Allied_Powers_(World_War_II)

World Map with the participants in World War II.
The Allies depicted in green (those in light green entered after the attack on Pearl Harbor), the Axis Powers in orange, and neutral countries in grey.
The Allied Powers were a group of countries (also known as the Allies of World War II) that consisted of those nations opposed to the Axis Powers during the Second World War. Initially, as war broke out in Europe, Adolf Hitler's Germany, with its expansionist ideology, was opposed by Great Britain, her dominions and colonies, and by France. When France fell, Britain and her overseas possessions and former colonies were more or less alone in opposition to Hitler until the Soviet Union and the United States entered the war.
The Second World War's opposing alliances pitted strong democracies against totalitarian regimes. The conflict and the two sets of alliances can be seen as representing a struggle between freedom and tyranny, although there was some movement between the two alliances. For example, Italy, Hungary, and Romania were among those nations that switched from Axis to the Allied Powers towards the end of the war. This was less because they wanted to side with the victors than because they had been initially coerced into joining the Axis Powers. Members of the Provisional Government for Free India joined the Axis, fighting with Japanese forces more to express its opposition to Britain's colonial rule than because it saw Japan as a natural ally.

Contents

1 History

1.1 Key alliances are formed


2 Dates on which states joined the Allies

2.1 Following the German invasion of Poland
2.2 After the end of the Phony War
2.3 After the attack on Pearl Harbor
2.4 After D-Day


3 Formal alliances during the war

3.1 Original allies
3.2 The Commonwealth
3.3 The Oslo Group
3.4 Portugal
3.5 Atlantic Charter
3.6 Comintern
3.7 Declaration by United Nations
3.8 Tripartite Treaty of Alliance, January 29, 1942


4 Notes
5 References
6 External links
7 Credits



The Allies, who won, were also the architects of the United Nations, an international, inter-governmental organization whose goal is to resolve conflicts peacefully and to establish a world of peace, freedom, and justice for all. They signed the Declaration by the United Nations on January 1, 1941, stating that a complete victory against their adversaries was necessary if "life, liberty, independence and religious freedom" were to be defended, human rights and justice preserved in "their own lands as well as in other lands, and that they [were] engaged in a common struggle against savage and brutal forces seeking to subjugate the world." Almost all the founding members of the UN had been anti-Axis during the war. Many of the Allies of World War II were also co-founders of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949.

 "The Big 3": Josef Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill meeting at Tehran in 1943.
History
By the time World War II began, the Republic of China had been fighting the Empire of Japan since 1937.
During the 1920s, the Kuomintang government was aided by the Soviet Union, which helped to reorganize the party along the Leninist model of the unification of party, state, and army. However, following the unification of China, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek purged leftists from his party and refused to ally with the Communist Party of China to fight against the Japanese, and instead opted to fight both at once. This remained the case even after the Mukden Incident and the puppet regime of Manchuria set up by Japanese troops in 1931. Chiang's anti-communist campaigns continued while he fought small, incessant conflicts against Japan throughout the 1930s. This period saw China lose territories piece by piece to Japan.
Beginning in early 1930s, Germany and China became close partners in areas of military and industrial exchange. Nazi Germany provided the largest proportion of Chinese arms imports and technical expertise. Following the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of July 7, 1937, China and Japan became embroiled in a full-scale war that continued until 1945. Initially, Germany denounced Japanese war crimes in China, such as the Nanking Massacre of 1937. However Germany also recognized that Japan was more capable of fighting the Soviet Union, and soon broke off the cooperation with China in May 1938. The Soviet Union, wishing to keep China in the fight against Japan, supplied China with some military assistance until 1941, after which it made peace with Japan to prepare for the war against Germany.
Even though China had been fighting the longest among all the Allied Powers, it only officially joined the Allies after the attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941. Chiang Kai-shek felt Allied victory was assured with the entrance of the United States into the war and he declared war on Germany and the other Axis nations. However, Allied aid remained low as the Burma Road was closed and the Allies suffered a series of military defeats against Japan early on in the campaign. The bulk of military aid would not arrive until the spring of 1945 when more than 1.5 million Japanese troops were trapped in the Chinese Theater; troops that otherwise could have been deployed elsewhere had China collapsed and made a separate peace with Japan.

Key alliances are formed
On September 1, 1939, the German invasion of Poland started World War II. Britain, France, Australia, and New Zealand all declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939. Nepal, Newfoundland, Tonga, South Africa, and Canada followed suit within days. On September 17, 1939, the Soviets invaded Poland from the East. The following year, the U.S.S.R. annexed the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) together with parts of Romania, and attacked Finland. The German-Soviet agreement was brought to an end by the German invasion of the U.S.S.R. on June 22, 1941.
The United States joined the Allies following the attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941. The Declaration by United Nations, on January 1, 1942, officially united 26 nations as Allies and formed the basis for the United Nations. The informal Big 3 alliance of the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States emerged in the latter half of the war, and their decisions determined Allied strategy around the world.

Dates on which states joined the Allies
Following the German invasion of Poland
Poland: September 1, 1939
United Kingdom: September 3, 1939
France: September 3, 1939
Australia: September 3, 1939
New Zealand: September 3, 1939
Nepal: September 4, 1939
Newfoundland: September 4, 1939
Tonga: September 4, 1939
South Africa: September 6, 1939
Canada: September 10, 1939
After the end of the Phony War
Denmark: April 9, 1940
Norway: April 9, 1940
Belgium: May 10, 1940
Luxembourg: May 10, 1940
Netherlands: May 10, 1940
Malta: June 10, 1940
Free France: June 18, 1940
Greece: October 28, 1940
Kingdom of Yugoslavia: April 6, 1941
Soviet Union: June 22, 1941
Tannu Tuva: June 25, 1941
After the attack on Pearl Harbor
Panama: December 7, 1941
Philippines: December 7, 1941
Costa Rica: December 8, 1941
Dominican Republic: December 8, 1941
El Salvador: December 8, 1941
Haiti: December 8, 1941
Honduras: December 8, 1941
Nicaragua: December 8, 1941
United States: December 8, 1941
Republic of China: December 9, 1941
Guatemala: December 9, 1941
Cuba: December 9, 1941
Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea (government in exile): December 9, 1941
Czechoslovakia (government in exile): December 16, 1941
Mexico: May 22, 1942
Brazil: August 22, 1942
Ethiopia: December 14, 1942
Iraq: January 17, 1943
Bolivia: April 7, 1943
Iran: September 9, 1943
Italy: October 13, 1943 (formerly a member of the Axis)
Colombia: November 26, 1943
Liberia: January 27, 1944
After D-Day
Romania: August 25, 1944, (formerly a member of the Axis)
Bulgaria: September 8, 1944, (formerly a member of the Axis)
San Marino: September 21, 1944
Albania: October 26, 1944
Hungary: January 20, 1945, (formerly a member of the Axis)
Bahawalpur: February 2, 1945
Ecuador: February 2, 1945
Paraguay: February 7, 1945
Peru: February 12, 1945
Uruguay: February 15, 1945
Venezuela: February 15, 1945
Turkey: February 23, 1945
Lebanon: February 27, 1945
Saudi Arabia: March 1945
Argentina: March 27, 1945
Chile: April 11, 1945
People's Republic of Mongolia: August 9, 1945
Formal alliances during the war
Original allies
French Republic
Republic of Poland
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
These countries were allied to each other by a net of common defense pacts and military alliance pacts signed before the war. The Franco-British Alliance dated back to the Entente Cordiale of 1904 and the Triple Entente of 1907, active during World War I. The Franco-Polish Alliance was signed in 1921, amended in 1927 and again in 1939. The original allies were those states that declared war on Nazi Germany following the German invasion of Poland in September 1939.
The Polish government in exile after 1939 continued the Polish contribution to World War II on several fronts with hundreds of thousands of members of the Polish Army in France and the United Kingdom, as well as the Home Army in occupied Poland. The Soviet Union however, did not recognize the government and in 1943 organized the Polish People's Army under Rokossovsky, around which eventually it constructed the post-war successor state.
British, Dutch, and French colonies fought alongside their metropolitan countries, and many continued their contribution also when the mother countries were occupied.

The Commonwealth
In addition to the United Kingdom, several independent members of the Commonwealth of Nations, known as the Dominions, declared war on Germany separately, either on the same day, or soon afterwards.

The Oslo Group
The Oslo Group was an organization of officially neutral countries. Four members later joined the Allies, as governments in exile: the Kingdom of Norway, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Kingdom of Belgium, and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg.
The Republic of Finland was invaded by the U.S.S.R. on November 30, 1939.[1] Later, Finland and the Kingdom of Denmark officially joined the Axis Anti-Comintern Pact. The Kingdom of Sweden remained officially neutral.
Iceland and Greenland, respectively in union with Denmark and a Danish colony, were occupied by the Allies for most of the war. British forces took control of Iceland in 1940, and it was used to facilitate the movement of Lend Lease equipment. Forces from the United States, although they were officially neutral at the time, occupied Greenland on April 9, 1941. The United States also took over in Iceland on July 7, 1941. Iceland declared full independence from Denmark in 1944, but never declared war on any of the Axis powers.

Portugal
Although Portugal remained officially neutral, the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance was invoked in World War II leading to the establishment of an Allied base in the Azores. Portugal protested the occupation of Portuguese Timor by Allied forces in 1942, but did not actively resist. The colony was subsequently occupied by Japan; Timorese and Portuguese civilians assisted Allied commandos in resisting the Japanese. (See Battle of Timor.) Macao was also occupied by Japan.

Atlantic Charter
The Atlantic Charter was negotiated at the Atlantic Conference by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, aboard warships in a secure anchorage at Argentia, Newfoundland (located on Placentia Bay), and was issued as a joint declaration on August 14, 1941.
The Atlantic Charter established a vision for a post-World War II world, despite the fact the United States had yet to enter the war.
In brief, the nine points were:

no territorial gains sought by the United States or the United Kingdom;
territorial adjustments must be in accord with wishes of the people;
the right to self-determination of peoples;
trade barriers lowered;
global economic cooperation and advancement of social welfare;
freedom from want and fear;
freedom of the seas;
disarmament of aggressor nations, postwar common disarmament
defeat of Germany and other Axis powers
The Atlantic Charter proved to be one of the first steps towards the formation of the United Nations.

Comintern
The following socialist and pro-Soviet forces also fought against the Axis Powers before or during the Second World War:

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
International Brigades
Popular Front
Albanian National Liberation Army
Chinese People's Liberation Army
Moldova [2] and Bukovina
Communist Party of Yugoslavia
Greek National Liberation Front
Malayan Communist Party
Tudeh Party of Iran
Mongolian People's Republic
Polish People's Army
Viet Minh
People's Republic of Azerbaijan[3]
Kurdish People's Republic
Declaration by United Nations
The Declaration by United Nations, January 1, 1942, had the following 26 signatories[4]:

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
United States
Republic of China
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Australia
Kingdom of Belgium
Canada
Costa Rica
Cuba
Czechoslovakia
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
Greece
Guatemala
Haiti
Honduras
India
Luxembourg
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Norway
Panama
Poland
South Africa
Yugoslavia
(Note: During 1942 the declaration was adhered to by Mexico, the Philippines, and Ethiopia; in the first four months of 1943, it was adhered to by Iraq, Brazil, and Bolivia.)

Tripartite Treaty of Alliance, January 29, 1942
United Kingdom
Soviet Union
Iran[5]
Notes

↑  League of Nations, League of Nations’ Expulsion of the U.S.S.R., December 14, 1939, Official Journal 1939: 506, 540. Retrieved May 22, 2007.

↑ Markus Schönherr, Russification and Ethnic Consciousness of Romanians in Bessarabia (1812 to 1991), International Studies Center – Budapest University of Economics. Retrieved May 22, 2007.

↑ GlobalSecurity.org, Iran/r Azerbaijan. Retrieved May 22, 2007.

↑ Department of State, Declaration by United Nations, January 1, 1942, Department of State Bulletin 6: 3. Retrieved May 22, 2007.

↑  T. H. Vail Motter, I. Experiment in Co-operation: The British and the Americas, in United States Army in World War II: The Middle East Theater; The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia (United States Army Center of Military History, 1952), 6–18. Retrieved May 22, 2007.


ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
Ambrose, Stephen E. The Good Fight: How World War II was Won. New York: Atheneum, 2001. ISBN 0689843615
Gilbert, Martin. The Second World War: A Complete History. New York: Owl Books/Henry, Holt & Co, 2004. ISBN 0805076239
Ready, J. L. Forgotten Allies: The Military Contribution of the Colonies, Exiled Governments and Lesser Powers to the Allied Victory in World War II. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 1989. ISBN 0899501176
External links
All links retrieved May 17, 2021.

The Atlantic Conference: Resolution of September 24, 1941

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