Sunday, March 19, 1944. Germany invades Hungary.

US 75mm howitzer engaging in direct fire, Bougainville

The Germans, now in the position of having to invade their own allies in order to keep them in the war, did just that and invaded Hungary with eight divisions.  The invasion was a complete surprise, and came from all directions.  It was largely bloodless.

Hungary was Germany's largest ally, and the country had approached the Western Allies as early as the summer of 1943.  Hungary had refused, starting around that time, to provide troops for the Balkans and by this time in 1944 was openly seeking to withdraw its troops from Ukraine.  By March 1944 it had largely demobilized and was nearly out of the war.

The Germans kept the Hungarian Army in the field, having no other choice.  The SS began the deportation of 550,000 Hungarian Jews, with Hungarian collaboration.  Admiral Horthy continued his efforts to negotiate a separate peace with the Soviet Union but had to form a new government under Döme Sztójay which reentered the war in the East.

The U-1059 was sunk by US aircraft off of Cape Verde.

The Indian National Army hoisted its flag on Indian soil captured by the Japanese offensive in northeast Indian.

Picasso's Desire Caught by the Tail was preformed for the first time in occupied Paris, making the performance presented by Albert Camus particularly pathetic, in my opinion.

Last prior edition:

Saturday, March 18, 1944. Summoned to Germany.

Thursday, July 1, 1943. Romania seeks a way out, Cadet Nurse Corps established.

Romanian Foreign Minister Mihai Antonescu met with Benito Mussolini in an effort to secure Mussolini's cooperation for both countries to leave the Axis and exit World War Two.  Mussolini was non-committal.

Romania clearly saw which way the war was going and that the time had come to get out.  It likely figured it couldn't get out on its own, however.

The Women's Auxiliary Army Corps became the Women's Army Corps, reflecting it having achieved permanent status.

On the same day, the Cadet Nurse corps was established.

The organization hoped to relieve wartime and peacetime nursing shortages.

The Japanese Ministry of Health and Welfare issued it's An Investigation of Global Policy, with the Yamato Race as Nucleus.  Based on Nazi concepts of racism and Lebensraum, it justified the ongoing attempt at expansion of the Japanese Empire and planned to impose Japanese names, the Japanese language and the Shinto religion on all minorities within the Empire.

President Roosevelt commuted the death sentence of German-born Detroit restaurant owner Max Stephan to life imprisonment.  Scheduled to hang in just seven hours, Stephan had been convicted for harboring a German POW who had escaped captivity in Canada, and even taking the fellow to a tour of Detroit restaurants.

An item about keeping your radio working from this month in 1943, something vitally important as there was no wartime radio production.

Keep Your Radio Working: 1943

Thursday, June 10, 1943. Pointblank

The Pointblank Directive was issued by the Allied Combined Chiefs of Staff directing the implementation of Operation Pointblank, the round the clock Allied bomber offensive over Europe.  The order prioritized targets for the combined Allied air forces, starting with the German aircraft industry.

The order met with passive resistance from RAF's fighter command, which refused to provide escorts to the U.S. Army Air Force during the daylight, citing the inability to convert fighters for long ranges.  This would lead the US to study the conversion of P-51 Mustangs to that use.  It would also lead to considerable tension between the US and the UK on the topic of daylight escorts.

Sarah Sundin noted Pointblank on her blog:

Today in World War II History—June 10, 1943: US & UK begin Combined Bomber Offensive against Germany; priorities for bombing targets are submarine yards, aircraft & ball bearings factories, and oil targets

She also noted that Hungarian Jewish refugee László Bíró , who was living in Argentina, filed for a US patent for the first commercial ballpoint pen, a sad event for fountain pen fans.

The Gemeinde, "Community", the last operating Jewish hospital in Berlin, was closed, with employees and patients all sent to Theresienstadt on June 16.

Germany and Italy recognized President Pedro Ramirez's government in Argentina, Argentina being the sole Latin American country which had not severed relations with them.  Nonetheless, the Argentine government, on the same day, ended the privilege to transmit messages from their embassies in code.

Wednesday, April 7, 1943. An uncomfortable meeting.

Hitler and Mussolini met at Schloss Klessheim.

Mussolini was sick and Hitler babbled on.  Il Duce suggested that perhaps the pair approach Uncle Joe about a separate peace, but Hitler would have none of it.

The Japanese conducted massive air raids in the Solomons on this day, although they were not a complete surprise due to American radio intercepts.  Marine Corps pilot James E. Swett would be awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions.  His citation reads:

FIRST LIEUTENANT JAMES E. SWETT

UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS RESERVE for service as set forth in the following CITATION:

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty, as a division leader in Marine Fighting Squadron TWO TWENTY-ONE in action against enemy Japanese aerial forces in the Solomon Islands Area, April 7, 1943. In a daring flight to intercept a wave of 150 Japanese planes, First Lieutenant Swett unhesitatingly hurled his four-plane division into action against a formation of fifteen enemy bombers and during his dive personally exploded three hostile planes in mid-air with accurate and deadly fire. Although separated from his division while clearing the heavy concentration of anti-aircraft fire, he boldly attacked six enemy bombers, engaged the first four in turn, and unaided, shot them down in flames. Exhausting his ammunition as he closed the fifth Japanese bomber, he relentlessly drove his attack against terrific opposition which partially disabled his engine, shattered the windscreen and slashed his face. In spite of this, he brought his battered plane down with skillful precision in the water off Tulagi without further injury. The superb airmanship and tenacious fighting spirit which enabled First Lieutenant Swett to destroy eight enemy bombers in a single flight were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.

Swett, far right.

Born in 1920, Swett was a prewar private pilot before joining the Navy, and then transferring following flight school to the Marine Corps.  Swett remained in the Marine Corps following World War Two but left for the reserves folloiwng the Marine Corps' decision not to deploy him to Korea during the Korean War as he was a Medal of Honor recipient.  He died in California in 2009 at age 88.

The British government published a report by John Maynard Keynes about the global postwar economy, proposing an international monetary fund.

Allied forces prevailed at Wadi Akarit

Bolivia declared war against the Axis powers.

There were still a fair number of foreign language newspapers in the U.S., even in languages which had been officially unpopular during the prior World War.  This one printed in German fraktur, which interestingly was now officially prohibited in Germany itself.

Today In Wyoming's History: April 7: 1943. On this day, the sale of coffee was banned in Cheyenne and Casper due to violations of wartime rationing restrictions.

Sunday, January 31, 1943. Paulus surrenders the German 6th Army at Stalingrad and the war enters its third phase in Europe.

One day after having been promoted to the rank of Field Marshal, and also having been ordered to go down fighting with his command, Friedrich von Paulus surrendered that command to the Red Army.  90,000 men of the original 250,000 of the German 6th Army remained alive, a surprisingly large number in context.  Only 5,000 would return to Germany, many having died due to the Soviet's inability to take care of such a large number of prisoners.

By Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-F0316-0204-005 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5362815

Most were German, but not all, at the end.  One of the last Axis anti tank guns to stop firing in the battle was one manned by a Russian crew.

By most measures, the Battle of Stalingrad was the largest battle in human history, although that title could be contested.  By the same token, by most measures, it was the largest battle in modern history, and of World War Two.  Often missed in the story of the epic contest, and German defeat, the Soviets had taken higher casualties than the Axis forces had, with an overall 1,129,619 compared to a potential Axis high of 868,374.  478,741 Soviet combatants were killed, more than the entire number of Germans in the 6th Army.  Axis casualties were rounded out, however, by 114,520 Italian losses, 158,854 Romanian losses, 143,000 Hungarian losses and 52,000 Soviet citizens supporting the Axis forces losses.  The battle was one whose character was defined by it being fought by two totalitarian combatants who had no regard for human life.  The Soviets had the ability to lose more men than the Axis did, and had no real option in regard to retreating further.

The battle had been taken on and fought stupidly by the Germans.  Taking the city was unnecessary and engaging in ongoing house to house fighting pointless. Defending the city, from the Soviet prospective, made a great deal more sense as it served to sap up German resources and arrest German progress.

With the fall of Stalingrad, the war entered a new and more bizarre, indeed sickening, phase.

The first phase of the war had seen the United Kingdom become Germany's principal enemy, and the German war aims had been to consolidate "German" lands in the Reich, subjugate and begin to destroy the Polish people, humble France, and to defeat the UK such that parts of the British Empire could be transferred to Germany.  The first two goals had been achieved, but the UK proved impossible to defeat and in fact was giving nearly as good as it was getting, if not more so, after the withdrawal from the Continent.  The British Empire could not defeat the Germans, but they clearly also could not be defeated by the Germans.

Faced with this, the Germans had toyed with Soviet assistance, and in fact the Soviet Union had been a German ally in this phase, which ran from 1938, with the Austrian Anschluß, to June 22, 1941.  During this phase of the war, the USSR had joined with Germany in the dismemberment of Poland and the murder of Polish elites.  It had also attacked the Baltic States and Finland, with only Finland proving impossible to defeat.  Like the Germans, the Soviets engaged in widespread murder wherever they went, with in this phase of the war the real difference being that the German atrocities, visited upon mass populations for the first time, unlike the Soviet ones which had been going on for two decades, were racial in nature to a much larger degree than the Soviet ones.

Nazi Germany, it is often noted, always had an expressed goal for Lebenstraum in the East, but often missed in that as well is that the Germans were able to put that aside, and on the shelf, as long as it appeared that there was a realistic chance of acquiring British possessions.  Ultimately, it is hard not to imagine the Germans and the Soviets going to war, but up until late 1940, it was not imminent.  After that, it became so as the Germans became increasingly desperate for raw materials for the war against the British Empire, the Soviet Union being the principal source of them.  The Soviets overplayed their hands in this after being invited by the Germans to join in the war against Britain by demanding more of British possessions than the Germans were willing to give.  Confident in their abilities in a land war, the Germans set their sites on the Soviet Union.

June 22, 1941, brought about the second phase of the war, the German Soviet phase.  The Germans expected to rapidly advance, and in fact did at first.  With this they brought murder on a wide scale to Ukraine, the rest of Poland, and Belorussia.  Their murderous intent towards the Jews rapidly evidenced itself wherever they went, and they began their planned colonization of Eastern lands almost immediately.  At the same time, their goals remained, in that phase, the defeat of the Soviet Union.

In the fall of 1942 the German advance stalled out, and the Germans became grossly overextended. Even with the support of Romanian, Hungarian, and Italian allies, they could no longer cover all of the front. The Red Army could.  Early in 1943 the German battlefield fortunes began to rapidly decline.  

With the fall of Stalingrad, a new phase of the war began.  The Germans did not concede defeat, either intellectually or militarily, but internally the central Nazi leadership seems to have grasped it.Thereafter, the goal of the war turned in an unexpressed way towards murder of the Jewish nation as its principal goal, and the mass murder of Jews accelerated and took first place in their war effort.

Franklin Roosevelt returned to the White House after attending the Casablanca Conference.   The conference had arrived upon a declaration, yet to be released, providing that the Germans and the Japanese would have to unconditionally surrender, a phrase borrowed from Ulysses S. Grant.

The wisdom of that declaration has been debated, principally in regard to Japan.  As a practical matter, there was no other way to approach the war against Germany at this time, and the declaration served to address Soviet fears that the Western Allies would arrive on a separate peace with Germany.  In reality, while it may not have been obvious to the Germans or the general public, the Western Allies regarded an Axis defeat at this point inevitable.   The real fear was that Stalin would arrange a separate peace with the Germans, which while it has been discounted by many historians, was in fact much more likely and not even unlikely.  Soviet military performance had been poor in 41 and most of 42, and the Soviet Union, as the then Bolshevik Russia, had in fact done just that in 1917.

Interestingly, its rarely noted that the US, and then everyone else, violated the unconditional surrender provision of the Casablanca agreements as to Japan.  The Japanese surrender, if not conditional, saw the Western Allies, for their own reasons, agree to keep the Japanese monarchy on the throne.  And it was also violated in regards to Italy, which negotiated its way out of the Axis and into the Allied powers, while dumping Mussolini, as a condition to the end of the Allied war against it.

The Allies prevailed in the Battle of Wau.

Friday, October 23, 1942. The High Water Mark for Nazi Germany

The Second Battle of El Alamein began.

Montgomery watching his armor in action.

The British offensive was really the first under Bernard Law Montgomery, and pitted slightly larger Allied forces against the Afrika Korps.  Of note, the British had considerably more armor than the Germans.  It would result in an Allied victory, of which Churchill stated; It may almost be said, "Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat".

On that theme, arguably today was the high water mark for the Axis, or perhaps yesterday.  The Germans and their European Allies had advanced as far as they were going to in the Soviet Union, having taken the Stalingrad tractor factory several days prior.  They had expelled the British from Europe and defeated all of their enemies there, although guerilla campaigns were going on against them.  In North Africa, they had advanced up to El Alamein, but they had not taken it.

The Germans knew they were in trouble at this point.  While it was not obvious to casual observers, their offensive in the Soviet Union had stalled without defeating the USSR and without even bringing to an end the fighting before the onset of winter.  Their advances in the country had been massive, but insufficient, and they knew it.  Additionally, massive Axis efforts on the land, air and sea had failed to drive the British out of North Afrika and, on this day, the British would recommence advancing.

Starting on this day, the Germans would be losing ground every day.

The Battle for Henderson Field commenced as well, with a large-scale Japanese assault designed to take the airfield.

In the Pacific War, the Japanese were already in the position of not really advancing any longer, although the war in New Guinea made that unclear.  Resources were still thin in a theater that was limited to Australian and American forces, with the Japanese war being much more recent than the European one.  Having said that, the Japanese run in the Pacific was over.

Elanor Roosevelt arrived in the UK and met with the King and Queen.

The latter event emphasizes, again without the public really realizing it, that the Western Allies already knew that they would win the war at this point, and the Soviets may have realized it by this point as well.  Lots of the war was yet to be fought, but the final results were dimly in view.

Friday, May 22, 1942 Mexico Declares War on the Axis.

Today in World War II History—May 22, 1942: Mexico declares war on Germany, Japan, and Italy after many ships are lost to German U-boats. United Steel Workers of America is formed.

So notes Sarah Sundin on her blog.

Something little noted by most historians today, the Mexican declaration of war was significant to the United States, as it ended up releasing forces stationed on the border, which included two cavalry regiments from the Texas National Guard.  The US had frankly been concerned about what side of the war Mexico would favor, with the single part state favoring strong central rule and having a wing that favored fascism.  Having said that, the sympathies of the ruling party, the PRI, fell more heavily on the left, and indeed Mexico had teetered on the edge of outright Communism for a time during the 1930s.  A change in leadership in 1940 brought in Manuel Ávila Camacho, the last general to serve as President of Mexico, who was a political moderate.

Camacho took a much more conciliatory view towards relations with the United States than his predecessors since the revolution, even though he had been an officer in revolutionary armies since 1914.  Perhaps ironically, his opponent in the 1940 Mexican election was the retired right wing Mexican officer Juan Andreu Almazán, who traveled to the United States thereafter to seek support from the Roosevelt Administration for an intended revolution against Camacho.  In this context, the US actually did favor Almazán over Camacho.  Almazán's friendship with far right figures in the United States however doomed any support from the US.

In addition to starting the repair of relations with the US, Camacho, who was a practicing Catholic, ended the official PRI suppression of the Catholic Church.

Mexico would play a small role in the war militarily, but strategically its location made a difference to the allies in regard to shipping and control of the seas.  Additionally, the Bracero Program brought Mexican farm laborers in, in a shift in US agricultural practices, that became more or less permanent.

Mexican fighter pilot and maintenance crew of the 201st Fighter Squadron.

In terms of combat units, Mexico contributed a fighter squadron, equipped with US aircraft, in the fight against Japan.  15,000 Mexican nationals joined the American armed forces, something that's rarely noted.

Also on this day, Pan Am initiated the use of corrugated cardboard cartons for cargo, a massive weight saving innovation.

Sparrow Force on Timor ambushes a patrol led by the Japanese "Tiger of Singapore", who was leading the patrol mounted on a white horse.  He was killed.

Monday, June 23, 1941. The first modern tanks.

This was, obviously, D+1 in Operation Barbarossa.

German Armor in the early days of Barbarossa.  This tank is a Panzer III, one of the more modern German tanks at the time and would remain in production into 1943.  By this time it had already been really made obsolete by the Panzer IV, which had a larger more effective 75mm rifle as its main gun.  Only about half of the tanks that went into Russia in June, 1941, were IIIs and IVs.  It was By Bundesarchiv, Bild 101I-185-0139-20 / Grimm, Arthur / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5410249

Acting U.S. Secretary of State Sumner Welles stated on this day:

If any further proof could conceivably be required of the real purposes and projects of the present leaders of Germany for world-domination, it is now furnished by Hitler's treacherous attack upon Soviet Russia.

We see once more, beyond peradventure of doubt, with what intent the present Government of Germany negotiates "non-aggression pacts". To the leaders of the German Reich sworn engagements to refrain from hostile acts against other countries--engagements regarded in a happier and in a civilized world as contracts to the faithful observance of which the honor of nations themselves was pledged--are but a symbol of deceit and constitute a dire warning on the part of Germany of hostile and murderous intent. To the present German Government the very meaning of the word "honor" is unknown.

This Government has often stated, and in many of his public statements the President has declared, that the United States maintains that freedom to worship God as their consciences dictate is the great and fundamental right of all peoples. This right has been denied to their peoples by both the Nazi and the Soviet Governments. To the people of the United States this and other principles and doctrines of communistic dictatorship are as intolerable and as alien to their own beliefs as are the principles and doctrines of Nazi dictatorship. Neither kind of imposed overlordship can have or will have any support or any sway in the mode of life or in the system of government of the American people.

But the immediate issue that presents itself to the people of the United States is whether the plan for universal conquest, for the cruel and brutal enslavement of all peoples, and for the ultimate destruction of the remaining free democracies, which Hitler is now desperately trying to carry out, is to be successfully halted and defeated.

That is the present issue which faces a realistic America. It is the issue at this moment which most directly involves our own national defense and the security of the New World in which we live.

In the opinion of this Government, consequently, any defense against Hitlerism, any rallying of the forces opposing Hitlerism, from whatever source these forces may spring, will hasten the eventual downfall of the present German leaders, and will therefore redound to the benefit of our own defense and security. Hitler's armies are today the chief dangers of the Americas.

We have no intent of making this the "World War Two Day by Day Blog".  Indeed, this blog is still focused on the 1890s through 1920, but we are noting notable events that occurred 80 years ago, just as we do when we hit them that happened 50 years ago.

We note that is noting a couple entries that will appear here today.  The first is actually an advertisement email I received yesterday from that vender called At The Front which specializes in World War Two reproductions of clothing.  Their focus is on reenactors, which I am not, but I'm on their email list and indeed their blog, which is not often updated, is one of the ones that's linked in on this site.  The advertisement read:

 

Barbarossa

80 years ago today, the Germans made a grave error, disregarded the results of their own war games and many intelligence assessments and invaded the Soviet Union. A little less than 4 years later, T-34's were in Berlin. The consequences of their decision to attack are still affecting much of the world to this day. The early battles in the East are often brushed over in the history books as quick and relatively easy German victories, often due to the studies having been written in the 50's and 60's by former Wehrmacht officers working for allied historical departments. With the opening of the the Soviet archives in the 1990's, more recent works have been able to shed more detail on the subject and it's now clear that the Wehrmacht had a much rougher time of it and the Soviets were often far less incompetent than previously thought. Twenty years ago, during a rough Winter (the tickets were cheap.), I visited Stalingrad. It was the kind of weather where your face freezes the moment you walk outside. Studying the War for years is one thing- but standing on Mamayev Hill in January adds a perspective that no books or films can offer. At the museum, the granny guarding the displays looked at me indifferently until we told her I had come from the US to see how Russia won the War. Talk about the royal treatment...I got to meet the director, look at anything I wished, and got invited over for tea. No veterans were available, but everyone there had parents or grandparents who had been in the battle. It was an interesting trip. For those interested in the Eastern Front, among the best are the works by David M. Glantz.

I haven't read Glantz, but those who have read him often make similar recommendations.

I note this as what is noted here deserves some consideration. The typical story you hear is that the Germans simply ran over the Soviets up until winter hit in 1941.  It seems, now that we know more, that isn't really true.  We do know that the Germans took absolutely massive casualties in Barbarossa, something we'll discuss further in a moment.

Anyhow, on this date in 1941 the Germans encountered the KV1 and T34 tanks for the very first time.

Early KV1

Today in World War II History—June 23, 1941

The Germans encounter the KV1

The Germans were still advancing, and doing very well at it at that. By the end of this day they'd advanced up to fifty miles in some locations, which in military terms is a very rapid advance.  But they were taking heavier casualties than generally believed outside of German circles at the time, and they were finding that Soviet equipment was much better than they expected. The Germans were not unfamiliar with Soviet equipment, but had been fooled by the overall poor performance and quality of equipment used by the Soviets in the Winter War and the 1939 invasion of Poland.  

Among the rude shocks were the quality of new Soviet armor.

The Germans destroyed a massive amount of Soviet armor in the early days of Barbarossa, but a lot of it was of the prior generation of Soviet armor that was being phased out. For that matter, the Germans were still extraordinarily dependent on their early generation of armor themselves and all of their armor was light compared to what the Soviets were just starting to introduce.  The KV1 and the T-34 can be regarded as the first modern tanks in history, and the T-34 was the best tank of the war.  Regarding an encounter with a T-34 that occurred on this day, a German field report would note:

Half a dozen anti-tank guns fire shells at him, which sound like a drumroll. But he drives staunchly through our line like an impregnable prehistoric monster... It is remarkable that lieutenant Steup's tank made hits on a T-34, once at about 20 meters and four times at 50 meters, with Panzergranate 40, without any noticeable effect.

New Soviet armor from the beginning of the "Great Patriotic War". The two tanks on the right are T34s, models of 1940 and 1941 respectively.

Indeed, new Soviet armor was a massive leap ahead of anything anyone else was deploying in every respect.  It's armor protection was superior and the guns heavier.  The tanks clearly outmatched anything anyone else had.  The only problem was that it was brand new, and the Soviets were in the process of reorganizing their armor deployment strategy.

The battles of Brody and Raseiniai, both German victories, commenced on this day.  Brody was a Ukrainian battle, and Raseiniai a Lithuanian one.  At the latter, a single KV1 or KV2, in a battle that was much like that depicted in the move Fury, held up the entire German 6th Panzer Division for a day.

The Germans took Vilnius, the city that had been contested just after World War One between the Poles and the Lithuanians.

It should be noted that a person can take this too far.  A lot about the Soviet defense in these early days was disorganized, a mess, haphazard and ineffective. The Soviets took many, many, more casualties than the Germans did.  Soviet losses were outsized and massive, including armor losses.  Indeed, that was in part because the Soviets were just in the process of switching to a massed armor doctrine, like that used by the Germans, from a dispersed armor doctrine, like that used by the French (and which ironically would be partially implemented by the Germans).

Even that, however, revealed a long term German problem.  The Germans had to win quickly, which right then they were doing, which probably, in their minds, justified the high losses. The Axis had invaded the USSR with 3,500,000 troops.  The problem was, even at that point, the Soviets had over 5,000,000 men under arms, a massive increase from the year prior.  The Germans committed over 5000 aircraft to Operation Barbarossa and destroyed nearly 4,000 Soviet aircraft on the first two days, but the Soviets start the war against the Germans with over 14,000 aircraft themselves.  The Soviet losses, however, were so high in aircraft in 1941 that virtually their entire airforce was destroyed.

Again, none of this is to suggest that early German operations weren't a giant success against the Soviets.  But the success had to be complete and total in 1941 in order to be retained.  And now they were learning that the Soviets had surpassed theme in armor, and by a large margin.

The Soviets, on this day, reorganized their military command and recreated the Stavka, or central military command, which had not existed since Tsarist times.

Hitler took up quarters at the mosquito infested "Wolf's Lair" in East Prussia for the first time on this day in 1941.

That's interesting in and of itself as the construction of the East Prussian fortress suggests that somewhere in the recesses of his mind he know that the war against the Soviets was going to be a long one. The facility operated as an eastern based command center and was built to sustain any kind of attack.  Building a fortress to withstand an attack doesn't make a lot of sense unless you expect to be attacked.

Slovakia declared war on the Soviet Union.  The Provisional Government of Lithuania formed in anticipation of receiving its recognition from the advancing Germans and their allies, and regaining Lithuanian independence.  It would last only a little after a month until Lithuania was simply incorporated into the occupied German territories, slated for future German colonization.  

Eastern Herzogovina rebelled against Italian occupation and against the collaborationist government there.  It had been inspired to do so by the German invasion of Russia, with the Orthodox Russians being the traditional protectors of the Orthodox Serbs.  It's interesting to note that, of course, this assumed early on a German defeat at the hands of the Russians, which was correct, but which would in no way occur so rapidly as to be able to allow the rebels to hold out until the Russians arrived.  And, moreover, it failed to take into account that while Russia continued to look upon the Serbs as people in their sphere of influence, the government in Moscow was hardly sympathetic to Orthodoxy.

Sunday, June 22, 1941. The German invasion of the Soviet Union commences.

Horse drawn German artillery crossing Soviet border marker, June 22, 1941.

On this day in 1941, Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, commenced.  It was a Sunday, expressing the recent German preference for commencing offensive operations on the traditional Christian sabbath and day of rest.

Crowded road with German armor.

German preparations for the invasion had been going on nearly all year and upwards of 3,000,000 German troops and 690,000 other Axis troops, Italian, Romanian, Hungarian, Slovakian and Finnish, had been mobilized for the assault that commenced on this day.  The original D-Day had been set for May 15, but delay was created by the German invasion of Yugoslavia brought about by its determination to aid the Italian campaign in Greece.  Indeed, between May 15 and this date, Yugoslavia had been invaded, the Germans had conducted their own offensive in Greece, and Crete had been invaded by air.  The Germans had also engaged in major offensive operations in Libya.

During the month long interim the invasion plan was changed a bit, as Finland was brought into it and four German divisions pre-staged there.  Romania was also brought into it.  Italy had ultimately been brought into it as well, in spite of an abysmal combat performance in Greece and North Africa.  Whether it reflected a dawning realization of how difficult the operation was going to be or not, the net result was that what had originally been planned as a German offensive had actually taken on the character of a truly Axis one, albeit one which was by far dominated by the Germans.  

It would significantly omit, however, the one Axis power which had the potential to really greatly compound Soviet difficulties, that being Japan, which was at that time focused on plans to bring the sole remaining major neutral on the globe into the war, that being the United States.  Japan was aware of the German intent, but did not reformulate its own plans.

Slovak soldiers taking Soviet prisoners.

The German army made massive initial gains, although there were problems with the vast territorial campaign right from the onset.  Nonetheless, even its allies, whose forces were far inferior to the Germans, did well in the offensive.

The invasion committed Germany and its allies to a war against a massive well armed enemy in a campaign of conquest that depended upon speed, surprise and Soviet incompetence.  At first, all three of those were realized, but the speed alone required to defeat the Red Army by the winter of 1941, which was the goal, was something that even conceptually is difficult in retrospect to imagine as being possible.  Much about the German campaign seemed to rely on hubris combined with the assumption that reaching certain landmarks equated with victory.  Perhaps they may be somewhat excused for their assumptions by their defeat of the Imperial Russian Army in 1917 and the subsequent collapse of Red opposition to the Imperial German Army in 1917-1918, but the Soviets of 1941 were not the same opponent, in any sense, that had been faced during the First World War.

The invasion itself was accompanied by German, Italian and Romanian declarations of war.  Hitler issued a speech with justifications for the war, but the initial German public reaction was shock and fear.  Stalin also went into shock and near seclusion, being effectively paralyzed by the invasion.  Upon being visited by his minions he reacted with surprise that they had not come to execute him.  Indeed, given the typical Soviet penalty for failure, that Stalin wasn't summarily shot is amazing.  Winston Church also addressed the Allies, noting that the Soviets were now Allies.  Privately Churchill was overjoyed by the German invasion realizing, far in advance of others, that it would lead to German defeat.

Whether the German invasion could have been successful if only this or that had occurred has often been debated by armchair generals, but frankly no Nazi conquest of the Soviet Union was possible.  Nazi ideology guaranteed that a Russian population that initially welcomed the Wehrmacht would soon despise it, and no German invasion of the Soviet Union would have occurred but for Hitler.

On the same day, and not coincidentally, a rebellion broke out in Lithuania that sought to restore that country to its independence.

Lithuanian insurrectionist with Soviet prisoner.

The Lithuanian insurrection would result in the proclamation of a provisional government, but in order for it to survive, it would have needed German support, which it lacked. The Germans quickly operated to make it moot and it dissolved, under protest, on August 5.  Lithuania then joined the ranks of occupied countries, having switched Soviet occupation for German occupation.

The German reaction to the Lithuanian rebellion was telling in numerous ways. The Germans had come not as liberators but rather as conquerors and territorial extirpators.  The Nazi plan for the East was to expand into it, resettle the territory with Germans, and to make slaves of its surviving Slavic occupants.  Initially, it planned to incorporate large portions of  the Baltic states as well as a large portion of Ukraine into the the German Reich, basing those settlements on areas that German minorities had lived in prior to 1918, or still did.  Indeed, Germans living in those areas would soon find themselves liable for conscription, something that many would come to regret.  Ultimately the grain growing belt of the East would have been entirely German, if the Nazis had managed to pull the invasion successfully off.

Given the utter chaos of the Nazi government throughout its existence, and the pressures of the war, the Germans never fully implemented their postwar plans and, beyond that, they never fully formulated them.  They did commence to do so, however, murdering Slavic residents of the region.  Long-term plans that were developed called for the extermination of the Poles, and the expulsion of the Lithuanians, Latvians and many other Slavs.  Starving the Ukrainians to death was planned and commenced.

It should be noted that it is sometimes the case to make Operation Barbarossa a demarcation point for German conduct in the war and to almost excuse their conduct prior to that.  This is really not possible, however.  It is true that German conduct grew worse after Barbarossa, but all of the elements of German barbarity were already present.  Germany was already engaging in mass murder in Poland and it was already rounding up the Jewish population of regions it occupied and pressuring the same from those states which it influenced.  Germany was not about to commence murder, it was already doing it had had been doing so since September, 1939.

All of this makes German conduct all the more inexcusable following this date.  In spite of what some may later wish to claim, every German was aware by this date that its government was homicidal and racists.   German troops had been ordered into murder in Poland already and had shot civilians, under the pretext of their being franc tireurs, in Crete. At home the Nazi government was exterminating the mentally impaired and had recently banned the Catholic press, with which it was having difficulty.  Germany massed 3,000,000 men for the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and very few of those men could have had any realistic doubt about the nature of the regime they were marking for.

Because of all of these horrors, and more, historians have often wondered how it was that a nation that had seemed so cultured could have fallen so low.  No really acceptable answer has ever been provided.  Comparisons to the Soviets and the Japanese have largely failed.  Both Japan and Russia had populations that were much less technologically advanced and much less in communication with each other, let alone the outside world, which seems, perhaps to put them in a different category.

Hilaire Belloc, the great English writer, once expressed the opinion that the English in the Reformation had fallen into a unique category as, in his view, the northern tier of Europe that had gone into the Lutheran sphere had never really been Christianized and the Christianity there merely a thin veneer.  It's tempting to look at the events of the Second World War as proving that true, but there's more than a little reason to doubt that, including that the Scandinavians were never attracted to Nazi barbarity and had been many examples of devotion to the principals of Christianity both before and after the 1500s.  Something, however, went deeply wrong with Germany of the 20th Century in ways that are almost indescribable. 

Operation Barbarossa has been rightly noted as a major turning point in the war for a lot of reasons.  By this point in the war the Japanese had already commenced planning to strike the United States, so an entry of the US into the war, which likely would have tipped the balance permanently in favor of the Allies, was already in the works, but invading the Soviet Union guaranteed a German defeat.  The Russians were impossible for the Germans to defeat without the Russians agreeing they were beaten, and unlike 1914-1918, the Moscow government did not have an internal enemy that was organized and conspiring for its overthrow.  Indeed, the barbarity of the German invasion guaranteed that would not occur.

Of course, major German defeats on land were all in the future. And the German army had won victory after victory.  But even here, it's hard to wonder why things didn't give them pause.  If the Germans hadn't been defeated yet on land in any major engagement, the British army had proven again and again to be highly resilient even in defeat.  If the British hadn't defeated the German in North Africa, they had defeated the Italians and the Vichy French, and they had proven that on the defense they were capable of resisting the Germans in Libya.  The British had, moreover, won in the Battle of Britain and while the Luftwaffe continued to bomb the United Kingdom at night, the Blitz was over.  The Royal Air Force, moreover was hitting Germany itself from the nocturnal air.  The Royal Navy had ended the Kreigsmarine U-boot "happy time", even if it hadn't won the Battle of the Atlantic, and the U.S. Navy was already somewhat of a problem for the Germans.  The United States, under Franklin Roosevelt, was getting as close to combat with the Germans as it could, without declaring war, and the Germans could not afford to declare war on the US.  

All in all, the Germans not only had to hope for a short victorious war against the Soviet Union, having invaded it, they had utterly no choice but to win one.  Failing to defeat the Soviets by the winter would force Germany into a long protracted bloodletting it couldn't win and should know that it couldn't win.  So the gamble was not only that it could defeat the USSR, but that it would do so well before the end of the year.

That was a foolish thing to plan on. But the Germans having followed Hitler into Poland in 1939 had guaranteed a war against the Soviets soon thereafter.  Germany couldn't win a long war against multiple opponents and the Nazis couldn't avoid attacking the USSR.

Some Threads Elsewhere:

Day 661 June 22, 1941

Barbarossa – The invasion of Russia begins

Today in World War II History—June 22, 1941

Uncle Mike's Musings: A Yankees Blog and More

Saturday, June 14, 1941. The Soviets commence mass Baltic deportations.

On this day in 1941 the Soviet Union, which was mere days away from being attacked by Germany, which was receiving warnings from its own intelligence as well as the United Kingdom, started mass deportations of its perceived internal enemies in the Baltic States.

Mass deportations in Estonia

Today in World War II History—June 14, 1941

Given the horrors of the Second World War, and coming so close in time to Germany's invasion, this event has largely been forgotten outside of the Baltic States. There the day is a national day of mourning in the three countries which were impacted.

Deportations were on a mass scale with the victims largely sent to Siberia.  Most never returned and many died quickly.  The Soviets were already massively unpopular in the Baltic States, which had been independent following the Russian Revolution until overrun by the USSR in 1939, but the deportations would have an impact that would find immediate anti Soviet expression within a few days, given the time at which they came.

 As the second item there notes, the US also froze German and Italian assets in the U.S., as well as the assets of certain other Axis powers and countries now occupied by Germany or the Soviet Union, b y way of an executive order issued by President Roosevelt.

It read:

By virtue of and pursuant to the authority vested in me by Section 5 (b) of the Act of October 6, 1917 (40 Stat. 415), as amended, by virtue of all other authority vested in me, and by virtue of the existence of a period of unlimited national emergency, and finding that this Order is in the public interest and is necessary in the interest of national defense and security, I, Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States of America, do prescribe the following:

Executive Order No. 8389 of April 10, 1940, as amended, is amended to read as follows:

SECTION 1. All of the following transactions are prohibited, except as specifically authorized by the Secretary of the Treasury by means of regulations, rulings, instructions, licenses, or otherwise, if (i) such transactions are by, or on behalf of, or pursuant to the direction of any foreign country designated in this Order, or any national thereof, or (ii) such transactions involve property in which any foreign country designated in this Order, or any national thereof, has at any time on or since the effective date of this Order had any interest of any nature whatsoever, direct or indirect:

A. All transfers of credit between any banking institutions within the United States; and all transfers of credit between any banking institution within the United States and any banking institution outside the United States (including any principal, agent, home office, branch, or correspondent outside the United States, of a banking institution within the United States);

B. All payments by or to any banking institution within the United States;

C. All transactions in foreign exchange by any person within the United States;

D. The export or withdrawal from the United States, or the earmarking of gold or silver coin or bullion or currency by any person within the United States;

E. All transfers, withdrawals or exportations of, or dealings in, any evidences of indebtedness or evidences of ownership of property by any person within the United States; and

F. Any transaction for the purpose or which has the effect of evading or avoiding the foregoing prohibitions.

SECTION 2. A. All of the following transactions are prohibited, except as specifically authorized by the Secretary of the Treasury by means of regulations, rulings, instructions, licenses, or otherwise:

(1) The acquisition, disposition or transfer of, or other dealing in, or with respect to, any security or evidence thereof on which there is stamped or imprinted, or to which there is affixed or otherwise attached, a tax stamp or other stamp of a foreign country designated in this Order or a notarial or similar seal which by its contents indicates that it was stamped, imprinted, affixed, or attached within such foreign country, or where the attendant circumstances disclose or indicate that such stamp or seal may, at any time, have been stamped, imprinted, affixed, or attached thereto; and

(2) The acquisition by, or transfer to, any person within the United States of any interest in any security or evidence thereof ' if the attendant circumstances disclose or indicate that the security or evidence thereof is not physically situated within the United States.

B. The Secretary of the Treasury may investigate, regulate, or prohibit under such regulations, rulings, or instructions as he may prescribe, by means of licenses or otherwise, the sending, mailing, importing, or otherwise bringing, directly or indirectly, into the United States, from any foreign country, of any securities or evidences thereof or the receiving or holding in the United States of any securities or evidences thereof so brought into the United States.

SECTION 3. The term "foreign country designated in this Order" means a foreign country included in the following schedule, and the term "effective date of this Order" means with respect to any such foreign country, or any national thereof, the date specified in the following schedule:

(a) April 8, 1940 —Norway and Denmark;

(b) May 10, 1940 —The Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg;

(c) June 17, 1940 —France (including Monaco);

(d) July 10, 1940 —Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania;

(e) October 9, 1940 -Rumania;

(f) March 4, 1941 —Bulgaria;

(g) March 13, 1941 —Hungary;

(h) March 24, 1941 —Yugoslavia;

(i) April 28, 1941 —Greece; and

(j) June 14, 1941 —Albania,

Andorra, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Danzig, Finland, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Poland, Portugal, San Marino, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

The "effective date of this Order" with respect to any foreign country not designated in this Order shall be deemed to be June 14, 1941.

SECTION 4. A. The Secretary of the Treasury and/or the Attorney General may require, by means of regulations, rulings, instructions, or otherwise, any person to keep a full record of, and to furnish under oath, in the form of reports or otherwise, from time to time and at any time or times, complete information relative to, any transaction referred to in Section 5 (b) of the Act of October 6, 1917 (40 Stat. 415), as amended, or relative to any property in which any foreign country or any national thereof has any interest of any nature whatsoever, direct or indirect, including the production of any books of account, contracts, letters, or other papers, in connection therewith, in the custody or control of such person, either before or after such transaction is completed; and the Secretary of the Treasury and/or the Attorney General may, through any agency, investigate any such transaction or act, or any violation of the provisions of this Order.

B. Every person engaging in any of the transactions referred to in Sections 1 and 2 of this Order shall keep a full record of each such transaction engaged in by him, regardless of whether such transaction is effected pursuant to license or otherwise, and such record shall be available for examination for at least one year after the date of such transaction.

SECTION 5. A. As used in the first paragraph of Section 1 of this Order "transactions [which] involve property in which any foreign country designated in this Order, or any national thereof, has... any interest of any nature whatsoever, direct or indirect," shall include, but not by way of limitation (i) any payment or transfer to any such foreign country or national thereof, (ii) any export or withdrawal from the United States to such foreign country, and (iii) any transfer of credit, or payment of an obligation, expressed in terms of the currency of such foreign country.

B. The term "United States" means the United States and any place subject to the jurisdiction thereof; the term "continental United States" means the States of the United States, the District of Columbia, and the Territory of Alaska.

C. The term "person" means an individual, partnership, association, corporation, or other organization.

D. The term "foreign country" shall include, but not by way of limitation,

(i) The state and the government thereof on the effective date of this Order as well as any political subdivision, agency, or instrumentality thereof or any territory, dependency, colony, protectorate, mandate, dominion, possession, or place subject to the jurisdiction thereof,

(ii) Any other government (including any political subdivision, agency, or instrumentality thereof) to the extent and only to the extent that such government exercises or claims to exercise de jure or de facto sovereignty over the area which on such effective date constituted such foreign country, and

(iii) Any person to the extent that such person is, or has been, or to the extent that there is reasonable cause to believe that such person is, or has been, since such effective date, acting or purporting to act directly or indirectly for the benefit or on behalf of any of the foregoing.

E. The term "national" shall include,

(i) Any person who has been domiciled in, or a subject, citizen, or resident of a foreign country at any time on or since the effective date of this Order,

(ii) Any partnership, association, corporation, or other organization, organized under the laws of, or which on or since the effective date of this Order had or has had its principal place of business in such foreign country, or which on or since such effective date was or has been controlled by, or a substantial part of the stock, shares, bonds, debentures, notes, drafts, or other securities or obligations of which, was or has been owned or controlled by, directly or indirectly, such foreign country and/or one Or more nationals thereof as herein defined,

(iii) Any person to the extent that such person is, or has been, since such effective date, acting or purporting to act directly or indirectly for the benefit or on behalf of any national of such foreign country, and

(iv) Any other person who there is reasonable cause to believe is a "national" as herein defined. In any case in which by virtue of the foregoing definition a person is a national of more than one foreign country, such person shall be deemed to be a national of each such foreign country.

In any case in which the combined interests of two or more foreign countries designated in this Order and/or nationals thereof are sufficient in the aggregate to constitute, within the meaning of the foregoing, control or 25 per centum or more of the stock, shares, bonds, debentures, notes, drafts, or other securities or obligations of a partnership, association, corporation, or other organization, but such control or a substantial part of such stock, shares, bonds, debentures, notes, drafts, or other securities or obligations is not held by any one such foreign country and/or national thereof, such partnership, association, corporation, or other organization shall be deemed to be a national of each of such foreign countries. The Secretary of the Treasury shall have full power to determine that any person is or shall be deemed to be a "national" within the meaning of this definition, and the foreign country of which such person is or shall be deemed to be a national. Without limitation of the foregoing, the term "national" shall also include any other person who is determined by the Secretary of the Treasury to be, or to have been, since such effective date, acting or purporting to act directly or indirectly for the benefit or under the direction of a foreign country designated in this Order, or national thereof, as herein defined.

F. The term "banking institution" as used in this Order shall include any person engaged primarily or incidentally in the business of banking, of granting or transferring credits, or of purchasing or selling foreign exchange or procuring purchasers and sellers thereof, as principal or agent, or any person holding credits for others as a direct or incidental part of his business, or brokers; and, each principal, agent, home office, branch, or correspondent of any person so engaged shall be regarded as a separate "banking institution."

G. The term "this Order," as used herein, shall mean Executive Order No. 8389 of April 10, 1940, as amended.

SECTION 6. Executive Order No. 8389 of April 10, 1940, as amended, shall no longer be deemed to be an amendment to or a part of Executive Order No. 6560 of January 15, 1934. Executive Order No. 6560 of January 15, 1934, and the Regulations of November 12, 1934, are hereby modified in so far as they are inconsistent with the provisions of this Order, and except as so modified, continue in full force and effect. Nothing herein shall be deemed to revoke any license, ruling, or instruction now in effect and issued pursuant to Executive Order No. 6560 of January 15, 1934, as amended, or pursuant to this Order; provided, however, that all such licenses, rulings, or instructions shall be subject to the provisions hereof. Any amendment, modification, or revocation by or pursuant to the provisions of this Order of any orders, regulations, rulings, instructions, or licenses shall not affect any act done, or any suit or proceeding had or commenced in any civil or criminal case prior to such amendment, modification, or revocation, and all penalties, forfeitures, and liabilities under any such orders, regulations, rulings, instructions, or licenses shall continue and may be enforced as if such amendment, modification, or revocation had not been made.

SECTION 7. Without limitation as to any other powers or authority of the Secretary of the Treasury or the Attorney General under any other provision of this Order, the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized and empowered to prescribe from time to time regulations, rulings, and instructions to carry out the purposes of this Order and to provide therein or otherwise the conditions under which licenses may be granted by or through such officers or agencies as the Secretary of the Treasury may designate, and the decision of the Secretary with respect to the granting, denial, or other disposition of an application or license shall be final.

SECTION 8. Section 5 (b) of the Act of October 6, 1917, as amended, provides in part:

". . . Whoever willfully violates any of the provisions of this subdivision or of any license, order, rule or regulation issued thereunder, shall, upon conviction, be fined not more than $10,000, or, if a natural person, may be imprisoned for not more than ten years, or both; and any officer, director, or agent of any corporation who knowingly participates in such violation may be punished by a like fine, imprisonment, or both."

SECTION 9. This Order and any regulations, rulings, licenses, or instructions issued hereunder may be amended, modified, or revoked at any time.

Occupied Croatia joined the Axis powers.

Colliers magazine ran an article on Pearl Harbor which termed it "impregnable".  The reporter who wrote the admiring piece had been invited by the Navy to examine and review the installation.

May 2, 1941. The Anglo Iraqi War Commences

British troops wearing pith helmets and carrying SMLEs outside of Baghdad, 1941.

On this day in 1941, fighting between Iraqi insurgents who had recently staged a coup and taken over the country, and the British, started in earnest.  What is sometimes called the Anglo Iraqi War commenced on this day with British bombing raids on Iraqi air assets.  

Today in World War II History—May 2, 1941

War breaks out in Iraq

The entire Iraq episode would prove to be a sort of sideshow in the war, but perhaps one that should have gathered more attention at the time as it showed the practical limits of Axis' power.  Iraqi plotters had figured that the British were proving to be down and out.  In turn, the British would prove to have ample forces to deal with Iraq, even if those forces often looked more like they were out of World War One than World War Two.  The Axis, on the other hand, proved basically incapable of aiding their would be Iraqi allies.

The war would last until May 31, with the British, as noted, emerging victorious.

Romania formed a bureaucratic organization to expropriate Jewish property from Romanian Jews and to redistribute it to non Jewish Romanians.  Oppression of the Jews was a feature of the Romanian fascist state that ran the country until near the end of World War Two but it was home grown, rather than imported from the Nazis, as it was in some other nations. Romania, of course, was a German ally for most of the war.

German functionaries met on this day in 1941 to make economic plans for the occupation of the Soviet Union.  Those plans included seizure of food resources for importation into Germany with the resulting acknowledged starvation of large numbers of Soviet citizens.

The FCC took steps to start the licensing of the first ten commercial television stations in the U.S.

April 10, 1941. The Siege of Tobruk Commences.

The siege of Tobruk, which would last until November, commenced on this day when the Germans probe the defenses of the city invested from the land.  Australian infantry repulsed the German efforts.

The fighting there would go on until November and go on to become the basis of heroic British Commonwealth legend with the Australians playing an outsized role in the city's defense.

Australian infantry at Tobruk.

On the same day, the Germans took Zagreb and proclaimed an independent, fascist, Croatian state that would be the scene of all of the horrors associated with fascism and Nazism.

Other events occurring on this day in the Second World War can be read about here:

Day 588 April 10, 1941