Transcript Part One: - Schoolwires

Chapter Twenty-Five
World War II, 1941–1945
Section 1:
Los Alamos, New Mexico
Los Alamos

The Manhattan Project created a community of scientists
whose mission was to build the atomic bomb

The scientists and their families lived in the remote, isolated
community of Los Alamos

They formed a close-knit community, united by antagonism
toward the Army and secrecy from the outside world

Led by J. Robert Oppenheimer, the scientists developed a
strong sense of camaraderie as they struggled to develop the
atomic bomb.
U.S
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
Section 2
The Coming of
World War II
The Shadows of War

The global character of the Great Depression
accelerated a breakdown in the political order

Militaristic authoritarian regimes that had emerged in
Japan, Italy, and Germany threatened peace throughout
the world

Japan took over Manchuria and then invaded China
 They began their full-scale invasion in 1937

Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini wanted to
expand his boundaries
 made Ethiopia a colony
 Took power in 1922 and declared “ we have buried
the putrid corpse of liberty”

When Hitler started to rebuild Germany’s
armed forces he was rejecting the Versailles
Treaty

German aggression against Czechoslovakia
threatened to force Britain and France into
the war
 This action received the most attention
from the Western powers

In 1935 Hitler enacted the Nuremberg
Laws
 This denied civil rights to Jews

Hitler brought attention from the West
when is seized Czechoslovakia

Hitler's assertions
 National Socialism means peace-slogan
 Racial superiority of Aryans
 German self-determination in
Czechoslovakia
 Racial inferiority of the Jews
Isolationism

By the mid-1930s many Americans had concluded
that entry into WWI and an active foreign role for
the United States had been a serious mistake

College students protested against the war

The Great Depression allowed demagogues to
raise fear and hatred of others

Congress passed the Neutrality Acts (5
acts) to limit the sale of munitions to
warring countries

Prominent Americans urged a policy of
“America First” to promote nonintervention. FDR promoted military
preparedness, despite little national support.
Roosevelt Readies for War

The combined German-Soviet invasion of Poland plunged
Europe into war.
 The Soviet Union divided Poland with Germany and
attacked Finland

German blitzkrieg techniques quickly led to takeovers of
Denmark, Norway, and later Belgium and France.
 Blitzkrieg was strategy that used fast-moving columns of
tanks supported by air power

As the Nazi air force pounded Britain, FDR pushed for
increased military expenditures.

Since 1940 was an election year, FDR
claimed these were for “hemispheric
defense.” After winning his third term,
FDR expanded American involvement

FDR met with British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill and drafted the Atlantic
Charter


This was a statement of war aims such as free trade,
disarmament, and freedom from fear, want, and
tyranny
The Lend-Lease Act was passed in 1941
that allowed FDR to provide aid to Britain

Before Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt seemed to
bend United States neutrality to help the
Allies in these ways
 Permitting the sale of arms to Britain,
France, & China
 Transferring surplus United States
airplanes to Britain
 Joining Churchill in issuing the Atlantic
Charter

The Atlantic Charter identified war aims
principles of free trade, disarmament and
freedom from fear, want, and tyranny
Pearl Harbor

The Japanese threatened to seize Europe’s
Asian colonies

FDR cut off trade with Japan

Japan attacked the base in Pearl Harbor

The United States declared war; declarations
against Germany and Italy followed.

The Japanese attack Pearl Harbor
 Pearl Harbor, Hawaii was the site if the
United States Navy’s main Pacific bases
 Under the command of Vice Admiral
Nagumo was 6 aircraft carriers, 360
airplanes, battleships, cruisers &
submarines
 The attack was a complete surprise
 December 7, 1941

Results of the Attack
 2,500 killed
 8 battleships damaged
 3 destroyers unusable
 3 cruisers damaged
 160 aircraft destroyed
 128 aircraft damaged
 The battle fleet was knocked out for 6 months
 Allowing the Japanese to get their raw materials
from their newly conquered territories
The aircraft carriers were out at sea at the
time and were not damaged
 The USS Arizona, The USS Oklahoma &
the USS Utah suffered irreparable
damage

Section 3
Arsenal of Democracy
Mobilizing for War

Congress and FDR created laws and new
agencies to promote mobilization

The Office of War Information controlled
war news and promoted morale at home. War
bonds were used to promote support as well
as raise funds

As mobilization proceeded, New Deal
agencies vanished.

The War Powers Act of December 1941
 Let the president censor news and restrict
civil liberties
 Allowed the president to create new
agencies
 Permit the president to seize property
owned by foreigners

Federal Agencies that were concerned with
controlling information to influence the
public, the economy, or the war effort were
 Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI)
 Office of War Information (OWI)
 Office of War Mobilization (OWM)
 War Manpower Commission
 National War Labor Board
 Office of Price Administration
Organizing the Economy

The industrial capacity of the United States was the
decisive factor in the war

Civilian firms were converted to war purposes and
American industries were primed for all-out production

An unprecedented economic boom pulled the country
out of the depression.

The largest firms, especially those in the West and
South, received large shares of wartime contracts

The war increased farm profits, but thousands of small
farms disappeared.

WWII brought an
 Increase in the movement of people
around the country
 Weakening of farm tenancy in the South
 Mobilization of nearly 16 million to take
advantage of wartime jobs
New Workers

The demand for labor brought Mexicans,
Indians, African Americans, and women into
the industrial labor force

The entry of these new female workers broke
down many stereotypes

Workers’ wages went up, but not as fast as
profits or prices.
Wartime Strikes

Prior to American entry, militant unions had led a
number of strikes

Once the United States entered the war, the major
unions:
agreed to no-strike pledges
 increased their membership and won new benefits


African-American union membership doubled

Some illegal strikes did break out, leading to federal
antistrike legislation.
Section 4
The Home Front
Families in Wartime

The war spurred marriage rates

Shortages of housing and retail goods added to the
difficulties families encountered

With one-parent households increasing, child-care
issues arose. Some day-care assistance was available,
though it scarcely met people’s needs

The rise in unsupervised youths created problems with
juvenile crime. The availability of jobs led to higher
high school dropout rates

Public health improved greatly during the war.
The Internment of Japanese Americans

In 1942, more than 112,000 Japanese were
removed from their homes in the West to
relocation centers, often enduring harsh
living conditions

The internment of West Coast Japanese
Americans included almost everyone with
at least one Japanese grandparent

The Supreme Court upheld the policy,
though in 1988 the U.S. Congress voted for
reparations and public apologies.
“Double V”: Victory at Home &
Abroad

African-American activists launched a “Double V”
campaign calling for victory overseas and equal rights at
home

FDR responded to a threatened march on Washington by
banning racial discrimination in defense industries.

Langston Hughes wrote in a poem how long he will have
to fight “ both Hitler-and Jim Crow”

New civil rights organizations emerged while older
ones grew.
 Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) was formed
they conducted non-violent sit-ins at restaurants in
northern cities during WWII

More than 1 million blacks left the South to take jobs
in war industries

They often encountered violent resistance from local
whites
Zoot-Suit Riots

Whites’ bitter resentment against Mexican Americans
exploded in 1943

The zoot-suit riots erupted when whites concluded that
Mexican youths who wore the flamboyant clothes were
unpatriotic

Most Mexican Americans served in the military or worked in
war industries

The zoot-suit riots led Mexican Americans to fear internment
Popular Culture and the “Good War”

Popular culture seemed to bridge the racial divisions

Southerners moving to northern cities brought
musical styles and changed the sound of popular
culture

Popular entertainment, whether in film or comic
books, emphasized the wartime spirit, as did
fashion.
Section 5
Men and Women in
Uniform
Creating the Armed Forces

Even before formally entering the war, the
government had begun a draft

The officer corps, except for General
Eisenhower, tended to be professional,
conservative, and autocratic

Junior officers were trained in special
military schools and developed close ties
with their troops.

The Selective Service screed out the
illiterate and emotionally disturbed
Women Enter the Military

For the first time, the War Department created
women’s divisions of the major services

Most women stayed in the country and performed
clerical or health-related duties. Some flew planes
and others went into combat with the troops

The military closely monitored sexual activity and
practiced racial segregation

By 1945, the majority of women workers wanted to continue
to work at the jobs that they had
Old Practices and New Horizons

Despite suspicions of the military’s racism,
1 million African Americans served in the armed forces

These soldiers encountered segregation at every point

Many racial or ethnic minorities (along with homosexuals)
also served and often found their experience made them feel
more included in American society

In Europe, American troops met a mixed welcome, in part
dictated by their actions
The Medical Corps

The risk of injury was much higher than that
of getting killed in battle

Battle fatigue also was a problem

The Army depended on a variety of medical
personnel to care for sick and wounded
soldiers

The true heroes of the battlefront were the
medics attached to each infantry battalion.
Prisoners of War

POWs held in German camps were treated
much better than those held by the Japanese

This treatment, along with racism, led
Americans to treat Japanese POWs more
harshly than those captured in the European
theater
Section 6
The World at War
The War in Europe

Beginning in 1941, the brunt of the war for
the Allies in Europe fell on the Soviet
Union
Soviets Halt Nazi Drive

During the first year of American involvement,
FDR called the war news “all bad.” The burden of
fighting the Nazis fell to the Soviets who blocked
the German advance on Moscow

The Soviets broke the siege of Stalingrad in
February 1943 and began to push the Germans
back.
 1942-1943 on the Volga River
 In a Russia industrial city
 This was the turning point of the War in Europe

Stalin & the Soviet Union complained
about
 A delay in the second front
 Allies bombing campaign
 Would they enter the war in the Pacific
 Casablanca Policy of unconditional
surrender
The Allied Offensive

Although the Soviets appealed for the Allies to open up a
“second front” in western Europe, they instead attacked
North Africa and Italy

Churchill and FDR met in Casablanca and agreed to seek
an unconditional German surrender

American and British planes poured bombs on German
cities that:


weakened the economy
undermined civilian morale
The Allied Invasion of Europe

The Allied invasion forced Italy out of the war, though
German troops stalled Allied advances

Uprisings against Nazi rule tied up German power

By early 1944, Allied units were preparing for the DDay assault on France.
 Operation Overlord is the name given to Allied
invasion

Paris was taken on August 25, 1944. France
and other occupied countries fell as Allied
units overran the Germans
 Charles de Gaulle was the leader of the
Free French forces

The Battle of the Bulge temporarily halted
the Allied advance
 This was the last major German attack on
the Western Front

On May 8, 1945, Germany surrendered

D-Day
The War in Asia and the Pacific

In the Pacific theater Allied forces stopped Japanese
advances by June 1942

Naval battles and island hopping brought U.S. forces
closer to the Japanese home islands.
 Island hopping is strategy of taking one strategic
atoll after another

The Battle of Midway that ended Japan’s
threat to Hawaii
 This was the turning point for the war in
the Pacific

The bloodiest battle in the Pacific was
Okinawa

Victories in the Philippines, Iwo Jima, and
Okinawa enabled the Allies to bomb
Japanese cities

Britain and the United States pressed for
rapid surrender to prevent the Soviets from
taking any Japanese-held territories.

Iwo Jima
 Tiny volcanic island
 700 miles from Japan
 November-air attacks from the
Americans
 25,000 Japanese that were on the
island only 126 were captured
 The rest of them fought to the death
 27 medals of honor were awarded to
this group of American soldiers

Okinawa
 April-June 1945
 350 miles from Japan
 100,000 Japanese pledged to fight to the death
 Japan had 2,000 kamikazes vs. Americans 1,300
warships and 180,000 troops
 American soldiers made Banzai charges- these are
where they try to kill as many of the enemies as
possible until they get killed
 After 3 months 7,200 Japanese surrendered
 Americans had over 50,000 casualties
 Bloodiest battle in the Pacific
Section 7
The Last Stages of
the War
The Holocaust

The German decrees of 1935 that denied civil
rights to Jews are known as the Nuremberg
Laws

The horror of the Nazi’s systematic
extermination of 6 million Jews, 250, 000
Gypsies, 60,000 homosexuals, and other
“inferior” races was slow to enter American
consciousness.

. Hitler preaches Hate
 Anti-Semitism-prejudice & discrimination
against Jewish people
 Hitler blamed Jews for all the bad things
that had happened to Germany
 Communism
 Inflation
 Abstract painting
 The defeat of WWI

Nazi begin the Persecution
 As soon as Hitler gained power he started to
exterminate the Jews
 Urged Germans to boycott Jewish-owned
business
 Jews were banned from civil service, banking,
the stock exchange, law, journalism, & medicine
 Nuremburg laws
 Denied German citizenship to Jews
 Banned marriage between Jews & non-Jews
 Segregated Jews
Hitler already coming up with a final
solution for the Jews
 Newspapers were controlled by Hitler
and stated that the Jews were bad
 Children were taught that Jews were
polluting German society & culture


Jewish Refugees face Obstacles
 1933-1937 more than 120,000 Jews fled
Germany & Nazi controlled Austria
 Including Albert Einstein
 Some Jews were not welcomed into other
countries
 The Great Depression was still going on
 The U.S. and other countries would not let
Jews into their countries

Nazi’s build concentration camps
 1933 is when the first concentration camp was
opened
 This is where specific groups of people are
confined
 The camps were designed to contain the people
not kill them
 Jews as well as Aryans that were involved with
Jews were sent here
 Others included: Gypsies, Jehovah’s witness,
homosexuals, drunks, disabled and people with
mental illness
People were tattooed numbers on the arms
of the prisoners and dressed them in
vertically striped uniforms
 People were killed by:
 Torture
 Starvation diseases medical
experiments
• Oxygen deprivation
• Hypothermia
• Effects of altitude

Many concentration camps were also death
camps
 Extermination camps
 The largest death camp was in southern
Poland-Auschwitz
 Prisoners were transported by trains to the
death camps to be murdered
 They were forced into death chambers
where carbon monoxide was pumped
 They also crammed in shower like facilities
Where Zyklon B was released

In death camps that did not have gas
chambers the Nazi guards would just shoot
the Jews and bury them in ditches
 The bodies of there murdered prisoners
were further desecrated
 Human fat was turned into soap
 Human Hair was woven into wigs,
mattress & slippers
 Cash, gold fillings & wedding rings
were taken off of the Jews
 Then the bodies were burned

Auschwitz

Allied Soldiers Liberate the Camps
 The Nazi crime became real once they
started to liberate the concentration camps
 The bodies, the human hair, jewelry and
the ashes
 The finally realized the extremity of the
genocide
 Many survivors found temporary or
permanent residence in the U.S.
The Yalta Conference

The “Big Three” attempted to hammer out the shape
of the postwar world

The ideals of the Atlantic Charter fell before Soviet
and British demands for spheres of influence

FDR continued to hold on to his idealism, but his
death in April cast a shadow over hopes for peaceful
solutions to global problems.

At the Yalta Conference
 The Big Three agreed to the “spheres of
influence”
 Stalin agreed to enter the war with Japan
 The United States and Great Britain
agreed to allow Soviet troops to occupy
countries they were already in

Potsdam conference
 Last of the Allies wartime conference
 July 17-August 2, 1945
 Germany
The Atomic Bomb

The new president, Harry S. Truman, lacked FDR’s finesse and
planned a get-tough policy with the Soviet Union

At Potsdam, Germany little progress was made on planning the
future.
 This was the last of the Allies wartime conference held
from July 17 to August 2, 1945

Truman decided to use nuclear weapons
against the Japanese

Truman was aware that the war could have
been brought to a peaceful conclusion with
only a slight modification in policy

Truman claimed the use of the bomb would
substantially shorten the war and save
American lives.



The Year is 1945 and the Japanese have not yet
surrendered. You are President Harry Truman.
Your advisors have informed you that forcing a
Japanese surrender through continued
conventional fighting may cost as many as one
million American lives. You have another option:
Dropping the newly developed atomic bomb on
Japan, thereby killing hundreds of thousands of
Japanese.
Which option do you choose?
WHY?

Attack on Nagasaki