Transcript Significance of the Spanish American War (1898)

The US Drifts Toward War
 The
Neutrality Acts (1935-37)
 “Cash and Carry”
 First peacetime draft (1940)
All men 21 to 35 had to register
for one year’s military service
 Lend-Lease Act (1941)
The US Drifts Toward War
British Prime Minister
Winston S. Churchill
(1874-1965)
(1940-1945)
(1951-1955)
The US Drifts Toward War
USS Augusta off the
coast of
Newfoundland
 Atlantic Charter
(14 August 1941)

Some Points of the Charter
 No
aggrandizement, territorial or
other
 Freedom of the seas
 A new system of general security
 Right of all peoples to choose their
form of government
The US Drifts Toward War
Empire of Japan
and its Greater
East Asian CoProsperity Sphere
The US Drifts Toward War
Roosevelt imposed an embargo on
exports of strategic resources,
such as oil and metal, to Japan
(September 1941)
Japan Brings the US into the War
 Pearl
Harbor
Sunday,
7 December 1941
 Battleship Row—
USS Arizona and
Oklahoma
destroyed
2,403
Americans
killed; 1,178
wounded
 Japanese
mistakes:
 Fixated upon
the battleships
 Fuel
dumps
were not
bombed
 Repair facilities
untouched
 USS
West Virginia and California
refloated and repaired
 USS Maryland, Pennsylvania,
Tennessee, and Nevada repaired
No aircraft
carriers were
present,
specifically USS
Lexington,
Saratoga, and
Enterprise
US declared war on the
Empire of Japan
(8 December 1941)
“With confidence in our
armed forces—with
the unbounding
determination of our
people—we will gain
the inevitable
triumph—so help us
God.” — FDR
 Nazi
Germany declared war on the
US (11 December 1941)
 Japanese attacked multiple
targets:
 Philippines attacked by air
World War II in the Pacific
 Guam
(10
December)
 Wake Island
 Philippines fell
(8 April 1942)
World War II in the Pacific
General Douglas
MacArthur
(1880-1964)
World War II in the Pacific
 The
Doolittle
Raid
 LTC Jimmy
Doolittle
(1896-1993)
World War II in the Pacific
 Why
the Doolittle Raid?
 Psychological for Japan and the US
 Japan protected by the kamikaze
(divine wind)
World War II in the Pacific
16 B-25 Bombers
brought into
striking distance
of Japan by the
carrier USS
Lexington
World War II in the Pacific
Naval task
force was
spotted by a
Japanese
fishing boat
Doolittle Raid
bombed preassigned
targets in
TokyoYokohama,
Nagoya, and
Osaka-Kobe
areas
(18 April 1942)
Doolittle received a
hero’s welcome in
the US and a
promotion to
Brigadier General
Coral Sea (7-8 May 1942)
Battle was fought by Naval aviators who
took off from the decks of aircraft
carriers
Japanese Carrier HIJMS Shoho after torpedo hit
Helldivers return to the USS Hornet (January 1945)
Midway
(4-5 June 1942)
In addition
to Mikuma,
Japan lost
four carriers,
Akagi, Kaga,
Hiryu, and
Soryu
Japanese Heavy Cruiser HIJMS
Mikuma burns at Midway
Carrier USS
Yorktown
(lost after the
battle ended)
US Strategy in the Pacific
 General
Douglas
MacArthur
 Southwest Pacific
US Strategy in the Pacific
 Admiral
Chester
W. Nimitz
(1885-1966)
 Central Pacific
 Island hopping
Admiral
Nimitz
General
MacArthur
President
Roosevelt
1944
Admiral
Leahy
Roosevelt’s
Chief of Staff
 Tarawa
(20-24 November 1943)
 Code of Bushido
 Saipan (15 June-13 July 1944)
Leyte Gulf—
Japanese
introduced
kamikaze
pilots
Battleship USS Missouri under attack
FDR’s failing health was obvious at
the Yalta Conference (12 Feb 1945)
Death of Franklin Roosevelt
 FDR
died on
12 April 1945
 Harry S Truman
(1884-1972)
(1945-1953)
The Atomic Bomb
Trinity test, the
first nuclear
explosion
(Alamogordo,
New Mexico
16 July 1945)
The Atomic Bomb
B-29 Super
Fortress Enola
Gay dropped
“Little Boy”
on Hiroshima
(6 August)
The Atomic Bomb
 60,000
killed
 Four-square
miles destroyed
The Atomic Bomb
Bock’s Car
dropped
“Fat Man”
on Nagasaki
(9 August)
The Atomic Bomb
 70,000
 Japan
killed
surrendered
(15 August)
Japanese Surrender
Official surrender
aboard the
USS Missouri
anchored in
Tokyo Harbor
(2 September)