# World War II in Europe, 1939–1945: Who Held What > Interactive animated map on Moving Polygons by chrisjager, 13 Mar 1939 – 2 Aug 1945: 58 keyframes, 83 layers, 294 events. - Map: https://www.movingpolygons.com/map/chrisjager/world-war-ii-in-europe-19391945-who-held-what - Article: [World War II in Europe, 1939–1945: Who Held What, Month by Month](https://www.movingpolygons.com/blog/world-war-ii-in-europe-1939-1945) - Embed: `` - Last updated: 2026-10-05 ## About this map Who controlled which territory in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East from the destruction of Czecho-Slovakia (March 1939) to the Potsdam Agreement (August 1945), in 58 snapshots: sovereign states, annexations, occupation regimes (pale tints of the occupier), client states, partisan-held areas, front lines, pockets and the 1945 zones of occupation. Markers show battles, sieges, treaties, uprisings, liberations and atrocities. Accuracy: treaty and administrative lines ±2–5 km; front lines ±3–10 km where traced from German daily situation maps (Lage Ost, 1941–44), ±10–20 km in fluid phases; partisan areas are schematic. Sources: OpenHistoricalMap (CC0) dated boundaries; treaty and decree texts; OKH 'Lage Ost' situation maps (germandocsinrussia.org); US Army CMH histories and 12th Army Group situation maps; NZ, Australian and British official histories; Hungarian National Archives 1944–45 settlement data; IGN demarcation-line map (Gallica); Wikipedia in many languages. Base geometry: Natural Earth. ## Timeline The map animates between these keyframes. | Date | What the map shows | | --- | --- | | 13 Mar 1939 | Czecho-Slovakia on the eve of its destruction | | 16 Mar 1939 | Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia; Slovak state | | 16 Apr 1939 | Memel annexed; Franco wins; Italy takes Albania | | 31 Aug 1939 | Eve of war: Nazi-Soviet Pact; Hatay Turkish | | 12 Sep 1939 | Germans at Warsaw; battle of the Bzura | | 20 Sep 1939 | Soviet invasion of eastern Poland | | 6 Oct 1939 | Poland partitioned; last battle at Kock | | 31 Dec 1939 | Annexations; Vilnius Lithuanian; Winter War | | 31 Mar 1940 | Moscow Peace: Finland cedes Karelia | | 25 Apr 1940 | Denmark occupied; battle for Norway | | 15 May 1940 | Netherlands falls; breakthrough at Sedan | | 25 May 1940 | Panzers at the Channel; Allies trapped | | 4 Jun 1940 | Dunkirk evacuated; Belgium surrendered | | 17 Jun 1940 | Paris falls; Soviets occupy the Baltic states | | 4 Jul 1940 | France divided; Bessarabia Soviet | | 1 Oct 1940 | Second Vienna Award; Italians at Sidi Barrani | | 15 Dec 1940 | Greeks in Albania; Operation Compass | | 10 Feb 1941 | British at El Agheila; Albanian stalemate | | 12 Apr 1941 | Yugoslavia and Greece invaded; Tobruk besieged | | 19 May 1941 | Balkans partitioned; war in Iraq | | 21 Jun 1941 | Eve of Barbarossa; Crete taken; Syria | | 10 Jul 1941 | Barbarossa: Minsk pocket, Riga, Lviv fall | | 10 Aug 1941 | Smolensk and Uman; Odessa besieged | | 17 Sep 1941 | Kiev encircled; Leningrad blockaded; Iran | | 20 Oct 1941 | Vyazma–Bryansk; Odessa evacuated | | 5 Dec 1941 | Germans before Moscow; Rostov retaken | | 15 Jan 1942 | Soviet winter offensive; Rommel at El Agheila | | 10 Apr 1942 | Spring 1942: Demyansk and Kholm pockets; Gazala | | 27 Jun 1942 | Tobruk falls; Kharkov; eve of Case Blue | | 25 Jul 1942 | Rostov falls; First Alamein; Sevastopol fallen | | 25 Aug 1942 | Stalingrad reached; Germans in the Caucasus | | 18 Nov 1942 | Axis high-water; Torch; Vichy France occupied | | 31 Dec 1942 | Stalingrad encircled; stalemate in Tunisia | | 20 Feb 1943 | Stalingrad surrenders; Kharkov; Kasserine | | 13 May 1943 | Axis surrender in Tunisia; Kursk bulge | | 25 Jul 1943 | Sicily invaded; Kursk; Mussolini deposed | | 23 Aug 1943 | Sicily taken; Kursk, Orel and Kharkov | | 25 Sep 1943 | Italy surrenders; Salerno; Smolensk | | 17 Nov 1943 | Kiev liberated; Gustav line; Leros | | 31 Jan 1944 | Leningrad relieved; Anzio; Korsun pocket | | 15 Apr 1944 | Soviets at the Carpathians; Hungary occupied | | 21 Jun 1944 | Rome free; Normandy; eve of Bagration | | 31 Jul 1944 | Bagration; breakout from Normandy | | 19 Aug 1944 | Falaise pocket; Dragoon; Paris and Warsaw rise | | 31 Aug 1944 | Paris liberated; Romania changes sides | | 20 Sep 1944 | Brussels, Market Garden; Bulgaria, Finland | | 31 Oct 1944 | Belgrade, Athens, Riga; Aachen falls | | 15 Dec 1944 | Metz and Strasbourg; eve of the Ardennes | | 26 Dec 1944 | Battle of the Bulge; Budapest encircled | | 31 Jan 1945 | Vistula–Oder; East Prussia cut off | | 7 Mar 1945 | Remagen; Pomerania; Budapest fallen | | 1 Apr 1945 | Rhine crossed; Ruhr encircled; Danzig falls | | 19 Apr 1945 | Ruhr cleared; Vienna taken; Berlin attacked | | 30 Apr 1945 | Berlin encircled; Elbe link-up; Italy | | 7 May 1945 | Germany capitulates | | 12 May 1945 | Europe under Allied occupation | | 5 Jul 1945 | Zones of occupation; Allies enter Berlin | | 2 Aug 1945 | Potsdam: Germany divided, Oder–Neisse line | ## Layers | Layer | First shown | Last keyframe | | --- | --- | --- | | German-occupied territory (North Africa) | 18 Nov 1942 | 13 May 1943 | | German-occupied territory (Balkans) | 12 Apr 1941 | 5 Jul 1945 | | German-occupied territory (Central Europe) | 16 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | German-occupied territory (East) | 12 Sep 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | German-occupied territory (Italy) | 25 Sep 1943 | 7 May 1945 | | German-occupied territory (Scandinavia) | 25 Apr 1940 | 12 May 1945 | | German-occupied territory (West) | 15 May 1940 | 12 May 1945 | | German Reich | 13 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Italian-occupied territory | 4 Jul 1940 | 25 Sep 1943 | | Kingdom of Italy | 13 Mar 1939 | 31 Jan 1944 | | Italian Social Republic | 25 Sep 1943 | 30 Apr 1945 | | Hungarian-occupied territory | 16 Mar 1939 | 31 Oct 1944 | | Hungary | 13 Mar 1939 | 19 Apr 1945 | | Romanian-occupied territory | 17 Sep 1941 | 15 Apr 1944 | | Romania | 13 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Bulgarian-occupied territory | 15 Jan 1942 | 31 Oct 1944 | | Bulgaria | 13 Mar 1939 | 20 Sep 1944 | | Finnish-occupied territory | 10 Jul 1941 | 31 Oct 1944 | | Finland | 13 Mar 1939 | 31 Oct 1944 | | Slovakia (occupied/administered) | 12 Sep 1939 | 20 Sep 1939 | | Slovakia | 16 Mar 1939 | 7 May 1945 | | Independent State of Croatia | 12 Apr 1941 | 12 May 1945 | | Albania | 13 Mar 1939 | 15 Dec 1944 | | Vichy France (occupied/administered) | 4 Jul 1940 | 31 Dec 1942 | | Vichy France | 4 Jul 1940 | 31 Dec 1942 | | Carpatho-Ukraine (occupied/administered) | 16 Mar 1939 | 16 Apr 1939 | | British-occupied territory | 13 Mar 1939 | 2 Aug 1945 | | British Empire | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | French-occupied territory | 13 Mar 1939 | 2 Aug 1945 | | France | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | Soviet-occupied territory | 20 Sep 1939 | 2 Aug 1945 | | Soviet Union | 13 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Soviet Union | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | US-occupied territory | 10 Jul 1941 | 2 Aug 1945 | | Western Allied occupation | 15 Dec 1940 | 2 Aug 1945 | | Polish-administered territory | 6 Oct 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Poland | 13 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Czechoslovakia | 13 Mar 1939 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Yugoslavia (occupied/administered) | 12 Apr 1941 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Yugoslavia | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | Yugoslav Partisans (occupied/administered) | 31 Oct 1944 | 7 Mar 1945 | | Yugoslav Partisans | 10 Aug 1941 | 7 Mar 1945 | | Kingdom of Italy (co-belligerent) | 25 Sep 1943 | 12 May 1945 | | Greece (occupied/administered) | 15 Dec 1940 | 19 May 1941 | | Greece | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | Norway (occupied/administered) | 7 Mar 1945 | 30 Apr 1945 | | Norway | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | Netherlands | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 May 1945 | | Belgium | 13 Mar 1939 | 7 Mar 1945 | | Luxembourg | 13 Mar 1939 | 7 Mar 1945 | | Denmark | 13 Mar 1939 | 7 May 1945 | | Austria | 30 Apr 1945 | 5 Jul 1945 | | Spain (occupied/administered) | 13 Mar 1939 | 15 Dec 1940 | | Spain | 13 Mar 1939 | 15 Dec 1940 | | Spanish Republic | 13 Mar 1939 | 16 Apr 1939 | | Portugal | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Switzerland | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Liechtenstein | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Sweden | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Ireland | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Iceland | 13 Mar 1939 | 15 May 1940 | | Turkey | 13 Mar 1939 | 31 Aug 1939 | | Estonia | 13 Mar 1939 | 17 Jun 1940 | | Latvia | 13 Mar 1939 | 17 Jun 1940 | | Lithuania | 13 Mar 1939 | 17 Jun 1940 | | Andorra | 13 Mar 1939 | 13 Mar 1939 | | Monaco | 13 Mar 1939 | 20 Sep 1944 | | San Marino | 12 May 1945 | 12 May 1945 | | Free City of Danzig | 13 Mar 1939 | 12 Sep 1939 | | State of Hatay | 13 Mar 1939 | 31 Aug 1939 | | Tangier International Zone (occupied/administered) | 13 Mar 1939 | 17 Jun 1940 | | Egypt | 13 Mar 1939 | 18 Nov 1942 | | Iraq | 13 Mar 1939 | 21 Jun 1941 | | Iran | 13 Mar 1939 | 20 Oct 1941 | | Saudi Arabia | 13 Mar 1939 | 19 May 1941 | | Syria | 31 Jan 1944 | 31 Jan 1944 | | Lebanon | 31 Jan 1944 | 31 Jan 1944 | | Greek resistance | 25 Jul 1943 | 7 Mar 1945 | | Slovak National Uprising | 31 Aug 1944 | 31 Oct 1944 | | Italian partisans (occupied/administered) | 31 Jul 1944 | 19 Aug 1944 | | Italian partisans | 21 Jun 1944 | 7 May 1945 | | Soviet partisans | 5 Dec 1941 | 31 Jul 1944 | | Allied joint administration (occupied/administered) | 17 Sep 1941 | 20 Oct 1941 | ## Events - **14 Mar 1939, Slovak State proclaims independence**: After Hitler received Jozef Tiso in Berlin on 13 March and threatened to leave Slovakia to Hungary, the Slovak Diet in Bratislava proclaimed an independent Slovak State on 14 March. A treaty of protection signed on 18 and 23 March gave Germany control of Slovak foreign and military policy and a garrisoned zone in western Slovakia. - **15 Mar 1939, Carpatho-Ukraine declares independence; Hungary overruns it**: The Carpatho-Ukrainian diet in Khust declared independence on 15 March and elected Avgustyn Voloshyn president, while Hungarian troops were already crossing the border. Poorly armed Carpathian Sich units resisted, but Hungary occupied the whole territory by 18 March and reached a common border with Poland. - **15 Mar 1939, German troops occupy Bohemia and Moravia**: President Emil Hácha, summoned to Berlin and threatened with the bombing of Prague, signed a declaration placing the Czech people under the protection of the Reich at about 4 a.m. German troops crossed the border at 6 a.m. and Hitler spent the night at Prague Castle. The occupation broke the Munich Agreement and ended Western appeasement. - **23 Mar 1939, Germany annexes the Memel Territory**: Under a German ultimatum of 20 March, Lithuania signed a treaty ceding the Klaipėda (Memel) Territory in Berlin shortly after midnight on 22/23 March. Hitler arrived by warship on 23 March and the territory was incorporated into East Prussia. It was Germany's last annexation before the war. - **28 Mar 1939, Madrid falls; Franco declares the Spanish Civil War over**: After Colonel Casado's coup against the Negrín government, Republican resistance collapsed and Nationalist troops entered Madrid on 28 March. The last Republican provinces surrendered over the following days. Franco's final communiqué on 1 April declared the war over. - **7 Apr 1939, Italy invades Albania**: On Good Friday Italian forces landed at Durrës, Vlorë, Shëngjin and Sarandë; Albanian gendarmes and volunteers resisted briefly at Durrës. King Zog fled to Greece and Tirana was occupied on 8 April. The whole country was in Italian hands within days. - **22 May 1939, Pact of Steel: Germany and Italy form a military alliance**: Foreign ministers Ribbentrop and Ciano signed an offensive and defensive alliance at the Reich Chancellery. Italy nevertheless declared itself "non-belligerent" when war broke out in September. - **29 Jun 1939, Hatay State votes to join Turkey**: Under a Franco-Turkish agreement signed in Ankara on 23 June, France ceded the Sanjak of Alexandretta, its part of the Syrian mandate, to Turkey. The Hatay assembly voted on 29 June to dissolve the state and join Turkey, and the last French troops left on 23 July. - **23 Aug 1939, Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact: German–Soviet non-aggression treaty**: Ribbentrop and Molotov signed a ten-year non-aggression treaty in the Kremlin late on 23 August. A secret protocol divided Eastern Europe into spheres of interest: Finland, Estonia, Latvia, eastern Poland and Bessarabia to the USSR; western Poland and Lithuania to Germany. The pact freed Hitler to attack Poland. - **31 Aug 1939, Gleiwitz incident: SS stages an attack on a German radio station**: SS men under Alfred Naujocks, posing as Polish insurgents, seized the Gleiwitz transmitter on the evening of 31 August and broadcast an anti-German message. A murdered prisoner was left at the scene as "evidence". Hitler cited this and other staged incidents to justify the invasion the next morning. - **1 Sep 1939, War begins: German attack on Poland; siege of Westerplatte**: At 04:45 the German training battleship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on the Polish Military Transit Depot at Westerplatte in Danzig harbour, as German armies crossed the Polish border from Germany, East Prussia and Slovakia. The garrison of about 200 held out until 7 September. - **1 Sep 1939, Danzig annexed to the Reich; defence of the Polish Post Office**: Gauleiter Albert Forster proclaimed the Free City part of the Reich on 1 September, confirmed by a Reich law the same day. Polish postal workers defended their post office for about 15 hours; most survivors were sentenced as irregular combatants and shot on 5 October. - **3 Sep 1939, Britain declares war on Germany**: Germany did not answer the British ultimatum to withdraw from Poland, which expired at 11:00; Chamberlain announced by radio that Britain was at war. Australia and New Zealand declared war the same day, South Africa on 6 September and Canada on 10 September. - **3 Sep 1939, France declares war on Germany**: The French ultimatum expired at 17:00 and France entered the war. France had begun general mobilisation on 2 September, but its army gave Poland no real relief beyond the limited Saar offensive. - **8 Sep 1939, Siege of Warsaw**: German armour first attacked the Ochota district on 8–9 September and was repulsed. The city was encircled from 15 September and heavily bombed and shelled, particularly on 25 September. General Rómmel signed the capitulation on 27 September, effective on the 28th; German troops entered on 1 October. - **9 Sep 1939, Battle of the Bzura**: The Polish Poznań and Pomorze armies attacked southwards across the Bzura into the flank of the German Eighth Army on 9 September, the largest battle of the campaign. After initial success they were encircled around Kutno and destroyed by German counter-attacks and air strikes; some units broke through to Warsaw and Modlin. - **12 Sep 1939, Siege of Lwów**: German mountain troops reached the western outskirts on 12 September. The Red Army arrived from the east on 19 September, and the Polish commander, General Langner, surrendered the city to the Soviets on 22 September; the Germans withdrew behind the agreed demarcation line. - **17 Sep 1939, Soviet Union invades eastern Poland**: Invoking the "collapse" of the Polish state, the Red Army crossed the whole eastern border of Poland before dawn. The Polish commander-in-chief ordered troops not to fight the Soviets except in self-defence, but the Border Protection Corps and other units resisted at Grodno, Szack and elsewhere. - **17 Sep 1939, Polish government crosses into Romania**: President Mościcki, the government and Marshal Rydz-Śmigły crossed the Czeremosz bridge at Kuty during the night of 17–18 September and were interned by Romania. A government-in-exile under President Raczkiewicz and Prime Minister Sikorski was formed in Paris on 30 September. - **28 Sep 1939, German–Soviet Boundary and Friendship Treaty**: Ribbentrop and Molotov fixed the partition line in Poland along the Pisa, Narew, Bug and San rivers. Lithuania was transferred to the Soviet sphere in exchange for the Lublin and eastern Warsaw regions. On the same day Estonia was forced to sign a mutual-assistance pact granting the USSR military bases. - **2 Oct 1939, Battle of Kock: last battle of the Polish campaign**: The Independent Operational Group Polesie under General Kleeberg fought German motorised divisions near Kock from 2 October. Out of ammunition, it capitulated on 6 October, the last regular Polish formation to lay down arms. - **8 Oct 1939, Hitler annexes western Poland to the Reich**: A decree of 8 October, in force from 26 October, incorporated western Poland into the Reich as Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia and Reichsgau Posen (renamed Wartheland in January 1940), and added East Upper Silesia to Silesia and the Zichenau and Sudauen districts to East Prussia. Mass expulsions of Poles and Jews to the Generalgouvernement followed. - **12 Oct 1939, Generalgouvernement established under Hans Frank**: A decree of 12 October created the Generalgouvernement for the occupied Polish territories not annexed by Germany, in force from 26 October with Kraków as its seat. It was divided into the districts of Kraków, Radom, Warsaw and Lublin; Galicia was added in August 1941. - **14 Oct 1939, U-47 sinks the battleship Royal Oak in Scapa Flow**: Günther Prien's U-47 slipped through Kirk Sound into the Home Fleet's anchorage and torpedoed the battleship at anchor; 835 of her crew died. The sinking led to the building of the Churchill Barriers. - **28 Oct 1939, Lithuanian army enters Vilnius**: Under the Soviet–Lithuanian treaty of 10 October, the USSR handed Vilnius and part of its region to Lithuania in exchange for Soviet garrisons. Lithuanian troops entered the city on 28 October; anti-Jewish riots broke out days later and the Polish university was closed in December. - **1 Nov 1939, USSR annexes eastern Poland**: After rigged elections on 22 October, "People's Assemblies" in Lviv and Białystok asked for union with the USSR. The Supreme Soviet incorporated Western Ukraine into the Ukrainian SSR on 1 November and Western Belorussia into the Belorussian SSR on 2 November. - **30 Nov 1939, Winter War: the Soviet Union invades Finland**: Without a declaration of war, the Red Army crossed the Finnish border along its whole length and Soviet aircraft bombed Helsinki. On 1 December Moscow set up a puppet "Finnish Democratic Republic" under Otto Kuusinen at Terijoki. The League of Nations expelled the USSR on 14 December. - **7 Dec 1939, Battle of Suomussalmi and the Raate road**: Two Soviet divisions trying to cut Finland in two at its narrow waist were cut into isolated pockets ("motti") and destroyed in deep snow by much smaller Finnish forces under Hjalmar Siilasvuo. The victory became a symbol of Finnish resistance. - **1 Feb 1940, Soviet breakthrough on the Mannerheim Line**: After a massive artillery preparation from 1 February, the reorganised Red Army under Semyon Timoshenko broke into the main Finnish line at Lähde near Summa on 11 February. The Finns fell back to the intermediate and rear lines in front of Viipuri. - **12 Mar 1940, Moscow Peace ends the Winter War**: Finland signed the treaty on the night of 12 March and fighting stopped at 11:00 on 13 March. Finland ceded the Karelian Isthmus with Viipuri, the shores of Lake Ladoga, Salla and part of the Rybachy peninsula and leased Hanko to the USSR for 30 years; over 400,000 Karelians were evacuated. - **3 Apr 1940, Katyn massacre: the NKVD kills Polish officers and officials**: On a Politburo decision of 5 March 1940, the NKVD shot about 22,000 Polish prisoners in April and May 1940, mainly reserve and regular officers, policemen and officials. About 4,400 were killed in the Katyn forest, others at Kalinin (buried at Mednoye), Kharkiv and in prisons in the annexed territories. The USSR blamed Germany until 1990. - **9 Apr 1940, Germany occupies Denmark**: German troops crossed the Jutland border and landed at Copenhagen and other ports at dawn. After brief fighting in which 16 Danish soldiers died, the government capitulated within hours and continued in office under German "protection". - **9 Apr 1940, Oscarsborg fortress sinks the cruiser Blücher**: Guns and torpedoes of the Oscarsborg fortress in the Drøbak narrows sank the heavy cruiser Blücher, which was carrying the troops and staff meant to seize Oslo. The delay let the royal family, government, parliament and gold reserves escape north. - **9 Apr 1940, Operation Weserübung: Germany invades Norway**: German forces landed simultaneously at Oslo (by air at Fornebu), Kristiansand, Stavanger, Bergen, Trondheim and Narvik. Vidkun Quisling proclaimed himself head of government by radio that evening, but King Haakon VII refused to recognise him and the government chose to fight. - **10 Apr 1940, Naval battles of Narvik**: British destroyers attacked the German flotilla that had landed mountain troops at Narvik on 10 April; the battleship Warspite and nine destroyers returned on 13 April. All ten German destroyers were lost, leaving General Dietl's force isolated. - **10 May 1940, Britain invades Iceland**: About 750 Royal Marines landed at Reykjavík to forestall a German occupation; the Icelandic government protested but did not resist. United States forces took over the defence of Iceland from July 1941. - **10 May 1940, Churchill becomes Prime Minister**: Neville Chamberlain resigned after losing the confidence of much of his party in the Norway debate. Winston Churchill formed an all-party coalition government on 10 May, the day Germany attacked in the West. - **10 May 1940, Fall Gelb: glider troops seize Fort Eben-Emael**: The German attack on the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg began at dawn on 10 May. About 80 German glider-borne pioneers landed on the roof of Belgium's most modern fortress and disabled its guns with shaped charges; it surrendered on 11 May, opening the Albert Canal bridges to the Sixth Army. - **13 May 1940, Guderian crosses the Meuse at Sedan**: After passing through the Ardennes, Guderian's XIX Panzer Corps forced the Meuse at Sedan on 13 May behind massive dive-bomber attacks, while Rommel crossed at Dinant and Reinhardt at Monthermé. French counter-attacks failed and by 15 May the panzers had broken into open country. - **14 May 1940, Luftwaffe bombs the centre of Rotterdam**: During surrender negotiations for the city, German bombers destroyed the old city centre; the raid and the fires killed about 700-900 people (711 in the bombing itself according to an official list of 2022) and left some 85,000 homeless. Threatened with the bombing of Utrecht, the Dutch commander-in-chief ordered the army to capitulate that evening. - **15 May 1940, The Netherlands capitulates**: General Winkelman signed the capitulation of the Dutch army at a school in Rijsoord on 15 May. French and Dutch troops in Zeeland fought on until 17 May. The Netherlands was placed under Reichskommissar Arthur Seyss-Inquart. - **20 May 1940, Panzers reach the Channel at Abbeville**: The 2nd Panzer Division reached Abbeville and the Somme estuary on the evening of 20 May, ten days after the offensive began. The Allied armies in Belgium and northern France were cut off from the forces south of the Somme. - **26 May 1940, Operation Dynamo: the evacuation from Dunkirk**: Warships and hundreds of civilian boats lifted 338,000 British and French soldiers from the harbour and beaches of Dunkirk while French rearguards held the perimeter. The remaining French troops, some 35,000–40,000, surrendered on 4 June. The BEF left almost all its equipment behind. - **28 May 1940, Belgium capitulates**: With his army pinned against the coast on the Lys, King Leopold III asked for terms; the capitulation was signed at Anvaing and took effect at 04:00 on 28 May. The King stayed in Belgium as a prisoner, while the Pierlot government continued the war from exile. - **5 Jun 1940, Fall Rot: German offensive across the Somme and Aisne**: The Germans attacked the Weygand Line on the Somme from 5 June and on the Aisne from 9 June. After stubborn resistance the French front broke, and the French armies fell back in disorder towards the Loire. - **7 Jun 1940, King Haakon and the Norwegian government leave for Britain**: The king and government left Tromsø aboard the cruiser Devonshire and continued the war from London. The Norwegian forces in the north capitulated on 10 June. - **10 Jun 1940, Norwegian army capitulates**: The capitulation of the Norwegian forces in Norway was signed in Trondheim after 62 days of fighting, the longest resistance of any country invaded in 1940 except the USSR. Norway remained at war through its government in London. - **10 Jun 1940, Italy declares war on Britain and France**: Mussolini announced the declaration from the balcony of Palazzo Venezia, with effect from 11 June. The first Italian air raids on Malta followed on 11 June. - **11 Jun 1940, Siege of Malta**: The British island base, astride the Axis supply route to Libya, was bombed continuously by the Italian and German air forces from 11 June 1940, most heavily in spring 1942, and nearly starved; King George VI awarded the island the George Cross in April 1942. The siege was lifted when a convoy arrived in November 1942. - **14 Jun 1940, German troops enter Paris**: The French government had left for Tours on 10 June and declared Paris an open city. German troops entered unopposed on the morning of 14 June and paraded down the Champs-Élysées; the government moved on to Bordeaux. - **14 Jun 1940, Spain occupies the Tangier International Zone**: Spanish Moroccan troops occupied Tangier on the day Paris fell, officially to guarantee its neutrality. Spain abolished the international institutions of the zone on 3 November 1940 and attached it to the Spanish protectorate of Morocco on 23 November; the international regime was restored in October 1945. - **14 Jun 1940, Auschwitz: from concentration camp to largest extermination camp**: The camp opened with a transport of 728 Polish political prisoners from Tarnów on 14 June 1940. From 1942 the gas chambers of Auschwitz II-Birkenau became the main site of the murder of European Jews; about 1.1 million people were killed there, about 1 million of them Jews, together with Poles, Roma and Soviet prisoners of war. - **15 Jun 1940, Soviet troops occupy Lithuania**: After an ultimatum on 14 June demanding a new government and unlimited entry of troops, the Red Army occupied Lithuania on 15 June. President Smetona fled to Germany. - **17 Jun 1940, Soviet troops occupy Latvia and Estonia**: Ultimatums delivered on 16 June were followed by the entry of Soviet troops into Latvia and Estonia on 17 June. Pro-Soviet governments were installed within days and rigged elections were held on 14–15 July. - **17 Jun 1940, Pétain asks Germany for an armistice**: Paul Reynaud resigned on 16 June and Marshal Philippe Pétain formed a government in Bordeaux. On 17 June he announced by radio that the fighting must stop and asked Germany for terms. - **18 Jun 1940, De Gaulle's appeal of 18 June**: In a BBC broadcast from London, General Charles de Gaulle called on French soldiers and engineers to join him and continue the fight. It became the founding act of Free France. - **22 Jun 1940, Franco-German armistice signed at Compiègne**: In the same railway carriage used in 1918, France signed an armistice that left German troops in occupation of northern and western France, about three-fifths of the country, while an unoccupied zone in the south remained under the French government. The fleet was to be demobilised in French ports. - **28 Jun 1940, Soviet Union annexes Bessarabia and northern Bukovina**: Under an ultimatum of 26 June, Romania evacuated Bessarabia, northern Bukovina and the Hertsa region; the Red Army moved in from 28 June and completed the occupation on 3 July. The Moldavian SSR was created on 2 August. - **3 Jul 1940, British fleet attacks the French fleet at Mers-el-Kébir**: To keep the French fleet out of German hands, a British squadron under Admiral Somerville opened fire when the French admiral rejected an ultimatum. The battleship Bretagne blew up and 1,297 French sailors were killed. Vichy France broke off relations with Britain. - **10 Jul 1940, Vichy: the National Assembly gives Pétain full powers**: Meeting in the spa town of Vichy, the National Assembly voted by 569 to 80 to give Marshal Pétain full powers to draw up a new constitution. On 11 July he made himself head of the French State, ending the Third Republic. - **10 Jul 1940, Battle of Britain**: The Luftwaffe attacked Channel convoys, then from 13 August ("Adlertag") RAF airfields and radar stations, to win air superiority for an invasion. Fighter Command held out; after heavy losses on 15 September Hitler postponed Operation Sea Lion indefinitely. - **3 Aug 1940, USSR annexes Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia**: The "People's Assemblies" elected in July proclaimed Soviet republics on 21 July and applied to join the USSR. The Supreme Soviet admitted Lithuania on 3 August, Latvia on 5 August and Estonia on 6 August. The United States and other states refused to recognise the annexation. - **30 Aug 1940, Second Vienna Award divides Transylvania**: German and Italian arbitration at the Belvedere Palace gave northern Transylvania, about 43,000 km² with Cluj, to Hungary. Hungarian troops moved in between 5 and 13 September; in the villages of Treznea (9 September) and Ip (13–14 September) Hungarian troops killed Romanian civilians. - **6 Sep 1940, King Carol II abdicates; Antonescu takes power in Romania**: Discredited by the loss of Bessarabia, northern Bukovina and northern Transylvania, King Carol II abdicated in favour of his son Michael. General Ion Antonescu became Conducător and on 14 September proclaimed a "National Legionary State" with the Iron Guard. - **7 Sep 1940, Treaty of Craiova: southern Dobruja to Bulgaria**: Romania returned southern Dobruja, lost by Bulgaria in 1913, with a population exchange. Bulgarian troops took over the region between 21 September and 1 October 1940; it is the only territorial change of the period that outlasted the war. - **7 Sep 1940, The Blitz on London and British cities**: The Luftwaffe switched to bombing London on 7 September and attacked it on 57 consecutive nights, then extended the night offensive to Coventry, Birmingham, Liverpool, Glasgow, Belfast and other cities. The last heavy raid on London was on 10–11 May 1941. About 43,000 civilians were killed. - **13 Sep 1940, Italy invades Egypt and halts at Sidi Barrani**: Marshal Graziani's Tenth Army crossed the Libyan frontier on 13 September and advanced about 100 km, taking Sidi Barrani on 16 September. It then stopped to build a chain of fortified camps and to bring up supplies. - **27 Sep 1940, Tripartite Pact signed by Germany, Italy and Japan**: The three powers recognised each other's leadership in creating a "new order" in Europe and East Asia and pledged mutual assistance against any power not yet in the war, meaning the United States. Hungary, Romania and Slovakia joined in November. - **28 Oct 1940, Italy invades Greece after Metaxas says "No"**: At 3 a.m. the Italian minister handed Ioannis Metaxas an ultimatum demanding free passage for Italian troops; Metaxas refused. Italian forces crossed from Albania at 5:30, and Britain landed troops on Crete and Lemnos to support Greece. - **11 Nov 1940, Taranto: British carrier aircraft cripple the Italian fleet**: Twenty-one Swordfish torpedo bombers from HMS Illustrious attacked the Italian battle fleet at anchor at night, sinking the Conte di Cavour and badly damaging Littorio and Caio Duilio. The Italian fleet moved north to Naples. - **14 Nov 1940, Coventry destroyed in a night raid**: More than 500 German bombers attacked Coventry for eleven hours on the night of 14–15 November. The raid destroyed the medieval cathedral, much of the city centre and many factories and killed about 570 people. - **15 Nov 1940, Warsaw Ghetto sealed off**: The ghetto created by an order of 2 October was closed with a wall on 15–16 November, confining more than 400,000 Jews to about 3.4 km². Some 80,000 died of hunger and disease before the mass deportations of 1942. - **22 Nov 1940, Greek counter-offensive takes Korçë**: The Greek army counter-attacked from 14 November and entered Korçë, the largest town in southern Albania, on 22 November. Pogradec, Sarandë (6 December) and Gjirokastër (8 December) followed, until a quarter of Albania was in Greek hands. - **9 Dec 1940, Operation Compass: British offensive in the Western Desert**: The Western Desert Force under Richard O'Connor attacked the Italian camps at Nibeiwa and Tummar and took Sidi Barrani on 10 December, capturing some 38,000 prisoners in three days. By mid-December the Italians had been driven out of Egypt except for the Sollum area. - **21 Jan 1941, Australians capture Tobruk**: The 6th Australian Division broke into the Tobruk perimeter on 21 January and took the port the next day with some 25,000 prisoners. The capture gave the British a harbour close to the front. - **5 Feb 1941, Battle of Beda Fomm: the Italian Tenth Army destroyed**: A British force cut across the desert base of the Cyrenaican bulge and blocked the coast road south of Benghazi. The retreating Italian Tenth Army surrendered on 7 February; Operation Compass had taken about 130,000 prisoners since December. - **12 Feb 1941, Rommel arrives in Tripoli**: Lieutenant-General Erwin Rommel arrived to command the German troops sent to rescue Italy's position in Libya (Operation Sonnenblume). The first units of the Afrika Korps landed on 14 February. - **1 Mar 1941, Bulgaria joins the Axis; German troops enter**: Prime Minister Bogdan Filov signed the Tripartite Pact in Vienna on 1 March. The German Twelfth Army crossed the Danube from Romania into Bulgaria on 1–2 March to deploy against Greece. - **27 Mar 1941, Coup d'état in Belgrade**: Air force officers under General Dušan Simović overthrew the regency of Prince Paul and declared 17-year-old Peter II of age. Hitler ordered the destruction of Yugoslavia the same day. - **27 Mar 1941, Battle of Cape Matapan**: Forewarned by Ultra decrypts, the British Mediterranean Fleet under Admiral Cunningham damaged the battleship Vittorio Veneto. In a night action it sank the heavy cruisers Zara, Pola and Fiume and two destroyers; about 2,300 Italian sailors died. - **31 Mar 1941, Rommel's first offensive retakes Cyrenaica**: Rommel attacked at Mersa Brega on 31 March against orders to wait. Benghazi fell on 3–4 April and Generals O'Connor and Neame were captured; by 11 April the Axis had reached the Egyptian frontier and surrounded Tobruk. - **6 Apr 1941, Operation Punishment: Luftwaffe bombs Belgrade**: Without a declaration of war, German bombers attacked the Yugoslav capital at dawn on 6 April, destroying the city centre and the national library and killing thousands of civilians. German, Italian and Hungarian armies invaded Yugoslavia the same day. - **6 Apr 1941, Germany invades Greece: battle of the Metaxas Line**: The German Twelfth Army attacked Greece from Bulgaria on 6 April. The forts of the Metaxas Line, including Rupel, held out for four days, but German armour outflanked them through Yugoslav Macedonia; Thessaloniki fell on 9 April and the Greek East Macedonia Army surrendered. - **10 Apr 1941, Independent State of Croatia proclaimed**: As German troops entered Zagreb, the Ustaše leader Slavko Kvaternik proclaimed the Independent State of Croatia (NDH). Ante Pavelić arrived on 15 April; the new state, which included Bosnia and Herzegovina, began the persecution and mass murder of Serbs, Jews and Roma. - **10 Apr 1941, Siege of Tobruk**: The Australian 9th Division and British units, later replaced by British, Polish and Czechoslovak troops, held the fortress perimeter against Rommel's attacks from 10–11 April. Supplied by sea, Tobruk held for 241 days until relieved during Operation Crusader. - **17 Apr 1941, Yugoslav army capitulates**: Representatives of the Yugoslav High Command signed an unconditional surrender in Belgrade on 17 April, effective at noon on 18 April. King Peter and the government had already left for Greece and went on to London. - **20 Apr 1941, Greek Army of Epirus surrenders**: With its retreat cut off, General Tsolakoglou surrendered the Army of Epirus to the SS Leibstandarte at Votonosi near Metsovo on 20 April. A revised surrender including Italy was signed in Thessaloniki on 23 April, the day King George II and the government left for Crete. - **27 Apr 1941, German troops enter Athens**: German troops entered the undefended capital and raised the swastika over the Acropolis. Greece was divided into German, Italian and Bulgarian zones of occupation, with a collaborationist government under Tsolakoglou. - **2 May 1941, Anglo-Iraqi War**: Iraqi troops surrounding the RAF base at Habbaniya were attacked on 2 May. Reinforced by a column from Palestine and by Indian troops at Basra, the British took Fallujah on 19 May and reached Baghdad; an armistice on 31 May restored the regent. German aircraft sent via Vichy Syria arrived too late. - **20 May 1941, Battle of Crete**: German paratroopers landed at Maleme, Chania, Rethymno and Heraklion; after taking Maleme airfield on 21 May they flew in mountain troops. The British, Commonwealth and Greek defenders were evacuated from Sfakia and Heraklion by 1 June at heavy naval cost. German airborne losses were so high that no further large drops were made. - **27 May 1941, Battleship Bismarck sunk**: Three days after sinking the battlecruiser Hood in the Denmark Strait (1,415 dead, 3 survivors), Bismarck was crippled by an aerial torpedo from a Swordfish. The Home Fleet sank her about 550 km west of Brest; over 2,000 of her crew died. - **8 Jun 1941, Allied invasion of Vichy Syria and Lebanon**: British, Australian, Indian and Free French forces invaded from Palestine, Transjordan and Iraq to stop German use of the Levant. After hard fighting against Vichy troops, Damascus fell on 21 June, and a ceasefire on 12 July was followed by the armistice of Saint-Jean d'Acre on 14 July. - **22 Jun 1941, Operation Barbarossa: Germany invades the USSR; siege of Brest Fortress**: At about 3:15 a.m. more than three million German and allied troops attacked along the whole Soviet border from the Baltic to the Black Sea; Romania joined at once and Italy declared war the same day. The garrison of the Brest fortress on the Bug held out in isolated pockets for weeks; the last defender was captured in late July. - **23 Jun 1941, Tank battle of Dubno–Lutsk–Brody**: Six Soviet mechanised corps with some 3,000 tanks counter-attacked the German First Panzer Group in western Ukraine. Poorly coordinated, they lost most of their tanks but delayed the German drive on Kiev by about a week. - **25 Jun 1941, Continuation War: Soviet air raids and Finland at war**: Soviet aircraft bombed Helsinki, Turku and other Finnish towns on 25 June, and the Finnish government declared that the country was at war. Finnish forces attacked in Ladoga Karelia from 10 July and on the Karelian Isthmus from the end of July. - **26 Jun 1941, Bombing of Kassa: Hungary enters the war against the USSR**: Unidentified aircraft bombed the Hungarian city of Kassa (Košice) on 26 June. The government blamed the USSR and declared a state of war on 27 June; the origin of the aircraft is still disputed. - **28 Jun 1941, Minsk falls; Białystok–Minsk encirclement**: The panzer groups of Hoth and Guderian met east of Minsk on 27–28 June, trapping most of the Soviet Western Front in pockets around Białystok, Navahrudak and Minsk. By 9 July the Germans counted about 324,000 prisoners. - **29 Jun 1941, Iași pogrom**: Romanian police and soldiers, German troops and local residents killed thousands of Jews in the city, and thousands more died in sealed "death trains" that circulated for days in the summer heat. Romanian authorities later put the dead at over 13,000. - **30 Jun 1941, Germans take Lviv; NKVD prison massacres and pogroms**: Before retreating, the NKVD shot thousands of prisoners in the city's jails. After German troops entered on 30 June, Ukrainian militia and crowds, encouraged by the Germans, killed thousands of Jews in pogroms on 30 June–2 July and again at the end of July. OUN-B leaders proclaimed a Ukrainian state on 30 June and were arrested by the Germans. - **10 Jul 1941, Battle of Smolensk**: Army Group Centre crossed the Dnieper, took Smolensk on 16 July and encircled large Soviet forces west of the city by late July. Repeated Soviet counter-attacks, including the recapture of Yelnya on 6 September, cost both sides heavily and slowed the drive on Moscow for two months. - **20 Jul 1941, Ponary massacre near Vilnius**: In a forest outside Vilnius, German Einsatzgruppe and SD units and Lithuanian auxiliaries shot about 70,000 Jews and some 30,000 Poles, Soviet prisoners and others. The killings went on from July 1941 until the summer of 1944. - **2 Aug 1941, Uman pocket**: The First Panzer Group and Seventeenth Army encircled the Soviet 6th and 12th Armies near Uman and Podvysoke, closing the ring on 2 August. Some 100,000 soldiers, including both army commanders, were taken prisoner by 8 August. - **8 Aug 1941, Siege of Odessa**: The Romanian Fourth Army, with German support, besieged the port for 73 days at a cost of about 90,000 Romanian casualties. The Soviet Coastal Army was evacuated by sea to Sevastopol by 16 October, when Romanian troops entered the city. - **21 Aug 1941, Jasenovac camp system of the Ustaše**: The Ustaše regime ran a complex of camps at Jasenovac and Stara Gradiška from August 1941 until April 1945. Between 80,000 and 100,000 people were murdered there, mainly Serbs, Jews and Roma, as well as Croat and Bosniak opponents of the regime. - **25 Aug 1941, Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran**: British and Indian forces attacked at Abadan, Bandar Shahpur and Khorramshahr and from Iraq, while three Soviet armies advanced from the Caucasus and Central Asia. Iran accepted a ceasefire on 29-30 August and formally gave up on 31 August. The aim was to secure the oilfields and a supply route to the USSR. - **27 Aug 1941, Kamianets-Podilskyi massacre**: SS and police units under Friedrich Jeckeln shot about 23,600 Jews at Kamianets-Podilskyi, many of them deported there by Hungary as "alien" Jews. It was the largest single massacre of Jews up to that date. - **8 Sep 1941, Siege of Leningrad**: With the capture of Shlisselburg on 8 September, German forces cut Leningrad's last land link; the Finns held the north. During the 872-day blockade about 800,000 to one million civilians died, most of them of starvation in the winter of 1941–42. An ice road across Lake Ladoga was the main lifeline. - **14 Sep 1941, Battle of Kiev: the largest encirclement of the war**: Guderian's Second Panzer Group from the north and Kleist's First Panzer Group from the Kremenchuk bridgehead met at Lokhvytsia on 14–15 September, trapping the Soviet Southwestern Front east of Kiev. The Germans entered Kiev on 19 September, and by 26 September claimed about 665,000 prisoners; front commander Kirponos was killed. - **16 Sep 1941, Reza Shah abdicates; Allied troops enter Tehran**: Reza Shah abdicated in favour of his son Mohammad Reza and went into exile; British and Soviet troops entered Tehran on 17 September. Iran was divided into a Soviet zone in the north and a British zone in the south. - **24 Sep 1941, Republic of Užice**: Partisans took Užice on 24 September and held a liberated territory in western Serbia with an arms factory, schools and its own newspaper. German offensives destroyed it by 29 November; Tito withdrew to the Sandžak and Bosnia. - **29 Sep 1941, Babi Yar massacre**: In a ravine on the outskirts of Kiev, Sonderkommando 4a with German police battalions and Ukrainian auxiliaries shot 33,771 Jews in two days. Tens of thousands of Jews, Roma, Soviet prisoners and others were killed there in the following two years. - **1 Oct 1941, Majdanek concentration and extermination camp**: The SS camp on the edge of Lublin, opened in October 1941 for Soviet prisoners, had gas chambers in use from autumn 1942. About 78,000 people were killed there, about 60,000 of them Jews. It was the first major camp reached by the Red Army, on 23 July 1944, largely intact. - **2 Oct 1941, Operation Typhoon: Vyazma and Bryansk encirclements**: The German drive on Moscow opened on 30 September–2 October; on 7 October panzer pincers closed around five Soviet armies at Vyazma, and two more pockets formed near Bryansk. By 20 October the Germans claimed about 670,000 prisoners, and the road to Moscow was briefly open. - **15 Oct 1941, Moscow panic and state of siege**: On 15 October the State Defence Committee ordered the evacuation of the government and the diplomatic corps to Kuibyshev. Panic and looting on 16 October led to the proclamation of a state of siege on 19 October; Stalin remained in the capital. - **21 Oct 1941, Kragujevac massacre**: Applying a quota of 100 hostages for every German soldier killed, the Wehrmacht shot about 2,800 men and boys of Kragujevac, including whole school classes. At Kraljevo more than 1,700 people had been shot in the previous days. - **22 Oct 1941, Odessa massacre**: After a bomb destroyed the Romanian military headquarters on 22 October, Romanian troops with German help took reprisals on the Jewish population. About 25,000–34,000 Jews were killed in the city and at Dalnyk, many of them burned alive in warehouses. - **30 Oct 1941, Siege of Sevastopol**: After breaking into the Crimea at Perekop and Ishun (18–28 October), Manstein's Eleventh Army besieged the Black Sea Fleet's base. Two assaults failed; the third, from 7 June 1942 with super-heavy artillery, took the city on 1 July, and the last defenders on the Chersonese peninsula surrendered on 4 July. - **8 Nov 1941, Tikhvin taken and retaken**: The Germans took Tikhvin on 8 November, cutting the railway that fed the Ladoga supply route to Leningrad. A Soviet counter-offensive retook the town on 9 December, and supplies could again reach the ice road. - **18 Nov 1941, Operation Crusader: Tobruk relieved**: The British Eighth Army attacked into Cyrenaica on 18 November; tank battles around Sidi Rezegh (21–23 November) and Rommel's "dash to the wire" nearly defeated it. The Tobruk garrison linked up on 27 November, and by the end of December Rommel had withdrawn to El Agheila. - **21 Nov 1941, Rostov taken and lost: first major German retreat**: The First Panzer Army took Rostov on 21 November but was driven out on 28–29 November by Soviet counter-attacks. Rundstedt was dismissed when he ordered a withdrawal to the Mius. - **30 Nov 1941, Rumbula massacre**: On 30 November and 8 December, Friedrich Jeckeln's SS and police and the Latvian Arajs Kommando shot about 25,000 Jews in the Rumbula forest. The victims came from the Riga ghetto and from a transport of Jews deported from Berlin. - **5 Dec 1941, Soviet counter-offensive before Moscow**: The German advance stopped in early December within about 30 km of the Kremlin at Krasnaya Polyana, north of Moscow, in bitter cold. On 5–6 December the Kalinin, Western and Southwestern Fronts counter-attacked with fresh reserves and threw Army Group Centre back 100–250 km. - **8 Dec 1941, Chełmno: first extermination camp**: In Chełmno in the Wartheland, the SS began killing Jews in gas vans on 8 December 1941, first from surrounding towns, then from the Łódź ghetto, together with Roma and Soviet prisoners. The camp operated until April 1943 and again from June 1944 to January 1945; at least 150,000 people were murdered. - **11 Dec 1941, Germany and Italy declare war on the United States**: Four days after Pearl Harbor, Hitler announced the declaration in the Reichstag and Mussolini in Rome; the United States declared war in return the same day. Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Croatia followed within days. - **26 Dec 1941, Soviet landings at Kerch and Feodosia**: Soviet troops landed on the Kerch peninsula on 26 December and at Feodosia on 29 December, forcing the Germans to abandon the Kerch peninsula. The Germans retook Feodosia on 18 January 1942. - **20 Jan 1942, Wannsee Conference**: Reinhard Heydrich chaired a meeting of senior officials at a villa on the Wannsee to coordinate the deportation and murder of the Jews of Europe, the "Final Solution", among the ministries and occupation authorities. Mass killing was already under way in the occupied Soviet Union and at Chełmno. - **21 Jan 1942, Rommel strikes back and retakes Benghazi**: Rommel attacked from El Agheila on 21 January and retook Benghazi on 28–29 January. By early February he had pushed the Eighth Army back to the Gazala line west of Tobruk. - **8 Feb 1942, Demyansk pocket**: About 95,000 German troops of II Army Corps were encircled south of Lake Ilmen and supplied by air until a corridor was opened at Ramushevo on 21 April. The salient was held until February 1943. - **17 Mar 1942, Bełżec extermination camp**: The first camp of Operation Reinhard began gassing Jews from Lublin and Lwów on 17 March 1942. By the end of 1942 about 435,000 Jews had been murdered there, mainly from Galicia and the Lublin and Kraków districts; the camp was then dismantled. - **8 May 1942, Operation Trappenjagd: Kerch peninsula retaken**: Manstein's Eleventh Army broke through the Soviet Crimean Front on the Parpach line and drove it back to Kerch, taking about 170,000 prisoners. Survivors held out in the Adzhimushkay quarries for months. - **12 May 1942, Second Battle of Kharkov**: A Soviet offensive from the Barvenkovo salient towards Kharkov was cut off at its base by Army Group South's counter-stroke (Operation Fridericus) from 17 May. About 240,000 Soviet soldiers were captured, and the way was open for the German summer offensive. - **16 May 1942, Sobibór extermination camp**: The second Reinhard camp, near the Bug east of Lublin, began mass gassings on 16 or 18 May 1942. About 170,000–250,000 Jews from Poland, the Netherlands, Slovakia, France and the occupied USSR were murdered there. After the prisoners' revolt of 14 October 1943 the camp was closed and razed. - **26 May 1942, Battle of Gazala**: Rommel swung round the southern end of the Gazala line and after fierce fighting in the "Cauldron" defeated the Eighth Army in armoured battles around Knightsbridge. The British retreated into Egypt, leaving Tobruk isolated. - **26 May 1942, Free French defend Bir Hakeim**: The 1st Free French Brigade under General Koenig held the desert strongpoint at the southern end of the Gazala line for sixteen days. On the night of 10–11 June it broke out with most of its men. - **27 May 1942, Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich**: Czechoslovak paratroopers Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš, sent from London, attacked the Deputy Reich Protector's car in Prague-Libeň on 27 May; he died on 4 June. The parachutists were killed in the church of Sts Cyril and Methodius on 18 June, and brutal reprisals followed. - **30 May 1942, First "thousand-bomber" raid, on Cologne**: Bomber Command sent 1,047 aircraft against Cologne in one night, destroying about 3,300 buildings and killing some 470 people. The raid demonstrated the concentrated area-bombing tactics Harris would use against German cities. - **10 Jun 1942, Destruction of Lidice**: In reprisal for Heydrich's assassination, German police shot all 173 men of the village, deported the women to Ravensbrück and the children to Chełmno, where 82 were gassed, and razed Lidice to the ground. On 24 June the village of Ležáky suffered a similar fate. - **21 Jun 1942, Tobruk falls to Rommel**: The fortress that had held out in 1941 fell in a single day; General Klopper surrendered with about 33,000 South African, British and Indian troops and large stores. Rommel was promoted field marshal and pursued the Eighth Army into Egypt. - **28 Jun 1942, Case Blue: the German summer offensive begins**: Army Group South attacked east of Kursk on 28 June towards Voronezh, which it reached on 6–7 July, and then turned south-east along the Don. On 9 July the army group split into Army Group A (Caucasus) and Army Group B (Stalingrad). - **1 Jul 1942, First Battle of El Alamein**: Auchinleck stopped Rommel's exhausted army on a 60-km line between the sea at El Alamein and the Qattara Depression. Counter-attacks on Ruweisat Ridge and at Tel el Eisa in July failed, and both sides dug in. - **16 Jul 1942, Vel' d'Hiv roundup in Paris**: French police arrested 13,152 foreign and stateless Jews in Paris, including over 4,000 children, and held families in the Vélodrome d'Hiver in appalling conditions. They were sent via Drancy and other camps to Auschwitz, and very few survived. - **22 Jul 1942, Great deportation from the Warsaw Ghetto**: From the Umschlagplatz, the SS deported about 265,000 Jews from the Warsaw ghetto to Treblinka in eight weeks, where nearly all were murdered on arrival. About 60,000 people remained in the ghetto. - **23 Jul 1942, Treblinka extermination camp**: The largest of the Operation Reinhard camps began gassing Jews from Warsaw on 23 July 1942. About 800,000–900,000 Jews were murdered there, mainly from the Warsaw and Radom districts, Białystok, Theresienstadt, Greece and Macedonia. Prisoners revolted on 2 August 1943; the last transports arrived in August and the camp was razed that autumn. - **23 Jul 1942, Rostov falls a second time**: The Seventeenth Army and First Panzer Army took Rostov and the Don crossings, opening the way to the Caucasus. The Red Army's retreat led Stalin to issue Order No. 227, "Not one step back!", on 28 July. - **9 Aug 1942, Germans reach the Maikop oilfields**: Kleist's First Panzer Army took Maikop, the westernmost of the Caucasus oilfields, but found the wells and refineries destroyed. Krasnodar fell on 12 August. - **10 Aug 1942, Operation Pedestal: convoy to Malta**: Fourteen merchant ships escorted by a large fleet fought their way through Axis air, submarine and torpedo-boat attacks; the carrier Eagle and nine merchantmen were sunk. The five that reached Grand Harbour, including the crippled tanker Ohio on 15 August, saved Malta from surrender. - **19 Aug 1942, Dieppe raid**: About 6,000 mainly Canadian troops landed at Dieppe in a large-scale raid. They could not get off the beaches; within ten hours more than half were killed, wounded or captured. The lessons shaped planning for the Normandy landings. - **23 Aug 1942, Battle of Stalingrad**: The German XIV Panzer Corps reached the Volga north of Stalingrad on 23 August while a massive Luftwaffe raid set the city on fire. The Sixth Army fought its way into the ruined city street by street through September–November but could not take the last Soviet footholds on the river bank. - **23 Oct 1942, Second Battle of El Alamein**: Montgomery's Eighth Army attacked on the night of 23 October with a heavy artillery barrage and broke through after twelve days of attrition. Rommel ordered a retreat on 4 November; the Axis army was driven out of Egypt by 11 November. - **8 Nov 1942, Operation Torch: Allied landings in North Africa**: American and British forces landed near Casablanca, Oran and Algiers. Vichy French troops resisted for up to three days; Algiers surrendered on the first evening, Oran on 10 November and Casablanca on 11 November, when Admiral Darlan, who happened to be in Algiers, ordered a general ceasefire. - **9 Nov 1942, Axis troops land in Tunisia: the race for Tunis**: German aircraft and troops arrived at Tunis on 9 November and Bizerte soon after, unopposed by the Vichy authorities. The British First Army came within about 20 km of Tunis at Tebourba and Djedeida but was thrown back in December; after the failure at Longstop Hill on 22–25 December the front settled for the winter. - **11 Nov 1942, Case Anton: Germany and Italy occupy Vichy France**: In response to Torch, German troops crossed the demarcation line and occupied the southern zone, while Italy occupied the region east of the Rhône and Corsica. The Vichy regime remained in place but lost its last sovereignty. - **19 Nov 1942, Operation Uranus: the Sixth Army encircled at Stalingrad**: The Southwestern and Don Fronts attacked on 19 November, and the Stalingrad Front on 20 November, through the Romanian armies on the flanks. The pincers met at Sovetsky near Kalach on 23 November, trapping about 290,000 German and allied troops. - **27 Nov 1942, French fleet scuttled at Toulon**: When German troops tried to seize the naval base, the French navy scuttled 77 ships, including three battleships and seven cruisers. Only a few submarines escaped to join the Allies. - **12 Jan 1943, Operation Iskra breaks the Leningrad blockade**: The Leningrad and Volkhov Fronts attacked towards each other south of Lake Ladoga and met at Workers' Settlements No. 1 and 5 on 18 January, retaking Shlisselburg. A land corridor 8–10 km wide was opened and a railway was built through it, though under German artillery fire. - **13 Jan 1943, Ostrogozhsk–Rossosh offensive: Hungarian Second Army destroyed**: Soviet armies attacked from bridgeheads on the upper Don at Uryv and Korotoyak and near Kantemirovka, shattering the Hungarian Second Army and the remains of the Italian Alpine Corps. Hungary lost about 100,000 men in its greatest military disaster. - **14 Jan 1943, Casablanca Conference**: Roosevelt and Churchill met at the Anfa Hotel and agreed to invade Sicily after Tunisia and to intensify the bomber offensive against Germany. At the closing press conference Roosevelt announced the demand for the "unconditional surrender" of the Axis powers. - **23 Jan 1943, Eighth Army enters Tripoli**: Three months after El Alamein, Montgomery's army took Tripoli, the capital of Italian Libya; the Axis withdrew to the Mareth Line in southern Tunisia. Italy's North African empire was lost. - **31 Jan 1943, Paulus surrenders at Stalingrad**: Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus, promoted the day before, surrendered the southern pocket in the city centre on 31 January; the northern pocket at the tractor factory capitulated on 2 February. About 91,000 prisoners were taken, of whom only some 5,000–6,000 returned home. - **9 Feb 1943, Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia**: From February 1943 the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) carried out an ethnic-cleansing campaign against the Polish population of Volhynia, which spread to Eastern Galicia in 1944; at its height, on 11 July 1943, UPA units attacked about 100 Polish villages. Historians estimate 50,000–100,000 Polish victims; Polish self-defence and underground units killed several thousand Ukrainian civilians in reprisals. - **16 Feb 1943, Red Army liberates Kharkov**: Against Hitler's orders, the SS Panzer Corps abandoned Kharkov to avoid encirclement. The Soviet advance, overextended, was about to be struck by Manstein's counter-offensive. - **19 Feb 1943, Battle of the Kasserine Pass**: After defeating the Americans at Sidi Bou Zid on 14 February, German and Italian armour broke through the Kasserine Pass on 20 February, inflicting heavy losses on the inexperienced US II Corps. The Axis thrust was stopped short of Thala and Tebessa and withdrew by 24 February. - **19 Feb 1943, Manstein's counter-stroke retakes Kharkov**: Army Group South counter-attacked the overextended Soviet spearheads between the Donets and the Dnieper from 19 February. The SS Panzer Corps retook Kharkov on 14–15 March and Belgorod on 18 March, leaving the Kursk salient between the two German army groups. - **15 Mar 1943, Deportation of the Jews of Thessaloniki**: Between March and August 1943 the Germans deported about 45,000 Jews of Thessaloniki, the largest Sephardic community in Europe, to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Almost all of them were murdered. - **22 Mar 1943, Khatyn massacre**: Schutzmannschaft Battalion 118 and the SS Dirlewanger unit herded the inhabitants of the Belarusian village into a barn and set it on fire, killing 149 people, 75 of them children. Khatyn stands for more than 600 Belarusian villages destroyed with their inhabitants. - **19 Apr 1943, Warsaw Ghetto Uprising**: When SS and police entered the ghetto to deport its last inhabitants, Jewish fighters of the ŻOB under Mordechai Anielewicz and of the ŻZW resisted for almost four weeks. The Germans burned the ghetto block by block; SS General Jürgen Stroop ended the operation by blowing up the Great Synagogue on 16 May. Survivors were killed or deported to Treblinka and Majdanek. - **13 May 1943, Axis forces surrender in Tunisia**: Marshal Giovanni Messe surrendered the last Axis forces at Enfidaville. About 230,000–250,000 German and Italian soldiers became prisoners, more than at Stalingrad; North Africa was cleared of the Axis. - **15 May 1943, Battle of the Sutjeska**: In Case Black, some 120,000 German, Italian, Bulgarian and Croatian troops encircled Tito's main Partisan force of about 22,000 in Montenegro and eastern Bosnia. The Partisans broke out across the Sutjeska with heavy losses; Tito was wounded. - **5 Jul 1943, Battle of Kursk: Operation Citadel**: The Germans attacked the Kursk salient from north and south with about 2,700 tanks against deep Soviet defences. Model's Ninth Army was stopped after about 12 km around Ponyri and Olkhovatka; in the south Manstein advanced about 35 km before the offensive was called off. - **10 Jul 1943, Allied invasion of Sicily**: The US Seventh Army landed around Gela and Licata and the British Eighth Army between Pachino and Syracuse, the largest amphibious landing of the war to that date. Patton took Palermo on 22 July, and the Allies entered Messina on 17 August after the Axis had evacuated about 100,000 troops across the strait. - **12 Jul 1943, Tank battle of Prokhorovka**: The Soviet 5th Guards Tank Army counter-attacked the II SS Panzer Corps near Prokhorovka station in one of the largest tank battles in history; the Soviets lost several times more tanks, but the German advance in the south was halted. On the same day the Soviet offensive against the Orel salient began. - **12 Jul 1943, Operation Kutuzov: Orel liberated**: The Western, Bryansk and Central Fronts attacked the Orel salient north of Kursk. Orel and Belgorod were both liberated on 5 August, marked by the first artillery salute in Moscow. - **24 Jul 1943, Operation Gomorrah: firestorm in Hamburg**: RAF night raids and USAAF daylight raids struck Hamburg for over a week; on the night of 27–28 July a firestorm engulfed the eastern districts. About 37,000–40,000 people were killed and about 900,000 fled the city. - **25 Jul 1943, Mussolini deposed and arrested**: After the Fascist Grand Council voted for Dino Grandi's motion against him in the night of 24–25 July, King Victor Emmanuel III dismissed Mussolini and had him arrested at Villa Savoia. Marshal Pietro Badoglio formed a government that declared the war would go on while it secretly sought an armistice. - **3 Aug 1943, Kharkov liberated for the last time**: Following the defeat of Citadel, the Voronezh and Steppe Fronts attacked from the Belgorod area on 3 August. They took Kharkov on 23 August, the date usually given as the end of the Battle of Kursk. - **3 Sep 1943, Italy signs the armistice at Cassibile**: General Giuseppe Castellano signed Italy's surrender in a military camp in Sicily, to be announced later. On the same day the British Eighth Army crossed the Strait of Messina to Reggio Calabria (Operation Baytown). - **8 Sep 1943, Italian armistice announced; Germans seize Rome**: Eisenhower announced the armistice on the evening of 8 September and Badoglio confirmed it. German forces, prepared under Operation Achse, disarmed the Italian army in Italy, France and the Balkans; the King and Badoglio fled to Brindisi on 9–10 September, and after fighting at Porta San Paolo Rome capitulated on 10 September. - **9 Sep 1943, Salerno landings**: The US Fifth Army under Mark Clark landed in the Gulf of Salerno (Operation Avalanche). German counter-attacks on 12–14 September nearly split the beachhead; it was saved by naval gunfire and airborne reinforcements, and linked up with the Eighth Army on 16 September. - **13 Sep 1943, Liberation of Corsica**: After a rising in Ajaccio on 9 September, Free French troops landed from Algiers on 13 September and fought alongside local resisters and Italian troops against the Germans withdrawing from Sardinia. Bastia was liberated on 4 October; Corsica was the first French department freed. - **15 Sep 1943, Massacre of the Acqui Division on Kefalonia**: The Italian Acqui Division refused to surrender to the Germans and fought on Kefalonia until 22 September. Thousands of Italian soldiers were killed in battle or shot after surrendering; estimates of those executed range from about 2,000 to 5,000, and more drowned when prisoner transports sank. - **23 Sep 1943, Italian Social Republic formed under Mussolini**: Mussolini formed a new Fascist government in German-occupied northern Italy, with ministries dispersed around Lake Garda (Salò). It was renamed the Italian Social Republic (RSI) on 1 December; the Germans annexed de facto the Alpine and Adriatic provinces as operational zones. - **25 Sep 1943, Smolensk liberated**: The Western and Kalinin Fronts retook Smolensk and Roslavl, advancing about 200 km in the Smolensk operation. Further south Soviet armies had reached the Dnieper on a broad front and seized bridgeheads. - **27 Sep 1943, Four days of Naples; the Allies enter the city**: Neapolitans rose against the German occupiers, who were deporting men for forced labour, and fought them for four days. The Germans withdrew and Allied troops entered Naples on 1 October, finding the port wrecked. - **1 Oct 1943, Rescue of the Danish Jews to Sweden**: Warned of the German round-up planned for 1–2 October, Danes hid their Jewish neighbours and ferried about 7,200 of them across the Øresund to neutral Sweden in fishing boats. About 470 were caught and deported to Theresienstadt. - **3 Oct 1943, Dodecanese campaign: Kos and Leros**: After Italy's surrender, British troops occupied Kos, Leros and Samos, but Germany kept Rhodes. German paratroops and landing forces took Kos on 3–4 October and Leros on 12–16 November, the last major German victory of the war. - **13 Oct 1943, Italy declares war on Germany**: The Badoglio government in Brindisi declared war on Germany, and the Allies recognised Italy as a co-belligerent. The Kingdom of the South administered the provinces of Apulia and Calabria handed back by the Allied Military Government. - **14 Oct 1943, Sobibór uprising**: Prisoners led by Alexander Pechersky and Leon Feldhendler killed eleven SS men and guards, and about 300 escaped through the minefields; around 60 survived the war. Himmler ordered the camp closed. - **3 Nov 1943, Operation "Harvest Festival": 42,000 Jews shot**: SS and police units shot about 42,000 Jewish forced labourers at Majdanek, Trawniki and Poniatowa in two days, partly in response to the revolts at Treblinka and Sobibór. It was the largest single massacre of the Holocaust. - **6 Nov 1943, Red Army liberates Kiev**: Vatutin's 1st Ukrainian Front broke out of the Lyutezh bridgehead north of the city on 3 November and took Kiev on 6 November, on the eve of the anniversary of the revolution. A German counter-attack retook Zhitomir later in the month. - **11 Nov 1943, Lebanese independence crisis**: After the Lebanese parliament removed the mandate clauses from the constitution, the French authorities arrested President Bechara El Khoury and his ministers on 11 November. Protests and British pressure forced their release on 22 November, now Lebanon's Independence Day. - **18 Nov 1943, RAF "Battle of Berlin"**: Bomber Command made 16 heavy night raids on Berlin and many on other cities, hoping to end the war from the air. Berlin was badly damaged, but the RAF lost over 1,000 bombers in the campaign, which ended after the costly Nuremberg raid of 30–31 March 1944. - **28 Nov 1943, Tehran Conference of the "Big Three"**: Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met for the first time and agreed on an invasion of northern France in May 1944 (Operation Overlord), to be supported by a Soviet offensive. They discussed moving Poland westwards and dividing Germany, and pledged to respect Iran's independence. - **29 Nov 1943, AVNOJ meets at Jajce: foundation of the new Yugoslavia**: The second session of AVNOJ proclaimed itself the legislative body of a federal Yugoslavia and set up a provisional government under Tito, who was named marshal. It forbade King Peter II to return pending a decision after the war. - **13 Dec 1943, Massacre of Kalavryta**: In reprisal for the killing of German prisoners by partisans, troops of the 117th Jäger Division shot about 500 men and boys of Kalavryta. They burned the town, nearby villages and the Agia Lavra monastery. - **26 Dec 1943, Battle of the North Cape: Scharnhorst sunk**: The battleship Scharnhorst sortied to attack an Arctic convoy and was intercepted by the Home Fleet under Admiral Fraser; she was sunk by the battleship Duke of York, cruisers and destroyers. Only 36 of her crew of about 1,970 survived. - **14 Jan 1944, Leningrad–Novgorod offensive: the siege is lifted**: The Leningrad, Volkhov and 2nd Baltic Fronts attacked from the Oranienbaum bridgehead, the Pulkovo heights and the Volkhov. Novgorod was liberated on 20 January, and on 27 January Leningrad celebrated the end of the 872-day siege with a salute. By March the Germans had fallen back to the Panther Line at Narva and Pskov. - **17 Jan 1944, Battles of Monte Cassino**: Four major Allied assaults were needed to break the Gustav Line at Cassino. The abbey on the mountain was destroyed by bombing on 15 February; New Zealand, Indian, British, French, American and Polish troops attacked in turn, and Polish II Corps raised its flag over the ruins on 18 May during Operation Diadem. - **22 Jan 1944, Anzio landing**: The US VI Corps landed unopposed at Anzio and Nettuno behind the Gustav Line but did not advance quickly on Rome. German counter-attacks in February nearly drove it into the sea; the beachhead held for four months until the breakout of 23 May. - **24 Jan 1944, Korsun–Cherkassy pocket**: The 1st and 2nd Ukrainian Fronts encircled two German corps in a salient on the Dnieper, closing the ring at Zvenyhorodka on 28 January. Relief attempts failed, and on the night of 16–17 February the trapped troops broke out towards Lysianka, losing their equipment and many men. - **2 Feb 1944, Battle of Narva**: German and Estonian troops, with volunteers from many European countries, held the Narva river line against repeated Soviet offensives for six months. In late July they fell back to the Tannenberg Line in the Sinimäed hills, which held until the Germans evacuated Estonia in September. - **23 Feb 1944, Deportation of the Chechens and Ingush**: In Operation Lentil (Chechevitsa) NKVD troops deported the entire Chechen and Ingush peoples, about 500,000 people, to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, most of them within the first week. Tens of thousands died in transit and in the first years of exile. The Balkars followed on 8 March. - **19 Mar 1944, Operation Margarethe: Germany occupies Hungary**: Fearing that Hungary would seek a separate peace, Hitler summoned Horthy to Klessheim and had German troops occupy the country. A pro-German government under Döme Sztójay was installed, and Adolf Eichmann's unit arrived to organise the deportation of Hungarian Jews. - **24 Mar 1944, Ardeatine Caves massacre**: The day after a partisan bomb killed 33 German policemen in Via Rasella, SS and police under Herbert Kappler took reprisals. They shot 335 Italian civilians and prisoners, among them 75 Jews, in the Ardeatine Caves outside Rome. - **8 Apr 1944, Crimean offensive: Sevastopol liberated**: The 4th Ukrainian Front broke through at Perekop and the Sivash on 8 April while the Separate Coastal Army attacked from Kerch. Simferopol was freed on 13 April and Sevastopol stormed on 9 May; the last German and Romanian troops on the Chersonese peninsula surrendered on 12 May. - **10 Apr 1944, Odessa liberated**: The 3rd Ukrainian Front retook the Black Sea port after two and a half years of Romanian and German occupation. Romania's Transnistria governorate had already been handed back to German military control in March. - **15 May 1944, Deportation of the Jews of Hungary to Auschwitz**: Eichmann's unit and the Hungarian gendarmerie concentrated the Jews of provincial Hungary, including annexed northern Transylvania, in ghettos such as Nagyvárad (Oradea) and deported about 437,000 people to Auschwitz-Birkenau in 147 trains in less than two months; most were gassed on arrival. Horthy stopped the deportations on 6–7 July, before the Budapest Jews were taken. - **18 May 1944, Deportation of the Crimean Tatars**: Days after the liberation of the Crimea, the NKVD deported the entire Crimean Tatar people, about 190,000 people, mostly to Uzbekistan, accusing them collectively of collaboration. A large proportion died within the first two years of exile. - **4 Jun 1944, Allies enter Rome**: After the Cassino front collapsed and the Anzio beachhead broke out, the US Fifth Army entered Rome, which the Germans had declared an open city. It was the first Axis capital to fall. - **6 Jun 1944, D-Day: Allied landings in Normandy**: After airborne landings in the night, about 156,000 American, British, Canadian and other Allied troops landed on five beaches between the Orne and the Cotentin (Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword). By nightfall all five beaches were held, though none of the day's objectives had been fully reached. - **10 Jun 1944, Massacre of Oradour-sur-Glane**: A company of the Das Reich division killed 643 inhabitants of the village; the men were shot in barns, and the women and children were locked in the church and killed by fire and gunfire. The ruins have been preserved as a memorial. - **10 Jun 1944, Distomo massacre**: Men of the 4th SS Polizei Panzergrenadier Division killed 218 inhabitants of the Boeotian village of Distomo, including many children. The massacre followed a partisan ambush of the unit nearby. - **10 Jun 1944, Vyborg–Petrozavodsk offensive against Finland**: The Leningrad Front broke through the Finnish lines on the Karelian Isthmus and took Vyborg on 20 June; the Karelian Front advanced in East Karelia and retook Petrozavodsk on 28 June. The Finns stopped the offensive at Tali–Ihantala (25 June–9 July). - **13 Jun 1944, First V-1 flying bombs hit England**: The first V-1 to strike London's area fell at Swanscombe in Kent early on 13 June; a campaign of thousands followed from launch sites in northern France and later from aircraft. The V-1s killed about 6,000 people in Britain. - **17 Jun 1944, Iceland proclaims a republic**: After a referendum in May, the Althing met at Þingvellir and proclaimed the Republic of Iceland, ending the personal union with occupied Denmark. Sveinn Björnsson became the first president. - **22 Jun 1944, Operation Bagration: Army Group Centre destroyed**: Four Soviet fronts attacked in Belorussia on 22–23 June, the third anniversary of Barbarossa. Vitebsk (26–27 June) and Bobruisk (27–29 June) were encircled, Minsk fell on 3 July, and Army Group Centre lost about 28 divisions. By August the Red Army had advanced 500–600 km to the Vistula and East Prussia. - **3 Jul 1944, Minsk liberated**: Soviet tank armies took the Belorussian capital, trapping about 100,000 German troops of the Fourth Army to the east, who surrendered by 11 July. On 17 July some 57,000 of these prisoners were marched through Moscow. - **7 Jul 1944, Vilnius liberated**: The Polish Home Army (Operation Ostra Brama) and the 3rd Belorussian Front fought the German garrison in the city together; it fell on 13 July. The NKVD then arrested and disarmed the Home Army units. - **9 Jul 1944, Caen taken; Operation Goodwood**: After heavy bombing that destroyed much of the city, British and Canadian troops took northern Caen on 9 July (Operation Charnwood) and the rest by 19 July. The Goodwood armoured offensive east of the city drew German armour away from the American sector. - **13 Jul 1944, Lvov–Sandomierz offensive**: The 1st Ukrainian Front encircled eight German divisions at Brody (18–22 July) and took Lviv on 27 July with help from the Home Army. By early August it had seized a bridgehead across the Vistula at Baranów–Sandomierz. - **20 Jul 1944, 20 July plot: bomb attack on Hitler at the Wolf's Lair**: Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg placed a briefcase bomb in the conference barracks at Hitler's headquarters in East Prussia; Hitler was only slightly injured. The coup in Berlin collapsed that night, and about 200 people were executed in the reprisals that followed. - **22 Jul 1944, PKWN manifesto: Soviet-backed Polish administration**: The Polish Committee of National Liberation, formed under Soviet auspices, published its manifesto dated at Chełm, the first town west of the Curzon Line taken by the Red Army, and moved to Lublin. It challenged the government-in-exile in London. - **23 Jul 1944, Red Army liberates Majdanek**: Soviet troops entering Lublin found the Majdanek camp with its gas chambers and crematorium largely intact. It was the first extermination site shown to the world press. - **25 Jul 1944, Operation Cobra: breakout from Normandy**: After carpet bombing west of Saint-Lô, the US First Army broke through the German line. Avranches fell on 30–31 July, and Patton's Third Army poured into Brittany and towards the Loire and the Seine. - **1 Aug 1944, Warsaw Uprising**: The Home Army rose against the German occupiers at 17:00 on 1 August as the Red Army approached the Vistula, hoping to liberate the capital before it arrived. The Soviets did not intervene effectively; after 63 days the insurgents capitulated. About 150,000–200,000 civilians and 16,000 insurgents were killed, and the Germans then systematically destroyed the city. - **5 Aug 1944, Wola massacre**: SS and police units, including the Dirlewanger and Kaminski brigades, systematically murdered the inhabitants of the Wola district of Warsaw. About 40,000–50,000 civilians were killed, most of them in the first days. - **12 Aug 1944, Massacre of Sant'Anna di Stazzema**: Soldiers of the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division killed about 560 people, mostly women, children and old people, in the Tuscan mountain village of Sant'Anna di Stazzema. They burned the bodies and the houses. - **12 Aug 1944, Falaise pocket**: American, British, Canadian, Polish and French forces encircled the German armies in Normandy. The gap between Falaise and Argentan was closed at Chambois on 19–21 August; the Poles held Hill 262 against breakout attacks. About 50,000 Germans were captured and 10,000 killed, but many escaped without their equipment. - **15 Aug 1944, Operation Dragoon: Allied landings in Provence**: The US VI Corps and French Army B landed between Cavalaire and Saint-Raphaël, with airborne troops near Le Muy. The French took Toulon and Marseille by 28 August, and the Allies advanced up the Rhône, meeting forces from Normandy on 12 September. - **19 Aug 1944, Paris uprising and liberation**: Police and the FFI rose against the German garrison on 19 August. Leclerc's 2nd Armoured Division entered the city on the night of 24 August, and General von Choltitz surrendered on 25 August without carrying out Hitler's order to destroy the city. De Gaulle walked down the Champs-Élysées on 26 August. - **20 Aug 1944, Iași–Chișinău offensive**: The 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts broke through the German–Romanian front north of Iași and south of Bender and encircled the German Sixth Army south-west of Chișinău. Romania's change of sides on 23 August completed the collapse. - **23 Aug 1944, King Michael's coup: Romania changes sides**: King Michael had Marshal Antonescu arrested at the royal palace and announced that Romania accepted the Allied armistice terms. After German aircraft bombed Bucharest on 24 August, Romania declared war on Germany; Romanian troops cleared Bucharest and the Soviets entered on 31 August. - **29 Aug 1944, Slovak National Uprising**: When German troops entered Slovakia, units of the Slovak army and partisans rose against the Tiso regime, with Banská Bystrica as their centre. German forces took Banská Bystrica on 27 October and the leadership ordered a switch to guerrilla warfare on 28 October; the Soviet offensive through the Dukla Pass came too late to help. - **3 Sep 1944, Brussels liberated**: The Guards Armoured Division reached Brussels after an advance of more than 100 km in a day. Antwerp and its intact port were taken by the 11th Armoured Division the next day, but the Scheldt estuary stayed in German hands until November. - **5 Sep 1944, USSR declares war on Bulgaria; Fatherland Front coup**: The Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria on 5 September, and the Red Army crossed the Danube on 8 September without meeting resistance; Bulgaria declared war on Germany the same day. On 9 September the Fatherland Front seized power in Sofia. - **8 Sep 1944, First V-2 rockets strike Paris and London**: The first V-2 ballistic missiles were fired at Paris in the morning of 8 September and hit Chiswick in west London that evening. More than 1,300 were launched against Britain and about 1,600 against Antwerp; nothing could be done to intercept them. - **8 Sep 1944, Battle of the Dukla Pass**: The 1st Ukrainian Front, with the Czechoslovak Army Corps, attacked through the Carpathians to reach the Slovak uprising. The Dukla Pass was taken on 6 October at the cost of very heavy losses, but the offensive stalled in the mountains. - **17 Sep 1944, Operation Market Garden**: Three Allied airborne divisions were dropped to seize the bridges at Eindhoven, Nijmegen and Arnhem for the British XXX Corps to cross the Rhine. The British 1st Airborne Division reached the Arnhem bridge but was cut off and destroyed, and about 2,400 men were withdrawn across the river on 25 September. - **19 Sep 1944, Moscow Armistice between Finland and the Allies**: Finland restored the 1940 border, ceded Petsamo and leased the Porkkala peninsula to the USSR for 50 years. It also agreed to intern or expel the German troops in the country, which led to the Lapland War; fighting with the USSR had stopped on 4–5 September. - **29 Sep 1944, Marzabotto massacre**: SS troops under Walter Reder killed about 770 civilians in Marzabotto and neighbouring villages on Monte Sole south of Bologna. The massacre was part of an operation against the Stella Rossa partisan brigade. - **2 Oct 1944, Battle of Aachen: first German city taken**: The US First Army encircled Aachen and fought street by street against its garrison, which surrendered on 21 October. It was the first major German city to fall to the Western Allies. - **7 Oct 1944, Petsamo–Kirkenes offensive**: The Karelian Front attacked the German XIX Mountain Corps on the Litsa, took Petsamo on 15 October and entered Norway, liberating Kirkenes on 25 October. The Germans withdrew into northern Norway, burning Finnmark behind them. - **10 Oct 1944, Courland pocket**: The Soviet thrust to the Baltic coast near Palanga and Memel on 10 October cut off Army Group North in western Latvia. It held out against six Soviet offensives until the general capitulation, when about 190,000 men surrendered. - **12 Oct 1944, Athens liberated**: The last German troops left Athens on 12 October, and British paratroopers and naval forces arrived from 14 October. The Papandreou government of national unity returned on 18 October. - **13 Oct 1944, Red Army takes Riga**: The 3rd Baltic Front entered the Latvian capital on 13 October as Army Group North withdrew into Courland. The rest of the city on the left bank of the Daugava was taken by 15 October. - **14 Oct 1944, Belgrade liberated**: Yugoslav Partisans and the Soviet 4th Guards Mechanised Corps fought into Belgrade and freed it on 20 October. The Partisans took over its administration and Tito's National Committee moved to the capital. - **15 Oct 1944, Horthy's armistice bid fails; Arrow Cross take power**: Regent Horthy announced on the radio that Hungary had asked the Soviet Union for an armistice. German commandos seized the Castle Hill and Horthy's son, and Horthy was forced to appoint the Arrow Cross leader Ferenc Szálasi, whose regime renewed the persecution of the Jews of Budapest. - **17 Nov 1944, Communist partisans liberate Tirana and Albania**: The National Liberation Army under Enver Hoxha took Tirana on 17 November after three weeks of fighting. Shkodër followed on 29 November, when the last Germans left Albania. - **22 Nov 1944, Metz and Strasbourg liberated**: Patton's Third Army took the city of Metz on 22 November, although its last forts held out until 13 December. Leclerc's 2nd Armoured Division entered Strasbourg on 23 November, fulfilling the Oath of Kufra. - **3 Dec 1944, Dekemvriana: fighting between ELAS and British forces in Athens**: After police fired on an EAM demonstration in Syntagma Square on 3 December, ELAS fought government and British forces for control of Athens. British reinforcements won the battle; a truce was signed on 11 January and the Varkiza Agreement on 12 February 1945. - **16 Dec 1944, Ardennes offensive: the Battle of the Bulge**: Three German armies attacked the thinly held American front in the Ardennes, aiming for Antwerp. The 101st Airborne held the road hub of Bastogne, encircled from 20 December until Patton's troops broke through on 26 December; German spearheads were stopped short of the Meuse near Dinant. By late January the bulge was eliminated. - **26 Dec 1944, Siege of Budapest**: The 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts closed the ring around Budapest at Esztergom on 26 December. Pest fell on 18 January; the garrison in Buda tried to break out on 11 February and was destroyed, and the city capitulated on 13 February. About 38,000 civilians died. - **12 Jan 1945, Vistula–Oder offensive**: Konev's 1st Ukrainian Front attacked from the Sandomierz bridgehead on 12 January and Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front from Magnuszew and Puławy on 14 January. The German front in Poland collapsed; the Red Army advanced about 500 km in three weeks and reached the Oder, 70 km from Berlin. - **13 Jan 1945, East Prussian offensive**: The 3rd and 2nd Belorussian Fronts attacked East Prussia from the east and south. Hundreds of thousands of civilians fled westwards in winter conditions, many across the ice of the Vistula Lagoon; the last pockets on the Samland peninsula fell in April. - **17 Jan 1945, Red Army and Polish troops enter the ruins of Warsaw**: The Polish 1st Army and Soviet troops entered Warsaw, about 85% of whose left-bank buildings had been destroyed after the uprising. Kraków and Łódź were liberated on 19 January. - **23 Jan 1945, Operation Hannibal: evacuation across the Baltic**: The German navy and merchant fleet evacuated about 800,000–900,000 civilians and 350,000 soldiers from East Prussia, Danzig and Courland by sea, from ports such as Pillau, Gotenhafen and Hela. It was one of the largest seaborne evacuations in history. - **26 Jan 1945, East Prussia cut off at Tolkemit**: Soviet tanks of the 5th Guards Tank Army reached the Vistula Lagoon near Tolkemit, cutting the land connection between East Prussia and the Reich. Elbing held out until 10 February. - **27 Jan 1945, Red Army liberates Auschwitz**: Soldiers of the 60th Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front found about 7,000 sick and exhausted prisoners in Auschwitz and its sub-camps. About 58,000 prisoners had been driven west on death marches from 17 to 21 January; the SS had blown up the gas chambers and crematoria. - **30 Jan 1945, Wilhelm Gustloff sunk**: The Soviet submarine S-13 torpedoed the liner Wilhelm Gustloff, carrying refugees, wounded and naval personnel from Gotenhafen, off the Pomeranian coast. About 9,000 people died, the largest loss of life in a single ship sinking. - **4 Feb 1945, Yalta Conference**: Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin agreed on the occupation of Germany in zones (including a French one), on the Curzon Line as Poland's eastern border with compensation in the west, on a reorganised Polish government and on free elections in liberated Europe. The USSR undertook to enter the war against Japan. - **13 Feb 1945, Bombing of Dresden**: Two RAF night raids on 13–14 February and US daylight raids on 14 and 15 February caused a firestorm that destroyed the historic city centre. An official historians' commission put the number of dead at up to 25,000. - **13 Feb 1945, Siege of Breslau**: Gauleiter Karl Hanke's "Festung Breslau", encircled in mid-February, held out for almost three months, and much of the city was destroyed in the fighting. It surrendered on 6 May, four days after Berlin. - **6 Mar 1945, Operation Spring Awakening at Lake Balaton**: The Sixth SS Panzer Army and other German forces attacked between Lake Balaton and Lake Velence to protect the last oilfields at Nagykanizsa. The offensive bogged down in mud and was stopped after ten days; the Soviet Vienna offensive began on 16 March. - **7 Mar 1945, Americans seize the Ludendorff Bridge at Remagen**: Troops of the US 9th Armored Division captured the railway bridge at Remagen intact after a German demolition charge failed, establishing the first Allied bridgehead across the Rhine. The damaged bridge collapsed on 17 March. Cologne had fallen on 6 March. - **16 Mar 1945, Vienna offensive: Red Army takes Vienna**: The 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts attacked from Hungary on 16 March, crossed the Austrian border on 29 March and stormed Vienna after a week of street fighting; the city fell on 13 April. The Austrian resistance group O5 tried to help the Soviets. - **23 Mar 1945, Operation Plunder and Varsity: the Rhine crossing at Wesel**: Montgomery's 21st Army Group crossed the lower Rhine on the night of 23–24 March, supported on 24 March by the largest one-day airborne operation of the war (Varsity). Patton had crossed at Oppenheim on 22 March. - **28 Mar 1945, Gdynia and Danzig taken**: The 2nd Belorussian Front, with Polish troops, took Gdynia on 28 March and Danzig on 30 March after heavy fighting that left the old city in ruins. The remnants of the German Second Army held the Hela peninsula and the Vistula delta until May. - **1 Apr 1945, Ruhr pocket**: The US Ninth and First Armies met at Lippstadt on 1 April, encircling Army Group B in the Ruhr. When the pocket collapsed on 18 April about 317,000 German soldiers surrendered; Field Marshal Model shot himself on 21 April. - **6 Apr 1945, Königsberg stormed**: After a massive bombardment the 3rd Belorussian Front stormed the East Prussian capital in four days, and General Lasch surrendered on 9 April. Soviet sources counted about 90,000 prisoners, many of them civilians and Volkssturm men. - **9 Apr 1945, Final Allied offensive in Italy**: The Eighth Army attacked on the Senio on 9 April and forced the Argenta Gap, and the Fifth Army broke out of the Apennines on 14 April. Polish and American troops entered Bologna on 21 April, and the Allies crossed the Po on 23–24 April. - **11 Apr 1945, Buchenwald liberated**: As US troops approached, prisoners of the camp's resistance organisation took control of Buchenwald; the US 6th Armored Division arrived the same afternoon, finding about 21,000 prisoners. Eisenhower had visited the sub-camp of Ohrdruf, freed on 4 April, the day before. - **15 Apr 1945, British troops liberate Bergen-Belsen**: Under a local truce, British troops entered Bergen-Belsen and found about 60,000 starving prisoners, many dying of typhus, and thousands of unburied bodies. About 14,000 more died after liberation despite relief efforts. - **16 Apr 1945, Battle of the Seelow Heights**: Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front attacked from the Küstrin bridgehead on the Oder on 16 April. It broke through the German defences on the Seelow Heights after three days of costly fighting, opening the road to Berlin. - **16 Apr 1945, Battle of Berlin**: The 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts encircled Berlin on 25 April and fought their way into the city centre. Soviet troops stormed the Reichstag on 30 April; the garrison under General Weidling capitulated on 2 May. - **25 Apr 1945, Elbe Day: American and Soviet troops meet at Torgau**: Patrols of the US 69th Infantry Division met soldiers of the Soviet 58th Guards Rifle Division at Strehla and at Torgau on the Elbe. The link-up cut the remaining German territory in two. - **25 Apr 1945, National insurrection in northern Italy**: The National Liberation Committee for Northern Italy (CLNAI) called a general insurrection, and partisans took control of Milan, Turin and Genoa, where the German garrison surrendered to them on 25–26 April. The date is celebrated as Italy's Liberation Day. - **27 Apr 1945, Provisional Austrian government declares independence**: Karl Renner's provisional government, formed with Soviet approval, declared the Anschluss null and void and restored the Republic of Austria. The Western Allies recognised it only in October 1945. - **28 Apr 1945, Mussolini executed by partisans**: Captured at Dongo on 27 April while trying to escape to Switzerland with a German column, Mussolini and Clara Petacci were shot by partisans at Giulino di Mezzegra on Lake Como. Their bodies were hung in Piazzale Loreto in Milan the next day. - **29 Apr 1945, Dachau liberated**: Troops of the US 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions entered the first Nazi concentration camp, finding about 30,000 prisoners and a train full of bodies; some SS guards were killed after surrendering. Ravensbrück was liberated by the Red Army on 30 April. - **29 Apr 1945, Surrender at Caserta: German forces in Italy capitulate**: Envoys of General von Vietinghoff and SS General Wolff, who had negotiated secretly with the Allies (Operation Sunrise), signed the unconditional surrender of German and RSI forces in Italy at the Royal Palace of Caserta. It took effect on 2 May. - **30 Apr 1945, Hitler commits suicide in the Führerbunker**: With Soviet troops a few hundred metres away, Hitler shot himself in his bunker below the Reich Chancellery; Eva Braun took poison. In his testament he named Grand Admiral Dönitz as head of state. The same evening Soviet soldiers raised a flag on the Reichstag. - **1 May 1945, Yugoslav forces occupy Trieste**: The Yugoslav 4th Army and the Slovene 9th Corps entered Trieste on 1 May, a day before the 2nd New Zealand Division. The Yugoslav occupation lasted 40 days and was accompanied by arrests and killings (the "foibe"); under the Belgrade agreement of 9 June it withdrew behind the Morgan Line. - **2 May 1945, Berlin garrison surrenders**: General Helmuth Weidling ordered the defenders of Berlin to lay down their arms. On the same day the surrender in Italy came into force. - **3 May 1945, Cap Arcona and Thielbek sunk in the Bay of Lübeck**: RAF Typhoons attacked ships in the Bay of Lübeck not knowing that the SS had crammed them with prisoners from Neuengamme. About 7,000 prisoners died, many of them shot or drowned trying to reach the shore. - **4 May 1945, German surrender at Lüneburg Heath**: Admiral von Friedeburg signed the surrender of all German forces in north-west Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark to Field Marshal Montgomery at Timeloberg, effective 08:00 on 5 May. The Netherlands and Denmark celebrate 5 May as Liberation Day. - **5 May 1945, Prague uprising**: Czech insurgents seized the radio station and barricaded the streets. They were helped briefly by the Russian Liberation Army (Vlasov's troops), and German forces were allowed to leave the city on 8 May; the Red Army entered Prague on 9 May. - **5 May 1945, Mauthausen liberated**: A US reconnaissance patrol reached Mauthausen and Gusen, the last large concentration camps to be liberated. At least 90,000 people had died in the Mauthausen–Gusen camp system. - **7 May 1945, Germany signs unconditional surrender at Reims**: General Alfred Jodl signed the unconditional surrender of all German forces at Eisenhower's headquarters at 02:41 on 7 May. It was to take effect at 23:01 CET on 8 May. - **8 May 1945, Surrender ratified in Berlin-Karlshorst: VE Day**: At Soviet insistence, Field Marshal Keitel and the heads of the navy and air force signed a definitive surrender before Zhukov and Allied representatives in Karlshorst late on 8 May, after midnight Moscow time. The West celebrates Victory in Europe on 8 May, the Soviet Union on 9 May. - **8 May 1945, Sétif and Guelma massacres**: A VE-Day demonstration for Algerian independence in Sétif turned into riots in which 102 Europeans were killed. French troops, aircraft, warships and settler militias carried out weeks of reprisals in the Sétif and Guelma regions, killing thousands of Algerians; estimates range from 1,020 (the initial French figure) through 5,000-6,000 (historian Charles-Robert Ageron) to 45,000 (the Algerian official figure). - **15 May 1945, Bleiburg repatriations and post-war killings**: Tens of thousands of NDH soldiers, Slovene Home Guards, Chetniks and civilians fleeing to the British zone in Austria were refused surrender at Bleiburg and turned over to the Yugoslav army. Many of them were killed in mass executions, at sites such as Tezno and Kočevski Rog, or died on forced marches; estimates of the dead vary widely. - **5 Jun 1945, Berlin Declaration: the Allies assume supreme authority**: Eisenhower, Zhukov, Montgomery and de Lattre signed a declaration in Berlin by which the four powers assumed supreme authority over Germany. Statements issued the same day set out the zones of occupation, the division of Berlin and the Allied Control Council. - **1 Jul 1945, Western Allies withdraw into their zones; Soviets take Saxony and Thuringia**: American and British troops withdrew from the parts of Saxony, Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg they had conquered, which the Red Army occupied as part of the Soviet zone. In exchange American, British and later French troops took up their sectors in Berlin. - **4 Jul 1945, Americans and British take over their sectors of Berlin**: British and American forces had arrived in Berlin from 1 July; on 4 July the US flag was raised at the headquarters in Zehlendorf and the Western sectors formally passed to them. The Allied Kommandatura began work on 11 July. - **17 Jul 1945, Potsdam Conference and Agreement**: Truman, Stalin and Churchill, replaced by Clement Attlee after the British election on 26 July, agreed on the demilitarisation, denazification and reparations of Germany under the Allied Control Council. Germany east of the Oder–Neisse line was placed under Polish administration, northern East Prussia under Soviet administration, and the "orderly and humane" transfer of Germans from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary was approved.