Chapter 18 Section 3 VictoryInEurope

Axis surrender in North Africa When France surrendered in 1940, Germany placed France’s territories in Africa under control of Vichy, France In November 1942 the {Allies planned Operation Torch. Commanded by General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the operation was a planned invasion of northern Africa} On Nov. 8 th, 65,000 Allied troops landed at Casablanca in Morocco and at Oran and Algiers in Algeria As the soldiers established beachheads in Morocco and Algeria, Allied planes and ships cut Axis supply lines from Italy Allied troops came in from the east and the west forcing the Axis troops into a trap. After several battles in Tunisia, in May 1943 the Axis forces surrendered

The Invasion of Italy {After the victory in Africa, the Allies decided to next invade Sicily Led by General George S. Patton the Allies won the island in less than a month} The Italian king ordered Mussolini's arrest and signed a truce with the Allies But the Germans came in and took Mussolini and set up a new base for him in northern Italy Pushing their troops northward through Italy proved difficult for the allies Small armies from more than 25 different countries joined the Allies along the way After months of brutal warring in the mountains, the Germans occupying Italy were finally defeated Soon after that Mussolini was captured and executed by Italian rebels

General Patton

Sea and Air Assaults Meanwhile Germans U-boats in the Atlantic were taking their toll on Allied ships and supplies This Battle of the Atlantic took a turn for the better for the Allies with the improvements of sonar equipment, which uses wound waves to detect underwater objects {Between the sonar, faster boats and air bombs, by 1944 the Allies won the Battle of the Atlantic} In 1943 the Allies began to focus their air strikes on German military production facilities By 1944, the Allies had dropped hundreds of thousands of tons of explosives on German factories, supply lines and military centers

Operation Overlord U.S. Army chief of staff and Allied strategist, George C. Marshall led the planning for Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of German-occupied France General Eisenhower commanded the invasion {On June 6, 1944, {led by Omar Bradley, almost 5,000 transports carrying some 150,000 men landed on the beach at Normandy.} Overhead, planes dropped more than 23,000 more troops. This is now known as D-Day} The Allied forces had leaked false information to the Germans that they would be attacking France in Calais, so Hitler did not send any reinforcements to Normandy After a hard earned victory in Normandy the Allied began their push eastward through France Paris was liberated on August 25, Another Allied force was moving north through France from the Mediterranean. Meanwhile, Soviet forces were pressing Germany from the east

General Omar Bradley

The Holocaust Nothing prepared the Allies for the horrors of the {Holocaust, which was Nazi Germany’s slaughter of European Jews} If Jews were not forced into groups and shot, they were sent to concentration camps. These camps were designed for the specific purpose of {genocide- the deliberate annihilation of an entire race or culture} Jewish men, women and children were brought to the camps in sealed railroad cars They were then stripped and marched into large shower rooms were they were gassed. Their bodies were then cremated {About 6 million Jews, about 2/3 of the Jewish population in Europe, were murdered}

Continued…. {The Nazis also killed hundreds of thousands of Gypsies, Poles, mentally disabled people, and homosexuals} When the Allies liberated the death camps, they found thousands of emaciated survivors on the verge of death Some non-Jewish people in Nazi occupied countries either assisted the Nazi’s or failed to prevent them from sending the Jews to the camps Others worked heroically to save the lives of Jews.

Defeating Germany By September 1944 the Allies crossed the German border While the Allied halted to regroup and bring in supplies, Germany launched their final counter attack In the Battle of the Bulge, 200,000 German troops attacked the U.S. force of 80,000. The U.S. 101 st Airborne Division were completely surrounded. When asked to surrender General Anthony McAuliff offered only one word in reply: “Nuts” But Allied generals rush in reinforcements and they were able to push the Germans back By January 1945 it was pretty clear the German offensive had failed

Battle of the Bulge - New Year's Day, snow & frost-covered Browning.30 caliber LMG, in position near Sourbrodt, Belgium, Jan 1, 1944

The Yalta Conference Roosevelt was elected for an unprecedented fourth term with Harry S. Truman as his running mate {In February 1945, Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin met at the Yalta Conference to plan for post war peace.} At the conference Stalin pledged to declare war on Japan after they were done in Germany The Allied agreed to divide and occupy Germany after the war and outlined the plans for a new international peace organization

The Race to Berlin During the early months of 1945, Allied bombers continued to blast German cities In one massive two day attack on Dresden, Allied bombers created the worst firestorm of WWII. The civilian casualties at Dresden were estimated at between 40 and 60 thousand In March troops crossed the Rhine River into Germany, by then the Soviets occupied much of eastern Europe {On April , Adolph Hitler committed suicide}. He was found in his bunker underneath the city of Berlin Germany surrendered on May 7 th

D R E S D E N Before Feb After the Bombing

The German city of Rothenburg now and after it was destroyed during WWII