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something new today now without further
ado it's 1902 a young man by the name of
Benito Mussolini was from Italy to
Switzerland to avoid military service he
gets big into socialism working for
trade unions writing for socialist
newspapers advocating a violent
overthrow of European monarchies the
whole shebang this gets him in a bit of
trouble with the Swiss police so he gets
arrested sent back to Italy set free
returns to Switzerland is arrested again
goes back to Italy again completes his
military service after previously
avoiding it and then after a brief stint
as an elementary school teacher he
finally returns to work as an avid
socialist his speeches and journalistic
abilities made him famous among Italian
socialists he was anti-war so in Italy
colonized Libya in 1910 he rioted and
got arrested then World War one came
along and once again he protested
Italy's involvement but then he thought
wait a minute this war could bring about
the social climate needed to overthrow
European monarchies and bring about the
socialist revolution everyone in
he was pro-war but his fellow socialists
didn't like his new pro-war stance so
they kicked him out of the party so then
he said you know what I'm done with
socialism we need something new not
based on class divisions tearing us
apart but based on unity through
nationality will conquer the
Mediterranean and reunite all Italian
peoples just like the days of the Roman
Empire I'll call it fat she smoked and
it will guide the Italian nation to
greatness that's all well and good mr.
Mussolini but what kind of haircut am I
giving you let's go with
bold Italy had been on the winners side
in World War one and they hope they're
going to get a lot out of it but in the
end they only got a little and they felt
cheated on top of that a bad economy and
weak government's meant that the Italian
people were a little unhappy so when
Mussolini came along said that he could
fix everything his fascist movement
gained a lot of support in 1922 he went
to the king and said make me Prime
Minister or I'll make me prime minister
and the King said you and what army this
army
fair enough then he went about
establishing a dictatorship with himself
at its centre Europe had its first
fascist dictator next up Germany Germany
had been on the losers side and they got
absolutely wrecked by the Treaty of
Versailles they lost territory had to
demilitarize the Rhineland had to reduce
their army to just one hundred thousand
men couldn't have an Air Force had to
pay the Allies a huge amount of money
that it didn't have and a new rule was
established that every Englishman
withheld the right to walk into the
center of Berlin pick out any German
they wanted and spanked the hell out of
them I made that last one up but it
helps you understand how all this felt
to Germans on top of that a bad economy
and weak governments meant that when a
small angry man with a silly mustache
came along and said that he could fix
everything the German people loved him
Hitler had been a soldier during World
War one and he was crazy patriotic and
nobody was madder than him about
Germany's humiliation he helped start a
new political party and in 1923
attempted a march on Munich with his
boys and then he got arrested but his
popularity grew and grew and in 1933 the
president made him Chancellor he
believed he was Germany's great destined
Savior and he went full megalomania
establishing a dictatorship with himself
at its centre Europe had fascist
dictator number two Hitler and Mussolini
had a lot of the same ideas but more
importantly they had the same enemies
and he started to get along anyone else
want to be friends
Frank oh no you good I do who's that
it's Japan and they've taken over
northern China let's rewind a bit Japan
had isolated itself from the rest of the
world for over 200 years until the
Americans showed up and said you're
gonna trade with us and you're gonna
like it
then the Western powers imposed a bunch
of unequal treaties meaning Japan's
economy was bust they also had no
natural resources so they decided to go
get some they went to war with China to
gain a sphere of influence over Korea
and they took a bunch of Chinese stuff
but then the West said hey cut that out
and since Japan couldn't take on the
West they said okay I guess we'll just
go home wait a minute what are you doing
taking advantage of a week in China and
setting up spheres of influence but I
was the one who weakened them we know
and you guys didn't let me have anything
we know that seems unfair we don't think
so
okay see ya so Japan thought screw this
and went to war with Russia and stunned
everyone by actually winning then they
fully annexed Korea but they didn't stop
there in World War one they took
Germany's colonies and islands in Asia
and then in an incident that was maybe
States by the Japanese army a bomb blew
up the Japanese train in Manchuria
giving them an excuse to launch an
invasion and take over so here's a
situation Nazi Germany fascist Italy and
Japan all believe they're racially
superior all feel hostility towards the
Allies and all want to militarize and
take over more stuff and so they did
let's start with Germany Hitler hated
the Treaty of Versailles and now he was
ready to begin on doing it in complete
violation of the treaty the first
Luftwaffe squadrons were set up
conscription was introduced and he
pimped up his army the Allies did
nothing then Hitler sent his army back
into the demilitarized Rhineland giving
orders to immediately retreat if the
Allies showed up the Allies did nothing
with his military restraint and he could
now move on to step 2
he wanted to rapidly increase the Aryan
population and to do so he needed
Lebensraum or in other words he would
have to take over the world but for now
a good portion of Europe would do and he
began eyeing up his neighbors the Allies
finally started to get worried so they
implemented a fairly useless diplomatic
strategy called appeasement and it went
a little something like this
Hitler would say I want that thing and
the Allies would say you can't have that
thing okay you can have that thing but
no more I want that thing and repeat in
1938 Hitler's army marched into Austria
and just took it with no resistance boom
this is Germany now next he demanded to
be given the Sudetenland an area of
Czechoslovakia with many ethnic Germans
the Allies held a meeting with Hitler in
Munich and said look we're going to give
you what hang on this meeting is about
my territory shouldn't I come to the
meeting too
anyway we're gonna give you what you
want really yeah just like that yep
what's the catch just sign this piece of
paper promising you won't invade the
rest of Czechoslovakia
okay then Chamberlain returned home
victorious waving a signed piece of
paper in the air declaring crisis to be
averted and the continuation World Peace
and we built a statue of Chamberlain in
his honor and every day on the 30th of
September we celebrate Chamberlain
theatres invading the rest of
Czechoslovakia what he's invading the
rest of Czechoslovakia oh you lied to me
what do you expect I'm Hitler not to be
outdone Mussolini also wanted to get in
on the action he thought to himself
isn't there a not yet colonized nation
somewhere which is so underdeveloped
that the people would be defending
themselves against our tanks with
literal bows and arrows and wind spears
oh there is fantastic and so he took it
Italy also wanted to control the
entrance to the Adriatic Sea
so they occupied Albania then in another
incident which was maybe staged by the
Japanese gunfire was exchanged by
Japanese and Chinese troops at the Marco
Polo Bridge and the Japanese launched
yet another invasion against China they
swept through Beijing and Shanghai and
then advanced to the Yangtze Valley to
China's then capital Nanking it was here
that saw the worst of Japan's shocking
atrocities committed against the Chinese
people
back in Europe Germany and Italy made
their relationship status official by
signing the pact of Steel then Hitler
turned his eyes towards Poland and the
hated polish Court or splitting Germany
and - at this point the Allies really
had to put their foot down and they
warned him that an invasion of Poland
would mean war Hitler had planned to
continue his advance eastward but he
didn't want to end up fighting a war on
two fronts so for now he made an
alliance with Stalin saying how about we
both invade Poland and split it between
the two of us and I definitely won't not
refrain from not betraying you sometime
in the future
sounds
could this newline stunned the West on
the 1st of September 1939 German troops
entered Poland and Britain and France
declared war on Germany
the pols fought hard but they were no
match for the two giants crashing down
on them from either side then came a
period known as the phoney war where
everyone just sort of sat around not
doing much the French had launched a
small invasion into the Saarland they
maintained mostly defensive positions
and after a while decided to just turn
around and call it a day
speaking of France the French were still
super proud of their victory in World
War one and they hadn't really moved on
from it
they still use forces they dispatched
messages by motorbike instead of using
radio orders from the commander-in-chief
were usually pretty vague and the troops
were rarely inspected they built a line
of Defense's along their German border
but didn't bother extending it all the
way to the channel and they wouldn't
launch artillery strikes against Germany
out of fear of being retaliated against
in a war they didn't want to attack the
enemy and at first the UK wasn't much
better
Chamberlain still naively hoped that the
war could be ended diplomatically
instead of bombing raids the RAF dropped
propaganda leaflets over German cities
which one Air Marshal said likely did
nothing but provide the continent with
toilet paper for the duration of the war
they also only sent two hundred thousand
men to France while the French had
mobilized millions both Britain and
France wanted to avoid a repeat of the
first world war and so they wanted to
keep the war as far from home as
possible so they turned their eyes in
north towards Norway neutral Sweden was
exporting iron ore to Germany through
neutral Norway so the Allies asked them
if they could please stop exporting iron
ore to Germany but this request was
refused then the Soviet Union attacked
Finland so the ally said how about we
land troops in Norway and move them
across Sweden to go help out your good
pal Finland and along the way maybe take
control of all your armed fields but
Norway and Sweden still said no so if
you came mined the waters around Norway
to force any transport ships into
international waters and they also
attacked the German tanker they found in
the area Hitler realized what the Allies
were up to and he quickly moved to
secure his supply of iron ore he
launched an invasion through Denmark
into Norway the Allies rushed to land
troops at keyboards along the coast but
Germany had taken control of Noyes
airfield and their air superiority
decided the fight
the Allies had to retreat after the
slightly embarrassing failure
Chamberlain resigned and was replaced
with Winston Churchill who had a
slightly different approach to dealing
with the Germans Hitler's overall
strategy was similar to Germany's first
world war strategy attack France defeat
France knocking out the UK in the
process then turn on the Soviet Union
and win the war during the phoney war
the Allies had given Hitler timed
his forces now he was ready to attack
the Allies had wanted to place troops in
Belgium but Belgium had refused and then
a move that surprised pretty much no one
even launched an invasion to get around
Frances defenses the Allies charged into
Belgium at full speed to meet the German
invasion head-on and it looked like a
repeat of the first world war was coming
but this time Hitler had a trick up his
sleeve blitzkrieg as the Germans
advanced they sent thousands of refugees
westward slowing down the Allies then to
the south the French had left the our
den an area full of hills and forests
pretty under defended because they
thought it was naturally impenetrable
well the Germans were about to penetrate
it with everything they had they smashed
50 Vermont divisions through and
encircled the Allied armies at lightning
speed the best of the Allied forces were
now trapped
the Germans squeezed in from all sides
taking out Frances best armies and
nearly wiping out the British - but they
managed to make a desperate last-minute
escape at Dunkirk with British civilian
ships even making the perilous journey
to bring their young men home with most
of the French forces depleted the
Germans breezed through taking Paris and
France fell what the Germans couldn't do
in World War one Hitler had done just
like that
Hitler hoped that with the fall of
France the UK would also lose hope and
sue for peace but quite annoyingly
it didn't and he needed to secure the
Western Front so he tried to force them
into submission with mindgames UK were
now all alone and Hitler wanted to
emphasize that first of all just before
France fell Italy finally declared war
on the Allies making the UK situation
even worse next instead of just
occupying all of France Hillier occupied
the coastal areas for defense but
allowed France to continue its existence
as a German puppet state this way it
looked like the UK's old Ally had
decided to switch sides Hitler also
hoped that the UK wouldn't attack any
for old Ally's Navy bases or colonies in
Africa giving Hitler an extra line of
defense to the south but the UK made
sure to respond to this by sailing down
to Frances Navy base in Algeria and
wrecking a bunch of ships so have at it
Hitler then began laying down plans for
an invasion of Great Britain before
German troops could land on British soil
he would first need air and naval
superiority across the channel waves of
German bombers came while the completely
outnumbered Aria Ford gravely
around-the-clock in an attempt to quell
the German attacks at first the
Luftwaffe targeted British ports and
coastal facilities then it attacked RAF
bases crippling the RAF stability to
defend the nation and it looked like
Hitler's great British Invasion was
coming but then Churchill ordered a
small pretty and significant bombing
raid over Berlin it didn't do much
damage but Hitler was furious and he
immediately ordered the Luftwaffe
to refocus its attacks on civilian
targets in London children were sent off
to the countryside away from their
parents to avoid danger and frequent
trips to air-raid shelters became a
daily occurrence but British morale held
firm smiling knitting lounging casually
these people have balls of steel this
refocusing on London also gave the RAF
breathing space to reorganize so Hitler
kind of shot himself in the foot there
just the foot for now finally the
Luftwaffe sent one massive all-out
attack on London and the RAF
successfully repelled it destroying many
of the German aircraft and placing air
superiority firmly in British hands
Hitler's invasion had to be postponed
but the bombing of British cities
continued for some time
[Music]
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