The Start of the War
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German troops parade through Warsaw, Poland shortly after the succesful invasion and occupation in 1939.
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Hitler and his top military officials including Albert Speer and General Kittel walk through Paris after the fall of France in 1940.
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A German soldier on the Eastern Front approaches a burning Soviet tank during the start of Operation Barbarossa, the attack on Russia in June 1941.
In the wake of the German attack on Russia, both Britain and the United States pledge immediate aid. Here the President tells his cabinet to "step on it!'
Airfield at Pearl Harbor under attack, December 7, 1941
Devastation of Battleship Row at Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, bringing the United States into the war.
1942 photograph of one of the more then 350,000 women who joined the war effort as mechanics, munitions workers, truck drivers, pilots and many other facets of the home front.
Letter from Harry Hopkins to the American Ambassdor in London, June 12, 1942, stressing the need for Anglo-American postwar cooperation with the Soviet Union.
In October 1929, the stock market collapsed in the United States leading to an economic crisis that swept the entire capitalist world. The turmoil brought about by the Great Depression in Western countries helped sustain and propel the rise of fascism in Europe and Asia. In January 1933, Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. Hitler completely reorganized the country's life, established a fascist system with centralized power, and stepped up the expansion of the military. By this point Japan had also embarked on the road to war and fascism, invading Manchuria in 1931 and China in 1937. In 1935, the fascist dictator of Italy, Benito Mussolini, who rose to power in the early 1920s, launched an invasion of Abyssinia. Although the League of Nations established in 1920 was an international organization designed to prevent armed conflicts, it was weakened by the absence of the United States and was unable to prevent the expansion of fascist forces during these years. Hitler would take over in Austria in March 1938, the German-speaking part of Czechoslovakia in September, and the rest of Czechoslovakia in March 1939. After concluding a non-aggression pact with Soviet Union that included a secret agreement to allow Stalin to absorb eastern Poland and the Baltic States, Hitler attacked Poland on September 1, 1939. The United Kingdom sent an ultimatum to Germany to cease military operations. However, the diplomatic efforts failed. On September 3, Britain and France declared war on Germany. The Second World War was on.