World War II lasted from 1939 to 1945. The vast majority of the world's countries - including all the great powers - have formed two opposing military alliances.
The Second World War was the reason for the desire of the world powers to revise the spheres of influence and redistribute the markets for raw materials and sales of products (1939-1945). Germany and Italy sought revenge, the USSR wanted to establish itself in Eastern Europe, in the Black Sea Straits, in Western and South Asia, to increase influence on Far East, England, France and the United States tried to maintain their positions in the world.

Another reason for the Second World War was the attempt of bourgeois-democratic states to oppose each other totalitarian regimes - fascists and communists.
World War II was chronologically divided into three major phases:

1. From September 1, 1939 to June 1942, the period in which Germany dominated.
2. From June 1942 to January 1944. During this period, the anti-Hitler coalition took over the advantage.
3. From January 1944 to September 2, 1945 - the period when the troops of the aggressor countries were defeated and the ruling regimes in these countries fell.

World War II began on September 1, 1939 with the German attack on Poland. On September 8-14, in the battles near the Bruz River, the Polish troops were defeated. Warsaw fell on 28 September. In September, Soviet troops also invaded Poland. Poland became the first victim of the World War. The Germans destroyed the Jewish and Polish intelligentsia, introduced labor service.

"Strange War"
In response to the aggression of Germany, England and France on September 3 declared war on her. But active hostilities did not follow. Therefore, the beginning of the war on the Western Front is called the “Strange War”.
On September 17, 1939, Soviet troops captured Western Ukraine and Western Belarus - lands lost under the Riga Treaty of 1921 as a result of an unsuccessful Polish-Soviet war. The Soviet-German treaty “On Friendship and Borders” concluded on September 28, 1939, confirmed the fact of the capture and partition of Poland. The treaty defined the Soviet-German borders, the border was set aside a little to the west. Lithuania was included in the sphere of interests of the USSR.
In November 1939, Stalin offered Finland to lease the port of Petsamo and the Hanko peninsula for the construction of a military base, as well as to push back the border on the Karelian Isthmus in exchange for more territory in Soviet Karelia. Finland rejected this proposal. On November 30, 1939, the Soviet Union declared war on Finland. This war went down in history under the name "Winter War". Stalin organized a puppet Finnish "workers' government" in advance. But the Soviet troops met the fierce resistance of the Finns on the "Mannerheim Line" and only in March 1940 overcame it. Finland was forced to accept the conditions of the USSR. On March 12, 1940, a peace treaty was signed in Moscow. The Karelian-Finnish SSR was created.
During September-October 1939, the Soviet Union sent troops into the Baltic countries, forcing Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to conclude agreements. On June 21, 1940, Soviet power was established in all three republics. Two weeks later, these republics became part of the USSR. In June 1940, the USSR took Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from Romania.
In Bessarabia, the Moldavian SSR was created, which also became part of the USSR. And Northern Bukovina became part of Ukrainian SSR. These aggressive actions of the USSR were condemned by England and France. On December 14, 1939, the Soviet Union was expelled from the League of Nations.

Military operations in the West, Africa and the Balkans
For successful operations in the North Atlantic, Germany needed bases. Therefore, she attacked Denmark and Norway, although they declared themselves neutral. On April 9, 1940, Denmark surrendered, and on June 10, Norway. In Norway, the fascist V. Quisling seized power. The king of Norway turned to England for help. In May 1940, the main forces of the German army (Wehrmacht) concentrated on the Western Front. On May 10, the Germans suddenly occupied Holland and Belgium and pressed the Anglo-French-Belgian troops to the sea in the Dunkirk area. The Germans occupied Calais. But on the orders of Hitler, the offensive was suspended, and the enemy was given the opportunity to get out of the encirclement. This event was called the "Miracle of Dunkirk". With this gesture, Hitler wanted to propitiate England, conclude an agreement with her and withdraw her from the war for a while.

On May 26, Germany launched an offensive against France, achieved victory near the Aime River and, breaking through the Maginot Line, on June 14 the Germans entered Paris. On June 22, 1940, in the Forest of Compiègne, at the very spot where Germany surrendered 22 years ago, Marshal Foch, in the same staff car, signed the act of surrender of France. France was divided into 2 parts: the northern part, which was under German occupation, and the southern part, centered in the city of Vichy.
This part of France was dependent on Germany, a puppet “Vichy government” was organized here, headed by Marshal Pétain. The Vichy government had a small army. The fleet was confiscated. The French constitution was also abolished, and Pétain was given unlimited powers. The Vichy collaborationist regime lasted until August 1944.
The anti-fascist forces of France grouped around the Free French organization, created by Charles de Gaulle in England.
In the summer of 1940, an ardent opponent of Nazi Germany, Winston Churchill, was elected Prime Minister of England. Since the German navy was inferior to the English fleet, Hitler abandoned the idea of ​​​​landing troops in England, and was content with only air bombardments. England actively defended itself and won the "air war". This was the first victory in the war with Germany.
On June 10, 1940, Italy also joined the war against England and France. The Italian army from Ethiopia captured Kenya, strongholds in Sudan, and part of British Somalia. And in October, Italy attacked Libya and Egypt in order to seize the Suez Canal. But, having seized the initiative, the British troops forced the Italian army in Ethiopia to surrender. In December 1940, the Italians were defeated in Egypt, and in 1941 - in Libya. The help sent by Hitler was not effective. In general, during the winter of 1940-1941, British troops, with the help of the local population, drove the Italians out of British and Italian Somalia, from Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea.
On September 22, 1940, Germany, Italy and Japan concluded a pact in Berlin (“Pact of Steel”). A little later, Germany's allies - Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia and Slovakia - joined him. In essence, it was an agreement on the redistribution of the world. Germany invited the USSR to join this pact and participate in the occupation of British India and other southern lands. But Stalin was interested in the Balkans and the Black Sea straits. And this was contrary to Hitler's plans.
In October 1940, Italy attacked Greece. German troops helped Italy. In April 1941, Yugoslavia and Greece capitulated.
Thus, the most severe blow to the positions of the British was dealt in the Balkans. The British Corps was returned to Egypt. In May 1941 the Germans took the island of Crete and the British lost control of the Aegean. Yugoslavia ceased to exist as a state. An independent Croatia emerged. The remaining Yugoslav lands were divided among themselves by Germany, Italy, Bulgaria and Hungary. Under pressure from Hitler, Romania gave Transylvania to Hungary.

German attack on the USSR
Back in June 1940, Hitler instructed the leadership of the Wehrmacht to prepare for an attack on the USSR. Was prepared and approved on December 18, 1940, a plan for a "blitzkrieg" under the code name "Barbarossa". A native of Baku, intelligence officer Richard Sorge in May 1941 announced the impending German attack on the USSR, but Stalin did not believe it. On June 22, 1941, Germany attacked the Soviet Union without declaring war. The Germans intended to reach the Arkhangelsk-Astrakhan line before the onset of winter. During the first week of the war, the Germans took Smolensk, approached Kyiv and Leningrad. In September, Kyiv was taken, and Leningrad was under blockade.
In November 1941, the Germans launched an offensive against Moscow. On December 5-6, 1941, they were defeated in the battle near Moscow. In this battle and in the winter operations of 1942, the myth of the “invincibility” of the German army collapsed, and the plan for a “blitzkrieg” was frustrated. The victory of the Soviet troops inspired the resistance movement in the countries occupied by the Germans, strengthened the anti-Hitler coalition.
Creation of the anti-Hitler coalition

The territory of Eurasia to the east of the 70th meridian Japan considered the sphere of its influence. After the capitulation of France, Japan appropriated its colonies - Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and stationed its troops there. Sensing the danger to their possessions in the Philippines, the United States demanded that Japan withdraw its troops and established a ban on trade with Japan.
On December 7, 1941, the Japanese squadron launched an unexpected attack on the US naval base in the Hawaiian Islands - Pearl Harbor. On the same day, Japanese troops invaded Thailand and the British colonies of Malaysia and Burma. In response, the United States and Great Britain declared war on Japan.
At the same time, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States. In the spring of 1942, the Japanese took the British fortress of Singapore, which was considered impregnable, and approached India. Then they conquered Indonesia and the Philippines, landed on New Guinea.
Back in March 1941, the US Congress passed a law on Lend-Lease - an “assistance system” with weapons, strategic raw materials and food. After Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union, Great Britain and the United States became in solidarity with the USSR. W. Churchill said that against Hitler he was ready to enter into an alliance even with the devil himself.
On July 12, 1941, an agreement on cooperation between the USSR and Great Britain was signed. On October 10, a trilateral agreement was signed between the USA, the USSR and Great Britain on military and food aid to the USSR. In November 1941, the United States extended the Lend-Lease Act to the Soviet Union. An anti-Hitler coalition emerged, consisting of the USA, Great Britain and the USSR.
In order to prevent a rapprochement between Germany and Iran, on August 25, 1941, the Soviet army entered Iran from the north, and the British from the south. In the history of World War II, this was the first joint operation between the USSR and England.
On August 14, 1941, the United States and England signed a document called the “Atlantic Charter”, in which they declared their refusal to seize foreign territories, recognized the right of all peoples to self-government, renounced the use of force in international affairs, and showed interest in building a just and secure post-war world . The USSR announced the recognition of the governments of Czechoslovakia and Poland, who were in exile, and on September 24 also joined the Atlantic Charter. On January 1, 1942, 26 states signed the “Declaration of the United Nations”. The strengthening of the anti-Hitler coalition contributed to the onset of a radical turning point in the course of World War II.

The beginning of a radical fracture
The second period of the war is characterized as a period of radical change. The first step here was the Battle of Midway Atoll in June 1942, in which the US Navy sank a Japanese squadron. Having suffered heavy losses, Japan lost the ability to fight in the Pacific.
In October 1942, British troops under the command of General B. Montgomery surrounded and defeated the Italo-German troops at El Apamein. In November, US troops under the command of General Dwight Eisenhower in Morocco pressed the Italo-German troops against Tunisia and forced them to surrender. But the allies did not keep their promises and in 1942 they did not open a second front in Europe. This allowed the Germans to group large forces on the eastern front, break through the defenses of the Soviet troops on the Kerch Peninsula in May, capturing Sevastopol and Kharkov in July, and move towards Stalingrad and the Caucasus. But the German offensive was repulsed near Stalingrad, and in a counterattack on November 23 near the city of Kalach, Soviet troops surrounded 22 enemy divisions. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted until February 2, 1943, ended with the victory of the USSR, which seized the strategic initiative. A radical turning point took place in the Soviet-German war. The counteroffensive of the Soviet troops in the Caucasus began.
One of the important conditions for a radical turning point in the war was the ability of the USSR, the USA and Britain to mobilize their resources. So, on June 30, 1941, the State Defense Committee was created in the USSR under the chairmanship of I. Stalin and the main Logistics Directorate. A card system was introduced.
In 1942, a law was passed in England giving the government emergency powers in the field of management. In the United States, the Office of War Production was created.

Resistance movement
Another factor that contributed to the radical change was the resistance movement of the peoples who fell under the German, Italian and Japanese yoke. The Nazis created death camps - Buchenwald, Auschwitz, Maidanek, Treblinka, Dachau, Mauthausen, etc. In France - Oradur, in Czechoslovakia - Lidice, in Belarus - Khatyn and many more such villages around the world, the population of which was completely destroyed. A systematic policy of extermination of Jews and Slavs was pursued. On January 20, 1942, a plan was approved for the extermination of all Jews in Europe.
The Japanese acted under the slogan "Asia for Asians", but ran into desperate resistance in Indonesia, Malaysia, Burma, and the Philippines. The unification of anti-fascist forces contributed to the strengthening of resistance. Under pressure from the allies, the Comintern was dissolved in 1943, so the communists in some countries took an active part in joint anti-fascist actions.
In 1943, an anti-fascist uprising broke out in the Warsaw Jewish ghetto. In the territories of the USSR conquered by the Germans, the partisan movement was especially widespread.

Completion of a radical fracture
A radical turning point on the Soviet-German front ended with the grand Battle of Kursk (July-August 1943), in which the Nazis were defeated. In naval battles in the Atlantic, the Germans lost many submarines. Allied ships began to cross the Atlantic Ocean as part of special sentinel convoys.
A radical change in the course of the war caused a crisis in the countries of the fascist bloc. In July 1943, the allied forces captured the island of Sicily, and this caused a deep crisis of the fascist regime of Mussolini. He was overthrown and arrested. The new government was headed by Marshal Badoglio. The Fascist Party was outlawed, and political prisoners were granted amnesty.
Secret negotiations began. September 3 Allied troops landed in the Apennines. An armistice was signed with Italy.
At this time, Germany occupied northern Italy. Badoglio declared war on Germany. A front line arose north of Naples, and the regime of Mussolini, who had fled from captivity, was restored in the territory occupied by the Germans. He relied on the German troops.
After the completion of the radical change, the heads of the allied states - F. Roosevelt, J. Stalin and W. Churchill met in Tehran from November 28 to December 1, 1943. The central place in the work of the conference was occupied by the question of opening a second front. Churchill insisted on opening a second front in the Balkans to prevent the penetration of communism into Europe, and Stalin believed that a second front should be opened closer to the German borders - in Northern France. So there were differences in views on the second front. Roosevelt sided with Stalin. It was decided to open a second front in May 1944 in France. Thus, the foundations of the general military concept of the anti-Hitler coalition were worked out for the first time. Stalin agreed to participate in the war with Japan, on the condition that Kaliningrad (Königsberg) be transferred to the USSR, and the new western borders of the USSR would be recognized. Tehran also adopted a declaration on Iran. The heads of the three states expressed their intention to maintain the integrity of the territory of this country.
In December 1943, Roosevelt and Churchill signed the Egyptian Declaration in Egypt with Chinese President Chiang Kai-shek. An agreement was reached that the war would continue until the complete defeat of Japan. All the territories taken from it by Japan will be returned to China, Korea will become free and independent.

Deportation of Turks and Caucasian peoples
The German offensive in the Caucasus, which began in the summer of 1942, in accordance with the Edelweiss plan, failed.
In the territories inhabited by the Turkic peoples (North and South Azerbaijan, Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Bashkiria, Tatarstan, Crimea, the North Caucasus, Western China and Afghanistan), Germany planned to create the state of "Great Turkestan".
In 1944-1945, the Soviet leadership declared some Turkic and Caucasian peoples in cooperation with the German occupiers and deported them. As a result of this deportation, accompanied by genocide, in February 1944, 650,000 Chechens, Ingush and Karachais, in May - about 2 million Crimean Turks, in November - about a million Turks - Meskhetians from the regions of Georgia bordering Turkey were resettled in the eastern regions of the USSR. In parallel with the deportation, the forms government controlled these peoples (in 1944 the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, in 1945 the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic). In October 1944, the independent Republic of Tuva, located in Siberia, was incorporated into the RSFSR.

Military operations 1944-1945
At the beginning of 1944 Soviet army launched a counteroffensive near Leningrad and in right-bank Ukraine. On September 2, 1944, an armistice was signed between the USSR and Finland. The lands seized in 1940, the Pechenga region, were transferred to the USSR. Finland's access to the Barents Sea has been closed. In October, with the permission of the Norwegian authorities, Soviet troops entered the territory of Norway.
On June 6, 1944, Allied forces under the command of American General D. Eisenhower landed in northern France and opened a second front. At the same time, Soviet troops launched the "Operation Bagration", as a result of which the territory of the USSR was completely cleared of the enemy.
The Soviet army entered East Prussia and Poland. In August 1944, an anti-fascist uprising began in Paris. Before the end of this year, the Allies completely liberated France and Belgium.
At the beginning of 1944, the United States occupied the Marshall Islands, the Mariana Islands and the Philippines, and blocked Japan's sea lanes. In turn, the Japanese captured Central China. But due to difficulties in supplying the Japanese, the “campaign to Delhi” failed.
In July 1944, Soviet troops entered Romania. The fascist regime of Antonescu was overthrown, and the Romanian King Mihai declared war on Germany. September 2 - Bulgaria, and September 12 - Romania signed a truce with the allies. In mid-September, Soviet troops entered Yugoslavia, most of which by this time had been liberated by the partisan army of I.B. Tito. At this time, Churchill resigned himself to the entry of all the Balkan countries into the sphere of influence of the USSR. And the troops subordinate to the Polish government in exile in London fought both against the Germans and against the Russians. In August 1944, an unprepared uprising began in Warsaw, suppressed by the Nazis. The Allies did not agree on the legitimacy of each of the two Polish governments.

Crimean Conference
On February 4-11, 1945, Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met in the Crimea (Yalta). Here, a decision was made on the unconditional surrender of Germany and the division of its territory into 4 occupation zones (USSR, USA, England, France), the collection of reparations from Germany, the recognition of the new western borders of the USSR, and the inclusion of new members in the London Polish government. The USSR confirmed its consent to enter the war against Japan 2-3 months after the end of the war with Germany. In return, Stalin expected to receive South Sakhalin, the Kuril Islands, the railway in Manchuria and Port Arthur.

At the conference, a declaration "On a liberated Europe" was adopted. It guaranteed the right to create democratic structures of their own choice.
Here, the order of work of the future United Nations was determined. The Crimean Conference was the last meeting of the "Big Three" with the participation of Roosevelt. In 1945 he died. He was replaced by G. Truman.

The defeat at the fronts caused a severe crisis in the bloc of fascist regimes. Realizing the disastrous for Germany to continue the war and the need to conclude peace, a group of officers organized an assassination attempt on Hitler, but unsuccessfully.
In 1944, the German military industry reached high level, but there was no longer any strength to resist. Despite this, Hitler announced a general mobilization and began to use a new type of weapon - the V-rocket. In December 1944, in the Ardennes, the Germans went on the last counterattack. The position of the allies worsened. At their request, the USSR launched the Vistula-Oder operation ahead of schedule in January 1945 and approached Berlin at a distance of 60 kilometers. In February, the Allies launched a general offensive. On April 16, under the leadership of Marshal G. Zhukov, the Berlin operation began. On April 30, the Banner of Victory was hung over the Reichstag. Mussolini was executed by partisans in Milan. Upon learning of this, Hitler shot himself. On the night of May 8-9, on behalf of the German government, Field Marshal W. Keitel signed an act of unconditional surrender. On May 9, Prague was liberated and the war in Europe ended.

Potsdam conference
From July 17 to August 2, 1945, a new conference of the "Big Three" was held in Potsdam. Now the United States was represented by Truman, and England, instead of Churchill, by the newly elected Prime Minister, Labor leader K. Attlee.
The main purpose of the conference was to determine the principles of the Allied policy towards Germany. The territory of Germany was divided into 4 zones of occupation (USSR, USA, France, England). An agreement was reached on the dissolution of fascist organizations, the restoration of previously banned parties and civil liberties, the destruction of the military industry and cartels. The main fascist war criminals were tried by the International Tribunal. The conference decided that Germany should remain a single state. In the meantime, it will be controlled by the occupying authorities. The country's capital Berlin was also divided into 4 zones. There were elections after which peace would be signed with the new democratic government.
The conference also determined the state borders of Germany, which lost a quarter of its territory. Germany has lost everything it has gained since 1938. The lands of East Prussia were divided between the USSR and Poland. The borders of Poland were determined along the line of the Oder-Neisse rivers. Soviet citizens who fled to the west or remained there were to be returned to their homeland.
The amount of reparations from Germany was set at 20 billion dollars. 50% of this amount was due to the Soviet Union.

End of World War II
In April 1945, US troops entered the island of Okinawa during the anti-Japanese operation. Before the summer, the Philippines, Indonesia and part of Indo-China were liberated. On July 26, 1945, the United States, the USSR and China demanded the surrender of Japan, but were refused. To demonstrate its strength, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6. On August 8, the USSR declared war on Japan. On August 9, the United States dropped a second bomb on the city of Nagasaki.
On August 14, at the request of Emperor Hirohito, the Japanese government announced its surrender. The official act of surrender was signed on September 2, 1945 aboard the battleship Missouri.
Thus, the Second World War, in which 61 states participated and in which 67 million people died, ended.
If the First World War was mainly of a positional nature, then the Second World War was of an offensive nature.

The “policy of appeasement” pursued by England and France in relation to Germany and its allies led in fact to the unleashing of a new world conflict. Indulging Hitler's territorial claims, the Western powers themselves became the first victims of his aggression, paying for their inept foreign policy. The beginning of World War II and events in Europe will be discussed in this lesson.

World War II: events in Europe in 1939-1941.

The "policy of appeasement" pursued by Great Britain and France in relation to Nazi Germany was unsuccessful. On September 1, 1939, Germany attacked Poland, setting off World War II, and by 1941, Germany and its allies dominated the European continent.

background

After the National Socialists came to power in 1933, Germany set a course for the militarization of the country and an aggressive foreign policy. In a few years, a powerful army was created, possessing the most modern weapons. The primary foreign policy task of Germany during this period was the annexation of all foreign territories with a significant proportion of the German population, and the global goal was to conquer the living space for the German nation. Before the start of the war, Germany annexed Austria and initiated the partition of Czechoslovakia, bringing a large part of it under control. The major Western European powers - France and Great Britain - did not object to such actions by Germany, believing that meeting Hitler's demands would help avoid war.

Developments

August 23, 1939— Germany and the USSR sign a non-aggression pact, also known as the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact. A secret additional protocol was attached to the agreement, in which the parties delimited their spheres of interest in Europe.

September 1, 1939- having carried out a provocation (see Wikipedia), which in the eyes international community had to authorize an attack on Poland, Germany begins the invasion. By the end of September, all of Poland was captured. The USSR, in accordance with a secret protocol, occupied the eastern regions of Poland. In Poland and beyond, Germany used the strategy of blitzkrieg - lightning war (see Wikipedia).

September 3, 1939- France and Great Britain, connected with Poland by treaty, declare war on Germany. Active hostilities on land were not conducted until 1940, this period was called the Strange War.

November 1939- The USSR attacks Finland. As a result of a short but bloody war that ended in March 1940, the USSR annexed the territory of the Karelian Isthmus.

April 1940- Germany invades Denmark and Norway. British troops are defeated in Norway.

May - June 1940- Germany occupies the Netherlands and Belgium to attack the Franco-British troops around the Maginot Line, and captures France. The north of France was occupied, in the south a formally independent pro-fascist Vichy regime was created (after the name of the city in which the government of the collaborators is located). Collaborators - supporters of cooperation with the Nazis in the countries they defeated. The French, who did not accept the loss of independence, organized the Free France (Fighting France) movement, led by General Charles de Gaulle, which led an underground struggle against the occupation.

Summer - autumn 1940- Battle for England. Unsuccessful German attempt by massive air raids to withdraw Great Britain from the war. Germany's first major setback in World War II.

June - August 1940- The USSR occupies Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and establishes communist governments in these countries, after which they become part of the USSR and are reformed according to the Soviet model (see Wikipedia). The USSR also seizes Bessarabia and Bukovina from Romania.

April 1941- Germany and Italy, with the participation of Hungary, capture Yugoslavia and Greece. The stubborn resistance of the Balkan countries, supported by Great Britain, forced Hitler to postpone the planned attack on the Soviet Union for two months.

Conclusion

The outbreak of World War II was a logical continuation of the previous aggressive policy of Nazi Germany and its strategy for expanding living space. The first stage of the war demonstrated the power of the German military machine built in the 1930s, which could not be resisted by any of the European armies. One of the reasons for Germany's military success was efficient system state propaganda, through which German soldiers and the citizens felt the moral right to wage this war.

Abstract

September 1, 1939 Germany attacked Poland using a pre-planned war plan codenamed "Weiss". This event is considered to be the beginning of World War II.

September 3 England and France declared war on Germany, since they were connected with Poland by an agreement on mutual assistance, but in fact they did not take any hostilities. Such actions went down in history as " strange war". German troops using tactics "blitzkrieg" -lightning war, already on September 16 they broke through the Polish fortifications and reached Warsaw. September 28, the capital of Poland fell.

After conquering its eastern neighbor, Nazi Germany turned its eyes to the north and west. Bound with the USSR by a non-aggression pact, it could not develop an offensive against Soviet lands. AT April 1940 Germany captures Denmark and lands in Norway, annexing these countries to the Reich. After the defeat of the British troops in Norway, the Prime Minister of Great Britain becomes Winston Churchill- a supporter of a decisive struggle against Germany.

Not fearing for his rear, Hitler deploys troops to the west in order to conquer France. Throughout the 1930s. on the eastern border of France, a fortified " Maginot Line”, which the French considered impregnable. Considering that Hitler would attack "on the forehead", it was here that the main forces of the French and the British who arrived to help them were concentrated. To the north of the line were the independent countries of the Benelux. The German command, regardless of the sovereignty of the countries, delivers the main blow with its tank troops from the north, bypassing the Maginot Line, and simultaneously capturing Belgium, Holland (Netherlands) and Luxembourg, goes to the rear of the French troops.

In June 1940, German troops entered Paris. Government Marshal Pétain was forced to sign a peace treaty with Hitler, according to which the entire north and west of France passed to Germany, and the French government itself was obliged to cooperate with Germany. It is noteworthy that the signing of the peace took place in the same trailer in Compiègne forest in which Germany signed the peace treaty that ended the First World War. The French government, collaborating with Hitler, became collaborative, that is, voluntarily helped Germany. led the national struggle General Charles de Gaulle, who did not admit defeat and stood at the head of the created anti-fascist committee "Free France".

1940 is marked in the history of the Second World War as the year of the most brutal bombing of English cities and industrial facilities, which received the name Battle for England. Lacking sufficient naval forces to invade Great Britain, Germany decides on daily bombardments, which should reduce English cities to ruins. The most severe destruction was received by the city of Coventry, whose name has become synonymous with merciless air attacks - bombardments.

In 1940, the United States began to help England with weapons and volunteers. The United States did not want to strengthen Hitler and gradually began to withdraw from its policy of "non-intervention" in world affairs. In fact, only US help saved England from defeat.

Hitler's ally, the Italian dictator Mussolini, guided by his idea of ​​restoring the Roman Empire, launched military operations against Greece, but got stuck in the fighting there. Germany, to which he turned for help, after a short time occupied all of Greece and the islands, annexing them to itself.

AT Yugoslavia fell in May 1941, which Hitler also decided to annex to his empire.

At the same time, starting from the middle of 1940, there was an increase in tension in relations between Germany and the USSR, which eventually turned into a war between these countries.

In this way, June 22, 1941, by the time the German attack on the Soviet Union, Europe was conquered by Hitler. The “appeasement policy” has completely failed.

Bibliography

1. Shubin A.V. General history. Recent history. Grade 9: textbook. For general education institutions. - M.: Moscow textbooks, 2010.
2. Soroko-Tsyupa O.S., Soroko-Tsyupa A.O. General history. Recent history, 9th grade. - M.: Education, 2010.
3. Sergeev E.Yu. General history. Recent history. Grade 9 - M.: Education, 2011.

Homework

1. Read § 11 of the textbook by Shubin A.V. and answer questions 1-4 on p. 118.
2. How can one explain the behavior of England and France in the first days of the war in relation to Poland?
3. Why was Nazi Germany able to conquer almost all of Europe in such a short time?

1. Internet portal Army.lv ().
2. Information and news portal armyman.info ().
3. Encyclopedia of the Holocaust ().

War is a great pain

World War II is the most bloody war in the history of mankind. Lasted 6 years. The armies of 61 states with a total population of 1,700 million people, that is, 80% of the total population of the earth, participated in the hostilities. The fighting took place in the territories of 40 countries. For the first time in the annals of mankind, the number of civilian dead exceeded the number of those killed directly in battles, and almost twice.
finally dispelled the illusions of people about human nature. No progress will change this nature. People remained the same as they were two or a thousand years ago: animals, only slightly covered with a thin layer of civilization and culture. Anger, envy, self-interest, stupidity, indifference are qualities that are manifested in them to a much greater extent than kindness and compassion.
dispelled illusions about the importance of democracy. The people don't decide anything. As always in history, he is driven to the slaughterhouse to kill, rape, burn, and he dutifully goes.
dispelled the illusion that humanity learns from its own mistakes. It doesn't study. World War I, which claimed 10 million lives, is only 23 years away from World War II

Participants of the Second World War

— Germany, Italy, Japan, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czech Republic - on the one hand
— USSR, Great Britain, USA, China - on the other

Years of World War II 1939 - 1945

Causes of World War II

— not only drew a line under the First World War, in which Germany was defeated, but his terms humiliated and ruined Germany. Political instability, the danger of the victory of the left forces in the political struggle, economic difficulties contributed to the coming to power in Germany of the ultranationalist National Socialist Party led by Hitler, whose nationalist, demagogic, populist slogans appealed to the German people
"One Reich, one people, one Fuhrer"; "Blood and soil"; "Wake up Germany!"; “We want to show the German People that there is no life without Justice, but Justice without Power, Power without Power, and all Power is within our People”, “Freedom and Bread”, “Death of Lies”; "End Corruption!"
— After World War I, pacifist sentiment swept Western Europe. The peoples under no circumstances did not want to fight, for nothing. These feelings of voters were forced to be taken into account by politicians who in no way or very sluggishly, yielding in everything, reacted to the revanchist, aggressive actions and aspirations of Hitler

* early 1934 - Plans for the mobilization of 240 thousand enterprises for the production of military products were approved by the Working Committee of the Reich Defense Council
* October 1, 1934 - Hitler gave the order to increase the Reichswehr from 100,000 to 300,000 soldiers.
* March 10, 1935 - Goering announced that Germany had air Force
* March 16, 1935 - Hitler announced the restoration of the system of general recruitment into the army and the creation in peacetime of an army of thirty-six divisions (that's about half a million people)
* On March 7, 1936, German troops entered the territory of the Rhine demilitarized zone, violating all past treaties.
* March 12, 1938 - Accession to Germany by Austria
* September 28-30, 1938 - German transfer of the Sudetenland to Czechoslovakia
* October 24, 1938 - Germany's demand to Poland to allow the accession to the Reich of the free city of Danzig and the construction of extraterritorial railways and roads on Polish territory to East Prussia
* November 2, 1938 - Germany forced Czechoslovakia to transfer the southern regions of Slovakia and Transcarpathian Ukraine to Hungary
* March 15, 1939 - German occupation of the Czech Republic and its inclusion in the Reich

— In the 20-30s, before the Second World War, the West watched with great apprehension the actions and policies of the Soviet Union, which continued to broadcast about the world revolution, which Europe perceived as a desire for world domination. The leaders of France and England, Stalin and Hitler, seemed to be of the same field, and they hoped to direct Germany's aggression to the East, pushing Germany and the USSR with cunning diplomatic moves, and themselves to stay on the sidelines.
As a result of the disunity and inconsistency of the actions of the world community, Germany gained strength and confidence in the possibility of its hegemony in the world.

Major events of World War II

• , September 1 - the German army crossed the western border of Poland
• September 3, 1939 - Britain and France declared war on Germany.
• 1939, September 17 - The Red Army crossed the eastern border of Poland
• 1939, October 6 - capitulation of Poland
• May 10 - German attack on France
• 1940, April 9-June 7 - German occupation of Denmark, Belgium, Holland, Norway
• 1940, June 14 - The German army entered Paris
• 1940, September - 1941, May - Battle for England
• 1940, September 27 - Formation of the Triple Alliance between Germany, Italy, Japan, hoping after the victory to share influence in the world

Later Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Finland, Thailand, Croatia, Spain joined the Union. tripartite alliance or the Axis countries in World War II were opposed by the Anti-Hitler coalition consisting of the Soviet Union, Great Britain and its dominions, the USA and China

• , March 11 - Adopted in the USA
• 1941, April 13 - Treaty of the USSR and Japan on non-aggression and neutrality
• 1941, June 22 - German attack on the Soviet Union. The beginning of the Great Patriotic
• 1941, September 8 - the beginning of the blockade of Leningrad
• 1941, September 30-December 5 - Battle for Moscow. Defeat of the German army
• November 7, 1941 - The Lend-Lease Law was extended to the USSR
• December 7, 1941 - Japanese attack on the American base at Pearl Harbor. Beginning of the Pacific War
• 1941, December 8 - US entry into the war
• December 9, 1941 - China declares war on Japan, Germany and Italy
• 1941, December 25 - Japan captured the British-owned Hong Kong
• , January 1 - Washington Declaration of 26 States on cooperation in the fight against fascism
• 1942, January-May - heavy defeats of the British troops in North Africa
• 1942, January-March - Japanese troops occupied Rangoon, the islands of Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, Sumatra, Bali, part of New Guinea, New Britain, the Gilbert Islands, most of the Solomon Islands
• 1942, the first half - the defeat of the Red Army. The German army reached the Volga
• 1942, June 4-5 - the defeat by the US Navy of part of the Japanese fleet at Midway Atoll
• 1942, July 17 - the beginning of the Battle of Stalingrad
• 1942, October 23-November 11 - the defeat of the German army from the Anglo-American troops in North Africa
• 1942, November 11 - German occupation of southern France
• , February 2 - the defeat of the Nazi troops near Stalingrad
• 1943, January 12 - breakthrough of the blockade of Leningrad
• 1943, May 13 - capitulation German troops in Tunisia
• 1943, July 5-August 23 - the defeat of the Germans near Kursk
• 1943, July-August - the landing of the Anglo-American troops in Sicily
• 1943, August-December - the offensive of the Red Army, the liberation of most of Belarus and Ukraine
• 1943, November 28-December 1 - Tehran Conference of Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt
• , January-August - the offensive of the Red Army on all fronts. Its access to the pre-war borders of the USSR
• 1944, June 6 - landing of the allied Anglo-American troops in Normandy. Opening of the Second Front
• 1944, August 25 - Paris in the hands of the allies
• 1944, autumn - the continuation of the offensive of the Red Army, the liberation of the Baltic States, Moldova, Northern Norway
• 1944, December 16-1945, January - a heavy defeat of the Allies during the German counteroffensive in the Ardennes
• , January-May - offensive operations of the Red Army and allied forces in Europe and the Pacific
• 1945, January 4-11 - Yalta conference with the participation of Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill on the post-war structure of Europe
• April 12, 1945 - US President Roosevelt dies, succeeded by Truman
• 1945, April 25 - the assault on Berlin began by units of the Red Army
• 1945, May 8 - the surrender of Germany. End of the Great Patriotic War
• 1945, July 17-August 2 - Potsdam Conference of the Heads of Government of the USA, USSR, Great Britain
• 1945, July 26 - Japan rejected the offer of surrender
• 1945, August 6 - atomic bombing Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• 1945, August 8 - USSR of Japan
• September 2, 1945 Japan surrenders. End of World War II

World War II ended on September 2, 1945 with the signing of Japan's surrender.

Major battles of World War II

• Air and naval battle for England (July 10-October 30, 1940)
• Battle of Smolensk (July 10-September 10, 1941)
• Battle for Moscow (September 30, 1941-January 7, 1942)
• Defense of Sevastopol (October 30, 1941-July 4, 1942)
• Attack of the Japanese fleet on the US naval base Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941)
• Naval battle at Midway Atoll in the Pacific Ocean of the US and Japanese fleets (June 4-June 7, 1942)
• Battle of Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands in the Pacific (August 7, 1942-February 9, 1943)
• Battle of Rzhev (January 5, 1942-March 21, 1943)
• Battle of Stalingrad (July 17, 1942-February 2, 1943)
• Battle of El Alamein in North Africa (October 23-November 5)
• Battle of Kursk Bulge (July 5-August 23, 1943)
• Battle for the Dnieper (forcing the Dnieper on September 22-30) (August 26-December 23, 1943)
• Allied landings in Normandy (June 6, 1944)
• Liberation of Belarus (June 23-August 29, 1944)
• Battle of the Ardennes in southwest Belgium (December 16, 1944-January 29, 1945)
• Storming of Berlin (April 25-May 2, 1945)

Generals of World War II

• Marshal Zhukov (1896-1974)
• Marshal Vasilevsky (1895-1977)
• Marshal Rokossovsky (1896-1968)
• Marshal Konev (1897-1973)
• Marshal Meretskov (1897 - 1968)
• Marshal Govorov (1897 - 1955)
• Marshal Malinovsky (1898 - 1967)
• Marshal Tolbukhin (1894 - 1949)
• Army General Antonov (1896 - 1962)
• Army General Vatutin (1901-1944)
• Chief Marshal of the Armored Troops Rotmistrov (1901-1981)
• Marshal of the Armored Troops Katukov (1900-1976)
• General of the Army Chernyakhovsky (1906-1945)

• General of the Army Marshall (1880-1959)
• General of the Army Eisenhower (1890-1969)
• General of the Army MacArthur (1880-1964)
• General of the Army Bradley (1893-1981)
• Admiral Nimitz (1885-1966)
• Army General, Air Force General H. Arnold (1886-1950)
• General Patton (1885-1945)
• General Divers (1887-1979)
• General Clark (1896-1984)
• Admiral Fletcher (1885-1973)

World War II 1939-1945

a war prepared by the forces of international imperialist reaction and unleashed by the main aggressive states - fascist Germany, fascist Italy and militaristic Japan. V. m. v., like the first, arose due to the operation of the law of uneven development of capitalist countries under imperialism and was the result of a sharp aggravation of inter-imperialist contradictions, the struggle for markets, sources of raw materials, spheres of influence and investment of capital. The war began in conditions when capitalism was no longer an all-encompassing system, when the world's first socialist state, the USSR, existed and was growing stronger. The split of the world into two systems led to the emergence of the main contradiction of the era - between socialism and capitalism. Inter-imperialist contradictions have ceased to be the only factor in world politics. They developed in parallel and in interaction with the contradictions between the two systems. The warring capitalist groups, fighting each other, simultaneously sought to destroy the USSR. However, V. m. began as a clash between two coalitions of major capitalist powers. It was imperialist in origin, its originators were the imperialists of all countries, the system of modern capitalism. Hitlerite Germany, which led the bloc of fascist aggressors, bears special responsibility for its emergence. On the part of the states of the fascist bloc, the war bore an imperialist character throughout its entire length. On the part of the states fighting against the fascist aggressors and their allies, the nature of the war was gradually changing. Under the influence of the national liberation struggle of the peoples, the war was being transformed into a just, anti-fascist one. The entry of the Soviet Union into the war against the states of the fascist bloc that treacherously attacked it completed this process.

Preparation and outbreak of war. The forces that unleashed the war of war prepared strategic and political positions favorable to the aggressors long before it began. In the 30s. Two main centers of military danger formed in the world: Germany - in Europe, Japan - in the Far East. Strengthened German imperialism, under the pretext of eliminating the injustices of the Versailles system, began to demand a redistribution of the world in its favor. The establishment of a terrorist fascist dictatorship in Germany in 1933, which fulfilled the demands of the most reactionary and chauvinist circles of monopoly capital, turned that country into a strike force of imperialism directed primarily against the USSR. However, the plans of German fascism were not limited to the enslavement of the peoples of the Soviet Union. The fascist program for the conquest of world domination provided for the transformation of Germany into the center of a gigantic colonial empire, the power and influence of which would extend to all of Europe and the richest regions of Africa, Asia, Latin America, mass destruction population in the conquered countries, especially in Eastern Europe. The fascist elite planned to start implementing this program from the countries of Central Europe, then spreading it to the entire continent. The defeat and capture of the Soviet Union, with the aim of primarily destroying the center of the international communist and working-class movement, as well as expanding the "living space" of German imperialism, was the most important political task of fascism and, at the same time, the main prerequisite for the further successful deployment of aggression on a world scale. The imperialists of Italy and Japan also aspired to redistribute the world and establish a "new order". Thus, the plans of the Nazis and their allies posed a serious threat not only to the USSR, but also to Great Britain, France, and the USA. However, the ruling circles of the Western powers, driven by a feeling of class hatred for the Soviet state, under the guise of "non-intervention" and "neutrality", essentially pursued a policy of complicity with the fascist aggressors, hoping to avert the threat of a fascist invasion from their countries, to weaken their imperialist rivals by the forces of the Soviet Union, and then with their help to destroy the USSR. They relied on the mutual exhaustion of the USSR and Nazi Germany in a protracted and destructive war.

The French ruling elite, pushing Hitler's aggression to the East in the prewar years and waging a struggle against the communist movement inside the country, at the same time feared a new German invasion, sought a close military alliance with Great Britain, strengthened the eastern borders by building the Maginot Line and deploying armed forces against Germany. The British government sought to strengthen the British colonial empire and sent troops and naval forces to its key areas (the Middle East, Singapore, India). Pursuing a policy of complicity with aggressors in Europe, the government of N. Chamberlain, right up to the start of the war and in its first months, hoped for an agreement with Hitler at the expense of the USSR. In the event of aggression against France, it expected that the French armed forces, repelling aggression together with the British expeditionary forces and British aviation formations, will ensure the security of the British Isles. Before the war, the US ruling circles supported Germany economically and thus contributed to the reconstruction of the German military potential. With the outbreak of the war, they were forced to change their political course somewhat and, as fascist aggression expanded, they switched to supporting Great Britain and France.

The Soviet Union, in a situation of increasing military danger, pursued a policy aimed at curbing the aggressor and creating a reliable system for ensuring peace. On May 2, 1935, the Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance was signed in Paris. On May 16, 1935, the Soviet Union concluded a mutual assistance pact with Czechoslovakia. The Soviet government fought to create a system of collective security that could become an effective means of preventing war and ensuring peace. At the same time, the Soviet state carried out a set of measures aimed at strengthening the country's defense and developing its military and economic potential.

In the 30s. Hitler's government launched diplomatic, strategic and economic preparations for a world war. In October 1933, Germany left the Geneva Disarmament Conference of 1932-35 and announced its withdrawal from the League of Nations. On March 16, 1935, Hitler violated the military articles of the Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919 and introduced universal military service in the country. In March 1936, German troops occupied the demilitarized Rhineland. In November 1936, Germany and Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, which Italy joined in 1937. The activation of the aggressive forces of imperialism led to a series of international political crises and local wars. As a result of Japan's aggressive wars against China (started in 1931), Italy against Ethiopia (1935–36), and the German-Italian intervention in Spain (1936–39), the fascist states strengthened their positions in Europe, Africa, and Asia.

Using the policy of "non-intervention" pursued by Great Britain and France, fascist Germany captured Austria in March 1938 and began to prepare an attack on Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovakia had a well-trained army, based on a powerful system of border fortifications; treaties with France (1924) and with the USSR (1935) provided for military assistance from these powers to Czechoslovakia. The Soviet Union has repeatedly declared its readiness to fulfill its obligations and provide military assistance to Czechoslovakia, even if France does not do this. However, the government of E. Benes did not accept the help of the USSR. As a result of the Munich Agreement of 1938, the ruling circles of Great Britain and France, supported by the United States, betrayed Czechoslovakia and agreed to the seizure of the Sudetenland by Germany, hoping in this way to open "the road to the East" for fascist Germany. The hands of the fascist leadership were untied for aggression.

At the end of 1938, the ruling circles of fascist Germany launched a diplomatic offensive against Poland, creating the so-called Danzig crisis, the meaning of which was to carry out aggression against Poland under the cover of demands for the liquidation of the "injustices of Versailles" in relation to the free city of Danzig. In March 1939, Germany completely occupied Czechoslovakia, created a puppet fascist "state" - Slovakia, seized the Memel region from Lithuania and imposed an enslaving "economic" treaty on Romania. Italy occupied Albania in April 1939. In response to the expansion of fascist aggression, the governments of Great Britain and France, in order to protect their economic and political interests in Europe, provided "guarantees of independence" to Poland, Romania, Greece and Turkey. France also pledged military assistance to Poland in the event of an attack by Germany. In April–May 1939, Germany denounced the Anglo-German naval agreement of 1935, tore up the 1934 non-aggression agreement with Poland, and concluded with Italy the so-called Steel Pact, according to which the Italian government pledged to help Germany if it went to war with the Western powers.

In such a situation, the British and French governments, under the influence of public opinion, out of fear of a further strengthening of Germany and with the aim of putting pressure on it, entered into negotiations with the USSR, which took place in Moscow in the summer of 1939 (see Moscow negotiations of 1939). However, the Western powers did not agree to the conclusion of an agreement proposed by the USSR on a joint struggle against the aggressor. Offering the Soviet Union to take unilateral obligations to help any European neighbor in the event of an attack on it, the Western powers wanted to draw the USSR into a one-on-one war against Germany. Negotiations, which lasted until mid-August 1939, did not produce results due to the sabotage by Paris and London of Soviet constructive proposals. Leading the Moscow negotiations to a breakdown, the British government at the same time entered into secret contacts with the Nazis through their ambassador in London, G. Dirksen, seeking to achieve an agreement on the redistribution of the world at the expense of the USSR. The position of the Western powers predetermined the failure of the Moscow negotiations and confronted the Soviet Union with an alternative: to be isolated in the face of a direct threat of an attack by fascist Germany or, having exhausted the possibilities of concluding an alliance with Great Britain and France, to sign a non-aggression pact proposed by Germany and thereby postpone the threat of war. The situation made the second choice inevitable. The Soviet-German treaty concluded on August 23, 1939 contributed to the fact that, contrary to the calculations of Western politicians, the world war began with a clash within the capitalist world.

On the eve of V. m. German fascism, through the accelerated development of the war economy, created a powerful military potential. In 1933-39, spending on armaments increased more than 12 times and reached 37 billion marks. Germany smelted 22.5 million tons in 1939. t steel, 17.5 million t cast iron, mined 251.6 million tons. t coal, produced 66.0 billion kW · h electricity. However, for a number of types of strategic raw materials, Germany was dependent on imports (iron ore, rubber, manganese ore, copper, oil and oil products, chromium ore). By September 1, 1939, the number of armed forces of fascist Germany reached 4.6 million people. There were 26 thousand guns and mortars, 3.2 thousand tanks, 4.4 thousand combat aircraft, 115 warships (including 57 submarines) in service.

The strategy of the German High Command was based on the doctrine of "total war". Its main content was the concept of "blitzkrieg", according to which victory must be won in the shortest possible time, before the enemy fully deploys his armed forces and military-economic potential. The strategic plan of the fascist German command was to attack Poland, using the cover of limited forces in the west, and quickly defeat its armed forces. 61 divisions and 2 brigades were deployed against Poland (including 7 tank and about 9 motorized), of which 7 infantry and 1 tank divisions approached after the start of the war, a total of 1.8 million people, over 11 thousand guns and mortars, 2.8 thousand tanks, about 2 thousand aircraft; against France - 35 infantry divisions (after September 3, another 9 divisions approached), 1.5 thousand aircraft.

The Polish command, counting on military assistance guaranteed by Great Britain and France, intended to defend the border zone and go on the offensive after the French army and British aviation diverted German forces from the Polish front. By September 1, Poland managed to mobilize and concentrate troops only by 70%: 24 infantry divisions, 3 mountain rifle brigades, 1 armored motorized brigade, 8 cavalry brigades and 56 national defense battalions were deployed. The Polish armed forces had over 4,000 guns and mortars, 785 light tanks and tankettes, and about 400 aircraft.

The French plan for waging war against Germany, in accordance with the political course pursued by France and the military doctrine of the French command, provided for defense along the Maginot Line and the entry of troops into Belgium and the Netherlands to continue the defensive front to the north in order to protect the ports and industrial regions of France and Belgium. After mobilization, the armed forces of France numbered 110 divisions (of which 15 were in the colonies), a total of 2.67 million people, about 2.7 thousand tanks (in the metropolis - 2.4 thousand), over 26 thousand guns and mortars, 2330 aircraft (in the metropolis - 1735), 176 warships (including 77 submarines).

Great Britain had a strong Navy and Air Force - 320 warships of the main classes (including 69 submarines), about 2 thousand aircraft. Its ground forces consisted of 9 personnel and 17 territorial divisions; they had 5.6 thousand guns and mortars, 547 tanks. The number of the British army was 1.27 million people. In the event of a war with Germany, the British command planned to concentrate its main efforts on the sea and send 10 divisions to France. The English and French commands did not intend to provide serious assistance to Poland.

1st period of the war (September 1, 1939 - June 21, 1941)- the period of military successes of fascist Germany. On September 1, 1939, Germany attacked Poland (see Polish Campaign of 1939). On September 3, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany. With an overwhelming superiority of forces over the Polish army and by concentrating a mass of tanks and aircraft on the main sectors of the front, the Hitlerite command was able to achieve major operational results from the beginning of the war. The incomplete deployment of forces, the lack of help from the Allies, the weakness of the centralized leadership and its subsequent collapse put the Polish army in front of a catastrophe.

The courageous resistance of the Polish troops near Mokra, Mlawa, on the Bzura, the defense of Modlin, Westerplatte and the heroic 20-day defense of Warsaw (September 8-28) wrote bright pages in the history of the German-Polish war, but could not prevent the defeat of Poland. Hitler's troops surrounded a number of groupings of the Polish army west of the Vistula, transferred hostilities to the eastern regions of the country, and completed its occupation in early October.

On September 17, by order of the Soviet government, the troops of the Red Army crossed the border of the collapsed Polish state and began a liberation campaign in Western Belarus and Western Ukraine in order to protect the lives and property of the Ukrainian and Belarusian population, striving for reunification with the Soviet republics. A march to the West was also necessary to stop the spread of Hitler's aggression to the East. The Soviet government, confident in the inevitability of German aggression against the USSR in the near future, sought to postpone the starting point for the future deployment of troops of a potential enemy, which was in the interests not only of the Soviet Union, but of all peoples threatened by fascist aggression. After the liberation of the Western Belorussian and Western Ukrainian lands by the Red Army, Western Ukraine (November 1, 1939) and Western Belarus (November 2, 1939) were reunited with the Ukrainian SSR and the BSSR, respectively.

In late September - early October 1939, Soviet-Estonian, Soviet-Latvian and Soviet-Lithuanian mutual assistance treaties were signed, which prevented Nazi Germany from seizing the Baltic countries and turning them into a military foothold against the USSR. In August 1940, after the overthrow of the bourgeois governments of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, these countries, in accordance with the desire of their peoples, were admitted to the USSR.

As a result of the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939–40, according to an agreement dated March 12, 1940, the USSR border on the Karelian Isthmus, in the region of Leningrad and the Murmansk Railway, was somewhat pushed back to the northwest. On June 26, 1940, the Soviet government proposed to Romania that Bessarabia, which had been occupied by Romania in 1918, be returned to the USSR and that the northern part of Bukovina, inhabited by Ukrainians, be transferred to the USSR. On June 28, the Romanian government agreed to the return of Bessarabia and the transfer of Northern Bukovina.

After the outbreak of war until May 1940, the governments of Great Britain and France continued only in a slightly modified form the pre-war foreign policy, which was based on calculations of reconciliation with Nazi Germany on the basis of anti-communism and the direction of its aggression against the USSR. Despite the declaration of war, the French armed forces and the British Expeditionary Force (began to arrive in France from mid-September) were inactive for 9 months. During this period, called the "strange war", the Nazi army was preparing for an offensive against the countries of Western Europe. From the end of September 1939, active military operations were carried out only on sea lanes. To blockade Great Britain, the Nazi command used the forces of the fleet, especially submarines and large ships (raiders). From September to December 1939, Great Britain lost 114 ships from German submarine attacks, and in 1940 - 471 ships, while the Germans in 1939 lost only 9 submarines. By the summer of 1941, strikes against the sea communications of Great Britain led to the loss of 1/3 of the tonnage of the British merchant fleet and created a serious threat to the country's economy.

In April–May 1940, the German armed forces seized Norway and Denmark (see the Norwegian operation of 1940) with the aim of strengthening German positions in the Atlantic and northern Europe, seizing iron ore, bringing the bases of the German fleet closer to Great Britain, and securing a foothold in the north for an attack on the USSR . On April 9, 1940, amphibious assault troops, having landed at the same time, captured the key ports of Norway along its entire coast with a length of 1800 km, and airborne troops occupied the main airfields. The courageous resistance of the Norwegian army (late in deployment) and the patriots delayed the onslaught of the Nazis. Attempts by the Anglo-French troops to drive the Germans out of the points they occupied led to a series of battles in the areas of Narvik, Namsus, Molle (Molde), and others. British troops recaptured Narvik from the Germans. But it was not possible to snatch the strategic initiative from the Nazis. In early June, they evacuated from Narvik. The occupation of Norway was facilitated by the Nazis by the actions of the Norwegian "fifth column" headed by V. Quisling. The country turned into a Nazi base in northern Europe. But the significant losses of the Nazi fleet during the Norwegian operation weakened its capabilities in the further struggle for the Atlantic.

At dawn on May 10, 1940, after careful preparation, fascist German troops (135 divisions, including 10 tank and 6 motorized, and 1 brigade, 2580 tanks, 3834 aircraft) invaded Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and then through their territories and into France (see French campaign of 1940). The Germans delivered the main blow with a mass of mobile formations and aircraft through the Ardennes mountains, bypassing the Maginot Line from the north, through northern France to the coast of the English Channel. The French command, adhering to the defensive doctrine, deployed large forces on the Maginot Line and did not create a strategic reserve in the depths. After the start of the German offensive, it brought the main grouping of troops, including the British Expeditionary Army, into Belgian territory, exposing these forces to a blow from the rear. These serious mistakes of the French command, aggravated by poor interaction between the armies of the allies, allowed the Nazi troops after forcing the river. Meuse and battles in central Belgium to break through northern France, cut the front of the Anglo-French troops, go to the rear of the Anglo-French group operating in Belgium, and break through to the English Channel. On May 14, the Netherlands capitulated. The Belgian, British and part of the French armies were surrounded in Flanders. On May 28, Belgium capitulated. The British and part of the French troops, surrounded in the Dunkirk area, managed, having lost all military equipment, to evacuate to Great Britain (see the Dunkirk operation of 1940).

At the 2nd stage of the summer campaign of 1940, the Nazi army, with much superior forces, broke through the front hastily created by the French along the river. Somme and En. The danger hanging over France demanded the rallying of the forces of the people. The French Communists called for nationwide resistance and the organization of the defense of Paris. The capitulators and traitors (P. Reynaud, C. Peten, P. Laval, etc.), who determined the policy of France, the high command, headed by M. Weygand, rejected this the only way saving the country, as they feared the revolutionary actions of the proletariat and the strengthening of the Communist Party. They decided to surrender Paris without a fight and capitulate to Hitler. Without exhausting the possibilities of resistance, the French armed forces laid down their arms. The Compiègne armistice of 1940 (signed on June 22) was a milestone in the policy of national treason pursued by the Pétain government, which expressed the interests of a part of the French bourgeoisie that was oriented towards Nazi Germany. This truce was aimed at strangling the national liberation struggle of the French people. According to its terms, an occupation regime was established in the northern and central parts of France. Industrial, raw materials, food resources of France were under the control of Germany. In the unoccupied, southern part of the country, an anti-national pro-fascist Vichy government led by Pétain came to power, which became a puppet of Hitler. But at the end of June 1940, the Committee of Free (from July 1942 - Fighting) France was formed in London, headed by General Charles de Gaulle to lead the struggle for the liberation of France from the Nazi invaders and their henchmen.

On June 10, 1940, Italy entered the war against Great Britain and France, striving to establish dominance in the Mediterranean basin. In August, Italian troops captured British Somalia, part of Kenya and Sudan, and in mid-September invaded Egypt from Libya in order to break through to Suez (see North African campaigns of 1940-43). However, they were soon stopped, and in December 1940 they were driven back by the British. The Italian attempt, launched in October 1940, to develop an offensive from Albania to Greece was resolutely repulsed by the Greek army, which inflicted a number of strong retaliatory blows on the Italian troops (see Italo-Greek War of 1940-41 (See Italo-Greek War of 1940-1941)). In January - May 1941, British troops expelled the Italians from British Somalia, Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Italian Somalia, Eritrea. Mussolini was forced in January 1941 to ask for help from Hitler. In the spring, German troops were sent to North Africa, forming the so-called African Corps, headed by General E. Rommel. Going on the offensive on March 31, the Italo-German troops reached the Libyan-Egyptian border in the second half of April.

After the defeat of France, the threat looming over Great Britain contributed to the isolation of the Munich elements and the rallying of the forces of the British people. The government of W. Churchill, which replaced the government of N. Chamberlain on May 10, 1940, set about organizing effective defense. The British government attached particular importance to the support of the United States. In July 1940, secret negotiations between the air and naval headquarters of the United States and Great Britain began, culminating in the signing on September 2 of an agreement on the transfer of the last 50 obsolete American destroyers in exchange for British military bases in the Western Hemisphere (they were provided by the United States for a period of 99 years). Destroyers were required to fight on the Atlantic communications.

On July 16, 1940, Hitler issued a directive for the invasion of Great Britain (Operation Sea Lion). Since August 1940, the Nazis began massive bombardments of Great Britain in order to undermine its military and economic potential, demoralize the population, prepare an invasion, and ultimately force it to surrender (see Battle of England 1940-41). German aviation caused significant damage to many British cities, enterprises, ports, but did not break the resistance of the British Air Force, was unable to establish air supremacy over the English Channel and suffered heavy losses. As a result of air raids that continued until May 1941, the Nazi leadership was unable to force Great Britain to capitulate, destroy its industry, and undermine the morale of the population. The German command was unable to provide the required amount of landing equipment in a timely manner. The strength of the fleet was insufficient.

However main reason Hitler's refusal to invade Great Britain was the decision he made back in the summer of 1940 on aggression against the Soviet Union. Having begun direct preparations for an attack on the USSR, the Nazi leadership was forced to transfer forces from the West to the East, to direct huge resources for the development of ground forces, and not the fleet necessary to fight against Great Britain. In autumn, the preparations for war against the USSR removed the direct threat of a German invasion of Great Britain. Closely connected with plans to prepare for an attack on the USSR was the strengthening of the aggressive alliance of Germany, Italy, and Japan, which found expression in the signing of the Berlin Pact of 1940 on September 27 (See Berlin Pact of 1940).

In preparation for an attack on the USSR, fascist Germany carried out aggression in the Balkans in the spring of 1941 (see Balkan Campaign of 1941). On March 2, fascist German troops entered Bulgaria, which had joined the Berlin Pact; On April 6, Italo-German and then Hungarian troops invaded Yugoslavia and Greece and occupied Yugoslavia by April 18 and mainland Greece by April 29. Puppet fascist "states" - Croatia and Serbia - were created on the territory of Yugoslavia. From May 20 to June 2, the fascist German command carried out the Crete Airborne Operation of 1941, during which Crete and other Greek islands in the Aegean Sea were captured.

The military successes of fascist Germany in the first period of the war were largely due to the fact that its opponents, who possessed an overall higher industrial and economic potential, were unable to pool their resources, create a unified system of military leadership, and develop unified effective war plans. Their military machine lagged behind the new requirements of the armed struggle and with difficulty resisted more modern methods her conduct. In terms of training, combat training and technical equipment, the Nazi Wehrmacht as a whole surpassed the armed forces of Western states. Insufficient military readiness The latter was connected mainly with the reactionary pre-war foreign policy of their ruling circles, which was based on the desire to negotiate with the aggressor at the expense of the USSR.

By the end of the first period of the war, the bloc of fascist states had sharply increased economically and militarily. Most of continental Europe, with its resources and economy, came under German control. In Poland, Germany seized the main metallurgical and machine-building plants, the coal mines of Upper Silesia, the chemical and mining industries - a total of 294 large, 35 thousand medium and small industrial enterprises; in France - the metallurgical and steel industry of Lorraine, the entire automobile and aviation industry, reserves of iron ore, copper, aluminum, magnesium, as well as cars, precision mechanics, machine tools, rolling stock; in Norway - the mining, metallurgical, shipbuilding industry, enterprises for the production of ferroalloys; in Yugoslavia - copper, bauxite deposits; in the Netherlands, in addition to industrial enterprises, a gold reserve in the amount of 71.3 million florins. total amount material assets looted by fascist Germany in the occupied countries amounted to 9 billion pounds by 1941. By the spring of 1941, more than 3 million foreign workers and prisoners of war were working at German enterprises. In addition, all the weapons of their armies were seized in the occupied countries; for example, only in France - about 5 thousand tanks and 3 thousand aircraft. In 1941, the Nazis equipped 38 infantry, 3 motorized, 1 tank division. More than 4,000 steam locomotives and 40,000 wagons from the occupied countries appeared on the German railway. The economic resources of most European states were put at the service of the war, primarily the war being prepared against the USSR.

In the occupied territories, as well as in Germany itself, the Nazis established a terrorist regime, exterminating all those who were dissatisfied or suspected of discontent. A system of concentration camps was created, in which millions of people were exterminated in an organized manner. The activities of the death camps especially unfolded after the attack of fascist Germany on the USSR. Only in the Auschwitz camp (Poland) over 4 million people were killed. The Nazi command widely practiced punitive expeditions and mass executions of civilians (see Lidice, Oradour-sur-Glane, and others).

Military successes allowed Hitler's diplomacy to expand the boundaries of the fascist bloc, to consolidate the accession to it of Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Finland (which were headed by reactionary governments closely connected with fascist Germany and dependent on it), plant their agents and strengthen their positions in the Middle East, in parts of Africa and Latin America. At the same time, the political self-exposure of the Nazi regime took place, hatred for it grew not only among the general population, but also among the ruling classes of the capitalist countries, and the Resistance Movement began. In the face of the fascist threat, the ruling circles of the Western powers, primarily Great Britain, were forced to revise their previous political course aimed at condoning fascist aggression, and gradually replace it with a course towards the fight against fascism.

Gradually, the US government began to revise its foreign policy course. It increasingly actively supported Great Britain, becoming its "non-belligerent ally". In May 1940, Congress approved an amount of 3 billion dollars for the needs of the army and navy, and in the summer - 6.5 billion, including 4 billion for the construction of a "fleet of two oceans." The supply of arms and equipment for Great Britain increased. According to the law adopted by the US Congress on March 11, 1941, on the transfer of military materials to belligerent countries on loan or lease (see Lend-Lease), Great Britain was allocated 7 billion dollars. In April 1941, the lend-lease law was extended to Yugoslavia and Greece. US troops occupied Greenland and Iceland and established bases there. The North Atlantic was declared a "patrol zone" for the US Navy, which at the same time began to be used to escort merchant ships bound for the UK.

2nd period of the war (June 22, 1941 - November 18, 1942) characterized by a further expansion of its scope and the beginning in connection with the attack of Nazi Germany on the USSR of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45, which became the main and decisive integral part V. m. (for details on actions on the Soviet-German front, see Art.). On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany treacherously and suddenly attacked the Soviet Union. This attack completed the long course of the anti-Soviet policy of German fascism, which sought to destroy the world's first socialist state and seize its richest resources. Against the Soviet Union, fascist Germany threw 77% of the personnel of the armed forces, the bulk of tanks and aircraft, that is, the main most combat-ready forces of the fascist Wehrmacht. Together with Germany, Hungary, Romania, Finland and Italy entered the war against the USSR. The Soviet-German front became the main front of the war. From now on, the struggle of the Soviet Union against fascism decided the outcome of V. m. v., the fate of mankind.

From the very beginning, the struggle of the Red Army exerted a decisive influence on the entire course of the military war, on the entire policy and military strategy of the belligerent coalitions and states. Under the influence of events on the Soviet-German front, the Nazi military command was forced to determine the methods of strategic leadership of the war, the formation and use of strategic reserves, and the system of regroupings between theaters of military operations. During the war, the Red Army forced the Nazi command to completely abandon the doctrine of "blitzkrieg". Under the blows of the Soviet troops, other methods of warfare and military leadership used by the German strategy consistently collapsed.

As a result of the surprise attack, the superior forces of the Nazi troops succeeded in the first weeks of the war in penetrating deeply into Soviet territory. By the end of the first decade of July, the enemy captured Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, a significant part of Ukraine, part of Moldova. However, moving deep into the territory of the USSR, the fascist German troops met the growing resistance of the Red Army and suffered more and more heavy losses. Soviet troops fought steadfastly and stubbornly. Under the leadership of the Communist Party and its Central Committee, the restructuring of the entire life of the country on a military footing began, the mobilization of internal forces to defeat the enemy. The peoples of the USSR rallied into a single fighting camp. The formation of large strategic reserves was carried out, the reorganization of the country's leadership system was carried out. The Communist Party launched work to organize the partisan movement.

Already the initial period of the war showed that the military adventure of the Nazis was doomed to failure. The Nazi armies were stopped near Leningrad and on the river. Volkhov. The heroic defense of Kyiv, Odessa and Sevastopol for a long time fettered the large forces of the Nazi troops in the south. In the fierce battle of Smolensk 1941 (See Battle of Smolensk 1941) (July 10 - September 10) The Red Army stopped the German strike force - Army Group Center, advancing on Moscow, inflicting heavy losses on it. In October 1941, the enemy, having pulled up reserves, resumed the attack on Moscow. Despite initial successes, he failed to break the stubborn resistance of the Soviet troops, who were inferior to the enemy in numbers and military equipment, and break through to Moscow. In tense battles, the Red Army defended the capital under exceptionally difficult conditions, bled the enemy's shock groupings, and in early December 1941 launched a counteroffensive. The defeat of the Nazis in the Battle of Moscow 1941-42 (See the Battle of Moscow 1941-42) (September 30, 1941 - April 20, 1942) buried the fascist plan for a "blitzkrieg", becoming an event of world-historical significance. The battle near Moscow dispelled the myth of the invincibility of the Nazi Wehrmacht, forced fascist Germany to wage a protracted war, contributed to the further consolidation of the anti-Hitler coalition, and inspired all freedom-loving peoples to fight the aggressors. The victory of the Red Army near Moscow meant a decisive turn in military events in favor of the USSR and had a great influence on the entire further course of the V. m.

Having carried out extensive preparations, the Nazi leadership at the end of June 1942 resumed offensive operations on the Soviet-German front. After fierce fighting near Voronezh and in the Donbass, the Nazi troops managed to break into the big bend of the Don. However, the Soviet command managed to withdraw the main forces of the South-Western and Southern fronts from under attack, withdraw them beyond the Don, and thereby frustrate the enemy's plans to encircle them. In mid-July 1942, the Battle of Stalingrad 1942-1943 began (See Battle of Stalingrad 1942-43) - the greatest battle of the V. m. In the course of the heroic defense near Stalingrad in July-November 1942, Soviet troops pinned down the enemy strike force, inflicted heavy losses on it, and prepared the conditions for a counteroffensive. Hitler's troops were not able to achieve decisive success in the Caucasus either (see the article Caucasus).

By November 1942, despite enormous difficulties, the Red Army had achieved major successes. The fascist German army was stopped. A well-coordinated military economy was created in the USSR, the output of military products surpassed the output of military products of fascist Germany. The Soviet Union created the conditions for a radical change in the course of V. m.

The liberation struggle of the peoples against the aggressors created the objective prerequisites for the formation and consolidation of the anti-Hitler coalition. The Soviet government sought to mobilize all forces in the international arena to fight against fascism. On July 12, 1941, the USSR signed an agreement with Great Britain on joint actions in the war against Germany; On July 18, a similar agreement was signed with the government of Czechoslovakia, on July 30 - with the Polish government in exile. On August 9-12, 1941, talks were held on warships near Argentilla (Newfoundland) between British Prime Minister W. Churchill and US President F. D. Roosevelt. Taking a wait-and-see position, the United States intended to limit itself to providing material support (lend-lease) to countries fighting against Germany. Great Britain, urging the United States to enter the war, proposed a strategy of protracted actions by naval and air forces. The goals of the war and the principles of the post-war order of the world were formulated in the Atlantic Charter signed by Roosevelt and Churchill (See Atlantic Charter) (dated August 14, 1941). On September 24, the Soviet Union joined the Atlantic Charter, while expressing its dissenting opinion on certain issues. In late September - early October 1941, a meeting of representatives of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain was held in Moscow, which ended with the signing of a protocol on mutual deliveries.

December 7, 1941 Japan launched a surprise attack on the American military base in the Pacific Ocean, Pearl Harbor unleashed a war against the United States. On December 8, 1941, the USA, Great Britain and a number of other states declared war on Japan. The war in the Pacific and Asia was a product of long-standing and deep-seated Japanese-American imperialist contradictions, which were exacerbated in the course of the struggle for dominance in China and Southeast Asia. The US entry into the war strengthened the anti-Hitler coalition. The military alliance of states fighting against fascism was formalized in Washington on January 1 by the Declaration of 26 States of 1942 (See Declaration of 26 States of 1942). The Declaration proceeded from the recognition of the need to achieve complete victory over the enemy, for which the countries waging war were charged with the obligation to mobilize all military and economic resources, cooperate with each other, and not conclude a separate peace with the enemy. The creation of the anti-Hitler coalition meant the failure of the Nazi plans to isolate the USSR, the consolidation of all world anti-fascist forces.

To develop a joint plan of action, Churchill and Roosevelt held a conference in Washington on December 22, 1941 - January 14, 1942 (under the code name "Arcadia"), during which an agreed course of Anglo-American strategy was determined, based on the recognition of Germany as the main enemy in the war, and area of ​​the Atlantic and Europe - the decisive theater of war. However, assistance to the Red Army, which bore the brunt of the struggle, was planned only in the form of increased air raids on Germany, its blockade and the organization of subversive activities in the occupied countries. It was supposed to prepare an invasion of the continent, but not earlier than 1943, either from the Mediterranean region, or by landing in Western Europe.

At the Washington Conference, the system of general leadership of the military efforts of the Western allies was determined, a joint Anglo-American headquarters was created to coordinate the strategy developed at conferences of heads of government; a unified allied Anglo-American-Dutch-Australian command for the southwestern part of the Pacific was formed, headed by the British Field Marshal A.P. Wavell.

Immediately after the Washington Conference, the Allies began to violate their own established principle of the decisive importance of the European theater of operations. Without developing concrete plans for waging war in Europe, they (primarily the United States) began to transfer more and more forces of the fleet, aviation, and landing craft to the Pacific Ocean, where the situation was unfavorable for the United States.

Meanwhile, the leaders of fascist Germany sought to strengthen the fascist bloc. In November 1941, the "Anti-Comintern Pact" of the fascist powers was extended for 5 years. December 11, 1941 Germany, Italy, Japan signed an agreement on waging war against the United States and Great Britain "to a victorious end" and refusing to sign a truce with them without mutual agreement.

Having disabled the main forces of the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese armed forces then occupied Thailand, Xianggang (Hong Kong), Burma, Malaya with the fortress of Singapore, the Philippines, the most important islands of Indonesia, capturing vast reserves of strategic raw materials in the zone of the southern seas. They defeated the US Asiatic Fleet, part of the British Navy, the Air Force and the Allied ground forces and, having ensured supremacy at sea, deprived the US and Great Britain of all naval and air bases in the Western Pacific Ocean in 5 months of the war. With a strike from the Caroline Islands, the Japanese fleet captured part of New Guinea and the islands adjacent to it, including most of the Solomon Islands, and created the threat of an invasion of Australia (see Pacific campaigns of 1941-45). The ruling circles of Japan hoped that Germany would tie up the forces of the United States and Great Britain on other fronts, and that both powers, after seizing their possessions in Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean, would give up fighting at a great distance from the mother country.

Under these conditions, the United States began to take emergency measures to deploy a military economy and mobilize resources. By transferring part of the fleet from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the United States launched the first retaliatory strikes in the first half of 1942. The two-day battle in the Coral Sea on May 7-8 brought success to the American fleet and forced the Japanese to abandon further offensive in the southwestern Pacific. In June 1942 at Fr. Midway, the American fleet defeated the large forces of the Japanese fleet, which, having suffered heavy losses, was forced to limit its operations and go on the defensive in the Pacific Ocean in the second half of 1942. The patriots of the countries occupied by the Japanese - Indonesia, Indochina, Korea, Burma, Malaya, the Philippines - launched a national liberation struggle against the invaders. In China, in the summer of 1941, a major Japanese offensive against the liberated areas was halted (mainly by the forces of the People's Liberation Army of China).

The actions of the Red Army on the Eastern Front had a growing influence on the military situation in the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and North Africa. Germany and Italy, after the attack on the USSR, were unable to simultaneously conduct offensive operations in other areas. Having transferred the main aviation forces against the Soviet Union, the German command lost the opportunity to actively act against Great Britain, to deliver effective strikes against British sea lanes, fleet bases, and shipyards. This allowed Great Britain to strengthen the construction of the fleet, remove large naval forces from the waters of the mother country and transfer them to ensure communications in the Atlantic.

However, the German fleet soon seized the initiative for a short time. After the US entered the war, a significant part of the German submarines began to operate in the coastal waters of the Atlantic coast of America. In the first half of 1942, the losses of Anglo-American ships in the Atlantic increased again. But the improvement of anti-submarine defense methods allowed the Anglo-American command from the summer of 1942 to improve the situation on the Atlantic sea lanes, launch a series of retaliatory strikes against the German submarine fleet and push it back to the central regions of the Atlantic. From the beginning of V. m. Until the autumn of 1942, the tonnage of merchant ships sunk mainly in the Atlantic of Great Britain, the USA, allies with them and neutral countries exceeded 14 million tons. t.

The transfer of the bulk of the fascist German troops to the Soviet-German front contributed to a radical improvement in the position of the British armed forces in the Mediterranean basin and in North Africa. In the summer of 1941, the British Navy and Air Force firmly seized naval and air supremacy in the Mediterranean theater. Using o. Malta as a base, they sank in August 1941 33%, and in November - more than 70% of the cargo sent from Italy to North Africa. The British command re-formed the 8th Army in Egypt, which on November 18 went on the offensive against the German-Italian troops of Rommel. A fierce tank battle unfolded near Sidi Rezeh, which proceeded with varying success. The depletion of forces forced Rommel on December 7 to begin a withdrawal along the coast to positions at El Agheila.

In late November-December 1941, the German command reinforced its Air Force in the Mediterranean basin and transferred part of the submarines and torpedo boats from the Atlantic. Having inflicted a series of strong blows on the British fleet and its base in Malta, having sunk 3 battleships, 1 aircraft carrier and other ships, the German-Italian fleet and aviation again seized dominance in the Mediterranean Sea, which improved their position in North Africa. January 21, 1942 German-Italian troops suddenly went on the offensive for the British and advanced 450 km to El Ghazala. On May 27, they resumed their offensive with the aim of reaching Suez. With a deep maneuver, they managed to cover the main forces of the 8th Army and capture Tobruk. At the end of June 1942, Rommel's troops crossed the Libyan-Egyptian border and reached El Alamein, where they were stopped without reaching their goal due to exhaustion and lack of reinforcements.

3rd period of the war (November 19, 1942 - December 1943) was a period of a radical turning point, when the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition wrested the strategic initiative from the Axis powers, fully deployed their military potentials and went over to the strategic offensive everywhere. As before, decisive events took place on the Soviet-German front. By November 1942, out of 267 divisions and 5 brigades that Germany had, 192 divisions and 3 brigades (or 71%) were operating against the Red Army. In addition, there were 66 divisions and 13 brigades of German satellites on the Soviet-German front. On November 19, the counteroffensive of the Soviet troops near Stalingrad began. The troops of the Southwestern, Don and Stalingrad fronts broke through the enemy defenses and, having introduced mobile formations, by November 23 surrounded 330,000 troops in the interfluve of the Volga and Don. grouping from the 6th and 4th tank German armies. Soviet troops stubborn defense in the area of ​​the river. Myshkov thwarted an attempt by the Nazi command to release the encircled. The offensive on the middle Don of the troops of the South-Western and left wing of the Voronezh fronts (began on December 16) ended with the defeat of the 8th Italian army. The threat of a strike by Soviet tank formations on the flank of the German deblocking group forced it to start a hasty retreat. By February 2, 1943, the group surrounded by Stalingrad was liquidated. This ended the Battle of Stalingrad, in which from November 19, 1942 to February 2, 1943, 32 divisions and 3 brigades of the Nazi army and German satellites were completely defeated and 16 divisions were bled white. The total losses of the enemy during this time amounted to over 800 thousand people, 2 thousand tanks and assault guns, over 10 thousand guns and mortars, up to 3 thousand aircraft, etc. The victory of the Red Army shocked Nazi Germany, inflicted irreparable damage on its armed forces. damage, undermined the military and political prestige of Germany in the eyes of its allies, increased dissatisfaction with the war among them. The Battle of Stalingrad marked the beginning of a radical change in the course of the entire V. m.

The victories of the Red Army contributed to the expansion of the partisan movement in the USSR, became a powerful stimulus for the further development of the Resistance Movement in Poland, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Greece, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway and other European countries. Polish patriots gradually moved from spontaneous, scattered actions during the beginning of the war to a mass struggle. The Polish communists at the beginning of 1942 called for the formation of a "second front in the rear of the Nazi army." The fighting force of the Polish Workers' Party - the Guards of Ludow became the first military organization in Poland, which led a systematic struggle against the invaders. The creation of a democratic national front at the end of 1943 and the formation on the night of January 1, 1944, of its central body, the Craiova Rada Narodova (see Craiova Rada Narodova), contributed to the further development of the national liberation struggle.

In Yugoslavia in November 1942, under the leadership of the Communists, the formation of the People's Liberation Army began, which by the end of 1942 had liberated one-fifth of the country's territory. And although in 1943 the occupiers carried out 3 major offensives against the Yugoslav patriots, the ranks of active anti-fascist fighters steadily multiplied and grew stronger. Under the blows of the partisans, the Nazi troops suffered ever-increasing losses; the transport network in the Balkans by the end of 1943 was paralyzed.

In Czechoslovakia, on the initiative of the Communist Party, the National Revolutionary Committee was created, which became the central political body of the anti-fascist struggle. The number of partisan detachments grew, and centers of the partisan movement formed in a number of regions of Czechoslovakia. Under the leadership of the HRC, the movement anti-fascist resistance gradually developed into a national uprising.

The French Resistance Movement intensified sharply in the summer and autumn of 1943, after new defeats by the Wehrmacht on the Soviet-German front. Organizations of the Resistance Movement joined the united anti-fascist army created in France - French internal forces, whose number soon reached 500 thousand people.

The liberation movement that unfolded in the territories occupied by the countries of the fascist bloc fettered the Nazi troops, their main forces were bled to death by the Red Army. As early as the first half of 1942, conditions were in place for the opening of a second front in Western Europe. The leaders of the United States and Great Britain undertook to open it in 1942, which was announced in the Anglo-Soviet and Soviet-American communiqués published on June 12, 1942. However, the leaders of the Western powers delayed the opening of the second front, trying to weaken both fascist Germany and the USSR at the same time, in order to establish its dominance in Europe and throughout the world. On June 11, 1942, the British Cabinet rejected a plan for a direct invasion of France across the English Channel under the pretext of difficulties in supplying troops, transferring reinforcements, and a shortage of special landing craft. At a meeting in Washington of the heads of government and representatives of the joint headquarters of the United States and Great Britain in the second half of June 1942, it was decided to abandon the landing in France in 1942 and 1943, and instead carry out an operation to land expeditionary forces in French Northwest Africa (Operation "Torch") and only in the future to begin the concentration of large masses of American troops in the UK (Operation "Bolero"). This decision, which had no solid grounds, provoked a protest from the Soviet government.

In North Africa, British troops, using the weakening of the Italo-German grouping, launched offensive operations. British aviation, which again seized air supremacy in the fall of 1942, sank in October 1942 up to 40% of the Italian and German ships heading for North Africa, and disrupted the regular replenishment and supply of Rommel's troops. On October 23, 1942, General B. L. Montgomery's Eighth Army launched a decisive offensive. Having won an important victory in the battle of El Alamein, for the next three months she pursued Rommel's African Corps along the coast, occupied the territory of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, liberated Tobruk, Benghazi and reached positions at El Agheila.

On November 8, 1942, the landing of the American-British expeditionary forces in French North Africa began (under the overall command of General D. Eisenhower); in the ports of Algiers, Oran, Casablanca, 12 divisions were unloaded (a total of over 150 thousand people). Airborne detachments captured two large airfields in Morocco. After little resistance, the commander-in-chief of the French armed forces of the Vichy regime in North Africa, Admiral J. Darlan, ordered not to interfere with the American-British troops.

The fascist German command, intending to hold North Africa, urgently transferred the 5th Panzer Army to Tunisia by air and sea, which succeeded in stopping the Anglo-American troops and driving them back from Tunisia. In November 1942, fascist German troops occupied the entire territory of France and tried to capture the French Navy (about 60 warships) in Toulon, which, however, was sunk by French sailors.

At the Casablanca Conference of 1943 (see Casablanca Conference of 1943), the leaders of the United States and Great Britain, declaring the unconditional surrender of the "Axis" countries as their ultimate goal, determined further plans for the conduct of the war, which were based on a policy of delaying the opening of a second front. Roosevelt and Churchill considered and approved the strategic plan prepared by the Joint Chiefs of Staff for 1943, which provided for the capture of Sicily in order to put pressure on Italy and create conditions for attracting Turkey as an active ally, as well as an intensified air attack on Germany and the concentration of the largest possible forces to enter the Continent "as soon as German resistance has weakened to the desired level."

The implementation of this plan could not seriously undermine the forces of the fascist bloc in Europe, much less replace the second front, since active operations by the American-British troops were planned in a theater of military operations secondary to Germany. In the main questions of the strategy of V. m. this conference proved fruitless.

The struggle in North Africa went on with varying success until the spring of 1943. In March, the 18th Anglo-American Army Group under the command of the British Field Marshal H. Alexander struck with superior forces and, after lengthy battles, occupied the city of Tunis, and by May 13 forced the Italo-German troops capitulate on the Bon Peninsula. The entire territory of North Africa passed into the hands of the allies.

After the defeat in Africa, the Nazi command expected the Allied invasion of France, not being ready to resist it. However, the allied command was preparing a landing in Italy. On May 12, Roosevelt and Churchill met at a new conference in Washington. The intention was confirmed not to open a second front in Western Europe during 1943 and the approximate date of its opening was set - May 1, 1944.

At this time, Germany was preparing a decisive summer offensive on the Soviet-German front. The Hitlerite leadership sought to defeat the main forces of the Red Army, regain the strategic initiative, and achieve a change in the course of the war. It increased its armed forces by 2 million people. by means of "total mobilization", forced the release of military products, transferred large contingents of troops from various regions of Europe to the Eastern Front. According to the Citadel plan, it was supposed to encircle and destroy Soviet troops in the Kursk salient, and then expand the front of the offensive and capture the entire Donbass.

The Soviet command, having information about the enemy's impending offensive, decided to wear down the Nazi troops in a defensive battle on the Kursk Bulge, then defeat them in the central and southern sectors of the Soviet-German front, liberate the Left-Bank Ukraine, Donbass, eastern regions of Belarus and reach the Dnieper. Significant forces and means were concentrated and skillfully located to solve this problem. The Battle of Kursk 1943, which began on July 5, is one of the greatest battles of the V. m. - immediately developed in favor of the Red Army. The Hitlerite command failed to break the skillful and staunch defense of the Soviet troops with a powerful avalanche of tanks. In a defensive battle on the Kursk Bulge, the troops of the Central and Voronezh Fronts bled the enemy to death. On July 12, the Soviet command launched a counteroffensive of the troops of the Bryansk and Western fronts against the Germans' Oryol bridgehead. On July 16, the enemy began to withdraw. The troops of the five fronts of the Red Army, developing a counteroffensive, defeated the enemy strike groups, opened their way to the Left-Bank Ukraine and the Dnieper. AT Battle of Kursk Soviet troops defeated 30 Nazi divisions, including 7 tank divisions. After this major defeat, the leadership of the Wehrmacht finally lost the strategic initiative, was forced to completely abandon the offensive strategy and go on the defensive until the end of the war. The Red Army, using its major success, liberated the Donbass and the Left-bank Ukraine, crossed the Dnieper on the move (see Dnepr in the article), began the liberation of Belarus. In total, in the summer and autumn of 1943, Soviet troops defeated 218 Nazi divisions, completing a radical turning point in the course of the Great Patriotic War. A catastrophe loomed over Nazi Germany. The total losses of the German ground forces alone from the beginning of the war to November 1943 amounted to about 5.2 million people.

After the end of the struggle in North Africa, the Allies carried out the Sicilian operation of 1943 (See Sicilian operation of 1943), which began on July 10. With absolute superiority of forces at sea and in the air, by mid-August they captured Sicily, and in early September they crossed to the Apennine Peninsula (see Italian campaign 1943-1945 (See Italian campaign 1943-1945)). In Italy, a movement was growing for the elimination of the fascist regime and a way out of the war. As a result of the blows of the Anglo-American troops and the growth of the anti-fascist movement, Mussolini's regime fell at the end of July. He was replaced by the government of P. Badoglio, who signed an armistice with the United States and Great Britain on September 3. In response, the Nazis brought additional contingents of troops into Italy, disarmed the Italian army and occupied the country. By November 1943, after the Anglo-American landings in Salerno, the fascist German command withdrew its troops to S., in the area of ​​Rome, and entrenched itself on the line of the river. Sangro and Carigliano, where the front has stabilized.

AT Atlantic Ocean by the beginning of 1943, the positions of the German fleet were weakened. The Allies ensured their superiority in surface forces and naval aviation. The large ships of the German fleet could now operate only in the Arctic Ocean against convoys. Given the weakening of its surface fleet, the Nazi naval command, headed by Admiral K. Dönitz, who replaced the former fleet commander E. Raeder, shifted the focus to the actions of the submarine fleet. Having commissioned more than 200 submarines, the Germans inflicted a series of heavy blows on the allies in the Atlantic. But after the highest success achieved in March 1943, the effectiveness of German submarine attacks began to decline rapidly. The growth in the size of the allied fleet, the use of new technology for detecting submarines, and the increase in the range of naval aviation predetermined the growth of losses in the German submarine fleet, which were not replenished. Shipbuilding in the United States and Great Britain now provided an excess of the number of newly built ships over those sunk, the number of which had decreased.

In the Pacific Ocean in the first half of 1943, after the losses suffered in 1942, the belligerents accumulated forces and did not conduct extensive operations. Japan more than tripled its aircraft output compared to 1941, and its shipyards laid down 60 new ships, including 40 submarines. The total strength of the Japanese armed forces increased by 2.3 times. The Japanese command decided to stop further advance in the Pacific Ocean and consolidate what was captured by going on the defensive on the lines of the Aleutian, Marshall, Gilbert Islands, New Guinea, Indonesia, Burma.

The United States also intensively deployed military production. 28 new aircraft carriers were laid down, several new operational formations were formed (2 field and 2 air armies), many special units; military bases were built in the South Pacific. The forces of the United States and its allies in the Pacific were consolidated into two operational groups: the central part of the Pacific (Admiral C.W. Nimitz) and the southwestern part of the Pacific (General D. MacArthur). The groups included several fleets, field armies, marines, aircraft carrier and base aviation, mobile naval bases, etc., in total - 500 thousand people, 253 large warships (including 69 submarines) , over 2 thousand combat aircraft. The US Navy and Air Force outnumbered the Japanese. In May 1943, units of the Nimitz group occupied the Aleutian Islands, securing American positions in the north.

In connection with the great summer successes of the Red Army and the landing in Italy, Roosevelt and Churchill held a conference in Quebec (August 11-24, 1943) to refine military plans again. The leaders of both powers proclaimed the main intention "to achieve in the shortest possible time unconditional surrender European countries“Axis””, for which, through an air offensive, to achieve “undermining and disorganization on an ever-increasing scale of the military-economic power of Germany”. On May 1, 1944, it was planned to launch Operation Overlord to invade France. In the Far East, it was decided to expand the offensive in order to capture bridgeheads, from which it would then be possible, after the defeat of the European countries of the "axis" and the transfer of forces from Europe, to strike Japan and defeat it "within 12 months after the end of the war with Germany." The plan of action chosen by the allies did not meet the objectives of ending the war in Europe as soon as possible, since active operations in Western Europe were not expected until the summer of 1944.

Carrying out plans for offensive operations in the Pacific, the Americans continued the battles for the Solomon Islands that began as early as June 1943. Having mastered about New George and a bridgehead on about. Bougainville, they brought their bases in the South Pacific closer to the Japanese, including the main Japanese base - Rabaul. At the end of November 1943, the Americans occupied the Gilbert Islands, which were then turned into a base for preparing an attack on the Marshall Islands. MacArthur's group in stubborn battles captured most of the islands in the Coral Sea, the eastern part of New Guinea and deployed a base here for an attack on the Bismarck Archipelago. By removing the threat of a Japanese invasion of Australia, she secured US sea lanes in the area. As a result of these actions, the strategic initiative in the Pacific passed into the hands of the Allies, who eliminated the consequences of the defeat of 1941-42 and created the conditions for an offensive against Japan.

The national liberation struggle of the peoples of China, Korea, Indo-China, Burma, Indonesia, and the Philippines expanded ever more. The communist parties of these countries rallied partisan forces in the ranks of the National Front. People's Liberation Army and partisan detachments China, having resumed active operations, liberated the territory with a population of about 80 million people.

The rapid development of events in 1943 on all fronts, especially on the Soviet-German front, required the Allies to clarify and coordinate plans for the conduct of the war for the next year. This was done at the November 1943 conference in Cairo (see the Cairo Conference of 1943) and the Tehran Conference of 1943 (see the Tehran Conference of 1943).

At the Cairo Conference (November 22-26), the delegations of the United States (head of the delegation F. D. Roosevelt), Great Britain (head of the delegation W. Churchill), China (head of the delegation Chiang Kai-shek) considered plans for waging war in Southeast Asia, which provided for limited goals: the creation of bases for the subsequent offensive against Burma and Indochina and the improvement of air supply to Chiang Kai-shek's army. Questions of military action in Europe were seen as secondary; The British leadership proposed to postpone Operation Overlord.

At the Tehran conference (November 28 - December 1, 1943) of the heads of government of the USSR (head of the delegation I. V. Stalin), the USA (head of the delegation F. D. Roosevelt) and Great Britain (head of the delegation W. Churchill) military questions were in the center of attention. The British delegation proposed a plan to invade Southeast Europe through the Balkans, with the participation of Turkey. The Soviet delegation proved that this plan did not meet the requirements of the fastest defeat of Germany, because operations in the Mediterranean area were "operations of secondary importance"; With its firm and consistent position, the Soviet delegation forced the Allies to once again recognize the paramount importance of the invasion of Western Europe, and "Overlord" - the main operation of the Allies, which should be accompanied by an auxiliary landing in southern France and distracting actions in Italy. For its part, the USSR pledged to enter the war with Japan after the defeat of Germany.

The report on the conference of the heads of government of the three powers said: “We have come to full agreement on the scale and timing of the operations to be undertaken from the east, west and south. The mutual understanding we have reached here guarantees us victory.”

At the Cairo Conference held on December 3-7, 1943, the delegations of the United States and Great Britain, after a series of discussions, recognized the need to use landing craft destined for Southeast Asia in Europe and approved a program according to which the most important operations in 1944 should be Overlord and Anvil ( landing in the south of France); the conference participants agreed that "in no other part of the world should any action be taken that could hinder the success of these two operations." This was an important victory for Soviet foreign policy, its struggle for the unity of action of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition and the military strategy based on this policy.

4th period of the war (January 1, 1944 - May 8, 1945) was the period when the Red Army, in the course of a powerful strategic offensive, expelled the Nazi troops from the territory of the USSR, liberated the peoples of Eastern and Southeastern Europe, and, together with the armed forces of the allies, completed the defeat of Nazi Germany. At the same time, the offensive of the armed forces of the United States and Great Britain in the Pacific Ocean continued, and the people's liberation war in China intensified.

As in previous periods, the main burden of the struggle was borne by the Soviet Union, against which the fascist bloc continued to hold its main forces. By the beginning of 1944, the German command of 315 divisions and 10 brigades that it had had 198 divisions and 6 brigades on the Soviet-German front. In addition, there were 38 divisions and 18 brigades of satellite states on the Soviet-German front. In 1944, the Soviet command planned an offensive along the front from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, with the main attack in the southwestern direction. In January - February, the Red Army, after a 900-day heroic defense, liberated Leningrad from the blockade (see the Battle of Leningrad 1941-44). By spring, having carried out a number of major operations, Soviet troops liberated the Right-Bank Ukraine and Crimea, reached the Carpathians and entered the territory of Romania. In the winter campaign of 1944 alone, the enemy lost 30 divisions and 6 brigades from the blows of the Red Army; 172 divisions and 7 brigades suffered heavy losses; human losses amounted to more than 1 million people. Germany could no longer make up for the damage it had suffered. In June 1944, the Red Army struck the Finnish army, after which Finland requested an armistice, an agreement on which was signed on September 19, 1944 in Moscow.

The grandiose offensive of the Red Army in Belarus from June 23 to August 29, 1944 (see the Belarusian operation of 1944) and in Western Ukraine from July 13 to August 29, 1944 (see the Lvov-Sandomierz operation of 1944) ended with the defeat of the two largest strategic groups of the Wehrmacht in the center of the Soviet -German front, breakthrough of the German front to a depth of 600 km, the complete destruction of 26 divisions and the infliction of heavy losses on 82 Nazi divisions. Soviet troops reached the border of East Prussia, entered the territory of Poland and approached the Vistula. Polish troops also took part in the offensive.

In Chelm, the first Polish city liberated by the Red Army, on July 21, 1944, the Polish Committee of National Liberation was formed - a temporary executive body of people's power, subordinate to the Craiova Rada Narodova. In August 1944, the Home Army, following the order of the Polish government in exile in London, which sought to seize power in Poland before the Red Army approached and restore pre-war order, launched the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. After 63 days of heroic struggle, this uprising, undertaken in an unfavorable strategic environment, was defeated.

The international and military situation in the spring and summer of 1944 developed in such a way that a further delay in the opening of the second front would lead to the liberation of all of Europe by the forces of the USSR. This prospect worried the ruling circles of the United States and Great Britain, who sought to restore the pre-war capitalist order in the countries occupied by the Nazis and their allies. In London and Washington, they began to rush to prepare for an invasion of Western Europe across the English Channel in order to seize bridgeheads in Normandy and Brittany, ensure the landing of expeditionary troops, and then liberate northwestern France. In the future, it was supposed to break through the "Siegfried Line", which covered the German border, cross the Rhine and advance deep into Germany. The Allied expeditionary forces under the command of General Eisenhower by the beginning of June 1944 had 2.8 million people, 37 divisions, 12 separate brigades, "commando detachments", about 11 thousand combat aircraft, 537 warships and a large number of transports and landing craft.

After defeats on the Soviet-German front, the fascist German command could keep in France, Belgium and the Netherlands as part of Army Group West (Field Marshal G. Rundstedt) only 61 weakened, poorly equipped divisions, 500 aircraft, 182 warships. The allies had, in the same way, absolute superiority in forces and means.

On June 6, the Normandy landing operation of 1944 began. The second front in Europe was opened when the outcome of the war was already a foregone conclusion as a result of the victories won by the Soviet Union in single combat with Nazi Germany and its allies. But even after the creation of the second front, the main military forces of Germany continued to be on the Soviet-German front, and the decisive importance of the latter in winning victory over fascism did not diminish. In the summer of 1944, out of 324 divisions and 5 brigades that Nazi Germany had, there were 179 German divisions and 5 brigades on the Soviet-German front, as well as 49 divisions and 18 brigades of its allies, while in France, Belgium and the Netherlands there were 61, and in Italy 26.5 German divisions. Nevertheless, the opening of a second front was an important event in the history of military warfare, which confirmed the possibility of coordinated offensive operations by members of the anti-fascist coalition against a common enemy. Until the end of June, the landing troops occupied a bridgehead with a width of about 100 km and up to 50 km in depth. On July 25, the Allies went on the offensive from this bridgehead, delivering the main blow with the 1st American Army from the Saint-Lo area. After a successful breakthrough, the Americans occupied Brittany and, together with the 2nd British and 1st Canadian armies, defeated the main forces of the Norman German group near Falaise, defeating 6 divisions here. At the end of August, the allies, with the active support of the units of the French Resistance Movement, reached the Seine and occupied the whole of northwestern France. Under the blows of the allied troops advancing from Normandy and the American-French forces that landed on the coast of southern France on August 15, the Nazi command began the withdrawal of troops from France to the Siegfried Line. Pursuing the Germans, the American-British troops, with the active support of the French partisans, reached this line by mid-September, but attempts to break through it on the move failed.

The Red Army, continuing a powerful offensive, liberated the Baltic states between July and November 1944, defeating 29 Nazi divisions here (see the Baltic operation of 1944), and in the south in the Iasi-Kishinev operation of 1944 (See Iasi-Kishinev operation of 1944 ) inflicted a complete defeat on the Southern Ukraine Army Group, destroying 18 divisions and freeing Romania. As a result of the popular armed uprising that broke out in Romania on August 23, the anti-popular regime of Y. Antonescu was liquidated (see People's Armed Uprising of August 23, 1944). On September 12, an armistice agreement between the USSR, the USA and Great Britain with Romania was signed in Moscow. The entry of the Red Army troops into Bulgaria hastened the popular uprising that was imminent in the country, which took place on September 9 (see September People's Armed Uprising of 1944). During the uprising, the ruling monarcho-fascist clique was overthrown and the government of the Fatherland Front was formed. The peoples liberated with the help of the Red Army were given the opportunity to embark on the path of democratic development and social transformation and to contribute to the defeat of fascism. Romania and Bulgaria declared war on Nazi Germany. Soviet troops, together with the Romanian and Bulgarian troops, launched an offensive in the Carpathian, Belgrade and Budapest directions. Moving to help, the Soviet troops, together with the Czechoslovak units on September 20, 1944, crossed the border, marking the beginning of the liberation of Czechoslovakia. At the same time, the Red Army, together with units of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia and Bulgarian troops, set about liberating Yugoslavia (see the Belgrade operation of 1944). In October 1944 the Red Army began the liberation of Hungary. The position of Nazi Germany deteriorated sharply. Its Eastern Front, especially its southern flank, was collapsing.

On the Western Front, the fascist German command launched a counteroffensive in the Ardennes in December 1944. It intended to strike at Antwerp to cut the Anglo-American troops and defeat them. In the course of the Ardennes operation of 1944-45 (See Ardennes operation of 1944-45), the fascist German army group "B" managed to break through as deep as 90 km and defeat the 1st American Army. Having transferred large forces of troops and aviation from other sectors of the front, the allied command stopped the advance of the enemy. However, the situation on the western front remained tense. The transition of the Red Army at the request of the allies to the offensive on January 12-14, 1945 on the front from the Baltic to the Carpathians forced the Nazi command to abandon the continuation of the offensive in the Ardennes. Under the growing pressure of the Anglo-American troops, the German troops retreated to their original positions.

In Italy, the Anglo-American 15th Army Group only in May 1944 managed to break through the German defenses south of Rome and, uniting with the landing force landed earlier at Anzio, occupy the Italian capital. Pursuing the retreating German Army Group C, the Anglo-American 15th Army Group in a narrow sector then overcame the defenses on the so-called Gotha Line and in the autumn reached the Ravenna-Bergamo line, where it stopped the offensive until the spring of 1945. Thus, by the end of 1944, the Allies occupied France, Belgium, part of the Netherlands, central Italy and some areas of western Germany.

By the beginning of 1945, the economic and military resources of Nazi Germany were depleted. From the middle of 1944, military production fell rapidly, having lost its main sources of raw materials. The increasing intensity of the bombardment of industrial facilities of fascist Germany, which did not give the expected effect in 1943, in 1944-45 began to cause significant damage to the German economy.

However, the fascist ruling elite did not lose hope for a possible split in the anti-Hitler coalition and tried in every possible way to drag out the war. But these attempts were in vain. At the Crimean Conference of 1945, held in the first half of February, the heads of government of the USSR (JV Stalin), the USA (F. D. Roosevelt), and Great Britain (W. Churchill) agreed on military plans that provided for complete and the final defeat of fascist Germany, and also determined the leading principles of policy in matters of organizing the post-war world and international security. The tasks of destroying German militarism and Nazism, creating guarantees that Germany would never be able to disturb the peace were proclaimed. It was supposed to disarm and disband the German armed forces, forever destroy the German General base, liquidate German military equipment, punish war criminals, oblige Germany to compensate for the damage caused to the Allied countries, disband the Nazi Party and other fascist organizations and institutions. The conference determined the forms of control of defeated Germany by the allied powers. The Soviet government confirmed the agreement given at the Teheran Conference to take part in the war against Japan.

By January 1945, Germany had 299 divisions and 31 brigades, of which 169 divisions and 20 brigades were German, 16 divisions and 1 brigade were Hungarian. Anglo-American troops were opposed by 107 German divisions.

The goal of the Red Army was to finish off the Nazi Wehrmacht, complete the liberation of the countries of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe and, together with the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition, force Germany to unconditional surrender. In January - early February, during the Vistula-Oder operation of 1945, Soviet troops defeated the grouping of the Nazi army between the Vistula and the Oder, liberated a significant part of the territory of Poland, destroyed 35 enemy divisions, inflicted heavy losses on 25 divisions . In the East Prussian Operation of 1945, Soviet troops defeated the Nazi East Prussian grouping, occupied East Prussia, liberated part of northern Poland and the Baltic coast, defeating 25 Nazi divisions. On the southern wing of the Soviet-German front, Soviet troops repulsed a strong counteroffensive of the fascist German troops in Hungary, captured Budapest (see Budapest Operation 1944-45), liberated Hungary, and began the liberation of Austria. The offensive operations of the Red Army in February - the first half of April 1945 (see the East Pomeranian operation of 1945) frustrated the plans of the Nazi command and created favorable conditions for the final blow in the Berlin direction.

At the same time, the Allies launched an offensive on the Western Front and in Italy. Since the fascist German command threw the main forces against the Red Army, the offensive of the Anglo-American troops, which had an absolute superiority of forces, especially in tanks and aircraft, was carried out with increasing speed and without significant losses. In the first half of March 1945, the German troops were forced to withdraw beyond the Rhine. Pursuing them, American, British and French troops reached the Rhine and created bridgeheads near Remagen and south of Mainz. The Allied command decided to launch two blows in the general direction of Koblenz in order to encircle the fascist German army group "B" in the Ruhr. On the night of March 24, the allies crossed the Rhine on a broad front, bypassed the south-east. The Ruhr and in early April surrounded 20 German divisions and 1 brigade. The German Western Front ceased to exist. The Anglo-American troops continued their rapid offensive in all directions, which soon turned into an unimpeded advance of the troops. In the second half of April - early May, the allies reached the Elbe, occupied Erfurt, Nuremberg, entered Czechoslovakia and western Austria. On April 25, the advanced units of the 1st American Army met with Soviet troops at Torgau. In early May, British troops reached Schwerin, Lübeck and Hamburg.

In the first half of April, the Allies launched an offensive in Northern Italy. After a series of battles, with the support of Italian partisans, they occupied Bologna and crossed the river. By. At the end of April, under the blows of the allied troops and the influence of the popular uprising that engulfed all of northern Italy (see the April uprising of 1945), the German troops began to retreat rapidly, and on May 2 the German Army Group C capitulated.

Berlin was the last center of resistance to Nazi Germany. In early April, the Nazi command pulled the main forces to the Berlin direction, creating a large grouping: about 1 million people, over 10 thousand guns and mortars, 1.5 thousand tanks and assault guns, 3.3 thousand combat aircraft.

In order to defeat the Berlin grouping in a short time, Supreme High Command The Soviet Armed Forces concentrated in three fronts - the 1st and 2nd Belorussian, 1st Ukrainian - 2.5 million people, over 41 thousand guns and mortars, more than 6.2 thousand tanks and self-propelled guns, 7.5 thousand combat aircraft. In the course of the Berlin Operation of 1945, grandiose in scope and tension, which began on April 16, Soviet troops broke the desperate resistance of the Nazi troops. On April 28, the Berlin group was cut into three parts, on April 30 the Reichstag fell, and on May 1, the mass surrender of the garrison began. On the afternoon of May 2, the struggle for Berlin ended in a complete victory for the Soviet troops.

The Red Army, advancing on a broad front, completed the liberation of the countries of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. Having expelled the Nazis from Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, the eastern regions of Czechoslovakia, the Red Army, together with the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia, liberated Yugoslavia from the invaders; Soviet troops liberated a significant part of Austria. In carrying out its liberation mission, the Soviet Union met with the warm sympathy and active support of the European peoples, all the democratic and anti-fascist forces of the occupied countries and Germany's former allies. The entry of Soviet troops into the territory of the states of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe contributed to their social and political transformation, fettered the reaction and favorably affected the strengthening of democratic forces.

The storming of Berlin and its fall meant the end of the fascist Reich. In the West, capitulation soon took on a massive character. But on the Eastern Front, the fascist German troops continued, wherever they could, fierce resistance. The goal of the Dönitz government created after Hitler's suicide (April 30) was to conclude an agreement on "partial surrender" with the USA and Great Britain without stopping the fight against the Red Army. The most powerful grouping of fascist troops - the Army Groups "Center" and "Austria" - Dönitz ordered not to stop hostilities in Czechoslovakia and at the same time withdraw "everything that is possible" to the west. Field Marshal F. Schörner, who led this grouping, received an order from the high command "to continue the fight against the Soviet troops as long as possible."

To eliminate the Schörner group and help the popular uprising in Prague, the Soviet Supreme High Command organized the offensive of the 1st, 2nd and 4th Ukrainian fronts. With the defeat of Schörner's troops and the liberation of Prague (May 9), units of the Red Army, together with Czechoslovak formations with the participation of the Polish and Romanian armies and Czechoslovak partisans, ended the Prague operation of 1945 - the last operation in Europe in the Great Patriotic War.

As early as May 3, on behalf of Dönitz, Admiral Friedeburg established contact with the British commander, Field Marshal Montgomery, and obtained consent to the surrender of German troops “individually” to the British. On May 4, an act was signed on the surrender of German troops in the Netherlands, northwestern Germany, Schleswig-Holstein and Denmark. On May 5, the fascist German Army Groups "E", "G" and the 19th Army, operating in southern and western Austria, Bavaria, Tyrol, capitulated to the Anglo-American command. At 2 h 41 min. On the night of May 7, General A. Jodl, on behalf of the German command, signed at Eisenhower's headquarters in Reims the terms of unconditional surrender, which came into force on May 9 at 00:01. The Soviet government expressed a categorical protest against this unilateral act, so the Allies agreed to consider it a preliminary protocol of surrender. It was decided to sign the act of unconditional surrender in Berlin with the participation of the USSR, which bore the brunt of the war on its shoulders.

At midnight on May 8, in the Karlshorst suburb of Berlin, occupied by Soviet troops, representatives of the German high command, headed by V. Keitel, signed an act of unconditional surrender of the armed forces of Nazi Germany; unconditional surrender was accepted on behalf of the Soviet government by Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov together with representatives of the USA, Great Britain and France.

In the Pacific Ocean at the beginning of 1944, the Allied armed forces, outnumbering the Japanese in personnel by 1.5 times, in aviation by 3 times, in ships of various classes by 1.5-3 times, launched an offensive in the direction of the Philippines. The Nimitz group advanced through the Marshall and Mariana Islands, the MacArthur group along the northern coast of New Guinea. The Japanese command, having gone on the defensive in the Pacific Ocean, sought to strengthen its ground forces in central and southern China.

In early February 1944, the Americans, without encountering serious resistance, invaded the Marshall Islands. The Japanese attempt to strengthen the 2nd line of defense (the Bonin Islands, the Marianas, New Guinea) failed due to heavy aviation losses, which forced the Japanese 2nd Fleet, the main force of this defense, to be withdrawn from the Truk base (Caroline Islands) to 3 ., where a base was established on the Tavitavi Islands (Sulawesi Sea) near the oil sources of Kalimantan (Borneo). The capture of the Marshall Islands meant a breakthrough in the Japanese defenses in the center of the Pacific Ocean and allowed the Americans to establish bases for an attack against the Mariana Islands, which followed in June 1944 after careful preparation. Particularly heavy fighting unfolded on about. Saipan, where the Japanese resisted for a month. An attempt by the Japanese fleet to launch a counterattack from the Tawitawi base was thwarted. The Japanese fleet suffered heavy losses, especially in aircraft carriers, which finally deprived the Japanese command of the chance to improve the situation in the air. The capture by the Americans of the Mariana Islands by mid-August deprived Japan of maritime ties with the South Seas, with New Guinea and the most important strongholds in the center of the Pacific Ocean. MacArthur's group, which captured the Admiralty Islands in February-April 1944, set up an air force base on them and secured control over the Bismarck archipelago occupied by the Japanese and the approaches to New Guinea. In April - May, having landed troops, the Americans captured most of New Guinea and the islands to the west of it. This led to the unification of the actions of the Nimitz and MacArthur groups and made it possible to begin preparations for an invasion of the Philippines, which the Japanese command intended to hold at any cost, since their capture posed a direct threat to the mother country.

At the beginning of the Philippine operation (October 1944), MacArthur's group, having complete superiority over the Japanese in naval forces and more than double in infantry and aviation, occupied about. Leite. An attempt by the main forces of the Japanese fleet to launch a counteroffensive from Singapore and the bases of the metropolis led to a naval battle in the Philippine Islands (October 24-25), which ended in the defeat of the Japanese fleet and the occupation by the Americans of all the islands of the Philippine archipelago, except for about. Luzon. All the most important Japanese maritime communications that connected Japan with its main raw material base in the South Seas were under the control of the United States. The supply of oil from Indonesia and Malaya has almost ceased. The Japanese military industry, based on limited stocks of strategic raw materials, could not compensate for the heavy losses of the fleet and aviation. The Japanese command, having lost half of the fleet and most of the aviation, began to widely use aircraft with suicide pilots ("kamikaze") to fight the American fleet. In January - August 1945, the Americans occupied about. Luzon.

In China, in the spring of 1944, the Japanese armies went on the offensive against the troops of Chiang Kai-shek in Henan Province and achieved major successes. The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) addressed the government of Chiang Kai-shek with a proposal to coordinate actions. Chiang Kai-shek rejected these proposals, which were in the interests of the entire nation, and demanded that the CPC give up leadership of the liberated regions and disband 4/5 of the communist-led armed forces. No agreement was reached between the CCP and the Kuomintang. Despite this, the People's Liberation Army of China launched a counteroffensive in Henan province and from the territory of the liberated areas in the rear of the Japanese army, pinning down large forces of the Japanese troops. However, due to poor technical equipment and a lack of weapons, the People's Liberation Army of China was unable to stop the Japanese offensive in the south. As a result, the Japanese seized the communication linking the northern regions of China with the southern ones, and through Korea - with the Japanese islands. This gave the Japanese command the opportunity to use the railway to transport strategic raw materials from Southeast Asia.

During 1944, Allied forces succeeded in liberating Indian territory and most of northern Burma from the Japanese and cutting off the railroad from Rangoon to the north, as well as the highway linking Burma with southern China.

In February - March 1945, the US 5th Fleet captured about. Iwo Jima. The air base created here made it possible to sharply increase the power of air raids on Japan. On April 1, after a long preparation, the allies launched an assault on about. Okinawa. Despite the overwhelming superiority in forces and means, the Americans could not break the resistance of the 32nd Japanese Army for a long time. In order to disrupt the landing, the Japanese command sent suicide pilots against the American fleet, who sank 36 and damaged 368 warships, brought the 2nd fleet (10 ships) into battle, which, however, was destroyed on April 7 by American aircraft south of about. Kyushu. In June 1945, the allied forces occupied Okinawa, which made it possible to bring the basing even closer. American aviation to Japan and launch a broad air offensive against its economic centers.

At the same time, Allied troops and local partisans liberated Burma, most of Indonesia, and many regions of Indochina, which completely undermined Japanese positions in these regions and in the western Pacific Ocean.

5th period of the war (May 9 - September 2, 1945)- the final period of the war in the Far East and in the Pacific Ocean, which led to the end of the V. m.

At the Potsdam Conference of 1945, which took place from June 17 to August 2 (see Potsdam Conference of 1945), the heads of government of the USSR (head of the delegation J. V. Stalin), the USA (head of the delegation G. Truman) and Great Britain (head of the delegation W. Churchill, from July 28 - K. Attlee) it was decided to demilitarize, denazify and democratically reorganize Germany, destroy German monopoly associations. The three powers confirmed their intention to completely disarm Germany, to liquidate all German industry that could be used for war production. The Soviet delegation confirmed that the USSR would enter the war against Japan. On July 26, on behalf of the heads of government of Great Britain, the United States and China, the Potsdam Declaration of 1945 was published, containing the demand for the surrender of Japan. The Japanese government rejected this demand. On August 6 and 9, the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing and maiming about 1/4 million civilians. It was a barbaric atrocity, not caused by the demands of war, and served only to intimidate other peoples and states. The Japanese armed forces continued to resist. The Soviet Union's entry into the war against Japan on August 9, 1945, decided its outcome in favor of the Allies. Soviet troops in the Far East to conduct combat operations against Japan were consolidated into 3 fronts - Transbaikal, 1st and 2nd Far Eastern, which had 76 divisions, 4 tank and mechanized corps and 29 brigades. Mongolian formations acted together with the Soviet troops. In total, the group included over 1.5 million people. Japanese troops concentrated in Manchuria, Korea, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands numbered 49 divisions and 27 brigades (a total of 1.2 million people). As a result of the rapid defeat of the Japanese Kwantung Army, the Soviet troops liberated the northeastern part of China, North Korea, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. The successful actions of the Red Army stimulated the development of a broad national liberation movement in Southeast Asia. On August 17, 1945, the Indonesian Republic was established, and on September 2, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

On September 2, 1945, the Japanese government signed an act of unconditional surrender. Thus ended the six-year struggle of the freedom-loving peoples against fascism.

Results of V. m. The Second World War had a huge impact on the fate of mankind. It was attended by 61 states (80% of the world's population). Military operations were conducted on the territory of 40 states. 110 million people were mobilized into the armed forces. The total human losses reached 50-55 million people, of which 27 million people were killed on the fronts. Military spending and military losses totaled $4 trillion. Material costs reached 60-70% of the national income of the warring states. Only the industry of the USSR, USA, Great Britain and Germany produced 652.7 thousand aircraft (combat and transport), 286.7 thousand tanks, self-propelled guns and armored vehicles, over 1 million artillery pieces, over 4.8 million machine guns (without Germany), 53 million rifles, carbines and machine guns and a huge amount of other weapons and equipment. The war was accompanied by colossal destruction, destruction of tens of thousands of towns and villages, incalculable disasters of tens of millions of people.

During the course of the war, the forces of imperialist reaction failed to achieve their main goal - to destroy the Soviet Union, to suppress the communist and working-class movement throughout the world. In this war, which marked the further deepening of the general crisis of capitalism, fascism, the striking force of international imperialism, was completely defeated. The war irrefutably proved the irresistible strength of socialism and the Soviet Union, the world's first socialist state. The words of V. I. Lenin were confirmed: “They will never defeat the people in which the workers and peasants for the most part recognize, feel and see that they are defending their own, Soviet power - the power of the working people, that they are defending the cause, the victory of which they and them will provide children with the opportunity to enjoy all the benefits of culture, all the creations of human labor” (Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 38, p. 315).

The victory won by the anti-Hitler coalition with the decisive participation of the Soviet Union contributed to revolutionary transformations in many countries and regions of the world. The balance of forces between imperialism and socialism has undergone a radical change in favor of the latter. Exodus V. m. facilitated and accelerated the victory of people's democratic and socialist revolutions in a number of countries. The countries of Europe, numbering more than 100 million people, embarked on the path of socialism. The capitalist system was undermined in Germany itself: after the war, the GDR was formed - the first socialist state on German soil. The states of Asia, numbering about 1 billion people, fell away from the capitalist system. Later, Cuba was the first in America to follow the path of socialism. Socialism has become a world system - a decisive factor in the development of mankind.

The war influenced the development of the national liberation movement of the peoples, which led to the disintegration of the colonial system of imperialism. As a result of a new upsurge in the liberation struggle of the peoples, which began after the Second World War, almost 97% of the population (data for 1971), who lived by the end of the Second World War, freed themselves from colonial oppression. in the colonies. The peoples of the developing countries launched a struggle against neo-colonialism and for progressive development.

In the capitalist countries, the process of revolutionizing the masses has accelerated, the influence of the communist and workers' parties has increased; the world communist and workers' movement has risen to a new, higher level.

The Soviet Union played a decisive role in the victory over Nazi Germany. On the Soviet-German front, the main military forces of the fascist coalition were destroyed - a total of 607 divisions. Anglo-American troops defeated and captured 176 divisions. The German armed forces lost about 10 million people on the Eastern Front. (about 77% of all their losses in military combat), 62 thousand aircraft (62%), about 56 thousand tanks and assault guns (about 75%), about 180 thousand guns and mortars (about 74% ). The Soviet-German front was the longest of the war fronts. The duration of hostilities on the Soviet-German front was 1418 days, on the North African - 1068 days, on the Western European - 338 days, on the Italian - 663 days. Active operations on the Soviet-German front reached 93% of the total time of armed struggle, while on the North African - 28.8%, West European - 86.7%, Italian - 74.2%.

From 62 to 70% of the active divisions of fascist Germany and its allies (from 190 to 270 divisions) were on the Soviet-German front, while the Anglo-American troops in North Africa in 1941-43 were opposed by 9 to 20 divisions, in Italy in 1943-45 - from 7 to 26 divisions, in Western Europe after the opening of the second front - from 56 to 75 divisions. In the Far East, where the main forces of the Japanese Navy and Air Force were operating against the allied armed forces, the bulk of the ground forces were concentrated on the borders of the USSR, in China, Korea, and on the Japanese islands. By defeating the elite Kwantung Army in Manchuria, the Soviet Union made a major contribution to the victorious conclusion of the war with Japan.

V. m. demonstrated the decisive advantage of the socialist economy over the capitalist one. The socialist state was able to profoundly and comprehensively rebuild the economy in accordance with the requirements of the war, ensure the rapid growth of military production, make extensive use of material, financial, and labor resources for the needs of war and reconstruction. National economy in areas subjected to occupation, creating conditions for the post-war development of the country. The Soviet Union successfully solved the most difficult problem of rearmament and logistical support of the armed forces, relying only on its own economic resources. Having surpassed fascist Germany during the war years in all indicators of the production of weapons, the Soviet Union won an economic victory, which predetermined the military victory over fascism during the entire war of war.

V. m. It was conducted by huge masses of ground forces, numerous and powerful sea and air fleets, equipped with diverse military equipment, in which the highest achievements of military-technical thought of the 40s were embodied. In the long and intense battles of the colossal groupings of the armed forces of the two coalitions, the methods of armed struggle developed, and new forms of it were developed. V. m. - the largest stage in the development of military art, construction and organization of the armed forces.

The greatest and most comprehensive experience was acquired by the Soviet Armed Forces, whose military art was of an advanced nature (for details, see the article The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union 1941-45). Waging a tense struggle against a strong enemy, the personnel of the Soviet Armed Forces showed high military skill and mass heroism. During the war, a galaxy of outstanding Soviet military leaders emerged, including the Marshals of the Soviet Union A. M. Vasilevsky, L. A. Govorov, G. K. Zhukov, I. S. Konev; R. Ya. Malinovsky, K. K. Rokossovsky, F. I. Tolbukhin and many others.

The armed forces of the United States, Great Britain, and Japan carried out major operations in which various types of armed forces participated. Significant experience was gained in planning and managing such operations. The landing in Normandy was the largest amphibious operation of the military, in which all branches of the armed forces took part. In the land theaters, the military art of the Allies was characterized by the desire to create an absolute superiority in technology, mainly in aviation, and go on the offensive only after the complete suppression of the enemy's defenses. Significant experience was gained in operating in special conditions (in deserts, mountains, jungles), as well as experience in strategic offensive operations of the Air Force against the economic and political centers of Germany and Japan. On the whole, bourgeois military art developed significantly, but it was to a certain extent one-sided, since the main forces of fascist Germany were on the Soviet-German front and the armed forces of the United States and Great Britain fought mainly against a weakened enemy.

Source and lit.: Lenin V.I., Imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism, Poln. coll. soch., 5th ed., v. 27; his own, Imperialism and the split of socialism, ibid., vol. 30; his, Socialism and War, ibid., vol. 26; his, War and Revolution, ibid., vol. 32; his, War and Russian Social Democracy, ibid., vol. 26; Documents and materials on the eve of the Second World War, vol. 1-2, M., 1948; Correspondence of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR with the Presidents of the United States and Prime Ministers of Great Britain during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, vol. 1-2, M., 1957; Foreign policy of the Soviet Union during the Patriotic War, vol. 1-3, M., 1946-47; Soviet-French relations during the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945. Documents and materials, M., 1959; Soviet-Czechoslovak relations during the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945. Documents and materials, M., 1960; Tehran. Yalta. Potsdam. Sat. documents, 2nd ed., M., 1970; History of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, vol. 1-6, M., 1960-65; World War II, 1939-1945, M., 1958; Great Patriotic War Soviet Union 1941-1945. Brief history, 2nd ed., M., 1970; Against the falsification of the history of the Second World War. Sat. Art., M., 1964; The Second World War. materials scientific conference, dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany, vol. 1-3, M., 1966; Israelyan V. L., Anti-Hitler coalition, M., 1965; Projector D. M., Aggression and catastrophe, M., 1968; Deborin G. A., World War II, M., 1958; Fomin V. T., Imperialist aggression against Poland in 1939, M., 1952; Smirnov V.P., "Strange War" and the defeat of France, M., 1963; Kulish V. M., Second front, M., 1960; his own, Revealed Mystery, M., 1965; Melnikov D. E., The conspiracy of July 20, 1944 in Germany, M., 1965; Filatov G.S., Mussolini's Eastern Campaign, M., 1968; The lessons of history are irrefutable, M., 1964: Pushkas A.I., Hungary during the Second World War, M., 1966; Kuznets Yu. L., US Entry into World War II, M., 1962; Tippelskirch K., History of the Second World War, trans. from German., M., 1956; Fuller, J., World War II 1939-1945, trans. from English, M., 1956; Liddell-Gart BG, Strategy of indirect actions, trans. from English, M., 1957; Documents of British foreign policy, 1919-1939, L., 1949-55; Foreign Relations of the United States, Wash., 1967; Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht, Bd 1-4, Fr./M., 1961-65; Churchill, W.S., The Second World War, v. 1-6, L., 1948-54; Eisenhower D., Crusade in Europa, N. Y., 1948; Gaulle Ch. de, Memoires de Guerre, v. 1-3, P., 1954-59 (in Russian translation - Military memoirs, vol. 1-2, M., 1957-60); Montgomery B., El Alamein to the River Sangro, L., 1948; Morison S., History of United States naval operations in World War II, v. 2-10, Boston-Oxf., 1947-56; Müller-Hillebrand B., Das Heer 1933-1945, Bd 1-3, Fr./M., 1954-68; Osgood R., Ideals and self-interest in America's foreign relations, Chi., 1953; Kennan G., American diplomacy 1900-1950, 12 ed., N. Y., 1963; Baldwin H., The great mistakes of the war, L., 1950; Taylor A., ​​The origins of the second world war, 2 ed., L., 1966; The eve of war 1939, L., 1958; Görlitz W., Der deutsche Generalstab, Fr./M., 1953: Beard Ch., American foreign policy in the making 1932-1940, New Haven, 1946; Tansill Ch., Back door to war, Chi., 1952; Barnick J., Die deutschen Trümpfe, Stuttg., 1958; Meinecke F., Die deutsche Katastrophe, Wiesbaden, 1947; Hiligruber A. und Hümmelchen G., Chronik des Zweiten Weltkrieges, Fr./M., 1966.

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World War II Clockwise from top: Allied forces land in Normandy on D-Day; soldiers of the Red Army raise the Banner of Victory over the Reichstag; the gates of the Auschwitz concentration camp; Stalingrad after the battle; atomic bombings... Wikipedia

World War II 1939-45- SECOND WORLD WAR 193945, a war prepared by the forces of the International. imperialist reactions and unleashed Ch. aggressive state you fash. Germany, fascist Italy and militaristic Japan. 61 states were drawn into the war, St. 80%… … Great Patriotic War 1941-1945: Encyclopedia Read More

The Second World War(September 1, 1939 - September 2, 1945) is a military conflict between two world military-political coalitions.

It has become the largest armed conflict in mankind. 62 states took part in this war. About 80% of the entire population of the Earth participated in hostilities on one side or another.

We bring to your attention a brief history of World War II. From this article you will learn the main events associated with this terrible tragedy on a global scale.

First period of World War 2

September 1, 1939 The armed forces entered the territory. In this regard, after 2 days, they declared war on Germany.

The Wehrmacht troops did not meet decent resistance from the Poles, as a result of which they managed to occupy Poland in just 2 weeks.

At the end of April 1940, the Germans also occupied Denmark. After that, the army annexed. It is worth noting that none of the listed states could adequately resist the enemy.

Soon the Germans attacked France, which was also forced to capitulate in less than 2 months. This was a real triumph for the Nazis, since at that time the French had good infantry, aviation and navy.

After the conquest of France, the Germans turned out to be head and shoulders stronger than all their opponents. In the process of conducting the French campaign, Germany became an ally, headed by.

After that, Yugoslavia was also captured by the Germans. Thus, Hitler's lightning offensive allowed him to occupy all the countries of Western and Central Europe. Thus began the history of World War II.

Then the Nazis began to seize African states. The Fuhrer planned to conquer countries on this continent within a few months, and then launch an offensive in the Middle East and India.

At the end of this, according to Hitler's plans, the reunification of the German and Japanese troops was to take place.

Second period of World War 2

The battalion commander leads his soldiers on the attack. Ukraine, 1942

This came as a complete surprise to Soviet citizens and the country's leadership. As a result, the USSR united against Germany.

Soon, this union was joined by those who agreed to provide military, food and economic assistance. As a result, countries have been able to rationally use their own resources and support each other.

Stylized photo "Hitler vs Stalin"

At the end of the summer of 1941, British and Soviet troops entered, as a result of which Hitler had certain difficulties. Because of this, he was unable to place military bases there, necessary for the full conduct of the war.

Anti-Hitler coalition

January 1, 1942 in Washington, representatives of the Big Four (USSR, USA, Great Britain and China) signed the Declaration of the United Nations, thus initiating Anti-Hitler coalition. Later, 22 more countries joined it.

The first serious defeats of Germany in World War II began with the Battle of Moscow (1941-1942). Interestingly, Hitler's troops approached the capital of the USSR so close that they could already see it through binoculars.

Both the German leadership and the entire army were confident that they would soon defeat the Russians. Napoleon once dreamed of the same thing, entering during the year in.

The Germans were so overconfident that they didn't even bother with appropriate winter gear for their soldiers, because they thought the war was almost over. However, everything turned out quite the opposite.

The Soviet army made heroic deed, starting an active offensive against the Wehrmacht. He commanded the main military operations. It was thanks to the Russian troops that the blitzkrieg was thwarted.

A column of captured Germans on the Garden Ring, Moscow, 1944

During this period, Soviet soldiers won one victory after another over the Wehrmacht. Soon they were able to completely liberate the territory of the USSR. Moreover, the Red Army played a crucial role in the liberation of most European countries.

On June 6, 1944, one of the most significant events in the history of the Second World War took place. Anglo-American troops landed in Normandy and opened a second front. In this regard, the Germans had to leave many territories and retreat back.

In February 1945, the famous Yalta Conference took place, at which the leaders of three states took part:, and. On it were raised critical issues associated with the post-war structure of the world.

In the winter of 1945, the countries of the Anti-Hitler coalition continued their offensive against Nazi Germany. And although the Germans sometimes managed to win certain battles, in general they understood that the history of the Second World War was coming to an end, and would be taken in the near future.

Soviet soldiers in the trenches on the outskirts of Berlin. In the background is a captured German grenade launcher "Panzerfaust", 1945.

In 1945, during the North Italian operation, the allied forces managed to take control of the entire territory of Italy. It is worth noting that the Italian partisans actively helped them in this.

Meanwhile, Japan continued to suffer serious losses at sea, and was forced to retreat to its borders.

On the eve of the end of World War II, the Red Army won brilliant victories in the Berlin and Paris operations. Thanks to this, it was possible to finally defeat the remnants of the German groups.

Red Army soldier Shirobokov met his sisters who had escaped death. Their father and mother were shot by the Germans

On May 8, 1945, Germany surrendered unconditionally, and the next day, May 9, was proclaimed Victory Day.

Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel signing the act of unconditional surrender of the German Wehrmacht at the headquarters of the 5th Shock Army in Karlshorst, Berlin

Cries of jubilation were heard in all the streets of the country, and tears of joy were visible on the faces of people. The last time in a similar way to China .

The military operation, which lasted less than 1 month, ended with the surrender of Japan, which was signed on September 2. The biggest war in human history is over.

Results of World War II

As mentioned earlier, World War II is the largest military conflict in history. It lasted for 6 years. During this time, more than 50 million people died in total, although some historians give even higher numbers.

The USSR suffered the most damage from the Second World War. The country lost about 27 million citizens, and also suffered severe economic losses.

On April 30, at 22:00, the Banner of Victory was hoisted over the Reichstag

In conclusion, I would like to say that the Second World War is a terrible lesson for all mankind. Until now, a lot of documentary photo and video material has been preserved, helping to see the horrors of that war.

What is worth - the angel of death of the Nazi camps. But she was not alone!

People should do everything possible so that such tragedies of a universal scale never happen again. Never again!

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