soviet Union
• Stressed military cooperation over political
  differences
• Agreed to fight until unconditional surrender was
  achieved

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The Turning Point in the War

• In 1942 Hitler was still optimistic about the
  outcome of the war
• Germany controlled western and central Europe
• The Afrika Korps, under Rommel, were making gains
  in North Africa
• Large areas of Russia had been captured

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The Turning Point in the War

• The turning point came in the fall of 1942
• Rommels tanks were turned back by British forces
  in Africa
• Hitler was obsessed with capturing Stalingrad
• Between November 1942 and February 1943 Hitler
  lost 300,000 at Stalingrad
• By February 1943, German forces were pushed back
  to their positions of early that year

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End of War in Europe

• By 1943 the tide of the war had turned against
  Germany
• Allied forces used positions in Africa to attack
  Italy
• Allied forces slowly moved up the Italian
  peninsula towards Rome
• Rome fell on June 4, 1944

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End of War in Europe

• Since the fall of 1943 the Allies had been
  planning a cross-channel invasions of France from
  Great Britain
• Under the U.S. General Eisenhower, the Allies
  launched the D-day invasion on June 6, 1944
• Within three months the Allies had landed 2
  million men in France

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End of War in Europe

• Allies liberated Paris by August
• Advanced into Germany by March of 1945

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End of War in Europe

• On the Eastern front, Russia had liberated
  Ukraine and Leningrad by 1944
• Soviet troops occupied Warsaw by January 1945
• As Allied forces closed in on Berlin from West
  and East, the decision was made to allow the
  Soviets to capture Berlin

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End of War in Europe

• From his bunker in Berlin, Hitler committed
  suicide on April 30, 1945
• On May 7, 1945 German commanders surrendered