The Second World War: outbreak and course

Among the causes of the Second World War were the weakness of the Versailles system, economic and political instability after the 1929 crisis, aggressive regimes in Germany, Italy and Japan, and the policy of appeasement. In March 1938 Austria was annexed by Germany (the Anschluss), the Munich Agreement of 29–30 September 1938 handed over the Sudetenland, and in March 1939 Czechoslovakia was dismembered; on 23 August 1939 Germany and the USSR signed a non-aggression pact (the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact). On 1 September 1939 Germany attacked Poland, Britain and France declared war on 3 September, and on 17 September Soviet troops entered eastern Poland. In 1940 Germany took Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium and France (Paris fell on 14 June) while Britain defended itself in the air battle; on 27 September 1940 Germany, Italy and Japan signed the Tripartite Pact. On 22 June 1941 Germany attacked the USSR (Operation Barbarossa), in August the Atlantic Charter was announced, and on 7 December Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, drawing the USA into the war. In December 1941 the German advance was halted before Moscow, and the Battle of Stalingrad, which began in July 1942, ended with the Soviet counter-offensive of November and the surrender of the encircled German army on 2 February 1943 – a turning point of the war; on 6 June 1944 the Allies landed in Normandy.