Download The War for Europe and North Africa

The War for Europe and
North Africa
Chapter 17
Section 2
Pages 569-577
The Battle of the Atlantic
1941-1943
• U-boats off the coast of the
eastern U.S. sink 87 ships
• 7 months sank 681 Allied ships
• Prevent war materials and food
from reaching the British and
Soviets
• Starve Britain into submission
The Battle of the Atlantic
1941-1943
• Convoys escorted by destroyers
• Sonar onboard ships
• Airplanes equipped with radar
• Allies destroy U-boats faster than
Germany can build them
• The U.S. producing 140 Liberty
ships per month
The Battle of Stalingrad
Summer 1942 – January 1943
• To capture the southern oil fields of the
Caucasus Mountains
• To destroy a major industrial city
• Stalin demands the defense of his
namesake city at all costs
• Brutal hand-to-hand combat
• Germans control 90% of city
The Battle of Stalingrad
Summer 1942 – January 1943
• Soviets counterattack and surround
German army
• Hitler orders them to stand and fight
• Soviets suffer 1,100,000 dead
• Germans suffer an irreversible defeat
The North African Front
November 1942-May 1943
• During Stalingrad, Stalin demands the
Allies open a “second front” in Europe
• This will relieve pressure on Soviets
by diverting German troops to France
• FDR and Churchill don’t feel ready
• Launch Operation Torch instead
under the command of Dwight D.
Eisenhower
The North African Front
November 1942-May 1943
• 107,000 Allied troops land at
Casablanca, Oran, and Algiers
• Defeat General Erwin Rommel, the
Desert Fox, and his Afrika Corps
• Review map on page 572
Casablanca Conference
• FDR and Churchill meet to discuss the
unconditional surrender of the Axis
powers
• Meaning that enemy nations would have
to agree to whatever terms of peace the
Allies dictated
• Next, they discussed where to invade next
– FDR wanted France
– Churchill wanted Italy
The Italian Campaign
Spring 1944
• N. Africa is launching point to invade Sicily,
Summer of 1943
• Embarrassed the Italian government and King
strip Mussolini of his power and arrest him
– Rescued by German special forces
– Killed trying to escape to Austria in April 1945
• 40 miles south of Rome the Germans take a
stand
• “Bloody Anzio” lasts 4 months and costs 25,000
Allied and 30,000 Germans killed or wounded
D-Day
June 6, 1944
• Eisenhower named Supreme Allied
Commander
• Operation Overlord begins
• 3 million American, British, and Canadian
troops gather
• Secrecy and deception
– Phantom army placed in Dover under Patton’s
command
– Fake port of Calais invasion
D-Day
June 6, 1944
• Largest air-land-sea operation in history
– 5,000 ships
• 150,000 soldiers
• 50,000 vehicles
– 11,000 planes
• 13,000 bombs
• 23,000 airborne (parachute & glider) troops
• 50 miles of Normandy, France
– Map on page 575
D-Day
June 6, 1944
• Fortress Europe & the Atlantic Wall
– 24,000 miles of defensive positions
– Field Marshal Erwin Rommel
– Estimated 4-9,000 causalities
• Allied causalities
– 6,000 wounded
– 4,000+ dead
D-Day
June 6, 1944
• After 7 days
– 80 miles of beachhead
– 1 million troops
– 567,000 tons of supplies
– 170,000 vehicles
• August 25, Patton and the 3rd Army
liberates Paris
D-Day
June 6, 1944
• By September 1944, France, Belgium
and Luxembourg are free
• FDR is elected to an unprecedented
4th term
The Battle of the Bulge
• October 1944, Americans capture the
German town of Aachen
• Hitler orders the capture of Antwerp
• December 16, 8 German divisions
break through an 80 mile front (see
transparency)
• 200,000 Germans and 600 tanks
• Americans 80,000 men, 400 tanks
The Battle of the Bulge
• 60 mile bulge in Allied line
• 120 Americans captured near
Malmedy by SS troopers and
executed in open field
• 101st Airborne hold Bastogne
• Clouds and fog clear and US air
forces turn the tide
• Germans lose men and material that
they can no longer replace
Liberation of the Death Camps
• July 1944, Soviets pushing through Poland
find Majdanek
• 1,000 starving prisoners
• World’s largest crematorium
• 800,000 shoes
• “A gigantic murder plant”
Germany Surrenders
• The Red Army enters Berlin
• Deserters are shot on the spot
• April 29, Hitler marries Eva Braun
• Take their lives
• April 12, 1945, FDR dies from a stroke
• May 8, 1945 is V-E Day – Victory in Europe Day
• Harry S. Truman is sworn in as president