Italy showing envy the successes of Germany in 1940, and Mussolini declares war on Britain and France on June 10.
Two hundred thousand Italian troops attacked Greece from the territory that Italy had in Albania on 28 October 1940. The Greek army proved to be stronger than Mussolini and his generals had expected. The advance of Italian troops was not only eliminated but were expelled from Greece and sent to Albania.
Hitler was furious, since Mussolini had not bothered to inform him of this operation. At the time that Hitler planned to attack the Soviet Union in the spring of 1941, the Italians advanced, leaving the southern front dangerously exposed. At this time, Hitler postponed the invasion of the USSR operation to maintain control over the Balkans.
Adolf Hitler's forces attacked Greece and Yugoslavia on April 6, 1941. The front Metaxas, a fortress in the Greco-Bulgarian frontier, the Germans stopped until Yugoslavia fell on April 17. Thus, the Germans could move to Greece for Yugoslavia, encircling the Greek positions.
Hitler still had to use the forces that were preparing for the invasion of the Soviet Union for the destruction of the Greek resistance. With this, Athens fell on April 27.
The roughly 43,000 of Commonwealth forces were evacuated to Crete and Egypt. For lack of naval power, the Germans studied ways to eliminate the threat from Crete. For this, the German commander Kurt Student had the solution. He began planning an invasion of Crete by air.
Greece was occupied by Nazi Germany until the year 1944. These were withdrawing some troops as they were needed to replace losses in France and the USSR. Almost immediately, the Greeks began to convert to the pro-Western factions and Communists, is starting a civil war. Churchill, who saw the establishment of democracy in Greece, sent troops to maintain order. After the Second World War, the United States of America, supported the pro-Western in the prolonged civil war.
The english version of this article will be available soon. In the meanwhile, the text above was the result of a Google translation from portuguese version to english.