World War II was a global conflict that started in 1937 or 1939 and lasted until 1945, involving the majority of the world's states and every continent except Antarctica. It was the most extensive and costly armed conflict in the history of the world.

Attributed in varying degrees to the Treaty of Versailles, the Great Depression, nationalism, and militarism, the causes of the war are a matter of debate. On which date the war began is also debated, cited as either the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, the Japanese invasion of China on 7 July 1937 (the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War), or earlier yet the 1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Still others argue that the two world wars are one conflict separated only by a "ceasefire".

Fighting occurred across the Atlantic Ocean, in Western and Eastern Europe, in North Africa, the Middle East, and the Mediterranean Sea, in the Pacific and Oceania, and much of East Asia and South East Asia. In Europe, the war ended with the surrender of Germany on 8 May 1945 (V-E and Victory Days), but continued in Asia until Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945 (V-J Day).

Approximately 57 million people died as a result of the war, including acts of genocide such as the Holocaust. As a case of total war, it involved the "home front" and bombing of civilians to a new degree. Nuclear weapons, jet aircraft, and radar are only a few of many war-time inventions.

Post-war Europe was partitioned into Western and Soviet spheres of influence, the former undergoing the Marshall Plan of economic recovery and the latter becoming satellite states of the Soviet Union. Western Europe largely aligned as NATO, and Eastern Europe largely as the Warsaw pact, alliances which were fundamental to the ensuing Cold War. In Asia, the United States' military occupation of Japan led to its Westernisation, and China came to split into the Communist People's Republic of China and the Nationalist Republic of China.

Note: There is currently an alternative writing of this article at World War II/temp.

Participants

The belligerents of the Second World War are usually considered to belong to either of the two blocks: the Axis and the Allies. A number of smaller countries participated in the war, more or less voluntarily, on the side of the power that in their neighborhood was the most influential.

The Axis Powers consisted primarily of Germany, Italy, and Japan, which split the Earth into three spheres of influence under the Tripartite Pact of 1940, and vowed to defend one another against aggression. This replaced the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936 that Italy had joined in 1937. A number of smaller countries were counted to the Axis powers.

Until attacked in June 1941, the Soviet Union was effectively allied with Nazi Germany through the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, invading and occuping parts or the whole of Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania.

Among the Allied powers, the "Big Three" were the United Kingdom, from September 1939, the Soviet Union, from June 1941, and the United States, from December 1941. The British Commonwealth, Poland, France, Belgium, China, and the Netherlands were also counted to the Allied.

Countries that attempted to remain neutral in the conflict were often seen with suspicion by the participants, and often pressured to make contributions to the power that in their neighborhood was the most influential.

Origins of war

Main articles: Causes of World War II, Events preceding World War II in Europe, Events preceding World War II in Asia

The Second World War originated from a variety of causes. Some of the most commonly mentioned include the aggressive rise of totalitarian ideologies, and, from a narrower perspective, war reparations demanded of Weimar Germany after World War I, coupled with the effects of the Great Depression and the lack of raw materials in Japan.

In 1922 Benito Mussolini and the Fascist party had risen to power in Italy. Mussolini's Italian fascists shared some ideological goals with the German Nazis and, although Mussolini distrusted Hitler, the two countries formed an agreement that became known as the "Rome-Berlin Axis" in 1936.

As a result of the First World War's concluding Treaty of Versailles, Germany lost its colonies to the Allies, had much territory transfered to France or Poland, was responsible for paying war reparations, and had its military restricted to being a small defensive force. Economic difficulties following the war are commonly believed to have brought the nationalistic and militaristic Nazi Party to power in Germany. Adolf Hitler, its leader, was elected as Chancellor of Germany on 30 January 1933, and became de facto dictator on 2 August 1934 with the death of President Paul von Hindenberg. Defying treaty conditions, Hitler created a large, rearmed military capable of offense (Wehrmacht) in 1935. The United Kingdom and Germany signed the Anglo-German Naval Agreement on 18 June 1935, allowing Germany to expand its Kriegsmarine to one-third the tonnage of the Royal Navy. Italy began the Second Italo-Abyssinian War on 3 October by invading Ethiopia, which it desired as an empire territory.

Germany reoccupied the demilitarized Rhineland region bordering France on 7 March 1936. Poland sought the activation of Franco-Polish agreements from the Locarno Treaties, however action was dismissed. France and the United Kingdom pursued a strategy of appeasement, or attempting to maintain peace with Germany through diplomatic concessions. Germany annexed the nation of Austria in the Anschluss of 1938. United Kingdom Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain then met Adolf Hitler to reach a guarantee on the extent of Germany's territorial ambitions, and came away declaring "peace for our time" with the Munich Agreement of 1938. This gave Germany the United Kingdom's assent in annexing the ethnically German Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia, itself not represented, and nothing further.

Japan had, as early as the late nineteenth century, begun to spread out across Asia, brought about by conflict between traditional Japanese practices and changing social conditions associated with rapid industrialisation and modernisation. In 1905 Japan won an astounding victory over Russia, and in 1910 it occupied Korea and made it a colony.

During the 1920s democracy seemed to be taking root in Japan, but by the 1930s, the Great Depression brought to the fore many talented military leaders who took control of Japan, often ruling in the name of Emperor Hirohito, and playing on the traditional respect the Japanese people held for their emperors. In 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Inner Manchuria, setting up the puppet state of Manchukuo, and by 1937 launched a second invasion that occupied the rest of the region. For this reason, some scholars consider 1936/37 the actual start of World War II.

Europe, 1939-45

Main article: European Theatre of World War II, End of World War II in Europe

1939: Poland, Phony War, Tripartite Pact, Winter War

War began in Europe on 1 September 1939 with the German invasion of Poland. France and the United Kingdom honored their defensive alliance of March 1939 by declaring war two days later on 3 September.¹ Only partly mobilized, Poland fared poorly against the Wehrmacht's superior numbers and so-called strategy of "blitzkrieg". In accordance with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Red Army invaded Poland from the east on 17 September. Hours later, the Polish government escaped to Romania. The last Polish Army unit was defeated on 6 October.

During the fall of Poland, the British and French remained largely inactive in what would be termed "the Phony War," lasting until May 1940. Isolated engagements occurred during this period, including the sinking of the HMS Royal Oak in the British port of Scapa Flow and bombings of the naval bases at Rosyth and Scapa Flow by the Luftwaffe. The Kriegsmarine pocket battleship "Admiral Graf Spee" was sunk in South America after the battle of the River Plate.

The Tripartite Pact was signed between Germany, Italy, and Japan on 27 September 1940, formalizing their alignment as the "Axis Powers."

Finland was invaded by the Soviet Union on 30 November 1939, beginning the Winter War, which lasted until March of 1940 with Finland ceding territory to the Soviet Union.

1940: Denmark and Norway, France and Low Countries, Baltic Republics, Britain and Atlantic, Greece

Germany invaded Denmark and Norway on 9 April 1940 in Operation Weserübung, ostensibly for the threat of an Allied invasion from the region. Heavy fighting ensued on land and at sea in Norway. British, French and Polish forces landed to support the Norwegians, at Namsos, Åndalsnes and Narvik, with more success at the latter. By early June all Allied forces were evacuated and the Norweigan Army surrendered.

France and the Low Countries were invaded on 10 May, ending the Phony War and beginning the Battle of France. In the first phase of the invasion, Operation Yellow, the Wehrmacht's Panzergruppe von Kleist bypassed the Maginot Line and split the Allies in two by driving to the English channel. Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands fell quickly against the attack of Army Group B and the British Expeditionary Force, trapped in the north, was evacuated at Dunkirk in Operation Dynamo. German forces then invaded France itself, in Operation Red, advancing behind the Maginot Line and near the coast. Defeated, an armistice was declared on 22 June and the Vichy France puppet government created.

In June of 1940 the Soviet Union occupied Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, and annexed Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from Romania.

Not having secured a rapid peace with the United Kingdom, as desired, Germany began preparations to invade with the Battle of Britain. Fighter aircraft fought overhead for months as the Luftwaffe and Royal Air Force fought for control of Britain's skies. The Luftwaffe initially targetted RAF Fighter Command, however it turned to terror bombing London. Germany was defeated and Operation Sealion, the proposed invasion of the British Isles, was abandoned. Similar efforts were made, though at sea, in the Battle of the Atlantic. In a long-running campaign, German U-Boats attempted to deprive the British Isles of necessary Lend Lease cargo from the United States. Shipments were reduced considerably by the U-Boats, however it was not sufficient to cause the United Kingdom to seek peace.

Italy invaded Greece on 28 October 1940 from bases in Albania. Greek forces, although outnumbered, successfully repelled the Italian attacks and liberated one-fourth of Albania marking the first Allied victories of the war.

1941: Greece, Yugoslavia, Soviet Union, Continuation War, United States enters

Yugoslavia's government succumbed to the pressure of Italy and Germany and signed the Tripartite Treaty on March 25, 1941. This was followed by anti-axis demonstrations in the country and a coup which overthrew the government and replaced it with a pro-allied one on March 27, 1941. Hitler's forces then invaded Greece and Yugoslavia on April 6, 1941. Hitler reluctantly sent forces to assist Mussolini's bogged-down forces in Greece, principally to prevent a British buildup on Germany's strategic southern flank.

Yugoslavia was occupied within eleven days of the invasion. Thousands of Yugoslavs, however, continued to fight an effective guerilla war. The struggle lasted somewhat longer in Greece. The main mass of the Greek army was already engaged against Italian forces in Albania. Seeing the bleakness of the situation, about 58,000 British soldiers were sent to the aid of the Greeks. The German invasion developed along the Greek-Bulgarian border where they met stiff resistance from the fortifications of the Metaxas Line. The rapid downfall of Yugoslavia, however, allowed German forces to pour into Greece with little resistance and were able to surround the Greek positions. German soldiers entered Athens on April 27, 1941 symbolizing the end of organized Greek resistance. The British managed to evacuate about 43,000 of their men.

The outgunned and outnumbered Greek army collapsed in the face of overwhelming force, but was still able to fight the Germans hard enough to delay thier invasion of the Soviet Union by six weeks, which proved disastrous when the German army bogged down on the outskirts of Moscow as a result of the Russian winter.

A month later on May 20, 1941 tens of thousands of elite German paratroops and some 1,300 airplanes launched a massive air-borne invasion of the Greek island of Crete. German troops faced fierce resistance from the Anglo-Greek forces and from the civilian population. The Germans suffered heavy losses on Crete. The Germans admitted to suffering around 7,000 casualties but the real figure probably exceeds 17,000. They eventually seized Crete on May 31, 1941. Due to the heavy losses however, Hitler decided never to launch another massive airborne invasion. Some historians believe this saved Malta, Gibraltar, Cyprus, and the Suez Canal from airborne invasion.

Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, commenced on 22 June 1941. The "Great Patriotic War" (Russian: Великая Отечественная Война, Velikaya Otechestvennaya Voyna) had begun with surprise attacks by German panzer armies, which encircled and destroyed much of the Soviet's western military, capturing or killing hundreds of thousands of men. Soviet forces came to fight a war of scorched earth, withdrawing into the steppe of Russia to acquire time and stretch the German army. Industries were dismantled and withdrawn to the Ural mountains for reassembling. German armies pursued a three-pronged advance against Leningrad, Moscow, and the Caucasus. Having pushed to occupy Moscow before winter, German forces were delayed into the Soviet Winter. Soviet counterattacks defeated them within sight of Moscow's spires, and a rout was only narrowly avoided. This is identified by some historians as the "turning point" in the Allies' war against Germany; others identify the capitulation of German Sixth Army outside Stalingrad in 1943.

The Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union began with Soviet air attacks shortly after the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, on 25 June, and ended with an armistice in 1944. The Soviet Union was joined in the war by the United Kingdom but not by the United States.

Germany declared war on the United States on 11 December 1941, following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. It was not obligated to do so under the Tripartite Pact of 1940. Hitler made the declaration in the hopes that Japan would support him by attacking the Soviet Union. Japan did not oblige him and this diplomatic move proved a catastrophic blunder which gave Franklin Roosevelt the pretext he needed for the USA to join the fight in Europe with full commitment with no meaningful opposition in congress. Some historians mark this moment as another major turning point of the war with Hitler provoking a grand alliance of powerful nations who could wage powerful attacks on both East and West simultaneously.

1942: Caucasus offensive, Stalingrad

In 1942, an aborted German offensive was launched towards the Caucasus to secure oil fields and German armies reached Stalingrad. The siege of Stalingrad lasted into February of 1943, resulting in the destruction of the city, millions of casualties, and the surrender of Germany's Sixth Army. Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels responded with his Sportpalast speech to the German people. This is cited by some historians as the European war's "turning point."

1943: Kursk, Yugoslav resistance, Italy

Red Army offensives along the Don basin near Stalingrad were repulsed by German forces in January 1943. In July, the Wehrmacht launched a much-delayed offensive against the Soviet Union at Kursk. Their intentions were known by the Soviets, and the Battle of Kursk ended in a Soviet counteroffensive which threw the German Army back.

Mid-1943 brought the fifth and final Sutjeska offensive of the Germans against the Yugoslav Partisans before the invasion and subsequent capitulation of Italy, the other major occupying force in Yugoslavia.

1944: France invaded, Soviet-Finland armistice, surrender of minor Axis, Ardennes offensive

German-held Normandy was invaded on 6 June 1944 ("D-Day") by the Westen Allies, opening the "second front" against Germany.² Hedgerows aided the defender, and for months the Allies measured progress in hundreds of yards. An Allied breakout was effected at St.-Lô, and the most powerful German force in France, the Seventh Army was destroyed in the Falaise pocket while counterattacking. The French Riviera was invaded by Allied forces stationed in Italy on 15 August, and linked up with forces from Normandy. Paris was captured by the Allies on 25 August.

By early 1944, the Red Army had reached the border of Poland and lifted the Siege of Leningrad. Shortly after Allied landings at Normandy, on 9 June, the Soviet Union began an offensive on the Karelian Isthmus, that after three months would force Nazi Germany's co-belligerent Finland to an armistice. Operation Bagration, a Soviet offensive involving 2.5 million men and 6,000 tanks, was launched on 22 June, destroying the German Army Group Centre and taking 350,000 prisoners. Finland's defense had been dependent on active, or in periods passive, support from the German Wehrmacht that also provided defense for the northern chiefly uninhabited half of Finland. After the Wehrmacht had retreated from the southern shores of the Gulf of Finland, Finland's defense was untenable. The Allies' armistice conditions included further territorial losses and the internment or expulsion of German troops on Finnish soil executed in the Lapland War, now as co-belligerents of the Allies, who also demanded the political leadership to be prosecuted in "war-responsibility trials" that by the Finnish public were perceived as a mockery of rule of law.

Romania surrendered in August of 1944 and Bulgaria in September. British forces attempted a fast advance into Germany with Operation Market Garden in September, but were repulsed. The Warsaw Uprising was fought between 1 August and 2 October. Germany withdrew from the Balkans and held Hungary until February 1945.

In December of 1944, the German Army made its last major offensive in the West, attempting to capture the vital port of Antwerp and cripple the Allies in the Battle of the Bulge. The offensive was defeated. By now, the Soviets had reached the eastern borders of pre-war Germany.

1945: Yalta Conference, push into Germany, Berlin falls, occupation

Arrangements for post-war Europe were made between Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt at the Yalta Conference in February 1945. It resulted in an April meeting to form the United Nations, nation-states were created in Eastern Europe, it was agreed Poland would have free elections (in fact elections were heavily rigged by Soviets), Soviet nationals were to be repatriated, and the Soviet Union was to attack Japan within three months of Germany's surrender.

The Red Army (including 78,556 soldiers of the 1st Polish Army) began its final assault on Berlin on 16 April. Hitler and his staff moved into a bunker beneath the Chancellery, where on 30 April 1945 he committed suicide. The Soviets took a massive toll of 100,000 men killed. Admiral Karl Dönitz had been appointed President of Germany by Hitler, and unconditionally surrendered on 8 May, marking the end of the European war. "V-E Day" was celebrated by the Western Allies on 8 May and "Victory Day" by the Soviet Union on 9 May. However for countries like Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia and the rest of Eastern Europe the Soviet occupation did not end until 1990s. ³

Pacific and East Asia, 1937-45

Main article: Pacific War

1937: Sino-Japanese War

The Japanese had already invaded China before World War II started in Europe. U.S. President Roosevelt signed an executive order in May of 1940 allowing U.S. military personnel to resign from the service so that they could participate in a covert operation in China. Hence was born the All Volunteer Group, more commonly known as Chennault's Flying Tigers. With the United States and other countries cutting exports to Japan, Japan decided to bomb Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 without warning or declaration of war. Severe damage was done to the American Pacific Fleet, although the aircraft carriers escaped as they were at sea. Japanese forces simultaneously invaded the British possessions of Malaya and Borneo and the American occupied Philippines, with the intention of seizing the oilfields of the Dutch East Indies. The British island fortress of Singapore was captured in what Churchill considered one of the most humiliating British defeats of all time.

1940: Vichy France colonies

In 1940, Japan occupied French Indochina (Vietnam) upon agreement with the Vichy Government and despite local Free French, and joined the Axis powers Germany and Italy. These actions intensified Japan's conflict with the United States and the United Kingdom which reacted with an oil boycott.

1941: Pearl Harbor, Hong Kong

1942: Coral Sea, Port Moresby, Midway, Guadalcanal

In May 1942, the Allied navies in the Battle of the Coral Sea thwarted a Japanese naval attack on Port Moresby, New Guinea. Had the Japanese succeeded in capturing Port Moresby, the Japanese Navy would have been within striking range of Australia. This was both the first successful opposition to Japanese plans and the first naval battle fought only between aircraft carriers. A month later the U.S. Navy again prevented the invasion of Midway Island, this time destroying four Japanese carriers, which Japanese industry could not replace, and putting the Japanese navy on the defensive.

However, in July the Japanese Army attempted an overland attack on Port Moresby, along the rugged Kokoda Track. Australian reservists, many of them very young and untrained, fought a stubborn rearguard action, until they were relieved by Australian regular troops returning from action in North Africa, Greece and the Middle East.

The Allied leaders had agreed even prior to the American entry to the war that priority should be given to the defeat of Nazi Germany. Nonetheless US and Australian forces began to attack captured territories, beginning with Guadalcanal Island, against a bitter and determined defence by Japanese troops. On 7 August 1942 the island was assaulted by United States Marines. In late August and early September, while battle raged on Guadalcanal, Australian forces fought off a Japanese amphibious attack on the eastern tip of New Guinea at Milne Bay, the first conclusive defeat suffered by Japanese land forces. US forces triumphed on Guadalcanal in February 1943.

1943: New Guinea, submarine warfare

Exhausted Australian and US forces then strove to retake the occupied parts of New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies, experiencing some of the toughest resistance of the Pacific Theatre. The rest of the Solomon Islands were retaken in 1943, New Britain and New Ireland in 1944. The Philippines were attacked in late 1944 following the Battle of Leyte Gulf.

US and Allied submarines and aircraft also attacked Japanese merchant shipping, depriving Japanese industry of the raw materials she had gone to war to obtain. The effectiveness of this stranglehold increased as the U.S. captured islands closer to the Japanese mainland.

The Nationalist Kuomintang Army under Chiang Kai-shek and the Communist Chinese Army under Mao Zedong both opposed the Japanese occupation of China, but never truly allied against the Japanese. Conflict between Nationalist and Communist forces continued after and, to an extent, even during the war.

The Japanese captured most of Burma severing the Burma Road by which the Western Allies had been supplying the Chinese Nationalists. This forced the Allies to create a large sustained airlift of the war known as the Hump. US lead and trained Chinese divisions, a few thousand US ground forces and a British Division, cleared the Japanese forces from northern Burma so that the Ledo Road could be built to replace the Burma Road. Further south the main Japanese army in the theater were fought to a standstill on the Burma India frontier by the British Fourteenth Army (the "forgotten" army) which then counter-attacked and having recaptured all of Burma was planning attacks towards Malaya when the war ended.

1945: Iwo Jima, Okinawa, atomic bombings, Japan surrenders

Capture by the Allies of islands such as Iwo Jima and Okinawa close to Japan brought the homeland within range of naval and air attacks, Tokyo was firebombed and later an atomic bomb, the "Little Boy", was dropped from the B-29 "Enola Gay" and destroyed Hiroshima. On 8 August 1945 the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, as had been agreed to at Yalta, and launched a large scale invasion of Japanese occupied Manchuria (operation August Storm). On August 9, in Nagasaki, another atom bomb, "Fat Man" was dropped by the B-29 "Bock's Car".

The combination of the use of nuclear weapons and the new inclusion of the Soviet Union in the war were both highly responsible for the surrender of Japan, although the importance of the Soviet incursion has been largely overlooked in popular perception.

The Japanese surrendered on 14 August 1945, signing official surrender papers on 2 September 1945 aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.

Mediterranean and North Africa, 1940-45

1940: Egypt and Somaliland

The North African Campaign began in 1940, when small British forces in Egypt turned back an Italian advance from Libya. This advance was stopped in 1941 when German forces under Erwin Rommel landed in Libya.

1941: Syria, Lebanon, Afrika Korps to Tobruk

In June 1941 the Australian Army and allied forces invaded Syria and Lebanon, capturing Damascus on 17 June. Rommel's Afrika Korps advanced rapidly eastward, laying siege to the vital seaport of Tobruk. The Australian and British troops in the city resisted all until relieved, but a renewed Axis offensive captured the city and drove the Eighth Army back to a line at El Alamein.

1942: First and Second Battles of El Alamein, Operation Torch

The First Battle of El Alamein took place between July 1 and July 27, 1942. German forces had advanced to the last defensible point before Alexandria and the Suez Canal. However they had outrun their supplies, and a British and Commonwealth defence stopped their thrusts. The Second Battle of El Alamein occurred between October 23 and November 3, 1942 after Bernard Montgomery had replaced Claude Auchinleck as commander of the Eighth Army. Commonwealth forces took the offensive and destroyed the Afrika Korps. Rommel was pushed back, and this time did not stop falling back until Tunisia.

To complement this victory, on 8 November 1942, American and British troops landed in Morocco and Algeria in Operation Torch. The local forces of Vichy France put up limited resistance before joining the Allied cause. Ultimately German and Italian forces were caught in the pincers of a twin advance from Algeria and Libya. Advancing from both the east and west, the Allies completely pushed the Wehrmacht out of Africa and on May 13, 1943, the remnants of the Axis forces in North Africa surrendered. 250,000 prisoners were taken; as many as at Stalingrad.

1943-45: Invasion of Sicily and Italy, Mussolini gov't falls, Allied offensive north

North Africa was used as a springboard for the invasion of Sicily on 10 July 1943. Having captured Sicily, the Allies invaded mainland Italy on 3 September 1943. Shortly before the main invasion of 8 September, the Italian government surrendered. The German Army continued to fight from the Gothic Line and then Winter Line in Italy's mountains. The conflict would last until the spring of 1945.

Home front

Home front is the name given to the activities of civilians in a state of total war. During World War II, women joined the work force in jobs that the men overseas used to occupy. Families also grew victory gardens, small home vegetable gardens, to supply themselves with food during the war. They did this because the food was limited and they had to use ration stamps to get food. Sugar and coffee were especially hard to get, and gasoline was also rationed, as was nylon. Schools and organizations held scrap drives and money collections to help the war effort. Many things were conserved to turn into weapons later, such as fat left over from cooking. This was later used to make explosives. Franklin D. Roosevelt stated that the efforts of civilians at home to support the war through personal sacrifice was as critical to winning the war as the efforts of the soldiers themselves, and that the civilian populace constituted an additional front at home.

Civilian populations were heavily involved in war production and subject to propaganda from their governments.

Genocide and internment

Acts of genocide against or mass internment of civilian populations occurred in territories occupied by Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union; and within the national territory of the United States.

Following the war, German and Japanese officials were prosecuted by Allied tribunals for war crimes. Accused of genocide and atrocities, many German officials were tried at the Nuremburg Trials and many Japanese officials at the Tokyo War Crime Trial.

Technology in World War II

The massive research and development involved in the Manhattan Project in order to quickly achieve a working nuclear weapon design greatly impacted the scientific community, among other things creating a network of national laboratories in the United States. In addition, the pressing for numerous calculations for various things like code breaking and ballistics tables kickstarted the development of electronic computer technology.

Although pursuant to Article XXII of the draft Hague Rules of Air Warfare 1923, "aerial bombardment for the purpose of terrorizing the civilian population, of destroying or damaging private property not of a military character, or of injuring non-combatants" was to be prohibited, these rules had never been ratified by the Powers. Some attempt was made to adhere to the rules in the early part of the war by some of the participants. In the first months of the war the RAF was for example ordered by the British Government to adhere strictly to the draft rules, but this restriction was progessively relaxed, and abandonned altogether in 1942. By 1945 the strategic bombing of cities had been employed extensively by all sides, most notably in Poland, Britain, Germany and Japan, and no action was taken against those responsible.

Consequences

In contrast to World War I, the Western victors in the Second World War did not demand compensation from the defeated nations. On the contrary, a plan created by U. S. Secretary of State George Marshall, the "European Recovery Program", better known as the Marshall Plan, called for the U.S. Congress to allocate billions of dollars for the reconstruction of Europe. Also as part of the effort to rebuild global capitalism and spur post-war reconstruction, the Bretton Woods system was put into effect after the war.

United Nations and the Cold War

Since the League of Nations had obviously failed to prevent the war, a new international order was constructed. In 1945 the United Nations was founded. Also, in order to prevent such devastating war from occurring again and to establish a lasting peace in Europe, the European Coal and Steel Community was born in 1951 (Treaty of Paris (1951)), the predecessor of the European Union.

The future Warsaw Pact countries did not subscribe to the Marshall Plan. In the Paris Peace Treaty, the Soviet Union's enemies Hungary, Finland and Romania were required to pay war reparations of $300,000,000 each (in 1938 dollars) to the USSR. Italy was required to pay $360,000,000, shared chiefly between Greece, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union.

In the areas occupied by Western Allied troops, democratic governments were created, in the areas occupied by Soviet troops, communist governments were created. Germany was partitioned into four zones of occupation, with the American, British and French zones grouped as West Germany and the Soviet zone as East Germany. Austria was once again separated from Germany and it, too, was divided into four zones of occupation which eventually re-united and became the state of Austria. The Cold War had begun, and soon NATO and the Warsaw Pact would form.

The repatriation, pursuant to the terms of the Yalta Conference, of two million Russian soldiers who had come under the control of advancing American and British forces, resulted for the most part in their deaths.

Westernization of Japan

The defeat of Japan, and its occupation by American Forces, led to a westernization of Japan. It became the world's second largest economy.

Contemporary culture

Main article: Contemporary culture of World War II