LYCOS RETRIEVER 
1944: Fortress Europe
built 235 days ago
The year 1944 saw every combatant nation exert itself to the fullest extent. After three to four years of warfare, populations had become used to ceaseless rationing, travel restrictions, air-defense blackouts, and long hours in fields and factories. In Europe, approximately two-thirds of the countries' national product was diverted to war. Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union between them mobilized about 46 million men and women in the armed forces. These were levels of effort that few populations could sustain for long.
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August 7, 1944: Lodz Ghetto; 68,000 Jews remained. The largest gathering left in all of Europe. 67,000 of them were told they were to be resettled. Instead they are sent to Birkenau. Once there, most of them meet the usual horrific fate - selection, death by gas, and then the cremation of their bodies. Some of the crippled were specially selected by Dr. Mengele.
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For the first six months of 1944, the pace of advance on land against the Axis slowed. Both sides knew that at some point Europe would be invaded from the west, and that this blow, if successful, would probably ensure the defeat of Nazi Germany and its European allies. But while preparations went ahead for the invasion of France, Allied forces engaged in prolonged and bitter fighting on other fronts.
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Fortress Europe