WW2 Tweets @RealTimeWWII@mastodon.muage.org

Even fictional Americans are getting ready for war. "Popeye the Sailor Man" has joined the US Navy in newly released cartoon. Watch: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5uts1s

"According to fascist race-theory, the true Aryan must be blond like Hitler, slim like Göring, & beautiful like Goebbels." (To mark UK-USSR alliance, British have started publishing Soviet anti-Nazi propaganda.)

United States takes another step toward open war at sea: US Congress have voted to arm American merchant ships & coastguard vessels, & to let them deliver war supplies straight into British ports- fighting German U-boats if attacked.

Stalin is demanding counter-attacks against Wehrmacht- he's obsessed with driving Germans back from the gates Moscow, despite Red Army's stretched & exhausted state.

Leningrad Zoo's tigers, vultures & owls are being kept alive on a diet of "ersatz rabbits": diced bran & potatoes soaked in a little bone broth, then sewn into rabbit skins.

Zookeeper Yevdokia Dashina hauls 40 buckets of water daily, by hand from Leningrad's River Neva, to keep Beauty the hippo happy:

In Leningrad Zoo, staff sleep on the premises to guard the animals from hungry citizens- Bettie the elephant has already been killed by a German bomb.

In besieged Leningrad, corpses of the weak who have starved to death are being abandoned in streets, as food runs out- daily bread ration is now just 125 grams/day.

After a gloomy conference in Orsha, Belarus, German high command have decided to attempt to seize Moscow this year, rather than wait out the winter- despite admitting that Wehrmacht is exhausted & Red Army still have 160 divisions ready for battle.

Crew are being evacuated from HMS Ark Royal as lower decks flood & she lists to one side- Britain's most famous warship, wrecked by a single Kriegsmarine torpedo.

With its internal communications smashed, Ark Royal's captain must give orders to 1500 crew via runners & bugle commands, & is unable to order an immediate stop. The lower decks are rapidly flooding as ship's motion forces more water in through holed hull.

Torpedo stuck Ark Royal's main telephone exchange, shutting down communications across the ship: crew struggling for exit hatch in pitch blackness, wading through mix of oil & seawater.

HMS Ark Royal, British aircraft carrier & "ship that sank the Bismarck" has been torpedoed by a German submarine off Gibraltar- she's crippled & listing:

Over ground hardened by frost, Germans are launching a last-ditch assault on Moscow, frantic to smash Soviet defenders before winter truly sets in.

Cigarette company taking advantage of American military buildup to advertise "Army Man's Favorite Cigarette- the Camel":

Freezing temperatures in USSR bring one advantage to Germans: Russian roads, until now rivers of mud thanks to heavy rains, have frozen & become usable for Wehrmacht advance.

Mueller: To avoid public scenes, "Russians unable to withstand a short walk to the camp shall be executed on the spot."

Gestapo chief Heinrich Mueller complains: "5-10% of Soviet prisoners collapse dead marching to concentration camps." It is impossible to prevent German civilians from noticing the deaths.

Winter gear is finally being issued to German troops in the USSR; due to shortages of previously "unneeded" equipment, just one greatcoat issued to each Wehrmacht artillery team- of four men.

Today is Polish Independence day. 23 years after becoming an independent state, Poland is now totally occupied by Nazi Germany. 150 Polish prisoners have been murdered in concentration camp of Auschwitz: https://twitter.com/AuschwitzMuseum/status/1193833713810976768