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Conflicts in 1944

  • Western New Guinea campaignThe Allied command set a clear goal for early 1944. They needed to bypass heavily fortified Japanese positions in the Pacific theater.
  • Siege of MyitkyinaThe siege of Myitkyina began with a boast. General Joseph Stilwell predicted the coming battle for this town in Burma would be a feat which will live in…
  • Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaignThe Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign was a series of engagements fought from August 1942 to February 1944, in the Pacific theatre of World War II…
  • Operation QueenOperation Queen began on the 16th of November 1944 with one of the heaviest Allied tactical bombing raids of the entire war.
  • Battle of Guilin–LiuzhouThe Battle of Guilin-Liuzhou put two of southern China's most storied cities in the crosshairs of the largest Japanese land offensive of the entire Second…
  • Budapest offensiveThe Budapest offensive began on the 29th of October 1944, as Soviet and Romanian armies launched a sustained assault against Hungary and its Axis partners.
  • Leningrad–Novgorod offensiveThe Leningrad-Novgorod strategic offensive began on the 14th of January 1944 with a thunderclap of artillery: 220,000 shells poured onto German lines along a…
  • Operation OverlordIn May 1943, Allied leaders gathered at the Trident Conference in Washington to make a decision that would alter the course of history.
  • Vyborg–Petrozavodsk offensiveSoviet propaganda listed the Vyborg-Petrozavodsk offensive as one of Stalin's ten blows, the string of major offensives that reshaped the Eastern Front in…
  • Normandy landingsOn the 6th of June 1944, roughly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel in a single day. They came ashore along a 50-mile stretch of French coastline…
  • First Jassy–Kishinev offensiveThe First Jassy-Kishinev offensive is one of the least-documented major operations of the entire Soviet-German War. Named after two cities in the region…
  • Continuation WarThe Continuation War placed Finland in one of the strangest positions of the entire Second World War: a small Nordic democracy fighting alongside Nazi…
  • Battle of the BulgeThe Battle of the Bulge began at 05:30 on the 16th of December 1944, when 1,600 German artillery pieces opened fire along an 80-mile front in the forested…
  • Battle of LeyteThe Battle of Leyte began not with a single shot but with a promise. General Douglas MacArthur had vowed to return to the Philippines after President…
  • Operation DragoonOperation Dragoon began in the predawn hours of the 15th of August 1944, when 1,300 Allied bombers from Italy, Sardinia, and Corsica roared toward the…
  • 1944 Romanian coup d'étatOn the 23rd of August 1944, King Michael I of Romania summoned Prime Minister Ion Antonescu to the royal palace. The meeting lasted an hour.
  • Battle of Leyte GulfThe Battle of Leyte Gulf, fought from the 23rd to the 26th of October 1944, pulled more than 200,000 naval personnel into a single sprawling confrontation in…
  • Warsaw UprisingThe Warsaw Uprising began at 17:00 on the 1st of August 1944, when tens of thousands of Polish fighters rose against the German occupation.
  • Battle of ImphalThe Battle of Imphal began in March 1944 with a Japanese army crossing the Chindwin River, convinced it could destroy the Allied forces in northeast India…
  • Battle of the Philippine SeaThe Battle of the Philippine Sea, fought on the 19th and the 20th of June 1944, was the largest carrier-to-carrier naval engagement in history.
  • Battle of KohimaThe Battle of Kohima came down, at one point, to a tennis court. In April 1944, British and Japanese soldiers occupied trenches on opposite sides of a small…
  • Operation U-GoOperation U-Go began on the 6th of March, 1944, when Japanese forces crossed into northeast India on one of the most audacious bets of the Second World War.
  • Italian Civil WarOn the night between 24 and the 25th of July 1943, the Grand Council of Fascism approved a motion of no confidence against Benito Mussolini.
  • Lapland WarThe Lapland War began not with a declaration but with a surrender demand issued at around 08:00 on the 28th of September 1944, when Finnish advance units…
  • Liberation of ParisOn the night of the 24th of August 1944, a half-track named "Ebro" rolled into the square in front of the Hôtel de Ville and opened fire on a group of German…
  • Slovak National UprisingThe Slovak National Uprising, known in Slovak as Slovenské národné povstanie and abbreviated SNP, is remembered today as Povstanie roku 1944, the Uprising of…
  • Operation BagrationOperation Bagration began on the 22nd of June 1944, exactly three years to the day after Germany launched its invasion of the Soviet Union.
  • Siege of LeningradThe Siege of Leningrad lasted 872 days. From September 1941 to January 1944, the Soviet Union's second largest city was encircled by German and Finnish…
  • World War II in YugoslaviaWorld War II in Yugoslavia was not one war but several, all happening at the same time. On the 6th of April 1941, the German Luftwaffe bombed Belgrade, and…
  • 1944 Bulgarian coup d'étatThe 1944 Bulgarian coup d'état took shape in the early hours of the 9th of September, when Zveno-affiliated officers and War Minister General Ivan Marinov…
  • Belgrade offensiveThe Belgrade offensive, fought from the 15th of September to the 24th of November 1944, was one of the most complex joint military operations of the Second…
  • Dnieper–Carpathian offensiveThe Dnieper-Carpathian offensive, fought from late December 1943 to early May 1944, was one of the largest military operations in the history of the Second…
  • Operation CartwheelIn February 1942, Japanese forces captured Rabaul on the island of New Britain from Australian troops. This location became a major forward base for Japanese…
  • Second Jassy–Kishinev offensiveThe Jassy-Kishinev offensive began on the 20th of August 1944, and within two days the entire German-Romanian front line had collapsed.
  • World War IIWorld War II killed between 60 and 75 million people, making it the deadliest conflict in history. Tanks and aircraft reshaped the battlefield, and aircraft…
  • Operation Ichi-GoOperation Ichi-Go was, by one historian's reckoning, the largest military operation ever carried out in the history of the Japanese army.