Transcript World War II Beating the Germans - The Official Site

WORLD WAR II
Beating the Germans
THE CASABLANCA CONFERENCE






From January 14 to January 24, 1943, the first war
conference between the Allied Powers, was held in
Casablanca, Morocco. (Africa)
The purpose of the conference was relatively vague. It
took steps toward planning the allied strategy and the
end of the war.
Initially, it was to be a Big Three meeting between
Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin.
It became a Big Two meeting when Stalin declined
the invitation.
With his country besieged by both Hitler and the
harsh winter, Stalin didn't feel that he could leave.
Even without Stalin, or perhaps due to his absence,
the Casablanca Conference was successful.
No sitting President had ever been to Africa, nor had
a U.S. President ever left the country during a time of
war. But in the middle of January 1943, FDR became
the first President to do both.
How and when Roosevelt left the U.S. and arrived in
Morocco was kept secret. The President's trip itself
wasn't disclosed to the public until he was already
safely back in Washington.
NEW BOMBING CAMPAIGN

At the Casablanca Conference, FDR & Churchill
agreed to step up the bombing of Germany - the
goal of this new campaign was “the progressive
destruction of the German military, industrial,
and economic system, and the undermining of the
morale of the German people.”
INVADING SICILY

The Allies agreed to
attack the Axis of the
island of Sicily –
Churchill called Italy
the “soft underbelly”
of Europe and was
convinced that the
Italians would quit
the war if the Allies
invaded their
homeland.
INVADING THE SOFT UNDERBELLY
Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower was placed in overall
command of the invasion
 The invasion began before dawn on July 10, 1943
– despite bad weather, the Allied troops made it
ashore with few casualties thanks to the new
vehicle, the DUKW (an amphibious truck)
 8 days after troops came ashore, US tanks
smashed through enemy lines & captured the
western half of the island

• By August 18, Germans had evacuated the island
GENERAL DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
DUKW
ITALY SURRENDERS
The attack of Sicily created a crisis within the
Italian government.
 Victor Emmanuel, the Italian king & a group of
Italian Generals decided it was time to get rid of
Mussolini
 On July 25, 1943, the king invited Mussolini to
his palace & placed him under arrest & the new
Italian government began secretly negotiating
with the Allies for Italy’s surrender
 On September 8, 1943, Italy publicly announced
its surrender

Hitler was not about to loose Italy
 German troops went into action at once & seized
control of northern Italy, including Rome, attacked the
Americans at Salerno, and put Mussolini back in
power.

THE ITALIAN CAMPAIGN
To stop the Allied advance,
the German army took up
positions neat the heavily
fortified town of Cassino
with steep, barren, & rocky
terrain.
 Instead of attacking such
difficult terrain, the Allies
chose to land at Anzio
behind German lines hoping
to force them to retreat.

Instead of retreating, the Germans surrounded
the Allied troops near Anzio
 It took the Allies 5 months to break through the
German lines at Cassino & Anzio
 Finally in May 1944, the Germans were forced to
retreat
 The Italian campaign was one of the bloodiest in
the war – it cost the Allies more than 300,000
casualties

MUSSOLINIS FATE
On September 12, 1943, two months after he was
stripped of power, Mussolini was rescued by the
Germans in Operation Oak.
 The Germans relocated Mussolini to northern
Italy.
 After yielding to pressures from Hitler and the
remaining loyal fascists, Mussolini helped
orchestrate a series of executions of some of the
fascist leaders who had betrayed him at the last
meeting of the Fascist Grand Council.
 One of those executed included his son-in-law

Mussolini and his mistress were stopped by
communist partisans and identified as they headed for
Switzerland to board a plane to escape to Germancontrolled Austria.
 Mussolini had been traveling with retreating German
forces and was apprehended while attempting to
escape recognition by wearing a German military
uniform
 The next day, Mussolini and his mistress were both
shot by a firing squad, along with most of the members
of their 15-man train, primarily ministers and officials
of the Italian Social Republic.

On April 29, the bodies of Mussolini and his mistress
were taken to the Piazzale Loreto and hung upside
down on meat hooks.
 This was both to discourage any fascists to continue
the fight and an act of revenge for the hanging of many
partisans in the same place by Axis authorities.
 The corpse of the deposed leader became subject to
ridicule and abuse.

MEETING AT TEHRAN

FDR & Churchill wanted to meet with Stalin before
the Allies launched the invasion of France – the 3 met
in Tehran, Iran & reached several agreements:



Stalin promised to launch a full-scale offensive
against the Germans when the Allies invaded
France
FDR & Stalin agreed to break up Germany
after the war so that it would never again
threaten world peace
Stalin also promised that once Germany was
beaten, the Soviet Union would help the US
defeat Japan
OPERATION OVERLORD
FDR selected General Eisenhower to command the
planned invasion of France – Operation Overlord
 Knowing that the Allies would invade France, Hitler
had fortified the coast
 The Allies had one advantage – the element of
surprise – the Germans did not know when or where
the Allies would land

Pas-de-Calais
Normandy
OPERATION FORTITUDE
The Germans believed the Allies would land in
Pas-de-Calais – the area closet to Britain
 To convince the Germans they were right, the
Allies placed inflated rubber tanks, empty tents,
and dummy landing craft along the coast across
from Calais
 To German spy planes, the decoys looked real &
succeeded in fooling Germany - the real target
was Normandy

INFLATABLE DECOY TROOP CARRIER
By the spring of 1944, everything was ready – over 1.5
million American soldiers, 12,000 airplanes, and more
than 5 million tons of equipment had been sent to
England – only one thing left to do – pick the date &
give the command to go!
 The invasion had to begin at night to hide the ships
crossing the English Channel, the ships had to arrive
at low tide so they could see the beach obstacles, the
low tide had to come at dawn so that gunners
bombarding the coast could see their targets.
 Before the main landing, paratroopers would be
dropped behind enemy lines which required a moonlit
night in order to see where to land.
 Most important of all – the weather had to be good – a
storm would ground the airplanes & high waves would
swamp the landing craft.

Given all these conditions, there were only a few days
each month when the invasion could begin
 The 1st opportunity would last from June 5-7, 1944.
 Eisenhower's planning staff referred to the day any
operation began by the letter D, the date for the
invasion therefore came to be known as D-Day.
 Heavy cloud cover, strong winds & high waves made it
impossible to land on June 5th
 A day later the weather briefly improved but the
Channel was still rough
 After looking at the weather forecasts one last time,
shortly after midnight on June 6th, 1944, Eisenhower
gave the final order: “Ok, we’ll go!”

THE LONGEST DAY
Nearly 7,000 ships carrying more than 100,000
soldiers set sail for the coast of Normandy , France on
June 6th.
 At the same time 23,000 paratroopers were dropped
inland, east & west of the beaches.
 Allied fighter-bombers raced up & down the coast
hitting bridges, bunkers, & radar sites.
 As dawn broke, the warships in the Allied fleet let
loose with a tremendous barrage of fire – thousands of
shells rained down on the beaches.
 The beaches were code named Utah, Omaha, Gold,
Sword, & Juno


On the eastern flank, the British & Canadian landings
also went well – by the end of the day the forces were
several miles inland
SWORD BEACH (BRITISH TROOPS)
JUNO BEACH (CANADIAN TROOPS)
GOLD BEACH (BRITISH TROOPS)
UTAH BEACH (US TROOPS)

The American landing at Utah Beach went very well The German defenses were weak & in less than 3
hours US troops had captured the beach & moved
inland suffering less than 200 casualties in the process
OMAHA BEACH (US TROOPS)
Omaha Beach was a different story – under
intense German fire, the US assault almost
disintegrated.
 As General Omar Bradley (commander of US
forces at Utah & Omaha) watched the carnage,
he began making plans to evacuate Omaha.
 Slowly the US troops began to knock out the
German defenses.
 Nearly 2,500 US soldiers were either killed or
wounded on Omaha.

By the end of the day, nearly 35,000 US troops had
landed at Omaha & another 23,000 at Utah.
 Over 75,000 British & Canadian troops were on shore
as well – The invasion had succeeded!

DESTROYING THE NAZIS
Well before the war ended Allied leaders were
aware that the Nazis were committing atrocities.
 In 1943 the Allied officially declared that they
would punish the Nazis for the crimes after the
war.
 Meanwhile, they were convinced the best way to
put an end to the concentration camps was to
destroy the Nazi regime – to do that, the Allies
had to dedicate their resources to breaking out of
Normandy, liberating France, and conquering
Germany.

THE BATTLE OF THE HEDGEROWS

Although D-Day had been a success, it was only
the beginning – many fields in Normandy were
surrounded with hedgerows – dirt walls, several
feet thick, covered in shrubbery, built to fence in
cattle & crops – but they also enabled the
Germans to fiercely defend their positions.
Technical innovations helped turn the tide in Normandy. A Sherman
tank is equipped with a hedgerow cutter constructed of materials from
German beach obstacles. The “rhino” device was a huge benefit to our
tanks in hedgerow combat.

The battle of the hedgerows ended in July, 1944
when 2,500 US bombers blew a hole in the
German lines enabling tanks to race through the
gap.
THE FRENCH RESISTANCE

As the Allied broke out of Normandy, the French
Resistance – French civilians who had secretly
organized to resist the German occupation of their
country – staged a rebellion in Paris.

When the Allied forces liberated Paris on August 25th,
they found the streets filled with French citizens
celebrating their victory.

3 weeks
later, US
troops
were
within 20
miles of
the
German
border.
THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE

As the Allies close in on Germany, Hitler decided to
stage one last desperate offensive (in Belgium):
To cut of the Allies supplies through Antwerp
 To capture Bastogne (several important roads connect)

December 16, 1944 - The attack on Antwerp began
before dawn, bitterly cold, snow covered ground Allied troops caught by surprise
 As Germans rushed west, lines bulged out = attack
known as Battle of the Bulge

Allies raced to hold Bastogne & delay German advance
 Germans surrounded the town & demanded the
Americans surrender
 American commander sent back 1 word reply – “Nuts!”
 Eisenhower ordered Patton to rescue them – 3 days
later (faster than expected in snowstorm) Patton
troops slammed into German lines
 Weather cleared & airplanes began bombing German
fuel depots – on Christmas Eve, German troops were
forced to halt because they were out of fuel and
weakened by heavy losses
 2 days later, Patton's troops broke through

Although the fighting continued for 3 more weeks, the
US had one the Battle of the Bulge.
 On January 8th, the Germans began to withdraw.
 Having lost 100,000 troops & many tanks & aircraft,
the were not able to prevent the Allies from entering
Germany.

EASTERN FRONT
While US & British forces were liberating
France, the Soviets began a massive attack on
German troop in Russia –by the time the Battle
of the Bulge ended, the Soviets had driven the
Germans out of Russia, back across Poland & 35
miles from Berlin
 As Soviets crossed Germanys eastern border, US
forces attacked the western border – closing
within 70 miles of Berlin.

As the Soviets reached the outskirts of Berlin, Hitler
knew the end was near – on April 30th, 1934 – he put a
pistol in his mouth & pulled the trigger.
 His secretary carried his body outside, doused it with
gasoline, and set it on fire as he had wished.

GRAND ADMIRAL KARL DOENITZ
Before Hitler died, he
chose Grand Admiral
Karl Doenitz to
succeed him.
 Doenitz tried to
surrender to the US &
British while
continuing to fight the
Soviets – but
Eisenhower insisted
on unconditional
surrender.

“VICTORY IN EUROPE”

On May 7, 1945,
Germany
surrenders
unconditionally –
The next day,
May 8th, 1945 was
proclaimed V-E
Day for Victory in
Europe
FAREWELL ROOSEVELT
Unfortunately, President
Roosevelt did not live to
see the defeat of
Germany.
 On April 12, 1945, while
vacationing in Warm
Springs, Georgia, he
suffered a stroke and
died.

ROOSEVELT'S LITTLE WHITE HOUSE

BY
ELIZABETH SHOUMATOFF
This is the original
portrait that was
being painted of FDR
on the day he passed
away. In the middle of
painting the portrait
he complained of a
horrible headache
and went to lay down
for a bit. He suffered a
massive stroke in his
bed in the Little White
House and the
portrait was put away
and never finished. It
now hangs in a
building on the
grounds.
PRESIDENT TRUMAN
His vice president, Harry
S. Truman, became
president during this
difficult time.
 Despite feeling
overwhelmed, Truman
began at once to make
decisions about the war –
although Germany
surrendered a few weeks
later, the war with
Japan continued to
intensify.

25-5 BOOK QUESTIONS
 Read
What if..Operation Overload Had
Failed? On page 758-759 and answer the
2 Questions.
 Read A Day for Heroes on page 763 and
answer the 2 Questions.
 Pg 761 – 3, 5
 Pg 774 – 21