The event world war II (part 1)
Pre-war events
Italian invasion of Ethiopia (1935)
Main article: Second Italo-Abyssinian War
The Second Italo–Abyssinian War was a brief colonial war that began in October 1935 and ended in May 1936. The war was fought between the armed forces of the Kingdom of Italy (Regno d'Italia) and the armed forces of the Ethiopian Empire (also known as Abyssinia). The war resulted in the military occupation of Ethiopia and its annexation into the newly created colony of Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana, or AOI); in addition, it exposed the weakness of the League of Nations as a force to preserve peace. Both Italy and Ethiopia were member nations, but the League did nothing when the former clearly violated the League's own Article X.[29]
Spanish Civil War (1936–39)
Main article: Spanish Civil War
Hitler and Mussolini lent much military and financial support to the Nationalist insurrection led by general Francisco Franco in Spain. The Soviet Union supported the existing government, the Spanish Republic, which showed leftist tendencies. Furthemore, over 30,000 foreign volunteers, known as theInternational Brigades fought against Franco. Both Germany and the USSR used this proxy war as an opportunity to test improved weapons and tactics. The deliberate Bombing of Guernica by the German Condor Legion in April 1937 contributed to widespread concerns that the next major war would include extensive terror bombing attacks on civilians.[30][31] While there were some minor pockets of resistance, the Nationalist front declared victory on 1 April 1939.[32] It should be noted that five months later, Germany attacked Poland, initiating World War II.
Japanese invasion of China (1937)
Main article: Second Sino-Japanese War
In July 1937, Japan captured the former Chinese imperial capital of Beijing after instigating the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, which culminated in the Japanese campaign to invade all of China.[33] The Soviets quickly signed a non-aggression pact with China to lend materiel support, effectively ending China's prior cooperation with Germany. Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek deployed his best army to defend Shanghai, but after three months of fighting, Shanghai fell. The Japanese continued to push the Chinese forces back, capturing the capital Nanking in December 1937 and committed the Nanking Massacre.
In June 1938, Chinese forces stalled the Japanese advance by flooding the Yellow River; this manoeuvre bought time for the Chinese to prepare their defenses at Wuhan, but the city was taken by October.[34] Japanese military victories did not bring about the collapse of Chinese resistance that Japan had hoped to achieve, instead the Chinese government relocated inland to Chongqing and continued the war.[35]
Japanese invasion of the Soviet Union and Mongolia (1938)
See also: Nanshin-ron and Soviet–Japanese border conflicts
On 29 July 1938, the Japanese invaded the USSR and were checked at the Battle of Lake Khasan. Although the battle was a Soviet victory, the Japanese dismissed it as an inconclusive draw, and on 11 May 1939 decided to move the Japanese-Mongolian border up to the Khalkhin Gol River by force. After initial successes the Japanese assault on Mongolia was checked by the Red Army that inflicted the first major defeat on the JapaneseKwantung Army.[36][37]
These clashes convinced some factions in the Japanese government that they should focus on conciliating the Soviet government to avoid interference in the war against China and instead turn their military attention southward, towards the US and European holdings in the Pacific, and also prevented the sacking of experienced Soviet military leaders such as Georgy Zhukov, who would later play a vital role in the defence of Moscow.[38]
European occupations and agreements
Further information: Anschluss, Appeasement, Munich Agreement, German occupation of Czechoslovakia, and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
In Europe, Germany and Italy were becoming bolder. In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria, again provoking little response from other European powers.[39] Encouraged, Hitler began pressing German claims on the Sudetenland, an area of Czechoslovakia with a predominantly ethnic Germanpopulation; and soon France and Britain conceded this territory to Germany in the Munich Agreement, which was made against the wishes of the Czechoslovak government, in exchange for a promise of no further territorial demands.[40] Soon after that, however, Germany and Italy forced Czechoslovakia to cede additional territory to Hungary and Poland.[41] In March 1939, Germany invaded the remainder of Czechoslovakia and subsequently split it into the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and the pro-German client state, the Slovak Republic.[42]
Alarmed, and with Hitler making further demands on Danzig, France and Britain guaranteed their support for Polish independence; when Italy conquered Albania in April 1939, the same guarantee was extended to Romania and Greece.[43] Shortly after the Franco-British pledge to Poland, Germany and Italy formalised their own alliance with the Pact of Steel.[44]
In August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact,[45] a non-aggression treaty with a secret protocol. The parties gave each other rights, "in the event of a territorial and political rearrangement," to "spheres of influence" (western Poland and Lithuania for Germany, andeastern Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Bessarabia for the USSR). It also raised the question of continuing Polish independence.[46]
Course of the war
War breaks out in Europe (1939–40)
On 1 September 1939, Germany and Slovakia (which was a German client state at the time) attacked Poland.[47] On 3 September France and Britain, followed by the fully independent Dominions[48] of the British Commonwealth,[49] – Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa – declared war on Germany, but provided little support to Poland other than a small French attack into the Saarland.[50] Britain and France also began a naval blockade of Germany on 3 September which aimed to damage the country's economy and war effort.[51][52]
On 17 September, after signing a cease-fire with Japan, the Soviets also invaded Poland.[53] Poland's territory was divided between Germany and the Soviet Union, with Lithuania and Slovakia also receiving small shares. The Poles did not surrender; they established a Polish Underground State and an undergroundHome Army, and continued to fight with the Allies on all fronts outside Poland.[54]
About 100,000 Polish military personnel were evacuated to Romania and the Baltic countries; many of these soldiers later fought against the Germans in other theatres of the war.[55] Poland's Enigma codebreakers were also evacuated to France.[56] During this time, Japan launched its first attack against Changsha, a strategically important Chinese city, but was repulsed by late September.[57]
Following the invasion of Poland and a German-Soviet treaty governing Lithuania, the Soviet Union forced the Baltic countries to allow it to station Soviet troops in their countries under pacts of "mutual assistance."[58][59][60] Finland rejected territorial demands and was invaded by the Soviet Union in November 1939.[61]The resulting conflict ended in March 1940 with Finnish concessions.[62] France and the United Kingdom, treating the Soviet attack on Finland as tantamount to entering the war on the side of the Germans, responded to the Soviet invasion by supporting the USSR's expulsion from the League of Nations.[60]
In Western Europe, British troops deployed to the Continent, but in a phase nicknamed the Phoney War by the British and "Sitzkrieg" (sitting war) by the Germans, neither side launched major operations against the other until April 1940.[63] The Soviet Union and Germany entered a trade pact in February 1940, pursuant to which the Soviets received German military and industrial equipment in exchange for supplying raw materials to Germany to help circumvent the Allied blockade.[64]
In April 1940, Germany invaded Denmark and Norway to secure shipments of iron ore from Sweden, which the Allies were about to disrupt.[65] Denmarkimmediately capitulated, and despite Allied support, Norway was conquered within two months.[66] In May 1940 Britain invaded Iceland to preempt a possible German invasion of the island.[67] British discontent over the Norwegian campaign led to the replacement of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlainwith Winston Churchill on 10 May 1940.[68]
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