Transcript Chapter 29: World War II 1933-1945

Chapter 29: World War II
1933-1945
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(pp.806-807)
New Deal Foreign Policy

President Franklin D. Roosevelt is inaugurated in 1933

“Good Neighbor” pledge:
- to respect the sovereign rights of all nations in the Western Hemisphere
I.



Peaceful Intentions in Latin America
Pan-American Conference at Montevideo (Uruguay):
- The US agreed to the resolution that “no state has the right to
intervene in the internal affairs of another”
Roosevelt recalls troops from Haiti and Nicaragua
Peaceful diplomatic negotiations made with Cuba and Mexico
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(p. 807)
II.
Domestic Recovery Determines Foreign Decisions

Roosevelt’s New Deal = economic isolation:
- US not interested in cooperating with Europe and concentrated on internal
agricultural and industrial production problems
1933 London Conference:
- 60 European nation met to discuss international depression
- Roosevelt refuses to cooperate in fear that American farm prices would
inflate
Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act of 1934:
- initiated by Secretary of State Cordell Hull
- allowed State Department to make treaties with other countries to
mutually lower import duties


Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(pp. 807-808)
III. Recognition of the Soviet Union
 The United States recognized the government of the Soviet Union after years of
refusing to recognize their communist regime
 Soviet Union’s communist influence diminished due to internal economic
hardships
 Japan, the USSR’s rival, also threatened Soviet power
 Roosevelt took advantage of the Soviet’s need for food and industrial equipment
and therefore opened markets for American farmers and manufacturers
 Although relations between the Soviet Union and the United States improved,
trade was not significantly improved and Japanese militarism continued to grow
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(p. 808)
Aggression and Appeasement

Global affairs and events caused
for alarm and American
isolation quickly came to an end
I. Japanese Expansion in the Pacific

Japanese pursued policy of
expansion due to population
growth and a need for larger
markets for its products

September 1931: Japan ignored
orders from United Nations to
return Manchuria
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(pp. 808-809)
II. Threats from Germany and Italy
 March 5, 1933: Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist (Nazi) party was voted
leader and dictator of Germany with plans to control central and eastern Europe
 Dictator Benito Mussolini had similar plans to control the Mediterranean and to
expand an Italian empire in parts of Africa
 Fascism = a form of government that seeks power for their nation
 Totalitarianism = total control of a nation and the people of that nation
- both Hitler and Mussolini adopted fascism and totalitarianism as their ruling
doctrine
 Both countries blamed their national problems on “undesirables” after WWI
- Mussolini blamed the communists for causing strikes and social unrest
- Hitler blamed the Jews for Germany’s economic problems
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
Did you know…
My grandmother grew up during the
time of Mussolini’s dictatorship.
Although he was despised by the
vast majority of Italian people,
poor families (like my Nonna’s)
depended on Mussolini to
survive. She said that it was a
very bittersweet relationship; to
rely on the aid from a man who
imposed so much fear on
innocent civilians.
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(pp. 809-810)
III. Bargaining for Peace
 Appeasement = response of Great Britain and France; a policy that gave
aggressor nations what they wanted in order to avoid war
 Americans wanted peace and did not want to go to war
 Pacifism = Oxford University students refused to go to war on any account
 Munich Conference (Sept. 1938): British and French leaders allow Germany to
annex part of Czechoslovakia in return for Hitler’s promise not to make any
more territorial demands
Section 1: World Affairs, 1933-1939
(p. 810)
IV. Neutrality
 The United States was determined to avoid war, especially after the economic
devastation from the First World War
 Neutrality Acts (1935-1937): laws passed by Congress that barred the
transportation of or sale of arms to nations at war, and banned loans to nations at
war outside the Western Hemisphere
 Roosevelt feared that American involvement in war was inevitable and therefore
warned Americans that war was “contagious”
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(p. 811)
Europe at War
 March, 1939 : Hitler disobeyed agreement made at Munich Conference and
annexed the rest of Czechoslovakia, as well as demanded for territory in Poland
 Britain and France asked the Soviet Union to join their alliance in order to
defend Poland and contain Germany
 Joseph Stalin signed nonaggression pact with Germany
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(p. 812)
I. Outbreak of War

September 1, 1939: Germany invades Poland

Blitzkrieg = “lightening warfare” (term coined after Hitler’s brutal attack
on Poland)

September 3, 1939: Britain and France declare war on Germany

American Congress lifted Neutrality Acts and allowed Britain and France to
buy weapons
II. Near Disaster at Dunkirk

May 1940: German forces defeated Allied Army and drove it out to sea at
the French town of Dunkirk on Belgium border

300,000 British and French troops came to their rescue
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(pp.812-813)
III. Battle of Britain
 June 1940: Italy invaded France and declared war on Great Britain
 Roosevelt promised to extend aid to the democracies
 June 22: France surrendered
 Germany attacked a vulnerable Great Britain
 “blood, toil, tears, and sweat…” = Winston Churchill pledged to defend his
nation at all costs
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(pp.813-815)
America Abandons Neutrality

Roosevelt disregarded isolationist sentiments and gave Churchill a loan of
50 destroyers to protect shipping from German submarines
I. America Realizes its Peril

Americans feared an invasion from Hitler and Mussolini

Selective Service Act (Sept. 1940): first peacetime draft that added 800,000
men to the armed forces
II. Roosevelt’s Leadership Endorsed

Presidential election of 1940: Isolationists versus Internationalists

Roosevelt re-elected and promised to keep America out of the war
III. Aid to a Desperate Britain

Lend-lease = US would lend goods to Great Britain and the British could
pay it back after the war
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(pp.815-816)
IV. Battle for the Atlantic
 The United States had to make sure that lend-lease supplies reached their
destinations before German U-boats sank them
 Roosevelt ordered the US Navy to protect merchant shipping
 October 1941: German boat sank an American destroyer and killed more than 90
members of its crew
 Neutrality Acts revised, which allowed merchant ships to carry arms
V. Germany Turns for an Ally
 June 1941: Hitler attacked Russia for wheat and oils supplies
 As a result, Stalin signed an alliance with Great Britain and the United States
 Isolationism faded in support for Roosevelt
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(p.816)
Aggression in the Pacific

European colonies in Southeast Asia

US was the only remaining obstacle Japanese had moved into China and to
Japanese ambitions in the Pacific
I. Embargo

September 1940: Japan allied
with Axis Powers (Germany and Italy)

US cut off exports of scrap metal to Japan
and other products with possible military use

July 1941: Japan refused to abandon their
policy of conquest and the US stopped all
trade with them and ordered American forces
in the Pacific to prepare for war
Section 2: Moving Closer to War
(p.816)
II. Appeal for Peace
 October 18, 1941: Japanese Prime Minister Konoye resigned because he did not
believe that he could defeat the United States
 Konoye was replaced by General Hideki Tojo who favored war to eliminate
American and British influence in Asia
 Negotiations opened in Washington, D.C. in November of 1941
III. The Talks Stall
 December 6, 1941: President Roosevelt appealed for peace to Emperor Hirohito
 However, Japan had already sent out fleet to sea that headed for the US’s main
naval base in the Pacific – Pearl Harbor
Section 3: The United States at War
(pp.817-819)
The World at War

December 7, 1941: Japan attacked Pearl Harbor
I.
Japanese Victories in the Pacific

For 6 months, Japan captured American bases and conquered British
colonies throughout the Pacific

American forces in the Philippines surrendered to the Japanese
II.
German Success in Europe

By 1942, German forces occupied nearly all of Europe, parts of Northern
Africa (eg, the Suez Canal), and they had pushed deep into the Soviet
Union
III.
Turning Point of the War

September 1942: Soviet’s Red Army battled German troops at Stalingrad

November 1942: German army was defeated due to freezing winter
conditions
Section 3: The United States at War
(p.820)
IV. German Weak Point Exposed
 German campaign in North Africa
came to an end after American and
British forces pushed German troops
into Tunisia
 August 1943: the Italian mainland
was invaded and its government
surrendered after Mussolini’s defeat
in Sicily
 Allied forces faced fierce German
resisted, who continued to control
northern Italy
Section 3: The United States at War
(pp.820-821)
Victory in Europe

American and British forces prepared to defeat Hitler’s armies
I. Normandy Invasion

June 6, 1944: 176,000 Allied troops landed along a 60-mile stretch of
coastline in France = “D-Day” invasion

General Dwight D. Eisenhower led American forces and General George
Patton led British forces into the western border of Germany (Aug.1944)
II. Rapid Soviet Advance from the East

At the same time, the Soviets closed in from the east
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By the end of 1944, most of eastern Europe was in Soviet hands
Section 3: The United States at War
(p.821)
III. Germany Surrenders
 December 1944: Battle of the Bulge = last German offensive to attack Belgium
 Allied forces crushed Hitler’s armies from the west as Soviet forces pushed from
the east
 April 1945: Hitler committed suicide
 May 7, 1945: German leaders agreed to an official surrender
 President Roosevelt died before he could see Germany surrender
IV. Crimes Against Humanity
 When Allied armies entered Germany, they discovered the horrific truth about
the Holocaust
 As early as 1942, the US government had received reports that Hitler had
ordered the extermination of Jews, but Roosevelt did not respond until 1944
 By the time Allied troops reached the death camps, 12 million people had
perished; 6 million were Jews
Section 3: The United States at War
Section 3: The United States at War
(pp.822-823)
War in the Pacific

Battle of Midway = first major defeat of the Japanese navy that ended their
superiority in the Pacific

“Island hopping” = to cut Japanses supply lines by capturing key islands
and to use them as bases to attack other Japanese occupancies
I. Guadalcanal

American marines landed on Guadalcanal in August 1942 in the Solomon
Islands where they fought the Japanese for 6 months

Japan’s resistance came to an end in 1943

October 1944: American General Douglas MacArthur led Allied forces in
the Philippines
Section 3: The United States at War
(p.823)
II. Iwo Jima and Okinawa
 1945: the last of Japan’s islands outposts fell with the taking of Iwo Jima and
Okinawa
 Because Germany was defeated, the Soviet Union agreed to declare war on
Japan and confronted Japanese forces in Manchuria
 Japan rejected calls for unconditional surrender
III. Hiroshima and Nagasaki
 Early in the war, American scientists had secretly been developing an atomic
bomb
 August 6, 1945: after Japan rejected a final warning from Truman (who became
president after Roosevelt’s death), an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima
and destroyed 60% of the city
 A second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki after Japan still refused to surrender
 September 2, 1945: Japan’s final surrender took place on the battleship Missouri
in Tokyo Bay
Section 3: The United States at War
Section 3: The United States at War
(pp.824-825)
Wartime Diplomacy

Atlantic Charter: on January 1, 1942, representatives of the 26 countries at
war with the Axis Powers agreed to support this charter that promised full
economic and military support

Roosevelt and Churchill were the predominant leaders

Cooperation with the Soviet Union proved to be the most difficult
challenge, but the alliance between the United States, Great Britain and the
Soviet Union lasted until the end of the war
I. Planning for War and Peace

Plans for war and peace were worked out in a series of international
conferences
- January 1943: Casablanca, Morocco
- November 1943: Cairo, egypt
-November 1943: Tehran, Iran (D-Day invasion was planned here)
Section 3: The United States at War
(pp.824-825)
II. Yalta Conference
 February 1945: Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met for the last time where they
agreed that the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and France should
occupy Germany after the war
 Soviet Union was promised Japanese territories and in return Stalin agreed to
support the Nationalist government instead of the Communists
III. Roosevelt’s Death
 2 months after the Yalta Conference, President Roosevelt died (Apr.12, 1945)
and left the American people shocked and deeply saddened
IV. The United Nations
 2 weeks after Roosevelt’s death, 50 nations met at San Francisco to make plans
for a new world organization
 Produced a charter for the United Nations (UN) that pledged “faith in
fundamental human rights,” to “justice and respect” from all countries that had
signed
 US was the first nation to join the UN
Section 4: War on the Home Front
(pp.827-828)
The Production Battle

After a Senate investigation revealed corruption and mismanagement of
private companies involved in war production, Roosevelt gave a War
Production Board regulatory power (1942) headed by Donald Nelson
I. Rapid Conversion to War Production

By the end of 1942, nearly 33% of American production went to war
materials (50% by 1944)

May 1941: Office of Scientific Research and Development established to
mobilize science and technology for the war effort
II. Financing the War

Increases taxes and war bonds were initiated to raise funds for the war

The war increased employment, wages, and consumer goods

Office of Price Administration (1942): set price ceilings on consumer
products and rationed goods that were in short supply in order to combat
inflation
Section 4: War on the Home Front
(pp.828-829)
Financing the war continued…
 National War Labor Board: established to settle labor disputes by mediation
 1947: act passed that outlawed strikes against war industries
Section 4: War on the Home Front
(pp.828-830)
The War and Social Change

As men joined the army, more women that ever entered the work force
I. Women Assume Nontraditional Roles

Women were encouraged to join the work force

“Rosie the Riveter” = national symbol of the vital contribution women
made to the war effort

Women filled “nontraditional” roles (worked on production lines, steel
mills and other jobs that required manual labor, as well as truck and bus
drivers)

However, women still encountered resistance from male workers
Section 4: War on the Home Front
Section 4: War on the Home Front
(pp.830-831)
II. Opportunities for African Americans
 The need for workers also spread the shift of African Americans from farming to
manufacturing
 Many African Americans left the South and headed North to find jobs in
factories
III. Resentment Toward Social Change
 Because many Americans moved to fill jobs in war industries, this caused
housing shortages, crowded schools, and social tension rose
 Prejudice and resentment against newcomers prevailed
 Fair Employment Practices Commission: established to protect minority hiring
in government offices and in companies that had war contracts
- opposed discrimination but did not reject segregation
Section 4: War on the Home Front
(pp.831-832)
IV. Detention of Japanese Americans
 February 1942: US government moved 110,000 Japanese Americans to detention
centers (most of whom had been born in the United States)
 Japanese Americans had to leave behind or sell their possessions
 In detention centers, they were forced to work low-paying jobs and lived in very
poor conditions
 Detainees appealed to the courts for their rights, but the justices upheld the
government’s policy for national security