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 (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers. Its principal members by the end of 1941 were the "Big Four" – the United Kingdom, United States, Soviet Union, and China.

Quick Facts Status, Historical era ...

Allies of World War II 同盟國/同盟国 (Chinese) Alliés (French) Антигитлеровская коалиция (Russian)
1939–1945
Allies and their colonies   Allies entering after the attack on Pearl Harbor   Axis powers, co-belligerents, and their colonies   Neutral powers and their colonies The Big Three:  United Kingdom (from September 1939)  Soviet Union (from June 1941)  United States (from December 1941) Allied combatants with governments-in-exile: Free France[note 1]  Poland[note 2]  Czechoslovakia[note 3]  Belgium  Luxembourg  Netherlands Norway  Greece Yugoslavia Ethiopia[note 4] Philippines Other Allied combatant states:  China[note 5]  Canada  Australia  New Zealand  India  South Africa  Brazil  Mexico  Mongolia Co-belligerents (former Axis powers): Italy (from September 1943)  Romania (from August 1944)  Bulgaria (from September 1944)  Finland (from September 1944)
Status	Military alliance
Historical era	World War II
• Franco-Polish alliance	February 1921
• Anglo-Polish alliance	August 1939
• Anglo-French War Council	September 1939 – June 1940
• First Inter-Allied Meeting	June 1941
• Anglo-Soviet alliance	July 1941
• Atlantic Charter	August 1941
• Declaration by United Nations	January 1942
• Anglo-Soviet Treaty	May 1942
• Tehran Conference	November–December 1943
• Bretton Woods Conference	1–15 July 1944
• Yalta Conference	4–11 February 1945
• United Nations formed	April–June 1945
• Potsdam Conference	July–August 1945
Succeeded by United Nations
Footnotes [N 1] France declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939, two days after the German invasion of Poland. It was a member of the Allies until its defeat in the German invasion of France in June 1940. Unlike the other governments-in-exile in London, which were legitimate governments that had escaped their respective countries and continued the fight, France had surrendered to the Axis. The "Free French Forces" were a section of the French army which refused to recognize the armistice and continued to fight with the Allies. They worked towards France being seen and treated as a major allied power, as opposed to a defeated and then liberated nation. They struggled with legitimacy vis-a-vis the German client state "Vichy France", which was the internationally recognized government of France even among the Allies. A National Liberation Committee was formed by the Free French after the gradual liberation of Vichy colonial territory, which led to the full German occupation of Vichy France in 1942. This started a shift in Allied policy from trying to improve relations with the Vichy regime into full support to what was now the Provisional Government of the French Republic. [N 2] The Polish Underground State was allied with United Kingdom and United States. It fought against Axis Powers (mostly Germany), Soviet Union and the Polish Committee of National Liberation (PKWN). However the PKWN was allied with the Soviet Union and fought against Germany and the Polish Underground State. [N 3] Edvard Beneš, president of the First Czechoslovak Republic, fled the country after the 1938 Munich Agreement saw the Sudetenland region annexed by Germany. In 1939 a German sponsored Slovak Republic seceded from the post-Munich Second Czechoslovak Republic, providing justification for the establishment of a German protectorate over the remaining Czech lands (the rump Carpathian Ruthenia region being annexed by Hungary). Following the outbreak of war later the same year, Beneš, in his exile, formed a Czechoslovak National Liberation Committee which after some months of negotiations regarding its legitimacy became regarded as the Czechoslovak government-in-exile by the Allies. [N 4] The Ethiopian Empire was invaded by Italy on 3 October 1935. On 2 May 1936, Emperor Haile Selassie I fled into exile, just before the Italian occupation on 7 May. After the outbreak of World War II, the United Kingdom recognized Haile Selassie as the Emperor of Ethiopia in July 1940 and his Ethiopian exile government cooperated with the British during their invasion of Italian East Africa in 1941. Through the invasion Haile Selassie returned to Ethiopia on 18 January, with the liberation of the country being completed by November the same year. [N 5] China had been at war with Japan since July 1937. It declared war on Japan, Germany and Italy and joined the Allies in December 1941 after the attacks on Pearl Harbor.

Close

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 soon 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.^{[1][failed verification]} The United States, while providing some materiel support to European Allies since September 1940, remained formally neutral until the Japanese bombing of 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 Allies were led by the so-called "Big Three"—the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States—which were the principal contributors of manpower, resources, and strategy, each playing a key role in achieving victory.^[2][3][4] 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. Relations between the United Kingdom and the United States were especially close, with their bilateral Atlantic Charter forming the groundwork of their alliance.

The Allies became a formalized group upon the Declaration by United Nations on 1 January 1942, which was signed by 26 nations around the world; these ranged from governments in exile from the Axis occupation to small nations far removed from the war. The Declaration officially recognized the Big Three and China as the "Four Powers",^[5] 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.^[6] Many more countries joined through to the final days of the war, including colonies and former Axis nations. After the war ended, the Allies, and the Declaration that bound them, would become the basis of the modern United Nations;^[7] one enduring legacy of the alliance is the permanent membership of the U.N. Security Council, which is made up exclusively of the principal Allied powers that won the war.