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The course of the War
World War II on the
Battlefields & At Home
World War I v. World War II
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Global conflict
• Two theatres:
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Europe and North Africa
Asia/Pacific
• War at sea:
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Atlantic
Pacific
Fought in extended battles & campaigns
• Blitzkrieg?
or
• War in slow motion as armies raised,
mobilized, weapons, ships, planes produced?
The course of the war
Extended campaigns:
 Britain on the defensive
• Retreat from continent
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1941
• Attack on Soviet Union
• US enters
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North Africa, 1942
Italian campaign, 1943-45
Invasion of the continent & endgame,
1944-45
1939-1940
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Invasion of Poland http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/axis.htm
Entry of Britain and France
• Phoney war:
• German invasion of Denmark and Norway
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May, 1940
• Invasion of Netherlands, Belgium, France
• France defeated within 6 weeks
• Britain driven from continent
1940-1942
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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
Turning points:
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1942 – El Alemain: allied victory over
Rommel in North Africa
http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/axis.htm
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1942-43 – Defence of Stalingrad
1943 – Invasion of Italy
• Mussolini toppled
• Germans invade and occupy
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1944
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June 6: D-day – Invasion of Normandy
Liberation of France
Liberation of Belgium
Partial liberation of the Netherlands
War aims
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Germany:
•Initially Continental
domination, especially
hinterland to its east
•Restructuring of European
society –
 Aryan domination
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Allies:
•Unconditional surrender
Arguments over strategy
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Stalin’s demand for a second front
• North African campaign as a diversion
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Churchill: invade through the Balkans
US: invasion through France – when
ready
Dieppe, 1942
• An effort to placate Stalin
• ‘test landing’
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Italian campaign
Factors determining the outcome
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The difficulty of invading Britain
Germany’s 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
Civilians and the war
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Total mobilization on home fronts
• rationing
• Scramble for raw materials
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Civilians as victims of bombing
• UK
• Germany…
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Large numbers displaced
• Populations shifted as acts of policy (e.g.
Poland)
• More displaced by war
Occupied Europe
Different policies for different countries:
 Poland: dismembered, parts under
‘general government’
 Denmark: Danish gov’t allowed to
continue
 France:
• north and west occupied
• “puppet regime at Vichy, under Marshall Petain
Netherlands
Occupied territories exploited for resources
& labour
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Occupied Europe-II
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Occupation & choices it presented
• Collaboration
• Resistance
• Or combination of both?
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Resistance movements:
• In some places, from the beginning
• Growth after 1942, when forced labour
drafts begin
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Civilians as victims of genocide
•The Final Solution
Wannsee Conference 1942
 Ghettos & transit camps
 Role of Jewish Councils
 Auschwitz
 Terezin or Teresenstadt
 Efforts to resist or stop the process
Planning the peace - I
Summit negotiations on war aims, postwar
disposition of territory
 Casablanca 1943 (Roosevelt + Churchill)
• Agreement on unconditional surrender
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Teheran 1943
• Initial agreement on eastern Europe
• Plans for occupation of Germany
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Yalta 1945
• Plans for United Nations
• Further agreement on territory
• Concessions to Russia to secure entry into war against
Japan
Planning the peace – II
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Bretton Woods conference –1943
• Plans for monetary stability
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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
Other facets
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Lidice
liberation of Paris
Market Garden