This document provides an overview of World War 2, covering major events from the interwar period in the 1920s-1930s through the end of the war. It discusses the failures of the League of Nations and international agreements in the interwar period, the rise of fascism in Germany and Italy, key battles in Europe and the Pacific, major conferences between Allied leaders, the development and use of the atomic bomb against Japan, war crimes trials after the war, and the emergence of the US and USSR as superpowers afterwards.

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3. The Versailles Treaty

4. A Weak League of Nations

5. The Ineffectiveness of the
League of Nations
 No control of major conflicts.
 No progress in disarmament.
 No effective military force.

6. International Agreements
Washington Conference
- 9 Power Treaty – Stoppage of
Naval buildup
4 Power Treaty – Jap, US, Br, Fr
- Stop fortifications in the Pacific
5 Power Treaty – add Italy
Kellogg-Briand Pact – 1928
 Makes war illegal as a tool of
diplomacy
 No enforcement provisions

7. The Great Depression

8. Japan Invades Manchuria, 1931

9. Italy Attacks Ethiopia, 1935
Emperor
Haile
Selassie

10. Germany Invades the
Rhineland
March 7, 1936

11. U. S. Neutrality Acts:
1934, 1935, 1937, 1939

12. America-First Committee
Charles Lindbergh

13. Rome-Berlin Axis, 1936
The “Pact of Steel”

14. The Spanish Civil War: 1936 - 1939
The American “Lincoln Brigade”

15. The Spanish Civil War: 1936 - 1939
Francisco Franco

16. The Spanish Civil War:
A Dress Rehearsal for WW II?
Italian troops in
Madrid

17. The Japanese Invasion
of China, 1937

18. The Austrian Anschluss, 1938

19. The “Problem” of the
Sudetenland

20. Appeasement: The Munich
Agreement, 1938
British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain
Now we have “peace in our time!” Herr
Hitler is a man we can do business with.

21. Czechoslovakia Becomes Part of
the Third Reich: 1939

22. The Nazi-Soviet
Non-Aggression Pact, 1939
Foreign Ministers
von Ribbentrop & Molotov

24. Poland Attacked: Sept. 1, 1939
Blitzkrieg [“Lightening War”]

25. German Troops March into Warsaw

26. Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis, 1940
The Tripartite Pact

28. European Theater of Operations

29. The “Phoney War” Ends:
Spring, 1940

30. France Surrenders
June, 1940

31. A Divided France
Henri Petain

32. The French Resistance
The Free French
General Charles
The Maquis DeGaulle

33. Now Britain Is All Alone!

34. U. S. Lend-Lease Act,
1941
Great Britain.........................$31 billion
Soviet Union..........................$11 billion
France..................................$3 billion
China..................................$1.5 billion
Other European......................$500 million
South America.......................$400 million
The amount totaled: $48,601,365,000

35. Lend-Lease

36. Battle of Britain:
The “Blitz”

37. Battle of Britain:
The “Blitz”

38. The London “Tube”:
Air Raid Shelters during the Blitz

39. The Royal Air Force

40. British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill

41. The Atlantic Charter
 Roosevelt and
Churchill sign
treaty of
friendship in
August 1941.
 Solidifies alliance.
 Fashioned after
Wilson’s 14 Points.
 Calls for League of
Nations type
organization.

42. Operation Barbarossa:
Hitler’s Biggest Mistake

43. Operation Barbarossa:
June 22, 1941
 3,000,000 German soldiers.
 3,400 tanks.

44. The “Big Three”
Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, Joseph Stalin

45. Axis Powers in 1942

46. Battle of Stalingrad:
Winter of 1942-1943
German Army Russian Army
1,011,500 men 1,000,500 men
10,290 artillery guns 13,541 artillery guns
675 tanks 894 tanks
1,216 planes 1,115 planes

47. The North Africa Campaign:
The Battle of El Alamein, 1942
Gen. Ernst Rommel,
The “Desert Fox”
Gen. Bernard
Law
Montgomery
(“Monty”)

48. The Italian Campaign
[“Operation Torch”] :
Europe’s “Soft Underbelly”
 Allies plan
assault on
weakest Axis
area - North
Africa - Nov.
1942-May 1943
 George S.
Patton leads
American troops
 Germans
trapped in
Tunisia -
surrender over
275,000 troops.

49. The Allies Liberate Rome:
June 5, 1944

50. Gen. Eisenhower Gives the Orders
for D-Day [“Operation Overlord”]

51. D-Day (June 6, 1944)

52. Normandy Landing
(June 6, 1944)
Higgins Landing Crafts
German Prisoners

53. TThe Liberation of Paris:
August 25, 1944
De Gaulle in
Triumph!

54. U. S. Troops in Paris, 1944

55. The Battle of the Bulge:
Hitler’s Last Offensive
Dec. 16, 1944
to
Jan. 28, 1945

56. Yalta: February, 1945
 FDR wants quick Soviet entry into Pacific
war.
 FDR & Churchill concede Stalin needs
buffer, FDR & Stalin want spheres of
influence and a weak Germany.
 Churchill wants
strong Germany
as
buffer
against Stalin.
 FDR argues
for a ‘United
Nations’.

57. Mussolini &
His Mistress,
Claretta
Petacci
Are Hung in
Milan, 1945

58. US & Russian Soldiers Meet at
the Elbe River: April 25, 1945

59. Horrors of the Holocaust
Exposed

60. Horrors of the Holocaust
Crematoria
at
Majdanek
Entrance to
Auschwitz:
Work Makes You
Free
Exposed

61. Horrors of the Holocaust
Exposed
Eli Wiesel
Slave Labor at Buchenwald

62. Horrors of the Holocaust Exposed
Mass Graves at Bergen-Belsen

63. Hitler’s “Secret Weapons”:
Too Little, Too Late!
V-1 Rocket:
“Buzz Bomb”
V-2 Rocket Werner von Braun

64. Hitler Commits Suicide
April 30, 1945
The Führer’s Bunker
Cyanide & Pistols
Mr. & Mrs. Hitler

65. V-E Day (May 8, 1945)

67. Pearl Harbor

68. Pearl Harbor from the Cockpit
of a Japanese Pilot

69. Pearl Harbor - Dec. 7, 1941
A date which will live in infamy!

70. President Roosevelt Signs the
US Declaration of War

71. USS Arizona, Pearl Harbor

72. Pearl Harbor Memorial
2,887 Americans Dead!

73. Pacific Theater of Operations

74. Paying for the War

75. Paying for the War

76. Paying for the War

77. U.S. Surrenders at Corregidor,
the Philippines [March, 1942]

78. Bataan Death March: April, 1942
76,000 prisoners [12,000 Americans]
Marched 60 miles in the blazing heat to POW
camps in the Philippines.

79. Bataan: British Soldiers
AA
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PPOOWW

80. Allied Counter-Offensive:
“Island-Hopping”

81. “Island-Hopping”: US Troops
on Kwajalien Island

82. Farthest Extent
of Japanese Conquests

83. Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle:
First U. S. Raids on Tokyo, 1942

84. Battle of the Coral Sea:
May 7-8, 1942

85. Battle of Midway Island:
June 4-6, 1942

86. Battle of Midway Island:
June 4-6, 1942

87. Japanese Kamikaze Planes:
The Scourge of the South Pacific
Kamikaze Pilots
Suicide
Bombers

88. Gen. MacArthur “Returns” to
the Philippines! [1944]

89. US Marines on Mt. Surbachi,
Iwo Jima [Feb. 19, 1945]

90. Potsdam Conference:
July, 1945
 FDR dead, Churchill out of office as Prime
Minister during conference.
 Stalin only original.
 The United States
has the A-bomb.
 Allies agree Germany
is to be divided into
occupation zones
 Poland moved
around to suit
the Soviets.
P.M. Clement President Joseph
Atlee Truman Stalin

91. The Manhattan Project:
Los Alamos,
NM
Dr. Robert
Oppenheimer
I am become
death,
the shatterer
of worlds!
Major General
Lesley R. Groves

92. Tinian Island, 1945
Little Boy FFaatt MMaann
Enola Gay Crew

93. Col. Paul Tibbets & the A-Bomb

94. Hiroshima – August 6, 1945
© 70,000 killed
immediately.
© 48,000 buildings.
destroyed.
© 100,000s died of
radiation poisoning &
cancer later.

95. The Beginning of the
Atomic Age

96. Nagasaki – August 9, 1945
© 40,000 killed
immediately.
© 60,000 injured.
© 100,000s died of
radiation poisoning
& cancer later.

97. Japanese A-Bomb Survivors

98. Hiroshima Memorials

99. V-J Day (September 2, 1945)

100. Japanese POWs, Guam

101. V-J Day in Times Square, NYC

103. WW II Casualties: Europe
Each symbol
indicates 100,000
dead in the
appropriate theater
of operations

104. WW II Casualties: Asia
Each symbol
indicates 100,000
dead in the
appropriate theater
of operations

105. WW II
Casualties
CCoouunnttrryy MMeenn iinn wwaarr BBaattttllee ddeeaatthhss WWoouunnddeedd
AAuussttrraalliiaa 11,,000000,,000000 2266,,997766 118800,,886644
AAuussttrriiaa 880000,,000000 228800,,000000 335500,,111177
BBeellggiiuumm 662255,,000000 88,,446600 5555,,55113311
BBrraazziill22 4400,,333344 994433 44,,222222
BBuullggaarriiaa 333399,,776600 66,,667711 2211,,887788
CCaannaaddaa 11,,008866,,33443377 4422,,00442277 5533,,114455
CChhiinnaa33 1177,,225500,,552211 11,,332244,,551166 11,,776622,,000066
CCzzeecchhoosslloovvaakkiiaa —— 66,,66883344 88,,001177
DDeennmmaarrkk —— 44,,333399 ——
FFiinnllaanndd 550000,,000000 7799,,004477 5500,,000000
FFrraannccee —— 220011,,556688 440000,,000000
GGeerrmmaannyy 2200,,000000,,000000 33,,225500,,00000044 77,,225500,,000000
GGrreeeeccee —— 1177,,002244 4477,,229900
HHuunnggaarryy —— 114477,,443355 8899,,331133
IInnddiiaa 22,,339933,,889911 3322,,112211 6644,,335544
IIttaallyy 33,,110000,,000000 114499,,44996644 6666,,771166
JJaappaann 99,,770000,,000000 11,,227700,,000000 114400,,000000
NNeetthheerrllaannddss 228800,,000000 66,,550000 22,,886600
NNeeww ZZeeaallaanndd 119944,,000000 1111,,66225544 1177,,000000
NNoorrwwaayy 7755,,000000 22,,000000 ——
PPoollaanndd —— 666644,,000000 553300,,000000
RRoommaanniiaa 665500,,00000055 335500,,00000066 ——
SSoouutthh AAffrriiccaa 441100,,005566 22,,447733 ——
UU..SS..SS..RR.. —— 66,,111155,,00000044 1144,,001122,,000000
UUnniitteedd KKiinnggddoomm 55,,889966,,000000 335577,,11116644 336699,,226677
UUnniitteedd SSttaatteess 1166,,111122,,556666 229911,,555577 667700,,884466
YYuuggoossllaavviiaa 33,,774411,,000000 330055,,000000 442255,,000000
1. Civilians only.
2. Army and navy figures.
3. Figures cover period July 7,
1937 to Sept. 2, 1945,
and concern only Chinese
regular troops. They do not
include casualties suffered
by guerrillas and local
military corps.
4. Deaths from all causes.
5. Against Soviet Russia;
385,847
against Nazi Germany.
6. Against Soviet Russia;
169,822
against Nazi Germany.
7. National Defense Ctr.,
Canadian
Forces Hq., Director of
History.

106. Massive Human Dislocations

107. The U.S. & the U.S.S.R.
Emerged as the Two Superpowers
of the later 20c

108. The Bi-Polarization of Europe:
The Beginning of the Cold War

109. The Division of Germany:
1945 - 1990

110. The Creation of the U. N.

111. The Nuremberg War Trials:
Crimes Against Humanity

112. Japanese War Crimes Trials
GGeenneerraall
HHiiddeekkii TToojjoo
BBiioo--CChheemmiiccaall
EExxppeerriimmeennttss

113. 7 Future American Presidents
Served in World War II

114. The Race for
Space

115. Early Computer Technology
Came Out of WW II
Mark I, 1944
Colossus, 1941
Admiral Grace Hooper,
1944-1992
COBOL language

116. The De-Colonization of
European Empires