1940: London celebrates the holidays, despite
the war. A sign in the downtown district reads: "Christmas is 1,940 years old, and
Hitler is only fifty-one. The can't spoil our Christmas."

1941: More Japanese troops land in Luzon in the Philippines.

1941: The Avro Lancaster enters service with No. 44 Sqn at RAF Waddington, Lincolnshire. It isnt until 3 March 1942 that the Lancaster makes its operational debut.

1941: Bengazi reoccuppied by the British.

1942: Following the suspension of 'Operation Winter Tempest', the relief of Stalingrad, the Red Army begins an offensive against Army Group Don toward Kotelnikovo, breaking through the lines of 4th Rumanian Army.

1942: Admiral Darlan is assassinated by a young Frenchman in Algiers.

1942: US bomb Wake Island.

1943: Commanders of ‘Second Front’ are announced as Eisenhower, Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force; Montgomery to be C in C of 21st Army Group.

1943: Sir Henry Maitland Wilson is made Supreme Commander in the Mediterranean and Alexander is C in C Allied Armies, Italy.

1943: The Russians commence a third winter offensive, with Vatutin’s 63 divisions in the Ukraine and capture Berdichev.

1943: Roosevelt broadcasts about the Cairo and Teheran conferences and says plans have been laid for the invasion of Europe and its post-war reconstruction.

1944: In the English Channel, U-486 (Oblt.z.S. Gerhard Meyer) sinks the allied troop carrier SS Leopoldville with the loss of 763 men of the US 66th Infantry Division. All news and information on this incident is suppressed by orders of SHAEF headquarters.