什麼是第二次世界大戰

World War II，亦作Second World War。

1939～1945年間發生的國際衝突。交戰國爲軸心國（德國、義大利和日本）與同盟國（法國、英國、美國、蘇聯以及中國）。德國對第一次世界大戰失敗的怨恨、凡爾賽和約的嚴酷條款導致希特勒和納粹黨的崛起。1933年，希特勒開始祕密重新武裝德國。德國、義大利與日本締結反共產國際協定。並干預西班牙內戰。1938年，希特勒派兵佔領奧地利（參閱Anschluss）。1939年，併吞捷克斯洛伐克。在簽訂「德蘇互不侵犯條約」後，1939年9月德國入侵波蘭。兩天後，英法對德國宣戰。1939年底，德國與蘇聯將波蘭瓜分，蘇聯佔領巴爾幹國家。此外還進攻芬蘭。在海上，德國對駛往英國的商船進行的有效的潛艇戰。1940年4月，德國佔領了挪威港口和整個丹麥。5月，德國以閃電戰越過荷蘭與比利時進入法國。6月被迫投降，建立維琪法國政權。接着德國空軍大規模轟炸英國，準備實行橫渡英吉利海峽的入侵。英國獲得「不列顛戰役」的勝利。1941年希特勒將匈牙利、保加利亞、羅馬尼亞和斯洛伐克拉入軸心國；6月，希特勒廢除1939年的「德蘇互不侵犯條約」，向蘇聯發動大規模的突襲。德國機械部隊深入俄國領土，一度達到莫斯科郊外。在東亞，日本因對華戰爭曠日持久而無結果，決定利用歐洲局勢以奪取歐洲國家在遠東的殖民地。1941年日本襲擊夏威夷珍珠港和菲律賓。數日內，美國對所有軸心國宣戰。日本迅速佔領菲律賓、東南亞大部地區和緬甸、荷屬東印度羣島及許多太平洋島嶼，但於1942年中途島戰役中慘敗。美國逐島進攻，向日本逼近。在北非，1943年英國擊敗義大利和德國。盟軍從北非登陸西西里島，入侵義大利，法西斯政權被推翻，德軍進攻史達林格勒而未獲勝。紅軍開始將德軍逐出蘇聯。1944年6月6日，盟軍在法國北部諾曼第登陸。盟軍擁有制空權，迅速向東逼近，佔領德國本土。同時蘇軍將德軍完全逐出蘇聯，進入波蘭、捷克斯洛伐克、匈牙利和羅馬尼亞。1945年5月8日德軍投降。在太平洋地區，盟軍於1944年佔領菲律賓。雷伊泰灣戰役幾乎消滅了日本海軍。1945年佔領硫磺島與沖繩。同年8月對廣島和長崎的原子彈轟炸使戰爭突然戲劇性地結束。9月2日，日本簽署了正式投降條約。據估計戰爭中死亡人數爲3,500萬～6,000萬，其中包括六百萬死於大屠殺的猶太人。在歐洲和東亞有數百萬平民受傷和無家可歸。亦請參閱Anti-Comintern Pact、Atlantic Charter、Alamein, battles of el-、Atlantic, The、Bulge, Battle of the、philippine Sea, Battle of the、Casablanca Conference、Potsdam Conference、Tehran Conference、Yalta Conference、Dunkirk Evacuation、lend-lease、Munich agreement、Nuremberg Trials、Leningrad, Siege of、Bradley, Omar、Churchill, Winston、Eisenhower, Dwight David、MacArthur, Douglas、Montgomery, Bernard Law、Mussolini, Benito、Patton, George、Rommel, Erwin、Roosevelt, Franklin、Stalin, Joseph、Yamamoto Isoroku、Zhukov, Georgy Konstantinovich。

1939～1945年

World War II

International conflict principally between the Axis Powers—Germany, Italy, and Japan—and the Allied Powers—France, Britain, the U.S., and the Soviet Union. Political and economic instability in Germany, combined with bitterness over its defeat in World War I and the harsh conditions of the Treaty of Versailles, allowed Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party to rise to power. In the mid-1930s, Hitler began secretly to rearm Germany, in violation of the treaty. He signed alliances with Italy and Japan to oppose the Soviet Union and intervened in the Spanish Civil War in the name of anticommunism. Capitalizing on the reluctance of other European powers to oppose him by force, he sent troops to occupy Austria in 1938 (see Anschluss) and to annex Czechoslovakia in 1939. After signing the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. Two days later, France and Britain declared war on Germany. Poland's defeat was followed by a period of military inactivity on the Western front (see Phony War). At sea Germany conducted a damaging submarine campaign by U-boat against merchant shipping bound for Britain. By early 1940 the Soviet Union had divided Poland with Germany, occupied the Baltic states, and subdued Finland in the Russo-Finnish War. In April 1940 Germany overwhelmed Denmark and began its conquest of Norway. In May German forces swept through the Netherlands and Belgium on their blitzkrieg invasion of France, forcing it to capitulate in June and establish the Vichy France regime. Germany then launched massive bombing raids on Britain in preparation for a cross-Channel invasion, but after losing the Battle of Britain Hitler postponed the invasion indefinitely. By early 1941 Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria had joined the Axis, and German troops quickly overran Yugoslavia and Greece in April. In June Hitler abandoned his pact with the Soviet Union and launched a massive surprise invasion of Russia, reaching the outskirts of Moscow before Soviet counterattacks and winter weather halted the advance. In East Asia, Japan expanded its war with China and seized European colonial holdings. In December 1941 Japan attacked U.S. bases at Pearl Harbor and in the Philippines, and the U.S. declared war on Japan and all the Axis Powers. Japan quickly invaded and occupied most of Asia, Burma, the Netherlands East Indies, and many Pacific islands. After the crucial U.S. naval victory at the Battle of Midway (1942), U.S. forces began to advance up the chains of islands toward Japan. In the North Africa Campaigns, the British defeated Italian and German forces by 1943. The Allies then invaded Sicily and Italy, forcing the overthrow of the Fascist government in July 1943, though fighting against the Germans continued in Italy until 1945. In the Soviet Union, the Battle of Stalingrad (1943) marked the end of the German advance, and Soviet reinforcements in great numbers gradually pushed the German armies back. The massive Allied invasion of Western Europe began with the Normandy Campaign in western France (1944), and the Allies' steady advance ended in the occupation of Germany in 1945. After Soviet troops pushed German forces out of the Soviet Union, they advanced into Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Romania, and had occupied the eastern third of Germany by the time the surrender of Germany was signed on May 8, 1945. In the Pacific, an Allied invasion of the Philippines (1944) was followed by the successful Battle of Leyte Gulf and the costly Battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa (1945). The war in the Pacific ended quickly after atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. Japan's formal surrender on September 2 ended the war. Estimates of total military and civilian casualties varied from 35 million to 60 million killed, including about 6 million Jews who died in the Holocaust. Millions more civilians were wounded and made homeless throughout Europe and East Asia. See also Anti-Comintern Pact; Atlantic Charter; Battles of El Alamein, the Atlantic, the Bulge, Guadalcanal, and the Philippine Sea; Casablanca, Potsdam, Tehran, and Yalta conferences; Dunkirk Evacuation; lend-lease; Munich agreement; Nürnberg Trials; Siege of Leningrad; Sino-Japanese Wars; Omar Bradley, Winston Churchill, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Douglas MacArthur, Bernard Law Montgomery, Benito Mussolini, George Patton, Erwin Rommel, Franklin Roosevelt, Joseph Stalin, Yamamoto Isoroku, Georgy K. Zhukov.