1.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
2.
Saaremaa
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Saaremaa is the largest island in Estonia, measuring 2,673 km2. The main island of Saare County, it is located in the Baltic Sea, south of Hiiumaa island, the capital of the island is Kuressaare, which has about 15,000 inhabitants, the whole island has over 30,966 inhabitants. The island is called Saaremaa in Estonian, and in Finnish Saarenmaa — literally isle land or island land. In old Scandinavian sagas, Saaremaa is called Eysysla and in the Icelandic Sagas Eysýsla, which exactly the same as the name of the island in Estonian. This is the origin of the name in Danish Øsel, German and Swedish, Ösel, Gutnish Oysl. The name Eysysla appears sometimes together with Adalsysla, the big land, perhaps Suuremaa or Suur Maa in Estonian, in Latvian, the island is called Sāmsala, which means the island of Saami. According to archaeological finds, the territory of Saaremaa has been inhabited from at least 5,000 years BCE, pre-Viking age Salme ships burial have been found in Sõrve Peninsula. Sagas talk about numerous skirmishes between islanders and Vikings, Saaremaa was the wealthiest county of ancient Estonia and the home of notorious Estonian pirates, sometimes called the Eastern Vikings. The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia describes a fleet of sixteen ships, in 1206, King Valdemar II of Denmark built a fortress on the island but found no volunteers to man it. The Danes burned it themselves and left, probably around 1000, Gunnar Hámundarson from Iceland took part in a Viking raid at Eysýsla. There he obtained his famous atgeir, by taking it from a man named Hallgrímur, njáls saga tells the following, Thence they held on south to Denmark and thence east to Smálönd and had victory wherever they went. They did not come back in autumn, the next summer they held on to Rafala and fell in there with sea-rovers, and fought at once, and won the fight. After that they steered east to Eysýsla and lay there somewhile under a ness, there they saw a man coming down from the ness above them, Gunnar went on shore to meet the man, and they had a talk. Gunnar asked him his name, and he said it was Tófi, Gunnar asked again what he wanted. Thee I want to see, says the man, two warships lie on the other side under the ness, and I will tell thee who command them, two brothers are the captains — ones name is Hallgrímur, and the others Kolskeggur. I know them to be mighty men of war, and I know too that they have good weapons that the like are not to be had. Hallgrímur has an atgeir which he had made by seething-spells, and this is what the spells say, in 1227, Saaremaa was conquered by the Livonian Brothers of the Sword during the Livonian Crusade but remained a hotbed of Estonian resistance. The crusaders founded the Bishopric of Ösel-Wiek there, when the Order was defeated by the Lithuanian army in the Battle of Saule in 1236, the Saaremaa islanders rebelled
3.
Hiiumaa
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Hiiumaa is the second largest island in Estonia. It is in the Baltic Sea, north of the island of Saaremaa, the Hiiu Shoal is located located off the northwestern shore of Hiiumaa Island. Hiiumaa is the island of Hiiu County, called Hiiumaa or Hiiu maakond in Estonian. The Swedish and German name of the island is Dagö, Dagø in Danish — a calque of its old Finnish name Päivänsalo, in modern Finnish, it is called Hiidenmaa, literally Hiisis Land. In Old Gutnish, it was Dagaiþ, from which the local North Germanic name Daë is derived, archaeological evidence of the first human settlement in Hiiumaa dates to the 4th century BC. The first documented record of the island of Dageida was made by contemporary chroniclers in 1228, when Hiiumaa, in 1254, Hiiumaa was divided between the Bishopric of Ösel-Wiek and the Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order, acting partly on behalf of the Hanseatic League. Most of the islands previously numerous Swedish-speaking population emigrated or were Estonianised during the period of Imperial Russian rule, Estonian Swedes are also known as aibofolke or rannarootslased. Hiiumaa was occupied during World War I by the Imperial German Army, after the war, it became a part of independent Estonia. The waters near Hiiumaa were active during World War II,23 June 1941- The Soviet destroyer Gnevny was sunk by a German seamine,25 June- the Soviet minesweeper T-208 Shkiv was destroyed by a German seamine. 27 June- Two German motor torpedo boats, S43 and S106, were destroyed by Soviet seamines,1 July- the Soviet submarine M-81 was destroyed by a German seamine north of Hiiumaa. 7 July- the Soviet minesweeper T-216 was sunk,30 July- the Soviet minesweeper T-201 Zarjad was sunk. 10 August- the German submarine U-144 was sunk by a torpedo from the Soviet submarine SC-307, Hiiumaa Island was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, by Nazi Germany in 1941, and by the Soviets again in 1944. It was part of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic until the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, during the Soviet era, Hiiumaa was declared a restricted zone, closed to foreigners and to most mainland Estonians. Since 1991, the island has been a part of independent Estonia, Hiiumaa is an island in Estonia located north of Saaremaa in the Baltic Sea. It is the northernmost island in the Muhu archipelago, which includes Saaremaa, the Soela Strait separates Hiumaa from Saaremaa to its south, and the Muhu Strait separates it from the mainland of Estonia. Road transport from Estonian mainland to Hiiumaa involves a 90-minute ferry crossing from Rohuküla to Heltermaa, there are about 10 ferry departures a day. In the summer weekends, getting car space on the ferry usually requires advance booking, there are about 2 scheduled buses a day between Tallinn and Kärdla. In the winter, the island can be reached, conditions permitting, Hiiumaa is served by Kärdla Airport, with regular flights to Tallinn
4.
Muhu
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Muhu, is an island in the Baltic Sea. With an area of 198 km2 it is the third largest island belonging to Estonia, together with neighbouring smaller islands of Kesselaid, Viirelaid, Võilaid and Suurlaid it forms Muhu Parish, the rural municipality within Saare County. The municipality has a population of 1,697 and covers an area of 206.12 km2, the most important villages in Muhu are Kuivastu, Liiva and Koguva. In Pädaste, an internationally renowned luxury hotel and spa operates in the manor house. The island is divided from mainland Estonia by the Suur Strait and it is linked by ferry to Virtsu in the mainland, and to Saaremaa by a causeway, the Väinatamm. In winter an ice road connects the island to the mainland, the Estonians surrendered on Muhu at a circular stronghold called Mona, the earthworks of which are still preserved near the causeway between the islands. The Battle of Karuse or Battle on the Ice was fought on 16 February 1270 between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Livonian Order on the frozen Baltic Sea between the Muhu Island and the mainland, the Lithuanians achieved a decisive victory. The battle, named after the Karuse village, was the fifth-largest defeat of the Livonian or Teutonic Orders in the 13th century, the same waters saw the Battle of Moon Sound in September–October 1917 between Russian and German naval forces. Muhu is also famous for having the only still-working traditional windmills in Estonia, Muhu is the home of Estonias first wine tourism farm – Luscher & Matiesen Muhu Winehouse
5.
Estonia
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Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia, across the Baltic Sea lies Sweden in the west and Finland in the north. The territory of Estonia consists of a mainland and 2,222 islands and islets in the Baltic Sea, covering 45,339 km2 of land and water, and is influenced by a humid continental climate. The territory of Estonia has been inhabited since at least 6500 BC, in 1988, during the Singing Revolution, the Estonian Supreme Soviet issued the Estonian Sovereignty Declaration in defiance of Soviet rule, and independence was restored on 20 August 1991. Estonia is a parliamentary republic divided into fifteen counties. Its capital and largest city is Tallinn, with a population of 1.3 million, it is one of the least-populous member states of the European Union, Eurozone, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, OECD and Schengen Area. Estonia is a country with an advanced, high-income economy that is among the fastest growing in the EU. Its Human Development Index ranks very highly, and it performs favourably in measurements of economic freedom, civil liberties, the 2015 PISA test places Estonian high school students 3rd in the world, behind Singapore and Japan. Citizens of Estonia are provided with health care, free education. Since independence the country has developed its IT sector, becoming one of the worlds most digitally advanced societies. In 2005 Estonia became the first nation to hold elections over the Internet, in the Estonian language, the oldest known endonym of the Estonians was maarahvas, meaning country people or people of the land. The land inhabited by Estonians was called Maavald meaning Country Parish or Land Parish, one hypothesis regarding the modern name of Estonia is that it originated from the Aesti, a people described by the Roman historian Tacitus in his Germania. The historic Aesti were allegedly Baltic people, whereas the modern Estonians are Finno-Ugric, the geographical areas between Aesti and Estonia do not match, with Aesti being further down south. Ancient Scandinavian sagas refer to a land called Eistland, as the country is called in Icelandic. Early Latin and other ancient versions of the name are Estia and Hestia, esthonia was a common alternative English spelling prior to 1921. Human settlement in Estonia became possible 13,000 to 11,000 years ago, the oldest known settlement in Estonia is the Pulli settlement, which was on the banks of the river Pärnu, near the town of Sindi, in south-western Estonia. According to radiocarbon dating it was settled around 11,000 years ago, the earliest human inhabitation during the Mesolithic period is connected to Kunda culture, which is named after the town of Kunda in northern Estonia. At that time the country was covered with forests, and people lived in communities near bodies of water
6.
Nazi Germany
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Nazi Germany is the common English name for the period in German history from 1933 to 1945, when Germany was governed by a dictatorship under the control of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Under Hitlers rule, Germany was transformed into a fascist state in which the Nazi Party took totalitarian control over all aspects of life. The official name of the state was Deutsches Reich from 1933 to 1943, the period is also known under the names the Third Reich and the National Socialist Period. The Nazi regime came to an end after the Allied Powers defeated Germany in May 1945, Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany by the President of the Weimar Republic Paul von Hindenburg on 30 January 1933. The Nazi Party then began to eliminate all opposition and consolidate its power. Hindenburg died on 2 August 1934, and Hitler became dictator of Germany by merging the powers and offices of the Chancellery, a national referendum held 19 August 1934 confirmed Hitler as sole Führer of Germany. All power was centralised in Hitlers person, and his word became above all laws, the government was not a coordinated, co-operating body, but a collection of factions struggling for power and Hitlers favour. In the midst of the Great Depression, the Nazis restored economic stability and ended mass unemployment using heavy military spending, extensive public works were undertaken, including the construction of Autobahnen. The return to economic stability boosted the regimes popularity, racism, especially antisemitism, was a central feature of the regime. The Germanic peoples were considered by the Nazis to be the purest branch of the Aryan race, millions of Jews and other peoples deemed undesirable by the state were murdered in the Holocaust. Opposition to Hitlers rule was ruthlessly suppressed, members of the liberal, socialist, and communist opposition were killed, imprisoned, or exiled. The Christian churches were also oppressed, with many leaders imprisoned, education focused on racial biology, population policy, and fitness for military service. Career and educational opportunities for women were curtailed, recreation and tourism were organised via the Strength Through Joy program, and the 1936 Summer Olympics showcased the Third Reich on the international stage. Propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels made effective use of film, mass rallies, the government controlled artistic expression, promoting specific art forms and banning or discouraging others. Beginning in the late 1930s, Nazi Germany made increasingly aggressive territorial demands and it seized Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938 and 1939. Hitler made a pact with Joseph Stalin and invaded Poland in September 1939. In alliance with Italy and smaller Axis powers, Germany conquered most of Europe by 1940, reichskommissariats took control of conquered areas, and a German administration was established in what was left of Poland. Jews and others deemed undesirable were imprisoned, murdered in Nazi concentration camps and extermination camps, following the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the tide gradually turned against the Nazis, who suffered major military defeats in 1943
7.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states
8.
Nikolay Kuznetsov (officer)
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Nikolay Gerasimovich Kuznetsov was a Soviet naval officer who achieved the rank of Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union and served as Peoples Commissar of the Navy during The Second World War. The Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov is named in his honor, nikolay Gerasimovich Kuznetsov was born into a peasant family of Serbian descent in the village of Medvedki in the Kotlassky District of Arkhangelsk Oblast. In 1919, Kuznetsov joined the Northern Dvina Naval Flotilla, after adding two years to his age in order to be eligible to serve. In 1920 he was stationed at Petrograd and in 1924, as a member of a naval unit and that same year he joined the Bolshevik Party. Upon graduation from the Frunze Higher Naval School in 1926, Kuznetsov served on the cruiser Chervona Ukraina, first as watch officer, in 1932 he graduated from the Naval College after studying operational tactics. Upon graduation he was offered one of two options – a desk job with the staff or a command post on a ship. Kuznetsov successfully applied for the post of officer on the cruiser Krasnyi Kavkaz. Within a year the young officer earned his next promotion, in 1934 he returned to the Chervona Ukraina, this time as her commander. Under Kuznetsov, the became an outstanding example of discipline and organization. From September 5,1936 to August 15,1937, Kuznetsov was the naval attaché, serving during the early stages of the Spanish Civil War, he developed a strong dislike of fascism. On returning home, on January 10,1938, he was promoted to the rank of officer, 2nd rank. While in this position, he came face to face with Stalins purge of the military, Kuznetsov himself was never implicated, but many of the officers under his command were. Kuznetsov resisted the purges at every step, and his intervention saved the lives of many Soviet officers. On April 28,1939, Kuznetsov, still only thirty-four, was appointed the Peoples Commissar of the Navy, in 1941, he ordered the creation near Leningrad of a special forces company RON, the first Soviet underwater special force. Kuznetsov played a role during the first hours of the war – at this pivotal moment, his resolve. By June 21,1941, Kuznetzov was convinced of the inevitability of war with Nazi Germany, on the same day Semyon Timoshenko and Georgy Zhukov issued a directive prohibiting Soviet commanders from responding to German provocations. The Navy, however, constituted a distinct ministry, and thus Kuznetsov held a position which was technically outside the chain of command. He utilized this fact in a bold move
9.
Operation Barbarossa
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Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Nazi Germanys invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II, which was launched on Sunday 22 June 1941. In the two leading up to the invasion, the two countries signed political and economic pacts for strategic purposes. Nevertheless, the German High Command began planning an invasion of the Soviet Union in July 1940, over the course of the operation, about four million Axis personnel invaded the western Soviet Union along a 2, 900-kilometer front, the largest invasion force in the history of warfare. In addition to troops, the Wehrmacht employed some 600,000 motor vehicles, the offensive marked an escalation of the war, both geographically and in the formation of the Allied coalition. Despite their successes, the German offensive stalled in the Battle of Moscow and was pushed back by the Soviet winter counteroffensive. The Red Army repelled the Wehrmachts strongest blows and forced the unprepared Germans into a war of attrition, the Wehrmacht would never again mount a simultaneous offensive along the entire strategic Soviet–Axis front. The failure of the operation drove Hitler to demand further operations of limited scope inside the Soviet Union, such as Case Blue. The failure of Operation Barbarossa proved a point in the fortunes of the Third Reich. Most importantly, the operation opened up the Eastern Front, in more forces were committed than in any other theater of war in world history. The German armies captured 5,000,000 Soviet prisoners of war who were not granted protections stipulated in the Geneva Conventions, a majority of them never returned alive. The Nazis deliberately starved 3.1 million of the prisoners to death as part of a Hunger Plan that aimed to reduce the population of Eastern Europe, over a million Soviet Jews were murdered by Einsatzgruppen death squads and gassing as part of the Holocaust. On 10 February 1939, Hitler told his commanders that the next war would be purely a war of Weltanschauungen. Totally a peoples war, a racial war, on 23 November, once World War II had already started, Hitler declared that racial war has broken out and this war shall determine who shall govern Europe, and with it, the world. The racial policy of Nazi Germany viewed the Soviet Union as populated by non-Aryan Untermenschen, Hitler claimed in Mein Kampf that Germanys destiny was to turn to the East as it did six hundred years ago. Accordingly, it was stated Nazi policy to kill, deport, or enslave the majority of Russian and other Slavic populations and repopulate the land with Germanic peoples, under the Generalplan Ost. Likening the Soviets to the forces of Genghis Khan, Hitler told Croatian military leader Slavko Kvaternik that the Mongolian race threatened Europe. Following the invasion, Wehrmacht officers told their soldiers to target people who were described as Jewish Bolshevik subhumans, the Mongol hordes, the Asiatic flood, German army commanders cast the Jews as the major cause behind the partisan struggle. The main guideline policy for German troops was Where theres a partisan, theres a Jew, many German troops viewed the war in Nazi terms and regarded their Soviet enemies as sub-human
Nazi Germany
Soviet Union
