World War II ended in 1945, and as you may already know, 2020 marks the 75th anniversary since the end of the war. 8th or 9th of May, depending on where you live, are in many European countries observed as an annual public holiday, to commemorate the Victory over Nazi Germany and to celebrate the liberation of the occupied European countries.

I am sure most of you know a lot about the second world war already, as it is such a major event in history, so for the purpose of this article not to get too long, let us jump straight into the end of the war. 

The VE and VJ Days - Victories in Europe and Japan

After initiating the war and having run a ‘Blitzkrieg’ through Europe for a few years, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi troops, suffered a big loss to the Soviet Union during the Battle of Stalingrad in early 1943. This was Hitler’s first major defeat, and would prove to be the beginning of Nazi Germany’s downfall. 

Almost a year and a half later, on 6 June 1944, the Western Allied forces conducted the Normandy Landings, also referred to as D-Day or Operation Neptune, where they successfully landed over 150 thousand British, Canadian and American soldiers on the beaches of Normandy, France, starting a massive invasion of Europe from the west. Hitler responded to the western attack with all his remaining forces, which allowed Soviet troops to advance towards Germany from the east. As Hitler then failed his quest to divide the Brits, French and Americans in the Battle of the Bulge, that battle became his last major offence during the war. He then descended to his bunker in Berlin where he stayed for over three months. In April 1945, he had to admit his defeat, and on 30 April, Hitler, together with his wife, committed suicide down in the bunker. 

Victory in Europe Day, or VE Day, officially marked the end of World War II in Europe with Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender to the Allied Forces. The day was celebrated on 8 May, 1945, in Western Europe, the United States and Australia, and on 9 May in the Soviet Union and New Zealand. VE Day was an important milestone for the Allies, consisting of Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States, but it did not end the world war. The attention then got directed towards Japan, which had still not surrendered. 

The United States was working on developing nuclear weapons, after already in 1940 being warned that the Nazis were doing the same. When the US in 1945 conducted its first successful test of an atomic bomb, the Nazis were already defeated, thus the nuclear bomb was never used in Europe during the war. However, the war continued around the Pacific, and as the US was warned that invading Japan would result in extreme American casualties, president Harry S. Truman ordered that the new atomic bomb was to be used to quickly force the Japanese to surrender. On 6 August that same year, an American bomber dropped the first atomic bomb over the Japanese city Hiroshima, immediately killing 80 thousand people, and only a few days later, on 9 August, a second bomb which killed almost 40 thousand was dropped over the city of Nagasaki. This caused the Imperial Japan to surrender on 15 August, and the surrender was formally signed on 2 September 1945, officially ending World War II. 

The aftermath

World War II had catastrophic consequences for majority of the world. Even though the military war had ended in 1945, it was not the end of hardship, and people’s lives had been turned upside down. The central European countries were completely destroyed and Japan suffered with the radioactive aftermath of the nuclear weapons. It is estimated that about 70 - 85 million people lost their lives during the great war, over 50 million of them civilians. 

The war was especially hard for the Jews, who suffered the loss of more than half of their people, just because of what they believed in. 6 million Jews were systematically murdered by the Nazis through mass shootings, gas chambers and work in concentration camps, in a genocide later known as the Holocaust. 

As a result of the world wanting peace, representatives from 51 countries met in San Francisco to sign the United Nations Declaration, a charter which on 24 October 1945 officially established the United Nations. Now, almost 75 years later, the UN is the world’s largest and most powerful intergovernmental organisation, and they are continuing to work towards their aim of “maintaining international peace and security”. 

You can click on the photos below to enlarge.

1 - Members of the Auxiliary Territorial Service driving through Trafalgar Square, London, 8 May 1945 (R. J. Salmon / Fox Photos / Getty Images)

2 - Crowds celebrating the end of Britain’s involvement in the war at Trafalgar Square, London, 8 May 1945 (Fred Morley / Fox Photos / Getty Images)

3 - People celebrating Germany’s unconditional surrender in New York, 8 May 1945 (Fox Photos / getty Images)