- The Schlieffen Plan was Germany’s pre-war (1906) strategy in invading France in the event of an outbreak of war – aggressive and needed speed and surprise…
By invading the Soviet Union in 1941, Nazi Germany had broken the non-aggression pact the two nations had entered in 1939. Subsequently, the Soviet Union joined the Allies to defeat the Axis Powers. As the Soviets and Nazis were fighting on the eastern front, Stalin was feeling a lot of pressure. This was shown in the Tehran Conference in Iran when Stalin laid out his concerns that a western front against Germany to relieve pressure in the east was not opened yet. Churchill and Roosevelt agreed that they would open one within 6 months, but Stalin is already questioning their motives in the war. It wasn’t until D-Day in 1944 when western allies invaded Normandy that this was achieved.…
In preparation for the Invasion of Russia, Hitler moved troops and supplies to the Russian border, as well as launching many aerial surveillances over Soviet territory. The German attack on Russia involved 3 million soldiers, 3580 tanks, 7184 artillery guns, 1830 planes and 750,000 horses. At 3:15 am on June 22, 1941, the German and Axis powers attacked. From the beginning of their campaign and during a reasonable amount of time, The German’s experienced much success and the Russian collapsed under the German’s onslaught. During this time, Moscow was nearly reached, Leningrad was surrounded and the oil fields in the south were increasingly becoming under German control. But all this success would count for nothing as ultimately Hitler himself caused the German failure.…
Second Front –Churchhill wanted Roosevelt to come into war right away and not wait until the USA is attacked. Stalin wanted Britian and US to attack Germany ASAP so they can take pressure off the Russian on the Easter Front (invasion of France). Churchill and Roosevelt did not trust the Russians and the French and wanted to protect British and US Holdins.…
Germany had two plans to approach the taking off the lands from the city of the Kursk. The two plans were supported by different German field commanders. The first plan was supported German field commanders; Gudarian and Manstein. Their goal was to pinch off a large salient in the Eastern Front of the Soviet Union then cut off the rest of Soviet territory. He wanted…
The Second Front was, according to Philips and Roberts, a major source of tension between the USA, Britain and Russia during World War II. Philips states “To Stalin the need to open up a Second Front in Western Europe against Germany in order to relieve the pressure on the USSR in the East was a pressing necessity. Yet the refusal of Britain and the USA to do so until the time was right led Stalin to be suspicious of their motives.”[1] Roberts backs up Philips’s argument up by pointing out that there had been numerous failed agreements by the Allies to land troops in order to create a Second Front in 1942, and the issue was discussed in the Tehran conference of 1943[2]. However on closer inspection, neither argument is particularly strong. For example, although Philips points out that Russia was at risk of being invaded by Germany in 1941 and therefore had an strong reason for demanding the Second Front despite the fact that defeating Germany was not the USA’s or Britain’s main concern. Churchill was concerned with the risk of casualties a Second Front would create. He also had military interests in North Africa during 1942[3] and Italy during 1943[4] and…
Kaiser Wilhelm II’s foreign policy undid Bismarck’s policies, where he worked towards avoiding a war on two fronts for Germany. Apart from Austria-Hungary Alliance (1879), Three Emperor's Alliance (1881), treaties with Serbia in 1881 and Romania in 1883, Triple Alliance (1882) and eventually the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia (1887), which he considered essential to keep the Russians from reaching an alliance with the French and threaten Germany on two sides. The Schlieffen Plan, conceived by Count Alfred von Schlieffen in 1905 and further refined in the years was to cater for this eventuality. This occurred when the Russian Treaty was scheduled to expire in June 1890 and the Russians under The Tzar, Alexander III were aware of the fact that Bismarck was about to be replaced. Therefore, to secure relations with Germany they suggested renewing the Reinsurance Treaty for 6 years instead of 3 years. The new German Chancellor Caprivi and Wilhelm II decided not to renew it, this gave Russia a feeling of being isolated and vulnerable as her relations with Britain were not good at that time and it was just a natural development that France and Russia form an alliance. The French diplomats immediately began to work on this with the Tzar and an alliance was negotiated in 1894. This action was the one where…
Germany had decided to march through Belgium and then proceed on to Paris from the North at high speed; their plan was to defeat France in 6 weeks. As they knew that France was allied with Russia they had to attack as fast as possible to avoid a double engagement from the East and West.…
When war began in the summer of 1914 both Germany and France had distinct ideas about how war should proceed. Germany, being the initiator of conflict, had the advantage of putting its Schlieffen Plan' into action first. The plan called for a large-scale invasion of France with a large proportion of the German army moving into France through Belgium. Paramount to the German plan was speed. In order for Germany to be able to invade Russia without worrying about France, Germany needed to defeat the French in a matter of weeks. Due to a number of unforeseen factors, the German plan failed and led directly to the deadlocked situation that would continue for over four years.…
The Schlieffen Plan; was the German strategic plan that was to be put into action if there was war against both France and Russia simultaneously.…
The Schlieffen Plan was implemented by the German General Staff, who prepared German troops to attempt to attack France by advancing through neutral Belgium, before travelling southwards to encircle Paris. This plan was inflexible and unpredictable, and was based on assumptions such as slow six week full Russian mobilisation, and that by then, France would be neutralised. Because an attack on Russia was the main objective at the time, Germany committed a larger amount of troops to the East in Russia, rather than in the West to execute the Schlieffen Plan. As a result, fewer troops were deployed in the West, leading to a failure of the offensive on France.…
August 23, 1939 - Germany and Russia agreed not to attack each other, which allowed Hitler to open up a second front in the West without worrying about defending against Russia. Granted Western Poland ot Germany, but allowed Russia to occupy Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Eastern Poland. Hitler intended to break the pact.…
The Space Race and the Cold War “That's One Small Step for Man, One Giant Leap for Mankind”. These words were heard worldwide when astronaut Neil Armstrong first stepped foot on the moon. When the Apollo 11 mission launched on July 16, 1969, carrying astronauts Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin, the world was immersed in the middle of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union which had in essence split the globe into two radically different ideologies that lasted four decades.…
In retaliation Britain and France declared war on Germany. Russia and The United States were late to join the war for different reason. The Soviet Union and Germany signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. It was a non- aggression pact which meant that the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany would remain neutral in the event that either nation were attacked by a third party. This treaty remained in…
World War II started because of the Germans, Italy, and Japan wanting to expand their borders across the world. The European powers that did not agree with the vision of the Axis powers formed what we know today as the Allies. The Allies and Axis had many long battles. Ultimately leading up to the start of World War II was full of long lasting battles. Lots of those battles ended in a stale mate. The Allies were able to gain back most of the land that the Axis had claimed. Hitler, the Kaiser of Germany, proposed a plan to his generals. Most of the generals thought Hitler was out of his mind with this counter attack but Hitler had a goal “A unification of the individual German states and tribes or even the construction of a German Empire in the sense of a unified state.” Hitler’s goal was to bring Germany back to a world power. Bringing Germany back to power it once had would mean the control of Europe. After many long battle the Allies had the Germans backed up to a breaking point. The Germans then devised a plan for a counter attack. This counter attack would be known as the Ardennes where the Panzer armies were used to strike the Allied forces and halt their advances. The Ardennes, a forest between Belgium and Germany,…