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When The Tigers Broke Free

When the Tigers Broke Free

"When the Tigers Broke Free" is a Pink Floyd song by Roger Waters, describing the death of his father Eric Fletcher Waters, during World War II in Anzio. The song was written specifically for the 1982 movie version of Pink Floyd's album The Wall and first released as a separate track on a 7" single on July 26, 1982, before appearing in The Wall film. The song would make its first CD appearance on the 1996 album Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Plays the Music of Pink Floyd. In its original form, it would be released on CD for the first time on Pink Floyd's 2001 compilation album Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd. After that, the next time the song appeared was on the 2004 re-released, remastered version of The Final Cut, where it rests between "One of the Few" and "The Hero's Return". The song sets up the story premise for The Wall movie, with a recollectionary composite of the British Anzio campaign's Operation Shingle, where United Kingdom forces landed on the beaches near Anzio, Italy with the goal of eventually liberating Rome from under German control. These forces included the C-company of the Royal Fusiliers, in which Roger Waters' father Eric Fletcher Waters was a member of. As Waters tells it, the forward commander had asked to withdraw his forces from a German Tiger I tank assault, but the generals refused and "the Anzio bridgehead was held for the price / Of a few hundred ordinary lives," as the Tigers eventually broke through the British defense, killing the C-company, including Eric Waters. In the second verse of the song (which makes up the reprise later in The Wall film), Waters describes how he found the death certificate from the British government among some old photographs, described as a note from King George in the form of a gold leaf scroll which "His Majesty signed / With his own rubber stamp." Waters' resentment then explodes in a final painful line ("And that's how the High Command took my Daddy from me"). The underlying theme of the song is one of the primary catalysts for the character Pink's descent into isolation and insanity throughout the story of The Wall, especially in the film version.

External link

- [http://pinkfloydhyperbase.dk/albums/tigers.htm Lyrics of the song] Category:Pink Floyd songs Category:1982 singles

Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd (formed in 1965 in Cambridge, England) is a British progressive rock band, noted for their progressive compositions, thoughtful lyrics, sonic experimentation, album art and live shows. Pink Floyd is one of rock's most successful acts, having sold 73.5 million albums in the U.S. alone. The group is also believed to have sold an estimated 175 to 200 million albums worldwide.

Overview

Pink Floyd enjoyed moderate success in the late-1960s as a psychedelic band led by Syd Barrett. After Barrett's erratic behavior caused his colleagues to add guitarist David Gilmour (who eventually replaced Barrett), the band went on to record several elaborate concept albums, achieving worldwide success with 1973's Dark Side of the Moon and 1979's The Wall both among the best-selling and most enduringly popular albums in rock history.

Live Performances

Pink Floyd is renowned for their lavish stage shows, combining over-the-top visual experiences with their music to create a show in which the performers themselves are almost secondary. In their early days, Pink Floyd were among the first bands to use a dedicated traveling light show in conjunction with their performances, projecting slides, film clips, pyrotechnics (exploding flashpots and the exploding gong and fireworks) and psychedelic patterns onto a large circular screen (dubbed "Mr. Screen"). Their early combination of music and visuals set the standard for subsequent rock tours on both sides of the Atlantic. Later shows featured oversized balloons (notably a giant pig balloon which floated over the audience during performances of Pigs from the Animals album), a plane crashing into the stage at the end of "On the Run", a giant flowering disco ball (a projection screen which could be retracted and tilted), more than 100 multi-colored robotic 'dancing' spot lights, and multi-colored lasers. Their constant push for technological innovation in their concert shows is famously demonstrated by their use of extremely powerful, isotope splitting copper-vapor (rather than the usual argon) lasers in the 1994 Division Bell tour. These gold-colored lasers were worth over $120,000 apiece and previously used only in nuclear research and high speed photography ([http://www.lightingdimensions.com Lighting Dimensions], September 1994). The lavish stage shows were also the basis for Douglas Adams' fictional rock group "Disaster Area" (creators of the loudest noise in the universe, and making use of solar flares in their stage show) in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Douglas Adams was a personal friend of David Gilmour and made a one-off guest appearance, on guitar, on the Division Bell tour (October 28, 1994), purportedly as a present for Adams' 42nd birthday.

Split and reunion

In 1985, bassist Roger Waters declared Pink Floyd defunct, but the remaining band members recorded and twice toured under the Pink Floyd name without him. Waters rejoined the band at the London Live 8 concert on July 2, 2005, playing to Pink Floyd's biggest audience ever.

Band history

Syd Barrett led years: 1965-1968

2005 Pink Floyd evolved from an earlier band, formed in 1964, which was at various times called Sigma 6, The Meggadeaths, The Screaming Abdabs, and The Abdabs (see Band members for previous line-ups). When this band split up, some of its members - guitarist Bob Klose, bass player Roger Waters, drummer Nick Mason, and future keyboardist Rick Wright, who at this point played primarily wind instruments - formed a new band called Tea Set. A short time after their formation, they were joined by guitarist Syd Barrett, who became the band's primary vocalist as well. When Tea Set found itself on the same bill as another band with the same name, Barrett came up with an alternate name on the spur of the moment, choosing The Pink Floyd Sound (after two blues musicians, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council). For a time after this they oscillated between 'Tea Set' and 'The Pink Floyd Sound', with the latter name eventually winning out. The word Sound was dropped fairly quickly, but the definite article was still used occasionally for several years afterward, up to about the time of the More soundtrack. In the early days, the band covered rhythm and blues staples such as "Louie, Louie", but gained notoriety for their psychedelic interpretations, with extended improvised sections and 'spaced out' solos. The heavily jazz-oriented Klose left the band to become a photographer shortly before Pink Floyd started recording, leaving an otherwise stable lineup. Barrett started writing his own songs, influenced by American surf music and British psychedelic rock with his own brand of whimsical humor. Pink Floyd became a favorite in the underground movement, playing at such prominent venues as the UFO club, the Marquee Club and the Roundhouse. As their popularity increased, the band formed Blackhill Enterprises in October 1966, a six-way business partnership with their managers, Peter Jenner and Andrew King issuing the singles "Arnold Layne" in March 1967 and "See Emily Play" in June 1967. "Arnold Layne" reached number 20 in the UK singles chart, and "See Emily Play" reached number 6, granting the band their first TV appearance on Top of the Pops in July 1967. Released in August 1967, the band's debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (originally called "Projection") is considered to be a prime example of English psychedelic music. The album's tracks, predominantly written by Barrett, showcase poetic lyrics and an eclectic mixture of music, from the avant garde free form piece "Interstellar Overdrive" to whimsical songs, such as "The Scarecrow", inspired by the Fenlands, the rural region north of Cambridge, Barrett, Gilmour and Waters's home town. The album was a hit in the UK where it peaked at #6, but failed to get much attention in North America, reaching #131 in the US. During this period, the band toured with Jimi Hendrix, gaining them further popularity.

Barrett's decline

As the band became more and more popular, the stresses of life on the road and a significant intake of psychedelic drugs took its toll on Barrett. In January 1968, guitarist David Gilmour joined the band to carry out the playing and singing duties of Syd, whose mental health had been deteriorating for several months. Nevertheless, it was intended that Barrett would remain as the band's figurehead and main songwriter. With Barrett's behavior becoming less and less predictable, and his use of LSD almost constant, he became very unstable, often staring into space while the rest of the band performed. The band's live shows became increasingly ramshackle until, eventually, the other band members simply stopped taking him to the concerts. Once Barrett's departure was formalized in April 1968, producers Jenner and King decided to remain with him, and the six-way Blackhill partnership was dissolved. The band adopted Steve O'Rourke as their manager, and he remained with Pink Floyd until his death in 2003.

Finding their feet: 1969-1970

Steve O'Rourke

A Saucerful of Secrets

Whilst Barrett had written the bulk of the first record, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, only one Barrett composition, the Piper outtake "Jugband Blues", appeared on the second Floyd album. A Saucerful of Secrets was released in June 1968, reaching #9 in the UK and becoming the only Pink Floyd album not to chart in the U.S. The album contained hints of things to come, the center-piece being the 12-minute title track. Future Floyd albums would expand upon the lengthy compositions, offering more focused songwriting with each subsequent release.

Pink Floyd were recruited by director Barbet Schroeder to produce a soundtrack for his film, "More", which premiered in May 1969. The music was released as a Floyd album in its own right, Music From the Film More, in July 1969 . Pink Floyd would use this and future soundtrack recording sessions to produce work that may not have fit into their idea of what would appear on a proper Pink Floyd LP, many of the numbers on Music From The Film More being acoustic folk songs. The rest of the album consisted of incidental music with a few rockers such as "The Nile Song" thrown in.

Ummagumma

The next record, the double album Ummagumma, was a mix of live recordings and unchecked studio experimentation by the band members, with each recording half a side of a vinyl as a solo project (Mason's wife makes an uncredited contribution as a flautist). The album was Pink Floyd's most popular release yet, hitting UK #5 and making the U.S. charts at #70.

Atom Heart Mother

flautist 1970's Atom Heart Mother, their first recording with an orchestra, was a collaboration with avant-garde composer Ron Geesin. One side of the album consisted of the title piece, a 23-minute long rock-orchestral suite. The second side featured one song from each of the band's then-current vocalists (Roger Waters' "If", David Gilmour's "Fat Old Sun" and Rick Wright's "Summer 68"). Another lengthy piece, "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast", was a sound collage of a man cooking and eating breakfast and his thoughts on the matter, linked with instrumentals. The album had the best chart performance for the band so far, reaching #1 in the U.K. and #55 in the U.S., although the album has since been described by Gilmour as the sound of a band "blundering about in the dark." The album was a transitional piece for the group, hinting at future musical territory. The popularity of the album allowed Pink Floyd to embark on their first U.S. tour. The band also developed and pioneered the use of a device called the azimuth co-ordinator, a joystick used to pan sound around their quadrophonic PA system.

Breakthrough era: 1971-1975

quadrophonic

Meddle

The band's sound was considerably more focused on Meddle (1971), with the 23-minute epic "Echoes" taking up the entire second side of the LP. Meddle was considered by David Gilmour to be his first "real" Pink Floyd album, as it had the sound and style of the succeeding breakthrough-era Pink Floyd albums and stripped away the orchestra that was prominent in Atom Heart Mother. Meddle also included the atmospheric "One of These Days", a concert classic, with Nick Mason's menacing one-line vocal, "One of these days, I'm going to cut you into little pieces," and a melody that at one point segues into a throbbing synthetic pulse quoting the theme tune of the cult classic science fiction television show Doctor Who. A glimpse into their humorous side was shown on "Seamus" (earlier, "Mademoiselle Nobs"), a pseudo-blues number featuring lead vocals by a Russian wolfhound called Seamus, belonging to Steve Marriott. Waters' jazzy "San Tropez" was brought to the band practically completed, requiring minimal help in arrangement from the other band members. Pink Floyd was rewarded with a #3 chart peak in the UK for Meddle; it made #70 in U.S.

Obscured By Clouds

Obscured By Clouds was released in 1972 as the soundtrack to the film La Vallee, another art house film by Barbet Schroeder. This was the band's first U.S. Top 50 album (where it hit #46), hitting #6 at in the U.K. Barbet Schroeder

Dark Side of the Moon

Despite Pink Floyd never having been a hit-single-driven group (at the time they had stopped issuing singles after 1968's "Point Me At The Sky"), their massively successful 1973 album, Dark Side of the Moon, featured a U.S. Top 20 single ("Money"). Although the album hit #2 in U.K., it managed to become the band's first #1 on U.S. charts, a huge improvement over the last albums. The critically-acclaimed album stayed on the Billboard Top 200 for an unprecedent 741 weeks (including 591 consecutive weeks from 1973 to 1988), the world record, and making it one of the top-selling albums of all time. It also remained 301 weeks on U.K. charts, despite never hitting #1 there. Dark Side of the Moon went on to sell over 40 million copies worldwide and still sells around 250,000 copies a year, more than any other album of the 70s. On its new release in 2003 it was reported that it was selling 8,000 copies per week. Dark Side of the Moon, the first of Pink Floyd's five concept albums, described the different pressures applying in everyday life. The concept (conceived in Nick Mason's kitchen) proved a powerful catalyst for the band and together they drew up a list of themes: "On The Run" was dedicated to travel; "Time" depicted the encroachment of old age; "The Great Gig In The Sky" (originally named "Mortality Sequence" and "Religious Theme" during development) dealt with death; "Money" satirically spoke of the corrupting influence of money that often comes with fame and power; "Us And Them" entailed violence, and futility of war (a theme to which Waters would return, throughout his career) and "Brain Damage" touched on themes of insanity and neurosis. Thanks to the use of new 16-track recording equipment at Abbey Road Studios and the investment of an enormous amount of time by engineer Alan Parsons, the album set new standards for sound fidelity. It was during this period that the band released the first of their films, "Live at Pompeii". Film Director Adrian Maben's film featured footage of the band's 1971 performance at an amphitheater in Pompeii with no audience present (only the film crew and stage staff). A later version of Live at Pompeii labelled "director's cut" was released on DVD which had each song interspersed with interviews and behind-the-scenes footage of the band in the studio recording Dark Side Of The Moon. Dark Side of the Moon and the three following albums (Wish You Were Here, Animals and The Wall) are widely regarded as the peak of Pink Floyd's career.

Wish You Were Here

Wish You Were Here, released in 1975, carries an abstract theme of absence: absence of any humanity within the music industry and, most poignantly, the absence of Syd Barrett. This theme is carried by the music as well as the artwork packaged with the album. Originally, the album was sold with a black cellophane wrapping, hiding any indication of what could be beneath. In addition to the classic acoustic title track, Wish You Were Here, the album includes the majestic, mostly instrumental nine-part Shine On You Crazy Diamond, a tribute to Barrett in which the lyrics deal explicitly with the aftermath of his breakdown. The album also includes the songs "Welcome to the Machine" and "Have a Cigar" (Roy Harper sang the latter), both of which harshly criticize the music industry. Pink Floyd achieved their first transatlantic #1 album with Wish You Were Here, reaching the top spot in both U.K. and U.S. The album eventually sold over 10 million copies worldwide.

Knebworth '75

Dark Side of the Moon had made Pink Floyd a major international act. In 1975, the band launched a massive tour after the release of Wish You Were Here, which eventually sold out stadiums. The last gig of the tour was as the headliner of 1975 Knebworth Festival, which also featured The Steve Miller Band, Captain Beefheart and Roy Harper (who joined Pink Floyd on the stage to sing 'Have a Cigar'). It was the second Knebworth Festival, which featured artists such as the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Genesis and Frank Zappa between 1974 and 1979. The concert featured a large circular screen, lighting towers and great special effects for the time. Despite some technical problems, the band managed to perform a remarkable concert, before an audience of 125,000, their biggest until Live 8. It was the last time the band performed 'Echoes' and the entire Dark Side of the Moon with Roger Waters.

Roger Waters-led era: 1976-1984

Animals

By January 1977, and the release of Animals (UK #2, U.S. #3), the band's music came under increasing criticism from some quarters in the new punk rock sphere as being too flabby and pretentious, having lost its way from the simplicity of early rock and roll. However, Animals was considerably more guitar-driven than the previous albums, due to either the influence of the punk-rock movement or the fact that the album was recorded at Pink Floyd's new (and somewhat incomplete) Britannia Row Studios. Animals again contained lengthy songs tied to a theme, this time taken in part from George Orwell's Animal Farm, using pigs, dogs and sheep as metaphors for members of contemporary society. Animals was the first Pink Floyd album not to feature any compositions from Rick Wright. Four of the five songs on this record were written entirely by Roger Waters, with one song, 'Dogs', being co-written by David Gilmour. For the cover artwork, a giant inflatable pig was commissioned and floated over Battersea Power Station. This became one of the enduring symbols of Pink Floyd and inflatable pigs were a staple of Pink Floyd's live shows from then on.

In The Flesh

The 1977 Pink Floyd - In The Flesh tour was the last time Pink Floyd performed a major tour with Roger Waters. The tour featured the famous inflatable puppets, notably a 40 foot pig balloon, and a 'Nuclear family' with Mother, Father and two and a half children, later the band added a Cadillac, a television and a fridge. It also had a pyrotechnic 'waterfall' and featured one of the biggest and most elaborate stages to date. Pink Floyd's market strategy for the Animals tour was very aggressive, filling pages of The New York Times and Billboard magazine. To promote their four-night run at Madison Square Garden in New York City, there was a Pink Floyd parade on 6th Avenue featuring pigs and sheep. During the tour Waters began to exhibit more aggressive behaviour, and would often yell abuse at disruptive audiences who wouldn't stop yelling and screaming during the quieter numbers. In the New York shows they had to use local workers as lighting technicians. They had several difficulties with the apparently incompetent workers, as Waters had to at one point beckon one of the spotlights to move higher when it only illuminated his lower legs and feet while he was singing. After having enough of this, Waters brought the whole band to a halt for a moment to remark "I think you New York lighting guys are a fucking load of shit!" and then continued the song. In the first half of the show, Pink Floyd played 'Animals', with 'Wish You Were Here' in the second. Although the 'Animals' album had not been as successful as the two previous ones, the band managed to sell out arenas and stadiums in America and Europe, setting scale and attendance records. In Chicago, the band played to an estimated audience of 95,000 and set an attendance record, in Cleveland, of over 80,000 people. They helped set another attendance record on the final night of the tour, in Montreal, where a festival that also featured Emerson, Lake and Palmer drew another 80,000-strong audience. That night, Waters spat in the face of a disruptive fan; The Wall grew out of Waters' thoughts about this incident, particularly his growing awareness that stardom had alienated him from his audience.

The Wall

Emerson, Lake and Palmer 1979's epic rock opera, The Wall, conceived mainly by Waters, developed themes of loneliness and failure of communication, inspired by Waters' feelings of having constructed a metaphoric wall between himself and his audience. This album gave Pink Floyd renewed acclaim and their only chart-topping single with "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)". The Wall also included the future concert staples Comfortably Numb and Run Like Hell, with the former in particular becoming a cornerstone of album-oriented rock and classic-rock radio playlists as well as one of the group's best-known songs. The album was co-produced by Bob Ezrin, a friend of Waters who shared songwriting credits on "The Trial" and from whom the band distanced themselves, after Ezrin talked about the album to a journalist relative. Despite never hitting #1 in U.K. (it made it to #3), The Wall spent an astounding 15 weeks atop the U.S. charts during 1980. It sold well over 20 million copies worldwide and is often regarded as the best-selling double album ever. It has been certified 23x platinum by RIAA, for sales of 11.5 million copies in U.S. alone. The huge commercial success of The Wall made Pink Floyd the only artist since the Beatles to have the best-selling albums of two years (1973 and 1980) in less than a decade. Even more so than during the Animals sessions, Waters was increasingly asserting his artistic influence and leadership over the band, prompting frequent conflicts with the other members, and the eventual firing of Wright from the band. Wright returned, on a fixed wage, for the album's live concerts. Ironically, Wright was the only member of Pink Floyd to make any money from the Wall shows, the rest having to cover the extensive costs.

The Wall Live

Pink Floyd mounted their most elaborate stage show in conjunction with the tour of The Wall. A band of session musicians played the first song, wearing rubber face masks (demonstrating that the individual members of the band were practically anonymous to the public), then backed up the band for the remainder of the show. Giant inflatable characters designed by Gerald Scarfe, including fully mobile giant puppets of a teacher and Pink's wife, with menacing spotlights for eyes, took the traditional inflatables to a whole new level. During the first half of the show, a huge wall was built, brick by enormous brick, between the audience and the band. There were 340 white bricks forming a 160 foot wall which stood 35 feet tall. The final brick was placed as Roger Waters sang "goodbye" at the end of the song "Goodbye Cruel World". For the second half of the show, the band were largely invisible, except for a hole in the wall that simulated a hotel room setting, where Roger Waters "acted out" the story of Pink, and an appearance by David Gilmour on top of the wall to perform the climactic guitar solo in "Comfortably Numb". Other parts of the story were told by Gerald Scarfe animations projected onto the wall itself (these animations were later integrated into the film version Pink Floyd: The Wall). At the finale of the concert, the specially-constructed wall was demolished amidst sound effects and a spectacular light show. It was the most ambitious theatrical show seen so far, much more expensive and complex than contemporaneous efforts by artists such as David Bowie, Alice Cooper and KISS. The costs of the tour were estimated to have reached US$ 1.5 million even before the first performance. The New York Times stated in its March 2 1980 edition that "The 'Wall' show remains a milestone in rock history though and there's no point in denying it. Never again will one be able to accept the technical clumsiness, distorted sound and meagre visuals of most arena rock concerts as inevitable" and concluded that "the 'Wall' show "will be the touchstone against which all future rock spectacles must be measured". The Wall concert was only performed a handful of times each in four cities: Los Angeles, Uniondale (Long Island), Dortmund, and London (at Earl's Court). The primary 'tour' occurred in 1980, but the band performed two more shows at Earl's Court in 1981 for filming, with the intention of being integrated into the upcoming movie. The resulting footage, however, was deemed substandard, and scrapped; years later, Roger Waters said that he had tried to locate this footage for historical purposes, but was unsuccessful, and he now considers it to be lost forever. There are, however, several unofficial videos of the entire live show in circulation. Gilmour and Mason attempted to convince Waters to expand the show for a more lucrative large-scale, stadium tour, but because of the nature of the material (one of the primary themes is the distance between an artist and his audience) Waters balked at this. In fact, Waters had reportedly been offered a guaranteed US$ 1 million for each additional stadium concert, but declined the offer, insisting that such a tour would be hypocritical. Waters later re-created the Wall show in 1990, amid the ruins of the Berlin Wall, joined by a number of guest artists (including Bryan Adams, Scorpions, Van Morrison, The Band, Tim Curry, Cyndi Lauper, Sinéad O'Connor, Marianne Faithfull, Joni Mitchell, and Thomas Dolby). This concert was even bigger than the previous ones. Roger Waters built a 591 foot long and 80 foot high wall. The theatrical features of The Wall concert were increased to gather the attention of a sold-out audience of 200,000 people and of other estimated 500 million, in 35 countries, to whom the show would be broadcast. After the concert began, the gates were opened and an estimated 300,000 to 500,000 people were able to watch the concert.

Film

A film (essentially a music video for the entire album) entitled "Pink Floyd: The Wall" was released in 1982. The film, written by Waters and directed by Alan Parker, starred Boomtown Rats founder Bob Geldof and featured striking animation by noted British cartoonist Gerald Scarfe. It grossed over US$ 22 million at the North American box office. A song which first appeared in the movie, When the Tigers Broke Free, was released as a single on a limited basis. This song was finally made widely availble on the complilation album Echoes and recent re-releases of The Final Cut.

The Final Cut

1983 saw the release of The Final Cut. Even darker in tone than The Wall, this album re-examined many previous themes, while also addressing then-current events, including Waters' anger at Britain's participation in the Falklands War ("The Fletcher Memorial Home") and his cynicism toward, and fear of, nuclear war ("Two Suns in the Sunset"). Michael Kamen and Andy Bown contributed keyboard work due to Wright's absence. Though technically released as a Pink Floyd album, the interior sleeve specified "A requiem for the post war dream by Roger Waters, performed by Pink Floyd": the project was clearly dominated by Waters and became a prototype in sound and form for later Waters solo projects (Roger Waters has since said that he offered to release the record as a solo album, but the rest of the band rejected this idea). Gilmour also reportedly asked Waters to hold back the release of the album by a year so he could contribute material, but was rejected by Waters. Only moderately successful by Floyd standards (UK #1, U.S. #6), the album yielded one minor rock radio hit, "Not Now John". The arguing between Waters and Gilmour by this stage was rumored to be so bad that they were never seen in the recording studio simultaneously. Gilmour even had his name removed from the production credits in protest over some of Waters' decisions. There was no tour.

David Gilmour-led era: 1987-1995

Andy Bown After The Final Cut, the band members went their separate ways, each releasing solo albums to varying degrees of success. Waters announced in December of 1985 that he was departing Pink Floyd describing the band as "a spent force creatively". However, in 1986 Gilmour and Mason began recording a new Pink Floyd album. (At the same time, Roger Waters was also working on his second solo album entitled Radio K.A.O.S.). A bitter legal dispute ensued with Waters claiming that the name "Pink Floyd" should have been put to rest, but Gilmour and Mason upheld their conviction that they had the legal right to continue as "Pink Floyd". High Court proceedings went in favor of Gilmour and Mason, much to the chagrin of Waters, and the two camps continued working.

Momentary Lapse of Reason

Gilmour and Mason returned to the studio, along with producer Bob Ezrin in 1986. Richard Wright also rejoined Gilmour and Mason during the final recording sessions of A Momentary Lapse of Reason (UK #3/U.S. #3) album, though he did not officially rejoin the band until the end of the subsequent tour. Gilmour later admitted that Mason had hardly played on the album. Because of Mason's limited contribution, many critics say that A Momentary Lapse of Reason should really be regarded as a Gilmour solo effort, in the way that The Final Cut can be seen as a Waters solo album. Having usually written only music with Waters responsible for drafting lyrics (the most recent Pink Floyd album to which Gilmour had contributed lyrics was Obscured by Clouds), Gilmour received further criticism for bringing writers from outside the band to assist him. After the release of A Momentary Lapse of Reason in 1987, Pink Floyd embarked on what was initially meant to be an 11-week tour to promote the album. The two remaining members of the band, David Gilmour and Nick Mason, along with Richard Wright, who still not yet officially a band member, had just won a legal battle against Roger Waters and the future of the group was uncertain. Following the band's tradition, the tour was huge: 45 trucks were needed to carry the equipment necessary to build the biggest outdoor stage to date, 85 feet (26 m) high and 98 feet (30 m) wide. Initially scheduled just to promote the album, it lasted until almost two years later, in 1989, after playing around 200 concerts, including 3 dates at Madison Square Garden and 2 nights at Wembley Stadium, to about 5.5 million people in total. The numbers of the tour speak for themselves: it made Pink Floyd the second highest grossing act of 1987 and the highest grossing of 1988 in the U.S. Financially, Pìnk Floyd was the biggest act of these two years combined, as it grossed almost US$ 60 million from touring, about the same as U2 and Michael Jackson, their closest rivals, put together. Worldwide, the band grossed around US$ 135 million. A further concert was held in 1990, at the Knebworth Festival in 1990, a charity event that also featured other Silver Clef Award winners. Pink Floyd was the last act to play, to an audience of 125,000. The £60,000 firework display that ended the concert was entirely financed by the band. They released a double live album taken from their 1988 Long Island shows, entitled Delicate Sound of Thunder. They later recorded some instrumentals for a classic-car racing film La Carrera Panamericana, set in Mexico and featuring Gilmour and Mason as participating drivers. At one part of the race Gilmour and Steve O'Rourke (his map-reader in the race) crashed. O'Rourke suffered a broken leg, but Gilmour walked away with just some bruises. The instrumentals are notable for including the first Floyd material co-written by Wright since 1975, as well as the only Floyd material co-written by Mason since Dark Side of the Moon. 1992 saw the box set release of Shine On. The 9 disc set included re-releases of the studio albums A Saucerful of Secrets; Meddle; The Dark Side of the Moon; Wish You Were Here; Animals; The Wall; and A Momentary Lapse of Reason. A bonus disc entitled The Pink Floyd Early Singles was also included. An interesting detail of the set's packaging is that when all the albums are stacked up, from the side they form the cover of The Dark Side of the Moon.

The Division Bell

The band's next recording was the 1994 release The Division Bell (UK #1/U.S. #1), which was much more of a group effort than A Momentary Lapse of Reason had been, with Wright now reinstated as a full and contributing band member. The album was generally received more favorably by critics and fans alike than Lapse had been, sounding more like the timeless Pink Floyd of old. Saxophonist Dick Parry, a contributor to the mid-70s Floyd albums, also returned to the fold. The ensuing tour was promoted by legendary Canadian concert impresario Michael Cohl and became the highest-grossing tour in rock history to that date, with the band playing the entirety of Dark Side of the Moon in some shows, the first time they had done so since 1975. The concerts featured a very large stage, a large round screen, incredible special effects, quadrophonic sound and powerful lasers. Three stages leapfrogged around North America and Europe, each 180 feet long and featuring a 130 foot arch modelled on the Hollywood Bowl. All in all, the tour required 700 tons of steel carried by 53 articulated trucks, a crew of 161 people and an initial investment of US$ 4 million plus US$ 25 million of running costs just to stage. It paid off. This tour played to 5.5 million people in 68 cities; each concert gathered an average 45,000 audience. At the end of the year, the Division Bell tour was announced as the biggest tour ever, with worldwide gross of over £150 million (about US$ 250 million). In the U.S. alone, it grossed US$ 103.5 million from 59 concerts. However, this record was short-lived; less than a year later, The Rolling Stones' Voodoo Lounge tour finished with a worldwide gross of over US$ 300 million. The Stones remain the only act ever to achieve a higher worldwide gross from a tour.

Solo work and more 1995-2004

Pink Floyd has not released any new studio material or toured since 1994's The Division Bell, nor is there a sign of any forthcoming, however the band released a live album entitled P
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- E hit #1 in U.S. and featured songs recorded during one of the record-breaking 14 presentations at Earl's Court, in London, which ended "The Division Bell" tour, and includes an entire performance of "Dark Side of the Moon" as well as other favourites from albums like "The Wall" and "Wish You Were Here". In 1996, the band performed Wish You Were Here with Billy Corgan (of The Smashing Pumpkins fame) at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction. A live recording of The Wall was released in 2000 compiled from their 1980/1981 London concerts, entitled Is There Anybody Out There? The Wall Live 1980-81. It hit #1 on Billboard Internet Album Sales chart, but managed to only hit #19 on U.S. charts. A two-disc set of their best-known tracks entitled Echoes was released in 2001. This compilation caused some controversy due to the songs segueing into one other non-chronologically, thereby presenting the material out of the context of the original albums. Some of the tracks ("Echoes", "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", "Marooned" and "High Hopes") have had substantial parts removed from them. Despite the controversy, the album sold over 200,000 copies in its first week and guaranteed a #2 on U.S. charts. David Gilmour released a solo concert DVD called David Gilmour in Concert in November 2002 which was compiled from shows on 2001-06-22, and 2002-01-17, at The Royal Festival Hall in London. Richard Wright, Robert Wyatt, and Bob Geldof (Pink in The Wall film) make guest appearances. In 2002 Q magazine named Pink Floyd as one of the "50 Bands To See Before You Die". Two years later, the same magazine would place Pink Floyd as the biggest band of all time, above the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin, according to a complex system for comparing bands which included album sales, charts performance and concerts attendance. In 2003, a 30th-Anniversary SACD reissue of Dark Side of the Moon, featuring high resolution surround sound was released with new artwork on the front cover and went on to sell over 800,000 copies. Longtime manager Steve O'Rourke died later that year on October 30, 2003. The three remaining band members performed "Fat Old Sun" and "The Great Gig in the Sky" at his funeral at Chichester Cathedral, contrary to reports in the media claiming they played "Wish You Were Here". In 2004 a remastered re-release of The Final Cut was released with the single "When the Tigers Broke Free" added. Mason's book, Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd, was published in 2004 in Europe and 2005 in the US. To promote it, Mason made public appearances in a few European and American cities, giving interviews and meeting fans at book signings. The book gives Mason's personal view of the band's experiences. There has been talk of Roger Waters doing a Broadway musical version of The Wall, with extra music to be written by Waters. The Broadway version will feature all of the music written by Waters but it is not known whether the songs co-written by Gilmour ("Young Lust", "Comfortably Numb", and "Run Like Hell") will feature. The 30th-Anniversary SACD reissue of Wish You Were Here is due early in 2006, also to feature high-resolution surround sound. Waters, Gilmour and Wright are reported to all be working on solo albums, with Waters' and Gilmour's due to be released in 2006.

Live 8, 2005-present

On July 2, 2005 Pink Floyd performed at the London Live 8 concert with Roger Waters rejoining David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Richard Wright. It was the quartet's first performance together in over 24 years — the band's last show with Waters was at Earls Court in London on June 17, 1981. 1981 Gilmour announced the Live 8 reunion on June 12, 2005:

Like most people I want to do everything I can to persuade the G8 leaders to make huge commitments to the relief of poverty and increased aid to the third world. It's crazy that America gives such a paltry percentage of its GNP to the starving nations. Any squabbles Roger and the band have had in the past are so petty in this context, and if re-forming for this concert will help focus attention then it's got to be worthwhile.

The band's set consisted of "Speak To Me/Breathe/Breathe Reprise", "Money", "Wish You Were Here" and "Comfortably Numb". As on the original recordings, Gilmour sang the lead vocals on "Breathe" and "Money", and shared them with Waters on Comfortably Numb. "Wish You Were Here" was the exception to this with Gilmour singing his usual verse, with Waters picking it up halfway through. During the guitar introduction of "Wish You Were Here", Waters said:

It's actually quite emotional standing up here with these three guys after all these years. Standing to be counted with the rest of you. Anyway, we're doing this for everyone who's not here, but particularly, of course, for Syd.

They were augmented by guitarist Tim Renwick (guitarist on Roger Waters' 1984 solo tour, who has since become Pink Floyd's backing guitarist on stage), keyboardist/guitarist Jon Carin (Pink Floyd's backing keyboardist from 1987 onward who has since performed on the 1999-2000 North American leg of Waters' "In The Flesh" solo tour), saxophonist Dick Parry during "Money" (who played on the original recordings of "Money", "Us And Them", and "Shine on You Crazy Diamond"), and backing singer Carol Kenyon during "Comfortably Numb". On the screen behind them, film of the iconic pig from the Animals album was shown flying over Battersea Power Station. Many fans expressed the hope that the Live 8 appearance would lead to a reunion tour and a record-breaking US$ 250 million deal for a world tour is said to have being offered to the band. At first, however, the band has made it very clear that there are no such plans at that time. In the weeks after the show, the rifts that separated the members during the breakup seemed to have largely healed. David Gilmour confirmed that he and Waters were on "pretty amicable terms" and that they communicated via e-mail after the concert. Nick Mason said that the band would be willing to perform for a concert "that would support Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts." Waters has offered what some see as conflicting comments on the issue, first saying, "Never say never [...] I mean, under sort of similar circumstances, or in some way, we might do things again" when questioned on the prospects of another performance. However in an interview in Rolling Stone, Waters appeared less optimistic: "I decided that if anything came up in rehearsals [for Live 8] — any difference of opinion — I would just roll over. And I did...I didn't mind rolling over for one day, but I couldn't roll over for a whole fucking tour". However, in an October, 2005 interview with Word Magazine, Waters stated he "really loved" playing with the band again and he held out some possibility of the band re-forming again. "I hope we do it again. If some other opportunity arose, I could even imagine us doing Dark Side of the Moon again - you know, if there was a special occasion. It would be good to hear it again". Also, Waters stated on a BBC2 Radio interview in September the possibility of a reunion album with Gilmour, Mason and Wright. In the week after Live 8, there was a revival of interest in Pink Floyd. According to record store chain HMV, sales of Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd went up, in the following week, by 1343%, while [http://www.amazon.co.uk Amazon.co.uk] reported increases in sales of The Wall at 3600%, Wish You Were Here at 2000%, Dark Side of the Moon at 1400% and Animals at 1000%. David Gilmour subsequently declared that he would donate all profits from this post Live 8 boom in sales to charity, and urged that all the other performing artists and their record companies should do the same. On 16 November 2005 Pink Floyd were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame, by Pete Townshend. Gilmour and Mason attended in person, explaining that Wright was in hospital following eye surgery, and Waters appeared on a video screen, from Rome. It was stated that the chance of a reunion album is practically nil, and that any future concerts would be in the same vein as Live 8. This was contradicted on the 25 November, when Waters stated that he was willing to play with Pink Floyd again as long as other members agreed [http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/pink_floyd_to_reunite.html].

The images of Pink Floyd

25 November one of the best album covers ever created.]] Integral to the music is the artwork that comes with it. The album covers and sleeve artwork add to the emotional impact of the music with vivid and meaningful imagery. Throughout the band's career, this aspect was mainly provided by the talents of photographer and graphic artist Storm Thorgerson and his erstwhile graphic studio Hipgnosis ("hip" gnosis or hypnosis). Many of these images have acquired fame in their own right; notably the famous picture of a man shaking the hand of his burning alter-ego for Wish You Were Here and the refracting prism for Dark Side of the Moon. The cover of Meddle also gave testament to the band's ideas about the visualization of sound with its close-up of the human ear accompanied by visible sound waves. In fact, Thorgerson was involved in all the artwork for every album except The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, the front cover of which was a photograph by Vic Singh and the back cover a drawing by Barrett; The Wall, for which the band employed Gerald Scarfe; and The Final Cut, the cover of which was designed by Waters himself, using photography made by his then brother-in-law, Willie Christie. A quote from Roger Waters from a video/DVD on the making of the Dark Side of the Moon album: "We always wanted to kind of... not be on our covers ourselves; not have pictures".

Discography and awards

:Main article: Pink Floyd has released 14 studio albums, three live albums, one half live and half studio, and several compilations. Their albums have won numerous awards.

Bootlegs

Pink Floyd is one of the heaviest-bootlegged bands in history, with bootleg recordings of the band numbering at least in the hundreds. Collectors of these bootlegs often call them RoIOs, or Recordings of Illegal/Illegitimate Origin. The vast majority of these are audience recordings of their various concerts, as only a few studio outtakes and soundboard recordings have leaked to bootleggers. The most popular exceptions are the unreleased Syd Barrett songs "Scream Thy Last Scream" and "Vegetable Man", but there are others as well. Many bootlegs before the 1990's featured singles such as "Candy and a Currant Bun" that had not been released on compilation discs, but these disappeared when the The Early Singles disc in the Shine On box set was released. Collecting bootlegs is usually easy, as the internet has made bootleg sales for profit largely pointless. Organizations such as Harvested have made a hobby of cleaning up and remastering bootleg recordings and issuing them to traders for free. The hundreds of audience recordings vary in quality from excellent (concerts in 1994 and 1988) to abysmal (the era between 1967 and 1971). Audience noise is often absent, because audiences of the band in their early days were very quiet. There are sometimes recordings of standout quality in a period of otherwise low-quality recordings; an example is the Electric Factory show in late 1970, which was nearly soundboard-quality during a period when most other recordings were extremely poor. (Audience recordings would not regularly be as good as the Electric Factory show until 1988). Other standouts include the "Fireman" source of the Hollywood Bowl concert in 1972, in which a complete rendition of the pre-release "prototype" Dark Side of the Moon suite was played, and an excellent recording of a 1975 show taped by the legendary taper Mike Millard. This recording contains the best-existing versions of the unreleased Pink Floyd songs "Raving and Drooling" and "You've Got to Be Crazy", which would eventually become "Sheep" and "Dogs", respectively. One of the most useful bootlegs is A Tree Full Of Secrets, a massive 18-disc collection of all Pink Floyd material which ignores live recordings but includes all material released on albums outside the Pink Floyd discography (such as movie soundtracks), radio advertisements, television performances, studio outtakes, rehearsals and alternative mono/stereo remixes. It also features considerable solo material from Pink Floyd's members. It is the definitive collection of all Floyd rarities, and even includes materials suspected of being fake for the sake of completeness and allowing the listener to decide.

Band members

Classic line-up

- David Gilmour - guitar, vocals (1968 - present)
- Nick Mason - drums (1965 - present)
- Roger Waters - bass, vocals, sole lyrics from 1973 until departure (1965 - 1985, Live 8 appearance in 2005)
- Richard Wright - keyboards, vocals (1965 - 1981, 1986 - present)

Former members

- Syd Barrett - guitar, vocals, lyrics (1965 - 1968)
- Bob Klose - guitar (1965-1966; does not appear on any of Pink Floyd's recorded output)

Bibliography

- For about ten years from 1982, a fanzine, "The Amazing Pudding", documented and archived the band's activities.
- In 1991 Nicholas Schaffner's book Saucerful of Secrets: The Pink Floyd Odyssey (ISBN 0517576082), an in-depth biography of the band, was released.
- In 2001, 'Lost in the Woods: Syd Barrett and the Pink Floyd' (ISBN 0-7522-2328-3) by Julian Palacios, on Syd Barrett and his time in the group, was released.
- In 2004 Nick Mason's book Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd (ISBN 0297843877) was released.
- Another Brick In The Wall: The Stories Behind Every Pink Floyd Song, By Cliff Jones (ISBN 0553067338) was released in 1996 by Carlton Books, records details about how each song was written and recorded throughout Floyd's history, from Piper at the Gates Of Dawn (67) right up until Pulse in 1995.

External links

Official links

- [http://www.pinkfloyd.co.uk/ Pink Floyd official site]
- [http://www.pinkfloyd.com/ Pink Floyd official U.S. site]
- [http://www.roger-waters.com/ Roger Waters official site]

Resources links

- [http://www.pinkfloydarchives.com/ Pink Floyd Archives] - Resource of illustrated discogs, concerts, books, etc. by the author of The Pink Floyd Encyclopedia

World War II

, and the use of new, extremely devastating weapons such as the atom bomb. From top going counterclockwise: Allied landing on D-Day 1944, the Nuremberg Rally 1936, the Nagasaki atom bomb 1945, the Soviet flag over the Reichstag in Berlin 1945 and the Gate of Auschwitz.]] World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a mid-20th Century conflict that engulfed much of the globe and is accepted as the largest and deadliest continuous war in human history. It was the first time that a number of newly developed technologies, including nuclear weapons, were used against either military or civilian targets. World War II resulted in the direct or indirect death of anywhere from 50 to 60 million or more people, over 3% of the world population at that time. It is estimated to have cost more money and resources than all other wars combined: about 1 trillion US dollars in 1945 (adjusted for inflation; roughly 10.5 trillion in 2005), not including subsequent reconstruction [http://www.historychannel.com/worldwartwo/?page=triumph5]. The outcomes of the war, including new technology and changes to the world's geopolitical, cultural and economic arrangement, were unprecedented. The conflict began by most Western accounts on September 1 1939 with the German invasion of Poland (the Pacific war is taken to have started on July 7 1937 with the Japanese attack on China) and lasted until mid-1945, involving many of the world's countries. Virtually all countries that participated in World War I were involved in World War II. Britain, France, Australia and New Zealand declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939 and Canada followed on September 10, 1939. The United States entered the conflict in December of 1941 after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Summary

Attributed in varying degrees to the Treaty of Versailles, the Great Depression, and the rise in nationalism, racism, fascism, National socialism, Japanese imperialism, and militarism, the causes of the war are a matter of debate. The war was fought between the Axis Powers and the Allies. The Axis initially consisted of an alliance between Germany and Italy, which later expanded to include Japan and Eastern European countries such as Romania and Bulgaria. Some of the nations that Germany conquered sent military forces, particularly to the Eastern front. Among the expeditionary forces that joined Germany were forces from Vichy France, The Netherlands, Belgium, Spain (though Spain was itself a neutral country) and armies of Russians and Ukrainians under the command of the general Andrey Vlasov. The Allies were initially the United Kingdom, including the Commonwealth, France and Poland, later joined by the USSR, the United States of America and China. Fighting occurred across the Atlantic Ocean, in Western and Eastern Europe, in the Mediterranean Sea, Africa, the Middle East, in the Pacific and South East Asia, and it continued in China. In Europe, the war ended with the surrender of Germany on 8 May 1945 (V-E and Victory Days), but continued in Asia until Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945 (V-J Day). At least 50 million people died as a result of the war. This figure includes acts of genocide such as the Holocaust and General Ishii Shiro's Unit 731 experiments in Pingfan, incredibly bloody battles in Europe and the Pacific Ocean, and massive bombings of cities, including the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan and the firebombing of Dresden (and even worse but less known) of Pforzheim in Germany. Few areas of the world were unaffected; the war involved the "home front" and bombing of civilians to a new degree. Atomic weapons, jet aircraft, rockets and radar, the blitzkrieg, or "lightning war", the massive use of tanks, submarines, torpedo bombers and destroyer/tanker formations, are only a few of many wartime inventions and new tactics that changed the face of the conflict. Post–World War II Europe was partitioned into Western and Soviet spheres of influence, the former undergoing economic reconstruction under the Marshall Plan and the latter becoming satellite states of the Soviet Union. This partition was, however, informal; rather than coming to terms about the spheres of influence, the relationship between the victors steadily deteriorated, and the military lines of demarcation finally became the de facto country boundaries. Western Europe largely aligned as NATO, and Eastern Europe largely as the Warsaw pact countries, alliances which were fundamental to the ensuing Cold War. In Asia, the United States' military occupation of Japan led to Japan's democratisation. China's civil war continued through and after the war, resulting eventually in the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The war sparked a wave of independence for colonies of European powers, who were exhausted from fighting the war. There was a fundamental shift in power from Western Europe to the new superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, though there were few actual boundary changes. __TOC__

Causes

People's Republic of China]] Main articles: Causes of World War II, Events preceding World War II in Europe, Events preceding World War II in Asia The causes of World War II are naturally a debated subject, but a common view, particularly among the allies in the early post-war years, ties them to the expansionism of Germany and Japan: Germany had lost wealth, power and status following the First World War and the expansion was to make Germany great again.
- In Germany there was a strong desire to escape the bonds of the World War I Treaty of Versailles, and eventually, Hitler and the Nazis assumed control of the country. They led Germany through a chain of events: rearmament, reoccupation of the Rhineland, a merger with Austria (Anschluss), incorporation of Czechoslovakia and finally the invasion of Poland.
- In Asia, Japan's efforts to become a world power and the rise of militarist leadership (in the 1930s the government in Japan was undermined as militarists rose to power and de facto gained totalitarian control) led to conflicts with first China and later the United States. Japan also sought to secure additional natural resources, such as oil and iron ore, due in part to the lack of natural resources on Japan's own home islands.

Participants

iron ore and Joseph Stalin, during the Yalta Conference in 1945]] Main article: Participants in World War II The belligerents of the Second World War are usually considered to belong to either of the two blocs: the Axis and the Allies. A number of smaller countries participated in the war, though often under occupation or as proxies of one of the large powers. The Axis Powers consisted primarily of Germany, Italy, and Japan, which split the Earth into three spheres of influence under the Tripartite Pact of 1940, and vowed to defend one another against aggression. This replaced the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936 that Italy had joined in 1937. Spain's fascist government led by Francisco Franco was a great asset in trade to the Axis powers during the war. A number of smaller countries were counted among the Axis powers. Among these were Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovenia, and arguably Finland. Among the Allied powers, the so-called Big Three were the United Kingdom (from September 3 1939), the Soviet Union (from June 1941) and the United States (from December 1941). China had been at war with Japan since 1937. 1937 On August 23, 1939, just before the war broke out, the USSR and Germany signed the non-aggression Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which, among other things, divided Eastern Europe into regions of influence. But Germany violated the pact when it invaded the USSR in 1941. Similarly, the US had the (much older) unilateral Monroe Doctrine, which stated that Europe should not interfere in the Americas and in turn the U.S. would not interfere in European affairs (including wars). But the U.S. entered the war after first Japan and then Germany declared war on it and launched direct attacks on its navy, shipping and other interests. Many other countries, including Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Greece, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the Philippines, Poland, Thailand and Yugoslavia are also considered important Allies, although some of these were conquered and occupied by Axis forces or even officially joined the Axis as a result of coercion. Countries that attempted to remain neutral in the conflict were often viewed with suspicion by the participants, and often pressured to make contributions to the most influential power in their neighbourhood. Sovereignty was often difficult to maintain as many countries that did not directly participate in the conflict nevertheless held vested interests in seeing a particular side prevail. For example, neutral Switzerland was generally considered to be "Allied-friendly", while neutral Spain was considered "Axis-friendly", despite the fact that neither country openly proclaimed any alliances. Such situations allowed neutral countries to become hotbeds of espionage. It is important to note as well, that Sweden's participation in the war was negligable due to specific relations with the German state at the time.

A debated starting date

On which date World War II started is a debated subject; historians do not all agree on which event signified the start of the war. The most common date used is 1 September 1939, marking the German invasion of Poland which resulted in the British and French declarations of war two days later. Other candidates include the Japanese invasion of China on 7 July 1937 (the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War) or the entry of Hitler's armies to Prague in March 1939. Some historians argue that the Italian occupation of Ethiopia (The Second Italo-Abyssinian War) which lasted seven months in 1935-1936 was the actual start of World War II. There are some historians that argue the war started on the start of the Manchurian Incident on 18 September 1931.

Chronology 1937-45

Main articles: European Theatre of World War II, Mediterranean Theatre of World War II, Pacific War, End of World War II in Europe

1937: Second Sino-Japanese War

On 7 July 1937, Japan, after occupying northeastern China as Manchuria in 1931, launched another attack against China near Beijing (see Marco Polo Bridge Incident). Rather than retreating swiftly as in engagements with the Japanese before, the Chinese government declared war on Japan, marking the official start of the Second Sino-Japanese War, which would soon become part of the World War. In December 1937, the capital, Nanking (now Nanjing), fell and the Chinese government moved its seat to Chongqing for the rest of the war. Surprised by the unanticipated level of resistance from China, the Japanese forces committed brutal atrocities against civilians and POWs when Nanking was occupied (see Nanjing Massacre), killing up to 200,000 civilians within a month. In Europe, the peace was uneasy, with Germany annexing Austria and Czechoslovakia, and taking apparent aim at Poland.

1939: War breaks out in Europe

Poland]] Main articles: Polish September Campaign, Phony War War broke out in Poland on 1 September 1939, with the German invasion of Poland. France and the United Kingdom honoured their defensive alliance of March 1939 by declaring war two days later on 3 September. Australia and New Zealand declared war the same day, although through the quirk of the international date line, New Zealand then Australia were the first to declare war on Germany. Canada followed a week later, on 10 September. Only partly mobilised and with troops inadequately equipped with largely outdated weapons (which included large numbers of horse-mounted cavalry), and without the anticipated support of French or British forces, Poland unsurprisingly fared poorly against the Wehrmacht's superior numbers and "blitzkrieg" tactics. In accordance with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Red Army invaded Poland from the east on 17 September. Hours later, the Polish government escaped to Romania. The last Polish Army unit was defeated on 6 October. As Poland fell, the British and French were either caught unaware of German intentions or had not allowed themselves to believe that Germany would invade Poland. Germany paused to regroup during a period that would be termed "the Phony War", or the "Sitzkrieg", which lasted until May 1940. Polish forces continued to fight the Axis powers after their country fell. A prominent example was the assistance of Polish pilots during the Battle of Britain. The Soviet Union, due to its treaty relationship with Nazi Germany, did not fight the fascists: Stalin was happy to have those he felt were his natural and true enemies—the capitalist West and Nazi Germany—fight each other. Indeed, the Soviets had their partisans in the U.S., working alongside Nazi sympathisers, advocate that the U.S. remain neutral in the war, a position that the majority of Americans, reluctant to join in what they saw as "someone else's war," welcomed. Battle of Britain There were isolated engagements during the "Phony War" or "Sitzkrieg" period, including the sinking of HMS Royal Oak in the anchorage at Scapa Flow and Luftwaffe bombings of the naval bases at Rosyth and Scapa Flow. The Kriegsmarine pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee was sunk in South America after the battle of the River Plate. The Tripartite Pact was signed between Germany, Italy, and Japan on 27 September, 1940, formalising their alignment as the "Axis Powers". The Soviet Union invaded Finland on 30 November 1939, beginning the Winter War, which lasted until March 1940 with Finland ceding territory to the Soviet Union.

1940: The war spreads

Winter War Main Articles: Norwegian Campaign, Battle of France, Battle of Britain, North African Campaign, Balkans Campaign Europe: Germany invaded Denmark and Norway on 9 April 1940, in Operation Weserübung, ostensibly to counter the threat of an Allied invasion from the region. Heavy fighting ensued on land and at sea in Norway. British, French and Polish forces landed to support the Norwegians at Namsos, Åndalsnes and Narvik, with most success at the latter. By late June, all Allied forces had been evacuated, and the Norwegian Army surrendered. France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg were invaded on 10 May, ending the Phony War and beginning the Battle of France. The Allies had hoped to establish a static continuous front and were ill-prepared for the German Blitzkrieg tactics. In the first phase of the invasion, Operation Yellow, the Wehrmacht's Panzergruppe von Kleist bypassed the Maginot Line and split the Allies in two by driving to the English Channel. Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands fell quickly against the attack of Army Group B, and the British Expeditionary Force, trapped in the north, was evacuated at Dunkirk in Operation Dynamo. German forces then invaded France itself, in Operation Red, advancing behind the Maginot Line and near the coast. While some units from the French army were still fighting, a number of top politicians and military leaders decided that it would be better to surrender given the situation; France signed an armistice with Germany on June 22 1940, leading to the establishment of the Vichy France puppet government in the unoccupied part of France. In June 1940 the Soviet Union occupied Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, and annexed Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from Romania. Not having secured a rapid peace with the United Kingdom, Germany began preparations to invade with the Battle of Britain. Fighter aircraft fought overhead for months as the Luftwaffe and Royal Air Force fought for control of Britain's skies. The Luftwaffe initially targeted RAF Fighter Command but turned to terror bombing London. The Luftwaffe was not successful, and Operation Sealion, the proposed invasion of the British Isles, was abandoned. Similar efforts were made, though at sea, in the Battle of the Atlantic. In a long-running campaign, German U-Boats attempted to deprive the British Isles of necessary Lend Lease cargo from the United States. The U-Boats reduced shipments considerably; however, the United Kingdom refused to seek peace, with Prime Minister Winston Churchill stating that "We shall never surrender". President Roosevelt announced a shift in the American stance from neutrality to "non-belligerency". The Mediterranean: Italy invaded Greece on 28 October 1940, from bases in Albania. Although outnumbered, Greek forces successfully repelled the Italian attacks and launched a full-scale counter-attack deep into Albania. By mid-December they had liberated one-fourth of Albania. The North African Campaign began in 1940; Italian forces in Libya attacked British forces in Egypt. The aim was to make Egypt an Italian possession, especially the vital Suez Canal. British, Indian and Australian forces counter-attacked (see Operation Compass), but this offensive stopped in 1941 when much of the Commonwealth forces were transferred to Greece to defend it from German attack. However, German forces (known later as the Afrika Korps) under General Erwin Rommel landed in Libya and renewed the assault on Egypt. Italian troops invaded and captured British Somaliland in August 1940. On the other hand, the Italian declaration of war challenged the British supremacy of this sea, a supremacy hinged on Gibraltar, Malta and Alexandria. While Gibraltar was never under direct attack, Alexandria and to a deadlier degree Malta were hit repetitively by Axis attacks, the thrusts towards the Suez Canal for the former, and the 1940/42 Blitz for the latter, which made the island of Malta the most heavily bombed place on earth. Asia: In 1940, Japan occupied French Indochina (Vietnam) upon agreement with the Vichy Government, despite local Free French, and joined Axis powers Germany and Italy. These actions intensified Japan's conflict with the United States and the United Kingdom, which reacted with an oil boycott.

1941: The war becomes global

Main articles: Eastern Front, Continuation War, Attack on Pearl Harbor Europe: Attack on Pearl Harbor Yugoslavia's government succumbed to the pressure of Italy and Germany and signed the Tripartite Treaty on 25 March 1941. This was followed by anti-Axis demonstrations in the country and a coup which overthrew the government and replaced it with a pro-Allied one on 27 March 1941. Hitler's forces then invaded Greece and Yugoslavia on 6 April 1941. Hitler reluctantly sent forces to assist Mussolini's forces in their attempt to capture Greece, principally to prevent a British build-up on Germany's strategic southern flank. With these new troops the Axis succeeded in driving the Greek forces back. British troops were diverted from North Africa to assist with the defence but failed to prevent Greece's capture. On 20 May 1941, the Battle of Crete began when elite German paratroopers and glider-borne mountain troops and some 1300 aeroplanes launched a massive airborne invasion of the Greek island of Crete. Crete was defended by an group of about 43,000 Greek, New Zealand, Australian and British troops, not all of them fully equipped. The Germans attacked the island simultaneously on the three airfields. Their invasion on two of the airfields failed, but they successfully captured one, which allowed them to reinforce their position by landing reinforcements. After a week it was decided that so many German troops had been flown in that there was no way to defeat them, and about 17,000 Commonwealth soldiers were evacuated. However, over 10,000 Greek and 500 Commonwealth troops remained at large and caused problems for the German occupiers. The Germans may have suffered well over 15,000 casualties. So heavy were the losses that Hiler decided never to launch an airborne invasion again. General Kurt Student would later say, "Crete was the grave of the German parachutists". The Allies, on the other hand, came to the conclusion that every major invasion should be supported by paratroopers. Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the largest invasion in history, commenced on 22 June 1941. The "Great Patriotic War" (Russian: Великая Отечественная Война, Velikaya Otechestvennaya Voyna) had begun with surprise attacks by German panzer armies, which encircled and destroyed much of the Soviet's western military, capturing or killing hundreds of thousands of men. Soviet forces came to fight a war of scorched earth, withdrawing into the steppe of Russia to acquire time and stretch the German army. Industries were dismantled and withdrawn to the Ural mountains for reassembly. German armies pursued a three-pronged advance against Leningrad (modern-day St Petersburg), Moscow, and the Caucasus. Having pushed to occupy Moscow before winter, German forces were delayed into the Soviet Winter. Soviet counter-attacks defeated them within sight of Moscow's spires, and a rout was only narrowly avoided. Some historians identify this as the "turning point" in the Allies' war against Germany; others identify the capitulation of the German Sixth Army outside Stalingrad (modern-day Volgograd) in 1943. The Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union began with Soviet air attacks shortly after the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, on 25 June, and ended with an armistice in 1944. The Soviet Union was joined in the war by the United Kingdom but not by the United States. The Mediterranean again: In June 1941, Allied forces invaded Syria and Lebanon, capturing Damascus on 17 June (see Syria-Lebanon campaign). Meanwhile, Rommel's forces advanced rapidly eastward, laying siege to the vital seaport of Tobruk. Australian and other Allied troops in the city resisted all until relieved, but a renewed Axis offensive captured the city and drove the Eighth Army back to a line at El Alamein. Asia: The Sino-Japanese War El Alamein Main article: Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) A war had begun in Asia years before World War II started in Europe. Japan had invaded China in 1931. By 1937, war had broken out as the Japanese sought control of China. Roosevelt signed an unpublished (secret) executive order in May 1940 allowing U.S. military personnel to resign from the service so that they could participate in a covert operation in China: the American Volunteer Group, also known as Chennault's Flying Tigers. Over a seven-month period, Chennault's Flying Tigers destroyed an estimated 600 Japanese aircraft, sunk numerous Japanese ships, and stalled the Japanese invasion of Burma. With the United States and other countries cutting exports to Japan, particularly fuel oil, Japan planned a strike on Pearl Harbor on Sunday, 7 December 1941, to cripple the U.S. Pacific Fleet while consolidating oil fields in Southeast Asia. It is hard to determine whether the Japanese intended to release an advance declaration of war, however, as means of coordinating secret directives with public communication, particularly during a weekend in the U.S., were limited. Despite what warning signs remained, the attack on Pearl Harbor achieved military surprise and dealt severe damage to the American Fleet's battleships, though the primary targets, aircraft carriers, remained safely at sea. The next day, Japanese forces arrived at Hong Kong, which later led to the surrender of the British colony on Christmas Day (known to locals as 'Black Christmas'), as well as launching numerous attacks on British and American outposts across the Pacific. Asia: The United States enters the war
Main article: Attack on Pearl Harbor Attack on Pearl Harbor On 7 December 1941, Japanese warplanes commanded by Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo carried out a surprise air raid on Pearl Harbor, the largest U.S. naval base in the Pacific. The Japanese forces met little resistance and devastated the harbour. This attack resulted in 8 battleships either sunk or damaged, 3 light cruisers and 3 destroyers sunk as well as damage to some auxiliaries and 343 aircraft either damaged or destroyed. However the attack failed to strike targets that could have been crippling losses to the US Pacific Fleet such as the aircraft carriers which were out at sea at the time of the attack or the base's ship fuel storage and repair facilities. The survival of these assets have led many to consider this attack a catastrophic long term strategic blunder for Japan. The following day, the United States declared war on Japan. Simultaneously to the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japan also attacked U.S. air bases in the Philippines. Immediately following these attacks, Japan invaded the Philippines and also the British Colonies of Hong Kong, Malaya, Borneo and Burma with the intention of seizing the oilfields of the Dutch East Indies. In a matter of months, all these territories and more fell to the Japanese onslaught. The British island fortress of Singapore was captured in what Churchill considered one of the most humiliating British defeats of all time. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Germany declared war on the United States on 11 December 1941, even though it was not obliged to do so under the Tripartite Pact of 1940. Hitler made the declaration in the hopes that Japan would support him by attacking the Soviet Union. Japan did not oblige him, and this diplomatic move proved a catastrophic blunder which gave President Franklin D. Roosevelt the pretext needed for the United States joining the fight in Europe with full commitment and with no meaningful opposition from Congress. Some historians mark this moment as another major turning point of the war with Hitler provoking a grand alliance of powerful nations, most prominently the UK, the USA and the USSR, who could wage powerful offensives on both East and West simultaneously.

1942: Deadlock

Franklin D. Roosevelt] Main articles: Battle of Stalingrad, Operation Torch Europe: In 1942, an aborted German offensive was launched towards the Caucasus to secure oil fields, and German armies reached Stalingrad. The siege of Stalingrad continued for many months, with vicious urban warfare leading to high casualties on both sides. At night, the Soviet forces were resupplied from the east bank of the Volga, and the Wehrmacht forces were eventually ground down; especially after Hitler diverted the armour of the Sixth Army to the Caucasus. In November a Soviet offensive encircled Sixth Army. By early February 1943, it was clear that the Sixth Army would have to surrender. Hitler promoted General Friedrich Paulus, who was in charge of the German forces, to Field Marshal in the vain hope it would deter him from surrendering. It did not, and he surrendered completely on 2 February. The results were the destruction of the city, millions of casualties, and the collapse of Germany's Sixth Army as a viable fighting force. Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels responded with his Sportpalast speech to the German people. Some historians cite this as the European war's "turning point". The Mediterranean: Sportpalast speech Sportpalast speech (432nd Squadron) damaged by flak somewhere over Algeria during the North African Campaign in 1942.]] The First Battle of El Alamein took place between 1 July and 27 July 1942. German forces had advanced to the last defensible point before Alexandria and the Suez Canal. However, they had outrun their supplies, and a Commonwealth defence stopped their thrusts. The Second Battle of El Alamein occurred between October 23 and November 3, 1942, after Bernard Montgomery had replaced Claude Auchinleck as commander of the Commonwealth forces, now known as the Eighth Army. Erwin Rommel, German commander of the Afrika Corps, known as the "Desert Fox", was absent for this battle because he was recovering from jaundice back in Europe. Commonwealth forces took the offensive, and although they lost more tanks than the Germans began the battle with, Montgomery was ultimately triumphant. The western Allies had the advantage of being close to their supplies during the battle. In addition, Rommel was getting little or no help by this time from the struggling Luftwaffe, which was now more tasked with defending Western European air space, and fighting the Soviet Union, than providing Rommel with support in North Africa. After the German defeat at El Alamein, Rommel made a successful strategic withdrawal to Tunisia. During the Arcadia Conference from December 1941 to January 1942, the Allied leaders concluded that it was essential to keep Russia in the war. This consideration led to the overall strategy "Germany First"; i.e. giving priority of knocking out Germany before Japan. This decision resulted in a long debate as to where and when to open a Second Front against Germany. The American Chiefs of Staff favoured a cross-channel (France) amphibious operation in the summer. The British opposed this because of insufficient landing craft and logistical problems. It was also thought that American forces were in a process of expansion, organisation and exercise, not capable yet of fighting an experienced German army. Only if Russia collapsed would they approve a main landing in France. Churchill put forward the idea of a small invasion in Norway or landings in French North Africa. The plan for landings in Africa was approved in July 1942. Operation Torch was headed by General Dwight Eisenhower. The aim of Torch was to gain control of Morocco and Algiers through simultaneous landings at Casablanca, Oran and Algiers, followed a few days later with a landing at Bône, the gateway to Tunisia. The operation was launched on 8 November 1942. The first wave was almost entirely American troops, because it was thought that the French would react more favourably to Americans than British. It was hoped that the local forces of Vichy France would put up no resistance and submit to the authority of Free French General Henri Giraud. In fact, resistance was stronger than expected but still sporadic. In Algiers, 400 members of the French resistance captured much of the city, though it was retaken before Allied forces could arrive. The Vichy commander, Admiral Darlan, negotiated an end to hostilities, against orders from the Vichy government. He was allowed to retain local control by the Allies, to the annoyance of Free French leaders. Hitler invaded and occupied Vichy France in response. Rommel's Afrika Corps was not being supplied adequately because of the loss of transport shipments caused by Allied—mostly British—navies and air forces in the Mediterranean. This lack of supplies and air support destroyed any chance of a large German offensive in Africa. Ultimately, German and Italian forces were caught in the pincers of a twin advance from Algeria and Libya. The withdrawing Germans continued to put up stiff defence, and Rommel defeated the American forces decisively at the Battle of Kasserine Pass before finishing his strategic withdrawal back to the meagre German supply chain. Inevitably, advancing from both the east and west, the Allies finally defeated the German Afrika Corps on May 13 1943. Some 250,000 Axis soldiers were taken prisoner. Asia: 1943]] In May 1942, a naval attack on Port Moresby, New Guinea, was thwarted by Allied navies in the Battle of the Coral Sea. Had the capture of Port Moresby succeeded, the Japanese Navy would have been within striking range of Australia. This was both the first successful opposition to Japanese plans and the first naval battle fought only between aircraft carriers. The two sides suffered roughly equal losses. A month later the invasion of Midway Island was prevented by decoding secret Japanese messages, and hence alerted U.S. naval leaders that Midway was the Japanese target. American pilots sunk four Japanese carriers, which the Japanese industry could not replace swiftly. The loss of many planes and skilled pilots (many of them took part in Pearl Harbor) was also difficult to redress. The Americans lost one carrier and fewer planes. It was a complete victory for the Americans, and the Japanese Navy was now on the defensive. However, in July an overland attack on Port Moresby was led along the rugged Kokoda Track. This was met with Australian militia, many of them very young and undertrained, fighting a stubborn rearguard action until the arrival of Australian regulars returning from action in North Africa, Greece and the Middle East. But amazingly, the outnumbered and untrained Australian 39th battalion defeated the 5,000-strong Japanese army. This was one of the most significant victories in Australian military history. Even prior to the American entry to the war, the Allied leaders had agreed that priority should be given to the defeat of Nazi Germany. Nonetheless, U.S. forces began to attack captured territories, beginning with Guadalcanal Island, against a bitter and determined Japanese defence. On 7 August 1942, the United States assaulted the island. In late August and early September, while battle raged on Guadalcanal, an amphibious Japanese attack on the eastern tip of New Guinea was met by Australian forces at Milne Bay, and the Japanese land forces suffered their first conclusive defeat. On Guadalcanal, the Japanese resistance failed in February 1943. A substantial element of the Asian campaign was played out, starting in 1942, in the Aleutian Islands. For detailed information, see World War II: Aleutian Islands.

1943: The war turns

World War II: Aleutian Islands Main articles: Battle of Kursk, Italian Campaign Europe: Russia: After the victory at Stalingrad, the Red Army launched a series of eight offensives during the winter, many concentrated along the Don basin near Stalingrad, which resulted in initial gains until German forces were able to take advantage of the weakened condition of the Red Army and regain the territory it lost. In July, the Wehrmacht launched a much-delayed offensive against the Soviet Union at Kursk. Their intentions were known by the Soviets, and the Battle of Kursk ended in a Soviet counteroffensive that threw the German Army back. Italy is invaded: Newly captured North Africa was used as a springboard for the invasion of Sicily on 10 July 1943. On 25 July Mussolini was fired from office by the King of Italy, allowing a new government to take power. Having captured Sicily, the Allies invaded mainland Italy on 3 September 1943. Italy surrendered on 8 September, but German forces continue