I want to know what you all think was the true turning point of WW2 and I am talking Western Theatre. We all know that Midway was the turning point of the Pacific Theatre. There are many ideas as to where it was but I want to know what you people think was the turning point.

I personally say it Stalingrad for that began the gradual push of the Germans from the Soviet Union and all the way to Berlin.

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I agree. Stalingrad was a massive turning point, and is what started the beginning of the end. Another big one was the Battle of Kursk, more specifically, the Battle of Prokhorovka.

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I'm going to say Pearl Harbor for both theaters. The Japanese woke up a sleeping giant that day, dooming Germany and Japan to defeat eventually

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I go with the Battle of Britain. It kept the possibility of a Western Front open, and the British Isles became an excellent base for Allied troops, ships, and aircraft, from which they were deployed to Africa and eventually France.

1441572 I'd have to say...the Battle of El Alamein. By forcing Germany to focus more on taking Egypt, it left them unprepared for the landings of Operation Torch. Once the Americans established a front, Germany had to split the Afrika Korps forces against two large and hard fighting armies. The liberation of North Africa gave the Allies a perfect position to invade Southern Europe, which put the squeeze on Germany and made fighting the Allies in their subsequent pushes and invasions far more difficult. Especially with so much less oil in German reserves.

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I've always stuck to the fact that it was the beginning of operation Barberossa, and the German invasion of Russia. They did it at the wrong time and hadn't consolidated the rest of their holdings. It may have taken them a while to lose big battles like Stalingrad and Kursk, but as soon as they set boots on the ground in Russia, they were doomed to fail, as they couldn't keep the momentum of their blitzkrieg attacks up over such a large area. That, and Hitler being a moron and diverting the troops from the Caucasus oil fields to attack Stalingrad meant the rest of his army didn't have fuel, making the Panzer divisions inefficient if not useless.

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I got to say that your answers were...surprising because I realized that I should have thought about them.

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El Alamein was probably the first decisive land victory for the Western Allies (not including Russia) as it set in motion the falling of the Afrika Korps and like you said the eventual invasion of Sicily and Italy. It was a major turning point for the Western Allies (not including Russia) and basically started General Montgomery's WW2 career.

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You are completely right in saying that Hitler was doomed to fail when that operation began. One could also trace it back to his helping of the Italians in Greece and his moving of resources to the Balkans to try and subdue the partisans. Barbarossa was actually well planned out but failed to be launched at the right time. It might not have been a turning point per say but it was the cause of the German downfall.

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It's actually near-impossible to point to a clear turning point.

Even after Stalingrad, if Germany hadn't been fighting the West, they could have played a defensive role. Hell, they still had enough power to try and pull Kursk off.

As for the West, it's even harder. El Alamein did finally stop their advance, but it wasn't a crushing blow. Landing in Italy didn't really do much. If I had to pick one, it would be D-Day; because for all intents and purposes, Germany lost the war then and there.

What people get confused about Midway is just how decisive it was. The Japanese did lose their main strike force, but with the force America was building, it was more of a matter of when and not if. Even so, the Japanese Navy was still very powerful.
Take the Solomons campaign, for example. There were seven naval battles, two or three of which were carrier battles. We lost two carriers and the other two were badly damaged, not to mention all the other ships lost in surface action. They really gave the navy a run for it's money, but we still somehow came out on top. From the Solomons onward, the Japanese truly couldn't expect victory.

1443551 I still think Monty was a little bitch. But then again, Patton was the man and I'm a dirty Yank.

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Oh I personally don't like Montgomery. I always thought he was mediocre compared to Patton, Rommel, and Guderian.