World War II (Grant Shot at Ford's Theater)

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World War II
Date 7 July 1937 – 7 December 1944 (7 years and 5 months) Place Global Result United Nations victory Fall of Völkisch Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan UN military occupations of Germany, Japan, Austria and foundation of the Italian Republic in place of the Kingdom of Italy Beginning of the Nuclear Age Establishment of the Atlantic Pact. End of the European colonial empires.
Belligerents
United Nations United Nations United States Soviet Union China Canada Australia South Africa Template:Country data Liberia Liberia Philippines	Axis Germany Japan Italy   Support   Bulgaria Hungary Romania Slovakia Croatia
Commanders and leaders
Leon Trotsky William L. Dawson Lin Sen Mackenzie King	Alfred Hugenberg Hirohito Benito Mussolini

World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a global war that lasted from 1937 to 1944.

Pre-war events

Sudetenland Crisis (1937)

In March 1936, Germany annexed Austria, provoking little response from western European powers, and a condemnation from Trotsky. Encouraged, Hugenberg began pressing German claims on the Sudetenland, an area of Czechoslovakia with a predominantly ethnic German population. The United Kingdom and France attempted a policy of appeasement but were blocked by the Soviets who guaranteed their support for Czechoslovak independence. Shortly after the Soviet pledge to Czechoslovakia, Germany and Italy formed the Pact of Steel. Hugenberg accused Trotsky of being a "war-monger" and had the German state-owned press launch a bevy of newsreels and articles painting the Czechoslovak pledge as a secret plot to spread socialism throughout Europe.

The situation reached a general crisis after war had broken out in the Pacific as German troops continued to mobilize against the Czech border. On 23 August, when tripartite negotiations about a military alliance between France, the United Kingdom and Soviet Union stalled, the British and French signed a non-aggression pact with Germany. The pact played on the fears of the governments of Britain and France that the Soviets were bankrolling Socialist parties in their countries, and eliminated the prospect of a two-front war for Germany.

In response to Soviet requests for direct negotiations to avoid war, Germany made demands on all territory taken by the Russian Empire from Germany at the end of World War I, which only served as a pretext to worsen relations. Hugenberg was forced to stall plans for an attack against Soviet Poland as the German Army worked to covertly build up forces along the Soviet Border. Hugenberg even made concessions and the German foreign minister was ordered to make a feigned compromise to convince the Soviets that the situation was being de-escalated.

Course of the War

Axis Attack on the Soviet Union (1938-1939)

On 22 June 1938, Germany, supported by Italy and Romania, invaded the Soviet Union in Operation Störtebeker, with Germany accusing the Soviets of plotting against them. They were joined shortly by Finland and Hungary. The attack began with a massive air campaign against key Soviet military targets as far East as Minsk, with airborne Fallschirmjäger divisions dropping behind the Soviet lines prior to the main overland invasion. The initial targets of this surprise offensive were the Baltic region and the Carpathians with the goal of ending the 1939 campaign near the Krakow-Klaipėda line before advancing on Moscow. Hugenberg's objectives were to eliminate the Soviet Union as a military power and generate Lebensraum ("living space") by dispossessing the native population and guarantee access to the strategic resources needed to defeat Germany's remaining rivals.

Axis Attack Western Allies (1939-1940)

With the situation in Eastern Europe and Asia relatively stable, Germany, Japan, and the Italy made preparations for an attack against the western European powers, massing forces on the French border.

Hugenberg believed that the Soviet Union's refusal to end the war was based on the hope that the United States and the western Europeans would enter the war against Germany sooner or later. He, therefore, decided to try to strengthen Germany's relations with the United Kingdom, splitting the western powers, or failing that to attack and eliminate them as a factor. In November 1938, negotiations took place to determine if the United Kingdom would join the Tripartite Pact. The British showed some interest but asked for concessions from Japan, Turkey, and Italy that Germany considered unacceptable. On 18 December 1939, Hugenberg issued the directive to prepare for an invasion of France and an airborne attack on Britain.

On 10 June, Italy and Germany invaded France, declaring war on both France and the United Kingdom. After Paris fell to the Germans on 14 June and British and French forces were captured attempting to fleet at Dunkirk, France signed an armistice with Germany. France was divided into German and Italian occupation zones, and an unoccupied puppet state. France kept its fleet, which the United Kingdom attacked on 3 July in an attempt to prevent its seizure by Germany.

With the loss of the bulk of their army, Churchill called on the British people to prepare to resist. The Battle of Britain began in early July with Luftwaffe attacks on shipping and harbors. The United Kingdom initially rejected Hugenberg's peace offer, however after the German air superiority campaign in August defeated RAF Fighter Command, Churchill was ousted in a bloodless coup and Britain surrendered. A formal peace treaty between the Axis and the British government ceded British colonial holdings in East Asia to Japan, returned colonies ceded after World War I to Germany, and capped the size of British naval and air forces.

The loss of the western allies prompted the Soviet Union to reconsider its grand strategy. In July, the US and Soviet Union jointly issued the Atlantic Charter, which outlined Soviet and American goals for the postwar world. In late August the Soviets invaded neutral Iran to secure the Persian Corridor, Iran's oil fields, and preempt any Axis advances through Iran toward the Baku oil fields.

With Britain and France defeated, Hugenberg refocused his efforts against the Soviets, and funded Southron nationalist groups in the United States to delay their entry into the war.

Axis advance stalls (1940-1941)

Mackenzie King and other delegates from the commonwealth countries meet in Vancouver and declare their independence from the British Empire, citing its capitulation to the Völks and the Royal Navy's perceived refusal to guard fellow citizens of the Empire in Asia against Japan. The following week, the former commonwealth nations, the United States, and the Soviet Union sign the Mutual Friendship treaty of the United Nations.

In February 1941 American, Canadian and South African convoys arrived in Liberia, at the time the closest possible staging area for convoys bound for Casablanca. Naval superiority had been established in the Atlantic and after resupplying in Liberia troops began shipping out to take the Pillars of Hercules.

By the close of 1941 the US, Canadians, and South Africans captured Gibraltar and began the drive to Cairo.

United Nations gain momentum (1941-1942)

In late 1941 the US Army Air Corps began launching trans-Atlantic bombing missions from the American mainland, later joined by the Canadians. Formations of Douglass-Republic B-19 Guardians carried out raids against Axis positions in France, Italy, and even Germany itself with the goal of destroying Axis war production and demoralizing the populace. These Redtail Raids remain, the largest trans-Atlantic bombing raids in history, and were only possible after Operation Torch led to the capture of air bases in Algeria and Morocco for the United Nations.

United Nations close in (1943)

On 6 April 1943, the United Nations invaded Southern France from Italy.With the defeat of the German Army units in Southern France, Paris was liberated on 25 June by the local resistance and the United Nations continued to push back German forces in western Europe during the latter part of the year. After that, the Western United Nations slowly pushed into Germany, crossing the Rur river in a large offensive in November.

Axis collapse, United Nations victory (1944)

The call for unconditional surrender was rejected by the remaining Axis governments, which believed they could negotiate more favorable terms of surrender. In November, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Kyoto. Two weeks later on December 7th, the Soviets dropped their own atomic bomb on Dresden. These two events ultimately brought the war to a close. On December 13th, 1944, Germany surrendered formally ending the war.