Portal:World War II

The World War II Portal

Clockwise from top left: Commonwealth troops in the desert; Chinese civilians being buried alive by Japanese soldiers; Soviet forces during a winter offensive; Carrier-borne Japanese planes readying for take off; Soviet troops fighting in Berlin; A German submarine under attack.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global military conflict. It began as the joining of what had initially been two separate conflicts, with the first beginning in Asia in 1937 (the Second Sino-Japanese War) and the other beginning in Europe in 1939 (the German and Soviet invasion of Poland).

The war split the majority of the world's nations into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. It involved the mobilization of over 100 million military personnel, making it the most widespread war in history, and placed the participants in a state of "total war", which erased the distinction between civil and military resources and resulted in the complete activation of a nation's economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities for the purposes of the war effort. Over 70 million people, the majority of them civilians, were killed, making it the deadliest conflict in human history.

The Allies won the war, and as a result, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as the world's leading superpowers. This set the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 45 years. The United Nations was formed in the hope of preventing another such conflict. The self-determination spawned by the war accelerated decolonization movements in Asia and Africa, while Europe itself began moving toward integration.

More about World War II...

Featured article -

The U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial, located in Arlington, Virginia is based on the photo.

Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima is a historic photograph taken on February 23, 1945, by Joe Rosenthal. It depicts five United States Marines and a U.S. Navy corpsman raising the flag of the United States atop Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II. The photograph was extremely popular, being reprinted in thousands of publications. Later, it became the only photograph to win the Pulitzer Prize for Photography in the same year as its publication, and ultimately came to be regarded as one of the most significant and recognizable images of the war, and possibly the most reproduced photograph of all time.Of the six men depicted in the picture, three (Franklin Sousley, Harlon Block, and Michael Strank) did not survive the battle; the three survivors (John Bradley, Rene Gagnon, and Ira Hayes) became celebrities upon their identification in the photo. The picture was later used by Felix de Weldon to sculpt the USMC War Memorial, located adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery just outside Washington, D.C.

Selected equipment -

Nevada underway off of the Atlantic coast of the United States in 1944

USS Nevada (BB-36), the second United States Navy ship to be named after the 36th state, was the lead ship of the two Nevada-class battleships; her sister ship was Oklahoma. Nevada was a giant leap forward in dreadnought technology, as she showcased four new features that would be included on almost every subsequent U.S. battleship: gun turrets with three guns, anti-aircraft guns, oil in place of coal for fuel, and the "all or nothing" armor principle. All of these new features resulted in Nevada becoming the first U.S. Navy "super-dreadnought". Nevada served in both of the World Wars: during World War I, Nevada was based in Bantry Bay, Ireland, for the last few months of the war to support the supply convoys that were sailing to and from Great Britain. In World War II, she was one of the battleships that were trapped when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941. Subsequently salvaged and modernized at Puget Sound Navy Yard, Nevada served in four amphibious assaults: the Normandy Landings and the invasions of Southern France, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa. At the end of World War II, the Navy decided that Nevada was too old to be retained in the post-war fleet, so they assigned her to be a target ship in the Bikini atomic experiments of July 1946. After being hit by two atomic bombs, she was still afloat but heavily damaged and radioactive. She was sunk during naval gunfire exercise in 1948.

Selected battle -

Dead Japanese soldiers, killed assaulting United States Marine positions, lie on the sandbar at the mouth of Alligator Creek, Guadalcanal after the battle on August 21, 1942.

The Battle of the Tenaru (or Battle of the Ilu River) took place August 21, 1942, on the island of Guadalcanal, and was a land battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II, between Imperial Japanese Army and Allied (mainly United States (U.S.) Marine) ground forces. The battle was the first major Japanese land offensive during the Guadalcanal campaign.In the battle, U.S. Marines, under the overall command of U.S. Major General Alexander Vandegrift, successfully repulsed an assault by the "First Element" of the "Ichiki" Regiment, under the command of Japanese Colonel Kiyonao Ichiki. The Marines were defending the Lunga perimeter, which guarded Henderson Field, which was captured by the Allies in landings on Guadalcanal on August 7. Ichiki's unit was sent to Guadalcanal in response to the Allied landings with the mission of recapturing the airfield and driving the Allied forces off of the island. Underestimating the strength of Allied forces on Guadalcanal, which at that time numbered about 11,000 personnel, Ichiki's unit conducted a nighttime frontal assault on Marine positions at Alligator Creek on the east side of the Lunga perimeter. Ichiki's assault was defeated with heavy losses for the Japanese attackers.

General images

The following are images from various World War II-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Hitler at a meeting in Germany on 24 September 1938, and Hitler demanded the immediate annexation of Czechoslovak border areas. (from Causes of World War II)
Image 2Adolf Hitler in Bad Godesberg, Germany, 1938 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 3Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov (left) meets with German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop at the signing of the German–Soviet non-aggression pact on 23 August 1939 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 4"The Big Four" made all the major decisions at the Paris Peace Conference (from left to right, David Lloyd George of Britain, Vittorio Emanuele Orlando of Italy, Georges Clemenceau of France, Woodrow Wilson of the U.S.) (from Causes of World War II)
Image 5During the Battle of Westerplatte, the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein attacks Westerplatte at the start of the war, September 1, 1939 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 6The destroyer USS Shaw explodes during the attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 7Chiang Kai-shek of China with Roosevelt and Churchill at the Cairo Conference in 1943. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 8Nazi leaders (from left) Karl Wolff and Heinrich Himmler meet with Spanish dictator Francisco Franco and his Foreign Minister Serrano Súñer in Madrid, October 1940. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 9Chiang Kai-shek, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill meeting at the Cairo Conference in 1943 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 10The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in 1942. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 11Soviet POWs held by the Nazis in Mauthausen concentration camp. It is estimated that at least 3.3 million Soviet POWs died in German custody. (from World War II casualties)
Image 12The "stairs of death" at the Weiner Graben quarry, Mauthausen concentration camp, Austria, 1942 (from The Holocaust)
Image 13Clement Attlee, Harry Truman and Joseph Stalin at the Potsdam Conference, c.28 July – 1 August 1945 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 14The Polish Corridor and the Free City of Danzig (from Causes of World War II)
Image 15Jewish women were stripped, beaten and raped in Lwów, occupied eastern Poland (later Lviv, Ukraine), during the Lviv pogroms, July 1941. (from The Holocaust)
Image 16Captain Witold Pilecki (from The Holocaust)
Image 17Am Großen Wannsee 56–58, Berlin (from The Holocaust)
Image 18The poster (c. 1937) reads: "60,000 RM is what this person with hereditary illness costs the community in his lifetime. Fellow citizen, that is your money too. Read Neues Volk, the monthly magazine of the Office of Racial Policy of the Nazi Party." (from The Holocaust)
Image 19Map of territorial changes in Europe after World War I (as of 1922) (from Causes of World War II)
Image 20Cheering crowds greet the Nazis in Innsbruck (from Causes of World War II)
Image 21Italian Social Republic (RSI) as of 1943 in yellow and green. The green areas were German military operational zones under direct German administration. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 22German-occupied Europe, 1942 (from The Holocaust)
Image 23Gloster Gladiators of British RAF refuel in Iraq, 1941 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 24Hitler in action (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 25Adolf Hitler meeting Japanese ambassador to Germany Hiroshi Ōshima, 1942 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 26Atomic cloud over Hiroshima, 1945 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 27Francisco Franco and Heinrich Himmler in Madrid, Spain, 1940 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 28UN vs Axis War Production, near equality of strength in 1942 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 29The major long-term goal of Roosevelt's foreign policy during the war was creating a United Nations to resolve all world problems (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 30Italy and its colonial possessions in 1940 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 31March or April 1938: Jews are forced to scrub the pavement in Vienna, Austria. (from The Holocaust)
Image 32Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939 which directly led to the Anglo-French declaration of war on Germany on 3 September. The Soviet Union joined Germany's invasion of Poland on 17 September. (from Causes of World War II)
Image 33Marshal Pétain, left, head of Vichy France, shaking hands with Hitler on October 24, 1940. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 34Roosevelt and Churchill drafted the Atlantic Charter in August 1941. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 35Heinrich Himmler inspects a POW camp in Russia, c. 1941. (from The Holocaust)
Image 36The Japanese march into Zhengyangmen, Beijing, after they captured the city in July 1937 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 37The prime ministers of five members of the Commonwealth of Nations at the 1944 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 38Germany after Versailles----
  Administered by the League of Nations
  Annexed or transferred to neighbouring countries by the treaty or later by plebiscites and League of Nation actions
  Weimar Germany
(from Causes of World War II)
Image 39Greek counteroffensive against Italian-controlled Albania, late 1940. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 40All territories taken from Czechoslovakia by its neighbours in October 1938 ("Munich Dictate") and March 1939 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 41Potsdamer Straße 26, Berlin, the day after Kristallnacht, November 1938 (from The Holocaust)
Image 42Hitler and Finnish commander-in-chief Field MarshalMannerheim (right) (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 43Jews arrive with their belongings at the Auschwitz II extermination camp, summer 1944, thinking they were being resettled. (from The Holocaust)
Image 44Romani people being deported from Asperg, Germany, 22 May 1940 (from The Holocaust)
Image 45Roosevelt, İnönü of Turkey and Churchill at the Second Cairo Conference which was held between December 4–6, 1943. (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 46Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 1941 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 47Japanese troops entering Saigon (from Causes of World War II)
Image 48Jewish women wearing yellow badges in occupied Paris, June 1942 (from The Holocaust)
Image 49Czechoslovakian Jews at Croydon airport, England, 31 March 1939, before deportation (from The Holocaust)
Image 50SS-Gruppenführer Otto Ohlendorf, commander of Einsatzgruppe D, pleads not guilty during the Einsatzgruppen trial, Nuremberg, 15 September 1947. He was executed in 1951. (from The Holocaust)
Image 5111 December 1941: Adolf Hitler speaking at the Kroll Opera House to Reichstag members about war in the Pacific. (from The Holocaust)
Image 521935 poster of the puppet state of Manchukuo promoting harmony among peoples. The caption reads: "With the help of Japan, China, and Manchukuo, the world can be in peace." (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 53Soviet soldiers killed during the Toropets–Kholm Offensive, January 1942. Officially, roughly 8.6 million Soviet soldiers died in the course of the war, including millions of POWs. (from World War II casualties)
Image 54Grave of German soldiers fallen during invasion of Poland in Końskie. Visible inscription "For Fuhrer und Vaterland" (from Causes of World War II)
Image 55The 23 defendants during the Doctors' trial, Nuremberg, 9 December 1946 – 20 August 1947 (from The Holocaust)
Image 56Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses: SA troopers urge a boycott outside Israel's Department Store, Berlin, 1 April 1933. All signs read: "Germans! Defend yourselves! Don't buy from Jews!" (from The Holocaust)
Image 57Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin, 2016 (from The Holocaust)
Image 58Einsatzgruppen murder Jewish civilians outside Ivanhorod, Ukraine, 1942. Over 6 million Jews were murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators in the Holocaust. (from World War II casualties)
Image 59Bodies of U.S. Marines on the beach of Tarawa. The Marines secured the island after 76 hours of intense fighting. Over 6,000 American and Japanese troops died in the fighting. (from World War II casualties)
Image 60Ivanhorod Einsatzgruppen photograph: Einsatzgruppe shooting a woman and child, near Ivangorod, Ukraine, 1942 (from The Holocaust)
Image 61Stolpersteine, Berlin-Mitte, 2011 (from The Holocaust)
Image 62Jews from Carpathian Ruthenia on the selection ramp at Auschwitz II, c. May 1944. Women and children are lined up on one side, men on the other, waiting for the SS to determine who was fit for work. About 20 percent at Auschwitz were selected for work and the rest gassed. (from The Holocaust)
Image 63Bodies being pulled out of a train carrying Romanian Jews from the Iași pogrom, July 1941 (from The Holocaust)
Image 64Japanese occupation of China in 1937 (from Causes of World War II)
Image 65Greek Jews from Saloniki are forced to exercise or dance, July 1942. (from The Holocaust)
Image 66Antisemitic Christian Social Party placard from the 1920 Austrian legislative election: "Vote Social Christian. German Christians Save Austria!" (from The Holocaust)
Image 67Animation of the European Theatre (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 68Polish military officers executed by the Soviet NKVD in the Katyn massacre, exhumation photo taken by the Polish Red Cross delegation in 1943. (from World War II casualties)
Image 69Shōwa Steel Works was a mainstay of the Economy of Manchukuo (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 70Prime Minister Churchill and General de Gaulle at Marrakesh, January 1944 (from Diplomatic history of World War II)
Image 71A mass grave at Bergen-Belsen after the camp's liberation, April 1945 (from The Holocaust)
Image 72Defendants in the dock at the Nuremberg trials, 1945–1946 (from The Holocaust)

Selected picture -

Key American military officials, 1945

Senior American military officials of World War II. Seated are (from left to right) Gens. William H. Simpson, George S. Patton, Carl A. Spaatz, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, Courtney H. Hodges, and Leonard T. Gerow; standing are (from left to right) Gens. Ralph F. Stearley, Hoyt Vandenberg, Walter Bedell Smith, Otto P. Weyland, and Richard E. Nugent.

Selected biography -

Lieutenant-General Arthur Ernest Percival, CB, DSO and Bar, OBE, MC, OStJ, DL, (26 December 1887 – 31 January 1966) was a British Army officer and World War I veteran. He built a successful military career during the interwar period but is most noted for his involvement in World War II, when he commanded the forces of the British Commonwealth during the Battle of Malaya and the subsequent Battle of Singapore. Percival's surrender to the invading Imperial Japanese Army force was and remains the largest capitulation in British military history, and it permanently undermined Britain's prestige as an imperial power in the Far East. However, current knowledge about the years of under-funding of Malaya's defences and the inexperienced, under-equipped nature of the Commonwealth army makes it possible to hold a more sympathetic view of his command. Arthur Ernest Percival was born on 26 December 1887 in Aspenden Lodge, Aspenden near Buntingford in Hertfordshire, England, the second son of Alfred Reginald and Edith Percival (née Miller).

Did you know...? -

... that the British Army changed its plans for operations in Greece during World War II on medical advice from Australian Brigadier Sir Neil Fairley?

...that the first time in World War II submersible tanks were used was on June 22, 1941, by German tanks of the 18th Panzer-Division?

...that future Maltese diplomat Arvid Pardo was successively detained by Fascist Italian, Nazi German, and Soviet authorities between 1940 and 1945?

Selected quote -

"I said, to the people of the Philippines whence I came, I shall return. Tonight, I repeat those words: I shall return!"

— Douglas MacArthur, 30 March 1942

Topics

World War II

Theatres

Main events

Specific articles

Participants

Prelude
• Causes
• in Europe
• in Asia

Main theatres
• Europe
• Eastern Europe
• China
• Mediterranean, Middle East and Africa
• Asia and the Pacific
• Atlantic

General timeline
• Timeline

1939
• Invasion of Poland
• Winter War

1940
• Invasion of Denmark/Norway
• Battle of France
• Battle of Britain

1941
• Invasion of the Soviet Union
• Battle of Moscow
• Attack on Pearl Harbor

1942
• Battle of Midway
• Battle of Stalingrad
• Second Battle of El Alamein

1943
• Battle of Kursk
• Guadalcanal campaign
• Invasion of Italy

1944
• Battle of Normandy
• Operation Bagration
• Battle of Leyte Gulf
• Operation Market Garden
• Battle of the Bulge

1945
• Battle of Iwo Jima
• Battle of Okinawa
• Battle of Berlin
• End in Europe
• Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• Surrender of Japan

• more...

• Blitzkrieg
• Cryptography
• Equipment
• Home Front
• Military engagements
• Production
• Resistance
• Technology

Civilian impact and atrocities
• Nanking Massacre
• The Holocaust
• Siege of Leningrad
• Bataan Death March
• Dutch famine of 1944
• Bengal famine of 1943
• Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• Unit 731
• Strategic bombings
• Comfort women
• Allied war crimes
• German war crimes
• Japanese war crimes

Aftermath
• Effects
• Casualties
• Expulsion of Germans
• Denazification
• Cold War
• Universal Declaration of Human Rights
• Decline of the British Empire

The Allies
• Australia
• Belgium
• Brazil
• British India
• Canada
• Czechoslovakia
• Egypt
• El Salvador
• France (after June 16, 1940: Free France)
• Greece
• Netherlands
• New Zealand
• Norway
• Philippines
• Poland
• Republic of China
• South Africa
• Soviet Union
• United Kingdom
• United States
• Yugoslavia

more...

The Axis
• Germany
• Italy
• Japan
• Slovakia
• Bulgaria
• Independent State of Croatia
• Finland
• Vichy France
• Hungary
• Romania
• Thailand

more...

Related portals

Things you can do

From the World War II task force of the Military history WikiProject:

Attention needed: ...to referencing and citation • ...to coverage and accuracy • ...to structure • ...to grammar • ...to supporting materials
Popular pages: Full list
Cleanup needed: Battle of Kiev (1943) • Battle of Ko Chang • Colditz Castle • Spiritual national defence • Tuskegee Airmen
Requested articles: Battle of Uhtua-Kiestinki • Battles of Repola-Rukajärvi • Battle of Siiranmäki • Battle of Łuck • Battle of Równe • Battle of Włodzimierz Wołyński • Battle of Lubartów • Battle of Miedniki • Battle of Jodła • Francis Blanchain • Shinshou Draenger • Christer Lyst Hansen • Ove Kampman • League for Combat Policy • Julien Meline • Operation Mittelmeer • Operation Richard • Otto Program • Martin Poppel • Roehm's Avengers • Poul Bruun • Raoul Boulanger • Battle of West Ukraine (1941) • Battle of Zunyi • Liberation of Denmark (currently redirect) • Operation Vado (currently redirect) • Finnish 19th Division (Continuation War) • Finnish 11th Division (Continuation War) • Finnish Cavalry Brigade • 1st Jaeger Brigade • 2nd Jaeger Brigade • 168th Rifle Division (Soviet Union) • 71st Rifle Division (Soviet Union) • Group Oinonen • Operation Vesuvius (currently redirect) • Capture of Kassala (currently redirect) • Battle of Pankow • Brandenburg–Rathenow Offensive • Japanese internment of European civilians during World War II • Miranda de Ebro concentration camp • German occupation of the Netherlands (current redirect) • Soviet home front during World War II • Labour Charter (Vichy France) • Berles-Monchel and Aubigny-en-Artois massacres (1940) • Febvin-Palfart massacre (1940) • German massacres of French colonial prisoners of war • 1941 Nord-Pas de Calais miners' strike • Spitfire funds • Good War (historiography) • Nederlandsche Oost Compagnie • West African Pioneers • 2nd Marching Battalion of Ubangui-Shari • Bataillon du Pacifique • Persecution of freemasons in Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe • Mohammed El Maadi • Luxembourgers in the Wehrmacht • Chantiers de la Jeunesse (Vichy France)
Expansion needed: Princess Irene Brigade • Battle of Bay of Viipuri • Demilitarisation • Free Dutch Forces • Martha Desrumeaux • Mochitsura Hashimoto • Operation Cascade • Operation Tan No. 2 • Burma Area Army • Battle of Courland • Battle of Munda Point • Battle of Voronezh (1943) • Drive on Munda Point • First Battle of Kharkov • Race to Berlin • Marie Fourcade • Donald Blakeslee • Operation Nordwind • Battle of Skerki Bank • Michael Sinclair (soldier) • Battle of Maastricht • Battle of Zeeland • Landings on Rendova • New Georgia counterattack • Operation Waterfall • Petsamo–Kirkenes Offensive • American-British-Dutch-Australian Command • Battle of Viru Harbor • Battle of Wickham Anchorage • Western New Guinea campaign (and the individual battles of the campaign) • Operation Blockbuster • Operation Cooney • The Holocaust in France • Knowledge of the Holocaust in Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe • Francoist Spain and the Holocaust • Japan campaign • Volcano and Ryukyu Islands campaign • Légion Français des Combattants • more
Images needed: Twelfth Army (United Kingdom) • 4th Airborne Division (United Kingdom) • 5th Airborne Division (United Kingdom) • XVI Corps (United Kingdom) • Battle of Dakar • Battle of the Lys (1940) • Battle of Zeeland • Battle of the Grebbeberg • Franco-Thai War • Battle of Ko Chang • Switzerland during the World Wars • Berthe Fraser • Western Allied invasion of Germany • LXXXIII Army Corps (Wehrmacht)
Merging needed: Add an article here!
Citations needed: Battle of Borneo (1941–42) • Battle of Imphal • Garderegiment Fuseliers Prinses Irene • Japanese invasion of French Indochina • Japanese invasion of Thailand • Luxembourg in World War II • New Georgia Campaign • Operation Cartwheel • Operation Chastise • Royal Netherlands Motorized Infantry Brigade • Solomon Islands campaign • Battle of Radom • Seishin Operation • Moravia–Ostrava Offensive • Panzerjäger
Translation needed: 5th Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment • Novorossiysk-Taman Operation • 1943 Novorossiysk Operation • 1943 Air Battles over Kuban • Battle of Rostov (1943) • Battle of Olshansky • Nalchik-Ordzhonikidzevskaya Operation • Bukrinsky Landing • Cape Tarhan Landing • 1942 Sudak Landing • Mozdok-Malgobek Operation • Alexander Sergeyevich Ksenofontov • Henri de Vernejoul • André Bergeret • Battle of Nice • Liberation de Saint-Malo • Battle of Seuil Valley • René-Jean-Paul Cassagne • Cameroun's rallying to the Free French • Battle of Bouno-Misaki

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