Japan during World War I Japan during World War I Japan participated in World War I from 1914 to 1918 in an alliance with Entente Powers and played an important role in securing the sea lanes in the West Pacific and Indian Oceans against the Imperial German Navy as the member of the Allies. Politically, the Japanese Empire seized the opportunity to expand its sphere of influence in China, and to gain recognition as a great power in postwar geopolitics. Japan's military, taking advantage of the great distances and Imperial Germany's preoccupation with the war in Europe, seized German possessions in the Pacific and East
War crimes in occupied Poland during World War II at Chełmno according to postwar verdict by West Germany, although up to 340,000 victims were estimated by the Polish Main Commission for Investigation of German Crimes in Poland (GKBZNwP), a predecessor of the Institute of National Remembrance. Following the Wannsee Conference of 1942, as part of highly secretive Operation Reinhard in occupied Poland, the German government built three regular killing centres with stationary gas chambers. It was the most deadly phase of the Final Solution, based on implementing semi-industrial means of killing and incinerating people. The new facilities included Treblinka extermination camp (set up in July 1942), Bełżec (March 1942),