European theatre of World War II
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The European theatre of World War II was one of the two main
Preceding events
Germany was defeated in World War I, and the Treaty of Versailles placed punitive conditions on the country, including significant financial reparations, the loss of territory (some only temporarily), war guilt, military weakening and limitation, and economic weakening. Germany was humiliated in front of the world and had to pay very large war reparations. Many Germans blamed their country's post-war economic collapse on the treaty's conditions and these resentments contributed to the political instability which made it possible for Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party to come to power.
After
Outbreak of war in Europe
Germany and the Soviet Union were sworn enemies, but following the Munich Agreement, which effectively handed over Czechoslovakia (a French and Soviet ally, and the only remaining presidential democracy in Central Europe) to Germany, political realities allowed the Soviet Union to sign a non-aggression pact (the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact) including a secret clause partitioning Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland between the two spheres of influence.
Full-scale war in Europe began at dawn on 1 September 1939, when Germany used so-called Blitzkrieg tactics and military strength to invade Poland, to which both the United Kingdom and France had pledged protection and independence guarantees. On 3 September 1939, Britain and France declared war on Germany, and other allies soon followed. The British Expeditionary Force was sent to France; however, neither French nor British troops gave any significant assistance to the Poles during the entire invasion, and the German–French border, excepting the Saar Offensive, remained mostly calm. This period of the war is commonly known as the Phoney War.
On 17 September the
Despite the quick campaign in the east, along the Franco-German frontier the war settled into a quiet period. This relatively non-confrontational and mostly non-fighting period between the major powers lasted until Germany launched an invasion on 10 May 1940.
Germany and the USSR partition Northern Europe
Several other countries were drawn into the conflict at this time. After 28 September 1939, the Soviet government presented the governments of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania with ultimatums threatening military invasion, thus compelling the three small nations to conclude mutual assistance pacts which gave the Soviets the right to establish military bases there. The Soviet Union issued similar demands to Finland in October 1939 but these were rejected, leading to the Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November, starting the Winter War.
The Soviet Union did not accomplish its goal of annexing Finland.. The Finns were embittered over having lost more land in the peace than on the battlefields, and over the perceived lack of world sympathy.
In the rest of
The Baltic Republics were occupied by the Soviet army in June 1940, and formally annexed to the Soviet Union in August 1940.
War comes to the West
On 10 May 1940 the
On 24 April 1941 the USSR gave full diplomatic recognition to the Vichy government situated in the non-occupied zone in France.[30]
Thus, the Fall of France left Britain and
The British rejected several covert German attempts to negotiate peace. Germany massed their air force in northern German-occupied France to prepare the way for a possible invasion, code-named
During the Blitz, all of Britain's major industrial, cathedral, and political sites were heavily bombed. London suffered particularly, being bombed each night for several months. Other targets included
Air war
This section needs expansion with: aerial warfare on the Eastern Front and Soviet-based air operations. You can help by adding to it. (May 2013) |
The air war in the European theatre commenced in 1939.
Pre-war expectations that "
Initial German bomber attacks against the UK were targeted at the RAF's airfields during the Battle of Britain; from 7 September 1940 until 10 May 1941 the targets were British towns and cities in "The Blitz".
Following the abandonment of any idea of invasion of the UK, most of the strength of the Luftwaffe was diverted to the
British bombing by day resulted in too many losses and too few results; as a result the British operated by night while building up their strategic force with larger bombers. By 1942, Bomber Command could put 1,000 bombers over one German city.
During the initial raids of
From 1942 onwards, the efforts of Bomber Command were supplemented by the Eighth Air Force of the United States Army Air Forces, U.S. Army Air Forces units being deployed to England to join the assault on mainland Europe on 4 July 1942. Bomber Command raided by night and the US forces by day. The "Operation Gomorrah" raids on Hamburg (24 July 1943 – 29 July 1943) caused a firestorm, leading to massive destruction and loss of life.
On 14 February 1945, a
Mediterranean and other European countries
The
and the Middle East.Prior to the war
Fighting in Southern Europe did not resume until Axis forces were defeated in North Africa. Following the Axis defeat in Africa, Allied forces invaded Italy and during a prolonged campaign fought their way north through Italy. The invasion of Italy resulted in the nation switching sides to the Allies and the ousting of Mussolini. Despite this coup, Fascists and occupying German forces retained possession of the northern half of Italy. In the northern part of Italy, the occupying Germans installed Mussolini as the head of the new fascist republican government, the Italian Social Republic or RSI to show that the Axis forces were still in power there and a force to be dealt with. However, Mussolini and his Fascists were now puppet rulers under their German patrons.
On the opposite side of the
By April 1945, German forces were retreating on all fronts in northern Italy and occupied Yugoslavia, following continuous Allied attacks. The campaign and the fighting in the Mediterranean and Middle East theatre came to an end on 29 April. On 2 May in Italy, Field Marshal
Eastern Front
Initial Soviet retreat
On 22 June 1941, Germany launched the invasion of the Soviet Union, code-named Operation Barbarossa.[34] This invasion, the biggest in recorded history, started the bloodiest conflict in world history: the Axis–Soviet War, also known as the Eastern Front. It is generally accepted as being the most lethal conflict in human history, with over 30 million dead as a result. It involved more land combat than all other World War II theatres combined.
On the very night of the invasion Soviet troops received a directive undersigned by
Operation Barbarossa suffered from several fundamental flaws. The most serious of these was the logistical situation of the attack. The sheer vastness of the distances in the Soviet Union meant that Germany could only advance so far before outrunning their supply chains. A crucial mistake on the part of Germany was that the timetable for Barbarossa was planned with the assumption that the Soviets would collapse before the onset of winter. By the time the German attack froze to a halt before the city of Moscow on 5 December 1941, it literally could not go any further. There simply were not enough supplies reaching the front to conduct proper defensive operations, let alone a proper offense.
During their long retreat, the Soviets employed a scorched earth policy. They burned crops and destroyed utilities as they withdrew before Germany's advance, which contributed to the logistical problems that Germany experienced. More importantly for them, the Soviets also succeeded in a massive and unprecedented removal of their industrial resources from the threatened war zone to protected areas further east.
The extension of the campaign beyond the length that Germany expected meant that the German Army suffered hundreds of thousands of casualties in winter conditions and from the counterattacks of Soviet units.
Even with their advance having ground to a halt due to a lack of supplies and the onset of winter, Germany had conquered a vast amount of territory, including two-fifths of the Soviet economy. Dislodging them proved difficult and eventually cost the Soviet Union dearly.
A few months after the invasion began, German troops came to southern approaches to
Summer campaign of 1942 and Stalingrad
After enduring the Russian winter of 1941–1942, the German army prepared for further offensive operations. One of the major problems faced by the Nazi war machine in World War II was a shortage of
The beginning of the Soviet campaign turned into a strategic disaster when its Southern flank was nearly destroyed. Surviving Soviet units were pushed hundreds of kilometers to the east and the Wehrmacht advance went almost uncontested. But in a major blunder, Hitler split Army Group South into two subgroups, Army Group A which would attack the Caucasus and Army Group B which would advance towards the city of Stalingrad (now Volgograd).
Indecision by Hitler, dissent among the higher-ranked Nazi German officers, and over-extended supply lines contributed to the eventual defeat and withdrawal of the Axis military in the prolonged battle in the streets of Stalingrad. Germany had occupied over 90% of the city, but in an attempt to defeat the remaining Soviet defenders almost all German soldiers in the area were funneled into the ruins of the city. Months of bitter hand-to-hand combat in the ruins of the city depleted the German forces, leaving only Romanian and Hungarian forces to guard the flanks of the Stalingrad army group.[citation needed] In Operation Uranus, the Soviets defeated these Axis forces as they performed a massive encirclement operation. The Axis troops remaining in the city were trapped – cut off from their supply lines and starving, amidst a harsh winter - were ordered by Hitler to fight to the last man.
Starved of food, fuel, ammunition, and clothes, the pocket was gradually reduced, with the last portion surrendering on 2 February 1943. In a cynical attempt to prevent the surrender, Hitler promoted
Battles after Stalingrad
After Stalingrad, the initiative had passed from Germany but had not yet been seized by the Soviets. A desperate counterattack in the spring of 1943 by forces of Field Marshal Erich von Manstein temporarily halted the Soviet advance. The Battle of Kursk was the last major offensive by the German Army on the eastern front. The Soviets had intelligence of what was to come and prepared massive defences in huge depth in the Kursk salient. They stopped the German armoured assaults after a maximum penetration of just over 30 miles (48 km). After Kursk, the Red Army got the upper hand and generally was on the offensive for the rest of the war. The large scale of the Soviet Union allowed it to overcome high losses in manpower and equipment. The Soviet success prompted a more successful Allied initiative on the Western Front of Europe because Nazi Germany was bogged down in a costly defensive war on the East, defending its ever-shrinking occupied territory.
Pushing the enemy out of the Soviet territory in June 1944 by conducting the large-scale Operation Bagration, the Soviet Army proceeded to dismantle the Eastern Axis powers — Romania, Bulgaria, and Hungary — to liberate other neighbouring countries from the German Army, and to impose Communist-led governments on the "liberated" nations. Some of these nations joined the Allies and provided troops to fight Nazi Germany, which was effectively the only remaining Axis power in Europe by the end of 1944. Finland retained its independence the second time, but broke with the Axis, at the cost of having to fight its former ally and ceding more territory to the USSR.
By February 1945, the Soviets
Effects of the Eastern Front
More Soviet citizens died during World War II than those of all other European countries combined. Nazi ideology considered Slavs to be "subhuman" and German forces committed ethnically targeted mass murder. Civilians were rounded up and burned alive or shot in squads in many cities conquered by the Nazis. At least 27 million civilians and military personnel perished during the war.
8 million Red Army troops died facing the Germans and their allies on the Eastern Front. The Axis forces themselves had lost over 6 million troops, whether by combat or by wounds, disease, starvation or exposure; many others were seized as POW, about 10% of them died in the rear [35]
Allied invasion of occupied France
Simultaneously with the
Incessant bombing of Germany's infrastructure and cities caused tremendous casualties and disruption. Internally, Hitler survived a number of Nazi inner assassination attempts. The most serious was the 20 July 1944 plot: orchestrated by Claus von Stauffenberg and involving among others Erwin Rommel and Alfred Delp, the plot had intended to place a time bomb in a position to kill Hitler but a number of unscheduled factors and operation failures led to its failure. Adolf Hitler was only slightly injured.
Operation Overlord was complemented by an invasion of southern France on 15 August 1944, code-named Operation Dragoon. By September 1944 three Allied Army Groups were in line against German formations in the west. There was optimism that the war in Europe might be over by the end of 1944.[36]
An attempt was made to force the situation with Operation Market Garden (17 September 1944 – 25 September 1944). The Allies attempted to capture bridges with an airborne assault, to open the way into Germany and liberate the northern Netherlands. Since heavier German forces than intelligence had predicted were present, the British 1st Airborne Division was almost completely destroyed, and the operation failed.
The weather of 1944 combined with a poor situation for the Allies led to a stagnant situation on the western front. The Americans continued to grind away at the defenders in the
That changed when Germany mounted a major counteroffensive on 16 December 1944. The Ardennes offensive, also called the Battle of the Bulge, drove back and surrounded some small American units. The Allied forces were eventually successful in driving back Germany, in what turned out to be their last major advance of the war. The battle officially ended on 27 January 1945.
The final obstacle to the Allies was the
End of the war in Europe
On 27 April 1945, as Allied forces closed in on
Hitler, learning of
On 5 June 1945, the Allies signed the Berlin Declaration, which formally took over the supreme authority of Germany and declared Germany's unconditional surrender, bringing about the end of Nazi Germany.[37]
See also
- European–African–Middle Eastern Campaign Medal
- Mediterranean and Middle East theatre of World War II
- Pacific War
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Notes
- ^ From 1941.
- ^ From 1941.
- ^ To 1940.
- ^ From 1940 to 1944.
- ^ From 1944.
- ^ From 1943.
- ^ From 1942.
- ^ The official designation of these countries under the 1947 Paris Peace Treaties.[1]
- ^ Until Armistice of Cassibile 8 September 1943.
- King Michael's Coup 23 August 1944.
second Axis power in Europe from 8 September 1943[2] - 19 March 1944.
- ^ Until 17 August 1944.[3]
- ^ 25 June 1941-Moscow Armistice 19 September 1944.
- ^ From 23 September 1943.
- armed neutrality and conducted military actions against armed incursions from both Axis and Allied belligerents. The cease fire and pledging of allegiance to the Allies of the Vichy troops in French North Africa during Operation Torch convinced the Axis that Vichy could no longer be trusted to continue this policy, so they invaded and occupied the French rump state in November 1942. Collaborationist units, such as the Milice, continued to fight alongside German troops against French Resistance fighters until the liberation of Francein 1944.
- ^ Although Germany surrendered to the Allies on 8 May, the fighting continued insignificantly until 25 May.
- ^ Ellis:
- Danish: no figures;
- Norwegian: 2,000 killed or missing with no information provided on those wounded or captured;
- Dutch: 2,890 killed or missing, 6,900 wounded, with no information provided on those captured;
- Belgian: 7,500 killed or missing, 15,850 wounded, and 200,000 captured;
- French: 120,000 killed or missing, 250,000 wounded, and 1,450,000 taken prisoner;
- British: 11,010 killed or missing, 14,070 wounded (only those who were evacuated have been counted), and 41,340 taken prisoner.[10][11]
- ^ Ellis's numbers:
- American: 109,820 killed or missing, 356,660 wounded, and 56,630 captured;
- British: 30,280 killed or missing, 96,670 wounded, 14,700 captured;
- Canadian: 10,740 killed or missing, 30,910 wounded, 2,250 captured;
- French: 12,590 killed or missing, 49,510 wounded, 4,730 captured;
- Pole: 1,160 killed or missing, 3,840 wounded, 370 captured.[12] Thus according to Ellis' information, the Western Allies incurred 783,860 casualties.
- According to a post-war US Army study using war records, the army and army air forces of the United States suffered 586,628 casualties in western Europe, including 116,991 killed in action and 381,350 wounded, of whom 16,264 later died of their wounds.[13][page needed]
- ^ 43,110 Germans killed or missing, 111,640 wounded, no information is provided on any who were captured. Italian losses amounted to 1,250 killed or missing, 4,780 wounded, and no information is provided on any who were captured.[10]
- ^ Total German casualties between September 1939 to 31 December 1944, on the Western Front for both the army, Waffen SS, and foreign volunteers amounts to 128,030 killed, 399,860 wounded. 7,614,790 were held in POW camps by early June of 1945 (including 3,404,950 who were disarmed following the surrender of Germany).[12] See also: Disarmed Enemy Forces
- Holocaust.[20]
Netherlands: 187,300. Includes 100,000 Dutch Jews in the Holocaust.[21]
Belgium: 76,000. Includes 27,000 Belgian Jews in the Holocaust.[22]
United Kingdom: 67,200. Mostly died in German bombing.[23]
Norway: 8,200.[24] Includes 800 Norwegian Jews in the Holocaust.
Denmark: 6,000.[25]
Luxembourg: 5,000. Includes 2,000 Luxembourgish Jews.[26] - ^ The other main theatre of operations was the Pacific War.
- ^ All German forces were to cease operations on 23:01 hours Central European time on 8 May 1945, which was already 9 May in Moscow and other parts of the USSR; therefore 9 May was considered to be the end of the war in the Soviet Union and still is in its successor states
References
Citations
- ^ Claus Kreß, Robert Lawless, Oxford University Press, Nov 30, 2020, Necessity and Proportionality in International Peace and Security Law, p. 450
- ^ David Stahel, Cambridge University Press, 2018, Joining Hitler's Crusade, p. 78
- ^ Robert Bideleux, Ian Jeffries, Routledge, Jan 24, 2007, The Balkans: A Post-Communist History, p. 84
- ^ Frieser, Karl-Heinz (2013)The Blitzkrieg Legend. Naval Institute Press
- ^ MacDonald 2005, p. 478.
- ^ a b Glantz & House 2015, pp. 301–303.
- ^ Overmans, Rüdiger (2004). Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg (in German). München: Oldenbourg. Page 215.
- ^ Total German soldiers who surrendered in the West, including 3,404,950 who surrendered after the end of the war, is given as 7,614,790. To this must be added the 263,000–655,000 who died, giving a rough total of 8 million German soldiers having served on the Western Front in 1944–1945.Ellis 1993, p. 256
- ^ Regio Esercito: The Italian Royal Army in Mussolini's Wars, 1935–1943, Patrick Cloutier, p. 211.
- ^ a b Ellis 1993, p. 255.
- ^ MacDonald 2005, p. 478: "Allied casualties from D-day to V–E totaled 766,294. American losses were 586,628, including 135,576 dead. The British, Canadians, French, and other allies in the west lost slightly over 60,000 dead".
- ^ a b Ellis 1993, p. 256.
- ^ U.S. Army Casualties in World War II 1951.
- ISBN 5-93165-107-1; Mark Axworthy, Third Axis Fourth Ally. Arms and Armour 1995, p. 216.ISBN 1-85409-267-7
- ^ George C Marshall, Biennial reports of the Chief of Staff of the United States Army to the Secretary of War : 1 July 1939 – 30 June 1945 Washington, DC : Center of Military History, 1996. Page 202 Archived 1 May 2017 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ a b
- Rüdiger Overmans, Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Oldenbourg 2000. on 2 May 2013. Retrieved 10 July 2018.
- ISBN 0-7139-9309-X[page needed]
- Italy:
- Ufficio Storico dello Stato Maggiore dell'Esercito. Commissariato generale C.G.V. . Ministero della Difesa – Edizioni 1986
- Romania: Krivosheev 2001.
- Hungary: Krivosheev 2001.
- Hungarian wounded: Clodfelter 2017, p. 527.
- Soviet volunteer deaths:
- Percy Schramm Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht: 1940–1945: 8 Bde. (ISBN 9783881990738) Pages 1508 to 1511
- Percy Schramm Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht: 1940–1945: 8 Bde. (
- German prisoners: Krivosheev 2001.
- ISBN 0-231-11200-9, p. 421.
- ^ Statistisches Jahrbuch für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1960 Bonn 1961 p. 78
- ^ Bundesarchiv Euthanasie" im Nationalsozialismus, bundesarchiv.de; accessed 5 March 2016.(German)
- ^ Frumkin 1951, pp. 58–59.
- ^ "Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) Netherlands" (PDF). Retrieved 4 March 2016.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, p. 44–45.
- ^ Commonwealth War Graves Commission Annual Report 2013–2014, page 44.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, p. 144.
- ^ "Hvor mange dræbte danskere?". Danish Ministry of Education. Retrieved 4 March 2016.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, p. 59.
- ^ Krivosheev 1997.
- ^ Massari, Ivano (18 August 2015). "The Winter War – When the Finns Humiliated the Russians". War History Online. Retrieved 20 December 2021.
- ^ [1] Archived 27 December 2005 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ The Isolation of the Revolution Archived 2006-08-26 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Bojan Pancevski Dresden bombing death toll lower than thought, The Daily Telegraph, 3 October 2008.
- ^ Kate Connolly, Panel rethinks death toll from Dresden raids, The Guardian, 3 October 2008.
- ^ Landeshauptstadt Dresden (1 October 2008). "Erklärung der Dresdner Historikerkommission zur Ermittlung der Opferzahlen der Luftangriffe auf die Stadt Dresden am 13./14. Februar 1945" (PDF). Landeshauptstadt Dresden. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
- ^ Amnon Sella. 'Barbarossa': Surprise Attack and Communication. Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 13, No. 3, (Jul., 1978), pp. 555–583.
- ^ "Россия и СССР в войнах XX века - Потери вооруженных сил" (in Russian). 22 July 2010. Archived from the original on 22 July 2010.
- ISBN 978-0750988032.
- ^ "Avalon Project - Declaration Regarding the Defeat of Germany and the Assumption of Supreme Authority by Allied Powers; June 5, 1945". avalon.law.yale.edu. Retrieved 25 December 2022.
Works cited
- Clodfelter, Micheal (2017). "The Toll of World War II". Warfare and Armed Conflicts: A Statistical Encyclopedia of Casualty and Other Figures, 1492–2015 (Fourth ed.). Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-0-7864-7470-7.
- Ellis, John (1993). The World War II Databook: The Essential Facts and Figures for all the combatants. BCA. ISBN 978-1-85410-254-6.
- Frumkin, Gregory (1951). Population Changes in Europe Since 1939. Geneva: Allen & Unwin.
- Glantz, David M.; House, Jonathan M. (2015). When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler. Modern War Studies (Second ed.). University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-2121-7.
- Keegan, John (1989). The Second World War. Hutchinson. ISBN 0-09-174011-8.
- Krivosheev, G. I. (1997). Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses. Greenhill. ISBN 1-85367-280-7.
- Krivosheev, G. I. (2001). Rossiia i SSSR v voinakh XX veka: Poteri vooruzhennykh sil; statisticheskoe issledovanie (in Russian). OLMA Press. ISBN 5-224-01515-4.
- MacDonald, C. (2005). The Last Offensive: The European Theater of Operations. University Press of the Pacific.
- Office of the Adjutant General, U.S. Army (25 June 1953). U.S. Army Battle Casualties and Non-battle Deaths in World War II: Final Report (Report). CSCAP (OT) 87 – via HyperWar Foundation.
- ISBN 0-7126-7453-5.
Further reading
- Churchill, Winston. The Second World War. 6 volumes, 1948–1953
- Hanson, Davis Victor (2017). The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won. Basic Books.
- Lee, Loyd E., ed. (1997). World War II in Europe, Africa, and the Americas, with General Sources: A Handbook of Literature and Research. Westport, Connecticut / London: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-29325-2.
- Murray, Williamson; Millett, Allan R. (2000). A War to Be Won: Fighting the Second World War. Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-00163-X.
- ISBN 978-0-471-39431-0.
- ISBN 978-0-7858-2097-0.
- Weinberg, Gerhard L. (2005). A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-44317-2.