Allies of World War II


The Allies, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during World War II to oppose the Axis powers. Its principal members were the "Big Four" – the United Kingdom, Soviet Union, United States, and China.
Membership in the Allies varied during the course of the war. When the conflict broke out on 1 September 1939, the Allied coalition consisted of the United Kingdom, France, and Poland, as well as their respective dependencies, such as British India. They were joined by the independent dominions of the British Commonwealth: Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Consequently, the initial alliance resembled that of the First World War. As Axis forces began invading northern Europe and the Balkans, the Allies added the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Greece, and Yugoslavia. The Soviet Union, which initially had a nonaggression pact with Germany and participated in its invasion of Poland, joined the Allies after the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. The United States, while providing some material support to European Allies since September 1940, remained formally neutral until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, after which it declared war and officially joined the Allies. China had already been at war with Japan since 1937, and formally joined the Allies in December 1941.
The "Big Three"—the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States—were the principal contributors of manpower, resources and strategy, each playing a key role in achieving victory. Relations between the United Kingdom and the United States were especially close, with their bilateral Atlantic Charter forming the basis of their alliance. A series of conferences between Allied leaders, diplomats, and military officials gradually shaped the makeup of the alliance, the direction of the war, and ultimately the postwar international order.
The Allies became a formalized group upon the Declaration by United Nations on 1 January 1942, which was signed by 26 countries around the world; these ranged from governments in exile from the Axis occupation to small states far removed from the war. The Declaration officially recognized the Big Three and China as the "Four Powers", acknowledging their central role in prosecuting the war; they were also referred to as the "trusteeship of the powerful", and later as the "Four Policemen" of the United Nations. Many more countries joined through to the final days of the war, including colonies and former Axis states. After the war ended, the Allies, and the Declaration that bound them, would become the basis of the modern United Nations.

Origins

Following the First World War, the Treaty of Versailles established the League of Nations in an attempt to create a system of collective security and prevent war. The League's covenant obliged members to protect the political and territorial integrity of all members against aggression. Four of the major allies of the First World Warthe United Kingdom, France, Italy and Japanbecame permanent members of the league's council. The league, however, was weakened by the failure of the United States to join and by the cumbersome rules for enforcing sanctions for breaches of its security provisions.
France attempted to further protect itself against possible future German attack with the Franco-Polish alliance and the Franco-Czechoslovak alliance. Under the Locarno treaties, France, Britain, Belgium, Germany and Italy also guaranteed the borders between Germany and France and Germany and Belgium as defined in the Treaty of Versailles.
The system of collective security was weakened when Japan withdrew from the League in February 1933, following the League's criticism of Japan's invasion of Manchuria in 1931. A further blow came when Nazi Germany withdrew from the League and the world disarmament conference in October 1933. In May 1935, France signed a mutual defence agreement with the Soviet Union, which Germany saw as directed against it. In October 1935, Italy invaded Abyssinia and the league responded with weak, short-lived sanctions.
Germany remilitarised the Rhineland in March 1936 in contravention of the Versailles and Locarno treaties but Britain, France and the League of Nations imposed no sanctions. Britain, however, announced that it would aid France and Belgium if they were the victims of aggression, and France stated that it would assist Britain and Belgium in the same circumstances. In July 1937, Japan began an undeclared war in China. The league found Japan's actions illegal and invited its members to impose sanctions. In November, Italy joined the German and Japanese Anti-Comintern pact, and in December it left the league.
In March 1938, Germany invaded and annexed Austria in contravention of the Versailles treaty. France and Britain issued formal protests but took no further action. Britain declined a Soviet offer to form a defensive alliance against Germany and also declined a French request to provide a security guarantee to Czechoslovakia, which was subject to German threats over its alleged mistreatment of the German-speaking majority in its Sudetenland region. Instead, Britain continued its policy of appeasing Germany by putting pressure on Czechoslovakia to negotiate a solution acceptable to Hitler. As the crisis deepened, Britain, France, Germany, and Italy signed the Munich Agreement on 30 September 1938, whereby the Sudetenland was ceded to Germany against the wishes of the Czechoslovak government, and the signatories guaranteed the territorial integrity of the rump Czechoslovak state.
Germany invaded Czechoslovakia on 15 March 1939 in violation of the Munich Agreement. Subsequently, Germany increased pressure on Poland to agree to the transfer of Danzig and the Polish corridor to Germany. On 31 March, Britain and France announced that they would come to Poland's aid if it were attacked. Italy invaded Albania on 7 April, and Britain and France responded by issuing security guarantees to Greece, Romania and Turkey. In May, France and Poland agreed to preliminary political and military protocols for mutual defence. Britain and France also began negotiations for a defence treaty with the Soviet Union but little progress was made. On 22 May, Germany and Italy signed a military alliance known as the Pact of Steel.
The governments of Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact on 23 August, which included a secret protocol for the partition of Poland. Two days later, Britain signed a military alliance with Poland.

Grand Alliance

Formation

On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and on 3 September, Britain and France declared war on Germany. The Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east on 17 September but remained officially neutral in the war between Germany and the western allies. Italy, Japan and the United States were also formally neutral in the conflict, although Italy eventually declared war on Britain and France on 10 June 1940.
Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada declared war on Germany in the two weeks following the British declaration. An Anglo-French Supreme War Council was established to coordinate military decisions and it first met on 12 September 1939. By 1 October, Warsaw had fallen and the Polish government had escaped into exile. Following a lull in fighting between Germany and the western allies, Germany began its invasion of western Europe in April 1940, quickly overrunning Denmark, Norway, the Low Countries, and France. The governments of these occupied countries, except France, fled, establishing governments-in-exile in London which Britain recognized as allies. Britain recognized Charles de Gaulle as leader of the Free-French forces in London, which opposed the collaborationist French Vichy government. The Free French, however, were not recognized as a government-in-exile until 1944. Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Greece also established governments-in-exile in 1941 following the German advances towards eastern Mediterranean.
The First Inter-Allied Meeting took place in London in early June 1941 between the United Kingdom, the four allied British Dominions, the eight governments in exile, and Free France. The meeting culminated with the Declaration of St James's Palace, which committed the signatories to work together until victory was achieved and an enduring peace secured.
On 22 June 1941, Hitler broke the non-aggression agreement with Stalin and Axis forces invaded the Soviet Union. Britain formed an alliance with the Soviet Union in July, whereby they agreed to assist one another by any means, and to never negotiate a separate peace. The following August saw the Atlantic Conference between American President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, which defined a common Anglo-American vision of the post-war world, as formalized by the Atlantic Charter.
At the Second Inter-Allied Meeting in London in September 1941, the Soviet Union joined the other Allies in adopting the Atlantic Charter. On 7-8 December, Japan attacked American and British territories in Asia and the Pacific, resulting in the US entering the war as an Allied power. China, which had been resisting a Japanese invasion since 1937, formally declared war on the Axis on 9 December.

The Big Three and Big Four

called the association of the United Kingdom, United States, Soviet Union and other Allies the "Grand Alliance". The "Big Three"—the United Kingdom, United States and Soviet Union—were the principal contributors of manpower, resources and strategy, each playing a key role in achieving victory. The United States also saw China and its leader Chiang Kai-shek as its main ally in Asia and considered it one of the "Big Four" allied powers, a view not always shared by the United Kingdom and Soviet Union.

Declaration by United Nations

In December 1941, at the First Washington Conference, Roosevelt proposed the name "United Nations" for the Allies and Churchill agreed. On 1 January 1942, Roosevelt, Churchill and representatives of the Soviet Union and China signed the Declaration by United Nations. The following day, representatives of 22 other allied countries signed the declaration. The Free French were not invited to sign because the United States recognized the Vichy government in France. The 26 original signatories were:
From this time, countries that adopted the declaration were considered allies. Mexico, the Philippines and Ethiopia adopted the declaration later in 1942, followed by Iraq, Brazil, Bolivia, Iran and Colombia in 1943, and Liberia in February 1944. Following the liberation of France, the French provisional government signed the declaration on 26 December 1944 and France officially became one of the allied nations. Eleven nations adhered to the declaration in early 1945, when an allied victory over Germany was assured and the Big Four powers were preparing to invite signatories to the San Francisco Conference to prepare a charter for the new United Nations organization.