Madrid, Spain, An anti-Russian demonstration, 23.06.1941.

Madrid, Spain, An anti-Russian demonstration, 23.06.1941.

Protestors hold placards during a demonstration dubbed "suround the congress" against the Spanish monarchy, in Madrid on October 4, 2014 ... Russian 'traitor' who exposed Anna Chapman's spy ring dead in US – reports

Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and the young Colonel Gaddafi of Libya in 1969

Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and the young Colonel Gaddafi of Libya in 1969

On Sept. 1, 1969, he and a group of young officers seized power in a bloodless revolution. The charismatic Gaddafi, only 27 at the time, soon emerged as the country’s paramount leader and quickly tried to establish himself as an anti-Western iconoclast. He forced out U.S. and British military forces and, over the next two decades, invited in every shade of radical from the Palestine Liberation Organization to the Irish Republican Army.
Gaddafi was an early enthusiast of an Arab political union and saw himself as Nasser’s natural successor. But nearly all of his efforts to become an Arab liberator floundered, and Libya was often as isolated from its neighbors as it was from the West. The country had small shooting wars with Egypt, Chad and Tunisia. Gaddafi clashed with PLO leader Yasser Arafat. He called for the overthrow of the royal family in Saudi Arabia.

Dortmund, Germany, A crowd listening to a speech delivered by Goebbels, December 1943.

Dortmund, Germany, A crowd listening to a speech delivered by Goebbels, December 1943.

December 1943: Despite the disasters of 1942, Goebbels predicts ... q Total War: In his most famous speech delivered shortly after the defeat at Stalingrad, ... q "The Matter of the Plague": Why Germans may not listen to the BBC (5 October 1941). ...... part of the crowds on Berlin's Unter den Linden.

The Sportpalast speech (German: Sportpalastrede) or total war speech was a speech delivered byGerman Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels at the Berlin Sportpalast to a large but carefully selected audience on 18 February 1943 calling for a total war, as the tide of World War II had turned against Nazi Germany and its Axis allies.

It is considered the most famous of Joseph Goebbels's speeches.^[1] The speech was the first public admission by the Nazi leadership that Germany faced serious dangers. Goebbels exhorted the German people to continue the war even though it would be long and difficult because—as he asserted—both Germany's survival and the survival of a non-Bolshevist Europe were at stake.

Dunkirk, France, British army evacuating the beaches, 29.05.1940

Dunkirk, France, British army evacuating the beaches, 29.05.1940

Operation Dynamo
Part of the Battle of France in the Second World War
British troops evacuating Dunkirk's beaches
Date 26 May to 4 June 1940 Location France, Dunkirk, and English Channel 51°02′N 2°22′E Result Successful Allied withdrawal
Belligerents
United Kingdom  Canada[1]  France  Poland[2]  Belgium[2]  Netherlands[3]	Germany
Commanders and leaders
Lord Gort  Bertram Ramsay  Harold Alexander  William Tennant  J. M. Abrial[4]	Gerd von Rundstedt

The Dunkirk evacuation, code-named Operation Dynamo, also known as the Miracle of Dunkirk, was the evacuation of Allied soldiers from the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk, France, between 26 May and 4 June 1940, during World War II. The operation was decided upon when large numbers of Belgian, British, and French troops were cut off and surrounded by the German army during the Battle of France. In a speech to theHouse of Commons, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill called the events in France "a colossal military disaster", saying "the whole root and core and brain of the British Army" had been stranded at Dunkirk and seemed about to perish or be captured.^[5] In his We shall fight on the beaches speech on 4 June, he hailed their rescue as a "miracle of deliverance".^[6]

After Nazi Germany invaded Poland in September 1939, marking the beginning of the Second World War, theBritish Expeditionary Force (BEF) was sent to aid in the defence of France. Germany invaded Belgium and the Netherlands on 10 May 1940, and three of their Panzer corps attacked France through the Ardennes and rapidly drove to the English Channel. By 21 May, the German forces had trapped the BEF, the remains of the Belgian forces, and three French armies in an area along the northern coast of France. Commander of the BEF General John Vereker, 6th Viscount Gort, immediately saw that evacuation across the Channel was the best course of action and began planning a withdrawal to Dunkirk, the closest location with good port facilities. On 22 May 1940, a halt order was issued by the German High Command, with Adolf Hitler's approval. This gave the trapped Allied forces time to construct defensive works and pull back large numbers of troops toward Dunkirk, to fight the Battle of Dunkirk. From 28–31 May 1940, in the Siege of Lille, the remaining 40,000 men of the once-formidable French First Army fought a delaying action against seven German divisions, including three armoured divisions.

On the first day of the evacuation, only 7,669 men were evacuated, but by the end of the eighth day, a total of 338,226 soldiers had been rescued by a hastily assembled fleet of over 800 boats. Many of the troops were able to embark from the harbour's protective mole onto 39 British destroyers and other large ships, while others had to wade out from the beaches, waiting for hours in the shoulder-deep water. Some were ferried from the beaches to the larger ships by what came to be known as the little ships of Dunkirk, a flotilla of hundreds of merchant marine boats, fishing boats, pleasure craft, and lifeboats called into service for the emergency. The BEF lost 68,000 soldiers during the French campaign and had to abandon nearly all of their tanks, vehicles, and other equipment.

In his speech to the House of Commons on 4 June, Churchill reminded the country that "we must be very careful not to assign to this deliverance the attributes of a victory. Wars are not won by evacuations."^[7] The events at Dunkirk remain a prominent memory in the United Kingdom.

Greece, The German invasion, 07.04.1941

Greece, The German invasion, 07.04.1941

The Battle of Greece (also known as Operation Marita, German: Unternehmen Marita)^[16] is the common name for the invasion of Allied Greece by Nazi Germany in April 1941 during World War II. Concomitant to the stalled Greco-Italian War, it is usually distinguished from the Battle of Crete, which came after mainland Greece had been subdued. These Axis operations were part of the greater Balkan Campaign of Germany.

At the time of the German invasion, Greece was at war with Fascist Italy, following the Italian invasion on 28 October 1940. The Greeks joined the Allies and defeated the initial Italian attack and the counter-attack of March 1941. When Operation Marita began on 6 April, the bulk of the Greek Army was on the Greek border with Albania, then a protectorate of Italy, from which the Italian troops had attacked. German troops invaded from Bulgaria, creating a second front. Greece had already received a small, inadequate reinforcement fromBritish Empire forces in anticipation of the German attack, but no more help was sent afterward. The Greek army found itself outnumbered in its effort to defend against both Italian and German troops. As a result, the Bulgarian defensive line did not receive adequate troop reinforcements and was quickly overrun by the Germans, who then outflanked the Greek forces at the Albanian border, forcing their surrender. The British Empire forces were overwhelmed and forced to retreat, with the ultimate goal of evacuation. For several days, Allied troops played an important part in containing the German advance on the Thermopylae position, allowing ships to be prepared to evacuate the units defending Greece.^[17] The German Army reached the capital,Athens, on 27 April^a[›] and Greece's southern shore on 30 April, capturing 7,000 British Empire forces and ending the battle with a decisive victory. The conquest of Greece was completed with the capture of Crete a month later. Following its fall, Greece was occupied by the military forces of Germany, Italy and Bulgaria.^[18]

Hitler later blamed the failure of his invasion of the Soviet Union, which had to be delayed, on Mussolini's failed conquest of Greece.^[19] This explanation for Germany's calamitous defeat by the Soviet Union has been refuted by the majority of historians, who have accused Hitler of trying to deflect blame for his country's defeat from himself to his ally, Italy.^[20] It nevertheless had serious consequences for the Axis war effort in the North African theatre. Enno von Rintelen, who was the military attaché in Rome, emphasizes from the German point of view, the strategic mistake of not taking Malta.

Getting the survivors from the ‘Lusitania’ off the lifeboat

Getting the survivors from the ‘Lusitania’ off the lifeboat

RMS Lusitania was a British ocean liner that was sunk by a German submarine in World War I, causing a major diplomatic uproar. The ship was a holder of the Blue Riband, and briefly the world's largest passenger ship until the completion of her running mate Mauretania. She was launched by the Cunard Line in 1906, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic trade. She made a total of 202 trans-Atlantic crossings

Italy, The Japanese Foreign Minister meeting Ribbentrop, 07,04,1941.

Italy, The Japanese Foreign Minister meeting Ribbentrop, 07,04,1941.

SS-Obergruppenführer Ulrich Friedrich Wilhelm Joachim von Ribbentrop (30 April 1893 – 16 October 1946), more commonly known as Joachim von Ribbentrop, was Foreign Minister of Nazi Germany from 1938 until 1945.

Ribbentrop first came to Adolf Hitler's notice as a well-travelled businessman with more knowledge of the outside world than most senior Nazis and as an authority on world affairs. He offered his house for the secret meetings in January 1933 that resulted in Hitler's appointment as Chancellor of Germany. He became a close confidant of Adolf Hitler, to the disgust of some party members, who thought him superficial and lacking in talent. He was nevertheless appointed Ambassador to the Court of St James (for the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) in 1936 and then Foreign Minister of Germany in February 1938.

Before World War II, he played a key role in brokering the Pact of Steel (an alliance with fascist Italy) and the Nazi–Soviet non-aggression pact, known as the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. After 1941, Ribbentrop's influence declined.

Arrested in June 1945, Ribbentrop was tried at the Nuremberg trials and convicted for his role in starting World War II and enabling the Holocaust. On 16 October 1946, he became the first of those sentenced to death to be hanged.

Ekerberg, Norway, Himmler and general Falkenhorn visiting a German military cemetery, March 1941.

Ekerberg, Norway, Himmler and general Falkenhorn visiting a German military cemetery, March 1941.

The German occupation of Norway began on 9 April 1940 after German forces invaded the neutral Scandinavian country of Norway. Conventional armed resistance to the German invasion ended on 10 June 1940 and the Germans then controlled Norway until the capitulation of German forces in Europe on May 8/9, 1945. Throughout this period, Norway was continuously occupied by the Wehrmacht. Civil rule was effectively assumed by the Reichskommissariat Norwegen (Reich Commissariat of Norway), which acted in collaboration with a pro-German puppet government, while the Norwegian Kingand prewar government escaped to London, where they acted as a government in exile. This period of military occupation is in Norway referred to as the "war years" or "occupation period".

Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (German: [ˈhaɪnʁɪç ˈluˑɪtˌpɔlt ˈhɪmlɐ] ( listen); 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) wasReichsführer of the Schutzstaffel (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) of Nazi Germany. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler briefly appointed him a military commander and later Commander of the Replacement (Home) Army and General Plenipotentiary for the administration of the entire Third Reich (Generalbevollmächtigter für die Verwaltung). Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and one of the people most directly responsible for the Holocaust.

As a member of a reserve battalion during World War I, Himmler did not see active service. He studied agronomy in college, and joined the Nazi Party in 1923 and the SS in 1925. In 1929, he was appointed Reichsführer-SS by Hitler. Over the next 16 years, he developed the SS from a mere 290-man battalion into a million-strong paramilitary group, and, following Hitler's orders, set up and controlled the Nazi concentration camps. He was known to have good organisational skills and for selecting highly competent subordinates, such as Reinhard Heydrich in 1931. From 1943 onwards, he was both Chief of German Police and Minister of the Interior, overseeing all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo (Secret State Police). Himmler had a lifelong interest in occultism, interpreting Germanic neopagan and Völkisch beliefs to promote the racial policy of Nazi Germany, and incorporatingesoteric symbolism and rituals into the SS.

On Hitler's behalf, Himmler formed the Einsatzgruppen and built extermination camps. As facilitator and overseer of the concentration camps, Himmler directed the killing of some six million Jews, between 200,000 and 500,000 Romani people, and other victims; the total number of civilians killed by the regime is estimated at eleven to fourteen million people. Most of them were Polish and Soviet citizens.

Late in World War II, Hitler charged Himmler with the command of the Army Group Upper Rhine and the Army Group Vistula; he failed to achieve his assigned objectives and Hitler replaced him in these posts. Realising that the war was lost, he attempted to open peace talks with the western Allies without Hitler's knowledge shortly before the war ended. Hearing of this, Hitler dismissed him from all his posts in April 1945 and ordered his arrest. Himmler attempted to go into hiding, but was detained and then arrested by British forces once his identity became known. While in British custody, he committed suicide on 23 May 1945.