The course of the War

1
The course of the War

• World War II on the Battlefields At Home

2
World War I v. World War II

• Global conflict
• Two theatres
• Europe and North Africa
• Asia/Pacific
• War at sea
• Atlantic
• Pacific
• Fought in extended battles campaigns
• Blitzkrieg?
• or
• War in slow motion as armies raised, mobilized,
  weapons, ships, planes produced?

3
The course of the war

• Extended campaigns
• Britain on the defensive
• Retreat from continent
• 1941
• Attack on Soviet Union
• US enters
• North Africa, 1942
• Italian campaign, 1943-45
• Invasion of the continent endgame, 1944-45

4
1939-1940

• Invasion of Poland http//users.erols.com/mwhite
  28/axis.htm
• Entry of Britain and France
• Phoney war
• German invasion of Denmark and Norway
• May, 1940
• Invasion of Netherlands, Belgium, France
• France defeated within 6 weeks
• Britain driven from continent

5
1940-1942

• Battle of Britain Sept. 1940-41
• Battle for North Africa
• Germany solidifies hold on S.E. Europe
• June 21,1941, Operation Barbarossa Germany
  attacks USSR, bogs down
  
• December,1941
• Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour brings US into
  War http//users.erols.com/mwhite28/axis.htm

6
Turning points

• 1942 El Alemain allied victory over Rommel in
  North Africa http//users.erols.com/mwhite28/axis.
  htm
• 1942-43 Defence of Stalingrad
• 1943 Invasion of Italy
• Mussolini toppled
• Germans invade and occupy
• 1944
• June 6 D-day Invasion of Normandy
• Liberation of France
• Liberation of Belgium
• Partial liberation of the Netherlands

7
War aims

• Germany
• Initially Continental domination, especially
  hinterland to its east
• Restructuring of European society
• Aryan domination
• Allies
• Unconditional surrender

8
Arguments over strategy

• Stalins demand for a second front
• North African campaign as a diversion
• Churchill invade through the Balkans
• US invasion through France when ready
• Dieppe, 1942
• An effort to placate Stalin
• test landing
• Italian campaign

9
Factors determining the outcome

• The difficulty of invading Britain
• Germanys attack on the Soviet Union
• US entry
• Allies productive capacity
• Ability of allies to maintain supply lines
• Code breaking
• Enigma capture of German encryption machine

10
Civilians and the war

• Total mobilization on home fronts
• rationing
• Scramble for raw materials
• Civilians as victims of bombing
• UK
• Germany
• Large numbers displaced
• Populations shifted as acts of policy (e.g.
  Poland)
• More displaced by war

11
Occupied Europe

• Different policies for different countries
• Poland dismembered, parts under general
  government
• Denmark Danish govt allowed to continue
• France
• north and west occupied
• puppet regime at Vichy, under Marshall Petain
• Netherlands
• Occupied territories exploited for resources
  labour

12
Occupied Europe-II

• Occupation choices it presented
• Collaboration
• Resistance
• Or combination of both?
• Resistance movements
• In some places, from the beginning
• Growth after 1942, when forced labour drafts
  begin
• Civilians as victims of genocide

13
The Final Solution

• Wannsee Conference 1942
• Ghettos transit camps
• Role of Jewish Councils
• Auschwitz
• Terezin or Teresenstadt
• Efforts to resist or stop the process

14
Planning the peace - I

• Summit negotiations on war aims, postwar
  disposition of territory
• Casablanca 1943 (Roosevelt Churchill)
• Agreement on unconditional surrender
• Teheran 1943
• Initial agreement on eastern Europe
• Plans for occupation of Germany
• Yalta 1945
• Plans for United Nations
• Further agreement on territory
• Concessions to Russia to secure entry into war
  against Japan

15
Planning the peace II

• Bretton Woods conference 1943
• Plans for monetary stability
• Fixed system of exchange rates
• World Bank and International Monetary Fund to
  stabilize
• Agreements on trade (GATT)
• Domestic side
• UK plans for welfare state (Beveridge Report)
• Discussions in resistance movements, among
  governments in exile

16
Other facets

• Lidice
• liberation of Paris
• Market Garden