Causes, consequences and fundamental points of the war. Brief summary of the Second World War.
SUMMARY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR
The Second World War .
In Germany, after the abdication of Emperor Wilhelm II, the Weimar Republic was formed , named after the city in which its constitution was proclaimed. The first years of the new state were very difficult: the serious economic situation (unstoppable inflation) generated great political instability, with repeated attempts at insurrection.
Although the living conditions of the Germans gradually improved and in 1926 Germany became part of the League of Nations, a widespread distrust of the state and its institutions remained among the population.
World War II: summary
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR: THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST PARTY
In a climate of growing impatience, the popularity and political and electoral weight of the National Socialist (Nazi) party and its Fiihrer Adolf Hitler grew . In 1933 Hitler was appointed chancellor. The Nazi Germany was called the Third Reich(third empire). Hitler’s first objective in foreign policy was the annexation to Germany of all the territories inhabited by German-speaking and culturally minorities, which were located in other states. In internal politics Hitler established a ruthless dictatorship: he centralized all the powers in his hands and through the SS (the Nazi militia) and the GESTAPO (secret police) eliminated all opposition. At the same time he carried out a vast rearmament plan, which restored Germany to the rank of a great military power.
SUMMARY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR FOR MIDDLE SCHOOL
Meanwhile, he was carrying out a systematic persecution of German Jews , progressively deprived of all civil rights and segregated from the rest of the population. Hopes for lasting peace in Europe vanished year after year: Germany withdrew from the League of Nations; with the attack on Ethiopia, Italy also challenged the international body. These were all warning signs. In Spain which has become a republic, in the elections of 1936 a Popular Front, made up of republicans, socialists and communists, won the majority. The conservative forces (the army, the parties of the right, the clergy, the large landowners), under the leadership of General Francisco Franco, rose up against the republican government. For three years a bloody war was foughtcivil. Germany and Italy intervened in support of Franco’s Phalangists with weapons, volunteers and even regular troops.
THE SECOND WORLD WAR In Germany, after the abdication of Emperor Wilhelm II, the Weimar republic was formed, named after the city in which its constitution was proclaimed.The first years of the new state were very difficult: the serious economic situation (unstoppable inflation) generated great political instability, with repeated attempts at insurrection. Although the living conditions of the Germans gradually improved and in 1926 Germany became part of the League of Nations, a widespread distrust of the state and its institutions remained among the population. In a climate of growing impatience, the popularity and political and electoral weight of the National Socialist (Nazi) party and its Fiihrer Adolf Hitler grew.
In 1933 Hitler was appointed chancellor. Nazi Germany was called the Third Reich (third empire). Hitler’s first objective in foreign policy was the annexation to Germany of all the territories inhabited by German-speaking and culturally minorities, which were located in other states. In internal politics Hitler established a ruthless dictatorship: he centralized all the powers in his hands and through the SS (the Nazi militia) and the GESTAPO (secret police) eliminated all opposition. At the same time he carried out a vast rearmament plan, which restored Germany to the rank of a great military power. In the meantime, he was carrying out a systematic persecution of German Jews, progressively deprived of all civil rights and segregated from the rest of the population. Hopes for lasting peace in Europe faded year after year: Germany left the League of Nations; with the attack on Ethiopia, Italy also challenged the international body. These were all warning signs.
In Spain which has become a republic, in the elections of 1936 a Popular Front, made up of republicans, socialists and communists, won the majority. Conservative forces (the army, right-wing parties, clergy, large landowners), under the leadership of General Francisco Franco, rose up against the republican government. For three years a bloody civil war was fought. Germany and Italy intervened in support of Franco’s Phalangists with weapons, volunteers and even regular troops. The Spanish Civil War was the prelude to a total struggle between dictatorship and democracy. But the great European democracies France and England did not intervene. Thus in March 1939 Franco completed the occupation of Spain and established a dictatorship supported by the army and other ecclesiastical hierarchies. From the beginning of the Spanish War onwards, the steps on the road to war became ever more rapid. Already in October 1936 Italy and Germany signed an alliance called the “Rome-Berlin Axis”. At first Hitler aimed to annex territories where there were strong German minorities, so in March 1938 Austria was occupied by Nazi troops. Still in 1938 Hitler ordered Czechoslovakia to hand over the Sudetenland to Germany. At the Munich conference that year, British Prime Minister Chamberlain and French Prime Minister Daladier’s they met with Hitler and Mussolini to deal with the Sudeten question and yielded to the demands of the German dictator. The following year Hitler invaded the whole of Czechoslovakia. Not to be outdone, in April 1939 the Italian army invaded Albania.
The Munich conference was a decisive step in the race to war. Japan, which had signed a pact against international communism with Germany and Italy in 1937, resumed hostilities against China and began the invasion of the immense territory. From this situation Stalin emerged in an unexpected way. On August 23, 1939, the foreign ministers of Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact. At this point Germany felt confident that it could correct the borders with Poland to its advantage and that it could reoccupy Danzig which had been declared a free city and was in full Polish territory. A new war was now looming over Europe.
