Above title bar : events during World War II ( 1939 – 1945 ) : From left to right : Troops in an LCVP landing craft approaching Omaha Beach on D-Day ; Adolf Hitler visits Paris , soon after the Battle of France ; The Holocaust occurs as Nazi Germany carries out a programme of systematic state-sponsored genocide , during which approximately six million European Jews are killed ; The Japanese attack on the American naval base of Pearl Harbor launches the United States into the war ; An Observer Corps spotter scans the skies of London during the Battle of Britain ; The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the first uses of nuclear weapons , killing over a quarter million people and leading to the Japanese surrender ; Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signs the Instrument of Surrender on behalf of the Japanese Government , on board , effectively ending the war . Below title bar : events after World War II : From left to right : The Declaration of the State of Israel in 1948 ; The Nuremberg trials are held after the war , in which the prominent members of the political , military , and economic leadership of the defeated Nazi Germany are prosecuted ; After the war , the United States carries out the Marshall Plan , which aims at rebuilding Western Europe ; ENIAC , the world 's first general-purpose electronic computer . 420px thumb rect 1 1 224 195 Normandy landings rect 227 1 407 195 Battle of France rect 409 1 572 195 The Holocaust rect 1 198 148 383 Attack on Pearl Harbor rect 151 198 288 383 Battle of Britain rect 291 198 420 383 Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki rect 424 198 572 383 Surrender of Japan rect 0 384 572 411 World War II rect 1 412 125 599 Israeli Declaration of Independence rect 128 412 290 599 Nuremberg trials rect 294 412 438 599 Marshall Plan rect 441 412 572 599 ENIAC The 1940s ( pronounced " nineteen-forties " and commonly abbreviated as the " Forties " ) was a decade of the Gregorian calendar that began on January 1 , 1940 , and ended on December 31 , 1949
The Holocaust
The Holocaust
1940s