PHASES of World War II

One of the most important conflicts in the history of mankind is the WWII. It was a war that pitted all the great world powers against each other in numerous battles, bringing million deaths, and being considered the most traumatic event in the history of humanity. Like any war conflict, World War II went through many phases, depending on how the war will be carried out or who participated in it. For all this, in this lesson of a Teacher we must talk about the phases of the Second World War.

Index

1. What was World War II?
2. Blitzkrieg, the first of the phases of World War II
3. The start of the world war
4. The Allied Counteroffensive
5. The end of World War II

The WWII It was a military conflict on a global scale that took place in many areas throughout the world. between the years 1939 and 1945. It began with the German invasion of Poland and ended with the Allied conquest of Berlin. The scale of this war was such that all the great powers of the world participated

The war faced two great alliances:

• Axis Powers led by Germany, Japan and Italy as defenders of fascism
• allies, led by the United Kingdom, France, the USSR and the United States, all of them being liberal and communist nations that faced Nazism and fascism.

World War IIl caused more than 100 million deaths, being considered the war with the highest number of deaths in history and during its course, moments as serious as the Holocaust or the invention of nuclear weapons.

The first of all the phases of the Second World War is possibly the most important and well-known. Is named Blitzkrieg, because of Nazi attack quickly to the most important points for victory in the war. We can place chronologically between 1939 and 1940, being, therefore, the beginning of the war.

By 1939, Hitler had managed to become total leader of Nazi Germany. Through violence, propaganda and violence he had finished with the opposition, thereby managing to name himself fuhrer in what was clearly a dictatorship for life in his name.

Hitler's idea, defended by a large part of the population and its allies, was that Germany had been humiliated by France and the United Kingdom for years, since after being defeated in the First World War he had had to pay tribute and lose territory. Therefore, Hitler and the Nazis defend that entering the war is not an attack, but it was only to recover what they thought was theirs, to end the humiliation.

Nazi Germany's first attack was against Czechoslovakia, a nation that had a small region where Germans lived and Hitler used this small part of the population as an excuse. Hitler said that the Germans suffered inequalities from the Czechs, so he conquered all of Czechoslovakia, beginning his conquests.

But Hitler did not stop at Czechoslovakia. The German leader set his sights on the Polish area of ​​Gdansk, a place that, like Czechoslovakia, had a small German population, asking the Poles to give the area to Germany under threat of attack. The Polish government refused, asking for help from France and the United Kingdom, who told Germany that if they entered Poland it would start a war. few months after that, Hitler attacked Poland and it was the start of World War II.

The start of the war was a hit-and-run attack by Hitler. Germany conquered in a short time all of Poland, ignoring the declarations of war by France and the United Kingdom. At the same time, the Axis Powers, allies of Germany, began their own blitzkrieg, with Italy conquering Albania and Libya, and Japan taking parts of China.

Germany continued its blitzkrieg attacks quickly taking over countries like Luxembourg, Belgium or the Netherlands. But the real target of the lightning attack was something else, much more important: the France. In a huge, swift attack, the Germans invaded France and, before long, occupied the French capital and much of the country, setting up a puppet government known as Vichy France.

After the conquest of France, the war relaxed into a time of constant bombing between the Germans and the English in a situation that seemed to be good for the Germans.

Until 1940 the war had been European. But in 1941 and 1942 begins the second of the phases of the Second World War, since the war entered an international scene, with the entry of enormous powers from other continents that were going to change the game.

On the European continent, Germany's victory seemed assured. because, after taking France, there was no other similar force on European soil. So the Germans could take all the regions they wanted, either through battles or peace treaties to set up puppet governments.

Hitler's attack on the USSR

At that point Hitler had the idea to attack the USSR, since although both nations had a non-aggression agreement. The reality is that Hitler hated the Communists and Slavs on the same level as the Jews. In the summer of 1941, the Germans launched the Operation Barbarossa, whose objective was to carry out another lightning attack and take the USSR. P

But Russia was very big and the leaders of the USSR were prepared for a possible German attack, so were able to stop the invasion until the arrival of winter, at which time the Germans had to flee the area. The plan was a failure, and with it the USSR entered the Allied side in the war against the Germans.

The Pacific Front: Japan vs. USA.

On the other hand, there was the Pacific Front, where Japan and the United States clashed. At first, the United States did not enter the war and Japan was busy conquering China.

But the Japanese attacked the American base in Pearl Harbor, leading to the entry of the United States into the war and starting the battle for the Pacific between both powers. The Americans helped China, greatly weakened by the Japanese, being key to Japan's strength decrease.

Italy and the Balkans

And the last relevant area was where Italy was located, being the Balkans and North Africa. Hitler's idea was that controlling these areas was vital to avoid surprise attacks by the Allies, but the weakness of Italy meant that they could not control the area for too long.

The third phase of the Second World War is the one that corresponds to the allied counteroffensive. And it is that, after achieving important victories in all areas, the Allies began a counteroffensive against the Axis Powers, with the United States and the USSR already on the allied side and, therefore, with a greater number of troops.

After expelling the Germans, the USSR launched a counteroffensive against Germany occupying many of the areas that the Germans had conquered, such as Belarus, causing what Hitler feared so much: being surrounded by the Allies and the Russians.

In the African zone, the allied victories were greater and greater until Italy was left with no choice but to flee to its own country. The Allies did not stop and attacked the Italian Peninsula, forcing the Italian government to agree with them and abandon Hitler. The betrayal made Hitler moved part of his troops to Italy, happening a conflict between Allies and Germans, each being supported by a group of Italians.

Taking advantage of the fact that Hitler had to move troops, the British and Americans carried out the Normandy's landing, in which a huge number of troops made a surprise attack from Normandy, managing to liberate France, Belgium and the Netherlands from German hands in a short time.

Both in the African zone and in the continental zone, the Allies were winning, and the same thing happened in the peaceful, in which the union of the United States and China had caused the Japanese to withdraw towards their own nation.

To conclude this lesson on the phases of World War II we must talk about the last of these, being the final in which the allies won the war.

After winning numerous battles, the Allies managed to recover all the regions conquered by the Germans, forcing the Germans to flee to Germany. English, French, Americans and Russians reached the German capital, Berlin, and occupied the city.

Hitler, seeing that he had lost the war by being surrounded and without possible action, committed suicide. In this situation, leaderless and losing the capital, the Germans surrendered.

After the defeat of the Germans and Italians, only Japan remained She was very weak, but she refused to give up. For this reason, the United States used its new weapon, the atomic bombs that were dropped against Hiroshima and Nagasaki causing a great impact for the entire Japanese population.

Behind this, Japan surrendered, so the Allies won World War II, thus ending the greatest war in history.

If you want to read more articles similar to Phases of World War II, we recommend that you enter our category of History.

• Churchill, S. W., & Devoto, A. (2002). The Second World War (No. Sirsi) a443360). The sphere of books.
• Gonzalez, A. R. R. (1989). World War I (Vol. 1). Akal Editions.
• Hernandez, J. (2006). Brief history of the second world war. Nowtilus.