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Chapter 36 American in World War II, 1941-1945
ABC-1
The Internment War Production
Agreement
Camps
Board
Wartime
Fair
Double V
Migrations
Employment
Practices
Commission
(FEPC)
Battle of
Island Hopping El Alamein
Midway
D-Day
Presidential
Battle of the
Election of
Bulge
1944
Office of Price
Administration
Code Talkers
Women Power
Stalingrad
“Unconditional
surrender”
Atomic Bombs
Potsdam
Conference
Bataan Death
March
ABC-1 Agreement – The strategy of “getting Germany first”
 This was the solid foundation on which all American military strategy was built.
 What do you think the reaction to this strategy was in the United States
Time, in a sense, was the most needed munition.
National unity was no worry, thanks to the electrifying blow by the Japanese at Pearl
Harbor. World War II actually speeded the assimilation of many ethnic groups into
American society. Consequently, there was virtually no government witch-hunting of
minority groups, as had happened in WWI.
A painful exception was the plight of some 110,000 Japanese-Americans, concentrated
on the Pacific Coast.
The Internment Camps -- While this event is most commonly called the internment of
Japanese Americans, in fact there were several different types of camps involved. The
best known facilities were the Assembly Centers run by the Western Civilian Control
Administration (WCCA), and the Relocation Centers run by the War Relocation
Authority (WRA), which are generally (but unofficially) referred to as "internment
camps." The Department of Justice (DOJ), operated camps officially called Internment
Camps, which were used to detain those suspected of actual crimes or "enemy
sympathies." The WCCA and WRA facilities were the largest and the most public. The
WCCA Assembly Centers were temporary facilities that were first setup in horse racing
tracks, fairgrounds and other large public meeting places to assemble and organize
internees before they were transported to WRA Relocation Centers by truck, bus or train.
The WRA Relocation Centers were camps that housed persons removed from the
exclusion zone after March 1942, or until they were able to relocate elsewhere in
America outside the exclusion zone.
The war time Supreme Court in 1944 upheld the constitutionality of the Japanese
relocation in Korematsu v. US. But more than four decades later, in 1988, the US
government officially apologized for its actions and approved the payment of reparations
of $20,000 to each camp survivor.
Many of the programs created by the New Deal were wiped out. Dr. New Deal changed
to Dr. Win-the-War
Building the War Machine
War Production Board – Halting the manufacturing of nonessential items such as
passenger cars. Rationing will also take effect
Production brought economic strains. Full employment and scarce consumer goods
fueled a sharp inflationary surge in 1942.
Office of Price Administration -- bring ascending prices under control with extensive
regulations. Rationing held down the consumption of critical goods such as meat and
butter.
 Labor Unions resented the government – dictated wage ceilings. Despite the nostrike pledges of most of the major unions a rash of labor walkouts plagued the
war effort.
 Smith- Connally Anti-Strike Act – authorized the federal government to seize and
operate tied-up industries. Strikes against government – operated industry were
made a criminal offense.
o Under the act, Washington took over the coal mines and, for a brief
period, the railroads.
 American workers, on the whole, were commendably committed to the war effort.
The hand of the government touched more American lives more intimately during the
war than ever before.
Women Power – The armed services enlisted nearly 15 million men in World War II and
some 216,000 women, who were employed for noncombat duties
 WAACs (army), WAVES (navy) and SPARs (Coast Guard)
 More than 6 million women took up jobs outside the home, over half of them had
never before worked for wages
 The war foreshadowed an eventual revolution in the roles of women in American
society
Yet evidence shows – the war’s immediate impact on women’s lives has frequently
been exaggerated. The great majority of American women, especially those with
husbands present in the home or with small children to care for, did not work for
wages in the wartime economy but continued in their traditional roles.
 A poll in 1943 revealed that a majority of American women would not take a
job in a war plant if it were offered.
 After the war a return to domesticity occurred not a widening of women’s
employment opportunities
An agreement with Mexico in 1942 brought thousands of Mexican agricultural workers
across the border to harvest the fruit and grain crops of the West.
Wartime Migrations -- The war caused a shift in the population. War industries sucked
people into boomtowns.
 1.6 million blacks left the land of their ancient enslavement to seek jobs in the war
plants of the west and north. Forever after, race relations constituted a national,
not a regional issue. Explosive tensions developed over employment, housing,
and segregated facilities.
Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) – monitors discrimination in defense
industries.
Double V – In general the war helped to embolden blacks in their long struggle for
equality. They rallied behind the slogan Double V – victory over the dictators abroad and
over racism at home.
 Within a single generation, a near majority of African Americans gave up their
historic homeland and their rural way of life.
The war also promopeted an exodus of native Americans from the reservations.
Thousands of Indian men and women found war work in the major cities, and thousands
more answered Uncle Sam’s call to arms.
Code Talkers – 25 thousand Native Americans men served in the armed forces. They
transmitted radio messages in their native languages, which were incomprehensible to the
Germans and the Japanese
Japan’s Early Successes – Seldom if ever has so much territory been conquered so
rapidly with so little loss.
 Guam, Wake, and the Philippines, Port of Hong Kong, Malaya, Burma, and the
Dutch East Indies
Bataan Death March –
 The Japanese promptly landed a small army and General MacArthur, withdrew to
a strong defensive position at Bataan, not far from Manila.
 There about 20,000 American Troops supported by a much larger force of illtrained Filipinos, held off violent Japanese attacks until April 9, 1942
 Before the surrender MacArthur was ordered by Washington to depart secretly for
Australia, there to head the resistance against the Japanese.
 After the surrender the troops were subject to eighty-mile Bataan Death March to
prisoner of war camps.
Battle of Midway -- was a pivotal naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II. It
took place from June 4 to June 7, 1942, approximately one month after the Battle of the
Coral Sea, about two months after the Japanese capture of Wake Island, and six months
after the Empire of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
The battle was a crushing defeat for the Japanese and is widely regarded as the most
important naval battle of World War II. The battle permanently weakened the Japanese
Navy, particularly the loss of over 200 naval aviators. Strategically, the U.S. Navy was
able to seize the initiative in the Pacific and go on the offensive.
Japan started realizing they were over extended.
Island hopping – Towards Tokyo. Bypass some of the most heavily fortified Japanese
posts capturing nearby islands, setting up airfields on them, and then neutralizing the
enemy bases through heavy bombing.
The early set backs in the Pacific were paralleled in the Atlantic – Hitler’s submarines
were extremely effective. Not until the spring of 1943 did the Allies clearly have the
upper hand against the U-boat.
Hitler and his General Erwin Rommel had driven eastward across the hot sands of Africa
into Egypt.
El Alamein – Late in October 1942, British General Bernard Montgomery delivered an
attack against Rommel driving him back to Tunisia.
 marked a significant turning point in the Western Desert Campaign of World War
II. The battle lasted from October 23 to November 3, 1942.
 Success in the battle turned the tide in the North African Campaign. Allied victory
at El Alamein ended German hopes of occupying Egypt, controlling access to the
Suez Canal, and gaining access to the Middle Eastern oil fields. The German
defeat at El Alamein marked the end of German expansion.
Stalingrad -- was a battle between Germany and its allies and the Soviet Union for the
Soviet city of Stalingrad that took place between August 21, 1942 and February 2, 1943,
as part of World War II.
 It was the turning point of World War II and was arguably the bloodiest battle in
human history, with combined casualties estimated above 1.5 million. The battle
was marked by brutality and disregard for military and civilian casualties on both
sides.
 The battle is taken to include the German siege of the southern Russian city of
Stalingrad (now Volgograd), the battle inside the city, and the Soviet counteroffensive which eventually trapped and destroyed the German Sixth Army and
other Axis forces around the city.
 As a result of the battle, the Axis powers suffered roughly 850,000 casualties, ¼
of their strength on the Eastern Front, as well as a huge amount of supplies and
equipment. The Axis forces were never able to fully recover from this loss and
were eventually forced into a long retreat out of Eastern Europe, after the great
battles of 1943-1944. For the Soviets, who also suffered great losses during the
battle, the victory at Stalingrad marked the start of the liberation of the Soviet
Union, leading to eventual victory over Nazi Germany in 1945.
The French-held North Africa was to be the second front. Eisenhower, was going to head
the front.
Unconditional surrender – This policy would presumably hearten the ultrasuspicious
Soviets, who professed to fear separate Allied peace negotiations. It would also forestall
charges of broken armistice terms such as had come after 1918.

This proved to be one of the most controversial moves fo the war. The main
criticism was that it steeled the enemy to fight to a last-bunker resistance, while
discouraging antiwar groups in Germany from revolting.
o No one can prove that an uncoditional surrender either shortend or
lengthend the war.
Fighting continued into Italy after the Allied victories in Africa.
 Mussolini was deposed, and Italy surrendered unconditionally – Sept. 1943,
however Germany remined in Italy, thus fighting continued.
D-Day – Roosevelt, Churchill and stalin meet in Teheran to discuss the invasion. French
Normandy, less heavily defended than other parts of the European coast, was pinpointed
for the invasion assault.
 Preparations for the cross-channel invasion of France were gigantic
 The overall cammand was entrusted to an American, General Eisenhower.
 Forty-six hundred vessels The allies had the mastery of the air, crippled the
railroads, worsening German fuel shortages by bombing gasolilne-producing
plants.
 Able to liberate Paris in 1944.
The first important German city Aachen fell to the Americans in October 1944.
SHOW BAND OF BROTHERS AND IKES LETTER
Presidential Campaign of 1944 –
 Republicans elected – Thomas E. Dewy (Governor of New York) was regarded as
a liberal. The platform called for an unstinted prosecution of the war and for the
creation of a new international organization to maintain peace.
o Dewy used the fourth term to his campaigning, but the fourth term issue
did not figure prominently, since the ice had been broken by Roosevelt’s
3rd term
 Democrates elected – FDR, but more attention was given to the vice presidency.
Fight was between Henry A. Wallace the incombant and Harry S. Truman.
Truman one out.
 Roosevelt won, because the war was going well. His expereince was needed in
creating a future organization for world peace.
Battle of the Bulge -- started on December 16, 1944
 The goal of these operations as planned by the Germans was to split the British
and American Allied line in half, capturing Antwerp and then proceeding to
encircle and destroy four Allied armies, forcing the Western Allies to negotiate a
peace treaty in the Axis’s favor.
 The Ardennes attack was planned in total secrecy in almost total radio silence.
Even Ultra (the Allies’ reading of secret German radio messages) revealed
nothing about the upcoming buildup and offensive. Moreover, the degree of
surprise achieved was compounded by Allied overconfidence, preoccupation with
their own offensive plans, poor aerial reconnaissance, and the relative lack of
combat contact by the U.S. 1st Army. Allied intelligence failed completely to
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detect the upcoming offensive and almost complete surprise against a weak
section of the Allies' line was achieved at a time of heavy overcast when the
Allies' strong air forces would be grounded.
The “bulge” refers to the salient the Germans initially put into the Allies' line of
advance, as seen in maps presented in newspapers of the time.
Most of the American casualties occurred within the first three days of battle,
when two of the 106th Division’s three regiments were forced to surrender.
In its entirety, the “Battle of the Bulge” was the most bloody of the comparatively
few European battles American forces experienced in WWII, the 19,000
American dead unsurpassed by any other engagement.
For the U.S. Army, the Battle of the Ardennes incorporated more American
troops and engaged more enemy troops than any American conflict prior to
WWII.
Although the German objective was ultimately unrealized, the Allies’ own
offensive timetable was set back by months. In the wake of the defeat, many
experienced German units were left severely depleted of men and equipment, as
German survivors retreated to the defenses of the Siegfried Line.
Eisenhower’s troops reached the Elbe River in April 1945. There, a short distance south
of Berlin, American and Soviet advance guards dramatically shook hands.
The conquering Americans were horrified to find blood-spattered and still-stinking
concentration camps, where the German Nazis had engaged in scientific mass murder of
undesirables. The Washington government had long been informed about Hitler’s
campaign of genocide against the Jews had been reprehensibly slow to take steps aginst
it. Roosevelt’s administration had bolted the door against large numbers of Jewish
refugees, and his military commanders declined even to bomb the rail lines that carried
the victims to the camps. But until the war’s end, the full dimensions of the “Holocaust”
had not been known. When the details were revealed, the whole world was aghast.
Hitller and his mistress Eva Braun committed suicide in an underground bunker April 30,
1945.
FDR died from a massive cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, 1945.
On May 7, 1945 the German government surrendered uncoditionally. May 8th was
officially proclaimed V-E
Yhe allies were fire-bombing Tokyo on March 9-10 1945. The US slowly was heading
towards Tokyo defeating them at the Philippines, Leyte Gulf, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa.
Potsdam Conference – July 17 – August 2 1945
 The participants were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United
States, the three largest and most powerful of the victorious Allies that defeated
the Axis Powers in World War II. The three nations were represented by
Communist Party General Secretary Joseph Stalin, Prime Minister Winston
Churchill and later Clement Attlee, and President Harry S. Truman.
Stalin, Churchill, and Truman—as well as Attlee, who replaced Churchill after the
Labour Party's defeat of the Conservatives in the 1945 general election—had gathered to
decide how to administer the defeated Nazi Germany, which had agreed to unconditional
surrender nine weeks earlier, on May 8 (V-E Day). The goals of the conference also
included the establishment of post-war order, peace treaties issues, and countering the
effects of war.
Atomic Bombs – Early in 1940, Einstein pushed ahead with preparationf for unlocking
the secret of an atomic bomb. Manhattan Project. In July 16, 1945 the bomb was
successfully test at Alamogordo New mexico.
 With Japan still refusing to surrender, the Potsdam threat was fulfilled. On
August 6, 1945 a one American bomber dropped one atomic bomb on the city of
Hiroshima, Japan.
 Two day later, on August 8th Stalin enterd the war against Japan
 Jaoan still did not surrander.
 On August 9th another bomb was dropped on Nagasaki.
 One August 10, 1945 Japan asked for peace, with on condition Hirohito remain
emperor.
Missouri – On Sept. 2, 1945 the Official surrender ceremonies were conducted by Gernal
MacArthur on the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay.