Moscow, Soviet Union · March 5, 1940 In a proposal written on this date in 1940 to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin and other members of the Soviet Politburo, Lavrentiy Beria, who was the head of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), the Soviet secret police, advocated executing all members of the Polish Officer Corps who…
Berlin, Germany · March 3, 1945 Round-the-clock bombing operations against Germany began on March 3, 1944, with a U.S. 800‑plane daylight raid that dropped 2,000 tons of bombs on Berlin. On this date in 1945 American bombers mounted a daylight raid on Berlin that left 3,000 people dead and 100,000 homeless. Luftwaffe bombers retaliated, attacking Britain for the first…
Berlin, Germany · February 28, 1933 On this date in 1933, with the Reichstag (German parliament building) still smoldering following the fire set by 24-year-old Dutch Communist Marinus van der Lubbe the day before, German Chancellor Adolf Hitler persuaded 87-year-old President Paul von Hindenburg to sign the Reichstag Fire Edict. The emergency decree suspended key…
London, England · February 27, 1942 Under the cover of darkness on this date in 1942, over 100 British paratroopers kicked off Operation Biting when they parachuted into Nazi-occupied Normandy close to a German radar station in the tiny village of La Poterie-Cap-d’Antifer, 12 miles north of the large French harbor of Le Havre. A number of…
Berlin, Germany · February 25, 1941 The first flight of the German prototype Me 321 Gigant (“Giant”) took place on this date in 1941. The previous October German aircraft maker Messerschmitt had been given just 14 days to submit a proposal for a large-capacity troop- and cargo-carrying glider. The prototype glider’s maiden flight encouraged Messerschmitt to enlarge…
SHAEF HQ, Reims, France · February 21, 1945 On this date in 1945 U.S. fighter-bombers attacked the Berghof, Adolf Hitler’s Alpine retreat on the Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden on the Bavarian-Austrian border. The Berghof served as an outpost of Hitler’s Berlin chancellery, making it an obvious target. Further north, in a less symbolic move, more than…
Anzio, Italy · February 16, 1944 On this date in 1944, a day after the historic Benedictine abbey at Monte Cassino was bombed by Allied aircraft, the Germans launched their long-delayed counterattack on the Allied-held beachhead at Anzio, 35 miles south of the Italian capital, Rome. Just the month before, on January 22, American and British units…
Cassino, Italy · February 15, 1944 On this date in 1944 Gen. Harold Alexander, commander-in-chief of all Allied forces in the Mediterranean Theater, ordered the aerial bombing of the historic Benedictine abbey towering over the town of Cassino on the banks of the Rapido (Gari) River in Italy. Earlier in January British, American, and French troops…
Budapest, Hungary · February 14, 1945 On December 29, 1944, Soviet and Romanian troops (Romania was now a Soviet ally) began laying siege to Budapest, the capital of Adolf Hitler’s vassal state of Hungary. Budapest, split in two by the River Danube, was a city of over 800,000 resi¬dents and refugees, including well over 100,000…
Dresden, Germany · February 13, 1945 On this night in 1945, Shrove (or Fat) Tuesday, and over the next day, Ash Wednesday, some 1,300 British and American bombers appeared over largely untouched Dresden in eastern Germany. A city of 642,000 (1939) swelled by 300,000 refugees fleeing from fighting on the Eastern Front, Dresden was the ancient capital…