Download World War II Reader

World War II Reader
Write the number of the paragraph where you found the answer in the space provided.
Answer the questions on a separate sheet
Questions
1. What three countries’ aggression caused World War II?
2. What did Japan, Germany, and Italy do in the years leading up to World
War II?
3. Who was in the Axis alliance?
4. What did the United States do in the years leading to World War II?
5. What policy did Great Britain and France use to deal with Germany’s
imperialism?
6. Why did appeasement fail against Germany?
7. What event sparked World War II?
8. What were the two theatres of World War II?
9. What strategy did Germany use to win many early victories?
10. What happened during the Battle of Britain and the fighting in North
Africa?
11. How did the United States get involved in World War II before Pearl
Harbor?
12. What happened at Pearl Harbor?
13. What battles and events led to Allied victory in Europe?
14. Why did the United States choose to use atomic bombs against Japan?
15. What battles and events led to Allied victory in the Pacific?
Paragraph
Number
SECTION 1: THE ROAD TO WAR
1
World War II was caused by military aggression, meaning countries using their militaries
before they have been threatened. Germany, Italy, and Japan were all aggressive in the 1930s. All of
them were angry at the Treaty of Versailles and the problems they felt it caused. They were all
desperate to build themselves and empire and the other countries of the world were too caught up
in their own problems to stop them.
2
Italy’s aggression was against Ethiopia. The Italian people were unhappy with the treaty of
Versailles because they thought they should have received more land. Mussolini hoped he could
build an Italian empire in Ethiopia. The League of Nations couldn’t stop Italy’s plans. They could only
protest Italy’s actions.
3
Germany’s aggression was targeted at other parts of Europe. Germany had become a
totalitarian government because of the Treaty of Versailles and the Great Depression. Hitler used
his rebuilt military to invade the Rhineland (a piece of land that both France and Germany believed
they owned). Once again the League of Nations failed to prevent an aggressive nation from
becoming imperialist.
4
Japan’s aggression was taken out on other countries in Asia. They invaded Manchuria in
1931. When the League of Nations protested Japan simply dropped quite the group. When Japan
invaded China in 1937 other countries put economic sanctions (punishments targeting a country’s
economy) against them. The sanctions failed to stop Japanese aggression.
5
In 1936 Germany, Japan, and Italy formed the Axis alliance. Other totalitarian countries
chose not to join. The fascist Spanish leader Francisco Franco was sent soldiers and weapons, but
stayed neutral during the War. The Soviet Union formed a secret alliance with Germany when they
signed the Non-Aggression Pact but did not join the other Axis countries.
6
While all this was going on the United States was also falling into the same cycle as it had
during World War I. The U.S. decided to use isolationism to stay out of Europe’s problems. They
passed a series of laws called the Neutrality Acts that stopped the U.S. from selling weapons or
loaning money to countries that were fighting wars. They hoped that this would prevent the U.S.
from getting caught up in the same problems that had led to its involvement in World War I.
7
The United States was not the only country that had false hopes of staying out of a second
world war. Great Britain and France hoped to avoid another war by using a policy of appeasement
towards Germany. Appeasement meant that they would allow Hitler to take the land he wanted in
the hopes of containing his expansion. In 1938 Germany annexed (took control over) the country of
Austria. Britain and France let it go. Hitler then demanded control over the Sudetenland, an area of
Czechoslovakia that was largely German speaking. At the Munich Conference of 1938 Hitler was
given the Sudetenland. In return, he promised to stop his imperialist expansion. Leaders from
Britain and France returned home and declared that they had achieved “peace in our time” by
preventing Germany from starting another war. In early 1939 Germany invaded the rest of
Czechoslovakia while Italy invaded the North African country of Albania. Still Britain and France
hoped they could avoid war.
8
Those hopes ended in September of 1939. Germany invaded Poland. Britain and France,
who had an alliance with Poland, rushed into war to defend their ally. Around that same time, Japan
was also become more aggressive in the Pacific.
9
World War II was fought ono two theatres. The European Theatre saw fighting against the
Axis powers of Germany and Italy. The Pacific Theatre saw fighting against the Axis power of Japan.
SECTION 2: THE AXIS ADVANCES
10
Germany fought Poland using a tactic called the blitzkrieg, where they struck quickly and
overwhelmed their enemies before they could fight back. The Soviet Union attacked Poland from
the opposite direction. This was all part of the Non-Aggression Pact the two countries had signed.
Denmark and Norway also felt to Germany in 1939. In 1940 France’s defenses collapsed and they
were forced to surrender to the invading Germans. The British continued to fight.
11
The Battle of Britain lasted from 1940 – 1941. Germany dropped thousands of bombs on
Britain, destroying large parts of many British cities. Children were often sent to the countryside to
stay with relatives – or in some cases strangers – to keep them away from the worst of the attacks.
The British survived thanks to two important achievements. They developed radar to warn them
when Germany was coming to attack, and they learned to decode Germany’s secret messages. Led
by Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the British refused to surrender. The Germans were forced to
focus on attacking other areas of Europe.
12
In North Africa, the Germans fought for control of the Suez Canal – which connected the
Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf – to get access to the oil supplies in the Middle East. In the
Balkans, the countries of Yugoslavia and Greece were captured by Axis Powers in 1941.
13
Then that Adolf Hitler made the biggest mistake of World War II.
SECTION 3: THE UNITED STATES
14
The United States was officially neutral in World War II. President Franklin Roosevelt knew
they couldn’t stay that way, and that it would eventually become necessary for the United States to
get involved to prevent the defeat of the Allies and the Nazi takeover of Europe. In 1939 the United
States Congress changed the neutrality laws so the country could sell weapons to any of the Allies
(the alliance of Britain and France that later included the Soviet Union and the United States) that
paid for them in cash and transported them on their own ships. This was called the cash and carry
policy.
15
The problem was that the cash and carry policy was not enough to help the Allies. In 1941
the U.S. moved further from neutrality by passing the Lend-Lease Act. This act allowed the
president to led or lease weapons and other war supplies to countries that important to the
interests of the U.S. When Japan invaded French Indochina in 1941 the U.S. put an embargo on oil
exports to Japan, meaning they stopped sending oil to the Japanese to try and prevent further
aggression.
16
Instead the plan caused Japan to turn its attention on the United States. On the morning of
December 7th, 1941 the Japanese attacked the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor. The attack shocked
and angered the United States and the country declared war the next day. Japan continued
spreading through the Pacific by capturing Guam, Wake Island, Hong Kong, the Philippines, the
Dutch East Indies, and Burma. It would be the furthest the Japanese would expand in World War II.
SECTION 4: VICTORY IN EUROPE
17
The seeds of Hitler’s defeat were planted in 1941. That was the year that he made the
biggest mistake of World War II: the decision to betray the Soviet Union, Germany’s ally at that
time. Hitler ordered an invasion of the Soviet Union, which broke the Non-Aggression Pact the two
countries had signed. He was unable to capture any major Soviet cities, and instead lost over
500,000 soldiers to the Soviet military, the winter, and disease.
18
By the end of 1942 the Allies were taking the lead. They won major victories in
Mediterranean region and in the East. Allied forces, led by American General (and future president)
Dwight Eisenhower defeated the Axis in North Africa. Following a major defeat in the Battle of
Stalingrad the German army was forced to fight a defensive war against the steady march of the
Soviet Union. In 1943 The Americans and British conquered the Italian island of Sicily.
19
1944 would continue the Allies’ winning streak. That year Americans and British won two
important victories. In Italy, Allied forces captured the capital of Rome. On June 6 American, British,
and Canadian soldiers invaded the French region of Normandy. This invasion was called D-Day and
its goal was to free Nazi-controlled France and Northern Europe.
20
Germany’s last chance for victory came during the Battle of the Bugle. The Germans
successfully broke the American defenses but they were unable to fight a war from two different
sides. The Germans were ultimately pushed back and forced to retreat towards the German
homeland. The Allies moved into Germany from the East and the West.
21
VE Day (the day that Germany finally surrendered) came on May 7th, 1945.
22
Hitler and Mussolini were both dead by the time that happened. Mussolini was shot by his
own people, some of them from the same groups he had attacked when taking power in Italy. Hitler
and several of his closest supporters committed suicide in a bunker under the city of Berlin. Their
bodies were dragged into the street and burned by Soviet soldiers.
SECTION 3: VICTORY IN THE PACIFIC
23
1942 was also the year the war turned against the Axis in the Pacific. That year, the United
States won several important victories against the Japanese. In the Battle of Coral Sea, the U.S.
stopped a Japanese invasion of Australia. In the Battle of Midway, the U.S. damaged hundreds of
Japanese planes and all of its aircraft carriers. After Midway the U.S. began its strategy of islandhopping, meaning it ignored the islands that Japan had fortified and instead captured ones that
helped it get closer to the Japanese home islands. This was done to save many, many American
lives. In the Battle of Guadalcanal the Japanese suffered a devastating loss from American forces
attacking from land, sea, and air.
24
By 1945 the United States was attacking Japanese territory. American victories at Iwo Jima
and Okinawa brought the United States within striking distance of Japan’s main islands. Plans were
made for an invasion of Japan, with expected costs of millions of lives. U.S. President Harry Truman
(who had taken office when President Roosevelt died of a stroke that April) wanted to end the war
as quickly as possible to save as many lives as he could. On August 6 th he ordered the dropping of an
atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later a second bomb was dropped on
Nagasaki. Within a week Japan would decide to surrender. VJ Day, the day Japan officially
surrendered, was on September 2nd, 1945.
25
The war was over.