1932 (FRIDAY)
CHINA: Japanese forces from Manchukuo invade the Chinese province of Jehol as the Japanese seek to expand their influence in northern China.
1934 (SUNDAY)
ETHIOPIA: The Government invokes Article 5 of the Italo-Ethiopian treaty of friendship of 2 August 1928. (According to which the two Governments had agreed to "submit to a procedure of conciliation and arbitration any question which [might] arise between them and which it [had] not been possible to settle by the usual diplomatic means, without having recourse to force of arms."
1935 (MONDAY)
FRANCE: The Hoare-Laval plan published in the French press. In a last ditch effort to placate Italian demands in Ethiopia, the British Foreign Minister, Sir Samuel Hoare, and the French Premier, Pierre Laval, offer a proposal to the Italians for the partition of Ethiopia. The plan calls for the transfer of territory in Ethiopia, which includes Adua and Adigrat in northern Ethiopia and a significant portion of eastern Ethiopia, as well as the establishment of a special Italian economic zone, which includes most of southern Ethiopia. In return, the Ethiopians would receive a "corridor for camels" (a small sliver of territory to the Red Sea) between Eritrea and French Somaliland. The French and British abandon these proposals after a huge outcry from the British public and Sir Samuel is forced to resign from office on 18 December.
UNITED KINGDOM: The major powers (France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K. and the U.S.) make one last attempt to reduce naval armaments by attending the League of Nations Second London Naval Conference. The French, Italians, and Japanese left the conference without agreeing to any naval reductions, while the treaty which results from the talks remains vague and full of loop holes.
1936 (WEDNESDAY)
GERMANY and POLAND: Polish-German negotiations about the League of Nations High Commissioner of Danzig began. (On 5 October, the League of Nations had asked Poland to seek an end of the situation in which the High Commissioner was unable to function.)
1938 (FRIDAY)
UNITED STATES: Prototype shipboard radar, designed and built by the Naval Research Laboratory, is installed on the battleship USS New York (BB-34).
December 9th, 1939 (SATURDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: Submarines HMS Union and ORP Sokol (ex-HMS Urchin) laid down.
FRANCE: Twenty seven year old Corporal Thomas Priday, of the 1st Battalion, King's Shropshire Light Infantry is killed at Metz, the first British fatality on the Western front.SWITZERLAND: Finland submits an aide-memoire (position paper) to the League of Nations.
POLAND: 200 Polish Jews exhausted and starving, tonight crossed the River Bug into Soviet-occupied Poland. The Jews, mainly middle-aged men from the cities of Hrubieszow and Chelm, have been "deported" - brutally force-marched - from their homes by the Germans. The march took a week, in which time 1,400 of the original 1,800 Jews were murdered, often by soldiers competing to see how many could be killed in a given time.
FINLAND: Helsinki: "General Winter", normally Russia's wartime ally, has come to the aid of the Finns. Bad weather has prevented Russian bombers from resuming the attacks on Helsinki which so badly damaged the Finnish capital in the first two days of war.
The respite has given the Finns a chance to organise their defences. The fires caused by incendiary devices have been put out, the rubble has been cleared, and the women and children who fled to the safety of the snow covered forest have been properly evacuated. Air-raid shelters have been prepared, fire-fighting teams set up, patients evacuated from hospitals.
110 people died in the first raids, but their deaths and the photographs of the devastation, far from sapping the Finn's morale have served to strengthen their determination to fight. As is evident in the Finnish Air Force. 36 Fokker DXXI fighters backed up by obsolete Bristol Bulldogs, have torn into the Soviet aircraft over the battle front. The Finns tactics are simple, but effective, they charge into the middle of the Soviet formations causing them to scatter, then pick off the individual aircraft.
Help is on its way to the Finns. Britain is sending 30 Gloster Gladiators and a volunteer squadron of Swedish pilots is being formed.
U.S.S.R.: Moscow: Russia discovers that Italy is sending military supplies
to Finland via Germany.
Stavka (the Soviet high command) takes over the direct command of all troops
fighting against Finland. So far the war has been conducted locally by the Military
District of Leningrad.
GIBRALTER: U.S. freighter SS Explorer is detained at Gibraltar by British authorities.
U.S.A.: Destroyer USS Gleaves launched.
WEST INDIES: In the Netherlands West Indies, the German tanker SS Nordmeer sails from Curaçao.
ATLANTIC OCEAN: