Transcript WW II - World Civ at DHS with Mrs. Thomsen

The end of WWII
Italy
 Allies win in North Africa
– July 1943
– Target Italy
 Sicily is taken
– Italian king arrests
Mussolini
– surrenders to the Allies
 Mussolini is rescued by
German
– Leads puppet government in
northern Italy.
Mussolini’s Demise
 Allies march into Milan
– Mussolini tries to flee the country disguised as a
German soldier
 Italian partisans stop the convoy & demand all
Italians be turned over.
– Mussolini & his mistress were handed over
 April 28,1945 both were shot & taken to Milan
for public display
– Hung upside down
The score…
 North Africa once again controlled by the Allies
 USSR once again controlled by the Allies
 Italy once again controlled by the Allies
 Britain STILL controlled by the Allies
– Let’s keep going!
D-Day
Normandy…
D-Day Invasion
 Thousands of planes, ships, tanks
and landing crafts
 3.5 million troops
 June 6th 1944
– five beaches
– 150,000 US, Canadian and UK
troops.
– 23,000 parachuted
Normandy…D-Day Invasion
 Losses…Allies 12,000. Germans 9,000.
 By late summer 1944, Paris is liberated.
 All the Allies move towards Germany.
Battle of the Bulge
 Begins on December 16, 1944 in the Ardennes Forest
(N. France/Belgium)
 Germany attacks with the hopes of dividing the Allies to
force a peace treaty favorable to the Axis
– Remember: the Germans used this strategy once before
 Germany concentrated its fighting in the center of the
Allied line due to its apparent weakness…causing a
“bulge” effect which gave the battle its name
Battle of the Bulge
Hitler’s Downfall
 Allies move to Berlin
– Hitler refuses to surrender
 Hitler relocates to the bunker under the Chancellery
in Berlin on winter of 1945.
 As the Soviets enter Berlin in April 1945
– Hitler marries Eva Braun
– two days later commits suicide
– his body is burned afterwards
 The German army surrenders May 7th, 1945. War
in Europe is over!
War comes to an end in Japan
Cost of War
 Iwo Jima=
– US casualties 25,000
– only 216 of the 25,000 Japanese soldiers surrendered.
 Okinawa=
– US casualties 50,000
– only 7,200 of the 100,000 Japanese defenders surrendered.
 Japan resorts to desperate measures using Kamikaze
pilots who would fly their planes into Allied ships
killing themselves in the process.
Invasion or the Bomb?
 May 8th, 1945 V-E Day (Victory in
Europe)
 By mid-1945, most of the Japanese
navy & air force destroyed.
– BUT—Japanese still had 2 million
soldiers.
• 1944—More Japanese men become
kamikaze or suicide pilots.
– The Japanese would fight to the death!
Option #1: Invasion
 Iwo Jima & Okinawa
– Critical bases
– bombers could
reach Japan
 ESTIMATED:
– Taking Japan would
cost 200,000-1
million US lives
and ½ million
British lives
Option #2:
Manhattan
Project
 1939—Albert Einstein writes a
letter to FDR warning him that
Germany might create an
atomic bomb.
 US starts Manhattan Project
– Headed by J. Robert
Oppenheimer
• In Los Alamos, NM
– First test bomb detonated July
1945 near Alamogordo, NM
• Shattered windows 125 miles
away.
National
Crisis…
 FDR died unexpectedly on
April 12, 1945
 Truman becomes the 33rd
president.
 Truman is made aware of the
Manhattan Project
Decision to use the Atomic Bomb
 President Harry S. Truman
orders the use of the Atom
Bomb to force Japan to
surrender.
– He argues it will save the lives of
American soldiers.
– He warns Japan to surrender or
face “utter and complete
destruction.”
• Japan ignores the USA
Hiroshima
 August 6, 1945
– US dropped Little Boy over
Hiroshima
– an enriched uranium bomb
code-named “Little Boy”
 Japan refused to surrender—they
thought the US only had 1 bomb!
Nagasaki
 Three days later, “Fat Man”,
a plutonium bomb, was
dropped on Nagasaki
 Japan finally surrendered
The War is OVER!!!
 Japan officially, unconditionally surrenders
on September 2, 1945. WWII is over.
Japan after the War
 2 million lives had been lost!
 Many of the major cities were
destroyed
 Allies had taken all of Japan’s
colonies
US occupation of Japan
 Japan’s emperor has to step down and they
have to create a democracy
– They are forced to create a constitution that
looks like the US
– Japan is only allowed to use a small military
(provided by the US)
Want some extra credit?
Write down these directions!
1. Go to www. http://www.pbs.org/thewar/
2. Browse through the pics and videos
3. Choose 10-15 pics and videos to read about, watch, etc.
Save each one by clicking “add to favorites”
4. Once you are done, click the “Share my favorites” button
and follow the on-screen directions to e-mail the
collection to a friend.
5. Add a one paragraph description of what you learned
from this site.
6. Email to Mrs. Thomsen at [email protected]. Email it
to me by Friday, May 18th for up to 20 points of Extra
Credit! Don’t forget to include your full name and period!