The Years of Axis

Triumph

Section 21.106

Nazi Europe, 1939-1940: Poland and the Fall of France

Nazi Europe, 1939-1940: Poland and the Fall of France

Germans

• 1 million German soldiers invaded Poland on 9/1/1939

• Blitzkrieg (lightning war)

– Utilized rapidly moving armored divisions, infantry, and a massive air assault (Luftwaffe)

• Quickly overran Polish forces

Soviets

• Soviet Union invaded from east on 9/17 (secret agreement)

• Established fortified bases in Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, Lith)

• Attacked Finland (11/39)

• Fins were supplied by GB and French

• Soviets expelled from League of Nations

• USSR won by March 1940

The Phony War

The Phony War• Deceptively quiet in the West• French felt protected by the Maginot

Line• Germans did not cross the Siegfried

Line (West Wall) of the Rhineland• Little military action took place• West rejected Hitler peace overtures

but kept their peacetime outlook• Still hoped that conflict could be

averted• German forces trained throughout

bitter winter for the spring

Spring of 1940• 4/9 German attacked/overran Norway and

Denmark (under pretext that GB was blocking iron flow from Sweden)

• Invaded Low Countries (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg (5/10)

• British Expeditionary Force and French forces gathered at Belgian border

• Hitler bypassed Maginot Line and invaded France via Luxembourg and the Ardennes

• Raced to channel ports to cut off retreating armies

• German army captured large section of French army

• BEF cut off at Dunkirk in Belgium • Miracle of Dunkirk• 330 thousand BEF evacuated with motley of

boats

The Fall of France• Occupied Paris 6/13/40

– Given without a fight• France surrendered on June 22, 1940• French mindset geared for defensive war • Caught totally off guard by Blitzkrieg• Mussolini invaded (June, 1940)• Also attacked Greece and N. Africa (Brits)• Divided population were led by defeatist

leaders• Fall shocked the world (fell in 1 month)• Free France movement under General

Charles de Gaulle fled to GB• British forced to scuttle French fleet in

Algerian harbor of Oran rather than allow it to fall to Germans

Vichy France

Vichy France

• Northern 2/3rd occupied by Germany

• 3rd Republic now held capital in Vichy

• Stunned parliament voted for an authoritarian regime headed by Marshal Petain and Pierre Laval

• Republic is dead!

• Slogan “liberty, equality, and fraternity” were officially banned

• French fascists and the new leaders claimed that they were trying to protect France from more suffering

Vichy France• Collaborated with the

Nazis• Sent hundreds of

thousands of French workers as slave laborers to Germany

• Identified and deported thousands of French Jews to death camps

• Some collaborated, a few joined Underground Resistance

• Most of population tried to go on with day-to-day life

Festung Europa

Festung Europa• Does history repeat?

• Germans controlled almost same territory as Napoleon

• Created a new “continental system” to govern, exploit and coordinate resources, industry and labor

• Impressed millions, prisoners of war and civilians as slave labor

• Festung Europa (Fortress Europe)

• Soldiers were garrisoned throughout Europe

• Found sympathizers, collaborators or quislings

• Vidkun Quisling was organizer of Norwegian Fascist party in 1933 and premier from 1942-45

• ½ million non-Germans fought in Waffen SS

• AND only foe was Great Britain!!!!!!!!

The Battle of Britain and American Aid• Brits anticipated an invasion after Dunkirk• Churchill replaced Chamberlain as PM in

May 1940• Promised people nothing but “blood, toil,

tears, and sweat” and war against “a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime.”

• Asked US for the “tools” to finish the job• US was officially neutral• Isolationist opposed any involvement

– Charles Lindberg and the America First Committee

• Interventionists wanted to provide aid to Allies– FDR

The Great Arsenal of Democracy• FDR called GB “spearhead of

resistance to world democracy • US would supply the Brits as the

“arsenal of democracy”• Fights for Four Freedoms:• Speech, worship, from want, from fear• Began to supply GB soon after Dunkirk• 50 overage destroyers in return for

bases in Newfoundland, Bermudas, Caribbean

• Lend-Lease• Policy of providing arms, raw

materials, food to Allies• Introduced conscription• Created hemispheric defense with

Latin American nations

Air war over Britain: The Blitz• Germany rapid success was too fast for them to

devise a plan for invasion of GB• Hoped GB might become an ally• Began pre-invasion air war in summer of ’40• The Blitz• Reached climax in fall of ’40• Bombed London for over 76 consecutive nights• RAF

– used radar to detect approaching bombers– Were highly skilled– Combined P51 with Rolls Royce engine

• Ultra (British intelligence + Polish exiles) broke the code of German encoding device (Enigma Machine)

• Coventry was wiped out• 20 thousand killed in London alone• Yet war capacity and morale remained strong• Hitler began to plan for invasion of USSR in ‘41

The Blitz

The Nazi Invasion of Russia: The Russian Front, 1941-42

• Nazi-Soviet Pact (1929) similar to Napoleon-Alexander I

• Both were biding their time• Soviets quietly Soviet-ized the

three Baltic states into USSR• Baltic barons were returned to

Germany• Took Bessarabian province of

Romania• Hoped to win control of the

Balkans and Eastern Europe

1941 Hitler ‘convinced’ Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary to join Axis powers (German troops stationed there)Yugo and Greece also occupiedHitler desire the wheat fields of Ukraine, the oil fields of Caucasus

Barbarossa 6/7/1941

The Nazi Invasion of Russia• Operation Barbarosa began 6/22/1941• Stalin (although warned) was

completely caught off guard• 3 million German forces went along 2

thousand mile front• By autumn Germans controlled

Ukraine and Byelorussia and laid siege to Leningrad

• Took Crimea and laid siege to Sebastopol

• Were within 25 miles of Russia• But were not prepared for early and

bitter winter• Resistance stiffened to save Mother

Russia

•Counteroffensive of Red Army in winter saved Moscow•Hitler took control and pushed for attack in south towards oil fields•Laid siege to Stalingrad

•Albert Speer organized German economy for what would now be a long war and tripled armaments production

1942, The Year of Dismay: Russia, North Africa, the Pacific

• Germans were within 100 miles of Caspian Sea

• Russians shifted industry east of Urals

• Followed a “scorched earth” policy

• Destroyed crops and livestock

• Guerilla units destroyed industrial and transportation facilities

The Desert Campaigns• Beginning in Sept 1940

under Italian offensive from Libya to Egypt seeking control of Suez

• Outnumbered the Brits ousted the Italians by early 41 and took Ethiopia from Mussolini

• German Afrika Corps under Rommel attacked and drove Brits back to Egypt

• El Alamein British held the German advance

Japan and the Pacific• Had been at war with China since ‘31• Joined Axis in 1940• Signed neutrality treaty with Soviets

in ’41• Took French possession in Indochina• US cut trade of vital war making

material in effort to halt Japanese advance

• General Hideki Tojo, new Japanese prime minister publicly stated that Japan would eliminate US and GB influence in Asia

Hideki Tojo

•Tojo sent representatives to Washington even as he launched attack on Pearl Harbor (12/7/41)• 2, 500 US forces killed•Fleet crippled•Attacked Philippines, Guam, Midway, Hong Kong, Malaya•US and GB declared war on Japan 12/8

1942: The Year of Dismay• Japan took Singapore (supposedly impregnable)

• Sunk battleship Prince of Wales (supposedly unsinkable)

• Threatened invasion of Australia and attacked Aleutians

• Seemed poised to invade India

• Under banner of anti imperialism they formed Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and found ready cooperators

• George Marshall noted “how close to complete domination of the world” were Germany and Japan