In early 1943 Allied forces were plan ning to invade somewhere in southern Europe and begin an attack against German troops controlling much of the continent The Germans expected an invasion but didn’t know where it would take place Then on May 4 the Germans received a surprise The body of a drowned British naval offi cer washed up on the coast of Spain with a briefcase strapped to the body Inside the case were plans detailing an Allied invasion scheduled for later that summer in Greece A German intelligence officer rushed the infor mation to dictator Adolf Hitler who ordered his generals to send a large force to Greece to counter the attack An invasion did begin on July 9 but it was at Sicily nearly 500 miles 805 km west of Greece The body and the brief case had been planted by Allied spies to trick the Germans The deception worked and signaled a turning point in World War II A CLEVER CLUE
ECONOMIC and POLITICAL UNREST A FTER WORLD WAR I ended combat operations in 1918 dramatic economic and political changes began taking place around the world Starting in the early 1930s many countries experienced the Great Depression Banks failed people lost jobs and most govern ments focused on economic problems On the political front several other countries began building empires In Italy a Fascist government under Benito Mussolini took control and later attacked Ethiopia and Libya in northern Africa In the Far East Japan invaded Manchuria and China All these developments made government leaders around the world nervous However the most disturbing activities were happening in Germany Upon signing the Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War I Germany was required to give up land make payments to other countries for damages caused during the war and disband most of Germany’s military and other forces were on display at each annual rally 1923 38 of the Nazi Party
its military Many Germans were angered and humiliated by these terms They became even more upset when the German economy collapsed In the midst of this unrest Adolf Hitler gained popu larity as he blamed Germany’s problems on its Jewish citizens and his National Socialist or Nazi Party took control of the government Hitler began rebuilding Germany’s military might at first behind the scenes and then in plain sight of other nations Other major Western powers Great Britain France and the United States were too pre occupied with their own economic problems or too tired of warfare to stop Germany as it took over the neighboring countries of Austria and Czechoslovakia Hitler didn’t stop there He made alliances with Japan and Italy forming what became known as the Axis Powers and made a separate non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union as Russia was then known agreeing that neither country would attack the other Then on September 1 1939 Hitler’s army and air force invaded Poland with a lightning-fast attack called a blitzkrieg Shocked and worried for their own countries safety Great Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later and World War II of ficially began COVERT OPS THE BIG SECRET Imagine asking 10,000 people to keep a secret That’s what the Brit ish government did with the more than 10,000 people who worked at Bletchley Park or in other parts of Britain and Europe The code breakers included engineers mathematicians translators speed writing specialists radio operators and puzzle experts Some served in the military others were civilians Thousands of them spent hours each day listening in on radio traffic coming out of Germany and writ ing down each letter or number they detected Then code experts using early computers deciphered the messages and determined their meaning Amazingly the whole operation was kept hush-hush especially from the Germans 0909
