World War II, or the Second World War,[1] was a global military conflict, the joining of what had initially been two separate conflicts. The first began in Asia in 1937 as the Second Sino-Japanese War; the other began in Europe in 1939 with the German invasion of Poland. This global conflict split the majority of the world's nations into opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis powers. It involved the mobilization of over 100 million military personnel, making it the most widespread war in history, and placed the participants in a state of "total war", erasing the distinction between civil and military resources. This resulted in the complete activation of a nation's economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities for the purposes of the war effort. Over 70 million people, the majority of them civilians, were killed, making it the deadliest conflict in human history.[2] The financial cost of the war is estimated at about a trillion 1944 U.S. dollars worldwide,[3][4] making it the most costly war in capital as well as lives.[5] The Allies were victorious, and, as a result, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as the world's leading superpowers. This set the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 45 years. The United Nations was formed in the hope of preventing another such conflict. The self determination spawned by the war accelerated decolonization movements in Asia and Africa, while Europe itself began moving toward integration.[6] In the aftermath of World War I, the defeated German Empire signed the Treaty of Versailles.[7] This caused Germany to lose 13% of its national territory and prohibited the annexation of Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Danzig, and mandated German armed forces number no more than 100,000 troops. Some of the Treaty's prohibitions were against conscription, manufacturing of weapons, and import and export of weapons; the Treaty also imposed massive reparations on Germany. Russia's Civil war led to the creation of the Soviet Union which soon was under the control of Joseph Stalin. In Italy, Benito Mussolini seized power as a fascist dictator promising to create a "New Roman Empire."[8] The ruling Kuomintang (KMT) party in China launched a unification campaign against rebelling warlords in the mid-1920s, but was soon embroiled in a civil war against its former Chinese communist allies. In 1931, an increasingly militaristic Japanese Empire, which had long sought influence in China[9] as the first step of its right to rule Asia, used the Mukden Incident as justification to invade Manchuria; the two nations then fought several small conflicts until the Tanggu Truce in 1933. National Socialist Adolf Hitler became the leader of Germany in January 1933. He began a massive rearming campaign.[10] This worried France and the United Kingdom, who had lost much in the previous war, as well as Italy, which saw its territorial ambitions threatened by those of Germany.[11] To secure its alliance, the French allowed Italy a free hand in Ethiopia, which Italy desired to conquer. The situation was aggravated in early 1935 when the Saarland was legally reunited with Germany and Hitler repudiated the Treaty of Versailles, speeding up remilitarization and introducing conscription. Hoping to contain Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Italy formed the Stresa Front. The Soviet Union, concerned due to Germany's goals of capturing vast areas of eastern Europe, concluded a treaty of mutual assistance with France. Before taking effect, the Franco-Soviet pact required to go through the League of Nations but was essentially toothless[12][13] and in June of 1935, the United Kingdom made an independent naval agreement with Germany easing prior restrictions. The United States, concerned with events in Europe and Asia, passed the Neutrality Act in August.[14] In October Italy invaded Ethiopia, with Germany the only major European nation supporting her invasion. Italy then revoked objections to Germany's goal of making Austria a satellite state.[15] In direct violation of the Versailles and Locarno treaties, Hitler remilitarized the Rhineland in March of 1936. He received little response from other European powers.[16] When the Spanish Civil War broke out in July, Hitler and Mussolini supported fascist General?simo Francisco Franco in his civil war against the Soviet-supported Spanish Republic. Both sides used the conflict to test new weapons and methods of warfare.[17] With tensions mounting, efforts to strengthen or consolidate power were made. In October, Germany and Italy formed the Rome-Berlin Axis and a month later Germany and Japan, each believing communism and the Soviet Union in particular to be a threat, signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, which Italy would join in the following year. In China, the Kuomintang and communist forces agreed on a ceasefire to present a united front to oppose Japan.

• published: 21 May 2008
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