THE Second World War it was the biggest conflict in the history of humanity in terms of intensity, financial and human resources mobilized and the number of victims. Over the six years of conflict, the violence spread across different continents, resulting in the death of approximately 70 million people.
Major highlights of the Second World War years were the construction of concentration camps by Nazi Germany, especially in Poland, which had the objective of enslaving and exterminating Jews, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, homosexuals, etc. Also, during World War II, they were used for the first time atomic weapons, launched by the US against the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Mind Map - World War II
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Regarding World War II, we have separated some little-explored facts and curiosities:
During World War II, they were created in the United States ten concentration camps in different parts of the country to house the population of Japanese Americans
. The construction of these concentration camps was the result of the war hysteria that strengthened the xenophobia against citizens of Japanese descent.Xenophobia against Japanese-American citizens was something that had existed in the United States at least since the beginning of the 20th century, and it became stronger after the United States was attacked by Japan in pearl harbor, in the year 1941. Altogether, more than one hundred thousand people were relocated in these concentration camps and found terrible living conditions in these places. The last concentration camp in the United States was deactivated in 1946.
During World War II, Japan, driven by its xenophobic nationalism and its radical militarism, committed a series of war crimes. One of the places where several people were victims of the brutality committed by the Japanese army was the premises of the Unit 731. This unit was created with the name of “Kwangtung Army Epidemic Protection and Water Supply Unit” and its primary function was to control the quality of the water used by the Japanese army based in China.
However, secretly, Unit 731 was used by the Japanese army to promote a series of macabre studies in live human guinea pigs and promote studies for the development of chemical and biological weapons. Thus, as stated by historian Max Hastings:
Thousands of captured Chinese were murdered in tests carried out at the unit's base near Harbin, many undergoing vivisection without the benefit of anesthetics. Some victims were tied to stakes so that anthrax bombs could be detonated around them. Women were infected with syphilis in the laboratory; civilians in the region were kidnapped and injected with deadly viruses1.
Those involved in the Unit 731 experiments were not punished as war criminals as part of a deal between the US and doctors.
3. Quisling traitor
In April 1940, the Nazis ended months of doldrums and began the invasion of norway. The invasion of Norway had been authorized after a double postponement of the operation that would lead to the invasion of Holland, Belgium and France. Thus, Norway emerged as an alternative for the Nazis to have control over a strategic air support position that would guarantee them access to Swedish iron production.
The invasion of Norway by the Nazis came after Hitler was convinced by the Admiral Erich Raeder and by the pro-Nazi Norwegian Vidkun Quisling. When the Nazis invaded Norway, Quisling became head of the collaborationist government for a brief time and Quisling's role in convincing Hitler to invade his country. country itself has made its surname “Quisling” become a noun in the English language to refer to people who are traitors or who turn against their own parents.
One of the saddest episodes of the entire Second World War was the burnt offering, responsible for the deaths of 6 million people, mostly of Jewish origin. Throughout the war, the Nazis created different mechanisms and ways to find and exterminate Jews, especially in Eastern Europe. At first, the Nazis used the Einsatzgruppen, death squads responsible for locating and executing all Jews in the areas they operated.
A particular event related to the performance of the Einsatzgruppen it happened in the city of Kiev, at the time belonging to the Soviet Union (now Ukraine). Shortly after the conquest of the city, a building occupied by the Nazis was bombed, which infuriated the Nazis. In retaliation, the local Nazi command authorized the execution of all Jews still living in Kiev.
Reports say that the Nazis gathered a crowd of Jews in one part of the city and started a shooting that, for 36 hours, was responsible for the death of more than 33,000people. This event known as "Babi Yar Massacre” was one of the biggest massacres that took place during the war, and reports say that the place where the bodies were buried has drained blood for months.
5. gigantic cannons
During the years of conflict, the Nazi war machine worked doggedly to develop more effective weapons to use in warfare. The megalomania and ingenuity of the Nazis led them to build the largest cannons that were used during World War II.
The cannons were named after SchwererGustav and Dora, and its construction was a request from the Nazi command for the Krupp – armaments industry – build a weapon capable of destroying the French fortifications of the Linemaginot. Krupp's efforts led to the construction of these two cannons, which, in the words of one Nazi general, were an “extremely impressive but absolutely useless piece of engineering”2.
The Schwerer Gustav was particularly used during the siege to Sevastopol, a Soviet city located in the Crimean region in a combat that resulted in the death of 25,000 Germans and the use of 50,000 tons of artillery ammunition3.
Schwerer Gustav's attributions were:
Weight: 1350 tons
Greeting: approximately 47 meters
Crew: 4,000 men responsible for assembling the rails and handling the cannon
Caliber: 800mm
WeightFromprojectiles: 7 tons
reachofshot: 39 km to 47 km away
CadenceFromshots: 1 shot every 45 minutes, with a maximum of 14 shots per day.
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1HASTINGS, Max. Hell: the world at war 1939-1945. Rio de Janeiro: Intrinsic, 2012 p. 448.
2Idem, p. 319.
3Idem, p. 320.
By Daniel Neves
Graduated in History
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/historiag/cinco-fatos-sobre-segunda-guerra-mundial.htm