War in Europe

Chapter 16Section 2

Pages 536-541

Objectives:

• Explain Hitler’s motives for expansion and how Britain and France responded

• Describe the blitzkrieg tactics that Germany used against Poland and later Western Europe

• Summarize the first European battles of WWII

Axis AggressionIn 1936 Hitler marched troops into the Rhineland a

demilitarized area of W. GermanyEarly in 1938 Hitler annexed Austria

(The Anschluss)In 1938 Hitler demanded the Sudetenland, a section of

Czechoslovakia inhabited by ethnic GermansGreat Britain and France appease Hitler1938 Munich Pact – Neville Chamberlain signs an

agreement with Hitler giving up the Sudetenland1938 Hitler takes all of Czechoslovakia1939 Hitler signs a Non Aggression Pact with Stalin

and the USSR

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War in Europe• Sept 1st, 1939 Germany invades Poland,

“Blitzkrieg” or lightening war is used• Great Britain and France declare war • The USSR was neutral, Stalin and Hitler had

already agreed to divide up Poland• British and French troops waited along the

Maginot Line for an attack, the “Phony War” ensued

• Stalin annexes the Baltic states and defeats Finland

Hitler Invades Western Europe

• April 1940, Hitler invades Demark and Norway• May 1940, Hitler invades Netherlands, Belgium, and

Luxembourg• German tanks move through the Ardennes Forrest

bypassing the Maginot Line• 400,000 British troops escape at Dunkirk• June 1940 France is attacked by the Germans in the

North and the Italians in the South, Paris Falls• French General Charles de Gaulle flees to England

to govern in exile

The Battle of Britain

• During the summer of 1940 the Luftwaffe began to bomb Britain

• In order to launch Operation Sea Lion Hitler had to destroy the RAF fighters and gain control of the air

• With the help of radar the British fought back and bombed Germany

• The British were motivated by their new Prime Minister Winston Churchill

The Tripartite Pact• In Sept. 1940 the three nations of Germany, Italy

and Japan sign a mutual defense treaty known as the Tripartite Pact

• The Axis Powers are united• The goal was to keep the US out of war, and if we

declared war on any member of the pact the US would have to fight a two-ocean war

Invasion of the USSR

• Frustrated that England will not fall, in June 1941, Hitler launches Operation Babarrosa an all out attack on the USSR

• German troops push deep into the interior of the USSR, Leningrad was under siege, Stalingrad was rubble, and German guns boomed only miles outside Moscow

• Stalin took the brunt of the German offensive, millions of Soviets perished