Today is the 70th Anniversary of the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany. 17 days later, the Soviets launched an invasion from the East and wiped Poland off the map. Not even two years later, the German-Russian alliance broke down, and the Germans invaded the Soviet Union. Over the next four years, the Soviets lost over 27 million people fighting back the Germans and toppling Nazi Germany. At the same time, the Americans pushed the Germans out of France and other Western nations hastening the collapse of the Third Reich.
World War II was the bloodiest war in history. It also required a huge sacrifice from all people of all nations to defeat Fascism. Because of the brave fight put up by the Allied Soldiers, the nations throughout Europe and the people in Japan live in a world without Fascism and militarism. It was a heroic struggle to liberate the world.
Yes, but after the invasion of Sicily, and the Allies had gained a foothold in Italy, Many Italians switched over the the Allied from the axis, and mostly helped with behind-the-lines sorta of stuff. I've seen an article which said an Italian company walked up to a German Batallion (the Italians had switched over, but the Germans didnt know that) and the Italians started shooting everywhere. 100% Casulties for the Italians, and 40-50% Casilties for the Germans.
In my village in Greece, the Italians, in response to a guerilla attack in which two of them were killed, machine gunned every male from the age of 12 upwards. It's easy to forget these things because they switched to the Allied side. In fact, they got off scot free from many war crimes which the Germans would never have been able to do, purely because they switched sides. That's not to say all Italians were 'bad guys', just that you shouldn't forget the context behind it.
@ Gagamen, yes, numerically, the Jews were not the biggest losers of WW2. But proportionately, they suffered more than any other single group. That doesn't even factor in, the atrocious way there were treated under the Nazis for years before that, and the horrific way in which they were killed. Looking just at the numbers makes it easy to forget the human stories behind all those deaths.
Jews are the most remembered of the Holocaust, because they were treated so horribly and lost the most of the holocaust. But, and being Jewish, it is hard to say this, this was not the main point of the war. When i said most deaths, note I said holocaust, not WW2. Japanese soldiers invaded the Pacific Islands and raped and murdered civilians. Germany invaded and took over most all of Eroupe. Homosexuals, handicapped people, and Gypsies were also tortured and murdered. Jews were only part of the picture.
Let's not forget, the majority(if not all)of the soldiers on both sides were forced by the government to fight, be it Italian, American, Japanese, Soviet, German, British, Canadian, etc.
Not Canadian. Our forces were 99.99% volunteers. Near the end of the war a conscription began but it was so late that only about 20,000 were conscripted, and only 1,000 had enough time to make it to battle.
This percentage picture shows which countries fought the most in WWII
Nope. It shows which countries had the most casualties. Not which countries fought the most.
They didn't put their lines on the line for us, the government forced them too. Of course most of them were too brainwashed with american propaganda to dispute the draft.
Okay, you're allowed to dislike America . . . but you don't have to be a douche about it. You're still diminishing the deaths of people who laid their lives on the line to protect the world from the Nazi War Machine.
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In my opinion, we shouldn't respect contributing countries, but contributing people. And I certainly give my highest respects to those who lost their lives fighting off the Axis forces.
they were the one who defeated Nazism and still people think they were bad and that USA won which is really absurd
I could have sworn people thought it was the 'allied forces' that defeated the Germans & Japanese, subsequently winning the second world war. If Germany wasn't divided on multiple fronts, it's quite possible they would have been able to bring down the Soviet government.
Also you shouldn`t divide Jews as they are citizens of many countries on this planet not a special kind of humans, losses should be looked of countries not races.
Yes, they're citizens of many countries but it was the Nazi regime that singled them out as a race, regardless of what country they lived in. "The Final Solution" was solely about jews and other 'undesirables' (of which there was another 6 million put to death in camps). To dismiss the nature of them being singled out is to ignore the holocaust. You are right - they're not the only ones that died, but they are the ones rounded up in train cars and then thrown into gas chambers.
-Not ex Yugoslavian, like ex Soviet Union we were killed and deafeated but because we were the strongest people ever, in minds and in our hearths we rise from the ashes forming the biggest defence and offensive ever killing Nazis every where.
Curious how I must have missed the superior training partisan warriors & soviet soldiers received in the countless history books written on the second world war. Seriously Gaga, this crap again?
Homosexuals, handicapped people, and Gypsies were also tortured and murdered.
Don't forget also socialists and members of other political parties. Hitler killed even other Nazis, when they did not agree with him or when they were considered so powerful that they could be a threat to Hitler. Example the SA, almost all it's members where assassinated by the SS.
I'm saying that the forces that fought the Germans on the eastern front were poorly equipped in terms of their military training. The troops were very green.
I can respect the contribution that Yugoslavia made to the War effort; but the manner in which you speak, you suggest that theirs was the only effort that made victory possible, and that without any of the other nations participating in WW2 Yugoslavia and Russia could have defeated the Germans alone - which is an insult to every country that participated. If you think that to be the truth, you're beyond all hope of understanding the full scope of the war.
Not only that, but you yourself are guilty of the exact same views that you denounce about the U.S.A. You bash on people for thinking that the U.S.A. was the only country to save the day, when you have the exact same view, just with another country. Makes you look like a hypocrite.
You say there wasn't time for training, but clearly Germany's Wehrmacht were well trained. Britain has had a well trained military for a *very* long time.
So..
it wasn`t like Canada or USA to have your homes on an island and send some soldiers over seas to fight
Is this supposed to mean that Canada or the U.S.A.'s contributions are meaningless because they weren't occupied by the Germans? What about Britain? Or India? Or Australia? I guess they're all worthless because they didn't go through the exact same things Yugoslavia did?
Nope I am saying that people think that US did all the work without any help, still they weren`t even the most active fighting country in WWII, unlike US and Canada other countries were slaved and used their last brink of strenght to defend themselves and to form an offensive.
Even those who were hunted down and put in camps fought back. There was the Warsaw camp revolt, the Beilsky brothers small dizision of the Otriad, and civilians who formedd resistance. Germans fought against each other. It wasn't completely a military war.
Hitler killed even other Nazis, when they did not agree with him or when they were considered so powerful that they could be a threat to Hitler. Example the SA, almost all it's members where assassinated by the SS.
I seem to remember the Night of the Long knives was done because Hitler needed the Army onside.
This thread is getting heated; I'm glad it gives me some good stuff to read.
Nope nothing to do with contributions but it`s all a matter of "being in the center of the massacre war" you don`t know that kind of living Hidden, we took the bigger loss, very bigger one, so don`t you dare to say it was same with every country because it will be an insult to many civilian deaths including all ages genders and religions who were killed without carrying any weapons like I said you didn`t experienced that life so you can just read some books about it, also gathering an army was 100 times harder in an occupied country, people actually had to fight to get their houses, children and food from Nazis not having a steady peaceful homes from which they could send soldiers.
Neither do you, unless your ability to count draws you to conclude you were alive in the 1940's. You have this distasteful 'holier then thou' attitude that's just completely unwelcome. My biggest problem is that you don't get your facts straight at all, and you don't seem to care about how delusional you are either.
-So that means we were even stronger in our hearts to fight for our lives, we weren't even ready for any kind of war but nothing new there lol, still a great rise it was.
You know it only took Germany 11 days to crush Yugoslavia? Guess being 'strong of heart' doesn't really cut it in war time.
-Ah many people, all sorts.
This is a total cop-out. You're convincing yourself that everyone thinks this way and you don't have anything to back up your own postulate. Just embarassing.
I don't think the Italians even wanted to fight, they just kept to themselves most of the time.
That's true, though at the beginning some soldiers thought they wanted to fight, but after the first battles the lost their fighting mood. They were also overconfident the Italian army thought that was one of the best and when the opponent country resisted they faced enormous problems. Also the Italian soldiers where not very experienced and many of them were just 15/16 year old kids, who of course were not capable of fighting against person who are ready to die for their country.
