Transcript Rise of Dictators and WWII

Rise of Dictatorships
Totalitarianism and WWII
1939-1945
U.S. Following WWI
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Prosperity (on the surface)
 Consumer spending, new products
 Buying on credit (buy now, pay later)
 Strong stock market
 The Roaring Twenties
Reality
 Buying stocks with credit (on margin)
 Overproduction of goods – prices fell
 Farmers struggling – couldn’t get high prices
 Stock Market Crash! October 29, 1929
 THE GREAT DEPRESSION
Post War Uncertainty
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Unstable democracies, lots of political
parties and coalitions; war debts
Socialist/Communist groups strengthen –
view capitalism as a failure (Depression)
Germany – Weimar Republic (unpopular)
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No democratic history in Germany
Inflation – value of mark declines dramatically
U.S. loans money to Germany
Rise of Dictatorships
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Worldwide depression
Millions lose faith in democratic systems
Turn to totalitarian leaders:
Mussolini – Italy
Hitler – Germany
Franco – Spain
Stalin – USSR
Hirohito/Tojo - Japan
Italy
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Benito Mussolini – Fascist Party - 1923
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Il Duce – The Leader
Blackshirts – private army; terrorized people
Extreme nationalism – vowed to revive the
glory of the Roman Empire
Popularity increases as economy worsens
1922 King Victor Emmanuel “steps down”
Germany
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Adolf Hitler – Nazi Party
 Der Fuhrer – The Leader
 Beer Hall Putsch 1923 – attempts to take over govt.
 In jail, writes Mein Kampf (My Struggle)
 Brown Shirts (SA – Storm Troopers), Gestapo (SS)
(Heinrich Himmler)
 Chancellor in 1933 – Hindenburg “steps down”
 Terror and intimidation; propaganda (Joseph
Goebbels), Hitler youth, education, media
 The Third Reich
Germany cont.
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Aryans were the “master race”
Germany needed lebensraum (living
space)
Totalitarian state
Anti-Semitism – against Jews
USSR & Japan
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Joseph Stalin (Man of Steel)
Control over industry, farms
Millions die under forced labor, collective
farms, prisons
Japan – Emperor Hirohito
Heideki Tojo – military leader takes control
Spain
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Fascist leader Francisco Franco
(Nationalists) revolts against government
Hitler and Mussolini send troops
Hitler tests new weapons on Spain
Franco becomes dictator – remains
neutral in the war
Axis Aggression - Japan
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Japan desperately needed raw materials
Seizes Manchuria 1931
Invades China 1937
Wants to expand in the Pacific
Axis Aggression - Italy
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Mussolini wants a colonial empire
Invades Ethiopia 1935
Later Albania, Libya
League of Nations does nothing
Axis Aggression - Germany
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1. 1936 - German troops
occupy the Rhineland
2. 1938 – Germany annexes
Austria – Anschluss
3. Sudetenland
(Czechoslovakia)
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Germany needs lebensraum
Munich 1938 – appeasement
Neville Chamberlain (British
Prime Minister) gives in
4. Germany takes rest of
Czech. 6 months later
Europe Goes to War
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5. Germany signs
non-aggression pact
(Nazi-Soviet Pact)
with USSR 1939
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Stalin + Hitler
Agree to divide
Poland
6. Sept. 1, 1939 –
Germany invades
Poland
WWII begins
Europe Goes to War
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Blitzkrieg (“lightening
war”)
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Hitler crushes Poland
Stalin takes half of Poland
for USSR (communist)
French build up Maginot
Line - defenses
April 9, 1940 –
Denmark,
Norway, Netherlands, Belgium fall
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Takes Paris on June 14,
1940
Evacuation (“Miracle”) at
Dunkirk to England
War cont.
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Battle of Britain
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Luftwaffe vs. Royal Air
Force (RAF)
Great acts of
individual bravery
June 1940 – June
1941 – 30,000
Londoners killed
Winston Churchill
rallies England
Hitler’s first defeat
Americans Debate
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Was WWI a mistake?
Was it about big industries making money off
war?
Isolationists debate the interventionists
Neutrality Act 1939
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Cash & carry – nations could buy from U.S. if they
paid cash & used own ships (pro ally)
Lend Lease Act - loans to allies
Atlantic Charter – deepening alliance w/Britain; self
determination of nations
Hitler orders attacks on U.S. ships
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Japan Builds an Empire
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Japan
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American Response
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Invades Manchuria; other
Pacific Islands 30’s & 40’s
FDR moves Pacific fleet to
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
Threatens Japan’s
expansion
America remains neutral
Embargo (oil); Japanese
assets frozen
Japan Attacks Pearl
Harbor
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December 7, 1941 – “a date
which will live in infamy”
U.S. enters World War II
Pearl Harbor
Fighting in Italy and North Africa
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German General
Erwin Rommel –
“Desert Fox”
Leads Afrika Corps
Panzer units (tanks)
Defeated by GB at
Battle of El Alamein
(Bernard Montgomery
– GB)
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George Patton takes
Sicily; North Africa
Italy surrenders
Mussolini killed by
anti-fascists
War in the Soviet Union
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3.6 million Germans
attack in 1941
Operation Barbarossa
Scorched earth policy
Bitter winter
Battle of Stalingrad
Red Army launches
massive assault; victory
for USSR
Turning point in war
What is this?
Invasion of Western Europe
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Build up of troops in GB
D-Day (June 6, 1944)
 Operation Overlord
 Largest landing force in
history invades Normandy,
France
 Dwight D. Eisenhower –
Supreme Allied
Commander
Battle of the Bulge
 1944 – Hitler’s last chance
to defend Germany
 Costly for U.S.
 Patton stops Germans
War Ends in Europe
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The Soviets Advance
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Move on Berlin
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U.S. moves from west
Soviets move from east
Soviets take Berlin in
April 1945
Germany Surrenders
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Hitler commits suicide
on May 1, 1945
Germany surrenders
on May 8, 1945
V-E Day (Victory in
Europe Day)
War Ends in Europe cont.
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The Yalta Conference
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Stalin, Churchill, and FDR
(the big three) make
postwar plans
Divide Germany into 4
zones
Stalin promised to join war
against Japan
Also to hold free elections
Potsdam Conference
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Truman told Stalin about a
nuclear weapon
War in the Pacific
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The Japanese
advance
The Philippines fall
General Macarthur
forced to leave (“I
shall return”)
Bataan Death March
The Battle of Coral
Sea
First aircraft carrier
battle
Prevented attack of
Australia
War in the Pacific
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Allied victories turn the
tide
The Battle of Midway
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Iwo Jima and Okinawa
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Destroy 4 Jap. ships
Key victories
Kamikaze fighters
Island hopping to Japan
War Ends in Pacific
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The Manhattan Project –
secret project to develop
an atomic bomb (J. Robert
Oppenheimer)
Los Alamos – test site
FDR dies – Truman makes
decision to drop the bomb
August 6, 1945 - “Little Boy”
dropped on Hiroshima
August 9, 1945 - “Fat Man”
dropped on Nagasaki
Sept. 2, 1945 – Japan
signs surrender
Hiroshima
Japanese Internment
Camps
Japanese Americans put into
camps
Fear of spying
Liberation
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Soviet and American
troops come upon
Nazi concentration
camps
World begins to learn
about the Holocaust
Genocide
“Final Solution”
Europe and Japan in Ruins
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Over 50 million Europeans dead, 2/3 of them
civilians
Physical destruction of land and cities
Refugees, displaced persons, search for
Holocaust survivors
Nuremberg Trials – 22 charged with war crimes,
only one expressed remorse
Occupation of Japan (MacArthur)
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Demilitarization
Democratization
Losses – Includes civilians
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USSR – 25,000,000 (17,000,000 civilians!)
Germany – 7,000,000 (10,000 civilians)
Poland – 6,800,000
China – 11,300,000
Japan – 1,800,000
France – 810,000
Great Britain – 388,000
Italy – 410,000
U.S. – 295,000