Battles of WWII

The Battle of the Atlantic: Was the longest continuous military campaign of World War II, running from 1939 right through to the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945, and was at its height from mid-1940 through to about the end of 1943. The campaign pitted the German Navy’s surface raiders and U-boats against Allied convoys from North America and the South Atlantic to the United Kingdom and Russia, protected mainly by the British and Canadian navies and air forces, later aided by United States ships and aircraft. The German U-boats were joined by Italian submarines after Italy entered the war in June 1940.

The name ‘Battle of the Atlantic’, first coined by Winston Churchill in 1941, is a partial misnomer for a campaign that began on the first day of the European war and lasted for six years, involved thousands of ships and stretched over hundreds of miles of the vast ocean and seas in a succession of more than 100 convoy battles and perhaps 1,000 single-ship encounters. Tactical advantage switched back and forth over the next six years as new weapons, tactics and counter-measures were developed by both sides. The British and their allies gradually gained the upper hand, driving the German surface raiders from the ocean by the middle of 1941 and decisively defeating the U-boats in a series of convoy battles between March and May 1943. Promising new German submarines arrived in 1945, too late to affect the course of the war.

Battle of the Coral Sea: The Battle of the Coral Sea, fought between the 4th and 8th of May, with most of the fighting happening on the 7th and 8th of May, 1942, was the first fleet action in which aircraft carriers engaged each other, and the first naval battle in human history in which neither side's ships sighted or fired directly upon the other. The battle is considered a tactical victory for Japan since the aircraft carrier USS Lexington was lost, while Japan only lost a light carrier in the battle. Coral Sea was a strategic victory for the Allies as the Japanese abandoned their attempt to land troops to take Port Moresby, New Guinea. The engagement ended with no clear victor, but the damage suffered and experience gained by both sides set the stage for the Battle of Midway one month later.

Battle of Stalingrad: The Battle of Stalingrad was a battle between Germany and its allies and the Soviet Union for the Soviet city of Stalingrad that took place between August 21, 1942 and February 2, 1943. It was the turning point of World War II in Europe and was arguably the bloodiest battle in human history, with combined casualties estimated above 1.5 million. The battle is taken to include the German siege of the southern Russian city of Stalingrad (now Volgograd), the battle inside the city, and the Soviet counter-offensive which eventually trapped and destroyed the German Sixth Army and other Axis forces around the city.

As a result of the battle, the Axis powers suffered roughly 850,000 casualties (one-quarter of their strength on the Eastern Front), and lost a huge amount of supplies and equipment. The Axis forces were never able to fully recover from this loss and were eventually forced into a long retreat out of Eastern Europe. Generalfeldmarschall Friedrich Paulus disobeyed Hitler and surrendered.

Battle of Midway: The Battle of Midway was a pivotal naval battle. It took place from June 4 to June 7, 1942. During the battle, the United States Navy defeated a Japanese attack against Midway Atoll (located northwest of Hawaii) and destroyed four Japanese aircraft carriers and a heavy cruiser while losing a carrier and a destroyer.

The battle was a crushing defeat for the Japanese and is widely regarded as the most important naval battle of World War II. The battle permanently weakened the Japanese Navy, particularly through the loss of over 200 naval aviators. Strategically, the U.S. Navy was able to seize the initiative in the Pacific and go on the offensive.

The Japanese plan of attack, which included a secondary attack against the Aleutian Islands, was to lure America's few remaining carriers into a trap and sink them. The Japanese also intended to occupy Midway Atoll to extend Japan's defensive perimeter farther from its home islands. This operation was considered preparatory for further attacks against Fiji and Samoa, as well as the invasion of Hawaii.

The Battle of Guadalcanal: The Battle of Guadalcanal , also known as the Guadalcanal Campaign , was fought between August 7, 1942 and February 7, 1943 in the Pacific theatre of World War II. This campaign, fought on the ground, at sea, and in the air, pitted Allied forces against Imperial Japanese forces, and was a decisive, strategically significant campaign of World War II. The fighting took place on and around the island of Guadalcanal in the southern Solomon Islands and was the first major offensive launched by Allied forces against the Empire of Japan.

The Guadalcanal campaign marked the first significant strategic combined arms victory by Allied forces over Japanese forces in the Pacific theatre. For this reason, the Guadalcanal campaign is often referred to as a "turning point" in the war. The campaign marked the beginning of the transition by Allied forces from defensive operations to the strategic offensive while the forces of Japan were thereafter forced to cease strategic offensive operations and instead concentrate on strategic defense, culminating in the ultimate defeat of Japan and the end of World War II.

Operation Torch: Operation Torch (initially called Operation Gymnast) was the British-American invasion of French North Africa in World War II during the North African Campaign, started November 8, 1942.

The Soviet Union had pressed the United States and Britain to start operations in Europe, and open a second front to reduce the pressure of German forces on the Russian troops. While the American commanders favored Operation Sledgehammer, landing in Occupied Europe as soon as possible, the British commanders believed that such a course would end in disaster. An attack on French North Africa was proposed instead, which would clear the Axis from North Africa, improve naval control of the Mediterranean and prepare an invasion of Southern Europe in 1943. American President Roosevelt suspected the African operation would rule out an invasion of Europe in 1943 but agreed to support Churchill.

The Battle of Kursk or Kursk Campaign also called Unternehmen Zitadelle by the German Army (Operation Citadel in English), was fought from July 4, 1943 to July 20, 1943. Having good intelligence on Hitler's intentions, the Soviets established and managed to conceal elaborate layered defense works, mine fields, and stage and disguise large reserve forces poised for a tactical and strategic counterattack end game typical of defensive battle plans. Overall, the campaign, which included the famous sub-battle at Prokhorovka, remains the largest armored engagement of all time, and included the most costly single day of aerial warfare in history. The Germans saw the Battle of Kursk as Operation Zitadelle only; the Soviets saw Zitadelle as the defensive phase of the battle, followed by Operation Kutuzov and Operation Polkovodets Rumyantsev as an offensive phase.

Though the Germans planned and initiated an offensive strike, the well-planned Soviet defense not only managed to frustrate their ambitions but also enabled the Soviets to follow up the successful defense with counteroffensives—Operation Kutuzov and Operation Polkovodets Rumyantsev—and exhausted the German abilities in the theater. The subsequent counterattacks retook Oryol (August 5), Belgorod (August 5) and Kharkov (August 23), pushing back the Germans across a broad front, the first successful major Soviet summer offensive of the War.