Transcript The United States and World War II

The United States and
World War II
Rising Tensions Lead to War
• Military Leaders in Germany, Italy, and Japan made aggressive moves which
climaxed in the outbreak of WWII in 1939
• Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931 and took it over from China
• Germany began to rearm itself in 1935
• Hitler violated WWI peace treaty provisions by sending troops into Rhineland next
to France
• Italy, ruled by Mussolini, invaded the African nation of Ethiopia in 1935 and made
it part of Italy in 1936
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In 1937, Japan invaded more parts of China
German troops marched into Austria and took over in 1938
Hitler’s armies took over most of Czechoslovakia
League of Nations did little to try to stop all of these agressions
After the German army marched into Poland on September 1, 1939, Britain
and France declared war on Germany September 9, 1939
• United States chose to remain out of the war and be isolationist
• President Franklin Roosevelt wanted to help the Allies resist Axis aggression
• After Germany defeated France, Roosevelt persuaded Congress to make some
changes to the US neutrality laws:
• Congress allowed the sale of arms on a cash & carry basis
• Roosevelt swapped 50 old destroyers for British naval bases
• Congress approved the lend-lease program in 1941 allowing Roosevelt to
supply Britain with military goods on credit
• US Navy began protecting ships carrying these supplies from attacks by
German submarines which unofficially put the US at war with Germany in
the Atlantic
• Meanwhile, Japan was making conquest in the Pacific area.
• Japan became part of the Axis powers with Germany and Italy in
1940
• The US imposed an embargo against Japan in 1941.
• While officials from Japan and the US met in Washington to discuss
changes in Japanese policy, Japanese warplanes bombed the US naval
base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941
• On December 8, 1941, the US and Britain declared war on Japan
• Germany and Italy then declared war on the United States
• Immediately after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, President
Roosevelt spoke to the action in a special radio address.
• Roosevelt’s speech rallied Americans, shocked and outraged by the
attack, to the war effort.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VqQAf74fsE
• What would your reaction to this speech had been?
Wartime in the United States
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Millions of men and women joined the military
Raw materials and food were rationed.
Many consumer goods were no longer made
The government regulated wages and prices
Farms produced 20% more crops
Manufacturing doubled
War plants and army camps made population centers out of quiet rural areas
Women and Minorities
• Women and minorities flocked to jobs in WWII war industries
• Women worked the same jobs as men for less money
• African Americans were treated more fairly in this war although the armed
services remained segregated.
• WWII raised awareness of US racism as the US was fighting against Hitler’s
brand of “Aryan” racism causing many Americans to question laws and
customs that treated blacks as second-class citizens
Japanese Americans
• After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans who lived along the
west coast were rounded up and sent to bleak internment camps.
• http://www.ushistory.org/us/51e.asp
• Many Americans worried that citizens of Japanese ancestry would act as
spies or saboteurs for the Japanese government. Fear — not evidence —
drove the U.S. to place over 127,000 Japanese-Americans in
concentration camps for the duration of WWII.
• Most of these people were native-born American citizens who had to sell
almost all of their possessions for a small fraction of its actual worth
The War in Europe and the Pacific
• In 1942, the Axis powers controlled almost all of Europe and North Africa.
• By the time US forces got to Europe in significant numbers in 1943, the tide was beginning to
turn with allied forces driving the Axis out of North Africa. Soviet troops began to drive the
German army back as well
• German submarine threats were being contained
• The Allies invaded Italy in mid 1943
• On D-Day, June 6,1944, the Allies invaded France
• Allied forces moved into German on the west and Soviet troops from the east.
• US President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies on April 12, 1945 and vice president Harry Truman
becomes the US President.
• The Germans surrendered on May 8, 1945 or V-E-Day – Victory in Europe Day
The Holocaust
(Mass Murder)
• When Allied soldiers invaded Germany and Poland they discovered
concentration/death camps where Nazis had shot and gassed to death
millions of Jews from Germany and countries that Germany occupied.
• The planned killing of most of a racial, political, or cultural group is called
genocide
• Nazi leaders were tried for war crimes in a a special court at Nuremberg,
Germany during 1945 and 1946. Twelve received death sentences and others
got life in prison
• Japan began to falter in 1942
• US and Japanese forces fought a series of fierce
battles over small, strategic islands
• Turning points were two major naval battles:
• The Battle of the Coral Sea stopped a Japanese
naval fleet from attacking Austrailia
• The Battle of Midway kept Hawaii safe from a
Japanese invasions.
• Soon the US held island bases from which
they bombed the home islands of Japan
• The Japanese were fiercely resisting surrender
• President Truman thought a land invasion
would result in too many American lives lost.
• He decided to use the newly developed
atomic bomb.
Atomic Bomb Attacks
• On August 6, 1945, a US plane dropped a single atomic bomb on the
Japanese city of Hiroshima.
• 80,000 people were killed while destroying most of the city
• On August 9, 1945, the US dropped a second atomic bomb on the city of
Nagasaki
• Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945
• Surrender papers were signed on September 1, 1945 or V-J Day –Victory
over Japan Day.
• World War II was over.
Costs of the War
• 50 million people died during WWII with ½ of that number being civilians;
more were injured
• The war ruined national economies
• Millions of people found themselves homeless, lacking the basic necessities
of life: food, fuel, shelter, and water.
• Large cities lay in ruins – much of the world’s great art and architecture was
lost forever
Costs of War in America
• Due to the fact that the war had not been fought on American soil, the US
escaped the physical destruction that Europe and Asia suffered.
• Therefore, the US economy emerged from the war more powerful than ever.
• Much of the rebuilding efforts after the war would fall to the US
• What will come next?