Remembering History by day WW2

[Peter Clare]

October 28, 1940
Italy invades Greece

On this day in 1940, Mussolini's army, already occupying Albania, invades Greece in what will prove to be a disastrous military campaign for the Duce's forces.
Mussolini surprised everyone with this move against Greece; even his ally, Adolf Hitler, was caught off-guard, especially since the Duce had led Hitler to believe he had no such intention. Hitler denounced the move as a major strategic blunder. According to Hitler, Mussolini should have concentrated on North Africa, continuing the advance into Egypt. Even Mussolini's own chief of army staff found out about the invasion only after the fact. But despite being warned off an invasion of Greece by his own generals, despite the lack of preparedness on the part of his military, despite that it would mean getting bogged down in a mountainous country during the rainy season against an army willing to fight tooth and nail to defend its autonomy, Mussolini moved ahead out of sheer hubris, convinced he could defeat the Greeks in a matter of days. He also knew a secret, that millions of lire had been put aside to bribe Greek politicians and generals not to resist the Italian invasion. Whether the money ever made it past the Italian fascist agents delegated with the responsibility is unclear; if it did, it clearly made no difference whatsoever-the Greeks succeeded in pushing the Italian invaders back into Albania after just one week, and the Axis power spent the next three months fighting for its life in a defensive battle. To make matters worse, virtually half the Italian fleet at Taranto had been crippled by a British carrier-based attack. Mussolini had been humiliated.

[Peter Clare]

October 29, 1942
The British protest against the persecution of Jews

On this day in 1942, leading British clergymen and political figures hold a public meeting to register their outrage over the persecution of Jews by Nazi Germany.
In a message sent to the meeting, Prime Minister Winston Churchill summed up the sentiments of all present: "The systematic cruelties to which the Jewish people-men, women, and children-have been exposed under the Nazi regime are amongst the most terrible events of history, and place an indelible stain upon all who perpetrate and instigate them. Free men and women," Churchill continued, "denounce these vile crimes, and when this world struggle ends with the enthronement of human rights, racial persecution will be ended."
The very next day, the power of protest over cruelty was made evident elsewhere in Europe. When Gestapo officers in Brussels removed more than 100 Jewish children from a children's home for deportation, staff members refused to leave the sides of their young charges. Both the staff and the children were removed to a deportation camp set up in Malines. Protests rained down on the Germans, who had occupied the nation for more than two years, including one lodged by the Belgian secretary-general of the Ministry of Justice. The children and staff were returned to the home.

[Peter Clare]

October 30, 1941
FDR approves Lend-Lease aid to the USSR

On this day in 1941, President Roosevelt, determined to keep the United States out of the war while helping those allies already mired in it, approves $1 billion in Lend-Lease loans to the Soviet Union. The terms: no interest and repayment did not have to start until five years after the war was over.
The Lend-Lease program was devised by President Roosevelt and passed by Congress on March 11, 1941. Originally, it was meant to aid Great Britain in its war effort against the Germans by giving the chief executive the power to "sell, transfer title to, exchange, lease, lend, or otherwise dispose of" any military resources the president deemed ultimately in the interest of the defense of the United States. The reasoning was: If a neighbor was successful in defending his home, the security of your home was enhanced.
Although the Soviet Union had already been the recipient of American military weapons, and now had been promised $1 billion in financial aid, formal approval to extend the Lend-Lease program to the USSR had to be given by Congress. Anticommunist feeling meant much heated debate, but Congress finally gave its approval to the extension on November 7.
By the end of the war, more than $50 billion in funds, weapons, aircraft, and ships had been distributed to 44 countries. After the war, the Lend-Lease program morphed into the Marshall Plan, which allocated funds for the revitalization of "friendly" democratic nations--even if they were former enemies.

[Peter Clare]

Chiang Kai-Shek is born

On this day in 1887, in Chekiang province, China, Chiang Kai-Shek, leader of the Nationalist government of China from 1928 to 1949, is born. As a young man training in the Japanese military, Chiang was converted to the ideals of republicanism. Upon returning to China, Chiang fought against the dying Manchu imperial dynasty. He eventually joined forces with Sun Yat-sen's Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang. Both Sun and Chiang became enamored of Soviet communism and even reorganized the Nationalist Party based on a Soviet model.

Upon Sun's death, Chinese communists, who had been admitted into the party, came into conflict with strict republicans. It was at this point that Chiang's political shrewdness came to the fore, as he stemmed the influence of the communists in his party while keeping Moscow as an ally--that is, until Chiang led a coup that expelled the communists, feeling that they were too strong a challenge to his own control of the party. Chiang then lead the Nationalists in a march on Peking, eventually forming a new government under his control. Unifying the country and keeping it from communist control were now most important to Chiang, even more important than his supposedly treasured social reforms or the invasion of Manchuria by Japan, which he did little to resist. But when full-blown war with Japan broke out in 1937, he was compelled to join forces with his communist enemies in order to repel further Japanese encroachments. China fought alone against the Japanese for four years, until the Allies declared war in 1941.

Although the Allies hailed Chiang as the salvation of his nation, depicting him as a David against the Japanese Goliath, he was in fact a shortsighted tyrant who was more interested in maintaining his power base and privileges than fighting Imperial Japan. He resisted the attempts by U.S. Gen. Joseph Stilwell to create a modern Chinese army that would fight under joint Allied-Chinese control. He was more interested in getting hold of Lend-Lease money for his own purposes. Upon the Allied defeat of Japan, Chiang returned to his battle against Mao Tse-tung and the communists. In 1949, he lost his nation to communism. Chiang removed himself to Taiwan, where he set up a relatively benign dictatorship--an alternate China.

[Peter Clare]

BREMERHAVEN (October 31, 1944)
German ex-refrigerated cargo ship, converted to a troop transport in 1942 and then to a hospital ship early in 1944, sailed from the Latvian port of Windau at 5:30pm on October 29th, bound for Gotenhaven in the Bay of Danzig. On board were 1,515 wounded soldiers (stretcher cases) 156 walking wounded, 680 refugees, 511 workers from Organization Todt, 200 SS guards, 42 medical staff, 22 anti-aircraft gunners and 45 civilian crew, a total of 3,171 persons. At 9:30am on the 31st, the ship, commanded by Captain Grass, was attacked by five Russian planes when about 60 miles from its destination. Hit by one air-borne torpedo and two bombs, one of which exploded below deck setting the ship on fire. When the fire got out of control, the order to abandon ship was given. Luckily, the Bremerhaven (5355 Tons) stayed afloat long enough for rescue boats, including the tug-boat Danzig, to approach and save 2,795 from the burning vessel. Unfortunately, 410 souls were lost as the still burning vessel rolled over and sank at 7:30pm.

[Peter Clare]

USS REUBEN JAMES (DD-245) (October 31, 1941)
American four stack destroyer that was torpedoed and sunk 300 miles south of Iceland. The destroyer, one of five US destroyers escorting the UK bound Convoy HX-156 which had sailed from Halifax, Nova Scotia, sank after a torpedo fired from the U-562 (Lt. Capt. Eric Topp) struck her port side at 05.25 hrs and ignited ammunition in her forward magazine. The explosion split the ship in two, her forward section plunging beneath the waves taking all hands on that part of the ship with her. The stern then went under and when about 50 feet down her depth charges exploded killing a number of survivors in the water. The USS Reuben James took 115 men to their deaths including all its officers.
There were 44 survivors rescued by the USS Niblack. The Reuben James had joined the convoy escort force in March, 1941, guarding convoy's as far as Iceland where British escorts then took over. The U-562 was sunk on February 19, 1943, by depth charges from the British destroyers HMS Isis and HMS Hursley. She sank with all hands (49 men).

[Peter Clare]

November 1, 1941
FDR puts Coast Guard under control of the Navy

On this day in 1941, President Roosevelt announces that the U.S. Coast Guard will now be under the direction of the U.S. Navy, a transition of authority usually reserved only for wartime.
The Coast Guard was established as the Revenue Marine Service by Alexander Hamilton, secretary of the treasury, in 1790. In 1915, the U.S. Lifesaving Service, formed in 1878, and the RMS combined to become the Coast Guard. During peacetime, the Guard was under the direction of the Department of Treasury until 1967, when the Department of Transportation took control. But during war, it was under the control of the U.S. Navy. What made FDR's November 1 announcement significant was that the United States was not yet at war-but more and more American ships were nevertheless becoming casualties of the European war.
The Coast Guard's mission is to enforce all laws applicable to the waters within U.S. territory, including laws and regulations promoting personal safety and protection of property. It provides support and aid to all vessels within U.S. territorial waters. It is charged with inspecting sailing vessels and their equipment for violations of safety regulations, as well as lighthouses, buoys, navigation equipment, and radio beacons. The Guard operates and maintains a network of lifeboat and search-and-rescue stations, which also employs aircraft.
The Guard's wartime duties include escorting ships, providing port security, and inspecting ships for everything from illegal drugs to munitions. They also have powers of interdiction-the right to stop, board, and inspect any vessel suspected of threatening U.S. security. In fact, Coast Guard ranks are analogous to those of the U.S. Navy; even the uniforms are similar. The Guard is headed by an admiral appointed by the president. Women have served in the Guard since 1973

[Peter Clare]

November 1, 1941
FDR puts Coast Guard under control of the Navy

On this day in 1941, President Roosevelt announces that the U.S. Coast Guard will now be under the direction of the U.S. Navy, a transition of authority usually reserved only for wartime.
The Coast Guard was established as the Revenue Marine Service by Alexander Hamilton, secretary of the treasury, in 1790. In 1915, the U.S. Lifesaving Service, formed in 1878, and the RMS combined to become the Coast Guard. During peacetime, the Guard was under the direction of the Department of Treasury until 1967, when the Department of Transportation took control. But during war, it was under the control of the U.S. Navy. What made FDR's November 1 announcement significant was that the United States was not yet at war-but more and more American ships were nevertheless becoming casualties of the European war.
The Coast Guard's mission is to enforce all laws applicable to the waters within U.S. territory, including laws and regulations promoting personal safety and protection of property. It provides support and aid to all vessels within U.S. territorial waters. It is charged with inspecting sailing vessels and their equipment for violations of safety regulations, as well as lighthouses, buoys, navigation equipment, and radio beacons. The Guard operates and maintains a network of lifeboat and search-and-rescue stations, which also employs aircraft.
The Guard's wartime duties include escorting ships, providing port security, and inspecting ships for everything from illegal drugs to munitions. They also have powers of interdiction-the right to stop, board, and inspect any vessel suspected of threatening U.S. security. In fact, Coast Guard ranks are analogous to those of the U.S. Navy; even the uniforms are similar. The Guard is headed by an admiral appointed by the president. Women have served in the Guard since 1973

[Peter Clare]

November 2, 1942
British launch Operation Supercharge

On this day in 1942, General Montgomery breaks through Rommel's defensive line at El Alamein, Egypt, forcing a retreat. It was the beginning of the end of the Axis occupation of North Africa.
In July 1942, having already taken Tobruk, Gen. Erwin Rommel and his mixed German-Italian forces attempted to push through the British defensive line at El Alamein, but failed. The Brits and the Axis had reached a standstill, and both sides took time to regroup before resuming the battle. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. Bernard Montgomery took control of the British 8th Army, and on October 23 launched Operation Lightfoot, a broad offensive initiated by artillery fire. Rommel's forces had dug a five-mile-deep defensive area, replete with minefields and antitank guns. But this did not stop Montgomery, who had three armoured divisions and almost seven infantry divisions. The Axis forces were without their leader, as Rommel had taken ill and was convalescing in Austria. By the time the German general was recalled to Africa by Hitler, two days after the launching of Lightfoot, Monty and his forces had pushed passed his defensive line and were six miles beyond the original stalemate point.
Rommel gave as good as he got, using his antitank weaponry to destroy four times as many British tanks as he lost (but still leaving the Brits with 800 against Rommel's 90). Montgomery's drive northward was stopped-but only temporarily. On November 2, he launched Operation Supercharge, switched the direction of his attack westward, and punched through the German-Italian line. Rommel retreated to Fukah but Hitler insisted that Rommel hold his position at El Alamein. Rommel obeyed, which was a mistake. Instead of making a stand at Fukah, he was forced to waste more time and more of his forces as the British pushed harder, forcing Rommel to retreat even farther as he attempted to escape sweeping British offensives from the south. By mid-January 1943, Rommel had been pushed through Libya into Tunisia. As Churchill would sum up: "Up to Alamein we survived. After Alamein we conquered."

[Peter Clare]

SENDAI (November 2, 1943)
Imperial Japanese Navy cruiser of 7,100 tons commissioned on April 29, 1924 at the Mitsubishi Shipbuilding Yard in Nagasaki. Sunk at the Battle of Empress Augusta Bay off Torokina Point in the Solomons. Torpedoes and shells from US Rear Admiral Aaron Merrill's Task Force 39 set the cruiser on fire. At 0200 hrs the Sendai is abandoned and sinks at 0430 hrs with 184 of her crew. A total of 236 crewmen are rescued. The wreck lies at a depth of 440 metres about 55 kilometres north-east of Kota Bharu, Malaysia.