After reading 2 sections of the book One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich we get a clear image of how life in a camp would be. So, I decided to research a little bit more of what was going on outside the camp’s walls in the war two. To start with the research I watched a Brazilian’s documentary about the World War 2 so I could have a basic knowledge. After that I did a basic research and I found some facts about the World War 2.
The war was between the years 1939-1945. To this day it remains the most geographical military conflict the world has ever seen. The war began with Germany invading Poland on September 1, 1939. This war was a world conflict between two coalitions, the Axis Power and the Allies. The Axis included Germany, Italy, Japan and their satellites. The Allies included US, UK, USSR, China and their allies.
Although the fighting reach all around the world, many countries shared a union effort aimed at ending the aggression Axis Power. The rise of the Nazi Germany and it’s violence was mostly formed by World War 1. Because of the World War 1, Germany had serious economic issues so they put Hitler on their commend and he said it was better to hunt Jews down because they were the ones that held almost of the money in the country. The problem was that all of them were spreading to Poland so Hitler wanted to take over Poland. Hitler’s party had more that 100,000 and it was growing fast. When Germany attacked Poland, UK and France went against Germany. Japan though, was also in the great depression and Japan relied heavily in important resources and desperately needed more land for it’s expansion for it’s population. They occupied Chinese territory. By 1937 China and Japan were officially in war.
In 1940, Japan signed a formal alliance with Germany and Italy, to enter World War 2. US disapproved of Japan’s decision restricted trading. The action Japan chose was a surprise attack in the US in Hawaii, on December 7, 1941. So, US decided to join World War 2. In 1941 Germany started invading deeply Russia and started invading USSR.
The Axis stopped the war when Japan lost a battle of Midway, near Hawaii, and Germany was defeated in North Africa. The war in Europe ended with an invasion of Germany by the Western Allies. After that United States dropped atomic bomb in Japan cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9. War ended in Asia declaring Allies victory over Axis in 1945. 
This image represents the % of deaths on the overall deaths that the World War 2 caused with not only the civilians but also the military.
This image is really significant not because it shows how the military lines up but it shows that even in cold whether or in snow they had to fight for their countries and leave all their family behind I think that is why this image is so impacting because it symbolizes the military never looking back at their family but looking forward for a bloody war.
I really like how you filled the gap of what was happening in the background of the story. This seems very contradicting to all the stories that i heard about ,i usually heard just that hitler wanted to end inequality. this also makes me wonder how did this look like from a first person perspective. and wonder how deep or torturous it would be to someone in this situation.
ReplyDeleteHey, Caroline, I enjoyed how much you researched on World War 2. The only thing is that I would have liked to hear a bit more about Russia. I researched myself, and I noticed that Russia was allied with Germany until they turned on Russia. Did you also know that Japan had advised the US 1 hour before the attack. The US never officially received the message because a general in Pearl Harbor did not send the message to higher authorities.
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DeleteHi Nico,
Thank you for commenting on my post. I checked the website that on Russia in World War 2 and I checked out found a book in my house that had a lot of information on World War 2 and I found a lot of information so I combined them:
On 22 June 1941, Germany attacked her ally, Russia. The news that Hitler invaded Russia, certainly made the world hold it’s breath, but it came as a tonic to the other enemies. In Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939, Hitler was apparently planning even when the Battle of Britain was at its height. He believed that the Russians were sub-human (the 'untermenschen' ) and that they had no right to live where they did so he wanted to take up their territory to give Germany more area to fill. Hitler wanted all the land in Eastern Europe to be given to Germans. Also, many Jews lived in Russia (known at the time as USSR).
In August 1939, Hitler and Russia had signed a treaty of non-aggression which was meant to last for 10 years. However both countries just wanted more time to shape their armies before one attacked the other. In June 1941 Operation Barbarossa took place - a massive attack by the Germans on Russia.
The German attack on Russia involved:
3 million soldiers,
3580 tanks,
7184 artillery guns,
1830 planes
750,000 horses
Their is more information about Russia but these is a little summery that I did to reinforce our understanding in the World War 2 (outside world of the book One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich).
Here is the link if you want to read more
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Pearl_Harbor