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Conflicts in 1945

  • 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.
  • Invasion of the Kuril IslandsThe decision to invade the Kuril Islands emerged from a sudden shift in Soviet military strategy during August 1945. Planners initially targeted Hokkaido…
  • Soviet invasion of South SakhalinThe Soviet invasion of South Sakhalin kept troops fighting for more than a week after Japan had already surrendered. It struck the southern half of Sakhalin…
  • 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…
  • Battle of Nuremberg (1945)The Battle of Nuremberg lasted five days in April 1945, and it cost the United States four of those days just to capture a city center that was already…
  • 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.
  • East Prussian offensiveThe East Prussian offensive officially ended on the 25th of April 1945. Yet some German units under Wehrmacht command refused to surrender until the entire…
  • Spring 1945 offensive in ItalyOperation Grapeshot opened on the 6th of April 1945, when the 15th Allied Army Group unleashed a rolling artillery barrage against German positions along the…
  • East Pomeranian offensiveThe East Pomeranian offensive was a Soviet Red Army campaign that changed the final shape of World War Two in Europe. From the 10th of February to the 4th of…
  • Ruhr pocketThe Ruhr pocket ended with a field marshal shooting himself in a forest rather than face Allied captivity. In April 1945, some 317,000 German soldiers were…
  • Silesian offensivesThe Silesian offensives were not the main event. They were the protection racket for it. In the winter of 1945, the Soviet Red Army had its eyes fixed on…
  • Battle of LuzonThe Battle of Luzon was the largest land battle of the Pacific Theater in World War II, pitting Allied forces from the United States, the Philippines…
  • Borneo campaignOn the 1st of May 1945, Australian soldiers paddled toward a small island off the north-east coast of Borneo in handmade folboats, slipping past…
  • 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 Manila (1945)The Battle of Manila began on the 3rd of February 1945, and within a month it had killed at least 100,000 civilians and reduced one of Asia's most celebrated…
  • Battle of West HunanThe Battle of West Hunan began on the 6th of April 1945, just weeks before Germany's surrender in Europe, but on the other side of the world the Second…
  • Vienna offensiveJoseph Stalin reached an agreement with the Western Allies prior to April 1945 concerning the relative postwar political influence of each party in much of…
  • Soviet invasion of ManchuriaThe Soviet invasion of Manchuria began at one minute past midnight Trans-Baikal time on the 9th of August 1945, simultaneously on three fronts.
  • Soviet–Japanese WarThe Soviet-Japanese War began at one minute past midnight Trans-Baikal time on the 9th of August 1945, when three Red Army fronts crossed into Manchuria…
  • Western Allied invasion of GermanyThe Western Allied invasion of Germany reached its decisive turning point on the 22nd of March 1945, when American troops crossed the Rhine under a bright…
  • Battle of KönigsbergThe Battle of Königsberg took four days, but a siege had gripped the city since late January 1945 long before that. Soviet forces of the 3rd Belorussian…
  • 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…
  • Battle of BerlinAt 8:30 in the morning on the 22nd of April 1945, ninety-six shells fell on the centre of Berlin in the space of a few minutes.
  • 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…
  • Vistula–Oder offensiveThe Vistula-Oder offensive of January 1945 was the fastest large-scale advance in the history of the Eastern Front. In just over two weeks, the Red Army…
  • 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…