1940
The French submarine Doris is sunk by U-9 off the Dutch coast.
Age for conscription in Britain is raised to 36.
Hitler orders ‘Operation Yellow’, the great offensive in the West, to begin at 5:35 a.m.the next day.
1941
The Luftwaffe launches a massive night raid (507 bombers) against London which causes many fires and cripples the rail system in the city. Liverpool has its 7th consecutive night air raid. Belfast, Clydeside and Humberside also suffer in a heavy week of raids. The RAF attacks Bremen and Hamburg, but with little effect.
U-110 (Kptlt. Lemp) is forced to the surface by depth-charges of HMS Aubretia. A top-secret Enigma cipher machine is recovered before she sinks while being towed back to port.
A British Brigade sized column (Habforce), moves across the Iraqi border from Palastine.
A peace treaty is signed between Vichy France and Thailand, which cedes back portions of Indochina that had been lost by Thailand 40 years earlier.
1942
The turning point on Malta—62 RAF Spitfires are delivered by HMS Eagle and USS Wasp; the Luftwaffe will be diverted to other theaters.
Off North Carolina, US Coast Guard cutter Icarus sinks U-352, rescuing 33, the first German POWs taken by any US forces in WWII.
1943
The US II Corps breaks through to Tunisian east coast; all Axis troops north of Tunis surrender.
The Japanese begin 3-day massacre of 30,000 civilians in Changjiao, Hunan Province.
1944
Allied air forces begin a campaign of large scale raids against German airfields and rail communications in France in preparation for D-Day.
The Russians capture Sevastopol as Hitler finally changes his mind and orders evacuation of the city.
1945
The German garrison in the Channel Islands agree to surrender to British troops after five years of occupation. The surrender terms are signed aboard the destroyer HMS Bulldog, which is moored off St. Hellier.
The German garrisons at Lorient, St Nazaire and La Rochelle on the French Atlantic Coast finally surrender. Reich Marshal Goring and his wife, children and staff, surrender to Brigadier General Stack, of the U.S. 36th Division, near Salzburg. Field Marshal Kesselring, C-in-C West, is captured by U.S. troops at the village of Saalfelden, in western Austria.
A British naval squadron arrives in Copenhagen harbor to receive the surrender of the remains of German fleet.
Stalin announces the end of the war. German forces of Army Group Kurland surrender.
German forces in the Greek islands surrender.