WW2 European Front Part 1

            WW2 (1939-1941) European Front Part 1

On Sept 1st Hitler Invaded Poland Three days later Great Britain and France declared war on the german reich. Officially starting ww2. The Polish were surprised because of the german blitzkrieg tactic and numerical advance tanks and planes. The Luftwaffe quickly get air supieriotory over Poland where the polish air force struggle to compete with Luftwaffe after 2 weeks the Germans were at the gates of warsaw they put down siege but unfortunately, the Soviets invaded Poland on Sept 17th to get their interested lands. On Sept 27th, 1939 warsaw surrendered to Germany by the polish field marshal Juliusz Rommel. For some days fighting was done but eventually, on Oct 6th, the polish campaign came to an end. Poland remains in german occupation for the rest of the war. It was liberated by the Soviets in 1945.

The Germans then start preparing for the invasion of France (codenamed:- Operation Fall Gelb) but on 16-17th February the german tanker Altmark was scuttled off the coast of Norway and the crew was taken prisoner by the British while it was escorted by a Norwegian vessel. Hitler was very angry about this and said to his generals to start preparing to invade Norway and Denmark (codenamed:- Operation wesurubung) the operation has to be conducted by naval landing so the Kriegsmarine was needed so On April 9th the operation was launched. the surprise was achieved in all the ports except the capital Oslo the new heavy cruiser Blucher was sunken while escorting and going to give naval bombardment support for the landings in Oslo. When the two battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were returning back when they caught one British carrier glorious and sunk it But unfortunately for the allies On 10th of May the german launched operation fall Gelb and because of this the allied soldiers were evacuated from Norway the Norwegian still fight for another month but they were outnumbered and outgunned by the Germans. In the Norwegian campaign, both sides have heavy losses the Germans lost 1 heavy cruiser two light cruisers, and 10 destroyers and which Kriegsmarine cannot recover from In sort of land casualties the germans have over 5,296 germans who were either killed or captured,. The allies lost 1 aircraft carrier, 2 cruisers, 8 destroyers, and 2 submarines, and Norway lost over 116 ships The allies land lost is around 6,602 casualties.

While the Allies were mostly focusing on the Norwegian front the Germans launched Operation Fall Gelb on the 10th of May where they attacked Belgium to distract the allies forces the germans then sweep across the Ardennes and encircled the allied army where the french army has mostly destroyed the germans there was a discussion in berlin where they decided what to do the panzer divisions have 60% casualties so the Hitler was convinced by the Luftwaffe Commander Goring and Luftwaffe raided the whole area but because of low visibility the german air raids were not very accurate and all the British troops escaped the area via the port at Dunkirk while the germans raced to destroy or captured some British but they can see only the last British vessel leaving the area. Paris Fall after some days and a fascist french government Vichy France was established under Phillipe Petain. 

But then the chamberlain resigned because of his failed attempts to save Norway and France and then the First Lord of Admiralty Winston Churchill became prime minister of the UK. Hitler proposed a peace offer to Britain but Winston Churchill refused he gave many speeches and said that we will never surrender we will fight on the beaches, we will fight in towns but we will never surrender which gave a morale boost for the British citizens and army and because of this one Hitler minister Rudolf Hess while he was going to London for peace proposal he was captured by the British and taken as pow (prisoner of war). Then Winston Churchill launched operation catapult where they sunk the french ships at Mers-el-Kebir where the french lost one of its battleships and 2 Battleships were damaged. 

On June 10th the Italians joined the war where attacked the french at the alps and starting the Mediterranean campaign but they were pushed back in Libya by the British and because of this the germans sent general Erwin Rommel to Africa to relieve the Italians the germans and Italians has some success in Africa after that they get back Libya and put a siege on the port of Tobruk held by the Australasian divisions. The Germans, Italians, and Japanese signed the tripartite pact where they were officially becoming members of the axis. It was later joined by the Hungarians, Rumanians, and Bulgarians When the second Vienna award where the Hungarians get northern Transylvania and Bulgaria got a little part of Romania and they got Macedonia in the future. In 1941 the Italians attacked Greece which was a complete failure and because of this the germans gave an Ultimatum to all the Balkan countries to either join Germany or to get invaded Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria choose to join but there was an allied coup in Yugoslavia and because of these the Germans invaded Yugoslavia and attacked Greece after that.

On June 22nd Hitler Launched Operation Barbarossa (Invasion of Soviet Union) The Invasion army has 3 army groups army group north commanded by Willhelm von Leeb their objective was to go north and attack Leningrad then Army Group Centre commanded by Fedor von bock there objective was to go towards Moscow and The Last Army group south commanded by Gerd von Rundstedt their objective was to go towards Stalingrad and towards the oil fields at the caucuses. when the operation was launched Wehrmacht Achieved complete surprise when Stalin was informed about the invasion he was shocked he thinks that there is still time to make peace but Hitler in just 6 months by December he was in the gates of Moscow but because of the harsh conditions in Russia they were counter-attacked by the soviets 

Thanks for reading the article That's it for today's article ww2 article will be soon out
You can support us by donating on Patreon:- https://www.patreon.com/historywithirfan     
and Follow us on Instagram:- https://www.instagram.com/angloowarrior/