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Under the codename Operation “Dynamo”, Allied forces evacuated 338,000 British and French troops from Dunkirk, France, to Britain between May 26-June 4, 1940. Allied troops were surrounded by Nazi forces after the German military offensive into Belgium, the Netherlands and France in May 1940, forcing their retreat across the English Channel and clearing the path for the Nazi occupation of France.

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A concentration camp established near the city of Weimar in east-central Germany in 1937. The camp initially held primarily political prisoners. After Kristallnacht, some 10,000 Jews were detained here, and other groups were interned at Buchenwald throughout the war. The Buchenwald camp system eventually comprised over 80 subcamps, some of which were operated by private industry with prisoners deployed as forced laborers. By February 1945, the prisoner population grew to around 112,000 as prisoners from camps in the east were evacuated before the advancing Soviet offensive. Buchenwald was liberated by U.S. forces on April 11, 1945.

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Named for its location between two villages in northwest Germany, Bergen-Belsen was originally constructed for Allied prisoners-of-war in 1940. It was converted to a concentration camp in 1943 and expanded in 1944, absorbing large numbers of prisoners evacuated from camps in the east before advancing Soviet forces. Bergen-Belsen was the first major camp to be liberated by the Allies, when British soldiers reached the camp on April 15, 1945.

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A military offensive launched by Hitler in December of 1944, now named after the 70-miles wide and 50-miles deep “bulge” in the battle lines of the Allies in the Ardennes region of Belgium. The German offensive split American and British forces, temporarily halting the Allied advance. After four weeks of fighting, the Allies had pushed the Germans back into Germany.